The following essay is a response to the question: do we need to revalue our values now? If so, which values and why? This essay argues that moral nihilism is a latent possibility regardless of what values are created and how their authority is justified. In light of this, the question of whether our values ought to be revalued is secondary to the more fundamental problem of whether any values can possess objective authority. This essay will conclude by suggesting that, rather than creating new values, we should confront moral nihilism directly and seek a basis for moral constraint that does not depend upon objective value.
Nietzsche’s philosophy emerges in the wake of what is symbolically known as the death of God: the collapse of the foundations through which Western culture had understood value, meaning and truth (Anderson 2026, sec. 2). This collapse presents the possibility of moral nihilism: the position that there are no objective moral values or truths. A dangerous consequence of this position is that no action can be objectively morally prohibited, leaving no objective moral constraint on what one may do.
Nietzsche responds to the collapse of inherited values by calling for their revaluation and the creation of new values (Anderson 2026, sec. 3.1). Nietzsche’s revaluation involves critically reassessing inherited values according to the standard of whether they affirm life, rather than attempting to restore their status as objectively authoritative. For Nietzsche, life-affirmation involves a positive commitment to earthly life and an orientation towards embracing existence in its entirety, including its unavoidable suffering and struggle. He believes that many of the values inherited from Christian tradition do not affirm life in that they direct people towards an eternal afterworld beyond the earthly existence that they currently occupy (Anderson 2026, sec. 3.2.2).
In Thus Spoke Zarathustra, Nietzsche identifies the will to power as a fundamental drive of living things to overcome themselves and expand their power. He interprets the will to power as involving more than exerting power over others, describing it as the instinct towards mastery over oneself and the continual overcoming of one’s current limitations. For Nietzsche, the will to power provides the basis for self-overcoming and the creation of new values in response to the collapse of inherited ones (Nietzsche 1999, pt 2, 34).
Nietzsche personifies his ideal of life-affirmation and self-overcoming in the figure of the Übermensch. The Übermensch represents the overcoming of humanity’s dependence upon inherited value structures through the creation of new values following their collapse (Nietzsche 1999, Prologue, sec. 3). Nietzsche further develops his account of life-affirmation through the idea of eternal recurrence. In The Gay Science, he presents eternal recurrence through a hypothetical scenario in which a demon declares that one’s life will recur eternally in precisely the same form (Nietzsche 2020, sec. 341). While hypothetical, the demon’s proposition provides readers with a provocative existential challenge: if eternal recurrence were true, could one affirm their life so completely that they would will its recurrence infinitely?
Taken together, Nietzsche’s revaluation, value-creation and life-affirmation offer a response to nihilism by allowing the collapse of inherited values to become an opportunity for the creation of new values. However, moral nihilism remains a possibility if the authority of value itself can be rejected, or if Nietzsche’s newly created values can be interpreted in ways that are themselves compatible with moral nihilism.
A robust challenge to the view that values can have objective authority can be found in error theory. Error theory holds that moral judgements depend upon the existence of objective moral properties, such as moral rightness or wrongness. Mackie challenges the existence of objective values through his argument from queerness. He argues that objective values would be metaphysically strange because, unlike ordinary facts about the world, they would contain an authoritative ‘ought’ that determines how one should act. Since it is unclear how such authority could exist as an objective feature of reality, Mackie argues that we have reason to doubt the existence of objective values altogether (Joyce 2021, sec. 3.2).
A moral realist could present the counter argument that just because the nature of objective values are strange, that does not entail that they do not exist. However, once the legitimacy of objective value has been rejected, the error theorist can place the burden of justifying objective values back on the realist. Although numerous philosophical theories attempt to establish objective moral authority, none of them are beyond dispute. The continued disagreement allows the error theorist to maintain his position that no proper justification of objective moral values has been established. Error theory therefore provides a defensible route to moral nihilism, since the rejection of objective moral value entails that no actions can be objectively morally right or wrong.
In addition to the rejection of objective value, moral nihilism can also be reached through the selective adherence to and rejection of Nietzsche’s positive values. An individual might embrace life-affirmation, self-overcoming and the creation of new values, while rejecting any value that imposes moral constraints on their treatment of others. Judge Holden, the antagonist of Cormac McCarthy’s Blood Meridian, provides an extreme illustration of this possibility: he is an exceptionally intelligent, violent and domineering figure who rejects conventional morality and presents war and domination as not merely as fundamental features of human existence, but as desirable ends in themselves. In the novel, Holden engages in horrific acts of depravity while maintaining an intellectual and affirmative disposition towards his own existence and actions (McCarthy 2022).
Holden can very plausibly be described as a moral nihilist. Interestingly, he arguably possesses several qualities of Nietzsche’s life-affirmer: he rejects inherited morality, creates his own values, embraces rather than condemns the suffering and violence of existence, and pursues his life without resentment. In this sense, he might even appear to resemble the Übermensch. Furthermore, it is plausible that if he were approached by Nietzsche’s demon and told that his life would recur eternally in precisely the same form, Holden would affirm recurrence without hesitation. Holden therefore illustrates that even the affirmation and creation of values does not necessarily escape moral nihilism. Together with the possibility of rejecting the normative authority of value altogether, moral nihilism remains a valid conclusion.
This discussion is important since, if the values protecting us from moral nihilism are unstable, then we face the possibility of a subsequent collapse following the death of God, this time involving the authority of value itself. Furthermore, if created values leave open the possibility justifying moral nihilism then revaluation alone cannot guarantee moral constraint. We are therefore pressured to consider how moral constraint might remain possible in the absence of objective value.
References:
Anderson, R. Lanier. 2026. “Friedrich Nietzsche.” The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Substantive revision June 25, 2026. https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/nietzsche/
Joyce, R. 2021. “Moral Anti-Realism.” The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Substantive revision May 24, 2021. https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/moral-anti-realism/
McCarthy C (2022) Blood meridian: Or the evening redness in the West, Picador, London.
Nietzsche F (2020) The Gay Science, trans. T Common, Dover Publications, Mineola, NY.
Nietzsche F (1999) Thus spoke Zarathustra, trans. T Common, Project Gutenberg, accessed 19 September 2026.