Nihilistic Passage of the Day

[Dr. Bantham]

"We are all atheists about most of the gods that humanity has ever believed in. Some of us just go one god further."

Professor Richard Dawkins

[Nemonymous]

I think I would like 'Nihilism' defined in contradistinction to 'Pessimism', but here goes (thanks to Mr Can):

"From the cosmic point of view, to have opinions or preferences at all is to be ill; for by harbouring them one dams up the flow of the ineluctable force which, like a river, bears us down to the ocean of everything's unknowing. Reality is a running noose, one is brought up short with a jerk by death. It would have been wiser to co-operate wih the inevitable and learn to profit by this unhappy state of things - by realising and accommodating death! But we don't, we allow the ego to foul its own nest. Therefore we have insecurity, stress, the midnight-fruit of insomnia, with a whole culture crying itself to sleep."
- from 'The Avignon Quincunx' by Lawrence Durrell ('Constance' 1982)

[bendk]

Quote Originally Posted by Dr. Bantham

"We are all atheists about most of the gods that humanity has ever believed in. Some of us just go one god further." Professor Richard Dawkins

Richard Dawkins is a pleasure to read. It is hard to imagine a more clear-headed thinker. When I heard about his book The God Delusion, I was enthusiastic to say the least. There are few books I have looked forward to reading more. But one I can name is The Conspiracy Against the Human Race by Thomas Ligotti.

The above quote by Dawkins reminds me of H.L. Mencken's Graveyard of the Gods:

http://nowscape.com/atheism/dead_gods.htm

[G. S. Carnivals]

The Mystery Man came over
An' he said: "I'm outa-site!"
He said, for a nominal service charge,
I could reach nervonna t'nite
If I was ready, willing 'n able
To pay him his regular fee
He would drop all the rest of his pressing affairs
And devote His Attention to me

But I said . . .
Look here brother,
Who you jivin' with that Cosmik Debris?
(Now who you jivin' with that Cosmik Debris?)
Look here brother,
Don't you waste your time on me

The Mystery Man got nervous
An' he fidget around a bit
He reached in the pocket of his Mystery Robe
An' he whipped out a shaving kit
Now, I thought it was a razor
An' a can of foamin' goo
But he told me right then when the top popped open
There was nothin' his box won't do
With the oil of Afro-dytee
An' the dust of the Grand Wazoo
He said:
"You might not believe this, little fella, but it'll cure your Asthma too!"
An' I said . . .

Look here brother,
Who you jivin' with that Cosmik Debris?
(Now what kind of a geroo are you anyway?)
Look here brother,
Don't you waste your time on me
Don't waste yer time . . .

I've got troubles of my own, I said
An' you can't help me out
So take your meditations an' your preparations
An' ram it up yer snout
"BUT I GOT A KRISTL BOL!", he said
An' held it to the light
So I snatched it
All away from him
An' I showed him how to do it right
I wrapped a newspaper 'round my head
So I'd look like I was Deep
I said some Mumbo Jumbos then
An' told him he was goin' to sleep
I robbed his rings
An' pocket watch
An' everything else I found
I had that sucker hypnotized
He couldn't even make a sound
I proceeded to tell him his future then
As long as he was hanging around

Frank Zappa - "Cosmik Debris"

[G. S. Carnivals]

nihilarian A person who deals with things of no importance, whose concerns are a niggling and nugatory (trifling) affair. The office worker saddled with keeping records of inconsequential details or (an alimenter) feeding a machine, the seller of a worthless or meaningless item, the disgruntled gofer, the subordinate who never gets to be part of the real action - these are helpless nihilarians, some of whom know it all too well ("I have a nothing job"). Many people who deal with matters of no import are not conscious of that fact. They're still nihilarians.

David Grambs - Dimboxes, Epopts, and Other Quidams

[Nemonymous]

Quote Originally Posted by G. S. Carnivals

nihilarian A person who deals with things of no importance, whose concerns are a niggling and nugatory (trifling) affair. The office worker saddled with keeping records of inconsequential details or (an alimenter) feeding a machine, the seller of a worthless or meaningless item, the disgruntled gofer, the subordinate who never gets to be part of the real action - these are helpless nihilarians, some of whom know it all too well ("I have a nothing job"). Many people who deal with matters of no import are not conscious of that fact. They're still nihilarians. David Grambs - Dimboxes, Epopts, and Other Quidams

BRILLIANT!

[Cyril Tourneur]

[Russell Nash]

Quote Originally Posted by Cyril Tourneur

Definitely, believing in other than nothing is much more exhausting. Just imagine someone like that girl in my own family, who had a massive stroke because an anesthetist was celebrating a party and was unavailable for hours, and couldn't be born by C-section, the girl didn't breathe regularly, and most of her brain died at birth, when the guy finally showed up. The girl had several surgeries done later on. She couldn't see, eat, etc., and died within 4 years, which was considered by many to be a miracle. A miracle?! Don't make me laugh. How impossible it is to explain this accident believing in something, and how easy believing in nothing! Not really nothing but simply in that we exist for no reason, immersed in a Universe that doesn't even care if we keep going breathing or die.

[Nemonymous]

“Unseen or at least unremarked, I orbit the camp. That’s what I want: a place in which I have no part. I want to ride through space like wind in wind and sleep on the void, and be a go-between with nothing but between. I only know useless knowledge. The camp spins there to one side of me like so many floating candles collecting in a weak eddy. What I feel inside myself is fierce and calm; it’s a ruthless desire for an immortality of perfect weakness where I can be a tirelessly efficient functionary turning things over from one end of the message circuit to the other and back again, so that I never stop going back. As long as I’m going back, logically speaking, I yet won’t be back, only now am I getting under way. No one sees you while you’re in transit and the moment you arrive is the moment you have to turn around and leave again, provided there is some return correspondence, and even if there isn’t, it doesn’t matter, because there’s nothing to do but wait for some other message which will sooner or later have to go out and take you along with it.”

— From MEMBER a novel by Michael Cisco published by Chomu Press in 2013. This is to be added to my favourite quotes, first quoted in my review of MEMBER here.

[Laurent Barabba]

" We are a spectacle to the world. Let the great and humble, by our example, see well to what state they shall be inexorably reduced, whatever their condition, age or sex. Why, then, miserable person, are you puffed with pride? Dust you are, and unto dust you shall return, rotten corpse, morsel and meal for the worms."

Black Plague epitaph.