370 (Spring-Fall 1887) The “subject” is only a fiction: the ego of which one speaks when one censures egoism does not exist at all.
371 (1885-1886) The “ego”—which is not one with the central government of our nature!—4s, indeed, only a conceptual synthesis—thus there are no actions prompted by “egoism”
483 (1885) Through thought the ego is posited; but hitherto one believed as ordinary people do, that in “I think” there was something of 268 THE W ILL TO POWER immediate certainty, and that this “I” was the given cause of thought, from which by analogy we understood all other causal relationships; However habitual and indispensable this fiction may have become by now—that in itself proves nothing against its imaginary origin: a belief can be a condition of life and nonetheless be false
488 (Spring-Fall 1887) Psychological derivation of our belief in reason.— The concept “reality,” “being,” is taken from our feeling of the “subject.” “The subject” : interpreted from within ourselves, so that the ego counts as a substance, as the cause of all deeds, as a doer. b o o k t h r e e : Principles of A New Evaluation 269 5 Cf. section 473. 270 THE W IL L TO POWER The logical-metaphysical postulates, the belief in substance, accident, attribute, etc., derive their convincing force from our habit of regarding all our deeds as consequences of our will—so that the ego, as substance, does not vanish in the multiplicity of change.— But there is no such thing as will.— We have no categories at all that permit us to distinguish a “world in itself” from a “world of appearance.” All our categories of reason are of sensual origin: derived from the empirical'world. “The soul,” “the ego”— the history of these concepts shows that here, too, the oldest distinction (“breath,” “life”)— If there is nothing material, there is also nothing immaterial. The concept no longer contains anything. No subject “atoms.” The sphere of a subject constantly growing or decreasing, the center of the system constantly shifting; In cases where it cannot organize the appropriate mass, it breaks into two parts; On the other hand, it can transform a weaker subject into its functionary without destroying it, and to a certain degree form a new unity with it. No “substance,” rather something that in itself strives after greater strength, and that wants to “preserve” itself only indirectly (it wants to surpass itself— ).
519 (1883-1888) If there “is only one being, the ego” and all other “being” is fashioned after its model— if, finally, belief in the “ego” stands or falls with belief in logic, i.e., the metaphysical truth of the categories of reason; if, on the other hand, the ego proves to be something in a state of becoming: then—
635 (March-June 1888)We need “unities” in order to be able to reckon: that does not mean we must suppose that such unities exist. We have borrowed the concept of unity from our “ego” concept— our oldest article of faith. If we did not hold ourselves to be unities, we would never have formed the concept “thing.” Now, somewhat late, we are firmly convinced that our conception of the ego does not guarantee any actual unity. In order to sustain the theory of a mechanistic world, therefore, we always have to stipulate to what extent we are employing two fictions: the concept of motion (taken from our sense language) and the concept of the atom ( = unity, deriving from our psychical “experience” ) : the mechanistic theory presupposes a sense prejudice and a psychological prejudice. Mechanistic theory formulates consecutive appearances, and it does so semeiotically, in terms of the senses and of psychology (that all effect is motion; that where there is motion something is moved); it does not touch upon the causal force.
676 (1883-1888) On the Origin of Our Evaluations We can analyze our body spatially, and then we gain precisely the same image of it as we have of the stellar system, and the distinction between the organic and inorganic is no longer noticeable. Formerly, one explained the motions of the stars as effects produced by entities conscious of a purpose. One no longer needs this explanation, and in regard to bodily motions and changes, too, one has long since abandoned the belief in an explanation by means of a consciousness that determines purposes. By far the greater number of motions have nothing whatever to do with consciousness; nor with sensation. Sensations and thoughts are something extremely insignificant and rare in relation to the countless number of events that occur every moment. On the other hand, we perceive that a purposiveness rules over the smallest events that is beyond our understanding: planning, selectivity, co-ordination, reparation, etc. In short, we discover an activity that would have to be ascribed to a far higher and more comprehensive intellect than we know of. We learn to think less highly of all that is conscious; we unlearn responsibility for ourselves, since we as conscious, purposive creatures, are only the smallest part of us. Of the numerous influences operating at every moment, e.g., air, electricity, we sense almost nothing: there could well be forces that, although we never sense them, continually influence us. Pleasure and pain are very rare and scarce appearances compared with the countless stimuli that a cell or organ exercises upon another cell or organ. We are in the phase of modesty of consciousness. Ultimately, we understand the conscious ego itself only as a tool in the service of a higher, comprehensive intellect; and then we are able to ask whether all conscious willing, all conscious purposes, all evaluations are not perhaps only means through which something essentially different from what appears in consciousness is to be achieved. We think: it is a question of our pleasure and displeasure------ but pleasure and displeasure could be means through which we have to achieve something that lies outside our consciousness.------ It must be shown to what extent everything conscious remains on the surface; how an action and the image of an action differ, how little one knows of what precedes an action; how fantastic are our feelings of “freedom of will,” “cause and effect”; how thoughts and images are, like words, only signs of thoughts; the inexplicability of every action; the superficiality of all praise and blame; how essential fiction and conceits are in which we dwell consciously; how all our words refer to fictions (our affects, too), and how the bond between man and man depends on the transmission and elaboration of these fictions; while fundamentally the real bond (through procreation) goes its unknown way. Does this belief in common fictions really change men? Or is the entire realm of ideas and evaluations itself only an expression of unknown changes? Are there really will, purposes, thoughts, values? Is the whole of conscious life perhaps only a reflected image? And even when evaluation seems to determine the nature of a man, fundamentally something quite different is happening! In short: supposing that purposiveness in the work of nature could be explained without the assumption of an ego that posits purposes: could our positing of purposes, our willing, etc., not perhaps be also only a language of signs for something altogether different, namely something that does not will and is unconscious? Only the faintest reflection of that natural expediency in the organic but not different from it? Put briefly: perhaps the entire evolution of the spirit is a question of the body; it is the history of the development of a higher body that emerges into our sensibility. The organic is rising to yet higher levels. Our lust for knowledge of nature is a means through which the body desires to perfect itself. Or rather: hundreds of thousands of experiments are made to change the nourishment, the mode of living and of dwelling of the body; consciousness and evaluations in the body, all kinds of pleasure and displeasure, are signs of these changes and experiments. In the long run, it is not a question of man at all: he is to be overcome.
682 (Spring-Fall 1887) In natural science, the moral depreciation of the ego goes hand in hand with an overestimation of the species. But the species is something just as illusory as the ego: one had made a false distinction. The ego is a hundred times more than merely a unit in the chain of members; it is this chain itself, entirely; and the species is a mere abstraction from the multiplicity of these chains and their partial similarity. That the individual is sacrificed to the species, as has so often been asserted, is certainly not a fact; rather only an example of false interpretation.