As we turn to the issue of nihilism proper, let’s begin by recognizing that the typical “pop” understanding of the term is wholly inadequate. Simply put: the notion of a destructive force which renders `things’ and meaning empty is not the point; this as though there is some “real” meaning which must be secured and affixed to beings if life is to be affirmed. Such is merely the extension of a deeper valuatory dynamic, a symptom of a deeper and more systemic problem; a problem which demands the static control of so-called “right” definitions through tautologically derived Absolutes. In other words, the very notion of meaning’s `loss’ already presupposes the mythic cache of meaning as `held’ and `known’. In this, nihilism speaks to the deeper issue of how will-to-power creates the very delusion it seeks to dispel. As previously shown, these meta-epistemic tenets of dualism are always bound up with their opposing positions and fail to recognize the question’s onto-epistemic priority vis-à-vis the revelation of any “answer”. The very threat of meaning’s loss is presupposed in the epistemology of meaning’s gain via the supposition of meaning’s “truth”. Again, there is no normative meaning to the `high’ without a sense of the `lack’ in the low; no assumed satiety in the `filled’ if there does not simultaneously exist a sense of deficit in the meaning of the `empty’. And each of these seemingly opposed perspectives must be intertwined within a more original whole if their particularities are to subsequently have meaning. As such, the idea that nihilism is the inversion of meaning’s efficacy speaks to the underlying problem of how “truth” [ἀ-λήθεια] is understood during the metaphysical epoch. Nor are the new-wave existential nihilists of the post-structural period, all of whom appear to build on Empedocles and thinkers such as Nietzsche and Shakespeare, near the mark.88 It is shortsighted to place the absurdity of meaninglessness at the forefront of our existential analytic and thus carry the motto “kill thy self, all is nil” forward as a method of transcending a Sisyphian noose. The affirmation derived from the Nietzschean exclamation that `what doesn’t kill one makes one stronger’ presupposes the hierarchical valuation of `power’ over that which can never be mitigated: death. In this, the “affirmation” provided by Nietzsche actually speaks to the same meta-nihilistic evasion so typical of Buddhism; a nihilism Nietzsche himself decries. Nihilism, that most uncanny of guests: is nihilism merely the negation of life’s meaningfulness? Hardly, for wouldn’t merely assigning some new `feel good’ meaning to the world, a new narcotic-of-the-mind, this so as to pacify until the next crisis of meaning advents, suffice to quell the collective chatter for substantiality? Wouldn’t the platitudes and placations of an eternal recurrence of the same self-deception suffice to mythology `meaning’ into relevance? Insofar as we now see that this circular repetition of deception devalues the highest values, we come to realize that nihilism proper is a bit more serious an aliment than merely the power-elite manipulating the symbolic order, and it is more than a mere manipulation and manufacture of the semiotics of subjectivity’s consent qua meaning—a bit more involved than retooling the predicative representations understanding deems of meaning-import qua representationally affixing “truth” through objective correlates in the phenomenal-environment-of-beings. Nihilism is beyond the stopgap solution of turning new-found values—other seemingly “new” fables-of-truth—into temporary “truths”, i.e., the solution to nihilism is more than dressing up today’s newly conceived falsities as period-specific (and thus linearly relevant (i.e., transient)) truths; for at our juncture of history, we have come to realize that all the stopgap mediations available are the subterfuge of cultural filigree. In the immortal words of Pete Townsend, “It all seems fine to the naked eye, but it don’t really happen that way at all.” Thus, is it any wonder that Heidegger, now susceptible to the nihilism of the Age, is left to exclaim: “Only a god can save us.” --FOOTNOTE-- 88. Too be sure, Empedocles is one of my favorite pre-Socratic thinkers. While often deemed a “skeptic”, I find Empedocles to be a bridge or gateway thinker who conjoins or dovetails aspects of both Heraclitus and Parmenides in their respective cosmologies. However, the point to note here is this: the senselessness and/or seeming meaninglessness of existence and life is itself a phenomenal event premised upon the prior presupposition of meaning’s validity, need, and defined normative value. As such, the entirety of the issue and question is a strawman and begs its own question when seen from a deeper and more fundamental level. Also, nowhere do I understand Nietzsche to be implying or postulating nihilism, this as some grant of nothingness, to be a teleological end-game. Rather, quite the contrary. If one studies the phenomenon associated with nihilism and the philosophical works of those who seriously think nihilism in its essence (and thus if one avoids latching onto the poetic verbiage penned by Bill Shakespeare, Goethe, Orwell, Camus, and others), we discover that nihilism is a manifestation of history; a process of historization, so too speak. Clearly, when one thoughtfully reads Nietzsche, one understands that while Nietzsche provides no throughway by which to transcend Nihilism—this he cannot provide, as Nietzsche is a “firstling” and for the benefit of those who shall follow—he speaks of “what comes”, of a “history” of “movement” which has a duration, scope, and some manner of import. In this, the “cataclysmic” advent which comes and which can now come in but no other way, clearly proceeds as παρουσία. That which is wrenched forth into presence as a destructive force is not meaningless or meaninglessness, per se. Nor should parousia [παρουσία] be understood in the vulgar sense that the term is usurped by Christianity--this is not a reference to some `second coming’! Rather, it is now important to remember that the meaninglessness of that which comes as a destroyer is only as such relative to that which has meaning and thus that which it destroys—i.e., relative to that which is presupposed as a kind of dialectic alterity-in-tandem: the constructions of the metaphysical epoch. That which resides OUTSIDE the edicts of the ascription’s paradigm is not affected thereby. The entirety of why Nietzsche’s “last man” would be relevant in “living longest” denotes the transitional phase that nihilism is in its coming-to-presence in our period of history, not to mention the fact that the idea of a revaluation of all values would be senseless unless such a `laugh as never before heard’ [Zarathustra] had a posit-of-advent on some `other side’ or in alterity to the cycle of a recurrence-of-the-meaninglessness of an eternal cycle of nihilism. Think about it! Nihilism is neither the manifestation of a teleological end, nor is it something to be avoided via an acceptance of the eternal recurrence of the same; rather, nihilism speaks as the coming to presence of the opening of transition from one Age to the next. Oddly enough, with this, Plato’s Republic, Book VII, and the Allegory of the Cave, again becomes important for thinking. ((c) 2011 ArtifexAstrum (P) 2012 Metaunstable, Deno Canellos)
Posted on: Tue, 01 Oct 2013 00:37:22 +0000
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