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Tag Archives: nihilism
Nietzsche in a Nutshell
__________ Once you perceive that you are flung into a cosmos in which God is dead (or silent), and your ultimate questions are unlikely ever to be answered, it’s time to stop worrying about who or where you are really—what the truth is—and just, say, make lion-man totems … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged art, atheism, creativity, hippies, literature, Nietzsche, nihilism, philosophy, writing
34 Comments
Buddha’s Take on Suffering vs. Nietzsche’s
If you think about it, we respond to whatever arises into consciousness with desire, aversion, or neutrality. And the things that appear to consciousness are always in flux: they arise, they ripen, they decline from attention and disappear. Then others … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged Buddha, Buddhism, happiness, life, Nietzsche, nihilism, philosophy, psychology, suffering
11 Comments
What Is Truth After Sandy Hook?
Numerous parts of President Obama’s speech at Newtown on Sunday pricked me, but the following was especially jarring: Why are we here? What gives our life meaning? What gives our acts purpose? […] There’s only one thing we can be … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged apologetics, atheism, atheist, Camus, children, God, gun laws, nihilism, rebellion, Sandy Hook, the absurd
4 Comments
Mitt Romney Campaign Theme Song Suggestion: Live and Let Die
After watching, dumbfounded, “When Mitt Romney Came to Town“—the 28 minute documentary on Mitt Romney’s shenanigans at Bain Capital (the one put out by Newt Gingrich’s wealthy friends), I think Romney’s campaign theme song should be Paul McCartney’s “Live and Let … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged America, capitalism, Darwin, live and let die, mitt romney, newt gingrich, Nietzsche, nihilism, rick santorum, rush limbaugh, survival of the fittest
2 Comments
Catholic Church Christmas Bombing 2011: Boko Haram Means “Western Learning is Sinful”
The Islamist group that calls itself “Boko Haram”—northern Hausa language, meaning “Western learning is sinful”—and that blew up Catholics at a Christmas service yesterday, is described in the following manner by Reuters: The shadowy group from Nigeria’s Muslim north, blamed for … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged boko haram, Christmas, herderianism, holidays, Islam, Jesus, muhammad, nihilism, religion
1 Comment
What is Humanism, and Where is 21st Century Atheism Taking Us, Really?
Just as Unitarianism is the featherbed for catching the falling Christian (Erasmus Darwin), humanism is the featherbed for catching the falling atheist. What humanism functions to conceal for the squeamish atheist and agnostic (and I am one of those squeamish agnostics) is … Continue reading
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Tagged atheism, atheist, China, Darwinism, eugenics, evolution, God, humanism, jerry coyne, Nietzsche, nihilism, the future
25 Comments
Checkmate: Death and Determinism are the Two Absolute Truths of Atheism
It’s sometimes asserted that atheism admits of no ultimate or absolute truths, but in the “D Girl” episode of the Sopranos (Season 2) is a rather nice exchange between Tony Soprano and his therapist, Dr. Jennifer Malfi, that suggests otherwise. The exchange concerns … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged apologetics, atheism, atheist, determinism, Dostoevsky, existentialism, francis crick, freedom, naturalism, nihilism, science, tony soprano
17 Comments
Republican Governor Rick Perry Calls on Texans to Pray For Rain
Reuters reports that the governor of Texas, Rick Perry, has called on Texans to pray to God for rain, and quotes him as saying the following: It is fitting that Texans should join together in prayer to humbly seek an … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged apologetics, atheism, atheist, critical thinking, God, gods, nihilism, prayer, reason, rick perry, social psychology
1 Comment
Good Reasons for Being an Agnostic Watch: A Fifth Force of Nature? Things Just Got More Interesting
A “bump” in the data generated at Fermilab has the physics world buzzing. The following is in the New York Times today: “Nobody knows what this is,” said Christopher Hill, a theorist at Fermilab who was not part of the team. “If … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged agnostic, agnosticism, apologetics, atheism, atheist, God, life, nihilism, philosophy, physics, science
3 Comments
Are the New Atheists Insufficiently Serious?
R. Joseph Hoffmann, an atheist himself and the author or editor of numerous academic books—including Jesus in History and Myth (Prometheus Books 1986)—thinks so, writing at his blog recently the following: The mode of critique [by New Atheists] is lodged somewhere … Continue reading
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Tagged agnosticism, Albert Camus, apologetics, atheism, atheist, God, matthew arnold, nihilism, Prometheus, the Bible
41 Comments
Atheism and the Quest for Meaning: What Does It Mean to Say That All of Existence is Contingent?
It means that life didn’t have to be—it was an accident—and yet here we all are. Our existence is neither inherently necessary or meaningful. Welcome! Now, as human beings, what do we do? Well, we can try to take the incoherence of … Continue reading
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Tagged agnostic, agnosticism, apologetics, atheism, atheist, determinism, free will, God, hell, Jesus, nihilism, Richard Dawkins
10 Comments
The Neoconservative War on Nihilism (and Thomas Jefferson)
Harper’s website has a fascinating interview with C. Bradley Thompson on neoconservatism and his new book (with Yaron Brook) about it. Although, in the interview, the phrase “Herderian nationalism” is not used for neoconservatism by Thompson, he strongly implies that this is exactly what … Continue reading
Is going to church a form of weakness (a way of not dealing with what life is)?
In a recent thread, Trishothinks moves in the direction of deism and says the following: I hate to say this (because of my strong Christian upbringing), but now I believe that people who go to church are “weak”. They need … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged apologetics, atheism, atheist, Christianity, church, God, Jesus, Nietzsche, nihilism, philosophy, religion, social psychology
32 Comments
Contingency vs. Conspiracy
A recent set of studies reminds us that we use telos and conspiracy theories to control our anxiety over what really seems to rule the world: contingency. This at Miller-McCune: A research team led by social psychologist Daniel Sullivan of the … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged bilderbergers, chance, conspiracy, contingency, free will, God, hell mouth, history, nihilism, responsibility, social psychology, telos
2 Comments
Ralph Waldo Emerson’s “Circles” (1841): The Creative Vitalist Lost in Space?
Below are a few excerpts from Ralph Waldo Emerson’s essay “Circles” (1841). In this essay he likens the creative artist’s framing imagination to something like the growing layers of an onion building themselves over the dark inner depths of the ontological mystery. Emerson’s thesis is in his … Continue reading
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Tagged art, circles, creativity, Emerson, genius, literature, lost in space, Nietzsche, nihilism, poetry, poets, Ralph Waldo Emerson
3 Comments
Richard Rorty on Making Ethical Choices in a Godless Universe
I think that Richard Rorty is right about this, but it’s a bit jarring to read it stated so directly and matter-of-factly. The quote comes from Rorty’s essay, “Kant vs. Dewey” (in the last collection of his papers, Philosophy as Cultural … Continue reading
Posted in Uncategorized
Tagged agnostic, agnosticism, atheism, atheist, ethics, God, law, Moses, nihilism, philosophy, richard rorty, ten commandments
5 Comments
My Favorite Agnostic Joke
I don’t remember Woody Allen’s exact words, but in one of his films he’s having one of his characteristic existential crises and asks his elderly father whether or not he believes in the existence of God, and whether the universe has any … Continue reading
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Tagged agnostic, apologetics, atheist, doubt, epistemology, existentialism, humor, nihilism, philosophy, religion, woody allen
1 Comment
Prometheus Unbound 