NIHILISM
The term was first used by Turgeniev in his novel, "Fathers and Sons" (in "Russkij Vestnik", Feb., 1862): a Nihilist is one who bows to no authority and accepts no doctrine, however widespread, that is not supported by proof.
The nihilist theory was formulated by Cernysevskij in his novel "Cto delat" (What shall be done, 1862-64), which forecasts a new social order constructed on the ruins of the old. But essentially, Nihilism was a reaction against the abuses of Russian absolutism; it originated with the first secret political society in Russia founded by Pestel (1817), and its first effort was the military revolt of the Decembrists (14 Dec., 1825). Nicholas I crushed the uprising, sent its leaders to the scaffold and one hundred and sixteen participants to Siberia. The spread (1830) of certain philosophical doctrines (Hegel, Saint Simon, Fourier) brought numerous recruits to Nihilism, especially in the universities; and, in many of the cities, societies were organized to combat absolutism and introduce constitutional government.
THEORETICAL NIHILISM
Its apostles were Alexander Herzen (1812-70) and Michael Bakunin (1814-76), both of noble birth. The former, arrested (1832) as a partisan of liberal ideas, was imprisoned for eight months, deported, pardoned (1840), resided in Moscow till 1847 when he migrated to London and there founded (1857) the weekly periodical, "Kolokol" (Bell), and later "The Polar Star". The "Kolokol" published Russian political secrets and denunciations of the Government; and, in spite of the police, made its way into Russia to spread revolutionary ideas. Herzen, inspired by Hegel and Feurbach, proclaimed the destruction of the existing order; but he did not advocate violent measures. Hence his younger followers wearied of him; and on the other hand his defense of the Poles during the insurrection of 1863 alienated many of his Russian sympathizers. The "Kolokol" went out of existence in 1868 and Herzen died two years later. Bakunin was extreme in his revolutionary theories. In the first number of "L'Alliance Internationale de la Démocratie Socialiste" founded by him in 1869, he openly professed Atheism and called for the abolition of marriage, property, and of all social and religious institutions. His advice, given in his "Revolutionary Catechism", was: "Be severe to yourself and severe to others. Suppress the sentiments of relationship, friendship, love, and gratitude. Have only one pleasure, one joy, one reward -- the triumph of the revolution. Night and day, have only one thought, the destruction of everything without pity. Be ready to die and ready to kill any one who opposes the triumph of your revolt." Bakunin thus opened the way to nihilistic terrorism.
PROPAGANDA (1867-77)
It began with the formation (1861-62) of secret societies, the members of which devoted their lives and fortunes to the dissemination of revolutionary ideas. Many of these agitators, educated at Zurich, Switzerland, returned to Russia and gave Nihilism the support of trained intelligence. Prominent among them were Sergius Necaev, master of a parochial school in St. Petersburg, who was in constant communication with nihilist centers in various cities, and Sergius Kovalin who established thirteen associations in Cernigor. These societies took their names from their founders -- the Malikovcy, Lavrists, Bakunists, etc. They enrolled seminarists, university students, and young women. Among the working men the propaganda was conducted in part through free schools. The promoters engaged in humble trades as weavers, blacksmiths, and carpenters, and in their shops inculcated nihilist doctrine. The peasantry was reached by writings, speeches, schools, and personal intercourse. Even the nobles shared in this work, e.g., Prince Peter Krapotkin, who, under the pseudonym of Borodin, held conferences with workingmen. As secondary centres, taverns and shops served as meeting places, depositories of prohibited books, and, in case of need, as places of refuge. Though without a central organization the movement spread throughout Russia, notably in the region of the Volga and in that of the Dnieper where it gained adherents among the Cossacks. The women in particular displayed energy and self sacrifice in their zeal for the cause. Many were highly cultured and some belonged to the nobility or higher classes, e.g., Natalia Armfeld, Barbara Batiukova, Sofia von Herzfeld, Sofia Perovakaja. They co-operated more especially through the schools.
The propaganda of the press was at first conducted from foreign parts: London, Geneva, Zurich. In this latter city there were two printing offices, established in 1873, where the students published the works of Lavrov and of Bakunin. The first secret printing office in Russia, founded at St. Petersburg in 1861, published four numbers of the Velikoruss. At the same time there came to Russia, from London, copies of the "Proclamation to the New Generation" (Kmolodomu pokolkniju) and "Young Russia" (Molodaja Rosija), which was published in the following year. In 1862, another secret printing office, established at Moscow, published the recital of the revolt of 14 December, 1825, written by Ogarev. In 1862, another secret press at St. Petersburg published revolutionary proclamations for officers of the army; and in 1863, there were published in the same city a few copies of the daily Papers, "Svoboda" (Liberty) and "Zemlja i Volja" (The Earth and Liberty); the latter continued to be published in 1878 and 1879, under the editorship, at first, of Marco Natanson, and later of the student, Alexander Mihailov, one of the ablest organizers of Nihilism. In 1866, a student of Kazan, Elpidin, published two numbers of the "Podpolnoe Slovo", which was succeeded by the daily paper, the "Sovremennost" (The Contemporary), and later, by the "Narodnoe Delo" (The National Interest), which was published (1868-70), to disseminate the ideas of Bakunin. Two numbers of the "Narodnaja Rasprava" (The Tribunal of Reason) were published in 1870, at St. Petersburg and at Moscow. In 1873, appeared the "Vpred" (Forward!), one of the most esteemed periodicals of Nihilism, having salient socialistic tendencies. A volume of it appeared each year. In 1875-76, there was connected with the "Vpred", a small bi-monthly supplement, which was under the direction of Lavrov until 1876, when it passed under the editorship of Smironv, and went out of existence in the same year. It attacked theological and religious ideas, proclaiming the equality of rights, freedom of association, and justice for the proletariat. At Geneva, in 1875 and 1876, the "Rabotnik" (The Workman) was published, which was edited in the style of the people; the "Nabat" (The Tocsin) appeared in 1875, directed by Thacev; the "Narodnaja Volja" (The Will of the People), in 1879, and the "Cernyi Peredel", in 1880, were published in St. Petersburg. There was no fixed date for any of these papers, and their contents consisted, more especially, of proclamations, of letters from revolutionists, and at times, of sentences of the Executive Committees. These printing offices also produced books and pamphlets and Russian translations of the works of Lassalle, Marx, Proudhon, and Büchner. A government stenographer, Myskin, in 1870, established a printing office, through which several of Lassalle's works were published; while many pamphlets were published by the Zemlja i Volja Committee and by the Free Russian Printing Office. Some of the pamphlets were published under titles like those of the books for children, for example, "Deduska Egor" (Grandfather Egor), Mitiuska", Stories for the Workingmen, and others, in which the exploitation of the people was deplored, and the immunity of capitalists assailed. Again, some publications were printed in popular, as well as in cultured, language; and, in order to allure the peasants these pamphlets appeared at times, under such titles as "The Satiate and the Hungry"; "How Our Country Is No Longer Ours". But all this propaganda, which required considerable energy and sacrifice, did not produce satisfactory results. Nihilism did not penetrate the masses; its enthusiastic apostles committed acts of imprudence that drew upon them the ferocious reprisals of the Government; the peasants had not faith in the preachings of those teachers, whom, at times, they regarded as government spies, and whom, at times, they denounced. The books and pamphlets that were distributed among the country people often fell into the hands of the cinovniki (government employees), or of the popes. Very few of the peasants knew how to read. Accordingly, Nihilism had true adherents only among students of the universities and higher schools, and among the middle classes. The peasants and workmen did not understand its ideals of destruction and of social revolution.
NIHILIST TERRORISM
Propagation of ideas was soon followed by violence: 4 April, 1866, Tsar Alexander II narrowly escaped the shot fired by Demetrius Karakozov, and in consequence took severe measures (rescript of 23 May, 1866) against the revolution, making the universities and the press objects of special vigilance. To avoid detection and spying, the Nihilists formed a Central Executive Committee whose sentences of death were executed by "punishers". Sub-committees of from five to ten members were also organized and statutes (12 articles) drawn up. The applicant for admission was required to consecrate his life to the cause, sever ties of family and friendship, and observe absolute secrecy. Disobedience to the head of the association was punishable with death. The Government, in turn, enacted stringent laws against secret societies and brought hundreds before the tribunals. A notable instance was the trial, at St. Petersburg in October, 1877, of 193 persons: 94 went free, 36 were sent to Siberia; the others received light sentences. One of the accused, Myskin by name, who in addressing the judges had characterized the procedure as "an abominable comedy", was condemned to ten years of penal servitude. Another sensational trial (April, 1878) was that of Vera Sassulio, who had attempted to murder General Frepov, chief of police of St. Petersburg. Her acquittal was frantically applauded and she found a refuge in Switzerland. Among the deeds of violence committed by Nihilists may be mentioned the assassination of General Mezencev (4 Aug., 1878) and Prince Krapotkin (1879). These events were followed by new repressive measures on the part of the Government and by numerous executions. The Nihilists, however, continued their work, held a congress at Lipeck in 1879, and (26 Aug.) condemned Alexander II to death. An attempt to wreck the train on which the Tsar was returning to St. Petersburg proved abortive. Another attack on his life was made by Halturin, 5 Feb., 1880. He was slain on 1 March 1881, by a bomb, thrown by Grineveckij. Six conspirators, among them Sofia Perovskaja, were tried and executed. On 14 March, the Zemlja i Volja society issued a proclamation inciting the peasants to rise, while the Executive Committee wrote to Alexander III denouncing the abuses of the bureaucracy and demanding political amnesty, national representation, and civil liberty.
The reign of Alexander III was guided by the dictates of a reaction, due in great measure to the counsels of Constantine Pobedonoscev, procurator general of the Holy Synod. And Nihilism, which seemed to reach its apogee in the death of Alexander II, saw its eclipse. Its theories were too radical to gain proselytes among the people. Its assaults were repeated; on 20 March, 1882, General Strelnikov was assassinated at Odessa; and Colonel Sudezkin on the 28th of December, 1883; in 1887, an attempt against the life of the tsar was unsuccessful; in 1890, a conspiracy against the tsar was discovered at Paris; but these crimes were the work of the revolution in Russia, rather than of the Nihilists. The crimes that reddened the soil of Russia with blood in constitutional times are due to the revolution of 1905-07. But the Nihilism, that, as a doctrinal system, proclaimed the destruction of the old Russia, to establish the foundations of a new Russia, may be said to have disappeared; it became fused with Anarchism and Socialism, and therefore, the history of the crimes that were multiplied from 1905 on are a chapter in the history of political upheavals in Russia, and not in the history of Nihilism.
A. PALMIERI
Transcribed by Bob Mathewson
The Catholic Encyclopedia, Volume
XI
Copyright © 1911 by Robert Appleton Company
Online Edition Copyright © 2003 by Kevin Knight
Nihil Obstat, February 1, 1911. Remy Lafort, S.T.D., Censor
Imprimatur. +John Cardinal Farley, Archbishop of New York
http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/11074a.htm 3/19/03 11:12 AM
By Douglas Groothuis
A study of recent publications addressing postmodernism yields a myriad of materials and a panoply of perspectives. When did we or will we "cross the postmodern divide"? Is modernity really dead or only wounded? What identifies, if anything, the postmodernist posture? Although postmodernist philosophy is too diverse to corral into a tidy definition, one way of understanding it and assessing some of its common themes is to look to the thought of a predecessor, Friedrich Nietzsche.
Nietzsche, once hailed as a father of existentialism, has now come a kind of posthumous prophet for postmodernism, which often deems him a pioneering voice for its suspicion of universal rationality, morality, objectivity, and Western Christian sensibilities in general. Postmodernists also find in him an emphasis on the conventionality and contingency of all institutions and moralities, which, when deconstruct (a la Michel Foucault) end up as no more than self justifying arrangements of power. Thinkers such as Richard Rorty look to Nietzsche as an inspiration for their escape from the orbit of modernity, especially from its emphasis on objective truth and meaning that exists apart from evaluating agents.
Nietzsche's thought, though invigorating in its boldness and passion, is often enigmatic and difficult to form into a coherent whole. Therefore, we find no overwhelming consensus on the real Nietzsche. The interpretative difficulties arise from his frequently aphoristic style, scorn of systematizing, development as an author, radicality of conceptions, and use of intentionally inflammatory and hyperbolic language. Hermeneutical matters are not improved by Nietzsche's esotericism. Nietzsche wrote for the worthy few. "My writings are very well protected: whoever, having no right to such books, takes them and thereby mistakes them immediately makes himself rediculous." This preemptive strike against potential critics clouds matters considerably. Obscuring things further is Nietzsche's questioning of the basic laws of logic as descriptive of reality. If loosed from these strictures, contradictions are no longer stigmatized and anything can follow. Post modernists following their mentor may defend their opacities as esoteric profundities.
Although Christians and Jews have been ill-disposed toward Nietzsche, given his denunciations of the "slave morality" of the Bible and his heralding of the "death of God," some frequently invoked charges against him have little substance. Nietzsche is often regarded as a key ideological source for Nazi anti-Semitism. Scholars such as Walter Kauffmann, however, have given plausible textual arguments defending Nietzsche against this charge. Much of Nietzsche's supposed hostility to the Jews appears to have been a product of his sister Elizabeth's tampering with his writings during his years of derangement and after his death.
However, Nietzsche may not be defended against all criticisms of his ethics. And these charges, mutatis mutandis, are applicable to many of his postmodernist progeny as well. Irving M. Zeitlin has cogently argued in Nietzsche: A Re-examination (Polity, 1994) that crucial components of Nietzsche's thought justify the reign of the strong over the weak, even if he eschews anti-Semitism per se.
Given the "death of God," Nietzsche rejected any transcendently warranted system of ethics. This is no one universally binding Morality; there are only moralities, which come in two basic types: slave morality and master morality. Slaves compensate for their lack of power by their feelings of resentment toward their masters, whom they label as "evil." "Blessed are the poor" translates as "I hate the rich." Masters, however, discharge their powers without resentment, in accordance with their expansive ambitions. They are fettered neither by humility nor altruism, although they may elect to show kindness—when it suits them.
For Nietzsche, the herd of slaves exists for the sake of the master who realizes that "exploitation . . . belongs to the nature of the living being as . . . a consequence of the intrinsic Will to Power, which is precisely the Will to Life." Nietzsche champions the ultimate master as the Ubermensche, or Overman, who actualizes himself by destroying the old values and creating his own values ex nihilo. "Overman is the meaning of the earth," declares Nietzsche's Zarathustra (who elsewhere says life has no meaning).
Zeitlin cogently argues against Nietzsche defenders that this reduction of ethics to force is nothing but a classic example of "might makes right." Nietzsche glorified in the oligarchy of pre-democratic Greece and esteemed tyrants such as Napoleon as heroes. Yet Nietzsche's partiality for the strong really reduces to a kind of aesthetic preference, given his rejection of objective moral standards as the grounding for ethical evaluations. This entails that neither Nietzsche's commendations nor condemnations have any real moral consequence for anyone else, however passionately he ventilates them.
Zeitlin finds Nietzsche's nihilistic megalomania presaged in Dostoevsky's atheistic criminal, Raskolnikov from Crime and Punishment, who strikes out "beyond good and evil" by murdering an old misery woman he deems worthless. Sounding hauntingly Nietzschean, Raskolnikov says, "The great mass of the people—the masses exist merely for the sake of bringing into the world by some supreme effort . . . one man out of a thousand who is to some extent independent." These are men like Raskolnikov who are free from the conventions of morality. Zeitlin notes that "in powerfully dramatic terms Dostoevsky thus called attention to the dangerous moral vacuum created by the doctrine that God is dead—a danger to which Nietzsche gave no consideration." The Hitlers, Stalins, Maos, and Pol Pots of this century all subscribed to some variation of this philosophy of power, and created their own earthly hells.
In C.S. Lewis's Screwtape Letters, the demon Screwtape describes the philosophy of hell in terms suggestive of Nietzsche: "The whole philosophy of Hell rests on recognition of the axiom that one thing is not another thing, and specially, that one self is not another self. My good is my good, and your good is yours. What one gains another loses. Even an inanimate object is what it is by excluding all other objects from the space it occupies; if it expands, it does so by thrusting other objects aside or by absorbing them. A self does the same." Although Nietzsche sometimes lauds friendship between the strong and consideration (but not pity) for the weak, his dominant theme is the strong's expropriation of others. Christian love is impossible—given the philosophy of hell, that is. The Golden Rule melts before the Will to Power.
Inasmuch as postmodernist thinkers such as Rorty and Foucault jettison any enduring or objective sense of meaning, truth and value, they enter the same amoral vacuum advanced by Nietzsche and indicated by Dostoevsky. Although postmodernists often advocate the recognition of "alterity" or the appreciation for "the other" supposedly marginalized and silenced by Western, hegemonic forces (whether it be indigenous peoples, women, or nonheterosexuals), this imperative founders without a moral foundation; it reduces to mere preference or suggestion. Why not glorify the hegemonic as the heroic, as exemplary embodiments of the Will to Power? Why give ear to those denied a voice? "What have we to learn from the losers?" Nietzsche might well ask.
If power, both individual and political, is not tempered by a conscience capable of contact with and submission to an objective moral law and Law Giver, it becomes its own justification. No amount of postmodernist whimsy, irony, or aestheticism can defuse this peril. As Pascal said, "might without right is tyrannical."
Nietzsche is sometimes dismissed because of his lapse into insanity in 1889, which continued until his death in 1900. The politically correct opinion is that Nietzsche's ruthless atheism and brutal intellectual battles with nihilism had absolutely nothing to do with his breakdown and everything to do with a case of syphilis. A.J. Hoover's Friedrich Nietzsche: His life and Thought (Praeger, 1994) dares to challenge this on historical and philosophical grounds by arguing that it is not beyond question that Nietzsche suffered from syphilis. The insanity that results from the disease rarely lasts eleven years, and "Nietzsche's sex life was cool to nonexistent" (although Hoover mentions the theory that Nietzsche was infected during the Franco-Prussian War while attending to wounded soldiers).
Although Hoover does not condemn Nietzsche's thought because of his eventual insanity, he does carefully explore the features of Nietzsche's thinking that might have helped topple one of the greatest minds of his day. In so doing, he also exposes several vertiginous elements in the postmodernist posture that could similarly lead to a cognitive crisis, if not a total collapse.
Particularly troublesome is Nietzsche's perspectivism, a staple of postmodernists who are "incredulous toward metanarratives" (Jean Francois Lyotard). Having deconstructed the untrammeled intellect as a means of ascertaining objective truth, Nietzsche avers: "There are many kinds of eyes. Even the Sphinx has eyes—and therefore there are many kinds of 'truths,' and therefore there is no Truth." Viewing the world as a text with an indeterminate profusion of subjective meanings, Nietzsche affirms that there are no facts, only varying interpretations. But should we take that statement to be a fact—or only an interpretation? If it is an interpretation, the whole idea self-destructs.
However, as Hoover points out, Nietzsche is not consistently perspectival, particularly when he makes absolute metaphysical claims such as this one from The Will to Power: " This world is the Will to Power—and nothing else. And even you yourselves are this Will to Power—and nothing else!" When Nietzsche speaks of the eternal return—which he calls "the most scientific of all possible hypotheses—and the emergence of the Overman, he is describing what he must claim to be the Truth, not just his truth. This vacillation between subjective projection (my truth) and objective evaluation (the Truth), a recurring feature in postmodernist philosophy, is not the elixir of intellectual insight; it could even contribute to madness.
When Nietzsche sees the cosmos in objective terms, he finds a world bereft of intrinsic or God-given value: "The nut of the universe is hollow," declares Zarathustra. This hollowness leads to a "feeling of valuelessness" and "weightlessness," which Nietzsche tries to overcome through his faith in the appearance of Overman and his doctrine of the eternal recurrence, whereby all things are recapitulated endlessly. Since the latter lacks any teleology, Nietzsche says that it entails "the nothing (the 'meaningless') eternally!" Nihilism threatens. Yet through a kind of compensatory psychological alchemy, Nietzsche labors to transmute eternal recurrence into a beatitude without a Benefactor (as if nothing multiplied by infinity could produce Meaning)—a beatitude, at least for the Overman who embraces it without reservation through amor fati.
Zeitlin and Hoover convincingly argue that irrespective of Nietzsche's intellectual travails, he failed to neutralize the leaven of nihilism laced throughout his outlook. Against the cottage industry of Nietzschean apologists, they rightly indict him as a nihilist whose unfettered philosophy has no resources for either restraining evil or fostering virtue. When Rorty confesses that there is no objective, rational reason not to be cruel, and when other postmodernists dismiss any objective foundation for morality, they betray their fatal embrace of the emptiness of being. If the passion and brilliance of Nietzsche failed to escape the intellectual and ethical consequences of nihilism, the burden of proof is on the postmodernists inspired by him who purports to do otherwise.
ENCYCLOPEDIA
OF PHILOSOPHY ~ Nihilism
Nihilism is the belief that all values are baseless and that nothing can be known or communicated. It is often associated with extreme pessimism and a radical skepticism that condemns existence. A true nihilist would believe in nothing, have no loyalties, and no purpose other than, perhaps, an impulse to destroy. While few philosophers would claim to be nihilists, nihilism is most often associated with Friedrich Nietzsche who argued that its corrosive effects would eventually destroy all moral, religious, and metaphysical convictions and precipitate the greatest crisis in human history. In the 20th century, nihilistic themes--epistemological failure, value destruction, and cosmic purposelessness--have preoccupied artists, social critics, and philosophers. Mid-century, for example, the existentialists helped popularize tenets of nihilism in their attempts to blunt its destructive potential. By the end of the century, existential despair as a response to nihilism gave way to an attitude of indifference, often associated with antifoundationalism.
Origins
"Nihilism" comes from the Latin nihil, or nothing, which means not anything, that which does not exist. It appears in the verb "annihilate," meaning to bring to nothing, to destroy completely. Early in the nineteenth century, Friedrich Jacobi used the word to negatively characterize transcendental idealism. It only became popularized, however, after its appearance in Ivan Turgenev's novel Fathers and Sons (1862) where he used "nihilism" to describe the crude scientism espoused by his character Bazarov who preaches a creed of total negation.
In Russia, nihilism became identified with a loosely organized revolutionary movement (C.1860-1917) that rejected the authority of the state, church, and family. In his early writing, anarchist leader Mikhael Bakunin (1814-1876) composed the notorious entreaty still identified with nihilism: "Let us put our trust in the eternal spirit which destroys and annihilates only because it is the unsearchable and eternally creative source of all life--the passion for destruction is also a creative passion!" (Reaction in Germany, 1842). The movement advocated a social arrangement based on rationalism and materialism as the sole source of knowledge and individual freedom as the highest goal. By rejecting man's spiritual essence in favor of a solely materialistic one, nihilists denounced God and religious authority as antithetical to freedom. The movement eventually deteriorated into an ethos of subversion, destruction, and anarchy, and by the late 1870s, a nihilist was anyone associated with clandestine political groups advocating terrorism and assassination.
The earliest philosophical positions associated with what could be characterized as a nihilistic outlook are those of the Skeptics. Because they denied the possibility of certainty, Skeptics could denounce traditional truths as unjustifiable opinions. When Demosthenes (c.371-322 BC), for example, observes that "What he wished to believe, that is what each man believes" (Olynthiac), he posits the relational nature of knowledge. Extreme skepticism, then, is linked to epistemological nihilism which denies the possibility of knowledge and truth; this form of nihilism is currently identified with postmodern antifoundationalism. Nihilism, in fact, can be understood in several different ways. Political Nihilism, as noted, is associated with the belief that the destruction of all existing political, social, and religious order is a prerequisite for any future improvement. Ethical nihilism or moral nihilism rejects the possibility of absolute moral or ethical values. Instead, good and evil are nebulous, and values addressing such are the product of nothing more than social and emotive pressures. Existential nihilism is the notion that life has no intrinsic meaning or value, and it is, no doubt, the most commonly used and understood sense of the word today.
Max Stirner's (1806-1856) attacks on systematic philosophy, his denial of absolutes, and his rejection of abstract concepts of any kind often places him among the first philosophical nihilists. For Stirner, achieving individual freedom is the only law; and the state, which necessarily imperils freedom, must be destroyed. Even beyond the oppression of the state, though, are the constraints imposed by others because their very existence is an obstacle compromising individual freedom. Thus Stirner argues that existence is an endless "war of each against all" (The Ego and its Own, trans. 1907).
Friedrich Nietzsche and Nihilism
Among philosophers, Friedrich Nietzsche is most often associated with nihilism. For Nietzsche, there is no objective order or structure in the world except what we give it. Penetrating the façades buttressing convictions, the nihilist discovers that all values are baseless and that reason is impotent. "Every belief, every considering something-true," Nietzsche writes, "is necessarily false because there is simply no true world" (Will to Power [notes from 1883-1888]). For him, nihilism requires a radical repudiation of all imposed values and meaning: "Nihilism is . . . not only the belief that everything deserves to perish; but one actually puts one's shoulder to the plough; one destroys" (Will to Power).
The caustic strength of nihilism is absolute, Nietzsche argues, and under its withering scrutiny "the highest values devalue themselves. The aim is lacking, and 'Why' finds no answer" (Will to Power). Inevitably, nihilism will expose all cherished beliefs and sacrosanct truths as symptoms of a defective Western mythos. This collapse of meaning, relevance, and purpose will be the most destructive force in history, constituting a total assault on reality and nothing less than the greatest crisis of humanity:
What I relate is the history of the next two centuries. I describe what is coming, what can no longer come differently: the advent of nihilism. . . . For some time now our whole European culture has been moving as toward a catastrophe, with a tortured tension that is growing from decade to decade: restlessly, violently, headlong, like a river that wants to reach the end. . . . (Will to Power)
Since Nietzsche's compelling critique, nihilistic themes--epistemological failure, value destruction, and cosmic purposelessness--have preoccupied artists, social critics, and philosophers. Convinced that Nietzsche's analysis was accurate, for example, Oswald Spengler in The Decline of the West (1926) studied several cultures to confirm that patterns of nihilism were indeed a conspicuous feature of collapsing civilizations. In each of the failed cultures he examines, Spengler noticed that centuries-old religious, artistic, and political traditions were weakened and finally toppled by the insidious workings of several distinct nihilistic postures: the Faustian nihilist "shatters the ideals"; the Apollinian nihilist "watches them crumble before his eyes"; and the Indian nihilist "withdraws from their presence into himself." Withdrawal, for instance, often identified with the negation of reality and resignation advocated by Eastern religions, is in the West associated with various versions of epicureanism and stoicism. In his study, Spengler concludes that Western civilization is already in the advanced stages of decay with all three forms of nihilism working to undermine epistemological authority and ontological grounding.
In 1927, Martin Heidegger, to cite another example, observed that nihilism in various and hidden forms was already "the normal state of man" (The Question of Being). Other philosophers' predictions about nihilism's impact have been dire. Outlining the symptoms of nihilism in the 20th century, Helmut Thielicke wrote that "Nihilism literally has only one truth to declare, namely, that ultimately Nothingness prevails and the world is meaningless" (Nihilism: Its Origin and Nature, with a Christian Answer, 1969). From the nihilist's perspective, one can conclude that life is completely amoral, a conclusion, Thielicke believes, that motivates such monstrosities as the Nazi reign of terror. Gloomy predictions of nihilism's impact are also charted in Eugene Rose's Nihilism: The Root of the Revolution of the Modern Age (1994). If nihilism proves victorious--and it's well on its way, he argues--our world will become "a cold, inhuman world" where "nothingness, incoherence, and absurdity" will triumph.
Existential Nihilism
While nihilism is often discussed in terms of extreme skepticism and relativism, for most of the 20th century it has been associated with the belief that life is meaningless. Existential nihilism begins with the notion that the world is without meaning or purpose. Given this circumstance, existence itself--all action, suffering, and feeling--is ultimately senseless and empty.
In The Dark Side: Thoughts on the Futility of Life (1994), Alan Pratt demonstrates that existential nihilism, in one form or another, has been a part of the Western intellectual tradition from the beginning. The Skeptic Empedocles' observation that "the life of mortals is so mean a thing as to be virtually un-life," for instance, embodies the same kind of extreme pessimism associated with existential nihilism. In antiquity, such profound pessimism may have reached its apex with Hegesis. Because miseries vastly outnumber pleasures, happiness is impossible, the philosopher argues, and subsequently advocates suicide. Centuries later during the Renaissance, William Shakespeare eloquently summarized the existential nihilist's perspective when, in this famous passage near the end of Macbeth, he has Macbeth pour out his disgust for life:
Out, out, brief candle!
Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage
And then is heard no more; it is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing.
In the twentieth century, it's the atheistic existentialist movement, popularized in France in the 1940s and 50s, that is responsible for the currency of existential nihilism in the popular consciousness. Jean-Paul Sartre's (1905-1980) defining preposition for the movement, "existence precedes essence," rules out any ground or foundation for establishing an essential self or a human nature. When we abandon illusions, life is revealed as nothing; and for the existentialists, nothingness is the source of not only absolute freedom but also existential horror and emotional anguish. Nothingness reveals each individual as an isolated being "thrown" into an alien and unresponsive universe, barred forever from knowing why yet required to invent meaning. It's a situation that's nothing short of absurd. Writing from the enlightened perspective of the absurd, Albert Camus (1913-1960) observed that Sisyphus' plight, condemned to eternal, useless struggle, was a superb metaphor for human existence (The Myth of Sisyphus, 1942).
The common thread in the literature of the existentialists is coping with the emotional anguish arising from our confrontation with nothingness, and they expended great energy responding to the question of whether surviving it was possible. Their answer was a qualified "Yes," advocating a formula of passionate commitment and impassive stoicism. In retrospect, it was an anecdote tinged with desperation because in an absurd world there are absolutely no guidelines, and any course of action is problematic. Passionate commitment, be it to conquest, creation, or whatever, is itself meaningless. Enter nihilism.
Camus, like the other existentialists, was convinced that nihilism was the most vexing problem of the twentieth century. Although he argues passionately that individuals could endure its corrosive effects, his most famous works betray the extraordinary difficulty he faced building a convincing case. In The Stranger (1942), for example, Meursault has rejected the existential suppositions on which the uninitiated and weak rely. Just moments before his execution for a gratuitous murder, he discovers that life alone is reason enough for living, a raison d'être, however, that in context seems scarcely convincing. In Caligula (1944), the mad emperor tries to escape the human predicament by dehumanizing himself with acts of senseless violence, fails, and surreptitiously arranges his own assassination. The Plague (1947) shows the futility of doing one's best in an absurd world. And in his last novel, the short and sardonic, The Fall (1956), Camus posits that everyone has bloody hands because we are all responsible for making a sorry state worse by our inane action and inaction alike. In these works and other works by the existentialists, one is often left with the impression that living authentically with the meaninglessness of life is impossible.
Camus was fully aware of the pitfalls of defining existence without meaning, and in his philosophical essay The Rebel (1951) he faces the problem of nihilism head-on. In it, he describes at length how metaphysical collapse often ends in total negation and the victory of nihilism, characterized by profound hatred, pathological destruction, and incalculable violence and death.
Antifoundationalism and Nihilism
By the late 20th century, "nihilism" had assumed two different castes. In one form, "nihilist" is used to characterize the postmodern man, a dehumanized conformist, alienated, indifferent, and baffled, directing psychological energy into hedonistic narcissism or into a deep ressentiment that often explodes in violence. This perspective is derived from the existentialists' reflections on nihilism stripped of any hopeful expectations, leaving only the experience of sickness, decay, and disintegration.
In his study of meaninglessness, Donald Crosby writes that the source of modern nihilism paradoxically stems from a commitment to honest intellectual openness. "Once set in motion, the process of questioning could come to but one end, the erosion of conviction and certitude and collapse into despair" (The Specter of the Absurd, 1988). When sincere inquiry is extended to moral convictions and social consensus, it can prove deadly, Crosby continues, promoting forces that ultimately destroy civilizations. Michael Novak's recently revised The Experience of Nothingness (1968, 1998) tells a similar story. Both studies are responses to the existentialists' gloomy findings from earlier in the century. And both optimistically discuss ways out of the abyss by focusing of the positive implications nothingness reveals, such as liberty, freedom, and creative possibilities. Novak, for example, describes how since WWII we have been working to "climb out of nihilism" on the way to building a new civilization.
In contrast to the efforts to overcome nihilism noted above is the uniquely postmodern response associated with the current antifoundationalists. The philosophical, ethical, and intellectual crisis of nihilism that has tormented modern philosophers for over a century has given way to mild annoyance or, more interestingly, an upbeat acceptance of meaninglessness.
French philosopher Jean-Francois Lyotard characterizes postmodernism as an "incredulity toward metanarratives," those all-embracing foundations that we have relied on to make sense of the world. This extreme skepticism has undermined intellectual and moral hierarchies and made "truth" claims, transcendental or transcultural, problematic. Postmodern antifoundationalists, paradoxically grounded in relativism, dismiss knowledge as relational and "truth" as transitory, genuine only until something more palatable replaces it (reminiscent of William James' notion of "cash value"). The critic Jacques Derrida, for example, asserts that one can never be sure that what one knows corresponds with what is. Since human beings participate in only an infinitesimal part of the whole, they are unable to grasp anything with certainty, and absolutes are merely "fictional forms."
American antifoundationalist Richard Rorty makes a similar point: "Nothing grounds our practices, nothing legitimizes them, nothing shows them to be in touch with the way things are" ("From Logic to Language to Play," 1986). This epistemological cul-de-sac, Rorty concludes, leads inevitably to nihilism. "Faced with the nonhuman, the nonlinguistic, we no longer have the ability to overcome contingency and pain by appropriation and transformation, but only the ability to recognize contingency and pain" (Contingency, Irony, and Solidarity, 1989). In contrast to Nietzsche's fears and the angst of the existentialists, nihilism becomes for the antifoundationalists just another aspect of our contemporary milieu, one best endured with sang-froid.
In The Banalization of Nihilism (1992) Karen Carr discusses the antifoundationalist response to nihilism. Although it still inflames a paralyzing relativism and subverts critical tools, "cheerful nihilism" carries the day, she notes, distinguished by an easy-going acceptance of meaninglessness. Such a development, Carr concludes, is alarming. If we accept that all perspectives are equally non-binding, then intellectual or moral arrogance will determine which perspective has precedence. Worse still, the banalization of nihilism creates an environment where ideas can be imposed forcibly with little resistance, raw power alone determining intellectual and moral hierarchies. It's a conclusion that dovetails nicely with Nietzsche's, who pointed out that all interpretations of the world are simply manifestations of will-to-power.
Conclusion
It has been over a century now since Nietzsche explored nihilism and its implications for civilization. As he predicted, nihilism's impact on the culture and values of the 20th century has been pervasive, its apocalyptic tenor spawning a mood of gloom and a good deal of anxiety, anger, and terror. Interestingly, Nietzsche himself, a radical skeptic preoccupied with language, knowledge, and truth, anticipated many of the themes of postmodernity. It's helpful to note, then, that he believed we could--at a terrible price--eventually work through nihilism. If we survived the process of destroying all interpretations of the world, we could then perhaps discover the correct course for humankind:
I praise, I do not reproach, [nihilism's] arrival. I believe it is one of the greatest crises, a moment of the deepest self-reflection of humanity. Whether man recovers from it, whether he becomes master of this crisis, is a question of his strength. It is possible. . . . (Complete Works Vol. 13)
http://www.utm.edu/research/iep/n/nihilism.htm 3/19/03 11:04 AM
NIHILISM. There's nothing to it.TM
A snappy little
essay from the Prez. Em.
You're Really Nothing at All
Nihilism is the characteristic value-disease of our times. The word comes from the Latin root for "nothing", with more ancient connexions with the word for "trifle". Nihilism is the general phenomenon of human values having no evocatory power, in that questions about meaning fail to yield answers that are trustworthy or in the truth, but rather a void of senseless silence. While episodes of nihilism could be identified throughout our species' cultural history, the label is usually applied to the crisis of valuation that now grips the planet's pre-eminent culture, the so-called 'Western' or Euro-American culture.
The concept of nihilism receives its most penetrating analysis in the work of the German genius Friedrich Nietzsche (1844-1900), who called nihilism "that uncanniest of guests". Writing in the twilight of the nineteenth century, Nietzsche sketched an overall theory of value, in which the human animal invents value matrices with which to survive within, and perhaps to dominate, his physical and psychological environments. Nihilism is the result of a faulty value-system turning back on itself and its human creators, ultimately devaluing itself and causing the experience of nothingness on the many levels of human consciousness.
Specifically, Nietzsche accuses the platonic/christian schema of being inadequate to the needs of superior human beings, in that it promotes an anemic and unaesthetic worldview. This worldview is based on the illusion of another, more real world than the one we inhabit on earth, a supersensible world for which our actions here become merely derivative rituals. Plato's Ideas and the Christian God become the guarantors of all meaning for our lives. But Nietzsche maintained that this was a fiction that detoured us from being human, and that made men and women into slaves fettered to a herd mentality that strangled our profound creative urges.
Nietzsche saw this platonic/christian worldview coming apart at the seems in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. The results, he said, would be an increasingly frantic search for new sources of meaning by the European mind, including cataclysmic wars and the pursuit of ever more powerful forms of intoxication. The history of our century, with its global conflicts and increasing chemical, sexual, and materialistic orgiastics are instructive in this regard.
For even if we indulge in ever more intense means to pleasure, behind it all still looms the life-shattering question: Why?, the question that in the presence of nihilism admits no answer. Why exist, why strive, why love and create? Why not untruth? Why not nothing rather than something, why not pain rather than pleasure? Nietzsche's formulation is that the nihilist is the person who judges the world as it is that it ought not to exist, and that in this light our lives are essentially in vain, sealed off from any "ought", from any meaning. In other words, our value-systems do not allow themselves to exercise power or attempt to seek and create happiness, but instead are mired in resentment and endless rationalization. We are machines that are constructed so as to inform ourselves that we have no purpose and no beauty.
Nietzsche saw nihilism as both the great curse and the great opportunity. Man, he said, might very well destroy himself because of nihilism, either through physical destruction or by turning to a nihilistic religion in which man would die spiritually. But he also hoped that perhaps a new race of philosophers would arise, who could both look into the sun of nihilism without blinking and who could legislate anew order of value, new "tablets", Nietzsche called them, for the strong creative minority to live by, values that would serve their creators rather than enslave and demean them. This effort Nietzsche called the revaluation of values, and he went mad in the effort to shape the course of this revaluing.
It remains for us to be honest and cheerful in the light of nihilism. We are all nihilists--those who deny it have not yet awakened to the necessary evolution of their own diseased value structures, or refuse to see out of cowardice. Those of us who look over the edge and peer into the void must call up new tablets of values out of ourselves. It cannot be done so long as we are human. For Nietzsche, at least, the answer lay in becoming more than human. He postulated the Ubermensch, the so called Superman, who could make meaning for himself, a creature as different from the human as we are from the ape.
Unless we become Supermen, we are really nothing at all, and are destined to remain so. As to how the Superman can be brought about, Nietzsche and his alterego Zarathustra give us hints, but nothing more. It is up to a new race of philosophers with hammers to teach themselves the Superman.
-Brandon Floyd
President Emeritus, ANA
A Personal Note:
Our new president, Gloria Meadows, is now working to expand the scope of the ANA. Her first projects are inspired by the deluge of missives we have received from all over the planet. We are now talking with the folks at K+A/FBN, a full spectrum marketing agency, to create a publicity campaign to nudge--or shove--more people over the edge into authentic, self-rattling reflection about nihilism. >>We will be previewing the messages they come up with right here.
K+A/FBN is also developing a series of television spots that will be broadcast, among other places, on No Dogs or Philosophers Allowed© ( a nihilist project if there ever was one.)
In addition, Gloria is assembling a list of useful books on nihilism. And yes, there finally will be an official ANA shirt sporting our slogan that will be available for you to purchase. I beseech you to come back here soon and see what Gloria will be doing for all of us.
Not that it will make any difference in the long run. But you knew that.
-BF
http://www.nodogs.org/nihilism.html 3/19/03 11:08 AM
Nihilism Defined
http://www.counterorder.com/nihilism.html 3/19/03 11:22 AM
A common (but misleading) description of nihilism is the 'belief in nothing'. Instead, a far more useful one would substitute 'faith' for 'belief' where faith is defined as the "firm belief in something for which there is no proof." A universal definition of nihilism could then well be the rejection of that which requires faith for salvation or actualization and would span to include anything from theology to secular ideology. Within nihilism faith and similar values are discarded because they've no absolute, objective substance, they are invalid serving only as yet another exploitable lie never producing any strategically beneficial outcome. Faith is an imperative hazard to group and individual because it compels suspension of reason, critical analysis and common sense. Nietzsche once said that faith means not wanting to know. Faith is "don't let those pesky facts get in the way of our political plan or our mystically ordained path to heaven"; faith is "do what I tell you because I said so". All things that can't be disproved need faith, utopia needs faith, idealism needs faith, spiritual salvation needs faith. F**k faith.
The second element nihilism rejects is the belief in final purpose, that the universe is built upon non-random events and that everything is structured towards an eventual conclusive revelation. This is called teleology and it's the fatal flaw plaguing the whole rainbow of false solutions from Marxism to Buddhism and everything in between. Teleology compels obedience towards the fulfillment of "destiny" or "progress" or similar such grandiose goals. Teleology is used by despots and utopian dreamers alike as a coercive motivation leading only to yet another apocryphal apocalypse; the real way to lead humanity by the nose - tell them it's all part of the big plan so play along or else! It may even seem reasonable but there is not now and never has been any evidence the universe operates teleologically - there is no final purpose. This is the simple beauty nihilism has that no other idea-set does. By breaking free from the tethers of teleology one is empowered in outlook and outcome because for the first time it's possible to find answers without proceeding from pre-existing perceptions. We're finally free to find out what's really out there and not just the partial evidence to support original pretext and faulty notions only making a hell on earth in the process. So f**k teleology too.
Nihilism is primarily skepticism coupled with reduction but in practical reality it takes on more than one facet which often leads to a confusion of definitions. In the most general sense nihilism has two major classifications, the first is passive and usually goes by the term existential or 'social' nihilism and the second is active and is termed 'political' nihilism.
Existential nihilism is a passive world view which revolves around such topics as suffering, and futility, and even has connections to Eastern mysticism like Buddhism. In a more direct sense, existential 'social' nihilism is manifest within the sense of isolation, futility, angst and the hopelessness of existence increasingly prevalent within the modern digital world sometimes referred to as the 'downward spiral'. A direct way to describe it might be 'detachment from everything'.
Words used to describe political nihilism include - active, revolutionary, destructive and even creative. Political nihilism is defined as the realization "that conditions in the social organization are so bad as to make destruction desirable for its own sake independent of any constructive program or possibility." It deals with authority and social structures rather than simply the introspective, personal emotions of existential nihilism.
Political nihilism especially is a world-view that's rational, logical, empirical, scientific and devoid of pointless emotion. It's the logical psyche that distills everything down into what is known, what can be known and what can't be known. It's the realization that all values are ultimately relativistic and in some ways the simplicity of nihilism is its own complexity.
Nihilism ~ That conditions in
the social organization are so bad as to make destruction desirable for its own
sake independent of any constructive program or possibility.
An estimable and succinct definition of a (political) nihilist comes from Ivan Turgenev's 1861 novel Fathers And Sons, "A nihilist is a person who does not bow down to any authority, who does not accept any principle on faith, however much that principle may be revered." Clearly a real, mature nihilist is a very serious person with a sharp, cogent mind but one dealing with a double edged sword that can just as easily lead to damage as to enlightenment.
So the two classes of nihilism overlap but Nihilism's Home Page is mostly about this second stage of 'political' nihilism for reasons of brevity, because the existential angle when not stillborn generally leads to political nihilism anyway, because nihilism isn't something to just talk about it's something you live, and finally because political nihilism has real world history and experience as we will read concerning the Russian revolutionaries in Historical Nihilism below. Ultimately however, the nihilistic direction one travels depends on what the individual wishes to make out of life.
To negate and circumvent the paradox's and internal contradictions inherent within 'social' nihilism is the course of the 'political' nihilism you're reading about. I don't want to use the philosophy lexicon any more than necessary nor the confusing verbosity of academia (just a few colorful adjectives where necessary); nihilism is the destruction of philosophy the negation of idealism, the negation of mythology, and the destruction of perplexity along with the disingenuous despots that profit from it as the monopolist interpreters of the confusion.
Historical Nihilism
Technically the first nihilists were the Greek Sophists who lived about 2500 years ago. They used oratorical skills and argumentative discourse to destroy the values upon which everyday beliefs rested. However they were unable or unwilling to provide any constructive program to replace the old system. Needless to say it didn't take long before the sophists became highly unpopular and came to be perceived as threats to the establishment.
One of the earliest nihilistic writers of the modern era was the Dane Soren Aabye Kierkegaard who lived from 1813 to 1855. Kierkegaard was a truly unique but also enigmatic philosopher. His most important contribution was the philosophy of existentialism, which was in many ways a negation of the ruling Hegelian philosophy. The basis for existentialism was deeply rooted in Kierkegaard's Lutheran Protestantism and reflected the ideals of the subjectivity of truth and the nature of life as a uniquely individual pursuit. To be brutally succinct existentialism posits that existence is based on experience this experience is a uniquely individualized sensation; (my reality is not your reality). Modern quantum physical 'philosophy' returns to this theme of solipsistic reality during the late 20th century using empirical mathematics.
The Russian
Nihilists
Political nihilism goes back at least to Russia during the last half of the
1800s as a revolutionary movement with the stated goal of overthrowing the
despotic authority of the Czar. "In Russia, nihilism became identified
with a loosely organized revolutionary movement (C.1860-1917) that rejected the
authority of the state, church, and family. ... The movement advocated a social
arrangement based on rationalism and materialism as the sole source of
knowledge and individual freedom as the highest goal. By rejecting man's
spiritual essence in favor of a solely materialistic one, nihilists denounced
God and religious authority as antithetical to freedom." From: The
Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy
By modern standards the Nihilists attempts at revolution were inconsistent and ineffective - lobbing low quality munitions at the Czar and his family and often getting themselves blown up in the process. But what they lacked in equipment and tactics they made up for with vision, ideas and an unparalleled intensity.
The nihilists enjoyed shocking their parents by calling for an end to the old moral system, advocating, for instance, the extermination of everybody in Russia over the age of 25. In the 1860's many of these young intellectuals went to Switzerland, where the proper Swiss bourgeoisie were scandalized at the men with their hair cut long and the girls with their hair cut short, at their loud voices and insolent behaviour.¹
In some ways the Russian Nihilists were the 'Hippies' of the 60s (1860s), mostly hot air and grand ideas powered by the winds of popularity. It's an interesting parallel because both the pseudo-revolutionaries of the 1960s and the Nihilists of the 1860s were glorified an idolized by sectors of the media at the time. Both groups battled to overthrow a crumbling empire and corrupt leaders, and both were eventually outdone by the police powers of government authority and a shifting public sentiment towards order. Both groups had little if any concept of the necessary effort required for a true revolution but still achieved a certain level of success and notoriety.
Revolution for Russia wasn't eliminated, just delayed. By 1917 a more competent and better lead group known as the Bolsheviks finished the deed. Sometimes it makes me wonder what the U$A will be like in 2017?
Anarchism
Both modern nihilists and anarchists can trace roots to the 19th century
personality Mikhael Bakunin who succinctly reflected the nihilist sentiment
with his famous statement: "Let us put our trust in the eternal spirit
which destroys and annihilates only because it is the unsearchable and
eternally creative source of all." Politically anarchism and nihilism are
often confused and in a limited yet tangible sense nihilism is the struggle
between law/government (forces of anti-natural order) and liberty (nihilism).
Here anarchism and nihilism seem to have certain elements in common. For
example the anarchist will say 'no one has the authority to tell another what
to do'. But the nihilist would say that if the one giving orders has a gun and
the other not, then what do rights or authority matter? Indeed what good is
constitution at the moment of any criminal event? This is a fundamental flaw of
anarchism; its success is predicated on the good conduct of the constituents!
Anarchists are idealists, they believe in subjective concepts such as peace, justice, and especially the ultimately noble nature of the individual (at least under the proper social conditions). The nihilist reality is devoid of such foolishness. The nihilist realizes that history is often abused and misconstrued therough the formation of artificial lines and erroneous connections between disparate events only to substantiate preconceived interpretations of reality, the classic teleological myth.
"We draw an imaginary thread through the ages to chart the course we judge to be the 'correct' one. All wrong views are ignored. This approach was dubbed the 'Whig' theory of history by Herbert Butterfield. The name derived from those past historians who treated history as a record of events that culminated in the political system dear to their own hearts: the liberal democracy." ² It's an understandable product of human evolution to not only detect patterns but get carried away and concoct them as well. "It appears that the human mind has evolved an ability to recognize geometrical patterns where none exist. What else might it be recognizing that does not exist?" ²
Human nature see's things that aren't realy there, just think of optical illusions or Rorschach ink-blot tests. Much of life is nothing interpreted as something. This is because dealing with the yawning nothing necessitates the concoction of a something to grasp the nothing thereby ignoring the perilous obvious by manufacturing a more malleable artificial myth. Yet the attitude of a nihilist is contradictory to this because they desire to discern a more accurate understanding of reality at the moment not as they wish to see which is the tragically typical way divorced from evidence and reasoned hypothesis. This includes the desire to view human character as it actually is and understand purpose within context.
A Little Perspective
Everybody has an answer, but not just any answer, the answer. If you think about it it's truly amazing the sheer number of people that have the officially authorized monopoly on truth. This fact alone highlights the dissonance of absolute values and the misguided nature of idealism. What quantitative value would you place on your life? A life insurance corporation could concoct an exact dollar amount. But even that figure may be inflated, the chemical compounds that make up your body are only worth a few cents. But isn't life more valuable than gold, oil or other commodities? Think again.
Which is cheaper to create human life or an ounce of gold? Gold can actually be synthesized in a cyclotron but the cost is astronomical, however human life or any life can be created virtually for free. Planet Earth is infested with perpetual self-replicators but the amount of platinum for example is finite. This self-righteous confidence manifests itself as an unlimited capacity for egoistic narcissism and self-magnification. Human arrogance conveniently assumes itself the apex of evolution yet in reality the corporal being is merely a disposable vehicle for the reproduction of genetic material, not the other way around! Natural human cravings are harmful to the self but profitable to the genes, hence the prevalence of self-destructive behavior among others. And remarkably this is the true solution to the classic existential dilemma, why life is just death or as John Lennon once put it, "Why in the world are we here? Surely not to live in pain and fear," most assuredly we are. The human body isn't programmed for pain-free longevity just long enough to reproduce, which is why doctors will never run out of business. The biological boss may be too small to see but is far too powerful to ignore.
If human value could be measured outside the skewed perspective of the collective ego it might look something like this; if only one individual existed on planet Earth they would be the most important human. If two people existed their individual significance would be divided in half (1/2). If six thousand million people existed on Earth what would the individual significance of each one be? A simple equation shows the value as the fractional percentage of the whole population plus any incidental, conjectural additives from education, training, intelligence etc. Presupposing this Marxian values system of universal equality the formula for individual human value is:
|
||
|
So in a world of six billion people your uneducated mass is 1/6000000000 or 1.67 x 10^-10 of that whole. Your significance is 0.0000000167%. With a 12 year education your significance rockets upward to a factor of 2.167 x 10^-9 or 0.0000002167%. |
Is it any wonder religion is so popular, why human nature so desperately seeks meaning and purpose even in the most ridiculous places? Why do secular Americans hide behind money fooling only themselves into thinking that wealth gives them significance? Isn't it painfully obvious why society invents artificial concepts such as justice, morality, and ethics? The brutality and utter irrationality of the animal world is just outside the rusty gates of our crumbling civilization. But isn't it comforting to know that as long as we're inside we have the warming sensation of fairness, equality and justice for all (that can afford it anyway)?
Self-delusion may well be the defining quality of human nature. Lies maintain our flimsy order, we find consolation in myths like 'what we do has significance' and 'God punishes the wicked'. The constant avalanche of empirical evidence to the contrary simply gets relegated to the third class bureau of irrational philosophers.
"Hypocrisy can flourish when goodness is defined not only as kind and altruistic behavior, but as sticking to the rules and obligations of the faith."³
Our 'leaders' wage war in the name of peace and establish democracy with an iron fist. Our traditional values are warped; they reflect fantasy not reality. Our values are so removed from reality that fantasy becomes reality and truth becomes error. This is the primary difficulty in conveying the meaning of nihilism; all morally loaded concepts are biased against a lucid description of the nihilistic viewpoint. Nietzsche was addressing this issue when he wrote the title and the book Beyond Good and Evil. But it's not just a series of lies it's a debasing and wholly aberrant structure. The problem is so deep that even the words to define it must be replaced with a new lexicon.
Nihilism as Philosophy
Nihilism is a rejection of philosophy and the metaphysical nebulae such reasoning inevitably descends into. Yet if one wants this out of nihilism they can construct it, even more so than other idea sets, but to do so only leads to paradox and contradiction like finding value in no-values or literalizing belief in nothing; try the disbelief in gravity for instance. Nihilism is not absolutist voiding of values to create an imaginary milieu neutered of good or evil, up or down because those are absurd situations, indeed idealistic situations that are both impossible to achieve and dangerously delusional as goals. Unfortunately some nihilists get caught in this dim labyrinth of ethics and morality. Others jump head first into the maw as a demonstration of supposed mental prowess which explains existential nihilism's effervescent popularity among certain academics and similar insulated atoms of fantasy. Nihilism is the destruction of philosophy not the magnification of it! Reference Nietzsche's philosophy with a sledgehammer.
This existentialism is superfluous since such constructs are wholly elastic anyhow, they can and do mean whatever the proponent claims generating the same foggy haze of intellectual opacity nihilism disperses. In other words it's myth creation, although that doesn't render them insignificant or impotent in the mind of the public, myths have value for those that believe in them. The nihilists can't simply ignore the myth believers or the myths, instead the wise path is to seek understanding. Nihilism dissolves myth with the acid of reason and logic to illuminate their assumptions and underpinning structures to better understand and better act.
Nihilism challenges the assumptions supporting common values such as 'equality'; 'pity', 'justice', etc. But also terms of conclusion about human existence such as "meaningless", "pointless" and "futile" are equally flawed because their definitions stem from the original morality values that have hitherto been rejected. Simple example - 'justice'. In court its not whether one is guilty or not but how good a lawyer one has, how cogent the presented argument is and how well manipulated the jury and judge are, did somebody say justice - oh maybe not! Justice is the obfuscatory legalese that your high-priced barrister can spew in the courtroom like an oil slick in front of a pursuing vehicle. The rich go free while the poor go to prison. Why? Find out on the next page Nihilism in Action!
Nihilism is a consequence of the personal realization that all of modern values and morals are wholly false and unworkable the ultimate esteem with which these morals have been uplifted leads to catastrophic withdrawal to the opposite extreme when they're realized to be deception.
Values and their changes are related to increases in the power of those positing the values. The measure of unbelief of permitted 'freedom of the spirit' as an expression of an increase in power." Nihilism [is] an ideal of the spirit, the over-richest life-party destructive, partly ironic. -Nietzsche The Will to Power, #14
While a belief in nihilism immediately returns a perspective of utter futility for life and universal existence, this perspective is not the final resolution. "Nihilism represents a pathological transition phase..." ibid., #13. Existence is not futile simply because the edifice of modern morality is inherently dysfunctional. Actually existence has even more purpose now because a proper perspective has been attained and a reason is [finally] clear - the complete destruction of the debasing, theologically derived moral order. Thus the nihilist is at base a creator of the highest magnitude and a survivor of the most intense metaphysical struggle of all time. The nihilist undergoes a personal evolution and has proven themselves the mental superiors to the herd and mob, they have proven their will and 'license' for continued existence and have successfully escaped from the circus of values. Once the transvaluation of values is complete an entirely new and sane perspective is achieved.
280 Million Years of Nihilism
It's a characteristic of the human mind to turn simplicity into subjective complexity and to construe difficulty from life where none exists. Today the archetypal question for philosophers is "why are we here." Ask a human and serious responses will probably involve complex reasoning involving mystical deities or introspective analysis. But before we leave the final answer with humanity I think we need a second opinion.
Some 280 million years ago the first amphibians began life outside water. These Labryinthodonts named for their infolded tooth enamel typically had large triangular heads and wide, flat bodies that looked like giant road-kill without the tread marks. Tetrapods like these crawled around on land eating worms, maybe a few bugs but basically whatever they could catch and digest. Not much to look at or admire yet they gave rise to all other land vertebrates, reptiles, birds, and yes eventually even literate humans.
If we could ask the same of a Permian tetrapod what mysterious, and enlightening answers would they provide? Perhaps something like "I don't understand the question, I just want to avoid death."
Odd isn't it that they never had any goal or god, no soul or hope of an afterlife indeed they lacked any purpose beyond the brief struggle for life and yet millions of years later here we are reading this because of it, because they existed and evolved. We as humans exist in the same physical universe, subject to the same rules of physics and biology, the same need for sea-water salinity body fluid, the same protein and amino acids... Decades of scientific inquiry and careful research all to reach the inescapable conclusion that the point is there is no point. The joke is on us because we turned the absurdly simple into the dangerously complex. Indeed if scientists would or could get out of this loop they'd notice the likely conclusion that science itself is doomed because even archaic mythologies provided more appealing cosmic answers for public consumption!
The answer to "why are we here" is no different for human, Labryinthodont or jellyfish because we live in the same world subject to the same physical limitations and end up in the same place after death, well some leave better fossils than others. Now we see why fear of death is such a natural instinct and why religion exerts so much concerted effort to contradict that instinct.
The human mind creates ethics, moral codes, rules to die by, excuses and justifications for the deepest epiphany and the most trivial event alike. Some even go so far as to hijack random events and misinterpret them as self-created, the psychological principle known as 'illusion of control'. Unfortunately the complexities of the human mind merely make it easier to believe in fantasy and entertain delusion. Such an effort to find greater significance where there really is none and this only leads to wayward guidance and specious justifications. Those concocted reasons are then used to justify what need not be justified like our continued existence except based upon lies, setting up everyone for the fall when the myth erodes. Everything would move onward quite smoothly without any human minds around to believe in God, Satan or any other fictions, it did before us and it will after. Instead the Nihilist is concerned with the things that matter whether anyone believes in them or not; all those forces and factors that influence even the things that don't think.
Although evolution has no goal and our purpose may be just as elusive that doesn't void significance, it doesn't make action and consequence irrelevant, an important distinction too often confused within nihilism. Nihilism doesn't preclude significance or a naive refusal to extract lessons from history just as a lack of the traditional mystical goal does not necessitate futility. Extinction events for example are significant, after all we wouldn't be here without them. The only cosmic justification supported by any tangible evidence is the impetus for continued existence, the self-justifying purpose of tautology. And truthfully demanding any further justification from most simply foments confusion and foolish behavior. Furthermore it's likely that anything beyond that basal maxim is just an artificial construction. So, nihilism is not an issue of existence so much as a series of questions regarding the value if any that those artificially constructed meanings have. Where do they take us and do we really want to end up there? And can we really outsmart natural selection, for instance?
What's Left?
Nihilism can appear very complicated because in the present moral milieu it's necessary to describe it in the terms of negatives and 'against it's'. It's about accepting what is and working within that framework to generate a lifestyle of efficacy and natural perspective. Too often our modern hi-tech planet makes us think that if it looks confusing and it takes a Germanic scholar to analyze it then it must be complicated. What I'm saying is that you don't need any of that shit. You don't need to believe in God or Beelzebub or anything else that can't be verified or tested in any way. You don't need to believe that human nature is intrinsically evil or in original sin. It takes so much vain effort to struggle with good and bad. Normal people literally torture themselves with ethical and moral quandaries in self-created dungeons that ultimately never matter. For this reason the nihilistic philosophy takes a beating in the arena of ideas because it's just a nothing ideology. That's why I like to call it an anti-ideology. It simply doesn't play by those rules because those rules are arbitrary; they exist only in the social-mindset. And if other people want to live within that self-torturing, intellect numbing fantasy world then I'm not going to stop them; have fun ... hating life.
Change and acceptance of heterodoxy does not come without introspection. Human nature is so conditioned to social living that even the silliest social faux pas achieves monumental proportions; people live for the trivial at the cost of living for the critical. "Did I buy the right brand of shoes? Am I using the right brand of toothpaste?" Who really has the twisted perspective?
And what is the point? The point is that even if you reject nihilism your relationship has not been severed because the entire social and political structure our daily lives function within is programmed for self-destruction because its all based on disingenuous ideas and promulgated through hollow rhetoric and plastic faces for near-term goals. And what do lies breed except vengeance and anger?
So blame the violence, blame the anger, blame the nihilism, blame the effect not the cause; nevertheless that dangerous dénouement will remain not far off and no one alive will avoid it. Learn why, read the next page In Action!
Closing Statement
As humbling as it is the scale and perhaps significance of humanity shrinks in accordance with the magnitude of our knowledge. A basic understanding of cosmology leads to the ultimate nihilism. Springing from a cosmic accident life (apparently) has no purpose or value. Humans crawling upon an tiny world at the edge of one of countless galaxies in an uncaring, unconcerned universe. The product of a series of astounding improbabilities destined to die after lifetime of meaningless suffering alone and afraid... (and if you think God made it all, isn't that even more degrading?!)
Without a higher moral judge, nothing beyond life goes punished or rewarded. The fundamental moral quandary is that in order for moral rules to have validity they must have an ultimate arbiter, otherwise right and wrong dive into confusing waters of relativism. That ultimate arbiter has always been God, the final judge, where the buck stops, where even Earth's most evil and wicked run amok with free will get their comeuppance. The Bible says the Earth is the Devils domain (Isaiah 13:11 & Revelation 12:9, even though the Bible also says God created the Earth, Genesis 1:1). If that's what everyone expects, then that's all it will ever be. As a nihilist I say it's our domain and we can make it a hell or a heaven. But as long as we prejudge the decision absolving ourselves of responsibility then it probably will be a realm for the Devil.
When we conclude that we each only get one life, the goal becomes painfully obvious, as unpleasant as the sight of the predator messily devouring the prey on Wild Kingdom. I think humans are the gods, but the corporal package is a powerful dichotomy. Worm and god side by side. We need no higher power for justification or success, only the desire and willpower. Each human life has the potential, but unless one strives to be a god they are only a worm. We can do anything the question is will we? Will we struggle in vain with the futile labels of olde, senselessly slaughtering each other over self-imposed polarities while disingenuous despots reap the profits from our collective bloodletting? Or will we choose the exit, and in this very dark room known as life not too many exit signs are visible. The one I used is called nihilism.
Comments?
Well now that your sufficiently enthused or riled up depending on your reaction to the provocation why not direct the sentiment to freydis@counterorder.com And yes, I do actually respond to e-mail so if you have a link, question, found an intriguing opinion or debate on the topic pro or con send that too.
KING
SOLOMON A NIHILIST 10TH CENTURY BCE
"Everything is meaningless!"
A careful observer can find nihilism in even the most unlikely places. King Solomon was the son of David, king of Israel and is best known in mythology as the acme of wisdom, and historically for his empire building. After accumulating everything any king could want he realized it was all pretty futile since both the wicked and the righteous had the same lot in life. Solomon clearly had the benefit of experience and age, he stated "the more knowledge, the more grief".
In his time-off threatening to cleave infants in two he freelanced proverbs, aphorisms of wisdom as well as a few nihilistic diatribes on the how life is just chasing the wind and "everything is meaningless!" Ecclesiastes is a great book, in it Solomon discusses the conundrum of justice and the ennui of our brief lives on earth. But I'm not going to give away the ending conclusion, you'll have to read it yourself.
http://www.counterorder.com/nihilismbios.html 3/19/03 11:28 AM
BUDDHA A NIHILIST IN 563?-483? BCE
[SIDDHARTHA,
GAUTAMA BUDDHA OR 'ENLIGHTENED ONE']
Buddha Siddhartha was born in Nepal. Eventually burned out and bored with the hedonistic lifestyle as the privileged son of a warrior caste ruler in India, Buddha turned to introspection and came up with the path to enlightenment through love, serenity and especially loving serenity.
Realizing that suffering is the common denominator for humankind, meditation and inner-peace is the logical antidote to eternal external conflict. Taking this to it's full conclusion corporal existence once finally nullified removes the suffering and leaves nothing but enlightenment in the ultimate state of nirvana. This is the goal of Buddhists, the ultimata desire is to achieve nothingness. Sort of nihilism turned into religion, less spiritual than logical which was a virulent affront to the ruling Hindu system.
Buddha spoke in Pli but never wrote anything. By using the common language instead of the elitist Sanskrit most couldn't understand he included the average person in his sermons, a novel democratic idea that won converts from the overlooked majority. After all anyone can be on the path to enlightenment.
Buddha did have some amazing ideas given not only for the historical period but the ideological longevity which I attribute to the remarkable concept of religion as methodology - 'the path' instead of 'the faith'. And to this day monuments in his likeness, the big and the even bigger, litter the entire eastern half of the Asian continent. And incidentally sculpture and pictures of Buddha intend to portray the bliss attributed to the state of nirvana - facetiously akin to a somniferous drug high or the original nihilistic opiate.
Buddha died in Kusinagara, Nepal after eating contaminated ham; and if he'd survived I'm sure the ninth path would be 'skip the undercooked pork side-dish'.
NICCOLO MACHIAVELLI 1469-1527
A Florentine statesman, Machiavelli was a remarkably observant student of human nature. His book The Prince is an apt tool for gaining and maintaining political power as well as the policy making of expediency. Niccolo was a nihilist in the sense that he didn't allow morality in planning or ethics in his treatise to obstruct his judgment, although he was certainly aware of the implications of his endeavor. Consequently he constructed a product that despite complaints and condemnation remains useful and accessible to anyone.
Niccolo used his mastery of history, especially
the Roman politicians to form patterns and draw logical conclusions. He called
'em as he saw 'em, a pragmatism perhaps more accurately categorized within
chronology as opportunism but that's just a sign of understandable ambition.
Still the infamy ascribed to Machiavelli is
remarkably innapropriate given the logical simplicity of his conclusions.
"Men in general judge rather by the eye than by the hand, for every
one can see but few can touch. Every one sees what you seem, but few know what
you are."
His bottom line was not a justification of authoritarian excess' but the political prudence of a perpetually placated public.
SERGEI NECHAYEV 1847-1882
The Russian Revolutionary era, during the second half of the 19th century, was characterised by some very fiery personalities like Michael Bakunin. But if the rest were fiery, Sergei Nechayev was a thermobaric explosive!
For a while Sergei Nechayev operated in an ideological gray area between radical anarchism and political nihilism. But after publishing his 'Catechism of a Revolutionist' and promoting the most violent means to justify a destructive end, the anarchists expressed concern and trepidation over both Nechayevs methods and his highly focused and conspicuous lack of moral boundaries.
And when it came to revolutionary focus Nechayev was downright laser-like. His modus operandi was nihilistic in that he desired destruction of the polity regardless of any constructive future, or at least it wasn't a concern for the present. But by placing all the emphasis upon eliminating the political and social system of oppression and censorship without offering a vision of superior alternative it not only limited popular appeal but this manic adherence to the 'Revolutionist' precepts essentially became one of faith anyway.
Still given the brutal context of feudal Tsarist Russia there was logic to his methodology because whether you criticized the Tsars fashion sense or threatened to kill his entire family and the little dog too, you'd still end up doing the same 20 years of hard labor when caught by the secret police. Nechayev correctly surmised the lack of benefit to half-measure within the revolution.
ANDY WARHOL 1928-1987
[ANDREJ
WARHOLA]
No, he never killed anyone however Andy Warhol had some very nihilistic ideas and even his artwork had a nihilistic intent. Undeniably he was very misunderstood artist and individual (a common trait of Nihilists) and part of the reason for that was his tendency to verbally obfuscate explanations and basically sham the interviewers that continually tried to figure out what Warhol was all about. I think that the people that surrounded him were there to leech of his notoriety more that anything else and this created an undeserved sense of guilt by association towards Warhol.
Andy Warhol took the concept of 'nothing' and turned it into 'something'. His art wasn't art, it was anti-art; something to fill up empty spaces; it was taking nothing and filling it with something - turning nothing into something! He said, "Ideas are nothing.". In a sense he believed in what was not there, a philosophy of anti-philosophy.
He was even nihilist when it came to traditional values - he confidently asserted that he was married to his tape recorder. But when it came to art he was a revolutionary. Warhol wanted his art to be all the same, to make one image that could be copied as many times as desired, that way each one would be a masterpiece, everyone could have their own masterpiece!
http://www.counterorder.com/nihilismbios.html 3/19/03 11:35 AM
Objective Reality & Freewill
It's remarkable how even a modicum of logic and scientific philosophy demonstrates the weakness of defining what is real and the rules to describe it. Like a sandpit the more one struggles the tougher it gets. So an important value to question is objective reality. The closest match might be scientific laws which are merely consistent principles and the most powerful ones are just statistical constructs. Statistical is the operative word here for the latest research strongly suggests that even the absolute constant of light speed has subtly changed over the course of the universe!
This lack of objective reality implies a lack of objective truth but really this is a needless philosophical reduction that leads to neither clarity nor accurate interpretations. Even a state of total chaos has statistical uniformities. Consensus can be found and in fact it's remarkably prevalent. Commonality can be found and built upon at many levels but absolutes are less meaningful here than consistency; ultimate reality is fuzzy because it's a product of probabilities. The key is to utilize the solid and avoid the ambiguous, bet on the likely and not the unlikely. "There is no reason to suspend belief in an underlying reality. It's just that the steps we take to establish it determine what it will be found to be. Reality is contextual." ¹
The randomness of nature is a powerful asset because it negates the credibility of teleology, that purposeful predestination that undermines freewill. So one actually has the option to passively accept the socio-historically established concoction of absolutes, truth and moral laws, the objective reality which can be nothing but myth. Or they can accept real for what it is and assume the more healthy role of active participant constantly defining existence through perception and intelligence. In this way defining existence is predicated upon life, conscious awareness of sensory input combined with critical interpretation of what that input means. And the more highly developed the conscious or the greater the intelligence the more effective and meaningful is existence.
|
Passivity is a myth. We are all intricately enmeshed within a dynamic system that doesn't just demand but compels active decision making. |
Hence the difference between passive 'social' and active 'political' nihilism is that one accepts whatever happens within futility and pointlessness while the other destroys/creates meaning and value. Which path a person takes is a personal decision within the limits of ability and that means one does have choice; existence is not predetermined or fatally ordained. However default answers and the compulsion of conformity shouldn't be overlooked. Reality is contextual.
The Pitfalls of Artificial Law:
It may seem peculiar how terms like 'moral', 'liberal' and 'conservative' are used in conversation. People will tell you they're moral individuals but they don't say moral according to who or what even though every culture and religious order has different standards. They'll tell you they're liberal and one is supposed to assume they mean it politically instead of liberal users of peyote or stamps on heavy envelopes. 'Progress' is another favorite, progress is good but as in the spread of cancer? Or maybe they mean the spread of Wal-Mart's to every town in the world with at least 5,000 people?
But the consistent message people are trying to convey in conversation is their own subtle deviation from the political and social norm and from the ambient morality which is to say from the definitions and standards processed, packaged and pumped into them by media, government and church authority. Since all these concepts are unable to be empirically codified they assume elastic values that are easily warped to serve despots and unhealthy outcome which is why Nietzsche wisely stated:
"Morality is the best of all devices for leading mankind by the nose."
But moral laws aren't the only kind that can be warped to serve disingenuous ends. The greater the personal wealth and property one controls or possesses the more laws are needed to protect that wealth. Conversely the less one owns the fewer laws are needed for protecting it. At a point of total poverty where one has nothing but the self they would only feel the need for laws against killing i.e. 'thou shalt not murder'. In other words the degree of law desired is directly proportional to the wealth in possession. Laws protect that vested power and the people owning it by providing consistent codified support for the control and distribution of that wealth. But even though the stated desire for legality is universal the interpretation of that legality is not, clearly varying between have's and have-nots, a schism fervently exploited by Marxists. Enter the lawyers who are mercenaries paid to reinterpret the law to favor the client. Since the rich have the money to buy the most powerful lawyers and since the establishment of precedent is defined through epic court battles, common law is gradually skewed in favor of those rich patrons. Hence the emergence of a class-bifurcated, sanctimonious justice system and the erosion of law fairness. Scientific research shows that in a police lineup witnesses' who choose an incorrect person are just as confident as ones that choose the correct one because human memory fills in the blanks with assumptions. Furthermore juries are just as credulous of false or inaccurate testimony as legitimate because all that really matters is strength of conviction. The criminal justice system warps science and the witness to its own ends because the only thing that matters is which side your on - prosecution or defense.
Furthermore laws are designed to protect the incompetent and mitigate the influence of the capable. For example a cop with a gun is a greater danger than a 'criminal' because they have an official sanction to kill, their murder is backed by the concept of law. The government and legal institution has no higher morality than the 'criminal' does; they are prone to heinous conduct just as, if not worse than the 'criminal' is. One party can act with impunity; the other will be executed. So what of "rights"? Nihilism views rights as irrelevant because it's the underlying structures of morality and the roots of truth, myth and collective delusions that dictate significance. Morality and ethics are artificial byproducts of culture and through hypocrisy and abuse are warped into becoming illusory forces.
The major artificial structures of civilization are self destructive at the very least and totally dysgenic at worst. Government and Empires exist to protect the weak, the stupid, and the least fit to survive. Laws, rules, and mores all perpetuate and propagate the weakest elements at the expense of the best. Some argue that money is a proxy for achievement, this is false. Money is aggregated amongst the already wealthy. Nor does our capitalist society promote achievement through the educational establishment, the mythical system of western mandarinism perpetuated by certain intelligentsia members. The true nature of the system is based more on connections and wealth than merit. The number of slots to get on this escalator to social achievement is limited, and the already powerful get to choose who gets those slots, so guess who really gets in! It has never been truer than today, the rich get richer while the poor get poorer.
Evolution isn't aided by government or legislation, not even by laissez faire economics. After all evolution operates in chaos (the natural order), government stops growth, progress and positive change. Government forces creativity into well regulated conduits directing it into futile creations that stifle evolution and negate willpower like curing one disease to make way for another more insidious one or 'must see TV'.
War or Revolution?
Before I continue it is imperative that I clearly define the differences between war and revolution and their significance to Nihilism. All too often the two words are used interchangeably because they both convey a sense of violent action and social upheaval but they have very different meanings. Part of the problem involves the nature of modern warfare, which is increasingly an urban phenomenon that affects civilians even more than soldiers. Guerrilla warfare and counterinsurgency efforts all blur the distinction between revolution and warfare. But this doesn't mean the two concepts are synonymous; in fact warfare and revolution are opposites. A war is started by an established government and fought against an organized enemy. Revolution is an effort to overthrow and replace an established government or authority structure.
"It is better to deal with a government in difficulties than with one that has luck on its side," said Mayer Amschel Rothschild. "The best bargains can be found when the streets flow red with blood," is widely attributed to the Rothschilds as well. Cyclical, traditional European wars of the type funded by the Rothschilds culminated in World War One (the war to end all wars). Many bankers and rapaciuos industrialists gained fabulous wealth off the death and mutilation of millions. Just think of [Sir] Hiram Maxim who amassed an astronomical fortune from the invention of the machine gun! 'Build a better killing machine and the world will beat path to your door'. War is about the monetary profit of Kings and plutocrats.
Revolution is an anti-war, ideally it's the effort to destabilize the machines of the industrialists and overthrow the Kings. Still it would be naïve to think that many revolutions aren't manipulated by the same people they purport to overthrow.
Political leaders realized long ago that in order to achieve their goals and maintain the legitimacy of authority it was necessary to have the support of public opinion. Unfortunately the masses are conservative by nature and rarely desire to be dragged into the bloody machinations of their governments. The solution is to create the proper national event or circumstances with which to manipulate popular sentiment into supporting your campaign. This is called social engineering and like all tools it can be used to help or hurt. One infamous example involved F.D. Roosevelt who lured the Japanese into Pearl Harbor neatly creating the proper domestic outrage required for entry into another suicidal excapade known as war.
It's ridiculous to assume these people will protect us from anything. The Russians, Germans, Japanese, even the British believed their governments would achieve greatness and keep them safe. I guess WW II was a rude awakening? How many Americans used to think employment was guaranteed in a large corporation, or that Social Security funds would always be there? I guess theft just isn't a crime when it's sanctioned by authority. Support of the this Empire is futile; the only choice is to destroy it for safety and sanity.
Too many idealistic crusaders fall for the trick of turning their revolutions into wars at the behest of established authority, in other words be sure to rub-out the right people and hit the correct target. The wise realize that the visible is a product of the invisible in the sense that ideas define outcome, values define product and the moral topology defines the superstructure; and if we think it's impossible it'll never happen but if we think it can it will.
"For our struggle is not against flesh and blood but against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms." - Ephesians 6:12 with a little 'translation'
This is the true nature of the system we're dealing with. It's an unfortunate fault of simplistic human nature to first target the visible elements. But to merely attack the visible superstructure of capitalism, church and politicians is doomed - the mistake of anarchism. The real enemies are the "demons" in the public consciousness, the myths and the lies, the foolish ideas and the self-destructive notions and secondly the people that preach it. The relativistic moral codes of "good" is this and "bad" is that, they're cynically reinvented by self-righteous leaderships to achieve misguided, mystical goals. And the intangible, non-verifiable goals make the sweetest bait because no one can claim otherwise!
Strategic success of revolution if I may use the word is predicted upon reaching these roots. How? Two means and the first is the acidic dissolution of delusion. Ridicule the ridiculous, highlight absurdity contradiction and irony. Make fun of the foolish and faithful alike but more importantly the notions they use and discredit delusion by every means available.
Second propagate the replacement, fill the vacuum left by the discredited myths. Fill it with fact that's built from the boundaries of the known and the unknown in order to deal with the present and not some fictional afterlife. Counteract religious modes - convince the public that natural behavior and instinct are normal again. Work to build havens from media and pop-cultural influences allowing anyone the freedom of independent thought and introspection unfettered by the corporate sponsored, brand positioned homogenized opinions doled out like drug-laced candy. Communicate the message and the inveterate popularity of entertainment shouldn't be underestimated as a tool for changing opinion, it's the best way to connect with mass audiences. On a more localized level never begin with a frontal assault but instead aim to first disarm you opponent by using say, humor or unexpected actions. And never forget the effect of reinforced statements, one voice is nonsense but two is the sound of authority - use it.
So when does the revolution start? It already has! Act accordingly in what you do and what you say. There's no half measure and no fence to sit on, everyone is a participant in this omnipresent psychological war because it has no front-line or boundaries. Every mind is a battlefield and every person with above room temperature body warmth and IQ is a combatant. Now's the time to decide which side to be on.
Systemic Self-Destruction:
Nihilism is an awareness that destruction is at least as important as construction, even more so when institutions have outlived their usefulness to become corrupt and unhealthy. Idealist crusades fail because they never remove the vestiges of the past order. Think of it biologically, would Homo sapiens have evolved out of the Mesozoic era, or would they have just been dino-snacks? We're here because of a previous mass extinction! The old order didn't mutate, it was catastrophically destroyed because that's the only way radical, meaningful change can occur. Revolutions fail because the willpower to enact the necessary severity of change is lacking. Actually its not just willpower it's the total vision that's usually lacking. Some call Karl Marx a revolutionary but Marxism isn't genuine revolution it's just rearranging the artificial order. Every ideology on the books is merely a convenient way to re-order the present situation; they just shuffle the same old cards and the people end up worse off than before! Nihilism plays a completely new game, but the old game of lies and myths always self-destructs eventually. These are the cycles of history, the recycling of flawed ideologies and our era is a prime example.
Every political ideology has been discredited as an affront to freedom and well-being. From capitalism to communism the fatal flaw is always the same - actualization, the predictable literalization of faith and myth. Besides producing voluminous hypocrisy and tyranny the byproduct of sham ideologies and fractional logic also produces extensive pollution of both the human mind and the earth's ecosystem. Think of the billions of dollars spent to produce nuclear, biological and chemical weapons all to have them rust and leak in storage bunkers from Tooele to Tomsk-7. Millions toiling to produce ultra-deadly nerve gas and radioactive waste with a four and a half billion year half-life. Nihilists know who to 'thank'- and who to stop from doing it again.
Religion - independent theologies and de-centralized organizations have replaced the Church/State monopoly. With the loss of government support (money) the Church has revealed its true nature as the giant profit motivated scam that it is. The theological monopoly has been broken and now any faith is just as valid as any other is. History will rate the separation of Church and State as one of the most critical pivots of the modern era. The secondary effect of this is that the national population doesn't know which faith to choose, and although religion can't be eliminated it can be easily replaced. Now all the God addicts will have to make do with a pluralistic methadone.
Every election season has its battle over education in some form or another. These conflicts only become more heated as relative values polarize amidst social disintegration and concomitant increase of media attention on school violence. But this incessant emphasis on 'education' has little to do with training skills in socialization or adaptability and everything to do with myth indoctrination! This is why religious groups fight like hell for separate private or home schooling. What's commonly referred to as 'education' is really about molding and warping young minds when they're most impressionable. And given the stunning uselessness of 95% of school material within an actual employment setting it seems difficult to explain the education scam otherwise except perhaps as hollow tradition or keeping the kids off the streets for a few hours. Employers and authority powers all look for those stamped, notarized pieces of paper to effortlessly determine the gullibility and exploitability of a person, how quickly they'll latch on to authorized opinions and follow orders without questions, or at least that's how a cynic would posit degrees and diplomas are really used.
Elimination of monarchic rule. Those inveterate despots and prostitutes for the Church, one of mankind's long lasting afflictions has finally been relegated to the proper place in the dusty archives of history. Unfortunately the new master, the mass media, has simply replaced much of monarchic authority.
Never Let Authorities Shrink-Wrap Your Mind With Their Flag
Nationalism - the nation no longer has any political meaning except as a vestigial tool to drag the public into fratricidal conflicts or generate enthusiastic rivalry for sporting events. The citizenry get the pain without the benefits of nationalism anymore because leaders fail to protect their citizens from external threats. Money, immigrants, religion, drugs and disease all cross political boundaries with impunity, ironically usually unmolested by nationalist politicians. The facile irony only masks the hypocrisy of the domestic leadership that parrots nationalist rhetoric yet acts in favor of international moneyed interests; they talk local but act global.
Patriotism follows the same pattern of obsolescence because anymore its been hijacked to mean obedience to the suicidal dictates of corrupt authority. As long as the domestic death-toll can be kept to a minimum war is good and noble because it generates employment and corporate profits.
The traditional faith in the military establishment is on increasingly questionable grounds. The creation of the volunteer/ professional military is a radical departure from historical precedent. The worlds of the military and the civilian used to be intricately related. Now the two are rapidly spinning in opposite directions. Mistrust, ignorance, and incompetence have created a re-evaluation of the mission of the military and even its very necessity.
The character of the mass media is beginning to be viewed as the imperative threat to collective survival that it is. Democracy is a sham when the primary media filters and manipulates 98% of the information the voter needs to judge candidates. Not only do the same companies own the networks they're owned by the same people, and the trend towards consolidation and mergers continues unabated.
Governments are drowning in a self-created morass of hyper-legislation. Criminality is not a self-evident concept; laws create criminals. The beauty of legislative suffocation is that more laws mean more criminals, and the more criminals on the streets the greater the need for more protective legislation. Lawmaking is the ultimate sinful addiction of corrupt regimes. Global economic and political aggregation is building a new tower of Babel.
This highlights a few elements of the decaying superstructure but to stop at that would be a fatal flaw - Marx's mistake. This decaying process has only begun and it's crucial it not end before being burnt to the ground and dead to the root. The nihilist plays an important role in this process but not as part of the dying system. The nihilist is apart from that system, the suicide orgy of everything attached to the crumbling edifice of dying gods. There's no reason to play games which can't be won or fight for lost causes.
Nihilism Through The Eyes And Into The Minds
The natural world and it's inviolate rules consist largely of violence and dominance with a tenuous overlaid veneer of artificial order at certain moments; it's those news stories of conflict and suffering so distant and easy to disbelieve. If you keep glued to your TV and immersed in that fantasy world and if you go to church and get down on your knees in prayer every night just maybe that dark angel of reality will skip your house and take the next one ... or maybe you and your friends will be the one's in tomorrow's headline. Too many are blinded by subjective morality, they fail to see the purpose Pol Pot and friends serve. It's that glimpse of reality, the natural world so foreign to our insulated world of film and suburbia, that transient mythical realm inhabited for a moment most believe is forever. Regardless of good or evil he brought that potential for brutality into the homes and media of not just a tormented South East Asia but an entire planet. He generates fear, we know how far and how fast the halo graced angel of man can fall from heaven and the wise who watch now have an impetus to keep from falling further. I'm trying to stretch that deadened range of sensation to include a fraction of the evil as well as the good ...and if you don't like it you can't just change the channel, or move to the suburbs. Escape is an illusion, peace is an illusion, deal with the war we're all a part of and be prepared mentally and physically to defend and attack otherwise your just dead meat.
In any war you can't win without knowing the participants, who they are and what motivates them. Humanity consists of two simplified groups the ones that think and one's that only react. One group reasons with logic and the mind, the second from fear and intimidation. Don't hate the stupid, hate the ones that act stupid yet are capable of knowing better. The real target of immediacy isn't the crooked despots or the petty authoritarians, they're predictable and linear. The enemy is the middle class fence-sitters who grant support and mandate through jaded acquiescence and tacit approval. The 9-5 taxpayer, cop's salary-paying drones suckling the teat of the myth machine, the ones that just want to cooperate with this system and make a buck after taxes, these are the ones that keep the Empires well oiled oppression machine grinding away day after day. Don't take the fight to the capitols or the cities where it's already at, take it to the suburbs. Attack the havens and safe-zones the false insulation these people enjoy at the expense of the rest of the planet glibly sure everything is cute and fun because nothing bad happens here and TV says everything is OK.
To attack directly, physically may offer more of a thrill but it's dangerous and offers inferior benefit for the risk involved. Think like a social engineer, ideas are more powerful anyway. Take nihilism into the living room through the eyes and into the fearful minds of the public. Scare them with the facts, force the cognitive dissonance on the sheeple. Magnify conflict and inconsistencies, play the contradictory aspect of popular values against another. This will either make them nihilists too or cause them to react with fear and hatred giving the nihilists the upper hand of rationality and the authority of consistency. Remember, there's no need to be violent when the anti-nihilists so easily assume the role which just establishes your opponent as a negative, impulsive force discredited by their own absurdity. Read on to the next page and learn about the Nihilists.
Closing Comments:
Often what appears to be the 'extreme' message is actually just tomorrow's story today. One can ignore it and panic when it does arrive or learn from it and be ahead of your time prescient, prepared and devoid of fear or panic. Nihilism may never be understood let alone appreciated in modern times. Even the simplicity of anarchism is widely misinterpreted and misunderstood. We live in a dynamic era where traditional values have been warped by authorities to serve unjust ends contrary to public interests. It's an era of contradiction that often necessitates counterintuitive conduct, where sanity is nihilism and patriotism is sedition. The recourse for survival within this context of the erosion of traditional meaning is nihilism.
Nihilism is the organic logical response to artificial chaos, the intentional chaos manufactured by government, religion and mass-media.
Many people blame nihilism for the evils of the world, some might even (erroneously) blame me as a proponent. Much of the antagonism towards this nihilism is due to it's acidic affront of the everyday fantasy world most glibly inhabit. If all you want out of 'life' is the stupefying, self-delusional sense of security then either do nothing or get sent to prison which will get you the same results. After all prison is the most insulated and protected place a person can be, right! Hardly.
Complacency may be cheap but it's compound interest is deadly. Nevertheless even the most horrendous injustice is a lesson learned because it destroys the unhealthy delusion that ultimate responsibility for actions and consequences resides with ambiguous entities in mystical realms. The disabused realize even if they choose not to accept that ultimate responsibility resides within oneself. Life isn't fair because what's defined as 'fair' is self-centered and the universe simply does not revolve around any single person.
In a way that's all it is. That's all that's needed to revolutionize the planet because once a person finally realizes the totality of the lies that everyday life is they will become the greatest nihilist and radical imaginable.
1. The World Within The World by John D. Barrow, page 137, Oxford University Press, 1988.
http://www.counterorder.com/nihilismaction.html