Justin Remhof defends a constructivist interpretation of Nietzsche’s view regarding the metaphysics of material objects. First, I describe an attractive feature of Remhof’s interpretation. Since Nietzsche seems to be a constructivist about whatever sort of value he accepts, a constructivist account of objects would fit into a nicely unified overall metaphysical theory. Second, I explore various options for developing the constructivist view of objects. Depending on how Nietzsche understood concepts, and whose concepts he saw as giving rise to objects, he (...) could’ve had a variety of different constructivist accounts. (shrink)

The apparent consensus among Nietzsche interpreters is that Nietzsche accepts Schopenhauer’s “description of the ubiquity of suffering” (Gemes 2008, p. 463). In this paper, I argue against this consensus. Specifically, Nietzsche holds that life is not as painful as Schopenhauer makes it out to be, for Nietzsche recognizes two kinds of pleasures that Schopenhauer fails to acknowledge. The only kind of pleasure that Schopenhauer acknowledges is the experience of the cessation of pain that occurs upon the satisfaction of a desire. (...) Nietzsche explicitly rejects Schopenhauer’s view of pleasure; instead, he recognizes pleasurable feelings of power that one can experience when one is trying to satisfy desires, and pleasurable feelings of value that one can experience when one satisfies a desire for something one takes to be valuable. (shrink)