I will do so again.

I just learned something about myself.

Cosma Shalizi quotes an old Nietszchean chestnut:

What, if some day or night a demon were to steal after you in your loneliest loneliness and say to you: “This life as you now live it and have lived it, you will have to live once more and innumerable times more; and there will be nothing new in it, but every pain and every joy and every thought and sigh and everything unutterably small or great in your life will have to return to you, all in the same succession and sequence — even this spider and this moonlight between the trees, and even this moment and I myself. The eternal hourglass of existence is turned upside down again and again — and you with it, speck of dust!” — Would you not throw yourself down and gnash your teeth and curse the demon who spoke thus?

Cosma quotes it snarkily, but I took the philosopher’s question seriously despite myself.

No. I would not. Though some of it has been excruciating it has all been worthwhile so far. I would do everything again.

1. 
   siriosa 2007 10 19 at 3:23:48 pm

   three or four times, yeah, i can see that. beyond that ... i think i’d be looking for loopholes, trying to tweak the flow. bunch of stuff i’d do differently. several adventures i’d pass on. many many people i wouldn’t give the time of day.

   what’s the point of having all these learning experiences if i can’t apply the hard-won knowledge?

2. 
   black dog barking 2007 10 19 at 5:59:07 pm

   How do you know you’re not already in just such a cycle? With a memory wipe between iterations?

   I’d do it again but there are some relatively small changes that would make things better for all concerned. Version 1.2 or so.

3. 
   Cris 2007 10 19 at 9:38:58 pm

   But Chris, isn’t that exactly Nietzsche’s point?  After all, he immediately goes on to say:

   Or have you once experienced a tremendous moment when you would have answered him: ‘You area god and never have I heard anything more divine.’ [...] how well disposed would you have to become to yourself and to life to crave nothing more fervently than this ultimate eternal confirmation and seal?

   In short, gnashing your teeth and cursing is a sign that you haven’t loved life deeply enough.

   I’m not surprised at your reaction. As you have shown many times when you bear your heart to the world, you have loved deeply - your dog, your wife, the desert, our species, our ephemerality. Of course you would live it all again, with all its sorrow and all its sublime delight.

4. 
   Rob G 2007 10 20 at 3:58:48 am

   Only a German with a ridiculously large moustache could have come up with that.

   I would kick the demon in the nuts and then give him a big hug. The kick for being such a dick. The hug for probably enhancing the rest of my life.