%0 Journal Article %T Is Suffering Bad?” Derek Parfit and Nietzsche on Suffering %J Philosophy %I University of Tehran %Z 2008-1553 %A mahboobi, hamid reza %D 2018 %\ 06/22/2018 %V 16 %N 1 %P 117-139 %! Is Suffering Bad?” Derek Parfit and Nietzsche on Suffering %K Suffering %K Good %K Bad %K Will to Power %K Pleasure %K Resistance %R 10.22059/jop.2019.264509.1006382 %X Derek Parfit argues the central normative belief that “all sufferingis bad in itself” is held by all of us and known by intuition.Furthermore, given the intuitive statue of this normative belief, heargues that in ideal conditions everyone, including ordinary people,thinkers and philosophers would agree on it. He, then, must showthat Nietzsche, famous for his claims about the goodness ofsuffering, doesn’t fundamentally disagree with this belief. Parfit’stake on the issue is so simplistic, in my view, showing thatNietzsche’s relevant serious remarks can be reduced to aninstrumentalist view on suffering. After considering Parfit’sparaphrases and interpretations of his arbitrary selection ofNietzsche’s remarks, I will show that Nietzsche’s real view aboutsuffering should be understood under a psychological interpretationof the will to power as a second order drive or desire for overcomingresistance. Suffering itself is not anything except a resistance or anobstacle against our first order desires to be overcome by our activewill to power, as an important constituent of it. And then thenormative belief that “at least some suffering is good” finds itssignificance in Nietzsche’s philosophy, strongly contradictingParfit’s position about the intuitive statue of the belief %U https://jop.ut.ac.ir/article_69688_f0777e2c455cf64ec0e5ef8ca6f7d8bc.pdf