When it comes to having stupid opinions, when it comes to having false ideas, and when it comes to having incorrect viewpoints, I'm hard-pressed during my weary travels across the Internet to find anything that could feasibly match the pure evil, sheer insanity, and sky-rending idiocy of the "philosophy" known as moral nihilism. I have to use "philosophy" in quotation marks, too, because the word itself (derived, of course, from the Greek philosophia) is supposed to mean "love of wisdom", but any individuals who describe themselves as nihilists could never love wisdom. If they loved wisdom, they would have to concede that life isn't meaningless, and that there are logical imperatives to be fulfilled in the universe--but that would be inconvenient, so they hate wisdom. If they could, they would take wisdom and smash it, because to have wisdom would be to acknowledge that there is indeed value in the universe.

A nihilist is someone who doesn't believe there is any value in the universe. Common mantras include, but are not limited to, "life is meaningless," or "life has no meaning." Of course, life having no meaning entails the lack of concepts such as consequence, or the necessary result or effect of a negative action or cause. There is no such thing as a "crime" or "moral transgression" to a nihilist. You could torture five or ten or a hundred people, however many you want, for no good reason, and there would be no "moral" repercussions involved. You'll get imprisoned, sure, but to a nihilist, we're dealing with notions of intrinsic negative value. That is to say, to a nihilist, even though you'll get punished undoubtedly for your actions as a murderer, that doesn't mean there's anything intrinsically wrong with torturing someone. It doesn't matter if you don't have a good cause.

Most people who claim to be nihilists that I've spoken to are no older than twenty, so, more than likely, not a single one of them has underwent any real suffering in their lives. None of them have had cancer, none of them have had their limbs crushed, and none of them have died. They have no concept of how bad life can really get, and they're going to make the oh-so-dubious claim that none of it matters.

Next time you meet a nihilist, ask him if he'd appreciate it if you shoved a nail directly into his eyeball. They're going to say no. If you ask them why, they'll probably respond with a statement that establishes the existence, involvement, and the pertinence of the intensely negative sensation of pain. It would hurt a lot if you stabbed their eye with a nail, so they'd rather not be stabbed in the eye with a nail. It all seems very agreeable, until you ask them about other people.

You see, nihilism is often closely knit with a wide variety of other garbage philosophies, such as hedonism, rational egoism, and even solipsism. If one makes the argument that nothing in the universe matters, it's much easier, then, to act as though the self is of utmost importance, because your self is the only thing you know to exist. Your existence, your sensations, are all you are capable of experiencing, so the logical statement being made is that there is nothing else in the universe worth caring about. I call this "drain empathy", or the absence of all acknowledgement towards the feelings of other sentient beings, and this is, irreconcilably, the most evil philosophy that I can think of, bereft of all decency.

You ask that same nihilist, after establishing that he doesn't want to have nails in his eye (because it's painful), if he would go out of his way to prevent his eyes from ever being stabbed, and he says yes. Here's where it gets fun. Ask him how he would feel if someone else--be it a friend, a family member, or some random person--gets stabbed in the eye.

You might get responses like:

- Indifference. The person getting stabbed in the eye has nothing to do with me; therefore, I have no reason to care. It's his problem, not mine. Why should I let someone else's pain and suffering affect me in any way?

Fortunately, this is the more exceedingly rare of the two. Clearly, this person is insane--as is anyone who is unable to realize that one's own comfort has no bearing on the comfort of others, and that just because you may be comfortable does not mean that the idea of other's discomfort shouldn't give you pause.

The other, more common, response (which is really not much better):

- Indifference. Sure, it would be horrible--I know this, because I wouldn't want it to happen to me--and if given the opportunity to prevent it, I would most certainly take it. I wouldn't take it because getting stabbed in the eye is an intrinsic bad, though. I would only take it because I would personally feel bad if I didn't.

This is stupid and evil, for different, yet more complex, reasons. While this is obviously an exaggerated paraphrase, most garden-variety nihilists will take this route instead. While claiming that there is no intrinsic value, they'll also claim at the same time that, just because nothing has any meaning, doesn't mean that they still don't have emotions, and they'll function based on those emotions. This is certifiably retarded, for reasons that are obvious to me, but perhaps aren't for other people.

This version of nihilism is just textbook selfishness--doing good deeds for selfish reasons, in my opinion, almost negates the good deed itself. In a life-threatening situation, would you rather be spared by a kind individual who genuinely cares about your well-being, or by someone who's only in it for the fame and fortune? Or by someone who only did it because they'd feel bad if they didn't--and couldn't actually give a damn about you?

But operating on one's emotions alone isn't just inconsiderate--it's also inefficient and dangerous. An emotionally-driven individual is more likely to help a close relative or friend than they are an entire group of people. It's this type of mindset that feeds into our addictive personalities even further. You start doing good deeds not because they're the right thing to do, but because they make you feel good--and you'll start coming up with strategies to maximize your own happiness with the lowest possible effort--that's called inefficiency. The danger comes from the strain it'll inevitably place on our relationships with fellow human beings.

Most people don't like being "accused" of being selfish--but indeed, some nihilists embrace selfishness. A number of them ask insipid questions like "What's so bad about being selfish, anyway?"

The obvious answer, of course, is that there are a lot more people out there than you. Anyone who honestly believes that the self is the most important thing in one's own "personal universe" should be schlepped off of the goddamn planet, because that is just too stupid for words. If you wouldn't want something to happen to you, because it would incur huge amounts of pain and suffering for you, then you shouldn't want anyone to experience pain and suffering. Not because "it'll make you feel good," either, but because it's the logical standpoint to make.

The reason nihilists are the most intellectually bankrupt people there are is because they answer incorrectly one of the biggest and most important questions in the universe. If you can't figure out that the existence of suffering creates huge ethical responsibilities for us on this planet, then I can only wish the worst for you. I hope a pack of tigers maul you to death--or your family--and then I want to hear you say that suffering doesn't matter.

I want every nihilist--every person who claims that life doesn't matter, suffering has no meaning--every person who looks at events like the Holocaust, the Crusades, the Dark Ages, the plagues, the floods, the earthquakes, the anguish, the depression, the horror, every significant other who's ever died of cancer, every pet that's ever been run over, every disease that's ever been endured, takes a look at all of that horror and says, "None of it matters," I want every single nihilist who says that to be rounded up and shot. There's no excuse for this type of person to be a part of a nation that considers itself civilized, and they don't think anything matters anyway.

I mean, they've basically given the universe consent to torture them if they say nothing matters, in my opinion.
So they should get the absolute worst that life has to offer. It only makes sense.

Moral nihilism is, if I've got this right, a meta-ethical position; that's to say, it rejects moral universals in metaphysics or divine command theory. It doesn't necessarily reject moral realism, and I think the two can happily coexist, actually.

I don't think so. Moral nihilism is, by definition, an anti-realist philosophy in meta-ethics. It doesn't just reject moral universals, it rejects all positive moral claims.

Aren't you a nihilist though?

Oh God, let's not.

My problem with moral nihilism (speaking as a former nihilist, no less) is its complete unwillingness to make the presuppositions necessary to reach moral facts. Or indeed any facts. The whole of epistemology is a presupposition, the point is making the right presuppositions.

And when it comes to morality, you either make the presupposition or you don't. And if you don't, you're either religious or a nihilist.

Quote from: Pendulate on June 22, 2015, 07:03:32 AM

Moral nihilism is, if I've got this right, a meta-ethical position; that's to say, it rejects moral universals in metaphysics or divine command theory. It doesn't necessarily reject moral realism, and I think the two can happily coexist, actually.

I don't think so. Moral nihilism is, by definition, an anti-realist philosophy in meta-ethics. It doesn't just reject moral universals, it rejects all positive moral claims.

Hmm, wouldn't that take it outside the realm of meta-ethics, then?

I mean, you can reject meta-ethics while still accepting an empirically based moral framework, can't you?

Hmm, wouldn't that take it outside the realm of meta-ethics, then?

Not really, for the same reason that metaphysical nihilism is still a part of metaphysics or that epistemological nihilism is still part of epistemology.

The fact that they reject the very existence of ethical properties is still a meta-ethical claim.

https://francoistremblay.wordpress.com/2013/02/11/benatars-asymmetry/

But you say life has no value

I've stated explicitly that life's value is derived from the sentient being's capacity to suffer.

In other words, life has value.

Not really, for the same reason that metaphysical nihilism is still a part of metaphysics or that epistemological nihilism is still part of epistemology.

The fact that they reject the very existence of ethical properties is still a meta-ethical claim.

I think that makes sense. But, in the case of moral realism, would a nihilist be rejecting the moral precepts laid out (namely, that we can derive prescriptive norms from descriptive facts about experience) or would they be rejecting the assertion that experiences have descriptive value altogether?

If it's the latter, then wouldn't it be a case of conflating metaphysical value with empirical value? Because it's quite clear that experiences have values, at least in a subjective sense, in that some are more or less desirable than others. I don't know how a nihilist could dispute that without falling back on metaphysics.

Nobody's imposing anything on anybody. Everybody tries to avoid pain for their loved ones.

But people still regularly have children, as if it's some "good thing" to. As if that's "the dream" (you know how it is. Get married->have kids->have grandkids).
To be fair, though, people rarely have kids with negative intentions in mind. I just don't think people have thought what bringing a child into the world really means (IE. they don't understand the consequences fully.)

All of us dying won't fix the issue.

Actually, it would fix this issue. If no one is there to experience pain, then the anti-natalist dream has been realised.

Quote from: Snake on June 22, 2015, 11:49:39 AM

one could be both an anti-natalist and a nihilist, no?

I can't say I agree with Verbatim's more colourful conclusions in the OP, but this would still be a contradiction in terminus. Being an anti-natalist requires the attribution of objective disutility to life.

Right... that's what I figured.

I suppose the problem with my line of thinking was that I thought nihilism required some sort of action on the person's part (in the same way being an anti-natalist requires the action of not having children/preventing suffering).

I was only thinking in a very specific case (my case). I don't care about the consequences of my actions unless they affect others in a negative way. I don't believe there is a point to anything, yet I identify with the anti-natalist/Vegan crowd. But this isn't really nihilism.

Not that I ever considered myself a nihilist.

Meta summed it up rather well. If you're able to make value deductions like "I don't have the right to impose this on anybody else", then you're not a nihilist. It's a contradiction. If you think your own existence is pointless or insignificant, but you see the potential that others have, that's not nihilism--that's just being realistic. But of course, even as a "personal nihilist", you should still do your part in trying to make the world a better place. Otherwise, you're just kind of a parasite.

Well said.
But...
Hypothetically, what would "doing your part to try and make the world a better place" entail? If by "parasite" you mean someone who is actively trying to be unemployed* (or something along the lines of that), couldn't that person still theoretically make the world a better place by not having children and not supporting the meat and dairy industries?


*(I'm assuming that's what you meant by "parasite".)

I mean parasite in the sense that all we do is drain resources without really doing anything to give back. Parasites are just takers. All of us are parasites in this sense--but some are bigger parasites than others. For example, able-bodied fellows who refuse to work.

Being an advocate for veganism/anti-natalism is part of what I'd consider an attempt to making the world a better place, yes. And there's numerous other things you can do as well, but it's mostly just about helping others in any way you can. Acknowledge that everything you do is the result of another human being's suffering (to your house, to your job, down the clothes you wear). Account for it, and take whatever action you feel is necessary to counteract it. We're not going to succeed in preventing all the suffering in the world, but we can certainly try our hardest.

Again, well said.

Nothing further to discuss, here.