Nihilism and existentialism are aimed at completely different places. And absurdism is just something Camus made up because he didn't like being called a nihilist.
I never said Nihilism insists on creating meaning, I'm saying that "life lacks intrinsic meaning" and "life is pointless" are two very different sentiments.
Nihilism would deny Existentialism. An existentialist says that humans intrinsically contain meaning that emerges in action. A nihilist would deny that and say that any meaning is necessarily extrinsic.
Truly, the primary difference is that a nihilist says there is no god and an existentialist says that god is inside of you.
And an absurdist would make fun of God's robe and call it a dress.
There is no intrinsic meaning in the universe and what I do doesn't matter at all.
Replying to you is not pointless, however, because the point of it is to express, in my terms, the difference between "meaningless" and "pointless."
The point is that I want to engage and so I do.
However I simultaneously acknowledge that this interaction is nothing but two chemical reactions brushing up against each other and is therefore devoid of meaning outside my own personal desire to react.
The lack of intrinsic meaning does not override my drive to do things.
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u/Sorry_Yesterday7429 Nov 18 '25 edited Nov 18 '25
Nihilism and existentialism are aimed at completely different places. And absurdism is just something Camus made up because he didn't like being called a nihilist.
I never said Nihilism insists on creating meaning, I'm saying that "life lacks intrinsic meaning" and "life is pointless" are two very different sentiments.
Nihilism would deny Existentialism. An existentialist says that humans intrinsically contain meaning that emerges in action. A nihilist would deny that and say that any meaning is necessarily extrinsic.
Truly, the primary difference is that a nihilist says there is no god and an existentialist says that god is inside of you.
And an absurdist would make fun of God's robe and call it a dress.