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Nietzsche

Nietzsche & Evolution

H. James Birx looks at Darwin’s profound influence on Nietzsche’s dynamic philosophy.

The scientist Charles Darwin had awakened the philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche from his dogmatic slumber by the realization that, throughout organic history, no species is immutable (including our own). Pervasive change replaced eternal fixity. Going beyond Darwin, the German thinker offered an interpretation of dynamic nature that considered both the philosophical implications and theological consequences of taking the fact of biological evolution seriously.

Nietzsche was not previously oblivious to either geological time or the paleontological record. He accepted the most controversial ramification of Darwin’s theory: humankind had evolved from remote apelike ancestors, in a completely naturalistic way, through a process of chance and necessity (fortuitous random variations appearing in, and inevitable natural selection acting on, individuals within a changing environment).

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