A QUESTION re THE CONCEPT OF THE OVERMAN

-----Original Message-----

To: Lee, Kyoo

Subject: just doing some reading

Hi Dr. Lee,

I was just doing some reading yesterday, and I came across this quote, which I think is exactly the right response to Overman and other such thoughts.

"To be human is to be made in the image of God, and there is nothing higher to which we can aspire.  For to be made in the image of God is to be made as much like God as someone who is not God could ever be.  This amazing dignity, which attaches to human nature wherever it is found, is finally proved to us in Jesus Christ, since in the incarnation God took to himself the mode of existence which is also ours.  And having once taken it to himself, he has not laid it down.  Then and today and for all eternity, human existence is dignified by the astounding fact that the God who created it has made it his own. ...Any supposed advance on humanity is really no improvement at all. it is rather a deterioration.  You cannot become super-human, only sub-human.  Every attempt to go one step up simply takes us one step back.  Nothing is higher than the image of God.  How could it be?"

This was written by Nigel M. de S. Cameron, PhD.  Here's a little bit about him:

Nigel M. de S. Cameron, PhD, is Senior Fellow and International Advisory Board member for The Center for Bioethics and Human Dignity. Dr. Cameron serves as Director of the Council on Biotechnology Policy, Dean of the Wilberforce Forum and is president of Strategic Futures Group, LLC, which specializes in higher education consulting in the areas of strategic planning and institutional change. Former provost and distinguished professor at Trinity International University, he has written widely on issues of bioethics. He served as founding editor of the international journal, Ethics & Medicine: An International Journal of Bioethics, and his books include The New Medicine: Life and Death After Hippocrates (1992). A frequent guest commentator on network television, he has appeared on ABC's Nightline, PBS's Frontline, CNN, as well as the BBC. He testified at the congressional hearings on human cloning. Dr. Cameron divides his time between the United States and London, England, where he serves as Executive Chairman of the Center for Bioethics and Public Policy.

I thought you might enjoy a different point of view from a very scholarly source.

See you at the test.

[...]

A RESPONSE to the question re THE CONCEPT OF THE OVERMAN

-----Original Message-----

From: Lee, Kyoo

Subject: RE: just doing some reading

Dear [...],

thanks for sharing this with me. Again, glad to know that you are working hard.

The quotation you have introduced as "exactly the right response" seems, however, to indicate that you have misunderstood the concept of "overman" [and "other such thoughts" (I'm not quite sure what you're referring to here)]. I will just say something briefly as a way of helping you digesting the learning material better, and also prepare for the exam; my professorial duty includes assisting students in maximising their understanding of the course material.

(1) Overman is not a superman: a man that is or is trying to be "above" a normal man or even God. Such a spatial metaphor, which your quotation also uses, is deeply misleading and can cause serious, literalised confusion, especially when used in a context of discussing either deity or categories of the Human; and note that the quotation (in original English) talks about "sub" or "super" man, not Overman, so the focus is different. As you recall, I stressed this point repeatedly in class. "Over (Uber)" in this case means rather something like, as in, "overcoming." It is a quasi-historical notion, not spatial, that questions the historicised story of man. It aims for a certain cut, a radically different stage and level of questioning. The smooth ladder-like mode of thinking does not apply here. Whether you agree with or like Nietzsche's move or not, it is very important to get his point right -- only then, you can engage with his thought and legacy properly.

(2) The key point of the quotation concerns mimetic relation between God and the human with the first as the origin of the second***. Again, Nietzsche's Overman has very little with that; his point about the overman here that IS relevant, however, to such a divine mimesis of human is that, in acting upon that very presupposition about God (original) and human (inferior/imperfect copy), the inferior copy starts to forget the original and create an "idol," the illusion of the original. His critique of that reversal or bad faith cannot be more Christian, in fact, in its spirit. What the overman overcomes discerningly, in other words, is precisely that (strangely selfish) need for, and (historical) misuse of, idols. That is why, again, it is very important for anybody to gain a precise understanding of the context in which this very subtle idea of "overman" arose.

***this point has already been amply discussed in class, so if by "enjoying a different point of view" you mean something like "this material not dealt with in class," I must remind you of class discussion; if by that, you mean something like "Dr. Lee should be personally informed of this view," thank you and I appreciate the opportunity to articulate again my professorial thoughts on this class material.  

(3) The quote above does not argue a point or at least attempt to do so, and so to that extent it remains unscholarly.

It simply states or describes a system of deeply-held beliefs that matter to the writer: the second sentence and the rest of the paragraph are paraphrases of the first sentence, rather than a line of reasoning. And there's nothing wrong with that, as long as the aim of such statements is clear, which is to reinforce the Christian beliefs about the origin of human beings rather than to prove it. No where in the paragraph is an indication that it is a piece of reasoning; perhaps you haven't yet read, for instance, Aquinas or Anselm or Descartes or Spinoza, who uses philosophy as a means to prove the existence of God. The way the key thought has been presented in the quotation suggests clearly that it is meant to be read as a moral exhortation.   

(4) What makes a piece of writing scholarly is not the identity or social position of the author but the way in which it is constructed and presented. In other words, utterances made by Dr. Most Honourable and Absolutely Brilliant do not become automatically most honourable and absolutely brilliant; that happens only when you need and want to use or flatter that person in question to your advantage. Take TV commercials that have only 30 seconds where, for instance, what matters is the appearance of Dr. so and so rather than what he or she actually "demonstrates."  To appeal to a certain personae in an argument is a fallacy called "ad hominem" (to the person.) "Because I say so" cannot be an argument at all; besides, God does not argue, and that is why only God is granted this permission not to have to prove anything. Truly critical human thinking is and is to be anti-authoritarian: respect for truth is separate from respect for one who is supposed to tell the truth. The truth-sayer's authority comes from his or her closer association with truth, not with his or her identification with it, and anybody can have access to that truth, like all Christians. You will have to use scholarly material (which you yourself can compose), not necessarily a scholar's material. I hope the difference is more or less clearer by now.

And I hope the above helps. 

See you in class.

Cheers, Q.