{"corpus":"steiner","locus":"GA 5/c01_2/p002","lang":"en","edition":"RSPI1960","edition_basis":null,"is_original":false,"is_default_edition":true,"text":"All striving of mankind, as of every living thing, exists for the satisfying, in the very best way, of impulses and instincts implanted by nature. When human beings strive toward morality, justice, knowledge and art, this is done because morality, justice, and so forth, are means by which these human instincts can develop themselves according to their nature. The instincts would atrophy without these means. Now it is a peculiarity of the human being that he *forgets* this connection between his life needs and his natural impulses, and regards these means for a natural, powerful life as something with unconditional *intrinsic* value. Man then says that morality, justice, knowledge, and so on, must be attained for their own sakes. They do not have an intrinsic value in that they serve life, but rather that life first receives value when it strives toward these ideal possessions. Man does not exist to live according to his instincts, like an animal, but that he may ennoble his instincts by placing them at the service of higher purposes. In this way man comes to the point where he worships as ideals what he had first created for the satisfaction of his impulses, ideals which first give his life true inspiration. He demands *subjugation* to ideals which he values more highly than himself. He frees himself from the mother ground of reality and wishes to give his existence a higher meaning and purpose. He invents an unnatural origin for his ideals. He calls them “God's will,” the “eternal, moral laws.” He wishes to strive after “truth for truth's sake,” “virtue for virtue's sake.” He considers himself a good human being only when he has supposedly succeeded in controlling his egotism, that is, his natural instincts, and in following one ideal goal selflessly. For such an idealist, *that* man is considered ignoble and “evil” who has not attained such self control.","text_trust":"verbatim","quote_safe":true,"title":"Part I - ii. The Superman","site_heading":null,"date":null,"location":null,"word_count":315,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/en/ga/5/c01_2/p002","alignment_confidence":"low","alignment_reason":"no_original_to_compare","two_voice_volume":false,"translation_credit":null,"edition_coverage":{"de":["original"],"en":["RSPI1960"]},"available_versions":[{"lang":"en","edition":"RSPI1960","edition_basis":null,"is_original":false,"is_default_edition":true,"url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/en/ga/5/c01_2/p002"},{"lang":"de","edition":"original","edition_basis":null,"is_original":true,"is_default_edition":true,"locus":"GA 5/l05/p002","anchor_mapped":true,"anchor_method":"positional","anchor_confidence":"medium","url":"https://anthroposophy.ai/v1/steiner/de/ga/5/l05/p002"}],"witness_completeness":{"ratio":null,"band":"no_original","note":null,"word_count":15445,"original_word_count":null,"may_be_abridged":false},"witness_quality":{"translator":{"status":"unknown","warning":"No translator is recorded for this edition. An unattributed translation cannot be weighed as a witness: you cannot tell which hand made the choices in it. Cite the German for anything load-bearing."},"entity_parity":{"status":"not_checkable","note":"No verified paragraph alignment covers this passage, so its names cannot be compared with the German."},"note":"quote_safe certifies the bytes of this text. This block is about the translation as a WITNESS: who made it, and whether it carries the same names as the original. See witness_completeness for how much of the original this witness holds."}}