This is the form of active
nihilism: the denial of life leads to the suicide of life, and this paves the way the way to human suicide.
Rather than attempting to solve the problem of
nihilism directly by seizing on a more profound experience of life and art, Picabia began to change the form of his inquiry, rephrasing, for example, the transcendent question "What does it mean?" into the empirical "How does it work?" Crucially, he came to conceive of time as a circle (as did Nietzsche) and to detest any attachment to the past or belief in the future.
The
nihilism that Rosen sees at the foundation of Modernity is not simply a result then of the narrowing of our understanding of reason.
Its elaboration proves this speculative kernel different from the most diffused versions of
nihilism, such as those of Friedrich Nietzsche and Martin Heidegger, which are discussed at length.
Then, in each chapter, she presents close readings of six novels published after Orwell's work, focusing on the themes of
nihilism and morality.
Still, while his critical readings yield many interesting insights, the framework within which they are presented--the apocalyptic final battle between atheist
nihilism and combative Christian Platonism for the soul of the Republic--finally risks turning scholarly exposure and autobiography into epic poetry.
What Nietzsche's
nihilism states is that one can either confront the meaningless of existence and accept it, yet try to find hope in humanity's creative potential; or, one can remain in passive ignorance of this condition.
An atheistic Soviet Union deploying nuclear weapons would have been an act of
nihilism. There is a difference between
nihilism and a desire for supernatural reward.
Chapter 1, 'Our Contemporary
Nihilism', cites two contemporary heroes whose behavior we recognize and admire, but which we find exceptional.
The inertia of most people in the affluent Western nations in the face of the corruption of the core institutions of their democracies, including their universities, the disempowerment of people, the plundering of public wealth, growing economic injustice and economic insecurity, environmental degradation and the threat of global ecological collapse, has impelled more reflective people to search for explanations, and in doing so, to confront the
nihilism of modern civilization.
Perhaps it's just a matter of time before a deity rescues us from the condition that Nietzsche described as "
nihilism." In All Things Shining, philosophers Hubert Dreyfus (of Berkeley) and Sean Dorrance Kelly (of Harvard) take up this possibility.
Since the term was first popularized by Ivan Turgenev in Fathers and Sons (1862),
nihilism has acquired many shades of meaning in European thought.
"Muslim communities have got the reality that they face
nihilism, so trying to follow the path laid by the late Imam Khomeini: the path to awakening and movement," Ayatollah Emami Kashani added.
