Nihilism

Can someone explain nihilism to me? How could you see no meaning in the universe when it is self-evident? The universe exists so who's to say it is meaningless if it exists? Even if there truly is no God the universe should have meaning regardless simply by being here. I mean fuck, humans don't even need to exist to give the universe meaning, because the universe will exist wither humans are here or not.

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My take on it would be that it come's down to the individual looking for a lack of meaning. For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction.

Tell me, how would you define "meaning"?

what relation do you see between existence and meaning, op?

Anything that exists has meaning. Existence is tangible, it is understandable, logic tells me it would have more meaning than not even if we do not know what this meaning is

Remember, humans aren't required for meaning. Nihilists are too far trapped in their own minds

Nihilism doesn't really say there is no meaning as much as it says there is no belief system or interpretation of meaning that is worth committing yourself to

Faggots, niggers, and wiggers I'm about to pull the trigger.

Faggots, niggers, and wiggers I'm about to pull the trigger.

You and i exist, but can we say we have meaning? Just existing does not give meaning. Having purpose and reason gives meaning to ones existence. For what reason do we live? For what reason does the universe exist? For what purpose were you born? What purpose was i born? What purpose does the universe serve?

The long and short of it is that there is no reason/meaning, at least none that we can understand to any reasonable definition. There is no inherent meaning to life/the universe/vidya/porn/god/Holla Forums, in the end we all die and are forgotten.

You're just restating what you said to begin with.

I understand you understand that with existence comes meaning, but what then, is meaning?

How do you define meaning? Is it not just another word for goal? Nihilists simply think that they do not exist for the purpose of fulfilling any specific goal.

As for meaning of the universe, I think it's very arrogant to say it's self evident. It's a bunch of particles crashing together. It's very easy to say there's no inherent meaning to that. Just because something exists doesn't mean it exists to do something. A grain of sand exists because rocks got ground up. That doesn't mean those rocks or the forces that ground them up did it because they had a plan in mind for the resulting grain of sand.

I suppose to me meaning is something that is real, I do not think meaning is something that is moving to a finality or end-goal because if that's the case then the word meaning is itself meaningless
I feel like this is a very selfish notion, because although you may be forgotten after you die the universe will still exist.

meant to also quote

Problem of induction refutes this logic

If we define the universe as the observable universe, if that's the case then we're injecting too much humanity into it I think. Even in heat death this reality will still be here, and the very fact a heat death will happen at all is fascinating, it mean we live in a reality that is changing from an instance to another
see also;
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eternal_return#Modern_cosmology

External realism is not the same thing as reality as you're using the term. Without humans, the conception of reality you have envisioned, ie gone completely. External realism is so.ethi by you norni will ever understand as we cannot take the element of our senses we are equipped with and their ability to analyze and interpret sense-datum th we receive through experiential knowledge. Analytic knowledge knowledge and science give us explanations for certain things, but very few scientific theories have ever became law. Gravity is still technically a theory, for instance

*is so.ethi g neither you or I
Sry I'm phoneposting

*IS SOMETHING WHAT THE FUCK

checking

And these are descriptive explanations science gives us, not prescriptive, as 'meaning entails
Have you ever read actual nihilist philosophy before? It's be worthwhile, or any other school of metaphysics tbh

'Human realism' itself has been found to only go so far, however. For example we have topographic theories on a 4th dimension but we obviously cannot see it ourselves (the famous "hypercube" example is a projection of a 4D object into 3D much like how you can project a 3D cube onto a 2D space)

By that definition meaning is synonymous with existence.

It's no wonder you can't wrap your head as to why people experience nihilism.

I'm not trying to talk down to you, I am simply explaining why it might seem like a foreign concept.

You have to try and consider existence and meaning as two different things.

Right, and given that we ours elves are not equipped tonperceive things on th at plane of existence, we can only speculate by long theorems and equations, what makes you think we have any depth of knowledge great enough to decide where to begin understanding the meaning of the world, or even deciding if there is a meaning. Why does essence precede existence in this regard?

I suppose I am just confused on how nihilists fail to see meaning in existence. Rather than existence and meaning being synonymous. But I suppose you're right, meaning is perspective and not everyone sees things the same way

Dude your phone screen is oily as fuck. Rub a paper towel covered in alcohol on it or something

If you wanted to know why, you should have just asked!

They are faggots and choose not to find meaning in existence!

Whether or not someone wants to see something is a choice, but that's a topic for another discussion, I think.

Nihilism is the natural result of the search for absolute truth inherent to many traditional systems, especially the Western tradition.

After the scientific revolution of the 19th century, people became capable of utterly demolishing the traditional suppositions which marked human culture since the conception of civilization, for better or for worse. This is where Nietzsche's, "God is dead," quote stems from.

The scientific method removes all value and value structure from phenomena, alowing said phenomena to be understood objectively. A person becomes Nihilistic when they extrapolate from the fact that the universe is essentially a collection of objective phenomena that the actions of humans have no objective value. The seemignly tinny and insignificant nature of humanity in comperison to the rest of the universe also plays a role in creating Nihilism.

The main problem with Nihilism is that it doesn't consider the fact that there are many ontological questions which a person can use to understand, "meaning," and, "purpose."
Consider the questions, "What is the world?" and, "How do I behave in the world?"
The problem with Nihilism is that it only attempts to answer the first question, but the first question doesn't answer the second. In short, the facts don't tell you what to do with the facts.

Is that not exactly the point and the empowering component of nihilism?

I suppose so. Interesting that the generative conflict of nihilism is also it's primary flaw.
Instead of attempting to answer, "How do I behave in the world?" Nihilism avoids the question entirely by pointing out that there isn't a way to derive it through objective phenomena.

Depends how you define "exist". If you add up all the matter and antimatter, it yields a null sum. In any event, I think most who style themselves "nihilist" do so to justify aberrant behavior.

I couldn't be the only one to find his writing style difficult to follow. Maybe I'm just a brainlet.

That's just a lot o philosophers writings tbh,especially in the continental tradition. It's why for me at least a medium like a professor to present and package the info in a wa to mkake it more easily digestible to the student was realmynimportant in philosophy and learning how to read it from there onwardds

Define "meaning". Meaning could mean worshiping a deity or taking a shit to fertilize the ground.

Life has meaning if you have kids because you become dedicated to their future which means you invest in the worlds future. If you have no kids why care?

...

...

I get to die and not feel guilty, I'm golden

Because the answer to the second question is quite literally irrelevant beyond that point.

It's a psyop.

Nihilism comes from a modernist concept of placing no value on anything, as everything is worthless. Nihilists in practice value nothing but the benefit of themselves while disregarding the benefits of others and gaining satisfaction from helping or caring about other humans. It is selfishness manifested into a set of morals, and is to be disassociated from the actual concept of Nihilism which places value of nothing with no exception to ones self. A person who placed value on nothing would simply off themselves, while the modern Nihilist simply just wants to see themselves satisfied at the expense of literally everything.

Its a flawed concept that cannot be applied in its literal form because we have actual instinct that values survival and the acquisition of resources such as food and water, and cannot be applied realistically in its modern form being as humans are social creatures and our success is defined based upon how the society around us views our assets and value as people, not to mention that any attempts at saying "Fuck the world, Ill take what I want when I want" have ended in failure, as I said, humans are social creatures and need one another in order to position themselves in a place of luxury abd satisfaction.

The problem with nowadays most nihilst isn't that the universe is meaningless, but that they have no meaning to live. You had people sacrificing themselves for nazism/communism/freedom/etc. and they actually believed in making the world a better place. Nowadays everybody is used to be bored in their room not doing much put suck up to the cultural zeitgeist.

existence of anything isnt indicative of it having purpose of meaning
it doesnt
humans dont. But universe wont give itself meaning either. And whatever meaning universe is given, its only superimposed. It exists, cuz it has to. regardless of your wants