Clear all
Work #122 · Late

On the Genealogy of Morality

Friedrich Nietzsche
1887 (composed in 20 days) · German
Three connected essays · Continental philosophy / Nietzsche's mature critique of morality

Good/evil as slave-revolt in morality; bad conscience as turned-in cruelty; the ascetic ideal as the human will's defence against its own meaninglessness

Attribute Fingerprint

Rows where works disagree are highlighted in gold. The full ontology grid is shown.

Attribute On the Genealogy of Morality (Late)
Time · Extent Infinite
Time · Ontological Status Relational
Time · Grain Continuous
Time · Freedom Deterministic
Time · Traversability Cyclical
Time · Dimensionality One
Time · Direction Uni-directional
Space · Extent Infinite
Space · Ontological Status Relational
Space · Curvature Flat
Space · Dimensionality Three
Space · Locality Local
Matter · Extent Infinite
Matter · Ontological Status Relational
Matter · Conservation Conserved
Matter · Dimensionality Three
Matter · Locality Local
Observer · Time Instance Single
Observer · Space Instance Single
Observer · Knowledge Extent Immediate
Observer · Knowledge Retainment Immediate
Observer · Physicality Embodied
Observer · Agency Active
Observer · Number Plural
Observer · Metaphysical Agency None
Observer · Moral Authority Constructed
Observer · Theological Method
Energy · Extent Infinite
Energy · Ontological Status Substantival
Energy · Conservation Conserved
Energy · Dispersibility Reversible
Information · Ontological Status Relational
Information · Cosmic Conservation Non-conserved
Information · Personal Conservation Non-conserved
Information · Granularity Continuous

Dimension-by-Dimension Evidence

What each work's passages reveal about its stance on each of the six dimensions.

Time

On the Genealogy of Morality

Historical time of cultural-moral change. The genealogical method tracks moral concepts through their real historical mutations. Eternal recurrence lurks in the background as the test of any value.

Space

On the Genealogy of Morality

Not directly engaged.

Matter

On the Genealogy of Morality

Naturalistic background — bodies, drives, physiological energies are the substrate of moral phenomena.

Observer

On the Genealogy of Morality

The Nietzschean observer is the embodied historical-cultural human, plural, actively interpreting. Moral authority is constructed; no metaphysical agency.

Energy

On the Genealogy of Morality

Will to power is the energetic principle — substantival in Nietzsche's mature thought, conserved across cultural transformations.

Information

On the Genealogy of Morality

No fixed values, no preserved moral truths — only genealogical traces of past contests of power. Personal information not conserved.

Internal Tensions

Where each work's argument pulls against itself.

On the Genealogy of Morality

Nietzsche's rhetorical excess (the "blond beast" in Essay I, the language of master races) has been used to associate him with right-wing reaction in ways the philosophical content does not support. Walter Kaufmann's 1950 Nietzsche rehabilitated him in Anglophone scholarship; modern Nietzsche scholarship (Brian Leiter, Maudemarie Clark) reads the Genealogy as serious philosophy that survives the rhetorical-political distortions.