Thank you for your recommendations. It was interesting to read.

I think thinking about nihilism like believing in nothing is far too simple. I think it is rather to think nothing deserves us to stress about it. Painful situations, and good and bad experiences do not last forever. Nothing in our world deserves our attention more than necessary. We need clothing to protect our bodies and food to stay healthy like medicine when we get sick. But none of these aspects deserves our attention, none of them deserves to become the priority of our lives.

Thank you for your response. I think nihilistic perceptions of life are based on pessimism, sense of boredom, and the unability to pursue meaningful goals. I agree that both good and bad experiences won't last forever, and it's important to stay calm, balancing reality with the temporality of things.

Perhaps you might be interested in a more positive take on nihilism, viz. Optimistic Nihilism: https://medium.com/@steveinadelaide/optimistic-nihilism-a-creative-approach-to-existence-provided-you-exercise-caution-a698ff339596

Thank you for sharing the article; it was really interesting. I think nihilism mostly affects individuals negatively, even when viewed through optimistic perspectives. Optimistic nihilism doesn’t pave a path toward meaning but just helps people become comfortable with the idea of meaninglessness. Life indeed possesses objective meaning, which is interpreted subjectively based on one's worldview, values, and ideological depth.

Amalya Sukiasyan

You wrote: "Life indeed possesses objective meaning, which is interpreted subjectively based on one's worldview, values, and ideological depth."

On what basis do you say this, and how would you respond to those people who say that life could only have meaning that derives from human1 purposes, interests, projects, relationships, and accomplishments? (I suppose one could still say that that life objectively possesses the potential for such human-conferred meaningfulness.)

________

1 Of course there are also those folks who would base a claim of objective meaning on divine purposes, but I am presuming that that's not your position.

Karl Pfeifer, thank you for your thoughtful remarks. Various philosophers have confirmed the objective meaning of life, highlighting its intrinsic purpose and cosmic harmony. For instance, Kant emphasized that life’s objective meaning can be grounded in moral duty and reason. He argued that humans, as rational beings, are bound by the categorical imperative, which provides a universal moral law. Similarly, Plato believed in a higher purpose rooted in the realm of eternal Forms, asserting that life’s meaning is in aligning oneself with absolute truths such as justice, beauty, and goodness.

Since the objective meaning of life is demonstrated in various ways, based on individuals' values and worldview, the epistemic weight of meaning takes a subjective form. I believe that divine power governs the universe and its regularities, and the exceptional harmony of existence leaves no room for randomness.

Amalya Sukiasyan Divine power? So my presumption was wrong. Regarding moral duty, what is your position on the Euthyphro argument?

Thank you for sharing your perspectives. Moral relativism is indeed an important aspect in exploring the multifaceted essence of goodness. Having written about the optimistic, realistic, and nihilistic perceptions of life, I meant the vast and multidimensional nature of human consciousness. These neurocognitive dimensions can be analyzed both in the context of emotivism and as psychological aspects. The same situation can be interpreted differently by different people, depending on their reality-grounded nature, optimistic or nihilistic perspectives. This expresses the subjective value of those perceptions. On the other hand, human consciousness is not steady: it's dynamic, evolving, and constantly changing. As psychological aspects, optimistic, realistic, and nihilistic perceptions of life are interrelated and sometimes conditioned by the presence or absence of the other perspectives. These psycho-emotional dimensions are not only interconnected but also are enriched by being used as compound terms, such as realistic optimism, optimistic nihilism, or nihilistic realism.

Karl Pfeifer, moral duty, as an absolute principle of justice, equality, and eternal values, shatters the walls of evil, small-mindedness, and deep indifference. The Euthyphro Argument highlights the importance of goodness and its universal power to improve the human condition.

Plato challenged conventional thinking by asking: "Is something good because the gods command it, or do the gods command it because it is good?" In my perspective, it's context-dependent, but in many cases, goodness is identical to God. As William Tyndale said, "God’s goodness is the root of all goodness; and our goodness, if we have any, springs out of His goodness." However, atheists, while not interpreting the world's mysteries through spiritual lenses, follow the imperative of moral duty, valuing the importance of goodness. That is to say, moral goodness is unconventional and is not always dependent on one's divine perceptions.

Damian Wayne Williams, I think the Tyndale quote reflects not only the goodness of God but also the divine essence in humankind.

Damian Wayne Williams, yes, human nature is not always the reflection of higher truths or divine goodness, and sometimes doesn't even realize it.

Damian Wayne Williams

RE: 'Christ too was given the choice whether to 'pay' such a price, or 'play such a role' by God'

Since Christ=God that is a strange kind of choice. Divine schizophrenia (= one of the possibilities indicated in my Chapter Pantheism as Panpsychism

Damian Wayne Williams

Yes, "multiple personality disorder" (or the currently favored description "dissociative identity disorder") might be a better description, with less extraneous baggage. I guess the nub is how to construe the situation when the different personalities "talk" to one another and I was thinking in terms of Julian Jaynes's take on Greek gods and auditory hallucinations. Also, my mindset was influenced by an old paper by Jack Macintosh (which unfortunately I can't locate) in which he argued against an interpretation of multiple personalities as multiple persons in favor of multiple personalities as one person playing multiple roles, which can involve the sort of hallucinations indicative of schizophernia. Admittedly there's stuff here that I still haven't sorted out properly.

Damian Wayne Williams

Yes, a literal Trinity is bad enough, since it violates the idea of identity qua equivalence relation, yet without the pretence of a viable literal construal, the mystery is diminished. Identifying the Word with God seems like a crude category mistake. Of course it's a trope, but it reeks of ancient-Egyptian-style word magic and again lends an air of mystery.

There are without a doubt many problems with ancient sources and their sanctioned present-day translations and interpretations. But we can still try to make sense of various formulations and construals as "found objects".

Damian Wayne Williams

Just to be sure we're talking about the same thing:

• Reflexivity. A binary relation R is said to be reflexive iff (∀x)Rxx.

• Symmetry. R is symmetric iff (∀x)(∀y)(Rxy → Ryx).

• Transitivity. R is transitive iff (∀x)(∀y)(∀z)[(Rxy & Ryz) → Rxz].

• If R has all three of these properties, then R is an equivalence relation.

Damian Wayne Williams

Referring to the Trinity diagram we get:

The Father = God

The Son = God

The Holy Spirit = God

~ (The Father = The Son)

~ (The Father = The Holy Spirit)

~ (The Son = The Holy Spirit)

From these a contradiction can be derived if "=" is an equivalence relation, which in this case is to say, if "=" means "is identical to" or "is the same being as". I recall one of my professors saying that this was one of the inexplicable mysteries that the faithful just had to accept, a sacred mystery that cannot be put into words.

Damian Wayne Williams

You claim: "And lastly, just to point out: your rendition is utterly materialistic".

How do you get that? The variables and quantifiers in the formal definition of an equivalence relation could range over any ontological category or domain of discourse whatsoever: numbers, sets, gods, people, tables, chairs, etc. etc.

And I am not a materialist but more of an emergent property dualist, though at the end of the day I suspect I might at least become a physicalist, if physics manages to encompass the mental in a way that doesn't amount to mere mental-physical correlation. The ontology of physics does include immaterial stuff (fields, forces).

Damian Wayne Williams

Well, Led Zep notwithstanding, I think this conversation has come to an end. I am not up on unadulterated historicism. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

@ Participants of this discussion

Very good discussion and I like people who call spade a spade without bothering what others may think.

Even at the almost climax of human knowledge and scientific development I am at loss to understand being on the planet earth assuming that Big Bang Theory is correct then there is no Creator; can't one see the planet with water and its composition and extent to its existence, air and its composition, different life forms, soil and its composition, different species existing at different climatic zones both animal and plants and I can go to write a few pages and last but most importantly humans as a perfect creature having the book of morality inscribed in them then how come he can deny the existence of the Creator of this planet.

I have spent twenty years thinking about it and the tragedy that people give scientific and rational justification for it.

Thank you for your response. While scientific explanations are important in understanding the structure and essence of the universe, they don’t fully reflect its definite creation and evolution. From a nihilistic perspective, it doesn’t even matter: this dismissive worldview clouds the meaning of existence instead of attempting to find it.