That's usually how smart people get depressed in the first place, by thinking too much. You realize that there's no point to anything you do. You will die. Humanity will die. The universe will die.
If you were immortal, would that confer some kind of meaning on your actions? How do you define meaning, and does it make any sense? Philosophical issues like these can have, I believe, substantial effects on a persons mental health. It's an area of thinking that we view in a very dysfunctional way in our society, generally discouraging even exploration of the topics as 'meaningless' (which is a bit ironic since those ideas are how one determines meaning). And if you do wish to investigate the ideas, you're mostly on your own. I personally credit my study of philosophy with a great deal of my general contentment with life, and feel it gave me the tools I needed to address most of the concerns I always wrestled with. Not even any specific philosopher or school of philosophy. Just the process of being introduced to so many radically different viewpoints on life, along with the strong foundation in argumentation and reason, itself seems to have aided my greatly.
If the universe will die, and that establishes that anything which occurs within it has no meaning, perhaps meaning becomes entirely worthless as a concept. It distinguishes nothing. It becomes identical with mere existence.
That's pretty subjective. I think there's no point to anything but I'm not upset about it. If anything - it gives me more of a purpose. What can I do before I'm dead and basically don't exist? It's not like any fucking videos games I play have any point. What's the point? Oh - I win and finish the game. Greaaat. Oh I beat someone online - woooow. What's the real point of that in the end? Nothing - it's all hedonism.
I don't think you get depressed by thinking too much - you probably get depressed because you don't have what you want to begin with. You then just think about why you're in your unpleasant position, realize you're too crap to fix it, won't admit fault and change, and so then rationalize that inherently the universe is unfair and there's no point to anything anyway (just to make yourself feel better about how you're doing poorly). It's not that you're a piece of shit - it's the universes fault! I was made this way and there's no point to anything so I can still be a piece of crap human being! I'm too smart to be with the common man! They don't understand my deep intellect!
FWIW, each living being is connected in an unbroken chain to the original reproducing life form that existed roughly 3.5 billion years ago. Which means that each of us is related, however distantly, to every other living organism on this planet and that we're all playing a part in a grand, cosmic process that has been going on for an unfathomable amount of time. Thinking about that is one helluva cure for my nihilism.
This is why people have religion. Regardless of your personal views on the fact, it's a darn good way to avoid getting depressed by this sort of nihilism. You believe the universe will go on; you'll see your family one day and spend eternity in paradise. You may think it's BS, but have to admit it doesn't really matter for most people, it still does the job.
Another way to deal with nihilism is to embrace it. Once you accept that nothing matters, you can stop beating yourself up for mistakes and failures. You can strip the urgency from your goals. It allows you to proceed with outcome independence. This needs to be paired with some form of motivation too, but I think that's more up to the individual.
Exactly. I personally know people who have become despondent and given up on life. Maybe a few people will take advantage of total freedom to learn and do, but if we're being honest here, most will watch net flicks and eat potato chips. It is still a net positive for _most_ people.
This is me, up to certain a point. I workout regularly, get slowly better at my job, participate in social activities. Just focus on enjoying life and I do. Still, it's all utterly meaningless. Funny thing is, I'm quit sure that the lack of meaning is holding me back. Holding me back in the sense that my satisfaction with life and success within it could be better with the feeling of meaning in life.
There are people who proclaim that death gives everything meaning. Nonsense, death neither gives nor takes meaning, it's as meaningless as eternal life. I'm an atheist to every religion I've ever encountered and couldn't imagine the existence of a god providing meaning, either. (I actually perceive that idea, meaning by higher power, to be even more absurd).
I have the believe though, that the question for meaning is a side effect of having a modern life. Did ancient tribes people think about meaning or did they simply hunt, socialize and view the world as connected in everything (the natural view of the world, as children have it) and never ever even thing about the concept of meaning of life? There are still somewhat "natural" living tribes out there, did someone ask them that question? I'm really curious about their reaction and answer.
Really, to me it seems, that the answer to the question about the meaning of life is to never ask it in the first place.
I read that often, also in this thread. But it isn't working for me. Meaning is not a rational concept, I guess it is a feeling. I say guess, because I've never experienced it. I only know, that the lack of meaning is a feeling.
One day, I might stumble into a life where everything clicks together and the lack of meaning withers away. But that's not going to be a rational decision. "I conclude that this way of life is meaningful. 5 minutes later, I feel meaningful". Sounds ridiculous, doesn't it?
> Another way to deal with nihilism is to embrace it. Once you accept that nothing matters, you can stop beating yourself up
But because nothing (incl. consequences) matters, it can also be a path to sociopathy, especially if your nihilistic attitude has deprived you of a normal social outlet.
As someone who has been on both sides of that belief, I can agree that it generally has a stabilizing effect on people's mental state. However, once you lose that belief, it is very difficult to make yourself believe it again. And probably even harder for people that never believed in the first place.
See, I never got how religion solves the problem of 'life not having a meaning'... let's suppose that there is a god, he created everything, and he tells me my purpose is x... well, so what? Just because God created everything, does that mean his choice for meaning is the same as mine? I mean, my parents created me, and if they told me their idea for my purpose, it wouldn't make it mine.
Same with eternal life... how does something without meaning extended forever suddenly have meaning?
I guess I never got the connection with an omniscient creator and a feeing of having purpose.
I have plenty of purpose; experiencing the universe, taking it all in, seeing what happens next, loving deeply, sharing joy, experiencing pain. So much to life.
what if .. the story of there being a god separate from you is just a story. The nondual or advaita insight is that you are divine already, just pretending not to be. It goes deeper than that and should not be made another story but experienced yourself first. This was my own path to unshakeable faith, by own experience with the help of teachings and meditation as the beginning.
And yet millennia of philosophy have also attempted to address it. Epicurus comes first to mind from the materialist camp. Religion is not the only source of solace for existential dread, there are more rationalist approaches that can be viable. I think these have been sufficiently overshadowed by religion that they are only recently re-entering the public discourse.
I'm not _entirely_ sure of most things, but am unsure how I am to reply with anything of substance if you don't give me a little more to engage with. _Why_ doesn't it make sense? I'm approaching it from a sociological point in this case, rather than a moral or theological one.
Given my only exposure with any depth is Christianity (still superficial) I’m using this as my reference. If you read any of the really well-regarded spiritual authors (like the doctors of the church for example) you will read plenty about how your family (or you, of course) could easily be damned to hell. In fact, seeing relatives in hell is probably inevitable. Something even more discomforting to discuss is that, being that you’ve made it to heaven, your will is united to God’s and you would in fact marvel at God’s justice while you watch your relatives suffer in hell.
I think this is where intelligence gets you in trouble. You say this as if it was the whole story, and you trust your own beliefs too much to let them go.
High intelligence may not be as harmful if you use it as a tool where appropriate, and don’t use where it falls short.
And? If there's no point then there's also no point in not enjoying yourself. Sorry, I'm not trying to be flippant. Just pointing out the fact that there is no point to anything is arguably not a very good reason for not making your life the best it can be.
Life without purpose is... usually not great. I'm sure there's a more poignant way to put that. An intelligent person may even spot the hedonic treadmill more quickly than the norm.
It's not thinking too much, in that specific instance, that is the source of the problem at all.
The point (value or reason for) to the things they're claiming have no point, are provided by us, not the universe via magic assignment. That is the source of the mistake.
Pretending the value is externally assigned or innate is the source of the premise that there's no point to the big thing (existence, life, work and so on). In the process of being disappointed in the lack of innate value, they're actually mentally assigning low value to the thing in question (which is psychologically the entire point: it's about debasing the value of the thing, it's most likely a revealing indicator about the present state of mind).
For example: smart person thinks too much, they realize there's no point to life because we're going to die (or similar setup). The problem with that is, the point of life is decided by the smart person. They're in fact deciding to assign life less or little value in the act of saying there's no point, in that action they are actively determining the point: they're deciding there isn't much of one. They made a choice (with it being understood of course that a person may be in a mental place where for any number of reasons they can't clearly recognize a positive value to existence).
The old question: what is the point of life? Does in fact have a very obvious and very simple answer: you decide (which simultaneously does not guarantee good results, even if you decide what it means to you or what the point of your life is to be).
And if i decide it's about punching people in the face, in the end it has as much value as your decision for a grand humanitarian crusade, because it's just as much a choice as the other.
So we're back to needing a point to judge decisions by. The choice isn't enough, or the fact of choosing isn't enough. This is what creates the "whole life is pointless" reaction in the first place, because "you decide" can mean anything, and there has to be something that isn't solely "you decide" to give particular meaning to one choice over the other.
If you decide it's about punching peole in the face either you'll wildly succeed or more likely you'll get punched back and eventually locked up by the community at large who are all pursuing their own meanings and have collectively agreed to stop people punch other people in the face.
I mean you could choose that the meaning of life is to punch people in the face but you'll have to live with the reprocussions of that choice. That feels like you'll quickly come to the rational decision that it was/is a bad choice.
The problem is that pure rationality leads into abyss.
There might be a rational decision not to punch people directly into face but a purely rational psychopath can choose many other profitable avenues that are disastrous to society at large "in the long run" (fentanyl, global warming, etc etc). And we know what happens in the long run.
It all goes back to Ecclesiastes(and Job), you can be an "evil" person and prosper in this world.
If this tiny lifespan is all there is, this is quite distressing. And physically there is nothing else.
Apparently the best solution is to realize there are no rules but live as if they do per Voltaire(not necessarily Pascal).
This is where readin satanic texts early on in life really set the tone for me.
Summed up they say "There's no point to anything so enjoy life as best you can, while you can". Those texts really focus on you as the supreme master of yourself as opposed to any external entity.
I agree, bearing in mind that to decide is a bit more substantial than just saying it or thinking it - it's an interaction between your thoughts and your actions and everything. I'd say it more as you create your meaning - it might involve things outside of yourself or it might be more individualistic, but it's not arbitrary, and you can have incorrect beliefs about the meaning you are deciding on/creating.
I agree with the first sentiment. But I've always been of the mind that, because life is terminal, our actions and behaviors have meaning. If life never ended (at least naturally), what would be the drive to do anything, when it could simply be postponed (without any real consequence) til tomorrow?
