I used to be really into philosophy, until the revelation hit me that philosophy is ultimately ontological: it names ways of thinking -- suppose living life is like painting a painting. Philosophy, then, is a theory of aesthetics. Sure it can be handy, but at the end of the day you need to create a painting. How much time you spend reading about aesthetics deducts from your time actually painting and experimenting.
I think the author doesn't look at the drawbacks of nihilism completely -- nihilism is a blank canvas as opposed to something like paint-by-numbers. Ultimately the choice of nihilism is still personal. We are all given a blank canvas to start. What kind of painting do you want to hang up?
Nihilism is basically saying that no theory of aesthetics is better than any other. Is this really true? Would you paint random dots on the canvas? Surely circles are more meaningful than scribbles?
I did maybe a couple decades of applied nihilism, as presented by Landmark Education. It helped me a lot, given that I'm bipolar and prone to pessimism and depression.
So this makes sense to me:
> If, as I suggested earlier, nihilism and pessimism are opposites, then nihilism is actually much closer to optimism.
But not this:
> Such a lack of awareness is the point of nihilism, as nihilism is all about hiding from despair rather than dwelling on it.
As Landmark taught it, it's not so much hiding from despair as cultivating the awareness that despair is an illusion. That is, despair isn't about what happened. It's about our story about what happened. And our stories by default just reflect our programming.
This does, however, but it's too ambiguous:
> But the nihilist has feelings. It’s just that what the nihilist has feelings for is itself nothing.
It's not that it's "nothing", exactly. It's that it's indeterminate. By default, it's however we've been programmed. But it can be whatever we choose freely.
That would be https://www.landmarkworldwide.com/ ? I'd never heard of it/them. It asserts "designed to bring about positive, permanent shifts in the quality of your life—in just three days", but you mention "couple decades". Comment?
Personally, I see nihilism as part of strategic deployment like any other philosophical position.
If nothing has inherent meaning then you are the one who has power to give meaning to things. You can avoid giving meaning to mishaps, mistakes, past, nasty comments and anxiety while cherishing and making other things more meaningful (to yourself).
Nihilism opens door to countering positions such as above. By using it, one can either accept life without meaning and move on or they can counter it with different position that doesn't bind them from construction of their own structure.
off topic
> It helped me a lot, given that I'm bipolar
I am curious how do you trust yourself dealing with that.
In a similar position, I find it a bit complicated to retain trust in myself (messy part is I have trauma related to trusting others as well). The feeling of being able to do anything devolving into sleeping like a rotten piece of meat within a few months. When I noticed the pattern, I had to stop thinking anything ambitious long term.
Currently, I have a few yes/no questions that highly depend on ny emotional and psychological state. I ask myself when I am unsure whether it's a good phase or bad phase. When am I myself? Is it when I can be high or low? Or somewhere between combining both.
Obviously, I can ignore the emotions and look at things objectively but then, I would start disagreeing with lot of people including doctors and become more 'robot' like. I start thinking about incentives, motive, biases, biological coding and what not to rationalize 'something' but that 'something' ultimately depends on my emotional underlying. The argument proposed are hard to deny unless someone has an irrational absolute stance originating from a position of faith or bias they are unaware of.(I am not saying things directly, I know)
Aa for drugs (they don't really work that much for me), do you not see yourself as intoxicated though? If someone was under the effect of alcohol, would you say that someone has control or actually thinking by their own?
Comparing medical drugs to alcohol might be a bit stretched but some of what I took in the past was relatively similar in effects after a bit of research.
What if you had to take drugs forever to retain that person?
Who is judging what is ultimately good for you?
PSA, Landmark Forum was banned as a cult in France after the release of an investigative documentary [0] which they tried vigorously to suppress.
The group is a magnet for vulnerable people who respond to authoritarian style leadership and coercive psychological techniques including public shaming and gaslighting. They strongly discourage participants from taking notes. Anyone with a history of trauma, abuse or adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) should know that attending this kind of group can cause severe psychological harm.
There is a way to do deep personal transformation safely, but this group isn’t it.
The author doesn't actually seem to demonstrate an understanding of nihilism or of pessimism. Most of classical philosophy is predicated on _something_ in the universe having an intrinsic purpose or value. They require an "uncaused-cause" of moral values.
Nihilism is simply the rejection of inherent value or purpose to the universe or anything in it. It means the only values or purposes in the universe are non-inherent and they are things we made up. It doesn't discourage you from making up values, it just discourages you from claiming they are inherently right for some reason.
For a nihilist, hearing somebody ask how things are "good" or "bad" in a nihilist viewpoint is like an atheist being asked why they act morally without a god to act as judge. It is mildly horrifying to see somebody else unable to behave reasonably without made-up guidance.
I think this article is a waste of time. Rather than using actual sources the author uses scenes from mtv highschool sitcoms to prove their point. Also the author injects their personal bias into everything.
I think there’s a difference between illustrating an idea and proving a point.
When illustrating an idea, It might be sensible to use relatable examples that make the concept easier to grasp. I don’t see that an attempt to prove a point or persuade in and of itself.
I do however believe that if you disagree with the greater piece, it could be easy to pick on this kind of example to create the appearance of childishness / lack of seriousness. An easy win but not necessarily with merit.
I think if your concept of nihilism holds that Socrates believing that justice is inherently good is nihilistic, it's not a very useful take on nihilism.
I think it's actually a great take. In my opinion there always has been something downright creepy about justice. The way some people talk about justice and the good society is eerily similar to Norman Bates in American Psycho or corporate modernity which the movie mocks.
There is a thin line where justice crosses over into complacency, maintaining order or just being a hollow PR slogan that instead of rallying people actually pacifies them.
I think the author is right that there is something liberating about pessimism and cynicism because they refuse to play, actually challening and mocking whoever claims to know what is just or correct.
I wasn't satisfied with the essay, so I thought I'd share my understanding of Nihilism. This is coming from someone who has never read Nietzsche so take it with a grain of salt, I'm curious to know where I might be off.
First, I think we've all most commonly seen the "colloquial" form of Nihilism, which is a sort of despair over a lack of meaning in life. I'm pretty sure most people are aware that this is oversimplified, but it is partially grounded in actual Nihilism. The emphasis is put on despair, but the despair isn't the philosophy, just a product of it.
To sum up Nihilism in a sentence: reality lacks inherent meaning, and any meaning we attempt to fulfill is ultimately chosen, not given to us. Importantly, most of the sense of purpose we see as being "real" comes from our desire to continue existing, (hence Existentialism.) But, existence is a choice. You simply choose to continue to exist, or you don't. (In which case you die.) This is the main insight which makes Nihilism disturbing. Philosophically, if our existence has no purpose, then it seems that everything else we believe and value is built on a foundation of sand.
I won't speak to what "colloquial Nihilism" is because I think this will be highly dependent on your personal experiences.
I think you're basically right about what nihilism is, but I don't find the main insight to be disturbing at all. I never truly felt free, liberated, until I had that insight.
Prior to that insight, in young adulthood, I explored Hedonism and Existentialism, but it turned out that the secret is to just stop caring about it all so much and just live/die/whatever. Let it be.
It brings me joy to not care if I live or die, though my instincts will tend towards keeping me alive. It brings me joy to not care if I succeed or fail, although it's fun to Try sometimes. I enjoy trying to do right by others, raise good kids, but I don't worry about it when I fail.
Nihilism is a complicated subject. Like feminism, it's a word that means a wide range of things to different people. One person's take on nihilism obviously is their operating definition more than a single decisive statement on the subject.
Nihilism has been a fad in the last 5 years. (I blame Rick and Morty) A lot of these "nihilists" that I've met use it as an excuse to be apathetic or even low-level belligerent, or to not put a mental filter on their disjointed thoughts. But it's not that they never gave a damn about anything; it's that they're either bored or were let down in some way by the establishment.
I discovered nihilism before I even understood that it was a thing. I came to a realization that, until I had some clear evidence to the contrary(even then I'm not sure I could let go of my skepticism), there is effectively an exception to every rule that we conceive of and that our view of existence is almost completely tainted by the way in which we perceive it. Thus, I have to accept that people in my reality are also perceiving reality in an entirely unique way, in which case I can't truly begrudge them when they act out. Essentially, I became a moral nihilist because there's no way I can reconcile my view of the world with idea that morals are objective and not contingent on circumstance. (which isn't to say that I'm a moral relativist)
I doubt that most people who call themselves nihilists are truly nihilists or even have the kinds of views on nihilism that I do. It's an identity that most people arrive at not through their own inward exploration but as a response to the world acting upon them. I would argue that's true of most belief systems, though it's probably more transparent with nihilism since it's the rejection of something, so it's not as if there's a coherent doctrine that so-called nihilists can use to bullshit others.
Nihilism goes hand-in-hand with atheism, doesn't it? If you don't believe that the Universe is operating according to the scheme(s) of some kind of "divine being(s)", it's hard to see where any "meaning" would come from. It's just mindless and possibly deterministic motion. That is unless you can somehow derive "meaning" as an emergent concept and see it as significant. Desires originate in biology that has evolved through natural selection; morality and expectations originate with peoples attempts to control how other people behave as mediated by power structures in society.
I've not infrequently found nihilism intellectually attractive. Usually, something like political nihilism.
One problem that I think has long been overlooked is the foundation of human rights. Only in the past roughly five years has there been much scholarly contribution on the matter.
What could possibly ground human rights? And if they have no ground, then aren't they simply the same as the preference for, say, peeing standing up vs peeing sitting down?
There would be nothing stopping a "divine being" from creating a meaningless world, but they approach things from the other direction. The world as they can see it has no meaning, so there would be no reason to believe there is a designer.
There's no irony in that quote. Nihilism is predicated on the existence of meaningfulness. It merely holds that meaning is a subjective experience.
That's not to say that meaning is relative or that it isn't real.
This may be difficult to grasp at first. But consider this analogy which grasps the objective nature of a more concrete subjective experience: When you gaze up at the sky and see two birds it is objectively true that you are having a subjective experience of two birds in the sky above you (whether you're hallucinating or not) and not one bird or two elephants. There's nothing relative about it and it's very much a real experience. Cogito ergo sum, after all.
Likewise, under nihilism meaning itself is a subjective experience with quantifiable objective properties. Specifically, meaning is a quantitative (something objective) measure of experiences which are the most highly connected (ie. significant) to other experiences from a subjective perspective.
For example, if you experience prayer as meaningful to you, whether you're delusional or not about it's meaningfulness to you or in general, then it is objectively true that you are having said real non-relative experience of meaning.
ok, i finally understand exactly what nihilism concretely refers to now. a state of being similar to the one of the hollow human replicas in "the invasion of the body snatchers"...
so, that's what i've been referring to all this time lately when i use the phrase "delirium and drift"...
it's not stupidity i've been referring to, but nihilism it seems.
explains a lot.
dostoevsky's use of the term now suddenly becomes rather disturbing in its 19th century russian context.
either way, thank you.
that was maybe somehow useful and somewhat insightful in helping me diagnose the surrounding world going clinically/criminally insane..
An interesting article. I feel like, especially in the era of social media, nihilism is underrated at the margin. Perhaps we should all believe in fewer beliefs.
Citing an entire university system (or the press I can’t tell)? Why not the stanford encyclopedia of philosophy? It’s very high quality and trivially citable with a url.
Nihilism is a logical fallacy and to believe in it is utterly delusional. To assert “nothing” is to contradict the assertion. To assert “nothingness“ or that “everything is nothing” or that “nothing exists” is actually just a form of materialism in which the concept of a void is reified as just another kind of thing. If someone was truly a nihilist they would have to refute nihilism, for nihilism could not possibly exist, nor could nothing or any nothingness be established. Nihilism is logically impossible.
This is addressed in the first paragraph of the article, and the concept of "nihilism" has more to it than a literal translation of the Latin base word.
[+] [-] stanfordkid|6 years ago|reply
I think the author doesn't look at the drawbacks of nihilism completely -- nihilism is a blank canvas as opposed to something like paint-by-numbers. Ultimately the choice of nihilism is still personal. We are all given a blank canvas to start. What kind of painting do you want to hang up?
Nihilism is basically saying that no theory of aesthetics is better than any other. Is this really true? Would you paint random dots on the canvas? Surely circles are more meaningful than scribbles?
[+] [-] zdragnar|6 years ago|reply
https://meltingasphalt.com/a-nihilists-guide-to-meaning/
[+] [-] mirimir|6 years ago|reply
I did maybe a couple decades of applied nihilism, as presented by Landmark Education. It helped me a lot, given that I'm bipolar and prone to pessimism and depression.
So this makes sense to me:
> If, as I suggested earlier, nihilism and pessimism are opposites, then nihilism is actually much closer to optimism.
But not this:
> Such a lack of awareness is the point of nihilism, as nihilism is all about hiding from despair rather than dwelling on it.
As Landmark taught it, it's not so much hiding from despair as cultivating the awareness that despair is an illusion. That is, despair isn't about what happened. It's about our story about what happened. And our stories by default just reflect our programming.
This does, however, but it's too ambiguous:
> But the nihilist has feelings. It’s just that what the nihilist has feelings for is itself nothing.
It's not that it's "nothing", exactly. It's that it's indeterminate. By default, it's however we've been programmed. But it can be whatever we choose freely.
[+] [-] fernly|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] thrwaway69|6 years ago|reply
If nothing has inherent meaning then you are the one who has power to give meaning to things. You can avoid giving meaning to mishaps, mistakes, past, nasty comments and anxiety while cherishing and making other things more meaningful (to yourself).
Nihilism opens door to countering positions such as above. By using it, one can either accept life without meaning and move on or they can counter it with different position that doesn't bind them from construction of their own structure.
off topic
> It helped me a lot, given that I'm bipolar
I am curious how do you trust yourself dealing with that. In a similar position, I find it a bit complicated to retain trust in myself (messy part is I have trauma related to trusting others as well). The feeling of being able to do anything devolving into sleeping like a rotten piece of meat within a few months. When I noticed the pattern, I had to stop thinking anything ambitious long term.
Currently, I have a few yes/no questions that highly depend on ny emotional and psychological state. I ask myself when I am unsure whether it's a good phase or bad phase. When am I myself? Is it when I can be high or low? Or somewhere between combining both.
Obviously, I can ignore the emotions and look at things objectively but then, I would start disagreeing with lot of people including doctors and become more 'robot' like. I start thinking about incentives, motive, biases, biological coding and what not to rationalize 'something' but that 'something' ultimately depends on my emotional underlying. The argument proposed are hard to deny unless someone has an irrational absolute stance originating from a position of faith or bias they are unaware of.(I am not saying things directly, I know)
Aa for drugs (they don't really work that much for me), do you not see yourself as intoxicated though? If someone was under the effect of alcohol, would you say that someone has control or actually thinking by their own? Comparing medical drugs to alcohol might be a bit stretched but some of what I took in the past was relatively similar in effects after a bit of research. What if you had to take drugs forever to retain that person? Who is judging what is ultimately good for you?
[+] [-] oarabbus_|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mindgam3|6 years ago|reply
The group is a magnet for vulnerable people who respond to authoritarian style leadership and coercive psychological techniques including public shaming and gaslighting. They strongly discourage participants from taking notes. Anyone with a history of trauma, abuse or adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) should know that attending this kind of group can cause severe psychological harm.
There is a way to do deep personal transformation safely, but this group isn’t it.
0. https://wikileaks.org/wiki/Suppressed_French_documentary_on_...
[+] [-] __s|6 years ago|reply
Pessimist: the payoff matrix is negative
Cynic: players refuse to cooperate, so we're stuck playing with a net negative result
Apathetic: this game is boring
[+] [-] defertoreptar|6 years ago|reply
Pessimist: the expected value less than or equal to 0. It's a meaningless game of chance, and it doesn't matter what you do.
Existentialist: the expected value is 0, but if you score 10 points, we'll call it a win.
Cynic: you think that the expected value is positive. You idiots only act like you're not playing to win.
[+] [-] mirimir|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] blamestross|6 years ago|reply
Nihilism is simply the rejection of inherent value or purpose to the universe or anything in it. It means the only values or purposes in the universe are non-inherent and they are things we made up. It doesn't discourage you from making up values, it just discourages you from claiming they are inherently right for some reason.
For a nihilist, hearing somebody ask how things are "good" or "bad" in a nihilist viewpoint is like an atheist being asked why they act morally without a god to act as judge. It is mildly horrifying to see somebody else unable to behave reasonably without made-up guidance.
[+] [-] d0100|6 years ago|reply
Not behaving according to your made-up reasonableness?
If there is no absolute line, then the only thing that matters is being the current top-dog
[+] [-] newfangle|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] annamargot|6 years ago|reply
When illustrating an idea, It might be sensible to use relatable examples that make the concept easier to grasp. I don’t see that an attempt to prove a point or persuade in and of itself.
I do however believe that if you disagree with the greater piece, it could be easy to pick on this kind of example to create the appearance of childishness / lack of seriousness. An easy win but not necessarily with merit.
[+] [-] danans|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] evdev|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Barrin92|6 years ago|reply
There is a thin line where justice crosses over into complacency, maintaining order or just being a hollow PR slogan that instead of rallying people actually pacifies them.
I think the author is right that there is something liberating about pessimism and cynicism because they refuse to play, actually challening and mocking whoever claims to know what is just or correct.
[+] [-] boomboomsubban|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] skolskoly|6 years ago|reply
First, I think we've all most commonly seen the "colloquial" form of Nihilism, which is a sort of despair over a lack of meaning in life. I'm pretty sure most people are aware that this is oversimplified, but it is partially grounded in actual Nihilism. The emphasis is put on despair, but the despair isn't the philosophy, just a product of it.
To sum up Nihilism in a sentence: reality lacks inherent meaning, and any meaning we attempt to fulfill is ultimately chosen, not given to us. Importantly, most of the sense of purpose we see as being "real" comes from our desire to continue existing, (hence Existentialism.) But, existence is a choice. You simply choose to continue to exist, or you don't. (In which case you die.) This is the main insight which makes Nihilism disturbing. Philosophically, if our existence has no purpose, then it seems that everything else we believe and value is built on a foundation of sand.
[+] [-] IggleSniggle|6 years ago|reply
I think you're basically right about what nihilism is, but I don't find the main insight to be disturbing at all. I never truly felt free, liberated, until I had that insight.
Prior to that insight, in young adulthood, I explored Hedonism and Existentialism, but it turned out that the secret is to just stop caring about it all so much and just live/die/whatever. Let it be.
It brings me joy to not care if I live or die, though my instincts will tend towards keeping me alive. It brings me joy to not care if I succeed or fail, although it's fun to Try sometimes. I enjoy trying to do right by others, raise good kids, but I don't worry about it when I fail.
It's just a ride; people get on, people get off.
[+] [-] brazzy|6 years ago|reply
Only if you assume that only "inherent" or externally supplied meaning or purpose is valid.
Why make that assumption, though?
[+] [-] pc2g4d|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] ravenstine|6 years ago|reply
I discovered nihilism before I even understood that it was a thing. I came to a realization that, until I had some clear evidence to the contrary(even then I'm not sure I could let go of my skepticism), there is effectively an exception to every rule that we conceive of and that our view of existence is almost completely tainted by the way in which we perceive it. Thus, I have to accept that people in my reality are also perceiving reality in an entirely unique way, in which case I can't truly begrudge them when they act out. Essentially, I became a moral nihilist because there's no way I can reconcile my view of the world with idea that morals are objective and not contingent on circumstance. (which isn't to say that I'm a moral relativist)
I doubt that most people who call themselves nihilists are truly nihilists or even have the kinds of views on nihilism that I do. It's an identity that most people arrive at not through their own inward exploration but as a response to the world acting upon them. I would argue that's true of most belief systems, though it's probably more transparent with nihilism since it's the rejection of something, so it's not as if there's a coherent doctrine that so-called nihilists can use to bullshit others.
[+] [-] incompatible|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] anongraddebt|6 years ago|reply
One problem that I think has long been overlooked is the foundation of human rights. Only in the past roughly five years has there been much scholarly contribution on the matter.
What could possibly ground human rights? And if they have no ground, then aren't they simply the same as the preference for, say, peeing standing up vs peeing sitting down?
[+] [-] MrQuincle|6 years ago|reply
Someone can tell you your life has a lot of meaning... but what does that mean to you. It's vacuous if you don't think that yourself.
I won't say meaning is something emergent. It's something about point of view.
Or perhaps even stronger. If you don't find meaning in your life, there's none.
[+] [-] boomboomsubban|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] alexashka|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] charleskinbote|6 years ago|reply
I found the irony here rather amusing.
[+] [-] MacsHeadroom|6 years ago|reply
That's not to say that meaning is relative or that it isn't real.
This may be difficult to grasp at first. But consider this analogy which grasps the objective nature of a more concrete subjective experience: When you gaze up at the sky and see two birds it is objectively true that you are having a subjective experience of two birds in the sky above you (whether you're hallucinating or not) and not one bird or two elephants. There's nothing relative about it and it's very much a real experience. Cogito ergo sum, after all.
Likewise, under nihilism meaning itself is a subjective experience with quantifiable objective properties. Specifically, meaning is a quantitative (something objective) measure of experiences which are the most highly connected (ie. significant) to other experiences from a subjective perspective.
For example, if you experience prayer as meaningful to you, whether you're delusional or not about it's meaningfulness to you or in general, then it is objectively true that you are having said real non-relative experience of meaning.
For more insight, see A Nihilists Guide to Meaning: https://meltingasphalt.com/a-nihilists-guide-to-meaning/
[+] [-] rhyzom|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] lacker|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] amitport|6 years ago|reply
Concise and seems pretty clear to me. While the article is well written, it doesn't really adds much IMO.
[+] [-] kawakoliz|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Aperocky|6 years ago|reply
This is actually objectively true, our life are not different to the laws of physics then a rock on the surface of Mars.
Our life is meaningful to ourselves, however.
[+] [-] mirimir|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] himaraya|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] HelloSunday|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] airesearcher|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] boomboomsubban|6 years ago|reply