Last man


 * For the novel by Mary Shelley, see The Last Man.

The Last Man (German: der letzte Mensch) was a term used by the philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche to describe the antithesis of his imagined superior being the "Übermensch". This 'Over Man' may be contrasted to a weak-willed individual, one who is tired of life, takes no risks, seeks only comfort and security. Nietzsche calls this passive being the Last Man.

Nietzsche saw that nothing great is possible for the Last Man, and It is Nietzsche's contention that Western civilization (Europe) is moving in the direction of the last man, an apathetic creature, who has no great passion or commitment, who is unable to dream, who merely earns his living and keeps warm, perhaps exemplified in the novel Babbitt. It is important to have diversity, people should pass judgement, be intolerant, express differences in one another. The last man is about egality. Unification of differences where everything becomes equal, the same with each other. It is an expression of tolerance with one another. We therefore must squash any ideas of this egality or we would end up devaluing the idea itself. For example if everyone got an A for a course no matter what, then people would refuse to show up for class, don't do any work. It becomes unfair to those who are stuggling within the class to earn the A. With the comming of the last man is the onset of "nihilism," the negation of all values.

One of Nietzsche's greatest fears was creeping mediocrity. If the "Übermensch" represented his ideal -- the ideal of a being strong enough to create his own values, strong enough to live without the consolation of traditional morality -- then Nietzsche’s so called 'last man' is the exact opposite.

The last man, Nietzsche predicted, would be one response to nihilism. But the full implications of the death of God had yet to unfold. As he said:

"The event itself is far too great, too distant, too remote from the multitude's capacity for comprehension even for the tidings of it to be thought of having arrived as yet."