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A Nihilist's Guide to Meaning (2016)

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Re: A Nihilist's Guide to Meaning (2016)

#141

Post by vacuity »

regus wrote: post #125

I have often heard people say things like "I don't believe the universe or our lives have any meaning, so I choose to make my own meaning." If the universe is meaningless, and all the things in it are equally meaningless (ourselves included). How is it possible to create meaning? How can a meaningless thing or action within a meaningless system have any meaning? I guess we could just declare that this thing has meani…

> If the universe is meaningless, and all the things in it are equally meaningless (ourselves included)

That is an assumption in itself. No one is obligated to act under that premise.

> How is it possible to create meaning? I guess we could just declare that this thing has meaning, but isn't this just a delusion? Like thinking 0 + 0 = 1?

We perceive meaning all the time. This thread came to be because many people hold some meaning or another to the topic, the thought of discussing it, or something else along those lines. There is no reasoning to this phenomenon. It is not even an axiom, something taken to be true and not provable (or disprovable). If we didn't ascribe meaning to things then this conversation wouldn't be happening. I don't live in a world without meaning because I just don't. I couldn't imitate a bacterium if I wanted to. Now it's just a matter of whether I find it permissible for me to act on personal desires.

Re: A Nihilist's Guide to Meaning (2016)

#142

Post by vacuity »

shrimpx wrote: post #128
catsarebetter wrote: post #119

I've found that the antidote to pessimistic nihilism is optimistic nihilism. Going from the "world has no meaning, why do anything" (perhaps existentialist) to meaning the "world has no meaning, why don't I just do a bunch of things?" is a reasonable leap. The antidote to nihilism itself could be to accept lack of free will. Accepting lack of free will means that you get to enjoy the passage of time. Jimmy Carr said…

This reminds me of Dostoevsky's saying "God is dead, therefore everything is permitted".

This whole thread seems ridiculous to me. It just looks like "people needlessly complicating how they think about life". Why do you have to permit yourself to do anything? At least appealing to a higher power justifies why you would feel restricted. Nihilism just isn't for me, I guess.

Re: A Nihilist's Guide to Meaning (2016)

#143

Post by mensetmanusman »

tivert wrote: post #63
1970-01-01 wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yep, it's literally false. Astrophysicists estimate 5% of the universe is visible to us. Modern calculations say dark matter comprises about 27% of the Universe. Whatever else is out there, we truly do not know. https://www.cfa.harvard.edu/big-questions/what-universe-made

>>> "Science taught me that it's all just atoms and the void, so there can't be any deeper point or purpose to the whole thing" > Yep, it's literally false. Astrophysicists estimate 5% of the universe is visible to us. Modern calculations say dark matter comprises about 27% of the Universe. Whatever else is out there, we truly do not know. No. At worst it's only technically false, but broadly on the right track. If y…

It's funny that a materialist would say it's all 'particles and void' when our current understanding only accounts for a few percent of the universe...

Re: A Nihilist's Guide to Meaning (2016)

#144

Post by feoren »

regus wrote: post #125

I have often heard people say things like "I don't believe the universe or our lives have any meaning, so I choose to make my own meaning." If the universe is meaningless, and all the things in it are equally meaningless (ourselves included). How is it possible to create meaning? How can a meaningless thing or action within a meaningless system have any meaning? I guess we could just declare that this thing has meani…

It has meaning because we want it to have meaning, and that's enough. The universe didn't come with meaning a-priori. We're not here because the universe has meaning; it's the other way around: the universe has meaning now because we're in it, and we choose to ascribe meaning to it. It's not 0 + 0 = 1, it's 0 + 1 = 1.

Think of it this way: does a pretty, shiny rock on the beach have meaning on its own? Not really. But if a human finds it and loves it, and it brings joy, now it has meaning. And that human treasures it and passes it down generation by generation, and now it has even more meaning. And now someone looks at this rock and thinks about their great, great, great grandmother finding it on the beach, and thinks about their great, great, great grandchildren receiving it in turn, and it brings them joy, and the meaning continues to increase.

The universe is a pretty, shiny rock that humans have found.

Re: A Nihilist's Guide to Meaning (2016)

#145

Post by kogus »

Drakim wrote: post #137
kogus wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As it says: It's actually no more of a purpose than a tautology. It just happens that a species that survives and reproduces will continue to live. Without a creator, there is no real “purpose” at all. Everything came from nothing, will end as nothing, and is ultimately irrelevant. Everything. As a Christian, I sometimes look over into that chasm and wonder how atheists bear it.

What actually changes if there is a creator though? Isn't it exactly the same, it "just happens" that a creator created a species and that species survives and reproduces. As you yourself say, it's merely a tautology to define purpose into existence, but the same is true even if a creator is involved, it's still just something that "happens". Something was created by a creator. Now what? Where did purpose come from?

Presumably the creator created with purpose. If I make a chair, it fulfills its purpose when it serves as a place to sit. It does not serve its purpose if someone uses it to awkwardly dig a hole.

Likewise if God made me to, say, love and forgive others, I can either serve my purpose or not. But the purpose is given to me by the intent of the creator.

Re: A Nihilist's Guide to Meaning (2016)

#146

Post by vacuity »

mensetmanusman wrote: post #32

"Science taught me that it's all just atoms and the void, so there can't be any deeper point or purpose to the whole thing" Is this type of misunderstanding of what Science is that common? It's painfully lacking and I can't tell if it is written as sarcasm...

Ah yes, reject religion on the grounds that God is unfalsifiable and then proceed to...proclaim an uncertain, if not questionable statement as the objective truth. Sometimes what people call "science" should really be called a mirror. "Science tells me that..."

Re: A Nihilist's Guide to Meaning (2016)

#147

Post by catsarebetter »

vacuity wrote: post #142
shrimpx wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This reminds me of Dostoevsky's saying "God is dead, therefore everything is permitted".

This whole thread seems ridiculous to me. It just looks like "people needlessly complicating how they think about life". Why do you have to permit yourself to do anything? At least appealing to a higher power justifies why you would feel restricted. Nihilism just isn't for me, I guess.

That's philosophy in a nutshell haha.

Some people tend to be thinkers and others are doers.

Re: A Nihilist's Guide to Meaning (2016)

#148

Post by vacuity »

Drakim wrote: post #134
vacuity wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not sure why parent involves abiogenesis, but as they go on to say, surviving and reproducing aren't really purposes (as in motivation) but self-evident truths. Something made to replicate itself into more things that self-replicate and so on.

Self-evident truths of what exactly? Surviving and reproducing are facts of live, they are descriptive facts. What you ought to do with your life is not descriptive, but prescriptive. You cannot derive prescriptive statements from descriptive facts.

I didn't say you could. GP didn't seem to either.

Re: A Nihilist's Guide to Meaning (2016)

#149

Post by vacuity »

feoren wrote: post #139
beltsazar wrote: post #117

If physicalism were true, and abiogenesis happened without any intervention of "higher being"(s), and Darwinism were correct; then life wouldn't be meaningless. Neither would its purpose be determined by each individual. Life would have exactly two objective purposes: to survive and to reproduce. It's actually no more of a purpose than a tautology. It just happens that a species that survives and reproduces will cont…

When you say "survival" in terms of Darwinian evolution, you're really talking about survival of specific genes. Why should we choose to be beholden to the primal "desires" (if you'll grant me the intentional stance) of our genes? We are the AI that our DNA invented that turned around and overthrew it. The planet is ours now, not our DNA's. There are many other things that evolve too: ideas, memes, viruses, and many…

Objective, huh. Anyways, here's a problem in your last paragraph:

We?

Re: A Nihilist's Guide to Meaning (2016)

#150

Post by Drakim »

kogus wrote: post #145
Drakim wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What actually changes if there is a creator though? Isn't it exactly the same, it "just happens" that a creator created a species and that species survives and reproduces. As you yourself say, it's merely a tautology to define purpose into existence, but the same is true even if a creator is involved, it's still just something that "happens". Something was created by a creator. Now what? Where did purpose come from?

Presumably the creator created with purpose. If I make a chair, it fulfills its purpose when it serves as a place to sit. It does not serve its purpose if someone uses it to awkwardly dig a hole. Likewise if God made me to, say, love and forgive others, I can either serve my purpose or not. But the purpose is given to me by the intent of the creator.

If "purpose" is simply the intent of a creator, the words used to describe what the creator intended when they created, then I don't see the great loss in not having it.

Imagine your father always wanted a child, and for the child to take over the family business. Is your life without merit, utterly void of value, if you become a fireman instead? After all, you are not fulfilling the purpose, the intent, of those who created you. Anything outside their specifications is meaningless nihilism, right?

Personally, I think there is more to "purpose" than this definition, it's a very small definition that does not truly compass what people mean when they talk about purpose.

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