Contending With Nihilism Part 1: The Meaning Crisis (#35)

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January 10, 2022 • 45 mins

“What does nihilism mean? That the highest values devaluate themselves. The aim is lacking; 'why?' finds no answer.” —Friedrich Nietzsche, The Will to Power

This episode, Part 1 of our exploration of nihilism, gets into the justifications for nihilism and why it's important to give nihilism its due as a philosophy. We discuss Nietzsche and existential nihilism as well as the playful cosmic nihilism of people like Alan Watts or Kurt Vonnegut. We also explore whether or not nihilism is on the rise, and how it might be influencing political movements around the world. In Part 2, coming out shortly after this, we talk about how to overcome nihilism to find a more durable sense of meaning to life. For a more thorough exploration of this topic, you can read our article: Overcoming Nihilism: Why Meaning Matters And How To Find It

Timestamps:

[05:15] What is nihilism?
[07:12] Cosmic nihilism and Carl Sagan's Pale Blue Dot
[11:57] Nietzsche and existential nihilism
[19:30] What is the opposite of being nihilistic?
[22:23] Is nihilism on the rise?
[26:07] Nihilism and moral relativism in social justice movements and "woke" ideology
[34:03] The trap of ideology

What Is Nihilism?

Nihilism is a philosophy that more or less states that human life has no intrinsic meaning or value. There are different forms of nihilism—moral, cosmic, political, existential, etc—that each has interesting details and histories. But since Exploring Kodwari is more about approaching self-development with the kodawari energy, we were less interested in the academic side of nihilism and more interested in the personal/psychological way that we all wrestle with nihilistic thoughts. Some people are explicitly nihilistic, but it seems more common for people to implicitly/subconsciously succumb to nihilism. Maybe it is a way to cope with the challenges of life or maybe it is a problem of the intellect and rationalism going too far. Probably, each person's struggle with nihilism is slightly different. But our claim in this episode (and Part 2) is that you can find the most durable sense of meaning in life after properly contending with nihilism.

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