Why is there something rather than nothing? What existed before the universe? If there was nothing, then how can something arise from nothing?
If it has always existed, then how can something exist without ever having been created or destroyed? These are questions we ask ourselves since childhood, but it seems that no one was adult enough to answer. Until we become adults and discover that no one actually has the answer.
Of course, some people believe that everything happens for a reason, while others believe that nothing really makes sense. But how strange is it to think about the course that things have taken in the evolution of life and the universe? Approximately 13.
78 billion years ago, this strange place emerged where absolutely everything happens. All that existed were some interactions between elementary particles and fundamental forces of nature. It was all so simple.
Just like that for millions and millions of years. An almost uninhabited universe. A cosmic desert.
And after billions and billions of years of expansion, new elements, new stars, massive explosions, and even galaxies emerged. And in the midst of it all, our beloved planet Earth appeared, with its 4. 54 billion years of age.
This planet that has been home to thousands of species before ours. And in these billions of years of existence, it was only approximately 160,000 years ago that modern humans emerged. We are extremely new.
On a universal scale, we are practically insignificant. We live in a world filled with strange things that we don't understand. What exists outside the universe?
Is time infinite? Could life actually be an eternal recurrence, where we always experience the same things in a vicious cycle? Was our entire life already predetermined?
Is there free will? If not, then can I do anything? If yes, what should I do?
And if suddenly I were all alone in the world? What meaning would my life have? How can I deal with the coldness and indifference of the universe?
What makes me feel part of society and obey its created rules? Why do most people suffer? Why is there so much injustice?
How can we live like this? Maybe there is no reason behind it all. Maybe we are just an accidental product of millions and billions of years of an excessively lonely universe.
Maybe we are a brief company for the usual emptiness. Before we continue, I promise this will be quick. But you might be the exact person who needs to hear it.
If nothing around you makes sense, why not give it meaning yourself? Cambridge is the perfect place for those who dare to go beyond. Who dare not to stay still while time slips through our hands.
What does life mean to you? Well. .
. The meaning of life to me is, in my time, to continue the pursuit of happiness. And for me, love is happiness, period.
So that's what I answer. Don't let language be a barrier. Be free to do whatever you want.
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Or click the link in the description to check out the special offers. And now back to the video, how else can we live in a world filled with strange things that we don't understand? But what if we took seriously the idea that nothing really makes sense?
Nihilism is the philosophical thesis that there is no inherent meaning in the world. That there is no intrinsic structure to reality. The search for the meaning of life would be completely purposeless.
Since there is no objective meaning to it, no matter how much we search. Nihilism can be applied in different ways. Whether in ethics, politics, or even in science.
But all of them are based on some central ideas. The first is that there is no truth. In other words, there is no ideal or correct notion of truth.
And because of that, our moral actions have support only in ourselves. The second is that existence has no purpose. Therefore, we do not need any value or meaning.
Since there is no foundation of life in the universe. And to conclude the third, everything is senseless and nothing we do matters. These ideas have existed at least since Ancient Greece.
But nihilism began to take shape and become popular in the 19th and 20th centuries. With the term coined by the German philosopher Friedrich Jacobi and carried forward by the Russian writer Ivan Turgenev. Today, the name most associated with nihilism is definitely the German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche.
Who used nihilism as one of the main tools against the moralism of society and religion in his time. However, there are some things in this whole story that are not quite what they seem. For starters, nihilism is not a pessimistic attitude.
The worst will not happen simply because evil does not exist. However, good also does not exist. These concepts do not have any real meaning.
We are the ones who invent what is good and what is evil. While a pessimistic person lives in the shadows of suffering, a nihilist rejects the existence of any idea of good or evil. It makes no sense to talk about pessimism when what you do or think simply does not matter.
Nothing matters. But be careful, because nihilism can have a destructive potential in the long run. With harmful effects for the world and for people, in addition to existential panic.
What nihilism does best is help us question our moral foundations. Who created the system of beliefs and values that you adopt? And why should you accept something so arbitrary?
Who would you be if you had nothing and no one to judge you now? And that's why nihilism can be seen as a passing but necessary stage. For us to destroy and rebuild our values about the meaning of life.
Nietzsche warned of all this when he wrote that Nihilism is the logic of our great values and ideals thought through to the end. Because we first had to experience nihilism to find out, see behind what the value of these values really was. Okay, but how to do that?
How do we destroy everything we believe in and not go crazy along the way? And that's where existentialism comes in, which has the same starting points as nihilism, but with different conclusions on how to proceed. The existentialist maxim, following Jean Paul Sartre, is that existence precedes essence.
This basically tells us that there is no definition or meaning attributed to human nature prior to our existence. And this meaning only comes later, given by ourselves through our actions. This is a bit counterintuitive, since we usually consider the essence of things as defining their existence.
For example, an object is only a chair if people use it to sit on. An object is only a knife if it is used to cut things. And so on.
But existentialism reverses this order. It says that existence is the way we exist and what we do that make us human. You are, first and foremost, human.
And nothing more than that. For existentialism there is no inherent meaning in the world either. But instead of concluding that life is purposeless, the conclusion is that it's up to us to decide what that purpose is.
It's up to us to face the tangle of life and give it meaning. And precisely because of this we would be experiencing absolute and unprecedented freedom. In which we, and only we, can decide what is good and what is bad.
What is or isn't worthwhile. And above all, only we can give meaning to life. Thinking like that, it's not as if we have the privilege of being free.
We are condemned to be free. All our actions have no moral guarantee, either by superior entities or by an evil genius, or a conscious supercomputer running a simulated reality. We have nothing and no one to blame.
In Sartre's words, we are alone. No excuses. We are responsible for each and every one of our actions and choices.
That's why this freedom becomes a burden. And no one will come to save us if something goes wrong. But if you had an existential crisis listening to this, that's okay.
Because that's precisely the motto of the theory. Anyway, one might wonder if all this meaninglessness implies that life isn't worth living. And that's exactly what the French philosopher Albert Camuffeis.
. , in the myth, Sissi was the most intelligent of mortals. In an attempt to benefit himself, he tries to trick the God of Death.
So the gods revolt and decide to give him a punishment worse than death itself. He is condemned to spend his entire life rolling a giant boulder up a mountain so that when he gets there, the stone rolls back down and he has to repeat the process every day. The myth is a metaphor for the lack of purpose in our lives.
For the absurd undertakings we get involved in, from work to wars, as well as the pointlessness of human existence as a whole. As if we were eternally condemned to a constant struggle that is somewhat devoid of purpose. Camus tries to show us the contradiction of the human condition.
On the one hand, we have a reality that is devoid of meaning and quite apathetic towards us. And on the other, we have an almost uncontrollable urge to search for meaning, even though this is impossible. So what can we do?
Camus gives us three options. The first would be an act of faith. Simply accepting some doctrine that gives us meaning without question.
For him, this option would be unfeasible, since it represents the end of philosophy, the end of doubt, the end of questioning. The second would be to simply abandon this world, to give up playing with life's contradictions. But that's not a viable option either, since if living doesn't make sense, dying doesn't either.
And finally, the third option is simply to recognize and embrace the absurdity. Accepting that we will probably never have any purpose and won't even know the meaning of life, if there is one. And yet, we choose to live in spite of everything.
To live even without knowing why or how. And these are the ideas of absurdist philosophy, which arises as a revolt against the impossibility of meaning. Our very existence would be an act of rebellion against the impossibility of seeking meaning in an opaque and empty world.
It's choosing to live the impossible and laugh in the face of the existential abyss, no matter how much it stares back at you. You have embraced meaninglessness, you are meaninglessness itself. And yet, you have the passion to go on living in a paradoxical and indifferent world just because you do.
Because that's the only possible freedom, the only one that hasn't been offered to you. You want to live the impossible, to continually make the choice to exist even if nothing makes sense. Because at the end of the day, even though we may never discover what the purpose of everything is, or why we're here, or how the universe actually works, we are having an extremely unlikely and unique experience of the universe.
We are conscious, we are alive. And for me, that's extremely deep and meaningful. Thank you very much and see you next time.
