Eternal Recurrence
You Have Infinitely Many Lives

Prof. Eric Steinhart 1998

Eric Steinhart works primarily on metaphysics using contemporary analytical and logical methods and tools. He is also interested in historical metaphysical systems (particularly Plotinus, Neoplatonism, and Leibniz). Steinhart was originally trained as a computer scientist and mathematician: he received his BS in Computer Science from Penn State University in 1983, after which he worked as a software designer for several years. Some of his algorithms have been patented. He earned an MA in Philosophy from Boston College, focusing on the history of philosophy. He was awarded the Ph.D. in Philosophy from SUNY at Stony Brook in 1996, winning the first "Distinguished Dissertation" award given to any Humanities student in the history of the University. His past work has concerned Nietzsche as well as metaphor (analyzed using possible worlds semantics). He has written extensively on the metaphysics and computation. He is featured in the film Chronotrip, a documentary about time travel. He is increasingly interested in the philosophy of religion, focusing on the intersection of mathematics and theology, non-theistic conceptions of God, and naturalized versions of classical resurrection theories. A relentless pythagorean, his metaphysical projects aim to use mathematical insights to reconcile science and theology: set theory as formal theology! He believes that all that ultimately exists are classes and their properties. He believes in the existence of more things than you do. He also likes New York City, New England, mountain hiking, all sorts of biking, chess, and microscopy.

You Have Infinitely Many Lives

Eternal recurrence, also known as the eternal return of the same, is the theory that history repeats itself exactly down to the smallest detail: you will be born again, you will live your whole life again, you will die again. You will re-live your whole life exactly as you have and will live it. In fact, if the theory of eternal recurrence is true, then you already have lived your life infinitely many times already, and you will live it infinitely many times again.

Some Old-Timers on Eternal Recurrence

Recurrence is an old idea, probably first taught by the Pythagoreans: "If one were to believe the Pythagoreans, with the result that the same individual things will recur, then I shall be talking to you again sitting as you are now, with this pointer in my hand, and everything else will be just as it is now."[1]

The idea seems to occur in the Old Testament. The writer of Ecclesiastes 1:9 says: "The thing that hath been, it is that which shall be; and that which is done is that which shall be done: and there is no new thing under the sun."

Plotinus argues that there is an eternal return of Great Years ("Periods"). Each Period is exactly the same as the one before it:

[Each Period] is "a periodical renovation bounding the boundlessness by the return of a former series . . . The entire soul-period conveys with it all the requisite Reason-Principles, and so too the same existents appear once more under their action. . . . May we not take it that there may be identical reproduction from one Period to another but not in the same Period? . . . Thus when the universe has reached its end, there will be a fresh beginning, since the entire Quantity which the Kosmos is to exhibit, every item that is to emerge in its course, all is laid up from the first in the Being that contains the Reason-Principles. . . . As in Soul so in Divine Mind there is this infinitude of recurring generative powers; the Beings there are unfailing. [2]

Consequences of the Theory of Eternal Recurrence

Eternal recurrence is a resurrection doctrine, since your body is resurrected each time it recurs. But it is not like the Christian doctrine of resurrection, since according to the Christians (e. g. St. Augustine) your body is recreated at some adult stage; but recurrence theories say that you are literally born again (rebirth).

Eternal recurrence is entirely materialistic or physical, since it is your physical body that recurs. There is no soul or spirit.

Eternal recurrence happens entirely in this world: there is no other world nor is there any better world (Heaven) nor worse world (Hell). This is it.

Eternal recurrence is personal immortality. You live forever, both into the past and into the future. But you do not exist continuously: it is not eternal life.

Eternal recurrence is not reincarnation, since you recur in your own body.

You do not remember your past lives, since there is no consciousness between ocurrences nor memory of previous occurences.

Nietzsche's Modern Theory of Eternal Recurrence

Nietzsche's Presentation of the Eternal Return

In modern times, the doctrine is most closely associated with Friedrich Nietzsche. Here's how Nietzsche first puts it:

The greatest weight -- What, if some day or night a demon were to steal after you into 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? Or have you once experienced a tremendous moment when you would have answered him: "You are a god and never have I heard anything more divine." If this thought gained possession of you, it would change you as you are or perhaps crush you. The question in each and every thing, "Do you desire this once more and innumerable times more?" would lie upon your actions as the greatest weight. Or 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? [3]

In another book, Thus Spoke Zarathustra, Nietzsche invents a character named Zarathustra, a wandering philosopher who has many adventures. In one adventure, Zarathustra climbs a mountain and argues with his arch-enemy, a dwarf named the Spirit of Gravity (sort of the spirit of depression and despair). Zarathustra has a vision of the eternal return:

Behold this moment!, Zarathustra said. From this gateway [called] Moment, a long, eternal lane runs back: an eternity lies behind us.

Must not all things that can run have already run along this lane? Must not all things that can happen have already happened, been done, run past?

And if all things have been here before: what do you think of this moment, dwarf? Must not this gateway, too, have been here -- before?

And are not all things bound fast together in such way that this moment draws after it all future things? Therefore -- draws itself too?

For all things that can run must also run once again forward along this long lane.

And this slow spider that creeps along in the moonlight, and this moonlight itself, and I and you at this gateway whispering together, whispering of eternal things -- must we not all have been here before?

-- and must we not return and run down that other lane out before us, down that long, terrible lane -- must we not return eternally? [4]

Later, Zarathustra talks with his animals, an Eagle and a Snake. They tell him that they understand his theory of eternal recurrence:

Behold, we know what you teach: that all things recur eternally and we ourselves with them, and that we have already existed an infinite number of times before and all things with us.

You teach that there is a great year of becoming, a colossus of a year: this year must, like an hour-glass, turn itself over again and again, so that it may run down and run out anew:

So that all these years resemble one another, in the greatest things and in the smallest, so that we ourselves resemble ourselves in each great year, in the greatest things and in the smallest.

And if you should die now, O Zarathustra: behold, we know too what you would then say to yourself -- but your animals ask you not to die yet! --

"Now I die and decay" you would say, "and in an instant I shall be nothingness. Souls are as mortal as bodies."

"But the complex of causes in which I am entangled will recur -- it will create me again! I myself am part of these causes of the eternal recurrence.

"I shall return, with this sun, with this earth, with this eagle, with this serpent -- not to a new life or a better life or a similar life:

"I shall return eternally to this identical and self-same life, in the greatest things and in the smallest, to teach once more the eternal recurrence of all things." [5]

Nietzsche's Argument for the Eternal Return

Here's Nietzsche's argument for the eternal return of the same:

If the world may be thought of as a certain definite quantity of force and as a certain definite number of centers of force -- and every other representation remains indefinite and therefore useless -- it follows that, in the great dice game of existence, it must pass through a calculable number of combinations. In infinite time, every possible combination would at some time or another be realized; more: it would be realized an infinite number of times. And since between every combination and its next recurrence all other possible combinations would have to take place, and each of these combinations conditions the entire sequence of combinations in the same series, a circular movement of absolutely identical series is thus demonstrated: the world as a circular movement that has already repeated itself infinitely often and plays its dice game in infinitum. [6]

Analysis of Nietzsche's Argument for the Eternal Return

Nietzsche's argument is very compact. To understand an argument like this, you have to break it up and examine each part:

(1) "The world may be thought of as a certain definite quantity of force and as a certain definite number of centers of force -- and every other representation remains indefinite and therefore useless" Definite means finite; indefinite means infinite. Infinite force is self-contradictory, so the world as a whole a finite quantity of force, and there are only finitely many ways to divide up this force into parts. Thus, there are only finitely many combinations of forces.

(2) So, the existence of the world is a "great dice game". This image of the world as a game played with dice makes two points. First, there are only finitely many different ways the world is able to be (finitely man combinations of forces). If you play a game with one 6-sided die, there are only 6 ways it can come up. Second, changes in the world are in reality random, as if the history of the world were just a series of dice-throws.

(3) In the great dice game, the world "must pass through a calculable number of combinations". If you throw two 6-sided dice, each can only come up 6 ways, so the two of them come up 6 times 6 equals 36 ways. There are only finitely many combinations of finitely complex things, like the forces in the world.

(4) Time is infinite; it is infinite because it's absurd to think of it as having a beginning (when would it begin? -- time can't begin at any moment in time) or an ending (when would it end? -- time can't end at any moment in time).

(5) So, "In infinite time, every possible combination would at some time or another be realized." This is true for any finite collection of finitely complex things like dice if the sequence of the combinations of those things is random. If you were to throw a die infinitely many times, the probability of every side coming up is 100%.

(6) Indeed, every combination "would be realized an infinite number of times." This is true too. If you throw a 6-sided die 7 times, one of the numbers has to come up more than once. If you throw it infinitely many times, every combination will occur infinitely many times.

(7) "And since between every combination and its next recurrence all other possible combinations would have to take place, and each of these combinations conditions the entire sequence of combinations in the same series". This is hard to figure out. Nietzsche seems to mean that every sequence of combinations (every history of the world) will occur infinitely many times. This is true for a finitely complex whole going through infinite random recombinations of its parts.

(8) So Nietzsche concludes that "a circular movement of absolutely identical series is thus demonstrated: the world as a circular movement that has already repeated itself infinitely often and plays its dice game in infinitum."

Evaluation of Eternal Recurrence

Scientific Evaluation of Eternal Recurrence

You can get into pretty weird physics talking about eternal recurrence. Some say that the Second Law of Thermodynamics implies that recurrence is impossible; others respond that the French mathematician Poincare proved a Recurrence Theorem that entails that recurrence is necessary for pretty much every physical system to which the Second Law applies. There are similar Recurrence Theorems for quantum mechanics. Some say that the universe goes through a cycle of Big Bangs followed by Big Crunches, then the cycle repeats. There are solutions to Einstein's space-time equations that are known as "closed timelike curves", which are basically circles in which time recurs. But all of that is ultimately beside the point. Eternal recurrence is not a physical theory.

The eternal return of the same is a metaphysical theory. It's about the recurrence OF time, not any recurrence IN time. It says that time as a whole recurs eternally. So there is no physical evidence either for or against the theory. This means that you have to evaluate the speculative arguments for it, and against it, and make a rational, well-informed decision to affirm it or to deny it.

Science is neutral for recurrence, as it is for reincarnation, resurrection and physical immortality. All these theories have coherent physical formulations, though they all require going beyond present-day physics.

Comparison of Eternal Recurrence with Other Theories

Suppose for a moment that all the theories of personal immortality are possible. Which theory is preferable in the sense that is the most human? Which theory of personal immortality is most likely to be immortality for you?

I think the disembodied soul theory is the worst of all because I don't see how the disembodied soul preserves personal identity.

Reincarnation, resurrection, recurrence, and physical immorality are all bodily theories of personal immortality. All these theories give you some kind of flesh.

I think reincarnation fails to the extent that it says you could have non-human flesh. People don't "come back" as dogs or bugs or trees.

Physical immortality has problems with birth, and, like reincarnation, it doesn't seem to give you any sort of human body after death.

Resurrection makes the most sense as a theory of rejuvenation, as the idea that you have an astral body or spiritual body that is freed at death. The spiritual body is a super-body -- you'd be like Superman or Superwoman. The problem once again is that it isn't clear that Super-You is really you. It might be somebody else who was glad to get rid of you like you might be glad to get rid of a lousy suit of clothes you were forced to wear for 70 years. There's a sense in which your bodily flaws and limitations define who you are, either as negatives that you've got to cope with or that you struggle to overcome.

Recurrence seems to me to be the best of all the theories of personal immortality, because it's the one that most preserves personal identity by preserving your body. Your recurrence replicas are your twins; some of them live lives that are exactly identical to yours, others live different lives. But, like real twins or clones, their bodies are the same as your body. They are you.

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References.

1. Eudemus, Frag. 272 in G. S. Kirk & J. E. Raven, The Presocratic Philosophers (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1957).

2. Plotinus, Enneads, trans. S. MacKenna, V. 7.1-3.

3. Friedrich Nietzsche, Die Frohliche Wissenschaft, trans. W. Kaufmann (New York: Random House, 1974), section 341. Die Frohliche Wissenschaft means something like "the joyful or happy wisdom or science"; so Kaufmann entitled his translation The Gay Science, but that was back in the day when "gay" meant happy or joyous. Today, "gay" often means homosexual, but that isn't what Kaufmann or Nietzsche had in mind.

4. Friedrich Nietzsche, Thus Spake Zarathustra, trans. R. J. Hollingdale (New York: Penguin Books, 1978), III: 2/2.

5. Friedrich Nietzsche, Thus Spake Zarathustra, III: 13/2.

6. Friedrich Nietzsche, The Will to Power, trans. W. Kaufmann & R. J. Hollingdale (New York: Random House, 1968), sec. 1066.