Edit: Nothing. It was meaningless. And still is. — unenlightened

Not sure where you are responding but you bring up a good Ligotti quote:

Fact is, nothing can justify our existence. Existence of any flavor is not only unjustified, it is useless, malignantly so, and has nothing to recommend it over nonexistence. A person’s addiction to existence is understandable as a telltale of the fear of nonexistence, but one’s psychology as a being that already exists does not justify existence as a condition to be perpetuated but only explains why someone would want to perpetuate it. For the same reason, even eternal bliss in a holy hereafter is unjustified, since it is just another form of existence, another instance in which the unjustifiable is perpetuated. That anyone should have a bias for heaven over nonexistence should by rights be condemned as hedonistic by the same people who scoff at Schopenhauer for complaining about the disparity between “the effort and the reward” in human life. People may believe they can choose any number of things. But they cannot choose to undo their existence, leaving them to live and die as puppets who have had an existence forced upon them whose edicts they must follow. If you are already among the existent, anything you do will be unjustified and MALIGNANTLY USELESS.

Fact is, nothing can justify our existence. Existence of any flavor is not only unjustified, it is useless, malignantly so, and has nothing to recommend it over nonexistence. A person’s addiction to existence is understandable as a telltale of the fear of nonexistence, but one’s psychology as a being that already exists does not justify existence as a condition to be perpetuated but only explains why someone would want to perpetuate it. For the same reason, even eternal bliss in a holy hereafter is unjustified, since it is just another form of existence, another instance in which the unjustifiable is perpetuated.

What could possibly be meant by 'justified' here. Justification is a human activity embedded in our relationship with our desires. Absent of that it seems a nonsensical throw-away word devoid of meaning.

He's just saying a king can't be 'castled' outside of chess. Well duh!

Here is a secondary source that does a good analysis of CATHR. In lieu of people not having the book on hand to do a full analysis of quotes out of context, this may be a good place to start before diving into the primary source quotes.

https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/yzNhNvGDdLrtDsjyK/the-conspiracy-against-the-human-race-by-thomas-ligotti

Edit: I had the wrong blog. Here is one I meant I think: https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/yzNhNvGDdLrtDsjyK/the-conspiracy-against-the-human-race-by-thomas-ligotti

If there are other ones I think are useful in helping understand the book. I will add them.

A good one regarding people's reaction to the "complainers" (pessimists mainly):

If human pleasure did not have both a lid and a time limit, we would not bestir ourselves to do things that were not pleasurable, such as toiling for our subsistence. And then we would not survive. by the same token, should our mass mind ever become discontented with the restricted pleasures doled out by nature, as well as disgruntled owe the lack of restrictions on pain, we would omit the mandates of survival from our lives out of a stratospherically acerbic indignation. And then we would not reproduce. As a species, we do not shout into the sky, “The pleasures of this world are not enough for us.” In fact, they are just enough to drive us on like oxen, pulling a cart full of our calves, which in their turn will put on the yoke. As inordinately evolved beings, though, we can postulate that it will not always be this way. “A time will come,” we say to ourselves, “when we will unmake this work in which we are battered between long burden and brief delight, and will live in pleasure for all our days.” The belief in the possibility of long-lasting, high-flown pleasures is a deceptive but adaptive flimflam. It seems that nature did not make us to feel too good for too long, which would be no good for the survival of the species, but only to feel good enough for long enough to keep us from complaining that we not feel good all the time.

In the workaday work, complainers will not go far. When someone asks how you are doing, you had better be wise enough to reply, “I can’t complain.” If you do complain, even justifiably, people will stop asking how you are doing. complaining will not help you succeed and influence people. You can complain to your physician or psychiatrist because they are paid to hear you complain. But you cannot complain to your boss or your friends, if you have any. you will soon be dismissed from your job and dropped from the social register. Then you will be left alone with your complains and no one to listen to them. Perhaps then the message will sink into your head: If you do not feel good enough for long enough, you should act as if you do and even think as if you do. That is the way to get yourself to feel good enough for long enough and stop you from complaining for good, as any self-improvement book can affirm. But should you improve, someone must assume the blame. And that someone will be you. This is monumentally so if you are a pessimist or a depressive. Should you conclude that life is objectionable or that nothing matters–do not waste our time with your nonsense. We are on our way to the future, and the philosophically disheartening or the emotionally impaired are not going to hinder our progress. If you cannot say something positive, or at least equivocal, keep it to yourself. Pessimists and depressives need not apply for a position in the enterprise of life. You have two choices: Start thinking the way God and your society want you to think or be forsaken by all. The decision is yours, since your are a free agent who can choose to rejoin our fabricated world or stubbornly insist on…what? That we should mollycoddle non-positive thinkers like you or rethink how the whole world transacts its business? That we should start over from scratch? Or that we should go extinct? Try to be realistic. We did the best we could with the tools we had. After all, we are only human, as we like to say. Our world may not be in accord with nature’s way, but it did develop organically according to our consciousness, which delivered us to a lofty prominence over the Creation. The whole thing just took on a life of its own, and nothing is going to stop it anytime soon. There can be no starting over and no going back. No major readjustments are up for a vote. And no melancholic head-case is going to bad-mouth our catastrophe. The universe was created by the Creator, damn it. We live in a country we love and that loves us back. We have families and friends and jobs that make it all worthwhile. We are somebodies, not a bunch of nobodies without names or numbers or retirement plans. None of this is going to be overhauled by a though criminal who contends that the world is not doubleplusgood and never will be. Our lives may not be unflawed — that would deny us a better future to work toward — but if this charade is good enough for us, then it should be good enough for you. So if you cannot get your mind right, try walking away. you will find no place to go and no one who will have you. You will find only the same old trap the world over. Lighten up or leave us alone. you will never get us to give up our hopes. you will never get us to wake up from our dreams. We are not contradictory beings whose continuance only worsens our plight as mutants who embody the contorted logic of a paradox. Such opinion will not be accredited by institutions of authority or by the middling run of humans. To lay it on the line, whatever, whatever thoughts may enter your chemically imbalanced brain are invalid, inauthentic, or whatever dismissive term we care to hang on you, who are only “one of those people.” So start pretending that you feel good enough for long enough, stop your complaining, and get back in line. If you are not as strong as Samson — that no-good suicide and slaughterer of Philistines — then get loaded to the gills and return to the trap. Keep your medicine cabinet and your liquor cabinet well stocked, just like the rest of us. Come on and join the party. No pessimists or depressives invited. Do you think we are all morons? We know all about those complaints of yours. The only difference is that we have sense enough and feel good enough for long enough not to speak of them. keep your powder dry and your brains blocked. Our shibboleth “Up the Conspiracy and down with Consciousness.”

You don't know. You really don't. You don't know that the religious, political and economic ideological architecture of society is just made up, and can't see it because you draw your identities and purposes from it, and above all you've got to be right, especially when you're wrong. Science is not just a tool with which to pleasure yourself and threaten others. It's an increasingly valid and coherent understanding of the reality you inhabit; what at one time you called Creation. Remember? You had me stand in assembly to sing songs about it. So don't tell me now it doesn't matter, just because I figured it out.

You made a stupid, immodest mistake in defence of your own power and privilege you can't blame on the run-away train of civilisation. The continued existence of the human species is at stake, and you're responsible. You made science a heresy, and rendered it a whore to industrial and military power. In 400 years you have never revisited that arrangement - even as science has surrounded you with technological miracles, you continue to believe the superstitious myths that so unjustly order society, and so now, here we are, looking extinction in the eye.

All you need to do is accept that science describes reality best, and act accordingly. Tap into the limitless heat energy of the molten interior of the earth, and use that energy to secure a sustainable future. I'm not asking you to start over or turn back - but secure the future, now, before it's too late. Extract carbon from the air and bury it. Desalinate water to irrigate land, and farm it, rather than burning the forests and bleeding rivers dry. Produce hydrogen fuel, recycle, farm fish. Give us the hope of a future, and maybe - just maybe, we won't have so much not to complain about.

Not sure where you are responding — schopenhauer1

It was a joke. thought better of a post and deleted it.

MALIGNANTLY USELESS.

I'm trying to decide whether this is an oxymoron or a contradiction. It seems to depend on one's point of view.

If malignantly, then it seems to follow that it ought not be useless. But moral realism is an anathema.

Or ...

If useless, then malignancy can have no use.


Or is this another rhetorical flourish, not to be taken seriously?

Here is more complete quote from the book:

"Worthless” rather than “useless” is the more familiar epithet in this
context. The rationale for using “useless” in place of “worthless” in this
histrionically capitalized phrase is that “worthless” is tied to the concepts
of desirability and value, and by their depreciation introduces them into
the existential mix. “Useless,” on the other hand, is not so inviting of
these concepts. Elsewhere in this work, “worthless” is connected to the
language of pessimism and does what damage it can. But the devil of it
is that “worthless” really does not go far enough when speaking
pessimistically about the character of existence. Too many times the
question “Is life worth living?” has been asked. This usage of “worth”
excites impressions of a fair lot of experiences that are arguably
desirable and valuable within limits and that may follow upon one
another in such a way as to suggest that life is not totally worthless. With
“useless,” the wispy spirits of desirability and value do not as readily
rear their heads. Naturally, the uselessness of all that is or could ever be
is subject to the same repudiations as the worthlessness of all that is or
could ever be. For this reason, the adverb “malignantly” has been
annexed to “useless” to give it a little more semantic stretch and a dose
of toxicity. But to express with any adequacy a sense of the uselessness
of everything, a nonlinguistic modality would be needed, some effusion
out of a dream that amalgamated every gradation of the useless and
wordlessly transmitted to us the inanity of existence under any possible
conditions. Indigent of such means of communication, the uselessness of
all that exists or could possibly exist must be spoken with a poor
potency. Not unexpectedly, no one believes that everything is useless, and with
good reason. We all live within relative frameworks, and within those
frameworks uselessness is far wide of the norm. A potato masher is not
useless if one wants to mash

potatoes. For some people, a system of being that includes an afterlife of
eternal bliss may not seem useless. They might say that such a system is
absolutely useful because it gives them the hope they need to make it
through this life. But an afterlife of eternal bliss is not and cannot be
absolutely useful simply because you need it to be. It is part of a relative
framework and nothing beyond that, just as a potato masher is only part
of a relative framework and is useful only if you need to mash potatoes.
Once you had made it through this life to an afterlife of eternal bliss, you
would have no use for that afterlife. Its job would be done, and all you
would have is an afterlife of eternal bliss—a paradise for reverent
hedonists and pious libertines. What is the use in that? You might as
well not exist at all, either in this life or in an afterlife of eternal bliss.
Any kind of existence is useless. Nothing is self-justifying. Everything is
justified only in a relativistic potato-masher sense.
There are some people who do not get up in arms about potato-masher
relativism, while other people do. The latter want to think in terms of
absolutes that are really absolute and not just absolute potato mashers.
Christians, Jews, and Muslims have a real problem with a potato-masher
system of being. Buddhists have no problem with a potato-masher
system because for them there are no absolutes. What they need to
realize is the truth of “dependent origination,” which means that
everything is related to everything else in a great network of potato
mashers that are always interacting with one another. So the only
problem Buddhists have is not being able to realize that the only
absolutely useful thing is the realization that everything is a great
network of potato mashers. They think that if they can get over this
hump, they will be eternally liberated from suffering. At least they hope
they will, which is all they really need to make it through this life. In the
Buddhist faith, everyone suffers who cannot see that the world is a
MALIGNANTLY USELESS potato-mashing network. However, that does not make Buddhists superior to Christians, Jews, and Muslims. It only means they have a different
system for making it through a life where all we can do is wait for musty
shadows to call our names when they are ready for us. After that
happens, there will be nobody who will need anything that is not
absolutely useless. Ask any atheist.

http://www.blackandgreymagazine.com/chuang-tzu-the-useless-tree-translated-and-re-written-by-yi-yizzy-yu-and-john-yu-branscum/

So how does the story apply to the quote to you?

Useful and useless are judgements from a point of view. From one's own point of view, to be useless to a ruthless exploiter is a positive. The malignancy is the frustrated complaint of the ruthless exploiter. There are plenty of them, always complaining about how hard they have to work to satisfy their own greed.

Doesn't he actually address that here??

But to express with any adequacy a sense of the uselessness
of everything, a nonlinguistic modality would be needed, some effusion
out of a dream that amalgamated every gradation of the useless and
wordlessly transmitted to us the inanity of existence under any possible
conditions. Indigent of such means of communication, the uselessness of
all that exists or could possibly exist must be spoken with a poor
potency. Not unexpectedly, no one believes that everything is useless, and with
good reason. We all live within relative frameworks, and within those
frameworks uselessness is far wide of the norm. A potato masher is not
useless if one wants to mash

potatoes. For some people, a system of being that includes an afterlife of
eternal bliss may not seem useless. They might say that such a system is
absolutely useful because it gives them the hope they need to make it
through this life. But an afterlife of eternal bliss is not and cannot be
absolutely useful simply because you need it to be. It is part of a relative
framework and nothing beyond that, just as a potato masher is only part
of a relative framework and is useful only if you need to mash potatoes.
Once you had made it through this life to an afterlife of eternal bliss, you
would have no use for that afterlife. Its job would be done, and all you
would have is an afterlife of eternal bliss—a paradise for reverent
hedonists and pious libertines. What is the use in that? You might as
well not exist at all, either in this life or in an afterlife of eternal bliss.
Any kind of existence is useless. Nothing is self-justifying. Everything is
justified only in a relativistic potato-masher sense.
There are some people who do not get up in arms about potato-masher
relativism, while other people do. The latter want to think in terms of
absolutes that are really absolute and not just absolute potato mashers.
Christians, Jews, and Muslims have a real problem with a potato-masher
system of being. Buddhists have no problem with a potato-masher
system because for them there are no absolutes. What they need to
realize is the truth of “dependent origination,” which means that
everything is related to everything else in a great network of potato
mashers that are always interacting with one another. So the only
problem Buddhists have is not being able to realize that the only
absolutely useful thing is the realization that everything is a great
network of potato mashers. They think that if they can get over this
hump, they will be eternally liberated from suffering. At least they hope
they will, which is all they really need to make it through this life. In the
Buddhist faith, everyone suffers who cannot see that the world is a
MALIGNANTLY USELESS potato-mashing network. However, that does not make Buddhists superior to Christians, Jews, and Muslims. It only means they have a different
system for making it through a life where all we can do is wait for musty
shadows to call our names when they are ready for us. After that
happens, there will be nobody who will need anything that is not
absolutely useless. Ask any atheist.

Related to this but not the same.. I was just thinking:
When someone is put into existence, they are not given any choice about the choices presented to them in the first place. There are more-or-less natural consequences for those who choose certain choices. There are also elements of "using" and "abusing" the system which one can follow but then would be either objectively found lacking or subjectively feel guilty. Either way, that is another choice one cannot have been able to prevent in the first place. There is no escape from the givens of life. Even the choice of suicide falls into this paradox.

Yes. I would not make any argument against someone who felt that life is a burden or meaningless, however you want to put it. My argument is against the notion that this attitude is somehow more rational, more justified, or more moral than the love of life despite all its pains and horrors.

Even in its own terms, life is a losing game. One tries to survive; always, one fails eventually. Kind of like the high jump - the bar gets raised until eventually no one can jump it. We're all for the high jump sometime or other, and even the anti-natalist will get his heart's desire eventually. Happy days. :love:

I know you don't exactly agree with this sentiment, but I think Ligotti does pretty much a "slam dunk" answer to optimistic annoyance with pessimists. There is something delightful in his more-or-less accurate depiction here.

“

In the workaday world, complainers will not go far. When someone
asks how you are doing, you had better be wise enough to reply, “I can’t
complain.” If you do complain, even justifiably, people will stop asking
how you are doing. Complaining will not help you succeed and
influence people. You can complain to your physician or psychiatrist
because they are paid to hear you complain. But you cannot complain to
your boss or your friends, if you have any. You will soon be dismissed
from your job and dropped from the social register. Then you will be left
alone with your complaints and no one to listen to them. Perhaps then
the message will sink into your head: If you do not feel good enough for
long enough, you should act as if you do and even think as if you do.
That is the way to get yourself to feel good enough for long enough and
stop you from complaining for good, as any self-improvement book can
affirm. But should you not improve, someone must assume the blame.
And that someone will be you. This is monumentally so if you are a
pessimist or a depressive. Should you conclude that life is objectionable
or that nothing matters—do not waste our time with your nonsense. We
are on our way to the future, and the philosophically disheartening or the
emotionally impaired are not going to hinder our progress. If you cannot
say something positive, or at least equivocal, keep it to yourself.
Pessimists and depressives need not apply for a position in the enterprise
of life. You have two choices: Start thinking the way God and your
society want you to think or be forsaken by all. The decision is yours,
since you are a free agent who can choose to rejoin our fabricated world
or stubbornly insist on … what? That we should mollycoddle nonpositive
173
thinkers like you or rethink how the whole world transacts its business?
That we should start over from scratch? Or that we should go extinct?
Try to be realistic. We did the best we could with the tools we had. After
all, we are only human, as we like to say. Our world may not be in
accord with nature’s way, but it did develop organically according to our
consciousness, which delivered us to a lofty prominence over the
Creation. The whole thing just took on a life of its own, and nothing is
going to stop it anytime soon. There can be no starting over and no going
back. No major readjustments are up for a vote. And no melancholic
head-case is going to bad-mouth our catastrophe. The universe was
created by the Creator, damn it. We live in a country we love and that
loves us back. We have families and friends and jobs that make it all
worthwhile. We are somebodies, not a bunch of nobodies without names
or numbers or retirement plans. None of this is going to be overhauled
by a thought criminal who contends that the world is not doubleplusgood
and never will be. Our lives may not be unflawed—that would deny us a
better future to work toward—but if this charade is good enough for us,
then it should be good enough for you. So if you cannot get your mind
right, try walking away. You will find no place to go and no one who
will have you. You will find only the same old trap the world over.
Lighten up or leave us alone. You will never get us to give up our hopes.
You will never get us to wake up from our dreams. We are not
contradictory beings whose continuance only worsens our plight as
mutants who embody the contorted logic of a paradox. Such opinions
will not be accredited by institutions of authority or by the middling run
of humanity. To lay it on the line, whatever thoughts may enter your
chemically imbalanced brain are invalid, inauthentic, or whatever
dismissive term we care to hang on you, who are only “one of those
people.” So start pretending that you feel good enough for long enough,
174
stop your complaining, and get back in line. If you are not as strong as
Samson—that no-good suicide and slaughterer of Philistines—then get
loaded to the gills and return to the trap. Keep your medicine cabinet and
your liquor cabinet well stocked, just like the rest of us. Come on and
join the party. No pessimists or depressives invited. Do you think we are
morons? We know all about those complaints of yours. The only
difference is that we have sense enough and feel good enough for long
enough not to speak of them. Keep your powder dry and your brains
blocked. Our shibboleth: “Up the Conspiracy and down with
Consciousness.”

But you cannot complain to your boss or your friends

Must be pretty bad friends.

But regardless all that quote establishes is that pessimistic attitudes will be "phased out" by natural selection so to speak. The pessimists are put at a disadvantage so there will eventually be fewer and fewer of them. It does not establish that the pessimistic attitude is more genuine or more correct, only that it is more oppressed.

It's the reason I dropped the book after a few chapters. Ligotti pretends to always take a neutral position. "Oh I am a pessimist but that is by no means the objective or correct way to view life, that would be ridiculous!" then spends a whole book framing existing as a dystopia. I don't understand what the purpose of the book is if he doesn't want to claim objectivity.

And he does everything just short of that. For example, making fun of optimists, liking his situation to being oppressed by Big Brother, etc. What really is the purpose of the book?

my thoughts exactly on the book tbh. I treated Ligotti’s novel the same way one would treat a pop philosophy self help book. There’s some good ideas here and there but it’s not a philosophical work. Conspiracy against the Human Race is what I would define as “pop pessimism” insofar that I think the point of the book is that it’s just a compilation of pessimistic ideas Ligotti finds appealing and thinks everyone is too deluded to talk about. There’s some merit to that, given our Pollyanna biases and all, but there’s no real argument presented in it

and thinks everyone is too deluded to talk about. — Albero

God forbid! Ligotti is not pushing for any particular agenda. How dare you! Are you implying that being a pessimist is in any way more genuine or “grown up” than an optimist!?!? He would NEEEVER say that!

Anyways, so as I was saying.... life is a sexually transmitted terminal disease.


The book is basically the above on repeat.

But regardless all that quote establishes is that pessimistic attitudes will be "phased out" by natural selection so to speak. The pessimists are put at a disadvantage so there will eventually be fewer and fewer of them. It does not establish that the pessimistic attitude is more genuine or more correct, only that it is more oppressed. — khaled

Ok.. I would say that pessimists aren't so much oppressed as suppressed.

It's the reason I dropped the book after a few chapters. Ligotti pretends to always take a neutral position. "Oh I am a pessimist but that is by no means the objective or correct way to view life, that would be ridiculous!" then spends a whole book framing existing as a dystopia. I don't understand what the purpose of the book is if he doesn't want to claim objectivity. — khaled

He is putting pessimism in the spotlight but not fully committing to the conclusions. He entertains the notions and presents the case but is apathetic about it. I almost want to say he is an apathetic or agnostic pessimist, if that makes sense.

About being objective.. the name of the book is The Conspiracy Against the Human Race. I'm not sure he's objective here. Rather he is presenting the case for this conspiracy, but is not fully committed or enthusiastic about pessimism even. Kind of clever actually. Being too enthusiastic would almost negate the pessimism and make him an optimist for pessimism as if someone has found salvation in one's beliefs. He's keeping with the theme.

And he does everything just short of that. For example, making fun of optimists, liking his situation to being oppressed by Big Brother, etc. What really is the purpose of the book? — khaled

I think the book itself is trying to be a non-fictional horror of sorts. He is showcasing pessimistic themes in philosophy, metaphysics, religion, and literature.

my thoughts exactly on the book tbh. I treated Ligotti’s novel the same way one would treat a pop philosophy self help book. There’s some good ideas here and there but it’s not a philosophical work. Conspiracy against the Human Race is what I would define as “pop pessimism” insofar that I think the point of the book is that it’s just a compilation of pessimistic ideas Ligotti finds appealing and thinks everyone is too deluded to talk about. There’s some merit to that, given our Pollyanna biases and all, but there’s no real argument presented in it — Albero

Yeah, not a bad summary. I would hesitate to call this "pop" philosophy or self help. It's uses way too many primary and secondary sources to be just some whimsical extemporaneous surfacey book. There is clearly much research here. He doesn't rehash the ideas as if it was his own, he takes it directly from sources before giving his own spin on it. As for being a self help book.. I think it is an anti-self-help book. As as if you inverted self-help as self-help is almost always with an optimistic goal.

The book is basically the above on repeat. — khaled

One can say life itself is a certain set of things on repeat.

He is putting pessimism in the spotlight but not fully committing to the conclusions. He entertains the notions and presents the case but is apathetic about it. — schopenhauer1

From my reading, he seemed to be fully committing to the conclusions while claiming he is not.

But if he is not fully committing to the conclusions then who would read the book? If the conclusions are not objective or more genuine or anything like that, then why would anyone want to be a pessimist? That's just self harm at that point.

Pessimists usually either cannot see what is so great about life or believe their pessimism is somehow more "genuine" and so hold onto it. If he is of the former disposition, then he should be looking for ways out. Pessimists who are pessimists simply because they cannot bring themselves to cheer up try to look for ways to cheer up, be it antidepressants or therapy as nobody has any reason to be a pessimist if they believe that the alternative is just as genuine. But only pessimists of the latter disposition, who think that there is some "self deception" involved in our common view of the world, would write a book making a case for their beliefs by showing these "deceptions".

Ligotti pretends to be of the former disposition but I think is demonstrably from the latter. If he truly didn't think there was anything more genuine about a pessimistic attitude he wouldn't argue for it. Or if he did argue for it then we should treat his book with the same seriousness as someone who writes a whole book about why chocolate ice cream is superior to vanilla ice cream. But it seems to me he wants his work to be taken a bit more seriously than that.

About being objective.. the name of the book is The Conspiracy Against the Human Race. I'm not sure he's objective here. — schopenhauer1

"Conspiracy" implies that the actual case is being hidden by from a us in a veil of lies. Which is to imply that the "truth of things" is expressed in a pessimistic attitude and that the optimists are deluding themselves. Even in the title, he has an agenda.

One can say life itself is a certain set of things on repeat. — schopenhauer1

I don't know about you but I don't see how reading this:

God forbid! I am not pushing for any particular agenda. How dare you! Are you implying that being a pessimist is in any way more genuine or “grown up” than an optimist!?!? I would NEEEVER say that!

Anyways, so as I was saying.... life is a sexually transmitted terminal disease and if you don't think so you are deluding yourself. These view are being suppressed by all you naïve fools just so you can all continue to suffer in a never ending hell.

What do you MEAN I'm arguing for pessimism? Of course I'm not! Where have I done that!?!?!?! — khaled

on repeat is not a waste of time. The whole book read like a shitpost to me. Even back when I was AN.

From my reading, he seemed to be fully committing to the conclusions while claiming he is not.

But if he is not fully committing to the conclusions then who would read the book? If the conclusions are not objective or more genuine or anything like that, then why would anyone want to be a pessimist? That's just self harm at that point. — khaled

Again, I think it is not being optimistic about the assuredness of pessimism. Maybe he just wants to give it a fair shake, being that it is often derided. I can accept any of these and still read the book.

Pessimists usually either cannot see what is so great about life or believe their pessimism is somehow more "genuine" and so hold onto it. If he is of the former disposition, then he should be looking for ways out. Pessimists who are pessimists simply because they cannot bring themselves to cheer up try to look for ways to cheer up, be it antidepressants or therapy as nobody has any reason to be a pessimist if they believe that the alternative is just as genuine. But only pessimists of the latter disposition, who think that there is some "self deception" involved in our common view of the world, would write a book making a case for their beliefs by showing these "deceptions". — khaled

I think this is a bit too simplistic, making a binary here where there isn't necessarily one. It may be overlooking these aspects of life, not seeing the bigger picture, etc. I like philosophical pessimism to an aesthetic understanding of the world. The philosophical pessimist puts forth this aesthetic understanding to convey the aesthetic to those who may not see it (yet). You can (I am sure derisively) liken it to the Platonic philosopher-king seeing the forms. The pessimist see it, and are trying to convey it. Thus the non-pessimist doesn't perhaps see this integration of understanding yet.

However, I can see this genuine and deception thing being useful. If the pessimist is more accurate to what is the case (especially how we suffer), then not acknowledging this suffering and working through its implications and how it characterizes life, would be a sort of ignorance, deception, or other strategy to keep away from the conclusions from pessimism. But most "modern" people at some point have these notions.. It's just that how it is put together, in the aesthetic understanding isn't there. If pessimism is the framework.. Then the traditional view of the world is also a framework.

on repeat is not a waste of time. — khaled

I think you are caught up in concrete arguments. Sometimes people just present their views, even if that also means their vacillating apathy towards them. Another way to take his style is that he knows what people will say, so he simply takes the move before other people can make them. By acknowledging the standard responses to his ideas, he has provided an understanding that he has thought of that part too.

You can (I am sure derisively) liken it to the Platonic philosopher-king seeing the forms. — schopenhauer1

The pessimist see it, and are trying to convey it. Thus the non-pessimist doesn't perhaps see this integration of understanding yet. — schopenhauer1

Which is to imply that the pessimists got the "right of it". That they see the forms accurately. And that the rest of us are deluding ourselves or just haven't seen these facts yet.

That is precisely being optimistic about the assuredness of pessimism. But you want to argue that that's not what he is doing. So he must NOT think that he is like a platonic philosopher-king seeing the forms. In which case, why is he arguing for the view?

Who would want to be a pessimist unless it was more genuine somehow? It is clearly the less enjoyable state to be in. And so you would need some special reason to adopt it such as it being "more genuine". You and Ligotti supposedly think it is not any more genuine. So why argue for it? Instead of trying to find a way out of a bad state why try to pull people into it? Unless, again, Ligotti thinks there is some reason we should be pessimists.

If truly there was no reason to adopt pessimism over optimism then Ligotti would be doing something equivalent to spreading a virus. He would be trying to promote a bad state, for no reason at all. As he supposedly doesn't think there is any more genuinity behind his view.

I think you are caught up in concrete arguments. Sometimes people just present their views — schopenhauer1

But to do so they must think those view are NOT a problem. In other words, that there are genuine reasons to be a pessimist.

You don't see people writing books about how addicted they are to meth for example.


I'd like to clarify that I don't mind if someone writes a book about why you should be a pessimist. What I mind is when they do so and yet pretend they are not doing so. Like what's happening here. Because pretending to be an impartial commentator makes your interpretation seem factual when it isn't so, making it way more convincing than it actually should be to the uncritical reader. Also because it's dishonest.

Which is to imply that the pessimists got the "right of it". That they see the forms accurately. And that the rest of us are deluding ourselves or just haven't seen these facts yet. — khaled

Right.

That is precisely being optimistic about the assuredness of pessimism. But you want to argue that that's not what he is doing. So he must NOT think that he is like a platonic philosopher-king seeing the forms. In which case, why is he arguing for the view? — khaled

I said here:

Maybe he just wants to give it a fair shake, being that it is often derided. I can accept any of these and still read the book. — schopenhauer1

Who would want to be a pessimist unless it was more genuine somehow? It is clearly the less enjoyable state to be in. And so you would need some special reason to adopt it such as it being "more genuine". You and Ligotti supposedly think it is not any more genuine. So why argue for it? Instead of trying to find a way out of a bad state why try to pull people into it? Unless, again, Ligotti thinks there is some reason we should be pessimists. — khaled

I think Ligotti does believe it but is pessimistic about people's reaction to it.

If truly there was no reason to adopt pessimism over optimism then Ligotti would be doing something equivalent to spreading a virus. He would be trying to promote a bad state, for no reason at all. As he supposedly doesn't think there is any more genuinity behind his view. — khaled

Well, if you think about it, pessimists are saying the world has much suffering, and so is trying to provide this aesthetic insight. So perhaps he is presenting the view but giving people an out at the last minute so people at least see the viewpoint without succumbing to complete despair.

I personally think there should be communities of catharsis for likeminded pessimists. Being born i to the world means de facto choices and natural consequences. Even suicude is part of this. Yet dont bother anyone with it right?

The problem is everything is frameworks- even the normative more optimist view of things. Its just the pessimist puts things like suffering and forced de facto negative choices as what is most important to keep in mind. They dont put other considerations above this, or rather, as a justification for this.

Altbough tbis makes me think many people dont even adopt a framework, and go through the motions of other peoes frameworks. At least think of the bigger picture.


Youd honestly have to read interviews with the author to get the answer. I gave you my ideas.