Tue, Apr 14 · 2:15 PM BST
Note: This meetup requires quite a bit of reading. Please make sure you start preparing a few days before our discussion to give yourself time to assimilate and remember the ideas and to consider what follows below.
Google Metaphysics in philosophy and read the summary of what AI says about it (Core branches, Key themes & questions, Historical context).
The above will take about 15 minutes of our discussion and serve as an introduction. So, let's all be brief.
The sections in italics below are taken from the link. When these are genuine Nietzsche quotes this is indicated. My questions start from Chapter III.
https://intempestivemeditations.wordpress.com/2025/04/07/1531/
Chapter IIIMetaphysicians, according to Nietzsche, uncritically assume the existence of binary oppositions (true/false, good/evil, being/becoming) and invariably privilege one term over the other. This assumption, far from being self-evident, represents a profound prejudice that has distorted philosophical thinking since Plato. 'We have abolished the true world: what world is left? The apparent world perhaps?… But no! With the true world we have also abolished the apparent world!' Nietzsche quote.With this dramatic declaration, Nietzsche signals the end of the metaphysical distinction between appearance and reality that had dominated Western philosophy since Plato. What remains is neither a “true” nor an “apparent” world, but simply the world as we experience it—a world of becoming, perspective, and interpretation. metaphysicians (are) a distinct psychological type characterized by specific prejudices and habits of thought? It has gradually become clear to me what every great philosophy has been: a confession of its author and a kind of involuntary and unconscious memoir; also that the moral (or immoral) intentions in every philosophy constituted the real germ from which the whole plant has grown. Indeed, when explaining how the most remote metaphysical claims of a philosopher really came about, it is always well (and wise) to ask first: ‘What morality does this (does he —) aim at?’ 'From the habit of unconditional authorities, a deep need for unconditional authorities has finally developed: so strong that, even in a critical age like Kant’s, it proved superior to the need for criticism and, in a certain sense, was able to subject the whole work of critical reason to its own uses'. 'The will to appearance, to illusion, to deception, to becoming and change is considered deeper, more ‘metaphysical’ than the will to truth, to reality, to being: the latter is itself merely a form of the will to appearance.' In philosophy, the "will to appearance" (often contrasted with an "ill will to appearance") is a concept, primarily from Nietzsche's work, that embraces the world of phenomena, art, and illusion as valuable, rather than seeing appearance as a deceptive veil hiding a deeper truth. While traditional philosophy often seeks a hidden reality (the "ill will to appearance"), Nietzsche suggests art represents the "good will to appearance," offering life-affirming meaning and beauty, and helping us cope with an otherwise unbearable reality, affirming that "truth is ugly" and art is necessary for life.
