Of Genealogy and Transcendent Critique

Disagreements concerning Nietzsche’s methodology in On the Genealogy of Morals abound. The debate generally ranges over what the genealogical method is meant to do and how this mode of inquiry might achieve its aims. This article seeks to undermine the dominant interpretative strategy, which suggests that the genealogical mode of inquiry functions by way of a transcendent critique and achieves its aims by presenting a causal description of the origins of morality.