All Embracing But Underwhelming…

Nola, Robert, ‘Nietzsche as Anti-Semitic Jewish Conspiracy Theory,’ in The Croatian Journal of Philosophy, Vol. III, No. 7, 2003

p. 37-8 - Nola is suggesting that Nietzsche’s version of the Jewish Conspiracy is that the Jews advocated Slave Morality whilst not necessarily believing in it (they were being oppressed and thus perverted the natural order to survive…).

p. 38 - ‘We may take it that if one group, X, has a conspiratorial view or theory about another group, Y, then this at least involves X’s belief that the members of Y are acting together to bring about a state of affairs that X would regard as detrimental to them. And if some group X believes that Y are currently so acting (i.e., actively conspiring) then this presupposes that they also believe that Y most likely have the power to successfully bring off any conspiracy (even if they do not so act). That it is believed that Y has the power to successfully conspire is an important aspect of what it is to have a conspiratorial theory about group Y; for a conspiracy theory it is not necessary for the members of group Y to actually be in a conspiracy.’
(Definition of what it means to espouse a CT. Possibly a definition of Conspiracism?)

p. 41 - ‘Conspiracy theories about the Jews are quite old. It was an integral part of Christian belief that the Jews conspired against Jesus Christ in bringing about his death. And for this the Christians claimed that Jews ought to be punished. Only recently has the current Pope John-Paul II been able to abandon this ridiculous conspiracy theory, vastly expanded beyond its historical circumstance, and to ask for an apology for the Church’s role in promoting it (though the grounds on which it was done, and act of Christian contrition and forgiveness, are grounds that Nietzsche would despise). Another Jewish conspiracy theory is that of the alleged ability of the Jews to manipulate the world money markets for their own nefarious purposes. Ever since medieval Jews, because of restrictions on their property ownership, were forced into money lending (a good illustration being Shylock of Shakespeare’s Merchant of Venice), European Jews have been blamed for the financial woes of the gentile. Again, the Balfour Declaration of 1917 in which the British Government favoured the setting up of a Jewish homeland in the then Ottoman Palestine (after looking into places such as Africa as a possible Jewish homeland), was based on Jewish conspiracy beliefs. As Maccoby points out, there is much historical evidence for the claim that many British, such as Balfour, believed that the Jews were a powerful world force whose help could be enlisted to assist British aspirations around the world. Without such a false belief in Jewish power it might be doubted whether the British would have given the Jews their support.’
(Historical instances of anti-semitic CTs)

p. 41 - Nola argues that Nietzsche’s CT in re the Jews is unique (and still utterly wrong).

p. 44 - ‘As is commonly said, one group can have a conspiracy view of another group-and be right. But one can also be wrong.’
(A reason for why we suspect CTs?)

p. 46 - On alterative/contrasting explanations and how we choose between them. The probability of one explanation contrasted to another and the coherence of contrasting explanations.

p. 48 - Nola argues that there is a contradiction in Nietzsche’s theory in that he must argue for the truth of his geneological theory even though he seems adverse to truth elsewhere in the GM.

p. 52 - Nietzsche, as characterised by Nola, seems to have the following view:
P1. I think the world works in way A.
P2. A has the effect B
P3. Group C has effect B
Therefore,
C. Group C operates in way A
If this characterisation is true then Nietzsche is inferring from common effects that they have common causes. This might be an abductive inference… I would need to read more of the literature.

p. 53 - ‘Why does a subclass of masters A, the priests, come to adopt S-morality? This is unclear in Nietzsche; he strains mightily in GM §6 and §7 to give a psychological account of why this happened amongst the aristocrats to the priests only. It is not obvious that anthropological investigations would support the view that the equivalents of warriors and priests in different societies actually advocated different moralities.’
(The same critique applies to most conspirators.)

p. 54 - ‘In characterising the warrior M-morality and life Nietzsche says: ‘the knightly-aristocratic value-judgements presuppose a powerful physicality, a rich, burgeoning, ever overflowing health, as well as all those things that help preserve it-war, adventure, hunting, dancing competitive games…’ (GM I §7). In contrast the priests are said to be powerless: ‘from powerlessness their hatred grows to take on a monstrous sinister shape, the most cerebral and most poisonous form. The very greatest haters of worldhistory have been priests, as have the most ingenious’ (loc. cit.). And we can assume that this hatred is directed against the knightly aristocrats, since they are not subordinate to any slave master.’
(This notion of subversion Nola notes upon is similar to the questions around the 911 CTs; if it was staged then why did people allow this to occur/why didn’t they reveal the staged nature of it all?)

p. 56 - Nola notes the explanatory gap of why did the Knights succumb to the Priestly morality; Nietzsche doesn’t explain why these proud warriors give up the Master Morality. I wonder who common this explanatory gap is in CTs?