Nietzsche Colloquium 2021: “Transvaluation or devaluation of values? – On the topicality of Nietzsche’s social criticism”
Thursday, 30 September, to Sunday, 3 October 2021, all day, Hotel Waldhaus Sils
Nietzsche diagnosed a striking breakdown of values already in his own time. In his view, an all-pervasive nihilism emerged for a variety of reasons, ranging from a loss of cultural unity, the decline of educational institutions, the erosion of the foundations of the state and the end of metaphysics to the self-abdication of morals and the crisis of modern art. Nietzsche saw the breakdown of values as an inevitable consequence of the nihilism pervading all sectors of culture and society. At the same time, though, particularly in his later texts, he also made a case for a transvaluation of all values. To do this, traditional values had to be defined and new criteria for new values had to be found that would not immediately be caught up again in the maelstrom of nihilism. This task has recently acquired a new urgency. The crisis of truth in our own era of “alternative facts” and the all-encompassing “virtual” reality of all human phenomena in the wake of the digital revolution has led to a total arbitrariness of values. Values are set which survive without any justification, circulating freely: groundless values. However, a growing awareness of the global environmental crisis – literally, the desert is growing – has also led to a return of values and moral imperatives, whose status is philosophically largely unexplained, and which appear to, or perhaps have to, ignore Nietzsche’s critique of absolute valuation.
What potential does Nietzsche’s critique of values and his vision of a transvaluation of values have in today’s debates?
The Colloquium is held in German. It is intended both for experts and an interested general public. The events can be attended individually.
Prices: Colloquium ticket CHF 180 (students CHF 50) / individual events CHF 20 (students CHF 10) / concert CHF 30 (students CHF 20). No advance registration is required.
The programme in German will be available from the end of May 2021.
