Untimely Reflections #7: Paul Katsafanas - Nietzschean Constitutivism

This time, I'm having a conversation with Paul Katsafanas, Associate Professor of Philosophy, Boston University. He is the author of Nietzschean Constitutivism, an analytical approach to Nietzsche's ethics. This is the primary focus of our conversation, though I also talked to Professor Katfasanas about changes in the analytical/continental divide, his take on my own fictionalist approach to metaphysics, and the state of philosophy in 2021. I found Paul to have a wealth of insights into Nietzsche's work which were stated with utter clarity and directness.

Katsafanas' moral constitutivism, based on Nietzsche, stands in opposition to the work of Kantian constitutivists such as Christine Korsgaard and David Velleman. Katsafanas argues that the Nietzschean theory of meta-ethics, based on will to power, more coherently explains human action than the Kantian insistence on universalization and adherence to rational principles. Nietzschean constitutivism includes the unconscious and habitual side of man, not just his deliberating, rational side.

There was some glitching on his end but I think it was just my own poor connection. Or maybe this is just an inevitability of recording on Zoom from far-flung parts of the country.