Abstract

The basic thesis of this unsatisfying book is that there is a fundamental dualism in Nietzsche’s philosophy between his cosmology and his philosophical anthropology. Together both perspectives supposedly constitute for Nietzsche what it means to be human. Heidegger’s and Jaspers’ interpretations run aground, therefore, because they fail to appreciate this dualism: while Heidegger emphasizes the metaphysical perspective to the detriment of the anthropological, Jaspers emphasizes the perspective of philosophical anthropology to the detriment of the metaphysical. Heidegger reads his concern with fundamental ontology into Nietzsche; Jaspers, his philosophy of Existenz.