Self-awareness arises to facilitate this sharing. Hence “only as a social animal did the human learn to become conscious of himself—he does it still, he does it more and more” (again, GS354). “Consciousness is genuinely only a connection-net [Verbindungsnetz] between human and human, — only as such did it have to evolve [entwickeln].” So consciousness belongs to our “communal- [Gemeinschafts-] and herd-nature,” and it has “finely evolved” only in relation to “social- and herd-utilities.” We become self-aware, that is, not because it's in our own interest, but because it enables us to be fuller members of the herd: we look inward, the better to align ourselves with others. And this inhibits us, Nietzsche thinks, from understanding ourselves individually, since we become conscious only of our “average” (Durchschnittliches). Our thoughts are controlled by this “genius of the species” that controls consciousness, and are “as it were majoritized [majorisirt] and translated back into the herd-perspective.”

-- John Richardson, Nietzsche's New Darwinism, chapter 2, p 91

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