The concept of Necessity (Notwendigkeit) as the foundation of Nietzsche's philosophical work

• Grant number: 24/07988-6
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Doctorate
• Start date: March 01, 2025
• End date: April 30, 2028
• Field of knowledge: Humanities - Philosophy - History of Philosophy
• Principal Investigator: Ivo da Silva Júnior
• Grantee: Gabriela do Espírito Santo Marchiori
• Host Institution: Escola de Filosofia, Letras e Ciências Humanas (EFLCH). Universidade Federal de São Paulo (UNIFESP). Campus Guarulhos. Guarulhos , SP, Brazil

Abstract

This doctoral project aims to investigate the concept of necessity (Notwendigkeit),understanding it as the foundation of Nietzsche's philosophical work. The interpretative hypothesis argues that Nietzsche's philosophy, despite its supposed admission of contingency, would resume and profoundly reframe a necessitarian line of philosophical thought. Necessity would thus be seen as the intrinsic element in the process of the world that will shape Nietzsche's cosmology and epistemology and, consequently, the construction of his doctrines of the will to power and the eternal return of the same, also enabling the structuring of Nietzsche's great philosophical task, that is, the transvaluation of all values. To develop this hypothesis, we will first analyze the way in which Nietzsche assimilates and approaches in his works the historical-philosophical problematic of necessity and contingency in Greek, modern and German philosophers. In the following, we will investigate how Nietzsche develops his own conception of necessity, congruent with his philosophical thought. Subsequently, we will establish how the affirmation of what is necessary will lead to the implementation of its doctrines. And, finally, we will find out whether the postulation of necessity as the foundation of the world would convert Nietzsche's last philosophy into a metaphysics.