Editing The Last Messiah (section)

==The human condition==
Zapffe views the [[human condition]] as tragically overdeveloped, calling it "a biological [[paradox]], an abomination, an [[absurdity]], an exaggeration of disastrous nature."<ref name=":14" /> Zapffe viewed the world as beyond humanity's need for meaning, unable to provide any of the answers to the fundamental [[existential crisis|existential questions]].

{{Quotation|The tragedy of a species becoming unfit for life by over-evolving one ability is not confined to humankind. Thus it is thought, for instance, that certain deer in paleontological times succumbed as they acquired overly-heavy horns. The mutations must be considered blind, they work, are thrown forth, without any contact of interest with their environment.

In depressive states, the mind may be seen in the image of such an antler, in all its fantastic splendour pinning its bearer to the ground. |Peter Wessel Zapffe|The Last Messiah<ref name=":14" />|source=}}

Throughout the essay, Zapffe alludes to [[Nietzsche]], "the poster case, as it were, of seeing too much for sanity."<ref name=":0">{{Cite web|url=https://philosophynow.org/issues/45/The_View_from_Mount_Zapffe|title=The View from Mount Zapffe|last=Tangenes|first=Gisle R.|date=March–April 2004|website=Philosophy Now|access-date=2020-04-12}}</ref>

After placing the source of anguish in human intellect, Zapffe then sought as to why humanity simply didn't just perish. He concluded humanity "performs, to extend a settled phrase, a more or less [[self-consciousness|self-conscious]] repression of its damaging surplus of consciousness" and that this was "a requirement of social adaptability and of everything commonly referred to as healthy and normal living."<ref name=":14" /> He provided four defined mechanisms of defense that allowed an individual to overcome their burden of intellect.