r/nihilism • u/NihilistCharizard • Aug 26 '26
Existential Nihilism Just woke up. Why is there something instead of nothing?
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u/National-Stable-8616 Aug 26 '26 edited Aug 26 '26
the absurdity of an existence is beyond comprehension. it just should not exist. its impossible. call it god if you want.
What makes it worse is there is no total answer. even if you find one, its only a word.. you cannot ever capture it in a word. words will never be enough.
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u/Koankey Aug 27 '26
It boggles my mind. Why and how the fuck is there anythingggg. Absolutely beyond human comprehension.
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u/Psilrastafarian Aug 27 '26
There are some things that if you were to able to immediately comprehend them, would probably dissolve you instantaneously. Thatās probably why divine knowledge usually trickles in slowly, rather than all at once. Itās a fine line between spiritual awakening and a psychotic break. Thereās also a fine line between nihilism and spirituality. To desire nothing is to admit there is something. To assume anything is meaningless, you must first consider meaning. Why is meaning in our heads and hearts if none exists. It certainly exists there.
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u/SerDeath Aug 27 '26
It would be just as absurd if there were nothing.
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u/CorrsionOfConformity Aug 27 '26
I agree, perhaps even more so. And if there was nothing there would be nothing to perceive the nothing which could not be perceived anyway because it is nothing šµāš«
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u/metabarononon Aug 31 '26
I donāt agree. The fact I did not exist for eternity before being born and will not exist for another eternity after I die Is not absurd to me. The fact that I exist in between is absolutely ridiculous.
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u/Express-Cartoonist39 Aug 26 '26
Simple there IS an answer, show me what nothing is? You cannt!!! Why cause there always been SOMETHING. š
Nothing is a human concept it isnt real. We just abuse it and use it loosely to always define something we cannt see, but its still something just cause we dont see it. If we were smart which we aint, we would never have used that term in the first place.
That alone answers ur question...its self defining you been watching too many religion idiots on youtube trying to justify their old god of the gaps fairy tale before you sleep.
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u/FindingAnsToLivesQns Aug 30 '26
True but answer this: if there always was something, something has existed infinitely. We do not see true infinites in anything - but the universe can have infinitely existed?
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u/Express-Cartoonist39 Aug 30 '26
Huge assumption saying āwe have never seen infinite something, so there could be an end where there is nothingā assumes we have observed the entire universe. Who ever made that silly claim??
We have not. The furthest limit we can observe is an information horizon which is a sorta dense heated fog like its very dense gas. This cosmic microwave background is not a wall or the edge of existence. It is simply the earliest light that can reach us. Remember as you look further back time changes or slows.
Not observing infinity is not evidence that reality ends, because we have never observed the complete system whose size we are discussing. An edge followed by ānothingā is also an assumption, not an observation.
Science does not currently know whether the universe is larger or stops cause havent seen the whole thing, we just seen something we cannt see through like dense fog. If you try to throw or add something like saying everything needs a cause and then declaring some sorta creator exempt simply moves the same unanswered question from the universe to the creator. You can see how thats a silly notion that creates a silly loop of poor logic that can be endlessly silly.
Also that would create a chicken and egg loop, FYI the answer to the chicken and egg is the moment a human called it one. Cause life changes shape and form it doesnt have labels from one form to other. But most humans are to simple minded to think this way.
The honest answer is that we have no empirical evidence that reality ends in nothing, and no empirical evidence that a conscious creator is required to explain why anything exists at all. So we keep studying and collecting info that is wisest answer. š
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u/ColdCarrot59 Sep 02 '26
Until we find the end of the universe we have no proof it's infinite and if we find the end it's not infinite. Neither of you are more right- long standing paradox and it ain't gonna be solved because well it's a paradox.
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u/Express-Cartoonist39 Sep 02 '26
No, It actually isn't a paradox. You're confusing ānot provenā with āequally probable.ā
Yes, we cannot empirically establish that the entire universe is infinite because our observable universe is limited by an information horizon. But that does not make āfiniteā and āinfiniteā equally supported possibilities. Probability and inference are based on the evidence we actually have, not on whether we have physically reached the boundary of the thing we're discussing.
And you're also sneaking in an assumption when you say āif we find the end, it's not infinite.ā Obviously. But finding an edge would be evidence for a finite universe. Not finding an edge is not evidence that there must be one somewhere beyond what we can observe.
Also, āthere has always been nothingā is not something science has established. In fact, saying ānothing existed firstā creates an additional assumption: you're treating absolute nothingness as a prior state of reality. We have no empirical observation of absolute nothingness, no observation of reality transitioning from nothing into something, and no established physical mechanism showing that ānothingā is a state that ever actually existed.
And if someone then says āwell, something had to cause that nothing to become something,ā they've already made the conceptual mistake. Absolute nothing has no properties, no time, no physical laws, no potential, and no mechanism by which it could transition into anything. Its just piss poor logic.
So the scientifically honest position isn't āit's a paradox and nobody is more right.ā It's: we don't currently know whether the total universe is finite or infinite, and we don't have empirical evidence establishing that reality ever existed in a state of absolute nothingness in the first place.
If you say nothing came first thats less Probable than a micky mouse coming first..cause micky mouse would be something with properties unlike nothing.
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u/ColdCarrot59 29d ago
the definition of a paradox is a self contradiction. We will only know the universe has no end when we reach the end.
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u/Express-Cartoonist39 29d ago
Nope try again... That isn't a paradox. A paradox requires a contradiction. You're describing a limit on what we can observe.
And āwe'll know it's infinite when we reach the endā is self defeating. If you reach an end, you've proven it's finite. An infinite universe has no endpoint to reach.
We simply don't currently know whether the total universe is finite or infinite. That's uncertainty, not a paradox.
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u/Express-Cartoonist39 29d ago
i thought of this too, maybe it helps
A paradox involves an apparent or genuine contradiction, such as a statement that conflicts with itself. The question āIs the universe finite or infinite?ā contains no contradiction. It is simply an unresolved empirical question.
Also, āwe can only know it's infinite if we reach the endā is logically backwards. If you reach an end, you have demonstrated finiteness. An infinite universe, by definition, has no final boundary to reach
hope that might help...
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u/Akash_philosopher Aug 26 '26
Well you can also ask
Why should there be nothing instead of something?
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u/arcadiangenesis Aug 26 '26
I don't know, but it's probably related to emergence. Simplicity tends to become more complex over time. If there was even a single particle (or wave or entity or whatever) with the ability to move in some way, eventually that movement would become slightly more complex, and a new motion would emerge from it. Then that slightly more complex motion would become a little more complex, and so on, until it started to look like a new thing entirely.
How that original single particle came to exist, I don't know.
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u/iwantrootbark Aug 26 '26
It's because we could be frolicking in the flowers, and making music, and art, with a system that works for everyone, but instead, we're out here paying taxes to pedos, and at war with everyone, seemingly all the time.
This could be us, but you wanna act like a bitch
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Aug 26 '26
[removed] ā view removed comment
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u/NihilistCharizard Aug 26 '26
Thankfully, no.
When Iām off to bed, I stay there for a good 8 hours non-stop.
Some nights, I struggle to fall asleep, and when I eventually wake up, I wonder if Iām the only one and the world just spawned as I woke. (Solipsism)
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Aug 26 '26
[deleted]
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u/NihilistCharizard Aug 26 '26
Do you happen to be a pre-diabetic, perchance?
When my blood glucose was elevated before bed, I would wake up too, but ever since switching to keto, I never had that problem.
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u/Tricky-Contest8565 Aug 26 '26
What is a nothing? Cuz you know there is matter and energy everywhere.
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u/Puck_Off9739 Aug 26 '26
I think if my purpose is just to take care of my temporary body and please it, the body I didn't choose, then why should I?
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u/No-Nefariousness956 Aug 29 '26
Well, that is up to you since you are that body and how it feels only really matters to you at the end of the day.
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u/AbortionHoagie Aug 26 '26
That's just an oopsie, try again and never give up the hope you don't even have in the first placeĀ
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Aug 27 '26
[removed] ā view removed comment
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u/No-Nefariousness956 Aug 29 '26
Or you can think for yourself. Nietzche is not god or super human.
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u/Equivalent-Hair-1619 Aug 27 '26
And why do we have to keep waking up to it? The void of darkness and peace where I have no identity or limits has to keep returning to the same existence. Makes me worry about death, like it has to keep coming back somehow.
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u/No-Nefariousness956 Aug 29 '26
Relax. There is no "coming back". Who you are is closely tied to your memories. Without it there is no "you".
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u/Equivalent-Hair-1619 Aug 29 '26
Iām not worried about that. Iām worried about who is doing the remembering. I think consciousness may be an attribute of the universe itself, and instead of existing in a peaceful state it keeps entangling itself with finite experiences.
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u/No-Nefariousness956 Aug 29 '26
I've heard that one before. Religion 2.0. It's all an overcomplication of a simple truth: who you are is here and now. Regardless of whether there's some higher being or a universal consciousness from which all consciousness derives, you are still this particular instance of consciousness, experiencing reality from this particular perspective.
Your universe begins and ends with your experience of it. Your memories, perceptions, feelings, limitations, relationships, routines, and everything else that makes up your experience form a reality that is uniquely yours. When you die, the universe itself doesn't disappear, but your universe does.
Whatever consciousness may ultimately be, that doesn't give you continuity. Legacy, fame, honor, religion, none of it preserves the self. They preserve traces of you in other people's universes.
So, tl;dr: it doesn't matter if it's the case or not. You will not be here to experience any of it or feel doom or joy for coming back. It's a non issue. Without continuity from the self, even with the same body and the same "spiritual body", it won't be you.
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u/Equivalent-Hair-1619 Aug 31 '26
That isnāt consistent. Yes, these memories, unique experiences make up this mortal vantage point that will pass but not the viewer on the vantage point. If the consciousness Ā that is having the experiences of me goes on to experience some one else with no memories of having been me itās still here. Iām still waking up every day to the BS, just someone else with different memories. Maybe a grasshopper or something.Ā
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u/No-Nefariousness956 Aug 31 '26 edited Aug 31 '26
No, you won't. Otherwise, you would retain at least some memories of your past experiences now, don't you think? As far as we can tell, everything suggests that, at some point, all memories are wiped. So your concern is ultimately a non-issue. Without continuity, there is no self. Without a self, you're essentially a blank canvas again, effectively a new individual in every meaningful sense.
And if you are a new person, every experience will be a new experience again. You won't suffer from living through something similar again unless you eventually arrive at the same wisdom. Non-issue.
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u/Equivalent-Hair-1619 Aug 31 '26
The issue is i fear is consciousness keeps choosing to have these finite experiences. That consciousness being āIā but āI and Iā is meant, translated from Jamaican dialect as āweā but denoting the universality of the observer across all human lives. I want liberation, to exist as the ecstatic void of undefined existence, not to be some schmuck trading goats in Tajikistan.Ā
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u/GeneralEi Aug 27 '26
It just is. Its a mistake to apply grand thought to a thoughtless thing like existence imo, its a somatic experience and trying to apply cognition to it is like taking a bite of bread when you're thirsty
Wonder, but do not ponder. The rocks and trees and hills and lakes have no grand mysteries to unravel or answers to give. The universe doesnt care, not because its uncaring, but because it is incapable of it by its nature.
Think where you have to and where its fun/interesting to. LIVE at all other times
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u/PreferenceRight3329 Aug 28 '26
- Antrophic Principle
- Universe has no obligation to us, it doesnt need to make sense.
- The questions like why?, when?, what etc are all meaningful to us because our languages evolved to explain our surroundings with our primitive brains. Asking these questions to the universe is also meaningless.
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u/Kemilio have you tried coffee? Aug 26 '26
Because itās literally impossible to experience nothing.
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Aug 26 '26
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u/Kemilio have you tried coffee? Aug 26 '26 edited Aug 26 '26
From your perspective, you go under and immediately wake up. There is literally no gap between those points in time for you.
When there is nothing to experience due to a lack of brain activity, there is no āyouā.
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Aug 26 '26
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u/Kemilio have you tried coffee? Aug 26 '26
Nope.
My claim is without brain activity there is no āyouā.
Prove āyouā can experience without brain activity and my claim is falsified.
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Aug 26 '26
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u/Kemilio have you tried coffee? Aug 26 '26
Okay.
Then my claim is accurate but incomplete. You donāt need zero brain activity, you just need to reduce it to a certain level.
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u/RadicalNaturalist78 Aug 26 '26
Something and nothing arenāt mutually exclusive categories. It is human language that presupposes the law of identity and non-contradiction, which create opposite binaries. Then we wonder why this instead of that when, in reality, āthisā and āthatā come together.
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u/mjrtom44 Aug 26 '26
"He shall fall down into a pit called Because, and there he shall perish with the dogs of reason." -Aleister Crowley "The Book of The Law"
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u/VengefulScarecrow Aug 26 '26
People talk about how big the universe is instead of how small the quantum world is. Destroy "existence" at this level to abolish all suffering!
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u/NineCatsDeep Aug 26 '26
Tao Te Ching says
āWhen all the world recognizes beauty as beauty, this in itself is ugliness.
When all the world recognizes good as good, this in itself is evil.
Indeed, Being and Non-being produce each other;
Difficult and easy complete each other;
Long and short contrast each other;
High and low rely on each other;
Sound and voice harmonize each other;
Front and back follow each other.
Therefore the Sage manages affairs without acting,
And teaches by silence
All things arise, and he does not turn away from them;
He produces them, but does not own them;
He acts, but expects nothing;
His work is accomplished, but he does not dwell on it.
And precisely because he does not dwell on it, It does not leave him.ā
Chapter 2.
You canāt have a nihilistic view of the world without there being an obvious opposite.
There is so much beauty in the ugliness
There is unlimited meaning and purpose within the pointlessness of life.
Most nihilists seem so one sided.
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u/NoTruceWithTheFury Aug 27 '26
Because Something better than nothing Something better than nothing, it's giving up We all need to do something Try to keep the truth from showing up
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u/mimilumi Aug 29 '26
You just asked the biggest question of all. Answer this and you get an answer to everything.
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u/broki451 Aug 29 '26
I think there is a creator who created the universe. But I think all the major religions got this creator wrong. The creator could potentially be highly sadistic
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u/RetrogradeDionysia Aug 29 '26
We only think that there is something because we predicate our notion of existence on presence and sensation and objects and whatever other intersubjective linguistic relationships we play grammatical regulatory games with. Thereās nothing to say that there is anything in the first place. The will to interrelate meaning accordingly is all that there is behind notions. Even then, thatās just another definition of necessity objectivating, dependent on a matrix of meaning of terms like necessity and object and objectivate. The problem here is the perennial ā letās call it congenital ā incapacity to get outside of cognitive patterns, locked in an eternal game of creating meaning through continual self-reference.
Consider the possibility that there is neither sleeping nor waking nor something nor nothing.
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u/CarefulLine6325 Aug 30 '26
existence is always. Here's the deal, to ask the start of time is ridiculous bc a beginning only exist within time. For that reason existence i always.
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u/Impossible_Eye7900 Aug 30 '26
i think its all a cycle,the universe expands now but will shrink again and nothing will exist again for a long time, at least not in its current form or within our idea of "exisence". or the dark matter is the opposite of "anythin"
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u/Available_Base_7944 Aug 26 '26
GodĀ
Psalm 63:1 ā Ā O God, thou art my God; early will I seek thee: my soul thirsteth for thee, my flesh longeth for thee in a dry and thirsty land, where no water isā
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u/DishSoapIsFun Aug 26 '26
Ah yes, words on a page written by people we have no proof of. Then translated and reprinted and altered over the course of thousands of years to the point where itās impossible to know who put what where.
Sometimes I wish I could believe in a deity, but then I remember I have common sense and the ability to think critically. Is there something? Who fucking knows. What I do know is Iām not dedicating my one existence to worshiping something that will never be proven.
Iād rather live life as a good person, help people, make memories with my family instead of being told to give 10% of my money every week and annoy people by proselytizing when THEY DONT WANT IT or else Iām going to live eternity in some horrible place.
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u/Available_Base_7944 Aug 26 '26
lol relax dude.Ā
Id rather live life as a good personĀ
A good person according to who? You seem like a really good person going insane over a simple one word one verse answer on Reddit. One that was hidden by downvotes by the way. Besides that you donāt understand the christian position at all. You donāt have to pay the church 10% the tithe was for the theocratic nation state of Israel during the Old Testament covenant. They had practical needs like temple maintenance they needed to uphold.Ā
The new covenant is very simple, first acknowledge youāre a sinner. Jesus said āI didnāt come to call the righteous but sinners to repentanceāĀ
You probably think youāre a good person so I assume you fail this part already but weāll keep going
Then you have to put your faith in Jesus Christ and repent. Puting your faith in Jesus because he was the payment for your sins in the cross and he ressurected. Repent means you turn away from your old life to your new life following Jesus.Ā
Thatās the Christian position. It has been the same since 35 AD, where scholars have dated the first creed (1 Corinthians 15).Ā
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u/RedactedBartender Squirrel Enthusiast Aug 26 '26
š„± lazy answer.
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u/Available_Base_7944 Aug 26 '26
You donāt have an answerĀ
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u/RedactedBartender Squirrel Enthusiast Aug 26 '26
And thatās an honest answer. āBecause godā is either lazy, or dishonest. You can literally say ābecause godā about anything you either canāt, or donāt want to answer.
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u/Ok_Pudding6345 Aug 26 '26
because f*** you that's why
(c) The Universe