Nietzsche writes, "Even the body within which individuals treat each other as equals . . . will have to be an incarnate will to power, it will strive to grow, spread, seize, become predominant—not from any morality or immorality but because it is living and because life simply is will to power."
In contemporary Nietzsche scholarship, some interpreters have emphasized the will to power as a psychological principle, because Nietzsche applies it most frequently to human behavior. However, Nietzsche sometimes seems to view the will to power as a more general force, underlying all reality not just human behavior--thus making it more directly analogous to Schopenhauer's will to live. For example, Nietzsche claims the "world is the will to power -- and nothing besides!"
Some interpreters also upheld a biological interpretation of the Wille zur Macht, making it equivalent with some kind of social Darwinism. For example the concept was appropriated by some Nazis like Alfred Bäumler, etc., who may have drawn influence from it or used it to justify their expansive quest for power and world domination.
This reading was criticized by Martin Heidegger ... as seems to be reflected in the following passage:
"I have found strength where one does not look for it: in simple, mild, and pleasant people, without the least desire to rule—and, conversely, the desire to rule has often appeared to me a sign of inward weakness: they fear their own slave soul and shroud it in a royal cloak (in the end, they still become the slaves of their followers, their fame, etc.) The powerful natures dominate, it is a necessity, they need not lift one finger. Even if, during their lifetime, they bury themselves in a garden house!"
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