The Joy of Nihilism

Max Severin
3 min readMay 17, 2023
Artist unknown.

In a hundred years it’s likely no one will know who you were, or anything you did.

Keeping adding years and the probability decreases even more.

Unless you are some Hegelian world historical figure, your identity will be swallowed by the abyss of time in a couple centuries for sure.

Even if you are some kind of big wig, you will still be forgotten in a cosmic blink of an eye. But so will all of your fuck ups, and all of your worries and pain.

These are some of the primary implications of existential and moral nihilism. In other words, the fact that we have no good epistemic reasons to believe that there is any inherent reason we are here on this rock in space, that we will somehow survive death, or that there are any objectively naughty or nice acts.

Some may lament the supposed pointlessness or futility of living a temporary life in a meaningless universe, but those of us who are active nihilists say au contraire! Realizing that you are living without a cosmic boss, without some universal rules, and realizing that you won’t always be burdened by existence is fucking liberating! Hell, it can even be joyous at times — joyous nihilism.

Without a belief in inherent meaning or moral values, we are free to live authentically and creatively. We can pursue our own goals and desires —…

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Max Severin

I write about psychology, philosophy, suffering abolitionism & the pursuit of eudaimonia.