Scooping Freud by more than a decade, Friedrich Nietzsche argued that the conscious mind is mostly a façade and that the vast majority of what really goes on in the brain remains unavailable to us. In The Gay Science, we read: “For the longest time, conscious thought was considered thought itself. Only now does the truth dawn on us that by far the greatest part of our spirit's activity remains unconscious and unfelt.” Unlike Freud, Nietzsche did not suggest that prodding the unconscious into speech would yield liberating knowledge. Rather, he insisted that making instinct articulate would result in its misrepresentation, if not corruption.

In grappling with the unconscious, Nietzsche asessed the role of innate knowledge and skills. But his primary focus was passion. Its exclusion from discussion in the last chapter marks a glaring omission. No account of practical judgment is complete without an adequate understanding of the role of emotion.

Though we hold our conscious thoughts in high esteem, Nietzsche observes, they really represent “the last link of a chain.”