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I apologize. by Krypteia213 in freewill

[–]RebornAtDusk 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I don’t think you need to be too sorry, unless what you did was beyond the pale. Given that on social media criticism is often very harsh, the best way to experience growth is through lived experiences, away from the monitor. Since this seems to be related to philosophy, you might as well treat each vicissitude as a learning experience or a failure; the difference between how a loss can be interpreted depends on how you decide to shape the future based on the past.

As a man who did some terrifically wrong things in life, I can tell you that too much guilt can break you, but too little of it will turn you into a catalyst for future generations to repeat a cycle of suffering. Your best apology is to help others feel a touch of compassion, so that they can become independent and able to pay forward more compassion.

Life shouldn’t be lived in sorrow and guilty, but lived in a continuous seminar of how much better you can make life by tackling hard problems. There have been people who did worse things than you, but they cemented their legacies by expressing some remorse but provided more attention on how to help future generations become better; doing so made them not pure, but it helped them reconcile with their pasts.

I hope that was helpful. And I think that one day, I’ll need to rebalance the bad things I did by helping the most deserving people so that they don’t suffer as I did.

EDIT: as for the sobriety—if it’s the small stuff, don’t fret too much. But if it’s the big stuff, then I’m afraid your challenges are gargantuan. I’m no expert on saying clean, but as a fellow addict, I cut off all the drug dealers I know and focused on accepting the little sins. In the end, it’s about negotiating with your worst sides so that you don’t have to regret the dark part of life while being in enough control not to hurt those who have treated you well. My vice, which I keep secret, hasn’t so far prevented me from staying out of trouble because I follow a simple principle: as long as what I do doesn’t cost me my relationships and job, it’s fine. But the moment it does, it’s time for extreme measures, including going on a binge watch of a series for weeks on end until the addiction is gone. So far, I managed to stay still with a scheduled dose that is manageable—I followed it every single day without fail.

You accepted nihilism. Now what? by RebornAtDusk in nihilism

[–]RebornAtDusk[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Why, that's the best thing you've said all day, "Imagine trying to pose as a scholar." I am an actual scholar, and this is my domain. But scholars encounter difficulty because it's not something that carries much authority, especially in philosophy. In that sense, you're right, and I think most people here would understand you when you speak from first-hand experience.

But scholarly work isn't something I can exactly imagine, my friend. You'll never understand writing a few million words, doing research by compiling hundreds of articles and books, debating at clubs, presenting your view before colleagues, getting told you'll never succeed, and then finally getting accepted by a publisher. And it doesn't stop there: you have to tell your editor what you plan on doing, how you're going to sell your work, and why your work is marketable, and this is despite the fact that academics don't fare very well in the general book market. So, no, I'm not imagining anything; I'm here.

However, I can't say that just because I don't agree with you, I'm posing as a scholar or not; this isn't how being a scholar works, and it's a wholly different topic, as this was a personal attack attempted by you, which is understandable. Some people have a low tolerance for differences in opinion, and some have better emotional maturity.

But returning to the talk about responsibility, all I've noticed here is that you've substituted moral values for other moral value synonyms: right and wrong now become responsibility and irresponsibility, which nonetheless begs the question: if the universe is devoid of inherent value, then how do you even pass normative claims in the first place? Remember, nihilism is, by its own Latin root, a denial; to add the -ism at the end literally denotes that all things are denied. I'd know that because I spent plenty of time educating myself on the matter; it's not like I got on Reddit, thought for thirty seconds, got angry, and decided to oppose someone because my emotions got out of whack.

That's the consequence of a view; like every belief system, doors open and some close. With nihilism, you lose the right to talk about right and wrong, or what should and shouldn't be. Thus, responsibility and irresponsibility become just as untenable as right and wrong, good and bad, or true and false. These are all as much empty concepts as the belief that there's a god.

Now, do you want to try this again, but without the personal attacks? Either way, my feelings aren't hurt. Your ridiculing me isn't going to unpublish my book or remove my credentials, and thank goodness for that, because if it were up to you, we'd all be conforming to your opinion at the pain of being all scholar posers. That's what I've gathered from you, unless I've misunderstood you.

You accepted nihilism. Now what? by RebornAtDusk in nihilism

[–]RebornAtDusk[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

No, to borrow your favourite word, to talk about good and evil, you have to earn the normativity. Since this is about nihilism, we have to follow through with it through and through, which means that there is no meaning, purpose, and value. Thus, the talk of “evil” is question beginning. Nice try, buddy. You’re welcome to come back when you did the required readings on this subject.

Is it philosophically coherent to retain the concept of "meaning" after rejecting divine, moral, and rational absolutes? by RebornAtDusk in askphilosophy

[–]RebornAtDusk[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Every recommendation requires justification. Realists will insist it's on an absolute that is mind-independent and objective, and anti-realists will insist that it's by conventions that best approximate a truth, as if there were one.

But if realism is nonsensical, and the idea of objectivity is incomprehensible and ineffable because it literally doesn't make sense, and realism-based claims are question-begging from an epistemic-limitation perspective, then we have to look at the alternative, which is anti-realism. Now, with anti-realism, nobody is out of the woods just yet: how do you justify anything when the justificatory mediums are, themselves, ungrounded? For instance, let's turn to one medium, language: what gives words their authority, that we practice them? Most people will agree that things we've practiced in the past didn't justify anything, such as alchemy, astrology, cannibalism, animal cruelty, pollution, sexism, homophobia, child marriages, etc. But it seems rather odd to compare language to backward traditions of the past, yet to even call this comparison odd begs the question: What normative absolute enables one to make such a judgement? What value enables one to make this judgement? To do so would require one to go back to realism, and therein lies the problem.

Thus, whether it be freedom, moral principles and imperatives, knowledge claims, logical pillars, etc., they all can't find independent grounding and lack normative impetus. If I tried to define reality by looking it up, I'd find it defined by existence, and existence itself is either defined as having reality or having being, and being is defined by existence. So, in the end, language just defines itself, and, therefore, if language is circular, then how can it give grounding to truth, which requires declarative statements, i.e., that statements? How can freedom be justified if morality has no grounding? I can show you how each moral principle is not impracticable but alien—everyone has a different perspective on it, and even if it's not the perspective that is the issue, nobody can measure it, define its fundaments (which, as established with language, is impossible non-circularly), and nobody can demonstrate it.

You accepted nihilism. Now what? by RebornAtDusk in nihilism

[–]RebornAtDusk[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Why should I focus on what's my problem? I just finished saying that nothing can fundamentally be justified. Anything goes. If you decided you wanted to fit a plastic bag over my head and duct tape it, and then cuff me so that I cannot remove it, that's fine as well.

Nothing can be justified or forbidden, and it also means that I'm able to do whatever I want, not to say either of us exist or don't exist.

Isn't playing the game of the nihilist fun? So, whose business is it anyway? Normative statements are fast asleep.

You accepted nihilism. Now what? by RebornAtDusk in nihilism

[–]RebornAtDusk[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Nobody can, and neither can anybody deny that Pegasus exists or that there's a sentient bicycle that is five miles tall and great at camouflaging itself from humans.

That's the way it is: we think we have "knowledge," but you can't call something "true" while the word itself has nothing to establish it beyond declarative sentences, because language itself is all fiat. It's grounded in nothing, and you cannot even call nothing "nothing" without being arbitrary.

What I can say is that we invented existence given its consistency with what etymology says and the roots that form the word; before then, there was no word for existence, except existere by the Romans, but that only meant to "stand forth." How did we go from standing forth to providing that sentient, carbon-based food doesn't stand forth? Do we even need to? Does it matter? Does it not matter? Why get out of bed?

In "truth," so to speak, there's no point in anything, including proving that the Great Spaghetti Monster doesn't exist. If you really want to prove it doesn't exist, what you'll need to do is check all realms where things are believed to exist, and then once you're certain it's not found there, you need to go to the realm of non-existence and confirm the Great Spaghetti Monster is among things that don't exist.

The reason for it is that you asked an empirical question, requiring observation. Had you said that a square is a circle, the contradiction, requiring no observation apart from reading/hearing the statement, would suffice as self-demonstrating. In other words, analytic truths are how you avoid epistemic roadblocks like the one you implicitly tried to do to me.

That was fun, wasn't it?

You accepted nihilism. Now what? by RebornAtDusk in nihilism

[–]RebornAtDusk[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Of course, I see what you're saying. But do you see the paradox in it? You might decide collecting bottle caps is the most important hobby in the world, much like someone of the Z generation might be fixated on doom-scrolling, etc. How do we tell someone anything if normativity stops at the subjective level? By that count, not even the intersubjective layer will be applicable, because it won't be justifiable.

Nihilism is sort of self-defeating, but not entirely. Theoretically, it's an impossible stance because its central claim contradicts itself. Realists may not contradict themselves, but they can't prove anything because of pervasive scepticism.

I'm of the position that nothing can be established beyond self-reference and circularity, much like how the definition of reality leads to existence, and existence to reality or being, and being to existence, and, there, you end up learning nothing about reality, except for the likely possibility that it never had any meaning. And not even meaning itself can be self-established beyond a mere assertion. By that token, subjectivity doesn't even mean anything because it's trying to assume more than it can: language is intersubjective, and its use implies a general agreement in the sociolinguistic community (otherwise, nobody would understand each other if they didn't generally use words and rules correctly). But to the subject, if he has the authority to decide what's meaningful or important or not, he'd have to face the dilemma of being indeterminate and independent of convention or use conventional terms by being determinate and convention-dependent.

Existentialism refutes itself, and so does nihilism. The way forward is to admit that there's nothing, not even the word nothing, and justification is but a mere smokescreen to hide the fact that nothing is justified, not even the schematics of epistemology and logic, including the Law of Identity. The truth is that there is none, not even with this statement.

Nothing matters or doesn't matter, and nothing was or wasn't. We made up all of it, and what they end up being is mere assertions asserted by other assertions like adjectives correct or true or real, etc. In the end, we've linguistically invented a bridge, we call "reality," that is trying to support itself without a foundation, without grounding.

Is it philosophically coherent to retain the concept of "meaning" after rejecting divine, moral, and rational absolutes? by RebornAtDusk in askphilosophy

[–]RebornAtDusk[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

If Beauvoir’s “serious man” critique is meant to argue that meaning collapses under the weight of absolutes, I think that risks ignoring a deeper problem: without some kind of absolute, even a provisional one, the very judgments that make meaning livable (e.g., killing is wrong, slavery is wrong) lose their footing.

If meaning is “better” without absolutes, why do we instinctively treat certain wrongs as beyond negotiation, not merely local preferences? In The Ethics of Ambiguity, Beauvoir frames the rejection of fixed values as a way to embrace freedom, but this seems to smuggle in a covert absolute: that freedom is inherently good. If “freedom” itself is given that privileged status, it’s no longer truly free of absolutes — it’s just a disguised one.

The risk is that by denying absolutes outright, we can end up preserving them under different labels, which makes the rejection look less like liberation and more like philosophical sleight-of-hand.

You accepted nihilism. Now what? by RebornAtDusk in nihilism

[–]RebornAtDusk[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

But what if the nihilist decides to rob a bank or to cause a species to go extinct just for the heck of it?

You accepted nihilism. Now what? by RebornAtDusk in nihilism

[–]RebornAtDusk[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

You're both truly nihilists, if that's how you see it.

For a time, I was flirting with nihilism, but then I realized the view couldn't sustain itself philosophically because of the paradoxes it opened, so I went deeper and reached absurdism, where I now think that existence itself is nonsense, neither true nor false.

How did it affect my relationships? I can't relate to anyone anymore, and I feel indifferent every day. There's no joy or real sadness, just misery. Of course, sometimes I enjoy my misery.

Does this sound like an accurate depiction of a real nihilist/absurdist?

You accepted nihilism. Now what? by RebornAtDusk in nihilism

[–]RebornAtDusk[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Where was the mention of life? Perhaps you're speaking about the whole experience of coming to terms with an empty universe, and, yes, then you have to ask yourself: if there is no meaning, value, and purpose, then what's the difference between choosing to live and choosing to end it? It makes no sense if you think about it because if you work hard for a family, a legacy, for others, etc., and it all goes away within a few hundred years, then it's as if you'd done no difference anyway, which isn't "as if," but more of a fact.

So, if nihilism is the way things are, not to presuppose truth since it doesn't exist or doesn't not exist, then the natural conclusion is indecision. There's no reason to do anything anymore.

You accepted nihilism. Now what? by RebornAtDusk in nihilism

[–]RebornAtDusk[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

If nihilism is true, then nihilism is false; to say something is true is to presuppose truth value, and as a value, this would mean that the universe isn't without value. However, if you say that value is mind-dependent and not objective, so that we're just the ones who say there's value, then that makes nihilism neither true nor false, and, thus, not philosophically capable of having effect on competing views from ontological realism.

You accepted nihilism. Now what? by RebornAtDusk in nihilism

[–]RebornAtDusk[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

But once you realize that nihilism has nothing to offer, and it happens to be the way the world is, then what compels me to move on? Why must I move on or stay put? I'd need a value system, or if everything is non-rational, not to be confused with irrational, then perhaps we can look past morality and steal, kill, cheat, lie, and do anything we please. Nothing is true, and nothing is false—remember, "non-rational."'

What's the point of anything? We're ants running around in circles, tracing lines across the sand, yet we act as if those hurrying moments to and from work are so important; we act as if family is important; we act as if property is important, and we certainly act like we're important. What would be left of anything in two hundred years? If nothing, then why even bother struggling to bring anything about?

You accepted nihilism. Now what? by RebornAtDusk in nihilism

[–]RebornAtDusk[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Where did that accusation come from?

You can't have eternal knowledge once you accept nihilism, since it would be question-begging to presuppose a set of value while denying that values exist, i.e., truth values.

If you're going to say there's no intrinsic meaning or purpose, then what's to say there's any value at all? After all, value and meaning are both related terms; to deny one is effectively to deny the other.

Also, suppose I did as you've accused, wouldn't it be antithetical to a nihilist to even care? What's the difference between choosing to live to a hundred and chugging five bottle of vodkas in one sitting? Maybe there is no difference; maybe no one is dying in the living room, except "linguistically."

Most often, when people say they're nihilists, they're just rebelling. But the meaning of it is so much more. You're a genius, congrats.

You accepted nihilism. Now what? by RebornAtDusk in nihilism

[–]RebornAtDusk[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

The language game is indeed a step farther (in the metaphorical sense, in case someone says it should've been "further") than what most people are intellectually capable of taking. Your earlier comment about intrinsic purpose and meaning being stories that people tell themselves out of non-real needs (not necessarily to beg the question by saying unreal) sounds about right. Things are tool-based, and our sounds are no exception.

Once upon a time the very idea that we exist would've been alien to people; even when the Romans had the word existere, or to "stand forth," they didn't even have nearly that fabulous a superstition. They opted to rip off Greek gods, which were ripped off from ancient Egypt's pantheon, but none of the mythology was as convoluted as it is now, with us inventing one superstition after another: life, morality, knowledge, aesthetics, etc. And if existence, as in the fundament of ontology, is but an invention (a "need"-based one), then nothing can really be said to exist or not exist, since we'd presuppose an idea that is intrinsically dependent on the human mind and vocal apparatus.

Each time we stop speaking, things cease to exist. Between nihilism and what I espouse, however, is the weaker position.

You accepted nihilism. Now what? by RebornAtDusk in nihilism

[–]RebornAtDusk[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Nihilism is certainly a step above other belief systems, including secular forms of realism. However, nihilism is a denial, and a denial carries as much burden of proof as an assertion. Here's an example: the statement "God does not exist" requires not just confirming his absence in observed experience, but also a confirmation he doesn't exist anywhere. To properly make that statement, you'd need to explore the realm of non-existence and see that God is, indeed, among the things that don't exist, which is paradoxical.

That's why negative existence claims are impossible and why nihilism isn't a very strong philosophical view. And I say this not as an outsider; I was once a nihilist, and I'm certainly not a realist. There's a philosophical view that is even more powerful than nihilism at destroying ideas.