Nietzsche and Atomism

Introduction

Although he was not a systematic philosopher in the mold of Kant or Hegel, Nietzsche worked toward developing a theory of will to power. Nature, man, and society served as important dimensions of the will to power in his theory. He recognized higher and lower forms of this will to power. The highest expression of will to power is the will to knowledge. And science is the highest expression of will to knowledge. Of special interest among the sciences, for Nietzsche, stood physics, which he interpreted to be the will to knowledge about nature. Physics expresses a will to power by attempting to reduce all things to atomistic explanations. Physics would be, then, the will to atomism. As science, the will to atomism is a type of honesty, an intellectual honesty. Consequently, the spirit of science marginalizes morality as an explanation of the world. And so Nietzsche exclaimed, long live physics! All forms of education in the atomistic sciences, physics, and chemistry, among...