an interpretation of irony

[iambiguous]

First, you have do admit that you are not really a nihilist. It is your wildcard and I am tired of hearing it, it is disrespectful to actual nihilists.

I'll help you along by giving you a good reason: A nihilist isn't capable of making a final judgement on anything that isn't "nothing, really."

If you look up the word nihilism in the SEP you get...nothing. They do not include it in their encylopedia of philosophy.

Over at Wiki they encompass it thusly:

Nihilism ( /ˈnaɪ.ɨlɪzəm/ or /ˈniː.ɨlɪzəm/; from the Latin nihil, nothing) is the philosophical doctrine suggesting the negation of one or more putatively meaningful aspects of life. Most commonly, nihilism is presented in the form of existential nihilism which argues that life is without objective meaning, purpose, or intrinsic value.[1] Moral nihilists assert that morality does not inherently exist, and that any established moral values are abstractly contrived. Nihilism can also take epistemological, metaphysical, or ontological forms, meaning respectively that, in some aspect, knowledge is not possible, or that contrary to popular belief, some aspect of reality does not exist as such.

Now, everyone knows the preponderance of posts I contribute to ILP revolve around the relationship between what we can know, what we can think, what we can believe and what we can or cannot encompass and then express logically [through language] about value judgments "out in the world" we live in.

Yes, there are those who insist that "true" nihilists argue for, "the complete rejection of the existence of human knowledge and values or denial of the possibility of making any useful distinctions among things."

Well, I'm not one of those. Even though you insist that I must be.

[FilmSnob]

Then you should stop using the word nihilism.

Also, you know, just a clerical thing, but it should read "the feeling of realization of the impossibility of existence of human knowledge and values or of the possibility of making any useful distinctions among things."

And even that is extremely superficial.

You use the word "nihilism" like a polititian uses the word "christianity." You have no need of it, and you are using it to mean some completely subjective arrangement of values and ideas with no relation to the abyss that it points to: Nihil - Nothing. Nihilism - Nothingism.

[von Rivers]

It is problematic given that the analogy is towards a universal morality. What everyone should do. What the guy who likes FGM should do even though he doesn't get it. Unless I am missing something. I assume an objective morality SHOULD be universal, even if it isn't followed by everyone. Otherwise I am not sure what objective would mean in this context.

The analogy we're talking about is about physical health, right?. Let's try to clear this up. The analogy should help explain to you why objectivity and universality need to be kept separate. I think that was the original point...

At different ages, in different climates, for different body types---there are different things you need to do to be healthy. And they change. And the definition of 'health' changes, and so on. But nevertheless, some things are objectively bad for you. (Objective = not a matter of your opinion). If it helps you translate the analogy, then think of FGM like "drinking poison".

Now, whether or not "drinking poison" is healthy (or not) for you can't be universal---since it's (at least theoretically) possible for it to have a negative effect on one person, but a positive effect on another. So, X can't be universal (Universal = applies to anyone in any context). There are some cases where drinking poison might be the best thing you could do for your health. Suppose, in a hospital, you are given something that, in other contexts, would very likely harm your health---but in this context, it works to kill the disease that is actually currently harming your health to a far greater degree. That's just an example. But recognize: It might be the case that drinking some kind of poison is, as a matter of fact, never good for any creature such as us. In that case, objectivity and universality align---but there's no conceptual connection between them, it's just a matter of contingent matter of fact.

Now, think of FGM like drinking poison...

It's theoretically possible, I suppose, to think up an example where FGM is objectively good, and morally required. It's all contextual, right. It's hard for people to imagine because there's probably not an actual context---just one we imagine by thought-experiment. So, imagine a context: saving a life, 10 lives, painless, autonomy respected, stops nuclear war, etc etc. And line up the facts that are relevant. Thus: Objective, but not universal.

I think that is a common misunderstanding. I'm glad it's hopefully cleared up.

That we had a way of determining what we need are and what our well being is, that this can be objectively ascertained. This, in a context discussing morals.

Sometimes we can. I call it science, medicine, empirical things like that. Now, that transfers partially across analogies I think---when you're a consequentialist. Which is a good thing.

Why is this not universal amongst animals, then? Why has evolution not weeded out intraspecies violence? In fact it seems a core portion of many species behavior.

I'm not sure what point you think I made that you are now trying to hold me to. I'm not an evolutionary scientist, and I'm not even sure why this is a pertinent question.

I don't think I have to capitalize reasoning for it to be associated with a mental, generally language based, intended to be logical process. But I can work with your definition of reasons.

You surely don't. You have both feet firmly planted in a long tradition of using the word in an obscure way. That "process" you're referring to...is obscure. Why don't you stand up and put forth a view? I have been asking you to explain this "process", which I find obscure. And as a side point, I think it's false to call "reasons" in the way I'm using the word as "causes". They're not causes in any sense of "necessary connexion" or constant conjunction. They're just the ordinary facts about the world that you would point to when you explain 'why' you acted one way rather than another.

[iambiguous]

Then you should stop using the word nihilism.

Well, given the manner in which I choose to understand morality and human interaction in a Godless world, I shall continue to frame this as a nihilistic perspective. I am a moral nihilist. I do not believe any behavior is either inherently/objectively good or inherently/objectively bad.

But feel free to point out to others this is not what a real nihilist believes.

You use the word "nihilism" like a polititian uses the word "christianity." You have no need of it, and you are using it to mean some completely subjective arrangement of values and ideas with no relation to the abyss that it points to: Nihil - Nothing. Nihilism - Nothingism.

What on earth does that mean? Again, I use it in the Wiki sense: Most commonly, nihilism is presented in the form of existential nihilism which argues that life is without objective meaning, purpose, or intrinsic value.

Would you like to argue this is not how a true philosopher would use the word objective?

[FilmSnob]

Weren't you giving me shit for assuming that I was using dictionary definitions?

What happened to bringing the term down to earth?

If you use words in a subjective sense that you decided unilateraly, you are taking all meaning from that word. Might as well call your perspective precambrian, and you could probably make it fit in less steps than you are using now to make nihilism fit.

Nihil = nothing.

[iambiguous]

Weren't you giving me shit for assuming that I was using dictionary definitions?

There is nothing wrong with the dictionary if you need to look up the meaning of things.

But nihilism revolves around the interaction [the relationship] between many complex things able to be grasped from conflicting frames of mind "out in the world". The dictionary is just the starting point for words like these.

What happened to bringing the term down to earth?

When are you going to?

Again:

...make your point relevant to the distinction I make between "X happened" and "X is immoral".

You can pick the X.

If you use words in a subjective sense that you decided unilateraly, you are taking all meaning from that word. Might as well call your perspective precambrian, and you could probably make it fit in less steps than you are using now to make nihilism fit.

Jesus, you act as though I were suggesting the meaning of nihilism revolves around repairing motorcycles or harvesting grapes.

Nihil = nothing.

Think of the absurdity embedded in inventing a word to mean there can be no meaning.

Even in discussing nihilism with other nihilists I insist that eventually they bring their words down to earth. Otherwise the discussion devolves into the sort of stuff Will Durant's epistemologists pursue.

And, mind you, there is absolutely nothing wrong with that. Not if that is something that interests you. It just doesn't interest me.

[FilmSnob]

Think of the absurdity embedded in inventing a word to mean there can be no meaning.

Yeah, that's why it's an absurd position to argue from.

[iambiguous]

Think of the absurdity embedded in inventing a word to mean there can be no meaning.

Yeah, that's why it's an absurd position to argue from.

Yes, I agree. That's why we have Wittgenstein: To remind us that some things just cannot be encompassed wholly in language.

[FilmSnob]

Thus, you should find a better word.

May I propose relativism?

[FilmSnob]

The fact is that there is a psychological and philosophical state of mind that can be described as nothingism, as nihilism. But you don't seem like a nothingist to me.

[iambiguous]

The fact is that there is a psychological and philosophical state of mind that can be described as nothingism, as nihilism. But you don't seem like a nothingist to me.

Philosophers here "on earth" share in common two things [at least]:

1] they are all products of evolution and
2] they all interact within the confines of the laws of physics

So, the crucial distinction between their philosophies "down here" must revolve around the extent to which they are actually relevant to the manner in which they live on this planet.

So, when folks ask....

1. What can I know?
2. What ought I to do?

...I would want to know why -- for all practical purposes -- they would ask questions like this.

Questions about something in other words.

On the other hand, it doesn't really surprise me when particular philosophers never get around to that. They grapple instead with things like "nothingness". Why? Because, as soon as somethingness exists, matter as mind seems compelled to ponder, "why something and not nothing at all?" and "did something come from nothing?". "In the beginning", for example.

It just seems absurd to imagine the total absense of meaning when that's what minds do: make things more or less meaningful.

Instead, it is in pondering how and why all the individual meanings [and the individual's meaning] may or may not to connected "ontologically" or "teleologically" -- to what?! -- that boggles the mind.

Well, mine anyway.

Nihilism is existential or it is...nothing?

[FilmSnob]

Let me try to reconcile nihilism and existantialism, "is-m," explicitly. Nobody can be or say "nothing," that was settled by Parmenides. But nihilism does end in nothing.

Let's say that each individual person's perception of existance is an equation. This is a little more than that, which added to this other thing equals the complete opposite of that one thing. Nihilism, then, is like having a set value on the right side of the = sign. The value is, of course, nothing, nihil. Ethics, realism, relativism, objectivism, subjectivism, god, gods, ought, is, all equals to nothing. All that we see is, in terms of value, nothing.

Can you truly say that this accurately describes your philosophical ideas?

Btw, and I have started to notice this recently, people seem to assume that, because I am talking about nihilism, I am a nihilist. I am most certainly not. If you read any of my posts ever, I think you will note that I have strong feelings about the actual value of many things.

[iambiguous]

Let me try to reconcile nihilism and existantialism, "is-m," explicitly. Nobody can be or say "nothing," that was settled by Parmenides. But nihilism does end in nothing.

Nihilism says something about nothing. There is no getting around that. Oddly enough however that's when certain philosophers get into wrangling about which particular something [and which particular nothing] nihilsm really is.

It's just a word though. It was a signifer invented to point us in a direction---a direction that will come into conflict with the directions of others.

Is yours the right direction? I would never suggest that of my own.

Equations? They are the last direction to aim toward in discussing the relationship between something and nothing.

Descriptions? What can we describe with words objectively and what can we only nudge ourselves [and others] toward subjunctively?

Btw, and I have started to notice this recently, people seem to assume that, because I am talking about nihilism, I am a nihilist. I am most certainly not. If you read any of my posts ever, I think you will note that I have strong feelings about the actual value of many things.

I am a nihilist. But I tell people what that means to me and not what being a nihilist is. Nihilism revolves [for me] around becoming an atheist, becoming dasein, becoming a moral relativist, becoming someone keenly aware of the limitations of language in calibrating a "reality" between "in my head" and "out in the world".

It is also tangled existentially [for me] in death and political economy and psychology and emotion and libido and instinct.

Rooted somehow in the evolution of life rooted somehow in materialism rooted somehow in existence.

But mind existing as matter? What does that imply about the very nature of arguments like these?

[FilmSnob]

which particular something [and which particular nothing] nihilsm really is.

To a nihilists, all particulars = nothing.

[iambiguous]

which particular something [and which particular nothing] nihilsm really is.

To a nihilists, all particulars = nothing.

Yeah, but that's all you've really got to say. Or, as something Simon Critchley once nudged us towards: "Very little...almost nothing."

Come on, you can do better than that.

[FilmSnob]

No, I can't, nobody can. That's the whole point!

Nihiliism = nothing. There is (ha ha!) nothing more you can say about it, except show the particular ways in which a nihilist always ends his trains of thought in "=nothing."