Perspectivism and the will to power: The criteria of value in the philosophy of Friedrich Nietzsche

The purpose of this thesis is to examine Nietzsche's naturalistic solution to the problem: "What is the best way for humans to live?" Proclaiming "God is dead," Nietzsche predicted the inevitable rejection of "objective truth" and the "true world." Eschewing nihilism, Nietzsche's "prelude to a philosophy of the future" offers alternatives to traditional epistemological and metaphysical misconceptions, while endeavoring fundamentally to empower the species. Nietzsche's epistemology, perspectivism, holds that "truth" only makes sense from within the context of a perspective. His cosmology of flux depicts "reality" as an interrelated sea of energy emanations which originate in nominal centers of force. Accordingly, humans are ephemeral manifestations of the will to power whose lives are of the highest value if they meet the criteria of complete life-affirmation and power maximization through self-mastery. Under special conditions, certain exceptional individuals (Overmen) can redeem millennia by intensifying its energy into an optimal discharge of power.