My "nihilism"
Maybe I just don't understand my own position. I basically believe that nothing has any meaning. When asking myself what I should do under this condition, I decided I didn't believe in anything more strongly than that I was a biological organism, and my thinking should revolve around the idea of being a successful biological organism (and doing what I can to ensure my offspring's success). I know my ideas are troubling, or absurd, or what ever. But they all follow, somehow, from that. I'm here because I don't totally trust my own thinking and I want criticism, even insults.
Comments (125)
Don't be so self-abusive!
I think, that "meaning" is a psychological construct. So, perhaps you need to understand your own psychology to determine where are these questions arising from?
I don't see how life is meaningless makes any sense! Life's full of meanings; although we can experience meaninglessness, it's unwise to think all of life is meaningless.
It's the spirit of the age, the zeitgeist. Meaninglessness is the shadow of democratic liberalism. Philosophy can help understand that and see through it, but only if you're up for it.
Meaninglessness; the illusion of discreteness, separation and threat.
Meaninglessness shadows anyone who can think for themselves.
:ok:
Meaning is the relationship between cause and effect. Meaning is everywhere, possibly the fabric of reality itself.
If nothing had meaning then there would be no way for us to communicate, as communication requires shared meaning. Your scribbles on the screen mean something that I try to get at when I look at them. They mean the ideas in your head and your intent to share them with others as that is what caused the scribbles to appear on the screen.
Quoting yupamiralda
That is all any of us can do. Humans are very versatile (thanks to their large brains an opposable thumbs) and the variety of ways in which we choose to be successful organisms can make it seem like we have transcended our biology, but that is an illusion.
You arent just an organism, but a very intelligent and highly social organism that finds success in establishing long and useful relationships with others.
Quoting yupamiralda
Sounds like you find meaning in being a good parent. Why would you think this is absurd or deserving of criticism or insults?
As someone said, "the present age has too much thought, and not enough existence."
In past ages, meaning for a man was tied to his nobility and honor. Democratic liberalism is the result of the slave revolt, that did away with the nobility of man and replaced it with the right to individual opinion. In effect, the rabble, not even fit to rule itself, has gained a hand in ruling over all, all while meaningfulness has been reduced to the lowest common denominator.
So you might ask, am I suggesting a return to traditional religion? I don’t think that’s possible either - but we need to understand what has happened by loosing it. Scientific naturalism, a la modern atheism, pretends to depict the world as it really is, devoid of the superstitious trappings of the past. But it too is a deeply historically-conditioned worldview, embodying a set of values - namely, ‘the value of no value’, the assertion of the Universe as devoid of meaning and therefore purpose, and that humans are the result of a fundamentally meaningless physical process. That’s scientific atheism in a nutshell, and that is what I see behind many of these threads.
I agree with you here. But let me just point out that in the pre-modern/classic spirit, there was no illusion of choice. (Accidentally hit post)
You were born into your cultural role, and your task was to become that in your life's occupation.
As you point out, there is no going back. But it is evident that the effects of a mass culture that is based on the fundamental notion that you "can ‘be whatever you want to be’ - but with no deeper sense of what underwrites that, and furthermore without the implicit moral obligation", is having increasingly detrimental effects in to modern world.
I was a Christian the first half of my life and then I became an atheist. The only thing that I lost was my belief in a god.
What is "spirituality" - a belief in a higher power, a belief in souls - and how does one lose it if not by freeing oneself from one's cultural conditioning?
Quoting Wayfarer
Wrong. Your freedom is realized when you understand that you don't need to look to a higher power, or to others, to give you meaning and purpose. You have the power to give yourself meaning and purpose with your own actions.
As I see it there are two related but distinct aspects to this, which is basically spiritual (individual) and religious (group), and the thing that few realize or will acknowledge is that the ‘subject/object’ duality that the former may struggle with is merely replaced with an ‘in-group/out-group’ duality in the latter. There is ALWAYS an out-group for the religious. It is fundamental to its function.
Quoting Wayfarer
Because the foundation (spiritual authorities) have been proven to be frauds, for the vast majority anyway.
Because traditional religion is no longer meaningful.
‘There would be no fools’ gold, were there no gold’ ~ Rumi
Thanks for the lead. I'm about to start reading it.
It appears that you’ve decided on what is meaningful to you. You may change your mind in the future and find meaning elsewhere, or not.
If you say there is no meaning it is contrary to then ask what you should do. As soon as you ask that question you’re searching for meaning. You create meaning from the phenomenon of life. I think underneath all of this is a deeper question you’re going to have to tackle at some point. That is the question of what is ‘better’ or ‘worse’? My only advice is not to be seduced by some perverse nihilistic based hedonism - that will lead to long-term disaster.
That's like saying there would be no false self if there were no real self. Or no illusory external world if there were no real external world. I think the logic simply doesn't follow in any case.
Yes, the very notion of an "outgroup" could arguably be based on the idea of the separation of self and world. If there is no notion of self and world, no notion of the internal vs the external, then there can be no idea of internal "self-generated" meaning as opposed to meaning that is immanent in the world. Any such notion of a self with all its meanings set against a meaningless world is an archetypal expression of Cartesian thinking. This is one of the very important themes in Heidegger.
I would not necessarily agree that "there is ALWAYS an out-group for the religious" but there often is with religious institutions that have become politicized, that seek to control their members through fear of "contamination", of the Other; I would say this is fairly typical.
Quoting praxis
Anyone who sets themselves up as a any kind "spiritual authority" at all is likely to be a fraud in my view. It seems like many people need the frauds though, because they don't have sufficient independence of mind to think for themselves and make it on their own. The frauds give them solace and reassure them they are on the right path. Or the destructive frauds hold them in thrall by appealing to their guilt and feelings of inadequacy, unworthiness and self-hatred.
Quoting praxis
Meaningful to you?
Illusion only has meaning in relation to reality. Even in Hinduism and Buddhism, where 'the world' is considered maya, illusion, it is illusory from the perspective of one who sees through it. If everything is illusion, then you're back at nihilism. (And I think it's not surprising that there's quite a strong tendency towards nihilism amongst Western interpreters of Buddhism.)
The same goes for the self. We have the illusion of a substantive unchanging self. If there is no such thing then what is the illusion an illusion relative to?
If you say that the illusion of these things, a real self and a real world is an illusion relative to the reality that there are no such things, then why could the illusion that there are spiritual authorities not be an illusion relative to the reality that there are no such authorities. I see no difference in the logic.
How about looking at it from an exam perspective. There's a fill in the blanks question:
2a. The purpose/meaning of life is_____________
As you already know there is no right answer to this question and that, ironically, is the best thing ever. We can fill the blank with anything and it wouldn't be wrong. I'm not sure if it'd be right though. Nevertheless it gives us freedom to do what we want to do. Isn't liberty more important than purpose?
Strange how you singled me out for "projecting to the general what applies only to the particular", when everyone in this thread would be doing the same thing, like using ill-defined terms like "spirituality", as if it applied to all atheists or whole cultures, as something they lost. :roll:
Delusions work for people who have no interest in the truth, or in spite of the truth that isnt consoling to them. Religion works as a crutch for the weak .
So you're using "meaning" strictly in the "(life's) purpose" sense.
Don't you think that some individuals have purposes that they've assigned themselves? For example, Joe's life's purpose might be to spend at least three weeks in every country. Jane's life's purpose might be to write two novels per year, etc. Alice's life's purpose might be to have kids and devote her life to them. It could be anything, really. (Granted that these are simplified, though--people usually have multiple, or at least multifaceted purposes if they have them.)
If those folks have assigned purposes to themselves, then there are purposes, no?
You have to make your own meaning. People who try to find meaning, never do. You have to create it in philosophy, myth, art, etc. A true nihilist wouldn't have anything to say.
A sign you haven't created your own meaning might be excessive interest in ancestry or genetic bloodlines. As though the bodies and thoughts of your predecessors could be reflected perfectly in whatever you are. Which of course requires no myth-making or mythopoesis or meaning whatever.
Start with abolition of the past, realize there's no such thing as autonomous history. Return it to chaos, to in illo tempore. From the chaos, cosmicize...solarize your life according to prototypes/archetypes. Reactualize these gestures once a year with the beginning of time over and over again following each year's rite. Chaos to cosmos...unmanifest to manifest. The ultimate meaning is in regeneration.
Endlessly repeated history, together with the wrong image that it's autonomous with intrinsic meaning tends to make me feel the way of the OP. Intrinsic value is is imputed, not the sort of thing you find evidence for or data. I believe this is why meaning is disappearing in our species...meaning requires thought and can't be gleaned from physical observation or data. Nothing is more empirical than a kickshaw you are about to ingest...and yet it is without intrinsic value. The value of it is in the domain of idealism. Otherwise you just eat unconsciously.
It is not meaningless per sey, but the hands are dealt unevenly.
The Sun's yellow is meaning, search for meaning therefore, it's not just a statement, but more of a logos.
I don't know, it doesn't seem particularly dualistic to think that meaning exists in minds and not in shoeboxes. The same shoebox can have a wide variety of meanings for different minds. That doesn't mean that mind and matter are separable. Also, a mind can contrive meaning, or even a system of meaning as with religion.
Quoting Janus
For this to not be the case, a religion would need to allow its tenets to be freely questioned and revised by any of its members. Do you know of any such religion?
Just look at our friend Wayfarer, who espouses the value of religion AND enthusiastically condemns the materialist infidels.
I get that you hate religion. I'm not so much 'enthusiastic' about it, as wanting to retrieve from it what made it meaningful in the first place. It seems obvious to me that a good deal of modern nihilism is based on the lack of any sense of relatedness to the Cosmos.
Observe, @Janus, if you're not with them then you're against (hate) them. :roll:
You could use this observation to promote feeling. Feeling is undeniable.
It's not a general statement, but an observation based on what you say. OK, maybe 'hate' might be too strong a word but you generally express a very strong sense of hostility, scepticism, or something similar, against anything you deem 'religious'.
Quoting praxis
I share something of Wayfarer's view. Religious feeling is native to us. When it comes to my own practice I have little time for organized religion though. People often think you can't do it on your own, you need a guru and so on. I think this is nonsense based on the misplaced idea that we are,existentially speaking, alone. This is the devaluation of life that consists in our notions of separation. But many people are caught in that and so organized, politicized religion, and I think that includes all institutionalized religions, may have positive value as well as negative dis-value. For example, on the most basic level, it may provide solace for many who would, due to their mindsets, otherwise find life intolerable.
But, organized religions also inevitably tend to create chauvinistic cultures, and the fact that they all disagree with one another regarding whatever positive claims they make about life and death contributes to that tendency. So, organized religions also foster the delusions of separation. In fact it is the Christian idea of separation, original sin and fallen mechanical nature, which sets the stage for the rise of science, technology and capitalism that together are destroying the natural world at an accelarating rate.
The part I share with Wayfarer is in thinking that there is a common religious impulse, which is based on feeling and the deep intuition that life is sacred. The part I don't share is in thinking that there are "higher truths" to do with some transcendent realm that enlightened individuals or the favored "instruments of God" have privileged access to.
On the other hand, I do believe that any person will be more or less open to the sense of the sacred and that being in the presence of one who is more open to that sense, which is really love, may, if you are somewhat open yourself, be helpful in opening yourself further to such intuitions and to love. I also think it is common enough for such "open" individuals, who often become spiritual "leaders" to believe all kinds of nonsense, due to their underdeveloped critical and self-critical, faculties. That said, considering the human part of nature it is indeed an imperfect world, and looked at in that context, there may not be too much harm in such 'nonsense' beliefs, as they may countervail against even more pernicious attitudes.
I think the most important element of religion lies in the feeling, not in elitist fantasies of enlightenment, of "priveleged", or "higher" esoteric "knowledge". So, the point is that all these fantasies and games played by the religious and the self-styled and so-called "masters of wisdom" are not unequivocally negative, because they may to some degree counteract other impulses which could be far worse for our common human life. The important point for me is that the emphasis is on commonality and love and not on hatred and separation, and religion, just like science or any other human cultural phenomenon, can just as easily contribute to the one as to the other.
Sure. Occams razor and I'm not using these poorly defined and loaded terms, like "spirituality", "sacred" and "divine". I asked for "spirituality" to be defined earlier and you and Wayfarer ignored it and instead engaged in using even more of these terms in your post. I'll glady take my simplistic view over some poorly defined view.
Quoting Janus
Exactly. Youre comparing your view with humans' preliminary explanation of the world and their place in it - when humans believed that they were the focus of creation. Religion has a tendency to inflate one's self importance which is just another form of delusion - delusions of grandeur.
I get that. This is where the distinction between dharma and religion is useful. The two words have overlapping meanings but they're not exactly the same.
In Western culture and history, 'religion' is very strongly associated with authority and authoritarianism. I mean, you could argue that the Church created the template for later, political authoritarianism. So, a lot of modern culture is grounded in rejecting that authority, on thinking for yourself - as Praxis has stated more than once in this thread. So there's a perceived antinomy between conformist, authoritarian religious belief, and contrarian, creative individualism.
So I think that's why you rebel so strongly against any suggestion of religious authority, isn't it?
Whereas, the type of teacher associated with the more characteristically Eastern modes of understanding (i.e. dharma) does not necessarily represent authority in that sense (although he might). The model is different - more like the teacher empowering the student by guiding and imparting wisdom. That is more the Buddhist model. But it doesn't deny that there is something that 'the Buddha' understands or sees, which 'the ordinary worldling' does not. And I've come to accept that; even though every sentient being has the capacity for enlightenment, in reality, very few are enlightened. I guess that's why I now come across as being 'religious' although that wasn't at all the intention I set out with; that was to discover what this 'enlightenment' business was about. But as you travel along the path, your perspective changes. But I'm still resisting being 'a believer' - I still hope that there is a real wisdom that can be discerned, and not simply believed in.
The broader point is this. Much of great value in the Western philosophical tradition was incorporated by Christian theology over many centuries. And then with the dawn of 'this secular age', it was all bundled together and discarded. (Not by everyone of course.) Then you get these forlorn individuals signing up to philosophy forums and saying 'hey, nothing means anything any more.' And that's a cultural phenomenon, it's a sign of the times. Our culture doesn't imbue people with any sense of relatedness to the sacred, or to the Cosmos at large. Most kids, when you survey them, want either to be famous, or to be rich, or both.
In the kinds of animistic worldviews found in hunter/ gatherer cultures humans are not the focus of creation. That idea came later, most notably with the Abrahamic religions, and most especially Christianity.
I agree there is such an "antinomy", but that is only because the two are inherently very different. By using the word "contrarian" you seem to introduce an underlying suggestion that people reject authority only out of a kind of perversity. I don't see it that way. People question authority when they become able to think for themselves, it may take quite a lot for someone indoctrinated with, for example, Catholic belief, to free themselves from its thrall. (I have several friends who were devout in their teens, but being highly intelligent and brave souls, eventually came to reject the influence of the Church. And they are all good, loving, supportive people, or at least in those regards certainly a cut above the average).
If people fail to question their indoctrination then they are and will remain merely blind followers (which may be fine for some who are not inclined to think much about their lives). Once an individual becomes able to question it they may or may not become reconciled to their faith, and if they do they will no longer be the blind follower they previously were. They may still believe for mostly emotional reasons, but ideally they will have achieved the degree of self-knowledge necessary to know that is what they are doing; otherwise they will have merely reached a different stage of blindness.
Quoting Wayfarer
I have observed many, and been personally involved in a few, Buddhist and other "spiritual" organizations, and I would say that the teacher always becomes an authority figure. This may not be the fault of the teacher; the same kind of thing may happen with celebrities or prominent intellectual and scientific figures; it's on account of human life and nature at its most unexamined. If the teacher has the right feeling, a genuine feeling of love, then they may impart that feeling; that is the important influence. There is no "wisdom" in the form of some "hidden" or "higher" esoteric knowledge to be imparted above and beyond that feeling of love and unity. That there is such a "higher wisdom" is merely a kind of infantile fantasy in my view. But there may be, nonetheless an altered state of consciousness, experience and feeling; I believe that is very real, albeit rare.
This is false. In fact, I know that you’ve “observed” me sing the praises of Meido Zentetsu Roshi, if no other thing deemed religious.
How can you be so fucking blind? In a word: tribalism. Tribal life is so deliciously meaningful.
Well, that was my interpretation of the kinds of things you say, such as
Quoting praxis
Perhaps I misunderstood?
You make that abundantly clear at every possible opportunity, which can be tiresome, but I guess I'm asking for it. :sad:
I keep making it clear in the hope that it will eventually become clear to you. Anyway, I'm just expressing my opinion, which is all anyone of us do on here really, isn't it? At least I am giving my reasons for that opinion, and they stand open to challenge!
If someone wants to convince me that there is such a "higher knowledge" (beyond the altered consciousness and emotional responses that I have acknowledged to be real) then thy will need to provide a convincing argument for believing such a thing. I have never seen anything even approaching such an argument, so why should I believe? You might say you know there is higher knowledge from your own experience, but I don't believe it is possible to know such a thing, since all experiences are interpreted.
You may have a sense of direct knowing, I have had many such experiences myself, in fact I have them every day, but ask yourself 'What is it exactly that I know when I have such experiences? What exactly could it be that I know?' or 'Could it be any kind of communicable, discursive knowledge about anything?'. I think if you are honest with yourself you will admit that it couldn't be any such kind of knowledge. Does something qualify as knowledge if I cannot say clearly and unequivocally what it is, or is it not rather an intuitive sense, or feeling, of knowing something which cannot be expressed in words?
And please note, I am by no means denigrating that kind of experience; it is the most important kind of experience there is, and it is the basis for all kinds of practical wisdom and creative ability. I am just trying to show you that it is not knowledge in the kind of sense that you seem to think it is, that you can't get it from anyone else and that you don't need anyone else to guide you; in fact quite the opposite; you just need to learn to think less dualistically, more holistically and to trust your innate wisdom. I can't see any reason to believe that others who are may be more open than you to this capacity we all have can act as anything more than inspiring examples, they should never be thought of as infallible and any actual claims they make should be taken with a grain of salt. What they "know" will never be what you "know" because you are uniquely different individuals.
I say the idea of "higher knowledge" is an "infantile fantasy" because the child naturally looks to the adult for "higher" guidance; which is inevitable as long as the child is unschooled in the ways of the world. I understand that you will have an emotional resistance to accepting what I am saying, and I predict that you will do the politician's thing of evading trying to come up with a straight answer to the questions posed, or misinterpreting what I am saying and responding to the misinterpretation, because not to do either of those would lead you to see for yourself how there is no real ground upon which you are standing, and experience the vertigo that realization will bring. Maybe one day you'll be ready for it; I hope so..
Part of me agrees with you. But I think the problem of nihilism is that if we embrace it, we will have to believe that anything that gives an illusion of value is more deceitful than things that frankly denote meaninglessness since the meaninglessness of the world should be the only truth for us. In a world void of meaning, the more meaningless a thing is, the more clearly it reflects the truth.
Provided that everything is meaningless at its core, what is then the most meaningless thing in the world? Food, clothes, houses, money, books–they still seem to have some meaning. Love has also meaning, even if it's an illusion, because it unites men and women and thus contributes to our biological reproduction. Happiness, pleasure, hope, hatred–actually, to find something completely meaningless is as difficult as to find something completely meaningful: when we wanted the world full of meaning, everything seemed meaningless, but once we are prepared to accept the meaninglessness of the world, the world, every phenomenon of it, suddenly reveals itself to be full of petty meaning. So if we deny everything that gives us the illusion of meaningfulness as the shadows on the wall and try to find something that is completely void of any meaning, I think what our mind conceives to be the most meaningless thing in the world cannot be but God. I call this the negative God.
It cannot be the Devil, obviously, because unlike the Devil, which must be deceitful, it reveals the truth to us, that is to say, it's the only thing in the world that reveals absolutely nothing at all. And since everything is meaningless and anything of value is nothing but a shadow on the wall, we can see the glory of this negative God everywhere. It's completely non-existent, does no miracle, says nothing and has no meaning. It's pure and clean.
And this divine non-being is what connects us all since we human beings are made of dreams. We do meaningless things, think about meaningless things, and shed meaningless tears for meaningless affairs, knowing a gust of wind will wipe out all the traces of our existence some day. Our existence is fleeting, but our absence will be eternal. We will be one with the negative God when we all are dead.
And since the whole universe is devoid of meaning, this negative God, the purest form of meaninglessness, may be considered, in a reversed way, omnipresent. Now that we are nihilists, we find the glory of the negative God where the saints of old found the glory of the Christian God. And we cannot escape from the hand of the negative God as long as we live in a meaningless world.
But it’s not something that I personally want to convince you or anyone of, it’s more that in the absence of something like that, then what purpose does philosophy serve? As I’ve said before, I think It corresponds to the vertical axis along which quality or virtue is measured. That is even in keeping with the Aristotelian notion of wisdom, as I understand it. (Of course there’s also the Wittgensteinian parable of discarding the ladder after you use it, but it still assumes the need for a ladder.)
Look at science. Science is a way of ‘higher knowledge’ in a sense - in fact, that’s where it started, back before science, philosophy and religion were all thought of as separate. But the point about science is to arrive at a knowledge of causes and principles that couldn’t be gained without the methodical and systematic approach of science, and without building on the accumulated knowledge of the tradition (‘standing on the shoulders of giants’). The issue is that science, as you already noted, assumes a stance of ‘man and nature’ or ‘observer and observed’ which imposes a particular kind of mentality at the outset. Whereas the ‘scientia sacra’ (sacred sciences) of the perennial traditions are conducted within a different context, where the subject of the science is oneself, or rather, being qua being (with oneself as an epitome.)
(There was a really good and important Aeon article in January, The Blind Spot - Science as the Neglect of Lived Experience. It goes into this whole notion of the stance of ‘otherness’ that underwrites modern science and its limitations. And one of the contributors is Evan Thomson, whose most recent book Waking, Dreaming, Being is grounded in science, phenomenology, and Buddhist Abhidharma. This is also the kind of philosophy that Josh here talks about.)
But I disagree that these kinds of insights are only personal or private. In fact that seems to be our principle disagreement - that you recognise the importance of such experiential realisation, but you say that it is only ever first-person, can’t be communicated, and so on. Whereas I believe that a key part of the role of philosophy is in communicating that kind of understanding - otherwise, again, why philosophy? If nobody has wisdom, or if wisdom is what everyone already has, then what is the point of the discipline? Understanding the need for a vertical axis or dimension is fundamental to that as far as I’m concerned, so let’s just agree to disagree on that point.
Granted that God has not been proven to be dead. A meaningless God, however, is for all intents and purposes, dead.
I am not actually saying that they are. I think they are essentially human insights; insights which belong to the human as surely as instinct does to the animal. In fact, I don't believe they are inherently different to instinct; they manifest the immanent "wisdom" of the Cosmos, so to speak, the wisdom that explains how animals know what to do, and even know things, the knowing of which seems inexplicable to us. Not everything about wisdom can be explained and its conclusions or principles cannot be strictly warranted by evidence and argument.
I do agree with you that philosophy (in one of its guises at least) deals with wisdom. But since it consists in communicable ideas, anything that purports to be wisdom should be communicable as such in everyday terms; things such as the golden rule or the idea that harming another harms the self, for example. Communicable but not necessarily demonstrable! Philosophy cannot give us knowledge about what happens after death, or whether karma is real, or whether there is a God, and so on. What it can give us knowledge of, in its critical mode, is what we could possibly have good reason to believe and what we definitely, at least at the moment, do not. So, I believe that the discursive dialectical practice of philosophy is essentially an exercise in skepticism, in learning to withhold judgement in matters which cannot by their very nature, or at least currently, yield sufficient evidence to support any conclusions.
I totally disagree with the idea that a "vertical axis" can be made philosophically coherent without relying on unwarranted assumptions, so I guess we will just have to agree to disagree about that. :smile:
No doubt, it will come up again. ;-)
Modern culture is more individualistic, but we nevertheless share all sorts of fictions and ideologies, as well as willingly follow worthy leaders.
Subjective meaning clearly exists but the position that there is no objective meaning is correct. You have taken up an interpretation surrounding the importance of biology and evolutionary purpose, this is also lacking any truth, beyond the truth it has to you as a compelling idea.
All things wax and wane, and in time you'll shed this notion off when it becomes burdensome.
As it is, you're already shedding - having given yourself, your thinking and your offspring, some meaning.
If things were truly meaningless to you, you would not care for either of these, let alone write about them.
An absolutely meaningless world, is an absolutely meaningful world.
Being nothing in particular, it can be and so it is - everything.
Absurd ideas may become common and common ideas may become absurd.
Don't dwell on the steps, just dance the dance.
noted.
I'd say it's important to realize that making distinctions, noting differences, etc. doesn't equate to separation in the sense that it seems you're using that term (which seems to have value connotations related to isolation, inability to interact, loneliness, despair, etc.), and it certainly doesn't equate to hatred. It's important to be cognizant of distinctions and differences, otherwise you might put your socks in the toaster--and wind up burning down your house, or you might search for your lost car keys in the forest even though you haven't been in the forest since you last had your keys. Noting that meaning isn't everywhere, that it's only in/of minds, that minds aren't everywhere, etc. is simply making the same sorts of distinctions that we make between bread and socks, between one being in the pantry and the other in a dresser, etc.
Around and around we go.
Again I ask, what is "spiritual"? How is this any different than the Christian belief that God is everywhere and in everything? How is it not an anthropomorphic projection of one's mind onto the universe? How is that not Quoting Janus?
Your ideas are not absurd, you're merely now facing the absurd as, hopefully, we all do eventually. Whatever lead to your disillusionment, your only choice is to find meaning for yourself, or to live in 'bad faith'. Clearly, being a "successful biological organism" is rather devoid of meaning.
There are two basic approaches to dealing with the absurd that I've found to be successful. One is to simply fulfill our natural desire for meaning as well as possible. This is actually simple and straightforward, and a decent guide could probably be found in any self-help book section. The other approach is to transcend the absurd via spiritual practice or contemplation. A desire for meaning is strongly tied to self-identity, and contemplative practice can mediate the conflicts generated by our sense of self.
Have faith and be an absurd hero. :razz:
It was stupid of me to claim that the vast majority of religious authorities have been proven to be frauds. That hasn't been proven and I doubt the majority are intentionally deceitful. It may be fair to say that Wayfarer, who I believe is a Buddhist, disagrees with the vast majority of spiritual authorities. That doesn't mean that he hates them. In fact, I would guess that he considers them something like kindred spirits, all living under the general banner of religion or perhaps some form of idealism. In that way, they are all of the same tribe.
How so? Wouldnt it be dependent on how one defined, "successful" or what entails "success"?
What does this even mean? What exactly are you saying that is absurd?
Yes, certainly, but without the narrative it sounds rather bleak.
A narrative can be bleak. Which narrative?
How is life absurd?
Quoting Harry Hindu
Whichever one defines, "successful" or what entails "success," I assume.
I asked why life is absurd. It seems to me that youre saying its simply a way of thinking.
Quoting praxis
How is something that is successful, bleak?
Well, legend has it that Sisyphus successfully rolled a rock up a hill. :party:
Quoting Harry Hindu
As opposed to what? It's also a matter of experiencing the feeling of meaninglessness.
I dont see the bleakness in the above quote.
Quoting praxis
As opposed to the fact that life is actually absurd, which is why I asked why life is absurd. Is it actually absurd, or do some people just think that and why?
Good of you to say so. When I first started reading these things I was very negative about mainstream religion, and believed that Eastern spirituality was something completely different to that. But my views have changed over time, because I have found, shall we say, pockets of wisdom in many different places (although I also acknowledge that there's a lot of fallacious religious beliefs and delusions.)
But apart from all that, what I'm arguing is that the way religious authority was imposed on Western culture, and the violence that it caused, is one of the causes of the reaction against it in the form of secularism, or philosophies that try to define everything without reference to religion - like, 'Anything But God'. But that reaction is very much culturally conditioned - so we tend to absorb it, without really being conscious of the background to it. So it's a matter of becoming critically aware of this background, rather than simply lashing out against it, as many tend to do.
Great point. :up:
If you can find an error in any of my “claims” then please point them out, @Harry Hindu.
How do you distinguish between fallacious religious beliefs and non-fallacious religious beliefs? Is there more evidence for your religious beliefs than say a belief in Odin?
I wouldn't make the effort with those who aren't interested in the subject.
I've been on internet forums for around ten years now, and most discussions of religion are what I call 'coconut shy arguments':
:smile:
Frankly, I don’t see much of a difference between an organized religion and any other sort of ideology or shared fiction. Religion is particularly powerful because it has existential meaning or significance, but the essential function is the same, which is binding large groups of people with comma goals and values so they can act cooperatively.
Trumpism, for example, is a developing ideology (I use the term loosely) where its adherents value the solidarity of the group more than they value the truth. It’s reported that Trump has made more than 10k false claims since his inauguration. Yesterday Trump claimed that Mueller is a “never Trumper,” signaling to his followers that, though Republican, he’s still a heathen. I mean, isn’t that bizarre language for a president to use, a never-Trumper?
I know you’re not a Trump fan and that’s why I use his example. Surely his ability to influence his supporters, or rather the manner of his influence, concerns you.
Quoting praxis
Plotinus thought of his religious philosophy in terms of ‘the flight of the alone to the alone’. That is the element in philosophical spirituality which speaks to me.
The reaction against religious belief in the form of secularism is centered in concern with irrationality, is my point.
I don’t think anyone will care if I declare life or the universe absurd. Anyway, if that were known it wouldn’t be a philosophical matter. Why do some think it is? Because they’re not comfortable with not knowing, I suppose.
What do you think?
E F Schumacher, economist and philosopher; talk given on BBC Radio The Insufficiency of Liberalism, 1957 (from The Education of E F Schumacher).
So, I get you don't like it, but maybe one day you'll be ready for it. ;-)
How can I find error in your claims if you don't answer my questions? You error would be in avoiding my questions. They should be questions you should be asking yourself.
Quoting praxis
Then why did you seem to care, and think that I cared, that Camus declared that life is absurd?
Quoting praxis
Quoting praxis
Exactly. Practicing philosophy in an intellectually honest way requires us to feign ignorance of our own beliefs that we often take for granted - to look at our beliefs in a more objective light. This is what I did when I was a Christian that eventually led me to a "180" in my worldview. I questioned the beliefs that I took for granted.
Quoting praxis
I think that you have just described the God of the Gaps.
If I wasn't interested, I wouldn't be wasting my time asking the question.
I've been on internet forums for about 15 years and I have found that all religious claims are simply a use of loaded language.
Liberty to do what? I've gotten to the point where I'm staring at a glass of water in the bathroom and thinking "Well, should I drink this? Should I prolong this life of meaningless existence? On the other hand, it doesn't make me more holy than existence to die of thirst."
Sure, but the choice of purpose is totally arbitrary, and it's hard to get excited about something superfluous. What I'm saying is that I think I have a way out of this: "being an animal" being my purpose, I'm avoiding the entire mountain of cultural accretions.
Those accretions run deeper than you may realize.
Well of course in the long run we're all dead and then the universe will run out of heat but in the meantime we can live our biology. The idea that this is "lacking in truth" -- compared with something like "my vote matters" or "I am a child of God" -- is what I'm saying otherwise about. Biology seems like the default truth, the least arbitrary truth, and hence the surest basis for meaning (purpose).
I don't think it does at all. It means my flirting has meaning. It means sex has meaning. It means dominance signaling with other males has meaning. It means procreation has meaning. It means parenting has meaning(since mammals rear their young). It means extended family and clan have meaning. Ultimately it means culture has meaning, in the sense of education as further young-rearing.
Neitzsche's got a line somewhere where he doesn't care if something is true or false, but he looks rather at the functional effect on the species. I don't care so much about the species (or, eg "white people") -- I keep the focus on myself and my immediate kin.
Sacred entails non human. Fully valorizing what isn't human, and fear of autonomous history or time without subjecting it to abolition and recreation. In a way, prehistory or the Golden Age could be considered sacred. It doesn't make sense to attach special importance to recorded, additive time, lineal historicity, or to treat modernity as more advanced. It isn't more advanced for all we know.
Quoting Harry Hindu
Animism is more the opposite of what you say here. Human exceptionalism has never been higher than it is today. If this is the concern, religion has played a minor, though not exempt, role compared to what has occurred since the Enlightenment, which gave rise to a belief that nothing ought to be subscribed to that couldn't be measured.
The Enlightenment has led to transhumanism, the most human-centered orientation ever; to be sure the post human thinks he is the focus of creation. It's already an anthropocentric view to think in terms of a creation, we don't know if the universe had a beginning. Ancient or modern anthropolatry hardly makes a difference to my way of seeing things. How I choose to sculpt my belief system takes more from archaic ontology (less object proliferation determinism), however, than mania of physicalism we have today. How has so much overextension into physicalism orientation transpired when we have met survival needs, keeping the organism alive, probably 10,000 years ago? A prodigy. Must be for sport, play, or carnival or whatever, beat me. Somehow excessive concern with material things has led to many, many unnecessary objects to exist, and determinism that came with said objects. It isn't a parsimonious or Occam's razor situation we have today, hate to say.
For a biological organism, success is reproduction. With mammals this includes child-rearing. With humans one could argue it includes "culture".
By pointing out the error in the claim, of course.
I haven’t claimed to be avoiding your questions.
I didn’t assume that you cared. I simply pointed out an absurdist when you inquired about the meaning of the absurd.
I care because it’s a valuable way to talk about nihilism.
Nonsense, I’ve made no metaphysical description or claim whatever.
What do you think?
What about mules?
To be a successful biological organism all you need to do is stay alive. All the other things you mention are optional to your declared purpose.
That's not a matter of wanting there to be purposes where there are none, though.
It's an issue of not being satisfied with the fact that purposes are something that we create for ourselves.
They're not arbitrary in the sense of "random," by the way.
So what we'd need to diagnose is why self-created purposes aren't intuitively good enough in your view.
So what your ideas are better than others, is basically what you're saying. Just as all others with their own idea of what matters, self-assuredly convinced you're the one making sense. You are not a nihilist, you're just someone who believes their interpretations are better than those of others.
Reproduction is the measure of success? Go reproduce then, grow old, and just before you die and with a smile on your face tell yourself "good job". Your nihilism is not nihilism though, Your opinion, however, puts you in the category with the majority of people, who are like you, not nihilists.
Cockroaches and viruses are non human. Are they sacred?
Quoting Anthony
I also said that it is an anthropomorphic projection of a human mind onto the universe. I gave the definition per Wikipedia in that same post, where it is believed that everything has a spiritual essence. What is the difference between the spiritual and the mental, or the spirit and the mind?
Quoting AnthonyYou're forgetting how modern science has taken humans off of their pedestal and placed them squarely within the natural domain, as a product of natural processes, and moved human's home - Earth, from the center of the universe to a remote place in the universe. Science is what has shown us that we aren't as important as we think, and it is science that the religious fear because it removes humans special place in reality. Science humbles. Religion inflates one's own self-importance. Just look at the haughty claims made by the religious and spiritualists. They make claims of truth and don't question it. Science constantly questions its own claims.
Exactly. How can a human reproduce without participating in culture?
This type of talk also exemplifies the limited way in which most people view reproduction. What does reproduction entail - just sex? Did one successfully reproduce if the child is never born, or the child dies before coming of reproductive age themselves? What if the child becomes a mass murderer? Is that a successful reproduction? It seems to me that "being a good parent" is just another way of saying, "successful reproduction". If one finds meaning in being a good parent, do you get to tell them that that is meaningless? Who, or what, defines one's own meaning? What is "meaning"? I gave my take in the first post of this thread because as always in these philosophical discussions, the terms we use need to be clearly defined.
For one, I never said there were errors in your claims. I said that they were incoherent, hence the follow-up questions that you avoided.
Quoting praxis
Quoting Harry Hindu
This isn't an error that I pointed out and you ignored?
Quoting praxis
:roll: I never said you "claimed" to be avoiding my questions. You don't need to claim avoid a question, you actually do it. Actions (or inaction in this case) speak louder than words.
Quoting praxis
Why would you assume that I didn't care if I was participating in the discussion? Again actions speak louder than words. My actions speak for themselves, so how you assumed that I didn't care, I have no idea. When someone abandons the discussion, then that is when they show that they no longer care.
Quoting praxis
You made a claim about why people think life is absurd. I pointed out that is equivalent to a God of the Gaps argument. Some people aren't comfortable with not knowing something, so they create their own answers, or meanings for their existence. That is fine, as it is what I said in the my first post in this thread. One can create has meaning in their actions. It is when they project that same meaning onto others - as if they have the same meaning - is when we run into debates like this.
Quoting praxis
What exactly does this mean - that philosophy doesn't provide answers or even knowledge to such questions, so we should keep in the philosophical domain to never be answered?
I knew that you knew what I meant with the Sisyphus reference. You even readily acknowledged your feigned ignorance. Then you fault me for ignoring the question, and go on to suggest that pretending to be ignorant is a good method in philosophizing.
A waste.
Quoting Harry Hindu
I don't presume to know how you feel about absurdism. I still don't know your thoughts about it.
Quoting Harry Hindu
Why do we care if people are making that fallacy if they're not participating in this debate?
Quoting Harry Hindu
People usually need to think about a question before they can answer it. Some question may never be answered, at least not within our lifetime.
So now youre claiming to be able to read minds. I didnt get what you meant. Really. Because it is logically inconsistent. If what you meant was so easily obvious then why not explain it instead of wasting your time with what you typed.
Your arguments are pathetic.
I seriously don’t know if I can believe that at this point.
What is the inconsistency? I asked you before what the error was and you failed to point it out. Are you just trolling?
Maybe your hostility expresses a frustration with an intellectual or existentialist approach to dealing with the absurd. There are only two ways, as I mentioned earlier, to effectively deal with it. Either pragmatically develop meaning in your life and/or transcend it through contemplative practice. Those are the only real choices.
I don’t recall making an argument in this topic, at least not in dealing with you.
Since meaning depends on the individual, there is no absolute meaning, but there is personal meaning.
Watch how the concept of meaning arise. Say you want to build a shack, and you need a hammer to build it, then you feel the hammer is meaningful to you, because you need it to reach something that you want. More generally, we deem something to have meaning when we deem it useful to reach something that we want.
So it is obvious many things have meaning to many people, and presumably many things have meaning to you, for instance you deem it meaningful to come on this forum because you consider it might help you reach something that you want. Which is to know what you should do, to know what to do with your life, to find some absolute standard that would tell you why you should pick a specific course of action over some other one.
And your trouble here is with the idea that there is no such absolute standard, no absolute meaning, no desire shared by everyone and nothing seen as useful by everyone. But why does this trouble you? Why should you only do something that is seen as useful by everyone, what would be the problem with doing something that other people see as useless? You fear that they might judge you negatively? And if they do, so what?
You want to live, so live your life how you want to live it. Then you will see meaning in a lot of things. These things won't have absolute meaning, but you won't care, because they will have meaning to you.
No, this is wrong, for the very obvious reason that the relationship between cause and effect is meaningless without value and purpose. One thing does not cause another thing to happen. Causes are identified based on our values and goals.
Quoting Harry Hindu
What is that supposed to mean?
Quoting Harry Hindu
Communication requires shared values and goals. That's what makes communication possible. If an alien intelligence with entirely different values and goals tied to communicate with us, even the most basic forms of communication would appear nonsensical or meaningless.
Quoting Harry Hindu
Then how are choices, such as religious celibacy, hunger-striking, or simply suicide, possible?
Quoting Harry Hindu
Because of the incongruity between his desire for meaning and the apparent lack of meaning in the world that he lives in.
It is the old Taoist paradox: finding meaning in the meaningless. That it is all meaningless, is something that we should be greatly worried about. Here, there is meaning enough for all.
It's not so much of a paradox if we realize that we're creating meaning "in the meaningless."
It is analogous to the notion of "something out of nothing"; which also isn't much of a paradox if we realize that nothing is creating something.
You just need to have a non-Aspie understanding of "create."
A post-copulous intellect.
I disagree. We're not even individuals on the level I'm talking about, we're just machines for the transmission of our selfish genes. So why not accept that, and base one's values around that?
It only makes sense if you actually want to have children or whatever. If those things are actually meaningful to you, rather than you merely adopting social cues as to what's meaningful.
The so-called 'selfish genes' doesn't much care if you propagate your genes because it knows that you have siblings and such, who's genes are practically the same as your own. As long as you're supportive of them the selfish genes are selfishly happy.
I like how you use the word "diagnose", giving the connotation of my views being some kind of sickness.
Anyway, when I said that "nothing has meaning", I really meant something along the lines of "nothing has any value". All human values are equally meaningless, hence the selection of them is more or less arbitrary (they have nothing objectively to recommend them over other values). So why not go prior to the "human" and back to the animal? One of the least controversial things that can be said (leaving aside christians or scientologists) is that humans are evolved machines for genetic transmission. Values based on that account of existence would be prior to any socially derived value.
Wouldn't we be any and everything that we do?
If you realize that values are subjective, why would you even look for something objective to recommend them? Isn't that looking in the wrong place in that case?
Your tone of blame implies that you think your view is superior to mine.
Are you really going to try and tell me my DNA "knows" I have siblings? Tsk, tsk.
Well, you could certainly subvert this principle with a view such as "I'm not going to have kids because it's selfish".
Out of curiosity, would you call mathematics biological - as they're clearly social?
In a sense, that’s why people are far more likely to donate a kidney, for example, to a niece or nephew than they are to some rando kid.
Personally, if you're interested in knowing, I find math biological, inadvertently so.
Having preferences is a way that our brains work. You can't avoid it unless you have a very, very different psychology that would be diagnosed as some sort of medical disorder.
It's a fact that all values are subjective. It's important to realize this fact and work with it, not expecting values to be something that they're not.
I don't understand your comment, nihilism is an indiscriminate view and places all claims of objective meaning into the same category. That you separate the meaningful from the meaningless, caring about value and truth doesn't necessarily make what you're saying invalid or wrong but in your example, where you give your thoughts about "the value of products of the human mind" - this is not a nihilistic claim and most people hold beliefs contrary to others about the meaning and value of things.
I certainly think my view is superior to yours but that's just me playing out my nature as a human being and not necessarily indicative of anything. :grin: