Jacques Derrida, whose deconstruction is perhaps most commonly labeled nihilistic, did not himself make the nihilistic move that others have claimed. Derridean deconstructionists argue that this approach rather frees texts, individuals or organizations from a restrictive truth, and that deconstruction opens up the possibility of other ways of being. [96] Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, for example, uses deconstruction to create an ethics of opening up Western scholarship to the voice of the subaltern and to philosophies outside of the canon of western texts. [97] Derrida himself built a philosophy based upon a 'responsibility to the other'. [98] Deconstruction can thus be seen not as a denial of truth, but as a denial of our ability to know truth. That is to say, it makes an epistemological claim, compared to nihilism's ontological claim.

Nihilism - Wikipedia

Cosmic nihilism is the position that reality or the cosmos is either wholly or significantly unintelligible and that it provides no foundation for human aims and principles. [3] Particularly, it may regard the cosmos as distinctly hostile or indifferent to humanity. [100] It is often related to both epistemological and existential nihilism, as well as cosmicism. Veit W. Existential Nihilism: The Only Really Serious Philosophical Problem. Journal of Camus Studies. DOI:10.13140/RG.2.2.26965.24804 To all four questions, the Buddha answers that the terms "reappears somewhere else," "does not reappear," "both does and does not reappear," and "neither does nor does not reappear," do not apply. When Vaccha expresses puzzlement, the Buddha asks Vaccha a counter question to the effect of: if a fire were to go out and someone were to ask you whether the fire went north, south, east or west, how would you reply? Vaccha replies that the question does not apply and that an extinguished fire can only be classified as 'out'. [40] Passive and active nihilism, the former of which is also equated to philosophical pessimism, refer to two approaches to nihilist thought; passive nihilism sees nihility as an end in itself, whereas active nihilism attempts to surpass it. For Nietzsche, passive nihilism further encapsulates the "will to nothing" and the modern condition of resignation or unawareness towards the dissolution of higher values brought about by the 19th century. [31] [106]Cunningham, Conor (2002), Genealogy of Nihilism: Philosophies of Nothing & the Difference of Theology, New York, NY: Routledge. a moral realist who countenances the existence of metaphysically queer properties, facts, and relations must also posit some special faculty by which we have knowledge of them. [12] He was not a nihilist, and his films were not only about emptiness but about the desire for fullness. The basis of Sartre’s existentialism is the phrase ‘existence precedes essence,’ meaning no general account of what it means to be human can be given, and that meaning can only be decided and constructed through existence itself. Moral nihilism (also called ethical nihilism) is the meta-ethical view that nothing is morally right or morally wrong and that morality doesn't exist. [1] [2]

Nihilism vs. Existentialism vs. Absurdism — Explained and Nihilism vs. Existentialism vs. Absurdism — Explained and

Gillespie, Michael Allen (1996). Nihilism Before Nietzsche. University of Chicago Press. pp.139, 143–144. ISBN 9780226293486. These nihilists were not skeptics but passionate advocates of negation and liberation."; "While the two leading nihilist groups disagreed on details, they both sought to liberate the Promethean might of the Russian people"; "The nihilists believed that the prototypes of this new Promethean humanity already existed in the cadre of the revolutionary movement itself.Sinnott-Armstrong, Walter (2006a). "Moral Skepticism," The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Edward N. Zalta (ed.). ( link) Bhikkhu Bodhi. "Pali-English Glossary" and "Index of Subjects." In The Connected Discourses of the Buddha: A New Translation of the Samyutta Nikkaya.

Moral Skepticism - Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy Moral Skepticism - Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy

Main article: Philosophy of Søren Kierkegaard Unfinished sketch c. 1840 of Søren Kierkegaard by his cousin Niels Christian Kierkegaard

The term "nihilism" was actually popularized in 1862 by Ivan Turgenev in his novel Fathers and Sons, whose hero, Bazarov, was a nihilist and recruited several followers to the philosophy. He found his nihilistic ways challenged upon falling in love. [116] Anger at the system turned to anger against art. Damn that foolery too, which took, but never gave. A promise of achievement always withdrawn; an assurance of dignity and ease for ever vanishing over the skyline. The virus of communistic nihilism simmered within him, wishing to submerge all effort in an easily filled belly. Active nihilists are individuals who actively destroy our old, fake false values like those in Christianist, and begin constructing our own subjective beliefs and interpretations of meaning. Seen through all these glasses Russia is judged, or rather misjudged, by the western world; no wonder, therefore, that it is believed to be a barbarous country, governed by tyrants, inhabited by a savage population; a mixture of indolence, ignorance, despotism, and nihilism, without one of the redeeming features of culture or civilization. If there were objective values, then they would be entities or qualities or relations of a very strange sort, utterly different from anything else in the universe. [9]

Nihilism: History, Philosophy, Theories - Verywell Mind Nihilism: History, Philosophy, Theories - Verywell Mind

Perhaps, you’ve had times in your life where you felt directionless, powerless, and that nothing matters. a b c Pratt, Alan. " Nihilism." Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy. "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 2010-04-12 . Retrieved 2003-08-26. {{ cite web}}: CS1 maint: archived copy as title ( link) CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown ( link). Ravenscroft, Eric (22 March 2022). "Everything Everywhere All at Once Perfects Optimistic Nihilism". Wired . Retrieved 9 November 2022. Other criticisms of the argument include noting that the very fact that such entities would have to be something fundamentally different from what we normally experience, therefore assumably outside our sphere of experience, we cannot prima facie have reason to either doubt or affirm their existence. Therefore if one had independent grounds for supposing such things to exist (such as a reductio ad absurdum of the contrary) the argument from queerness cannot give one any particular reason to think otherwise. An argument along these lines has been provided by e.g. Akeel Bilgrami. [14] Argument from explanatory impotence [ edit ]Gillespie, Michael Allen (1996). Nihilism Before Nietzsche. University of Chicago Press. p.139. ISBN 9780226293486. This nihilist movement was essentially Promethean."; "It has often been argued that Russian nihilism is little more than skepticism or empiricism. While there is a certain plausibility to this assertion, it ultimately fails to capture the millenarian zeal the characterized Russian nihilism. These nihilists were not skeptics but passionate advocates of negation and liberation. Moral nihilists agree that all claims such as 'murder is morally wrong' are not true. But different nihilistic views differ in two ways. Gillespie, Michael Allen (1996). Nihilism Before Nietzsche. University of Chicago Press. p.110. ISBN 9780226293486. Therefore, it is up to individuals themselves to create meaning in their lives through their own freedom of choice.