Symbolic Nihilism?

[Elta]

Over the past few months I've been whining to my friends about how I wish I was religious, or believed in destiny. I might believe in destiny, but deep down I chalk it up to superstition. Anyway, I've come up with four 'stances' on destiny, but I am not sure if one of them make sense. - Well, I am not sure if the term I am using makes sense, but I figure it some sort of philosophical concept that has a term and I am wondering if anyone knows what it's called.

Destiny - Pretty straight forward, "it is written" Some things are inevitable etc. I mean that last part in a interpersonal human relations/achievement sort of way. It would be all to easy to say something like "The sun destroying earth is inevitable"

Taoist River concept - (paraphrasing) Life is like a river, and the harder you fight your destiny the harder it will be for you. I.E. - if you were meant to be a writer, you need to just get on with it and write or the river (universe/nature -whatever) will just fight you at every turn. This one is not strictly spiritual, one could take this stance based on personality factors alone.

Nihilism - There are no intrinsic values to anything etc I am sure you all know the rest

As a subset to Nihilism I am sure there is some line of thinking on the order of "Yes the universe is random, and nothing really matters, we will all die eventually, but what we hold to have value has value, for us at least." I am guessing you would call it symbolic nihilism because you are taking something that is morally formless and giving it meaning.


I am sure someone has had similar thoughts, but I don't know much about philosophy, so I don't know what you would call it. Does anyone know?
Also, Where do you stand on those four things. Somewhere in between the two? Something altogether different?

 

[Global Skeptic]

One place to start is with existentialism.

 

[Leoreth]

Is it part of your premise that not believing in some form of destiny automatically makes you a nihilist?

Actually I'm of the opinion that the things we do wouldn't matter if they were already predestined in some way.

 

[de Maistre]

Isn't that pretty much what Nietzsche believed? God is dead, there are no inherent values, so let's "become gods" and create our own. I've never actually read Nietzsche though so maybe I know nihil

 

[Ayatollah So]

I'm confused. Values aren't respectable unless the universe itself somehow values them?! That's crazy talk.

As to destiny: causality, yes; destiny, no.

 

[Traitorfish]

Isn't that pretty much what Nietzsche believed? God is dead, there are no inherent values, so let's "become gods" and create our own. I've never actually read Nietzsche though so maybe I know nihil

Nietzsche also had an ambiguous relationship to the concept of "destiny", though. While he did not accept pre-determination, he also rejected the classical concept of free will, hence all that amor fati stuff you find in his work.

 

[Souron]

The assertion that "values stem from man" isn't a form of nillism.

 

[Mechanicalsalvation]

Over the past few months I've been whining to my friends about how I wish I was religious, or believed in destiny. I might believe in destiny, but deep down I chalk it up to superstition. Anyway, I've come up with four 'stances' on destiny, but I am not sure if one of them make sense. - Well, I am not sure if the term I am using makes sense, but I figure it some sort of philosophical concept that has a term and I am wondering if anyone knows what it's called.

Destiny - Pretty straight forward, "it is written" Some things are inevitable etc. I mean that last part in a interpersonal human relations/achievement sort of way. It would be all to easy to say something like "The sun destroying earth is inevitable"

Taoist River concept - (paraphrasing) Life is like a river, and the harder you fight your destiny the harder it will be for you. I.E. - if you were meant to be a writer, you need to just get on with it and write or the river (universe/nature -whatever) will just fight you at every turn. This one is not strictly spiritual, one could take this stance based on personality factors alone.

Nihilism - There are no intrinsic values to anything etc I am sure you all know the rest

As a subset to Nihilism I am sure there is some line of thinking on the order of "Yes the universe is random, and nothing really matters, we will all die eventually, but what we hold to have value has value, for us at least." I am guessing you would call it symbolic nihilism because you are taking something that is morally formless and giving it meaning.


I am sure someone has had similar thoughts, but I don't know much about philosophy, so I don't know what you would call it. Does anyone know?
Also, Where do you stand on those four things. Somewhere in between the two? Something altogether different?

I also dont know much about philosophy but my opinion would be somewhere along the lines that all you have stated has some truth in it. These points of view simply represent some realities that can actually coexist and at one point or other play their respective role in human being or life of humanity.

Destiny? Sure. I dont see why not. Fulfillment would be most probable destiny of every single entity in this wide world...

Life is a river? Of course but dont forget that river not only flows but also challenges.

Nihilism? Sometimes you have to break up the old truth so that you can find new one more suitable and potent...

The value of things and existence changes as does individual consciousness so I suppose you can say it is non but in that nothingness one can find absolute and vice versa ...

 

[GoodGame]

As a subset to Nihilism I am sure there is some line of thinking on the order of "Yes the universe is random, and nothing really matters, we will all die eventually, but what we hold to have value has value, for us at least." I am guessing you would call it symbolic nihilism because you are taking something that is morally formless and giving it meaning.

That sounds like Moral Nihilism, actually. But I get how you meant the use of the word "symbolic", in that it is implied the individual 'stamps' a set of morals onto the world.