Ok, great. 
Trump’s father was a real estate developer and self-made millionare and Donald joined his dad’s company after he graduated from the Wharton School. He brought it to a current worth of about $3 billion, although there have been ups & down along the way.
I dunno, this is probably stretching it, but I’m trying to think of how these two would be nihilists. I don’t know about Trump’s specific philosophy of conservatism (he seems mostly into unbridled capitalism, AFAIK), but I think you could consider Palin’s neoconservatism that promotes individualism, natural rights and reasoned self-interest as tending toward a sort of nihilism (different from Nietzsche’s European version, though). That is, you could consider it if Palin was capable of coming up with deeply considered ideas…and I don’t believe she is. But no doubt there are people around her who are. Mostly, the only things neoconservatives propose to value above one’s self interest, as a form of self-sacrifice, requires waging war. Although the sacrificing in that case is intended primarily for the middle and lower classes, and not for the neocon elite.
To repeat, this is probably stretching it a bit far.
Maybe it’s Trump’s hairpiece that leads me to see him as a nihilist. 
I think one difference between myself and others, including you, who object to the word “nihilism” here, is that I don’t think you have to have “deeply considered ideas” to be a nihilist. Again, though, it’s fine with me that people don’t like my use of the word here.
Though I wouldn’t know of course, I don’t see any reason to assume that Trump has worked harder than Palin. Surely his skills are different than hers, but if I approach the question cynically, perhaps his success is due almost wholly to intuitively well-executed strong-arming, and hers to intuitively well-executed ass-kissing. If I approach the question less cynically, perhaps they both simply worked hard using the skills they have to get where they are.
If you set out to write a song, there is interplay involved between a subject and meaning you would like to convey in the song, and the playfulness required to not get so fixated that don’t have the fluidity required to change course and write something that works. In conventional songwriting, there is a structure that needs to be conformed to. Syllables, rhymes, etc. If you’re so fixated on saying exactly what you intended to say that you can’t conform to the necessary structure, you won’t write a good song. On the other hand, if all you care about is structure, you won’t end up saying anything meaningful. I submit that Palin and Trump have nothing to say, because they don’t care. If they are consistent in their message, it isn’t because they care about anything, it is because they have found a structure that works for them and provides them with short term success, for themselves and possibly their small circle of family and friends. In the balance between seriousness and playfulness, they are all play. And they’re not playing with us - they’re just plain playing us. That is what I mean by nihilism, here.
That is a very well-put and well-taken point Anon.
They are all play.
My previous post in this thread emphasized a definition of “nihilism” as a lack of “play.”
With these celebrities, all you get is play. They have no dogma, just self-interest.
Otherwise, belief in some dogma about “giving” or something might lead them to philanthropy. Perhaps they might even sell their worldly possessions and give all to the poor in exchange for a spot in heaven.
In any event, it is too easy to blame dogmatism. Ultimately dogma can be a strong ally. As long as you have the right dogma, dogma can say, “Hey! Quit playin’! You have specific work to do on this Earth!” Then, suddenly you have to deal with this dogmatic option, which can be enough to trivialize your nihilism if you’re listening to the right dogmatist. That’s why I nominate myself for Communist Dictator.
And how would this post be different if you had called it The Old Nihilists?
On the contrary, nihilism liberates us from the dogma of, among other things, God and ideology.
Tell me: How many innocent men, women and children have been slaughtered by nihilists? And how many by one or another doctrinaire proponent of God and ideology?
Unless you are confusing means and ends. Indeed, evangelical religionists, Communists, Nazis etc. will use any and all means in service of their particular Kingdom of Ends.
And then there are those who claim the global economy as the end that justifies any means. But that is an altogether different kind of nihilism.
Yes.
Yes, ideology as such is the antithesis of nihilism.
That would be another form of ideology, then, and not nihilism.
In response, particularly to your quote which follows, I direct you to my primary post in this thread. I suggest that there are “New Nihilists” (as opposed to whatever we call “Old Nihilists”) who can be characterized as nihilists not by a lack of dogmatic belief, but as a failure to think ethically, to think values. A nihilation of thinking, which I think is synonymous with ideology.
See? We’re both secular leftists and agree on everything.
There are no well-known examples of “old nihilists”, only caricatures. What I’m calling “new nihilists” are real people who are in the public eye. They are a bit giddy, and don’t wear black. If old nihilism is film noir, new nihilism is Pulp Fiction.
Sean, lots of good points. And I can’t tell exactly when you being serious and when your screwing around. Which is kind of fun.
nothing…
ho ho ho.
No, really though. I always thought the eastern philosophies had the best answer for this. If all things are but one thing, then even nothing is something.
Since this is the Social Science section though I’d argue that the problem with nihilism (the existential version) is used by authoritarian types as a false critique of democracy. ‘Given too much freedom and paralyzed by inummerable and equally meaningless choices, man falters and then falls in to the abyss’ or some such nonsense.
I think this “falling into the abyss of equally meaningless choices” is exactly what the Authoritarian Democrat wants.
Parse that sentence at will.
I should add, this response is meant entail that I also disagree with ThreeTimesGreat on this thread.
Also, GateControlTheory I hate your exorcist avatar, it makes me want to puke.
What do you mean by this?
That is certainly not what I said, nor is such a position necessitated or even implied directly by what I have said here regarding the nihilist position.
The essence of my point here is that nihilism is the reversal of the positivist, closed perspective (of belief, of thought, of understanding). Belief acts like a closed box, a concept into which we pour a limited meaning and then seal it away therein. The extent of the seal is the extent to which we fall prey to black and white thinking, bigotry, bias, closed-mindedness, decay of growth in understanding, and superficial analysis. So, in my experience (I am not implying this has been or ought to be your experience as well) nihilism is that view which “unseals” beliefs as such, frees them from positive forms which are closed and self-contained. Most people operate under such closed paradigms, with a number of sustaining concepts that ground the overall frame. These concepts are rarely examined, which is the utility of positivist thinking. Rather, I prefer open position, and the ground ought to be that which arises of necessity or known assumption-hypothesis (via deliberate self-testing), these then arising out of a fundamentally negative (falsifying, doubtful) perspective. Of course this perspective is mediated by both an awareness of the psychological limitations of thought/reason as well as a realistic view of the world in which we live and the demands imposed upon us by this world. So there is some give and take, as always.
Perhaps you need to explain what it is about my thoughts here in this thread that you disagree with?
We agree 100% on the implications for what a responsible human will do (for you, practice nihilism against ideology).
I disagree with you on a terminological level.
In this thread titled “The New Nihilists” I want to suggest that we need a new definition of nihilism.
I’ve outlined this in previous posts, but suffice to say I believe we need to save the word Nihilism to describe a nihilation of thought that takes place whenever we rely on authoritative dogma to make decisions.
What you describe as nihilism I see as a positive struggle to constantly practice positive thought, creating understanding and moving forward through dissolution of dogma.
When I called you a Cartesian I was hoping the Heideggerian in you would recoil and provide an easy explanation of the difference between practical skepticism and Cartesian global doubt. Unfortunately for me, you do not respond so easily to straw provocation.
What do you think of calling your project in this thread something different from “nihilism.” Can we here on this board come together in small groups to change the way we use loaded words like Nihilism? You’ve already described nihilism as a positive process. What if, instead of calling your project “nihilism,” we called it “turning.” When I say “turning” I am referring to the turning that takes place in Plato’s cave, but I am trying to call forth the Heideggerian turn of turning in order to evoke your “nihilism” in a way that is crucially substantial.
I apologize of course for missing this all those years ago.
Also, Donald Trump now puts a whole new spin on assessments of nihilism. Old or new.
From my own frame of mind, nihilism revolves first and foremost around the extent to which you believe that your moral and political narratives are in sync objectively [naturally] with the world around us.
My take on Trump today is that he pretends to be an objectivist around some because they need to hear that there really is only one right answer.
Trump projects to them as an advocate of the Christian God if the Christian God were more or less a Libertarian. Just not on “social issues”.
But, sure, nihilism embodied in a Pulp Fiction frame of mind can be a really, really scary thing to encounter. Everything and anything is rationalized if it is within your power to make it happen.
Still, how different is that from the more “civilized” rendition encompassed in the agenda of those who own and operate the global economy?
Show me the money. That’s morality enough for them.
New Nihilists? Where? 
How different is it? As different as red is from green, I’d say. You can’t just say it’s all just refracted light. I mean, in the right context you can. In the wrong context - like when you’re distinguishing red from green - you’d look foolish to just keep insisting that it’s all just refracted light. Everyone knows that, it doesn’t need repeating.
