Ernst Mach and Friedrich Nietzsche: On the Prejudices of Scientists

The aim of this paper is to provide a thorough account of the fact that Ernst Mach and Friedrich Nietzsche are often associated with each other in the specialized literature on the history of philosophy and the philosophy of science. As I will argue, the consistency which can be discovered between them is much more substantial than one may imagine. On the basis of their conception of knowledge and truth, it is possible to outline a complete parallelism between their approach to the issue concerning our intellectual relationship with the external world. In fact, Mach and Nietzsche dealt with the very same questions and indeed pursued a common general aim, namely the elimination of worn-out conceptions from the world of modern culture. Furthermore, I will maintain that Mach's and Nietzsche's research interests converge on the classic problem of realism vs. antirealism, and that it is in the light of this particular issue that their own views can be compared. In the specialized literature on the history of philosophy and the philosophy of science, Ernst Mach and Friedrich Nietzsche are often associated with each other. The reason for this is mainly rhetorical: given that Mach and Nietzsche apparently belong to different domains of our culture, scholars often try to surprise their readers by showing that similarities between these authors' views can in fact be found-and that they are not at all secondary. This happens on both sides. Mach scholars, whose audience has little patience for non-systematic, aphoristic modes of expression such as Nietzsche's and for the philosophical perspectives Nietzsche inspired, refer to Nietzsche in order to argue that Mach participated in a rich and multifaceted cultural movement. On the other hand, Nietzsche scholarship has been especially intrigued by Mach, for his viewpoint may cast light on certain interpretive problems involving questions approached by Nietzsche and inspired by post-Kantianism and modern epistemology-e.g. the problem of subjectivity, the contradictory concept of the 'thing in itself', and the actual value of scientific knowledge.