ABSTRACT
Does man really exist? To imagine, for an instant, what the world and thought and truth might be if man did not exist is considered to be merely indulging in paradox. This is because we are so blinded by the recent manifestation of man that we can no longer remember a time-and it is not so long ago-when the world, its order, and human beings existed, but man did not. It is easy to see why Nietzsche’s thought should have had, and still has for us, such a disturbing power when it introduced in the form of an imminent event, the Promise-Threat, the notion that man would soon be no more-but would be replaced by the overman; in a philosophy of the Return, this meant that man had long since disappeared and would continue to disappear, and that our modern thought about man, our concern for him, our humanism, were all sleeping serenely over the threatening rumble of his nonexistence.
