I do not often hear of nothingness spoken of beyond dense thought experiments. Existence is necessarily defined by something, and nothingness is not useful in the economy, in the political, or even within the mathematical. Nothingness might be used to prove innocence, such as in the absence of a crime, but the defender might speak rather upon the defendant’s innocuous activity during that time. If suspension in dread were more delicately attuned, for instance, as found in horror media, then we might see a wider resurgence in media. However, what provides the existential thrill or palsy is the obscurity of the dread. Nothingness is a perceptual disadvantage, and it arguably gives no evolutionary advantage in its reflection.

Nonetheless, absolute null is scintillating when used as an abstract misadventure. Thusly, it bears a broad usage in my profession.

Is this his inaugural address commencing his glorious term as rector of Freiburg in 1929 or something else?

No, it was....oh, I see what you did there. :wink:

To be suspended in complete oblivion is to be prepared for quietus. Death does not completely consume my thoughts, because I know that it will bring a finale to agony, and a countermeasure against eternity. To be suspended in my own lethe is somewhat comforting, because, rationally, I know that I need fear no eternal consciousness. The knowledge that I can there be saved from eternal torment lessens my own horror of the paradox. It is a blessing, or merely beneficial, to accept the lethefold, and to find there nepenthe.

Mannequins and monuments are fortunate, for they are noetically in oblivion. For many persons, however, they appear to pose an insidious animation.

When the abstract or Weird is discussed, I prefer to imagine the subject as being an exotic demesne. Acarytid, while typically referring to a pillar of feminine form, can also imply the uncanny. A being, or location, which emanates from the unimaginable might be populated by temples or architecture of obstreperesque form. The pillar might initially appear Heimlich, or near home, in a humanoid form, and thus ensnare the observer in dread. The uncanny can be found in architecture, in faces, or in stifling room. We might imagine that a carving, in its petrified glare, contemplates nothing, or that it reveals the actual state of humanity as being a mere object. Any of these concepts are routes into the unnameable, and therefore the immersion of dread.

If it was, it seems to me that with a nod to those who would point out nothing isn't a thing, he proceeds to treat it as one, insisting, wrongly I think, that we do so anyway. Even if we did, it doesn't mean it is one. Perhaps he intends a psychological point, but I think "the nothing" isn't something and if that's the case he makes no meaningful statements.

Do we not feel the world as unheimlich precisely because we could lose it, and thus lose ourselves, at any moment? And on the other hand whenever choices are made are we not "being towards death" in the sense that we feel the death of all the possibilities that become closed off due to choice, and the existential dread that comes with that? — Janus


Indeed.

And therein is the essence of the ironic nature of this matter. — Arne

Yes, I see what you mean, and I wasn't wanting to deny there is any irony in this aspect of the human condition. I guess I just wanted to dispel any idea that we are unwisely or even absurdly clinging on to something that gives us absolutely no comfort. Because the world does give us some comfort, it's just that it fails to give us ultimate comfort because of the seeming inevitability of its loss, so I guess I am introducing the caveat that we are not utterly failing to be at home in the world. You probably didn't intend to say that we were, anyway.

those who feel most at home are those who accepted that it was not home.

Speech about illusions refers us to what is not. Per H these small cases of negation are secondary to "the nothing." — frank

Illusions, dreams and such undoubtedly occur and take place. They're a part of the world as they're part of our existence, explainable by reference to conditions and events. They're something.

Sure. And they draw us to think about what is not.

Sure. And they draw us to think about what is not. — frank

I don't think that gets us anywhere, sadly, or at least it provides no insight for me into whatever it is that, apparently, isn't. Giving it a go: When we think about what is not, do we think about nothing? I don't think we can think of nothing when we think. We may, however, not think. Are we not thinking when we think about what is not?

You've developed thread amnesia. You protested that we don't talk about what is not. Have you realized now that you were wrong?

I think I said we ordinarily don't talk about it, but regardless I would be wrong only if I maintained that we can't speak, or write, the words what is not. I thought, perhaps mistakenly, that more than those words was being referred to, i.e. an actual what that is not, i.e. that which is not. I don't think I've ever claimed there is such a "what." But if those words are what H refers to, then certainly we can talk about them, just as we could talk about that which is not-not-nothing or the nothing in itself if we were so inclined. However, we don't, except perhaps in a book or class or forum of philosophy, talk about that which is not.

:meh: You don't know what negation is?

I don't know what "the nothing" is, and it's not clear to me anyone does. I suspect if a definition is hazarded by anyone, it will turn out to be fittingly obscure, or if not that a rather mundane expression of angst.

It's just the negation of everything. As I said before, H wants to breathe new life into an issue that becomes dead in the hands of a logician.

Some people want to say that what he was doing was entirely new. He didn't think that though. Neither do I.

I don't know what "the nothing" is, and it's not clear to me anyone does. — Ciceronianus the White

That's because it's not cognizable, it doesn't admit of being put in the sort of conceptual shape necessary for knowledge.

I suspect if a definition is hazarded by anyone, it will turn out to be fittingly obscure... — Ciceronianus the White

Indeed, it will be gesturing towards an indication of the unknown, something beyond the conceptual shape required for a word, a definition, knowledge....something like, say, a mood...

...or if not that a rather mundane expression of angst. — Ciceronianus the White

...which is not the same as a mundane expression of feeling.

That seems about right.

one does not need to live long before experiences gives rise to thoughts regarding the temporal nature of being. And such thoughts are pregnant with the indefinability of other than being. Or as Sartre would say, nothingness is a "worm in the heart of being."

It's just the negation of everything. — frank

Really? If it's necessary to give that a name, I think "the futile" would be more appropriate.

It seems a rather long way to go to say, in effect: "It upsets us greatly we're going to die. Why is that?"

I am not certain I understand your question. I said it the way I I did for several reasons. First, I reject the notion that "it upsets us greatly we're going to die" explains all contemplation regarding the temporal nature of being. Second, I said it the way I did so as to avoid the inevitable language/logic pitfalls that come with treating "nothing" as if it were "something." And third and most important of all, I said it the way I did because I really do suspect that our first contemplation of the temporal nature of being (most likely as children) ends with "nothing" as shorthand for an incomprehensible outcome. Only thereafter does "nothing" as shorthand appear early in the conversation. For the most part, I think the brutality of our conclusions often belie the organic circumstances leading to their adoption. And it also makes their recurrence as issues easier to dismiss.

Really? If it's necessary to give that a name, I think "the futile" would be more appropriate. — Ciceronianus the White

Thank you on behalf of the Empire. For your services to philosophy we will pay you in salt.

Heidegger apparently thinks we encounter "the nothing" only through a powerful emotion--dread. That's how this thread began. Thus my comment. I address his statements, not yours. We "dread" according to him (I've seen "anxiety" used in place of "dread" in a different translation). Why, then, do we dread? Presumably it arises in connection with "the nothing."

Well, consider what it means to negate, and what negation means, and therefore what is meant by "negation of everything." Is it the denial of everything? The absence of everything? The claim that "everything" is false? Causing everything to be invalid? The destruction of everything? What could be more futile then such a denial, or to claim that everything is absent, or false, or invalid, or destroyed? What would be more futile than to be concerned what it will be like not to exist or with what it would be like if nothing existed?

I don't think any of that is related.

What is the opposite of life, alive, or living?

Well, consider what it means to negate, and what negation means, and therefore what is meant by "negation of everything." Is it the denial of everything? The absence of everything? The claim that "everything" is false? Causing everything to be invalid? The destruction of everything? What could be more futile then such a denial, or to claim that everything is absent, or false, or invalid, or destroyed? What would be more futile than to be concerned what it will be like not to exist or with what it would be like if nothing existed?

I think it's less like this ^ and more closely related to 'why is there something rather than nothing?' It's one of those things that remains strange no matter how long you reflect on it. He's certainly not saying that there aren't things, or that everything is 'false.' It's that there's ultimately nothing holding any of it together. The world just is.

I always took your intrusive, repetitive comments on Heidegger threads to be basically a form of bad-faith roleplaying (you get to dress up like Dewey for a second, the way some people affect a pipe). I'm starting to wonder if maybe deep down, you're secretly drawn to him. Protesting too much, and all that.

I always thought it was quite clear the Cic had a kind of pathological/sado-masochistic relationship to Heidegger, enjoying quite immensly his bad-faith engagements with any discussion of him.

More like Carnap than Dewey, I would think. But I'll acknowledge "the nothing" and the fascination "it" has for some baffles and intrigues me. For example, I would pose the question as "Why is there something?" There is no "instead of" alternative. This nonentity is seemingly profound and fearsome, and I wonder how and why it can be that.

Not to Heiddegger, but to you, dear Street. I confess I was eagerly awaiting your appearance. In fact, though, I'm trying to explore whether there's an explanation for what Heiddeger fails to explain and apparently thinks self-evident: "The nothing" and our "dread" which manifests it.

for Heidegger, the language is different. For Heidegger it is world/not world rather than being/not being. And world is intelligible while not world is unintelligible. And our fears are always of something that is within the world. So using your term, is the not world/unitelligible that manifests as dread (anxieity). And I do think he hits the nail on the head with the "unintelligible" rather than nothing. Nothing is unintelligible. And that is why trying to talk about it results in "unitelligible" gibberish.