Non Serviam is the name of an electronic 'zine which has been distributed through the Internet for a period of three years. Its focus is on ownness – that is self-ownership - and is, due to the interest of the editor, mainly centered around a dialectical egoism inspired by Max Stirner.
Sidney Parker has for a long time edited zines with a scope similar to Non Serviam, and when he told me he was going to stop publishing, we got into talking about Non Serviam taking over where he left off. So we agreed that I should take over his readership. This is thus a free sample issue to potentially interested readers from his list of subscribers and exchanges.
This issue is composed of the welcome message I send to electronic subscribers – unaltered from the electronic version, plus some pieces by yours truly which I think describe my current interpretation Stirner well.
The formal side of Non Serviam: The frequency of the zine will be irregular, depending on the amount contributions I receive. The price will probably be about the same as what Sid Parker charged, i.e. just to cover printing and posting of your copy. For those interested, I can print out and #1-17 subject to the same price conditions. I will have more exact prices later. To subscribe or contribute, write to
For those readers with access to the Internet, I would recommend subscribing to Non Serviam in its electronic form; first of all it's free, and second, you'll have access to the electronic exchange forum which has been built up around Non Serviam – Nonserv. To contact me on the Internet, write to solan@nonserviam.com
Oslo, November 12th 1995 Svein Olav Nyberg
Welcome to Non Serviam – how Non Serviam and nonserv work
Advertisement – the purpose and idea of Non Serviam
Index of all issues – and how to get back issues and other relevant material
What is selfishness? – article by the editor
The union of egoists – article by the editor
Welcome to "non serviam". You have probably read the advertisement, which, in any case, is appended below. At the present time, the newsletter is handled solely through my personal mail-address solan@nonserviam.com, so all letters and request should be sent to that address.
People subscribing to this list range from self-taught amateurs to professors of philosophy, and so the interest ranges from academic interest in ideas to the more practical and applied. Nothing more will come out from this newsletter than is put into it. The only synergistic effect we can hope for, is that of inspiration through an environment of people discussing the same ideas.
Because this newsletter tries to address both professional and amateur alike, I would appreciate it if submitted entries took this into consideration. In practice, this means that claims should be supported by reasoned arguments, so that the opposite part has something to hold on to. References are fine, as long as they do not substitute argument.
The newsletter is not primarily aimed at confrontation, though this surely is not barred, but at exchange of information. That means that if anyone finds something [s]he thinks will be of interest to the readers of the newsletter, [s]he should feel free to post it. Examples of what is relevant are articles on how Nietzsche, Rand, Hegel and Feuerbach relate to the primary subject matter of this newsletter. Likewise articles on the relation to the basis of anarchism, and on the relation to sciences – in particular psychology. As examples of what is non-relevant, we have: Election issues, flames, issues in philosophy not even touching the main subject, academic small-talk, and nuisance mail. I would also appreciate minimisation of quoting from other posters.
Related to this newsletter is the list Nonserv, which is designed for quicker exchanges and replies. Subscription to the newsletter and the list are independent, though new subscribers by default get subscribed to both. Subscription issues for Nonserv can be sent either to me at
Sincerely,
"Non serviam!" – "I will not serve", is known from literature as Satan's declaration of his rebellion against God. We wish to follow up on this tradition of insurrection.
In modern times, the philosophy of the individual's assertion of himself against gods, ideals and human oppressors has been most eloquently expressed by Max Stirner in his book "Der Einzige und Sein Eigentum".[1]
Stirner, whose real name was Johann Kaspar Schmidt [1806-56], lived in a time dominated by German Idealism, with Hegel as its prominent figure. It is against this background of fixation of ideas that Stirner makes his rebellion. Stirner takes down these ideas from their fixed points in the starry sky of Spirit, and declares all ideas to be the ideas of an Ego[2], and the realm of spirits and ideas to be the mind of the thinker himself. His heaven-storming is total. Even the idealist tool – dialectic, and the supreme ghost of Idealism, [Absolute] Spirit – are stripped of their status of intrinsic existence, and are taken back into the Ego himself. This is most clearly seen in Stirner's main triad: Materialist – Idealist – Egoist. And the triad stops at its last link. Any further progress cannot negate Egoism, for – progress has been taken back into the individual, as his – property.
For Stirner, the solution to the "alienation", or "self-alienation" of Idealism, is in self-expression, or – ownership. What cannot be one's own cause, the cause that is not one's own, is not worth pursuing. As Stirner says "Away then, with every cause that is not altogether my cause!"
Now, this is the philosophical starting point of this newsletter. For the more formal part, though the letter is centered on philosophy and ideas, articles on topics relevant to true egoists will also be admitted. The prime requirement is that the articles are not on-line ranting, but serious attempts to convey something of interest and relevance. Articles on literature through the ages will be very fine, stories will be welcomed if I see them fit, and I even think I might fall for an article on French cuisine made easy ... However: If in doubt whether the article will be accepted, contact me by personal mail first. A waste of time is a waste of time.
I hope to be able to make each of the issues of the newsletter thematic, that is we have one main theme in each issue. The main theme is not meant to be the sole content, however, but more an inspiration for writing.
Editor & List owner: solan@nonserviam.com
[1]English title: "The Ego and Its Own".
[2]Einziger – single individual.
Current and back issues of Non Serviam, together with some material relevant to Stirner, are available via anonymous ftp from
etext.archive.umich.edu
The files are stored in pub/Politics/Non.Serviam and the subdirectory pub/Politics/Non.Serviam/Stirner. At the same server, in the directory pub/Mailing.Lists/Non.Serviam, you can find the archives of past discussion on the list Nonserv. If you have any problems retrieving the files, send email to pauls@umich.edu.
If you have access to WWW, do try the sites
http://www.nonserviam.com/egoism/
Its contents include the material from ftp site above. If there is any problem with the WWW site, contact buybuydandavis@yahoo.com. A somewhat smaller site exists at
http://www.nonserviam.com/stirner/
It has links that – with the right web program – will let you fill out subscription forms directly on the web.
I asked about "what egoism means". I should perhaps also have asked what egoism does not mean. For there are a lot of misconceptions about what egoism is. Religious literature incessantly warns us not to think about our own best interest, but the interest of the heavenly, of Man, and of just about everything else. But seldom is there found any advise to follow exactly this own interest. Why then these warnings against self interest, on and on, again and again? Surely not to counter any opposing system of ideas. For there have been close to none. What then is left to counter but – the individual himself! But to counter the individual is not a position that looks very good, so it has to be disguised, disguised as an attack on some "Deep Evil" lurking in self interest – in egoism. So the common view of egoism is far from formed by observation of actual egoists, but by propaganda in its disfavour. I therefore find it fruitful to list what I consider the types most typically mistaken for egoists, both by critics of egoism and by "egoists" themselves:
THE PSYCHOPATH: The psychopath is characterised by a tendency of always being in the right and of manipulating others. He typically takes little heed of the interests of people he confronts. The reasoning displayed by those who identify psychopaths with egoists are usually of the type "He does not care for others – thus he must care only for himself ...", which sets up a dichotomy without any basis in reality. Identifying an individual pursuing his own interests with a psychopath is a powerful means of keeping individuals "in line".
THE EGO-BOOSTER: Somewhat related to the psychopath, in that he tries to make himself "big" in the eyes of others often at the expense of some third person. But the Ego-Booster cares a lot about the judgement of others. In fact – he depends on it. Getting approval from other people dominates his way of life. His focus is not on himself, but on something else – his self image.
THE MATERIALIST: The glutton, the carelessly promiscuous and the one who spends all his time gathering possessions is often seen as the egoist by people who have seen through the traps above. A friend of mine wrote in his thesis on Stirner that these were "vulgar egoists". They sure enough care for their own interests. But they only care for part of their own interest, giving in to some urge to dominate them. They either care only for the taste in their mouths right-here-right-now, or for the feelings in other parts. They do not satisfy the whole chap, as Stirner wrote.
THE IDEALIST: Not too typical, but still – important. Can range from
the proponent of Fichte's Absolute or Transcendental Ego, to the person who has as his sole goal in this life to spread his own ideas. The first of these is not a proper egoist in that the "I" he is talking about is not the personal, individual "I" but – an abstraction, the mere idea of an ego. The latter is just the materialist mentality let loose in the realm of ideas.
THE FORMAL EGOIST: The formal egoist is perhaps the most elusively like to the proper egoist. For the formal egoist knows that an egoist looks to the satisfaction of the whole chap. Actually the formal egoist can know more about egoism than the egoist himself. For the formal egoist really wants to be an egoist – and he follows the recipe he has found to the last little detail, and sets out to find even new nuances. There is only one thing missing, and that is his realisation that there is no recipe. Egoism is not a religious or ideological system to be followed by duty, but simply the being and awareness of oneself.
Now we have defined selfishness in the negative. How now about the positive; to what degree is egoism positively definable? First of all: What does it mean to "value oneself", and is this what selfishness consists in?
This problematic is in particular motivated by a comment from a subscriber, Jon Newton, in a discussion of whether egoism meant following some personal "axioms of value". First of all, Jon commented that though underneath all "axioms" of evaluation there had to rest the deeper Valuing Subject him[/her]self, that would in no way imply that the Valuing Subject – as a consequence of that alone – had to have a higher value than even the axiom.
Now, how is the above problematic solved, if at all? First, I think that declaring as an axiom that the Valuing Subject is of higher value, or to keep it in some other way as an "act of faith" would be a miss. This would be again – to place the act of evaluation as being mediated by the "axiom" or the "object of faith".
The Valuing Subject is the subject, and viewing something else – implicitly or explicitly – as the subject, is an act of alienation and untruth. This does, of course, tie in with the question of the value of truth, which I will address in an upcoming post. But let us assume that the person in question sees this, and can value or non-value it as he wants. No generality is lost by this approach.
So the question is whether a person would or should value himself higher than anything or anyone else.
It might be tempting, like so many have done, to say some sentence to the effect that if X is a necessary ground for valuing, the X is necessarily valued – or even the highest of values. In my case, substituting "oneself, the (Valuing) Subject" for X would thereby yield the claim that one should value oneself the most.
But I do not think such an attempt via "a priori" judgement would get us very far if we were honest about it. For such an attempt would at best give us that I had a conditional value [derived, instrumental] from my values, and only for a certain limited period of time, given by these values. As an example, I could have valued the propagation of the species above all, and readily sacrifice myself when this goal did so require. All this without the contradiction an "a priori" argument like the above would require.
Instead, I propose we ask "What does it mean to value oneself the highest?" or "What does it mean to be an egoist?". Indeed, what does it mean to "value myself" at all?
One answer might be that to "value myself" means to value my existence.
But "existence"? Now what is really that? An empty, eternal staring into blankness is still "existence". But not what I would call very interesting, less even attractive. Something is missing. But what?
Now, to "value myself" would mean, I suggest, to value that which makes life valuable to me. That means that when I enjoy a good book – when I do what I value the book for – I do not sit there (ho-hum) valuing my existence, accidentally having a book in front of my eyes; rather it means that through the act of valuing the book, which is what I value, I thereby do value myself.
It is almost circular. I "value myself" when I value that which – I value. I value myself when I allow my own judgements of value qua (Valuing) Subject be what is in the end valued.
In contrast, "not valuing myself" would mean to negate my own value judgements qua (Valuing) Subject. It would mean to let a Fixed Idea get the better of me and leave its judgement as the final or one instead of my own; it would mean to let the Fixed Idea brand my values as "sinful", "un-human" etc. and – bow to it.
That was the theory. Now what is the practice? Lots of unresolved questions. Good. That's one reason I created Non Serviam. But this gives a very different picture of the Egoist than what is normally being promoted throughout society. Society's "Egoist" is nothing more than just another example of what I'd call a "spooked man"; a man who instead of plainly following his own interests – i.e. his own values – follows a Fixed Idea that is accidentally branded "My Own Interests".
Society's "Egoist" is a charicature who does not pet cats since oh horror! – the cat might benefit from it too, who does not like other people other than as means to gaining material advantage – "for of course an Egoist can see no value in other people, his gaze is all directed at one person" – and who's got as his prime imperative "Do not give to beggars!"
As a contrast, let us take some real Egoist, as described by Stirner: He does not only enjoy people when they are safely packed away in material books, but also gets pretty charmed by the smile of a little baby. He pets cats for enjoyment, and loves to sit for a friendly chat with his friends – possibly over a glass of wine given to this friend.
Think about it. If Egoism is not about making life as enjoyable as possible, i.e. about realising one's values without interference from Fixed Ideas, what is it? Society's charicature would soon find himself in a logical mess if he thought about this. Not only would he fade away in a Scrooge-like asceticism, but he would begin to wonder why this bugger tomorrow who incidentally identified himself-now with "himself-in-the-past" should ever get a little benefit from himself-now. He couldn't even get a glass of water.
As for ever being able to "axiomatise" my own value judgements. Is it possible? Stirner certainly did not think so. "I create myself each day anew" and "I am the creative nothing" are sentences that express this existentialist sentiment.
I lean to the same judgement, and do in particular not see present-day reductionism as a solution to the problem. First of all, I do not think reductionism is universally valid, and secondly, even if it were, our mere biology would probably be of such a nature as to make our values incapturable through fixed axioms at the level on which we normally live and breathe.
The above paragraph is of course merely my opinions. I think that most arguments count in their favour, and hence adopt these opinions as "mine" at the present time. I used to be of the opposite opinion, i.e. that reductionism was the truth, but after a discussion with a friend who found reductionism to be untenable, we switched opinions – both of us!
Anyhow, even given that for some period of my life my values were of the character that they could be axiomatised: Why should they? Would they ever express anything new in regards to my values? If they did, would not that mean they – contradicted them, and thus had become Fixed Ideas and – false?
A common misconception about egoism, and about the egoism of Stirner in particular, is that it is a reclusive, anti-social kind of behaviour. As far as Stirner is concerned, such commentators must have been asleep through that half of his book which is devoted to describing exactly the social interactions of an egoist, or more precisely – what social interactions are like when they are not mediated by ideals or "natural bonds".
Egoism is not anti-sociality, like some believe, but is better seen as a more mature kind of sociality.
Stirner is a dialectical philosopher, and as such his focus is on relations. As is with relations, it often comprises three elements, the two relata, and the relation itself, and hence the famous triad is a common occurrence in dialectical philosophy. So also with Stirner. Stirner's main triadic development is that of (1) The "natural" or material bond of the ancients, (2) The bond by ideas, our "equality before reason", into (3) the willed or owned relation.
In his book, Stirner starts the description of owned relations with relations to material objects and ideas. A willed relation to these are said to be that they are your property ("eigentum").
The opposite of the willed relation is, as indicated, the bond, the "ought" and the "shall". These are simply relations that are not mine to dispose of, but which are given me from without – without also in the sense of an "essence" I must confirm to and cannot dispose of.
A particular case of such a bond is when you are not to let go of an idea. In Hegelian terms: When that thought is seen as exempt from and sacred to "the power of the negative". Such an idea is called a fixed idea. It is, in Stirner's words "An idea that has subjected the man to itself" – an idea that you are not to criticise. [Recall that Der Einzige is "the power of the negative" to himself.]
Ideas are often expressed in the material world, as we call it. One such idea is that of "property". It should be noted that the common use of this word is that of conformation to an idea – a Fixed Idea – about what you can ["morally"] lay your hands on. By Stirner, however, property in this sense, "sacred property" or as he even calls it "state property", is not exempt from criticism and from – his laying hands on it. It is in the sense of idea already his property in his thinking it as such – in the intentional, willing act. However, factual possession, laying hands on it, depends also on "my might", as Stirner expresses it.
Now, once the relation of "Eigentum" – of "property" in the Stirnerian sense has been understood – and not before, can we proceed to the meeting of two Einzige, two Subjects. There are several ways in which two people can meet:
1. The Bond. This is a meeting of two people according to how they "ought to" behave towards one another. It is not as such a meeting which is willed, but rather a meeting according to the "ought". Examples of such are when the father and the son meet in the roles of father and son. "Father" and "son" they will always remain in a descriptive sense. But when they meet according to such roles, they meet by an "ought" and not by a "will". Roles are ascribed when the relation is seen as a static object.
2. The property. The relation can be a one-sidedly willed one. In this, the one is an Einzige whereas the Other has become Eigentum (for the one who is Einzige). Perhaps this is the state of things where we can say "Hell is the Other" (i.e. when that Other guy is Einzige and I am reduced to a role as Eigentum).
However, Moses Hess criticised Stirner's conception of what Stirner call "Verein der Egoisten" ["The Union of Egoists"] along the lines that in such a meeting, there would have to be one who dominated and one who submitted to domination. That is, Hess imagined that "The Union of Egoist" would be a relation of the kind (2) described above.
Now, (2) might describe a Hobbesian egoist. But can it describe la derniere mallon de la chaine Hegelienne (as Stirner has been called)? No, that is a bit too crude. Stirner did himself reply to this criticism by pointing to examples: Two friends playing with their toys, two men going together to the wine shop. These do of course not comprise an exhaustive list of unions, and our man Stirner does indeed speak of unions consisting of thousands of people, too, unions uniting to catch a thief or to get better pay for one's own labour.
More philosophically, Moses Hess describes a one-sidedness, and thinks it is a necessary one for an Stirner. What is then more natural than to apply a little dialectical reasoning to figure out what Stirner really did mean. I propose it is
3. The union. The relation is understood as a process. It is a process in which the relation is continually renewed by that both [/all] parts support it through an act of will. The Union requires that both/all parties are present through conscious egoism – i.e. own-will. If one part silently finds him/her-self to be suffering, but puts up and – keeps the appearance, the union has degenerated into something else.
Only after development has come to the understanding of the union of egoists does Stirner come to the ultimately important relation – the relation of me to myself. In the section entitled "My self-enjoyment", Stirner sets up mere valuing of life against enjoyment of life. In the former view, I am an object to be preserved. In the latter I see myself as the subject of all my valuing relations.
In this sense, Stirner can rebuke the question "what am I?" and replace it with "who am I?", a question which has its answer in this bodily person who asks the question. This is the "nothingness" of which Stirner speaks of as I. "Not nothing in the sense of emptiness, but a creative nothing."
My relation to myself is thus a meeting of myself as willer, a union with myself and a consumption – appropriation – of myself as my own.