>If the ER is a form of categorical imperative, as was suggested in the
>earlier thread, then it is a highly personal imperative, and not in any
>sense one that can be abstracted out in the form of a general ideal. Rather,
>one's imperative is simply one's virtue, following Nietzche's thought here,
>it seems to me, and one's virtue is one's own highest good. Thus, one
>person's good may be another's evil, etc.
A reverse or inverse categorical imperative indeed it is not, anymore
than it is the apology of irresponsibility. But the ethos of the ER
demands that one be responsible for one's reactions, as much as innocent
in one's actions: it is after all a selective thought for a selective
action; a rule "as rigorous as Kant's rule" (Deleuze), but certainly not
Kant's rule. It does not prescribe an impersonal (universal) content or
form for one's actions, only that one be sure that their return should
be welcomed an infinite series of times- and thus act accordingly.
However, one should keep in mind the ultimate implications of the ER
seized as return of the other, not as return of the same: if one is to
welcome the return of the active affects, rather than be depressed by
the prospect of an unending repetition of the same tiring reactions, one
should learn that the key to preventing one's unacted reactions from
recurring lies precisely in becoming responsible for them, in activating
them. That alone is the condition for innocence: selecting one's
reactions out from recurrence. So, one man's evil may be another's
salvation without that having to imply any equalization whatsoever of
values: as qualities of force, reactive still remains such, whether
activated or not, and active retains its difference.
Lastly, the ER hardly has anything to do with Mr. Sherwood's simplistic
banalization, which reduces it to a mere narcissistic affectation: as if
one could not tear up one's painting, etc, without welcoming the return
of the painting, the act of painting and the act of tearing it up.
There is hardly anything more threatening to the ego than the assumption
of the ER as an ethical thought and a selective action.
Lambda C
PS- Deleuze on the ER as selective thought-
"But in what sense is the eternal return selective? Firstly because, as
a thought, it gives the will a practical rule (VP IV 229, 231/WP 1053,
1056 "The great selective thought"). The eternal return gives the will
a rule as rigorous as the Kantian one. We have noted that the eternal
return, as a physical doctrine, was the new formulation of the
speculative synthesis. As an ethical thought the eternal return is the
new formulation of the practical synthesis: whatever you will, will it
in such a way that you also will its eternal return. "If, in all that
you will you begin by asking yourself: is it certain that I will to do
it an infinite number of times? This should be your most solid centre
of gravity" (VP IV 242). One thing in the world disheartens Nietzsche:
the little compensations, the little pleasures, the little joys and
everything that one is granted once, only once. Everything that can be
done again the next day only on the condition that it be said the day
before: tomorrow I will give it up- the whole ceremonial of the
obsessed. And we are like those old women who permit themselves an
excess only once, we act and think like them. "Oh, that you would put
from you all half willing, and decide upon lethargy as you do upon
action. Oh that you understood my saying: 'Always do what you will- but
first be such as can will?'" Laziness, stupidity, baseness, cowardice
or spitefulness that would will its own eternal return would no longer
be the same laziness, stupidity etc. How does the eternal return
perform the selection here? It is the thought of the eternal return
that selects. It makes willing something whole. The thought of the
eternal return eliminates from willing everything which falls outside
the eternal return, it makes willing a creation, it brings about the
equation 'willing = creation' ". (Nietzsche & Philosophy, G. Deleuze, p.
68-69)
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