

Nietzsche on Solitude - gnosis
http://www.hermitary.com/solitude/nietzsche.html

======
yashodhan
I empathize with Nietzsche, I seem to exhibit the same mental traits that he
did. I thought I enjoyed solitude but I'm starting to see that I'm slowly but
surely going mad all by myself (I have no constant friend circle). By being a
hermit you lose touch with reality and the cultural/social learnings that
everyone takes for granted become lost to you. That's not a good thing because
you need others to function in life.

~~~
gnosis
Despite your empathy for Nietzsche, if you actually read the article you'll
see that Nietzsche had the opposite view of solitude from the one you have.

Nietzsche thought solitude's effect was positive, and something to be
cultivated, not something that will _"drive you mad"_ or make you _"lose touch
with reality"_.

In fact, it might not be going too far to say that for Nietzsche, it is
society (not solitude) that _"drives you mad"_. And solitude is part of the
antidote.

~~~
kirse
_Nietzsche thought solitude's effect was positive, and something to be
cultivated, not something that will "drive you mad"_

It's funny how easily self-deception takes over the mind, while a single
external perspective would easily have pointed out the error in his ways.

It always amazes me how much people frequently hail and agree with the life
perspectives of a man who was, for all purposes, clinically psychotic and
mentally unstable most of the time.

I'm a fan of occasional philosophical _thinking_ in private to ensure that the
way I'm _doing_ things lines up with my conscience, otherwise I've long since
concluded that the maximum potential to create change in this world is not by
_thinking_ about it, but by _doing_ (especially in the company of others).

~~~
gnosis
_"It always amazes me how much people frequently hail and agree with the life
perspectives of a man who was, for all purposes, clinically psychotic and
mentally unstable most of the time."_

He was only "mentally unstable" towards the very end of his life. Virtually
everything he wrote he wrote before that period, when he was as sane as anyone
else.

In any event, even if he was as mad as a hatter his whole life (which he
wasn't), that would not necessarily mean that what he wrote was worthless.
What a person writes should be judged on its own merits, not on those of its
author.

------
helwr
why hermitary? Human, all too human

