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Series:   Elements in the Philosophy of Friedrich Nietzsche

Nietzsche on the Eternal Recurrence

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  13 December 2024

Neil Sinhababu
Neil Sinhababu
Affiliation:
National University of Singapore

Summary

The idea of the eternal recurrence is that we will live the exact same lives again an infinite number of times. Nietzsche appreciates that this would multiply the value of a single life by infinity, justifying intense emotional responses. His unpublished notes provide a cosmological argument for the eternal recurrence that anticipates Poincaré's recurrence theorem. Nietzsche's Thus Spoke Zarathustra describes its hero discovering this idea and struggling to accept the recurrence of all bad things. He eventually comes to love the eternal recurrence because it will bring back all the joys of his life, and teaches this idea to others.
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Keywords

Nietzscheeternal recurrenceThus Spoke Zarathustracosmologyvalue
Type
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Series: Elements in the Philosophy of Friedrich Nietzsche
Online ISBN: 9781009443180
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication: 16 January 2025

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Nietzsche on the Eternal Recurrence
  • Neil Sinhababu, National University of Singapore
  • Online ISBN: 9781009443180
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  • Neil Sinhababu, National University of Singapore
  • Online ISBN: 9781009443180
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Nietzsche on the Eternal Recurrence
  • Neil Sinhababu, National University of Singapore
  • Online ISBN: 9781009443180
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