The Eternal Recurrence

[jeeprs]

and of course in popular culture, we shouldn't overlook the hilarious but perceptive depiction of the eternal return provided in Bill Murray's film Groundhog Day.

[Reconstructo]

By carrot I did not mean to symbolize any sort of heavenly reward. The carrot is equivalent to a Jungian Archetype.

It's a psychological theory that man is compulsively an heroic being. Intellectuals, artists, the man on the street. All of them, I suggest, are role-playing (or incarnating) an heroic ideal, or if you like, an ego-ideal.

The carrot would be the non-contingent energy of this compulsion. The ideal as it is experienced can take many forms.

To act righteously without the certainty of Heavenly reward is a grander way to play the hero. In the same way must of existentialism is quasi-Satanic.
What an aesthetic notion: man alone in the void, creating himself. Or man against the world, him and his chosen essence. Or Sartre with his Marxism cape on, trying to reconcile a quasi-Satanic with a quasi-Christian sort of hero-myth.

[Theaetetus]

Originally Posted by jeeprs

and of course in popular culture, we shouldn't overlook the hilarious but perceptive depiction of the eternal return provided in Bill Murray's film Groundhog Day.

Well, that is not really the same idea that Nietzsche was talking about when you consider the cosmological or theoretical formulation of the eternal recurrence. For Bill Murray's character, he experiences the same day over and over again, not a life time over and over again.

[Fido]

Originally Posted by Theaetetus

Well, that is not really the same idea that Nietzsche was talking about when you consider the cosmological or theoretical formulation of the eternal recurrence. For Bill Murray's character, he experiences the same day over and over again, not a life time over and over again.

Do you suppose Mr. Nietzsche could cough up any proof???

---------- Post added 12-03-2009 at 06:28 PM ----------

Originally Posted by Reconstructo

By carrot I did not mean to symbolize any sort of heavenly reward. The carrot is equivalent to a Jungian Archetype.

It's a psychological theory that man is compulsively an heroic being. Intellectuals, artists, the man on the street. All of them, I suggest, are role-playing (or incarnating) an heroic ideal, or if you like, an ego-ideal.

The carrot would be the non-contingent energy of this compulsion. The ideal as it is experienced can take many forms.

To act righteously without the certainty of Heavenly reward is a grander way to play the hero. In the same way must of existentialism is quasi-Satanic.
What an aesthetic notion: man alone in the void, creating himself. Or man against the world, him and his chosen essence. Or Sartre with his Marxism cape on, trying to reconcile a quasi-Satanic with a quasi-Christian sort of hero-myth.

Good is good as an action because good is its result... There is no need for heaven to make men moral, because the lessons of immorality are all around us... We see the pain it causes, and that pain is an evil thing because it is brought onto ourselves...The difference between a Job, or a Jesus is that we suffer out of choice, and inflict suffering out of choice, and suffer the infliction of suffering out of choice...So, if we have choice, then choose to be moral because goodness is its reward, good health, long life, sober judgement, and best of all the power to help others endure the viscissitudes of life...This is hell and we are demons, or with a simple choice this is paradice and we are angels..The good we do, or the evil we do eternally re-occurs.... Save a life...Help out others...We have only this single life between us, no different for one than another, sprung from a single seed...Enjoy it...Give a care...Share water brother... Thou art God...

[jeeprs]

But I thought that one of the messages of the Book of Job was that dreadful suffering can befall those who do not seem to have done anything to deserve it. (Of course, in the East, this is not so difficult to explain, because one can always attribute it to 'past bad karma'. But the Judeo Christian tradition does not appear to have this.)

[salima]

Originally Posted by jeeprs

But I thought that one of the messages of the Book of Job was that dreadful suffering can befall those who do not seem to have done anything to deserve it. (Of course, in the East, this is not so difficult to explain, because one can always attribute it to 'past bad karma'. But the Judeo Christian tradition does not appear to have this.)

i know this is off topic, but cant resist commenting. i see everything as a unified happening, and in that light there is perfect justice. job is only a part of all humanity, and whatever befalls him befalls the whole race as well as any good fortune is jointly owned. the only way to deal with it is to know that we are not individual entities at all, and to try and have a unified self image that includes the whole human race.

as to the OP...i think it is insignificant whether we are repeating since we wouldnt know it and couldnt learn from it or adjust to it or change it in any way. if we were told that is the way it is, what would it matter? i already surmised that the big band would be followed by a total collapse and another big band on and on ad infinitum, and the one we are in is certainly not the first. but if we will be repeating everything exactly i dont know, i suppose it is as possible as anything else. how would it matter?

the deists and theists can also accept this, because the same ends could apply as in the scriptures, that god could choose to stop it at any time and proceed on to the next phase of afterlife.

maybe the significence to mr N was if we had the choice would we want to do it again. and to that, i cant imagine anyone saying yes. even if their life was totally fabulous-why repeat it again with no improvisation? boring...

nice post, theaetetus-great comments are coming out!

[Victor Eremita]

Originally Posted by Arjuna

How does eternal recurrence compare with Keirkegaard's idea of repetition? The idea there is that there is a melancholy that goes with the idea that there is nothing new. He wasn't saying that there's nothing new, just that there's two ways to look at things:

1. You're unique, this event in front of you is unique and will never come again... there's drama and anxiety with this outlook.

2. You're just another human, this is another morning, on another day, in another year... it's the same year over and over.. it can be a balm on an strife-ridden psyche to know this... that no matter how bad it may seem, we drink the same stream, see the same sun, and run the same course our father's have run....(William Knox)

Kierkegaard's idea of repetition is similar to the eternal recurrence, but has different groundings and conclusions. I'm interpreting what Nietzsche wrote in Ecce Homo, that is, "my formula for greatness is amor fati: that one wants nothing to be different, not forward, not backward, not in all eternity".

Kierkegaard writes in Repetition:

"Repetition and recollection are the same movement, only in opposite directions; for what is recollected is repeated backwards, whereas geniune repetiton is recollected forwards. Recollection makes us unhappy, but repetition, will make us happy, provided we give ourselves time to live and do not immediately at birth, try to find some lame excuse (that we forgot something for example) for creeping out of life again."

Kierkegaard posits repetition as a feature of the ethical life, contrasting with recollection a feature of the aesthetic life. In recollection, one just lives, statically, reflecting back on lost love for example, never doing anything with his life, always living and yearning for the past which never changes.

Repetition looks to the future, whereas recollection looks towards the past. Marriage, job, and responsibilities are types of repetition, and one continually chooses to maintain it and reaffirm it. In this sense, life is lived and constantly in motion. In an ethical life, one must not forget the past, but one must live for the future.

So whereas one interpretation of Nietzsche's eternal recurrence says a good life is a life worth repeating, one interpretation of Kierkegaard's Repetition says, a good life must be lived forwards, but understood backwards.

[Theaetetus]

There are two key features of the theoretical aspect of the eternal recurrence. First, it is eternal, and second, it is a recurrence. Thus, it invites us to think of our lives as finite segments in an ever revolving cycle. It also forces us to realize that our lives cannot be infinite as Christian dogma suggests because an infinite life cannot recur. Therefore, willing the eternal recurrence of our earthly life is to welcome its finitude since it both acknowledges and affirms the inevitability of death.

[salima]

uh...am i nuts or has the capability of editing posts been removed? i know there was no 'big band', though that would have been a nice concept. i meant to say 'big bang' of course...

[Arjuna]

Originally Posted by salima

uh...am i nuts or has the capability of editing posts been removed? i know there was no 'big band', though that would have been a nice concept. i meant to say 'big bang' of course...

Big band is a type of music. If you ever see a big band in concert, it's important to request a Glenn Miller song so you can see their response. The whole band will look up in exasperation. They're sick and tired of Glenn Miller. It's their eternal recurrence. (I knew you meant big bang... and I appreciated your comment very much)