this is wonderful insight, but not insightful enough. euripides use of the socratic rationalism is not the beginning of a decline but rather a shift into a different kind of dialectical understanding of the tragic. you see that the rational is already present in aeschylus and sophocles; the hero, who 'struggles to make order", as well the audience who shares in the drama, must have in mind a pre-existing notion of ‘justice’ before he can be understood as unfulfilled by having failed. without this, there is no possible juxtaposition to be noticed here, and therefore no tragedy. euripides didn’t introduce the ethical through the socratic dialectic… the ethical was already there.
the apollonian/dionysian dichotomy would be resolved if it is understood that in the apollonian, there is no struggle against a moral order/disorder (which does not exist; one cannot struggle against what isn’t there), while in the dionysian, there is no ‘chaos’ (because all is perfectly ordered). the opposition of these two perceived symbols in their current forms simply doesn’t exist. instead, if they are to symbolize anything at all, they both come into the service of a single, fused, feature of the human psyche. the apollonian would serve to make intelligible the general meaninglessness and hostility of the world… the dionysian would serve to strengthen and enhance the will to embrace and make useful, this nihilism. this is tragedy in its proper form. but then if properly understood, it isn’t tragedy anymore, in fact, because there is no longer a diametric opposition between the just and the unjust. there is neither now… and there never was, to begin with.
only in the moralist does the classical opposition represented by the apollonian/dionysian exist, and in such people neither is comprehended, while both are squandered.
see the value of myth and suffering being ‘brought down’ (untergang) to knowledge is and always was a non-problem. one must already have quite a bit of knowledge to perceive oneself as suffering. it was only the complexity of the kind of suffering that was made greater through the introduction of ‘reason’. with euripides and socrates it became more faceted, more morally sophisticated, when the ethical, civil sphere expanded. a hero involved in some kind of family intrigue or espionage is suffering no more or less than the hero who gets eaten by some monster. well i mean he’s suffering less because it doesn’t hurt as much when you’re fighting with the king rather than getting eaten by a monster, sure… but the perception of injustice at the mercy of a tyrannical king is just that; a perception. there is no justice, so there is no injustice.
i hereby merge apollo and dionysus into one machine which will now stand to symbolize the ubernihilist. previously, these two brothers were fighting over nothing at all the whole time. unbelievable, and embarrassing… especially for fritz. he should’ve seen this before me.