The Most Dangerous Idea in History | Nihilism

Nobody can prove to me that anything has any intrinsic value, up to and including human life, but I still enjoy having fun and being comfortable. Whats that?

The best question is:
Does life even need a meaning? It will all be gone anyway. Who will even remember one's existence in 200 years or so? Right, nobody will (well, except if you are quite famous or influencial).

That's one of the many reasons I'm an Existential Nihilist. Of course I'm not a total Nihilist. For me the position is more like: I think life has no value or meaning, but I don't care. I don't need my life to have any meaning because I will be forgotten anyway. No one will remember if or what value my life had.

hmm, that's not how i would describe nihilism, as i see it there's 2 forms of nihilism, it's more of an egotistical thinking in general i think.
one being moral nihilism that self preservation doesn't count as a source of morality and therefore everything else except self preservation has no meaning so there's no strive for anything except self preservation.
the other is social nihilism that other people have no meaning to ones self and as such to take meaning in anything social is meaningless, that what one says to another has no bearing on your own thoughts or actions and talking to anybody means nothing and what others think about you is meaningless so you might aswell do what you want as long as it is something you want because nothing else matters.

but it's just my own definition of it i guess, but i think a degree of nihilism is warranted especially in this day and age where it's so easy to get swept up by things that you cannot control that you worry about and try to gain control over, because if everything matters then everything matters and that is just a recipe for disaster.

Hope you won't delete this comment as you did with my previous one. You try to dissect nihilism like a doctor, making it into multiple forms. The problem is that the concept of nihilism is extremely rigid, like some subatomic particle that can't be divided. There is a field of study that is not quite considered full science yet, but it shows great promise that it will be one day. Evolutionary psychology. No human is born with a blank slate mind, the genetics of a baby make it predisposed to absorb and incorporate certain information, behaviours and values into its mind. This goes for many animals. You cannot be a "total" nihilist because of this, it would hinder your survival and reproduction probability. You cannot see a planet orbiting a star, million of light years from Earth but you can DEDUCT it's there by technology of light spectrometry, optics detect consistent minuscule blind spots around the star, which are consistent in trajectory, that could only be justified to a planet orbiting. And by the way nihilism resembles more like a state of mind, more than a philosophical concept. You put these things together.

"Being" is the reason for life ....enjoy !

Today’s incel and neet movement = nihilism of the past.

I know some anhedonia sufferers and they are total nihilists.

The one thing which must have value is value; value must be reflexive. If value itself has no value, then no value statements are relevant.
If you assert the axiom that value is reflexive, generating value and assigning value becomes important.
Subjective beings generate and/or assign value.
Thus if value is reflexive, life has value insofar as it contributes to the "value game"
We don't need objective value. Subjective value and value reflexivity are all we need to build a coherent moral philosophy.
Even if nihilism is true, subjective value and value reflexivity are a foundation upon which to build meaningful existence.

Its impossible to be a nihilist because our own conciouness is an illusion. We arent anything detached from the universe, just a mass of atoms rattling the wind claiming to be more. Tough pill to swallow but truth doesnt have to be what makes us feel good. Ie we cant be nihilists because we were never anything at all to begin with.

Over-simplified

Sartre please you r brilliant

The internet makes everyone think they have a background in philosophy. There are many arguments against pessimism or nihilism.

The arrogance of nihilists, thinking they are able to explain basically everything & having figured it out is wild af.

Although nihilism claims to be the objective truth, it still is a subjective view of subjective people.

We have very limited knowledge of the universe and existence. In fact, we can't even say if there is a objective meaning or not. Again its arrogant to think we learned everything there is to life and the universe. To give an example outside of the usualy Camus-storys, Albert Einstein thought there seems to be order in the universe and something or someone must have created the laws of nature. We saw the advancements of technology so ffs don't fool yourself to believe we habe figured anything out.

Then, there is the logical point that one cannot reduce something as complex and subjective like the human existence to some rational factors and numbers. Emotional experiences, individualism and the different kinds of meaning a person can create for themselves and others cannot be explained away that easily.

Depression and other mental illnesses are closely related to pessimistic and nihilistic thinking. Sadly people can't accept the fact that their brain might be dysfunctional and that their thought aren't „the truth!!1!!“ but some seriously depressing bs. They are deeply disconnectet from society and their fellow human beings.

Also, it should be obvious how destructive this philosophy is. Like Dostojewski and Nietzsche saw it coming, moral nihilism will bring suffering and unimaginable destruction to humanity and the world.

Society must overcome this poison, especially the youth gets robbed so much by it.
Don't go down this path and waste your life, the „truth“ you're delusional about ruins you. It is deeply flawed and very destructive. In serious philosophy it isn't even taken seriously. And also is it very close to the incel-community soooo…

I dig your stuff!

Cosmic nihilism??

Little too animated for Nihilism sense none of it matters anyway..

"Nietzsche was a psychopath" -
Fjodor Michailowitsch Dostojewski

I'd like to politely throw in my two cents.
Nihilism can kinda be interpreted in different ways, and that interpretation part can really make or break a person's life. The idea of meaning is entirely subjective, and people can take the phrase "nothing matters" a million different ways. It's a comforting thing for me, but it can absolutely diminish another person's will to live. In the end, I take solace in nihilism, but I'm not saying it's always a source of comfort.

I have no idea what you mean at all, but I like your style. Good kicks senpai

I'd like to add one more, one I discovered about four years ago, when I was 13. I'd like to call it absolute Nihilism and the first thing is that, in it's true form, absolute nihilism isn't even theoretically describable. Decarte said you know for sure that you yourself exist and may it be just in the moment you realize that you think, but I don't think so, I think that whatever would be manipulating me has complete control over logical thinking, therefore "I" don't have to be, yet "something'" has to. The Problem is that "something" doesn't describe the absurdity of how little about it I actually know, because I know nothing and I cannot say that I cannot describe "it" because that designates "it" therefore, reminding of the famous saying "the boundaries of my language are the boundaries of my world" I cannot describe absolute nihilism, because everything, even "I think, therefore I am" is built on this fundamental trust into what I cannot linguistically distance myself from being trustworthy. Absolute Nihilism rejects any trust or should I say "belief", therefore I not only have to reject belief in the physical reality, which the rejection of is some interstage in between total and absolute nihilism, but also belief in what I cannot even describe (none of this comes close because it is not possible to get any close than infinitely far from describing absolute nihilism). From this revelation comes my opinion, that conscious live, existence, being is not only impossible without belief in the unprovable, but also in the undescribable. Luckily I have always been Christian and therefore had my belief in god to prevent me from becoming a practicing absolute nihilist. From all this I also derive that rationality, which I was obsessed with and which led to me to this, is a dead end without belief and therefore useless without belief and the meaning of life, which is to not be a practicing absolute nihilist and therefore to believe in something, anything at all and in extension, to act consciously on the basis of this belief. I choose to trust and believe in god.

The most worst idea/ideology in the world is zionism.

dude, do you remember the villain from Yu-Gi-Oh? The white-haired fella, "Pegasus"?... You sound just like him; it is dope and adds to your thought-provoking videos.

How would we know murder is wrong? Hearing about someone else murdering someone then listening to their massive guilt and agony about it amd drawing our own conclusions.

Buddhist Monks are the epitome of Total Nihilism.

This video made me start thinking super positively because realized iam not a nihilistic it’s amazing that we even exist.

Please put a capital A in your name

Life is just an accidental chemical reaction

Meh, I like the philosophy of Diogenes and his cynicism more.

@Unsolicited advice In 70 years or less, you and everyone reading this is just going to end up a discarded pile of bones. You win ! loser.

Meanwhile Kurzgesagt:

Notice how most people in America only started revolting against society when they couldn’t enjoy their mundane lives anymore during the pandemic. It doesn’t matter that corruption, greed, social injustices, and mental illness, etc. were at an all time high. It only bothered them that they can’t enjoy their typical “bread and circuses” anymore and so they revolted for causes that didn’t even personally affect them. People only unite if it affects the masses deeply, otherwise the problem isn’t big enough to worry about until it’s too late.

We keep fabricating demented goals . And we keep killing people in order to build useless pyramids .

Wow very good approach on the subject. I feel that many successful intellectuals and philosophers don't go such a good job in trying to clarify concepts like you and leave vague concepts.

Even if you sit there and do nothing all day you're still valuing doing nothing over doing something, so there's still a subjective value judgment going on there.

i am a nihilist

Thank you

There is no meaning to life, you are born, you die. Not for any reason any more than all
life forms that ever existed. Religions have tried to give meaning, but the truth is you are
born, then you die. The universe doesn't care and won't care when our poor pitiful species
is long extinct.

so it’s the main reason why religion was created for prevention of nihilism , i will stand with nihilism , because it’s my ideology .

Love the analysis of Nihilism. I felt that I would follow your thoughts more easily if you could speak slower

Things are actually very very relative to context and situations and different people so nihilism is a valid idea. Existential and absurdism seem a good balance to it though

The meaning of life is actually simple and I'm surprised people are still asking the question because the Bible clearly states the answer. The total and only meaning of life is to qualify for eternal life. That's it. God wants to populate his creation with people who deserve his generosity so he created this life to show him if you qualify for eternal life.
Now some people will respond that there is no evidence that eternal life is actually a thing. Well, Jesus came and raised a number of ordinary people from the dead and then raised himself from the dead. That is pretty compelling evidence. But if a person refuses to accept that evidence then it's his personal choice and he will not get eternal life. In that case, there is nothing more we have to do for him or her.

I am a nihilist, but it doesn’t matter. I am pretty content.

For me nihilism is simply the value of unvaluing. lowering a value of something can and often does help in many struggles in life. After all philosophy is mostly a way to help us cope with hardships of fate.

A Brilliant Young Man.

Realizing that values are constructed does not need to lead to nihilism. Instead, this gives each of us the ability to create our own purpose in life. If nothing else, this could be built on human nature and psychological studies that show that what instinctively seems to make most humans happy is caring for others.

So you chose nihilism as the meaning of your life? I am a nihilist in an idealism with meaning in being of an nihalist; activist in the meaning of the nihilism of the idealism. A nihalist deconstructs the idealism. In the everyday. Even at work, until nothing matter's for the nihilist. Its a philosophy of Existentialism. As a nihalist I must realize my responsibility for my actions, the condition, and the choice was mine? So I don't do it again. Nothing matter's because you are a nihalast, I am nothing because I am a nihalist. The essence of the idealism of the nihilist is not in the nihilist itself but existence as a totality, and the nihalist.

In Arabic we have a saying that translates into: "oppose and be known" and it is often used to describe what you define as a conventional nihilist. It seems fitting because that type of nihilist wants change irrespective of actual evidence, such a nihilist's entire thesis is that the conventions are unproven by evidence, and yet they propose change which lacks evidence as well, hence why it they are bound to keep opposing the conventions even if their own proposed changes become the new conventions. Those people oppose the principle of conventions, not the conventions themselves. A conventional nihilist is someone who does not know where he is going, nor where he wants to go, he just knows he needs to change the current path no matter where it goes.