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Comment on what even is the purpose of life?

wonderingwanderer@sopuli.xyz ⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago

“Imagine Sisyphus happy” reeks of corporate middle management extolling the virtues of grind culture to their underlings. I’ve never thought it was a good argument. Just a cheap cop-out for people who can’t face the never-ending barrage of existential despair that comes from truly, deeply questioning the meaning and purpose of life.

Like “Here, find meaning in this menial labor that you’re compelled to do by society!” No, you mindless automaton, the whole point of my existential despair is that I’ve seen through the superficial layers of appearances to grasp the utter meaninglessness at the core of everything. I’m not gonna pretend that I haven’t seen through it and stop questioning things just because it’s uncomfortable.

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softwarist@programming.dev ⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago
From the Wikipedia summary:

However, the absurd can never be permanently accepted: it requires constant confrontation, constant revolt.

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shneancy@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago
Camu has addressed that in his essay on suicide -

it’s not that you distract yourself, that’s denial, and it’s not a full embrace of nothing, that’s depression (and suicide). it’s an acceptance that things are meaningless - but you as a person can never stop looking for that meaning, in fact just the search itself is what keeps you going. that’s the absurd in absurdism, searching for meaning despite knowing it doesn’t exist, finding happiness in the journey, making peace with the fact that even if you do reach some goal you’ll never feel fulfilled. and even if you become the king of the world and have everything you could ever desire - the rock is still going to roll down, you’ll feel like there’s still something missing, and you’ll need to push the rock again

at least that’s my interpretation

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sundray@lemmus.org ⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago
I think there’s more to existentialism than that, but if it’s not for you there are other philosophies available–there’s always Schopenhauer.

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- wonderingwanderer@sopuli.xyz ⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago
  There’s definitely more to existentialism than that. I don’t think any two existentialist philosophers are alike. Kierkegaard, Sartre, Camus, Heidegger, Watsuji, Nishida, Nishitani, et cetera. None of them are remotely similar other than in being existentialists. It makes sense though, for a school of philosophy that rejects essentialism to be so disparate in ideas.
  
  I do like Schopenhauer, though. So much better than Nietzsche who kinda stole his thunder.
  
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