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Against Nihilism

2022-09-20 · letter vlog · John · 4:00 · watch on YouTube

Topic: Philosophy & meaning · mode: Personal essay · tags: self promotion, calendar ritual

Sharing part of a talk to college students, John rejects the popular nihilism that nothing matters: humans are a catastrophe but also wondrous, there is meaning in loving and being heard, and he urges people to hurl words into the darkness and to be an echo for others.

What is said

The parts of the video and what is said in each (★ — how much it matters to the video).

00:00:00 — From a talk to college students: the popular nihilism that nothing matters, and why John is sympathetic to it

  • ★ John was recently asked to speak to a group of college students, and this video shares some of what he said. — 00:00:00
  • ★★ John says a strain of nihilism (everything's trash, nothing matters in the long run) has grown popular, and he is sympathetic because the world is profoundly unjust and shared challenges overwhelming. — 00:00:00
  • ★★ John says something like 275 million stars are going to die tomorrow, which makes earthly affairs like bridges, sewers and voting hard to get excited about. (hedged) — 00:00:00

00:00:29 — John rejects nihilism; writing The Anthropocene Reviewed taught him he is broadly in favor of humans

  • ★★★ John rejects nihilism, because like all straightforward answers to life's great questions it is inadequate, and because he thinks human life itself is imbued with meaning. — 00:00:29 · meaning of life
  • ★★ John wrote The Anthropocene Reviewed to pay attention to where his attention was going: not focus, but consciousness itself, his soul stuff. — 00:00:29 · The Anthropocene Reviewed (book)
  • ★★ John says what and who you care about and devote your soul stuff to will, taken together, be known as your life. — 00:00:58
  • ★★ In three and a half years writing the book John learned about Staphylococcus aureus and grocery stores, but the biggest, surprising lesson was that he is broadly in favor of humans. — 00:00:58 · The Anthropocene Reviewed (book)
  • ★★★ John says that as species go, humans are a catastrophe: they have caused countless extinctions, poisoned rivers, caused famines and murdered the innocent. — 00:00:58

00:01:27 — Humans as a catastrophe and as really interesting; we don't live in the grand scheme of things

  • ★★ John says humans are not the first life form whose success endangers climate and biodiversity: cyanobacteria caused a mass extinction over a billion years ago, but humans are the first to know what they are doing. — 00:01:27
  • ★★★ John says humans are also really interesting: we know DNA's structure, make art, sports, cappuccino and YouTube, know what keeps the stars apart, protect our young and make good music. — 00:01:27 · YouTube
  • ★★★ None of this matters in the grand scheme of things, as the sun will become a red giant, but we don't live there; John thinks there is meaning in us and in how we are bound together. — 00:01:56 · meaning of life

00:02:26 — Richard Wright's line about hurling words into the darkness; be an echo; we make life meaningful

  • ★★ When thinking about why any of it matters, John always thinks of a line from Richard Wright about hurling words into the darkness and waiting for an echo. — 00:02:26
  • ★★★ John rejects nihilism because he believes in the value of hurling words into the darkness, not least because someone in the darkness may echo them back. — 00:02:26
  • ★★ John knows optimism now feels foolish and cringy, and that nihilism is a way of cutting yourself off from feeling to avoid complexity and pain; he does it too. — 00:02:51 · optimism
  • ★★ John encourages listeners to hurl their words into the darkness and never give up bringing light and noise where there would be only darkness and silence. — 00:02:51
  • ★★ John asks listeners to be an echo: to tell friends and loved ones that they hear them, including the feelings and thoughts beneath their words. — 00:03:20
  • ★★★ John thinks the opportunity and responsibility of personhood is to make meaning and acknowledge it in others' lives, through loving, helping, being helped and deepening shared understanding. — 00:03:20 · meaning of life

  • ★★★ John concludes that maybe nothing matters, but only until we make things matter, and maybe life is meaningless, but only until we make it meaningful. — 00:03:49 · meaning of life

    “maybe life is meaningless, but only until we make it meaningful”

In the description and comments

  • ★★ The description says Pizzamas starts next week (week of 26 September 2022), when John's beard will finally be freed to do its essential work. — video description · Pizzamas
  • ★★★ The description announces that on October 5 Hank and John will be together in person for their first show since March 2020, a small fundraiser called Pizzamas: After Dark. — video description · Hank Green, Pizzamas

Threads in this video

Where the stories that moved here went next

Mentioned

Central: meaning of life · nihilism

Also: People: Richard Wright

Works: The Anthropocene Reviewed (book)

Organizations: YouTube

Concepts: consciousness · Cyanobacteria · DNA · Extinction event · optimism · personhood · red giant · Staphylococcus aureus

Places: Sun (star)

Only in the description or credits: Pizzamas

Also centred on nihilism: On Religion

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