I consider myself to be a nihilist, and I think it’s imperative that I lay out a brief summary of my own philosophy on the world as it relates to this question. I follow a train of thought known as Optimistic Nihilism, which is the belief that nothing matters in a universe as vast, old, and indifferent as ours; that eventually everything you are, will be, or ever loved will dissolve into the dust of history and be forgotten; and that eventually the universe itself will end and nothing will have mattered. And yet, despite all of that, the utter lack of meaning or permanence in the universe is actually a good thing. It means that there are no rules, no expectations put upon us. We do not need to wait or hope for things to get better, but instead we have to acknowledge that we must work for it. There may be a heat death waiting for the end of time, but that’s a few trillion years away and there are so many more video games to play, recipes to make, and friends to love that can fit into that span of time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The stochastic nihilism that characterizes the modern internet, however, is not optimistic. It’s an algorithmically generated ennui that pervades every corner of modern life, even from those who do not directly engage with the systems that cause it. The “enshittification” of everything that has stemmed from Web 2.0 architecture, while most obviously seen in the monopolization of the internet into three or four large companies and all content existing as cross-posts from the other ones, is also effecting the larger world too. Donald Trump is the enshittified president. Fox News is the enshittified traditional media. Online leftism is the enshittified Marxism. All of these facets of modern discourse have the same root cause: the expansion of sound-byte seeking, self-aggrandizing, self-victimization of the internet out into the wider world, or stagnating and becoming toxic in sub-spaces of the web.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Stochastic nihilism is a view of the world where nothing matters that occurs broadly and randomly throughout the population as they are inundated with information, opinions, and no meaningful way to parse the data that emerges from it. In order to try and streamline these thought processes, people have allowed the for-profit companies that own the websites that created this ennui to shape themselves by the algorithm. The Tik-Tok dancers and the 4-Chan \/pol addicts are the same, people driven by algorithms that they allow to shape who they are as they chase the attention of a fickle and ever changing public. I myself am guilty of this, to an extent, as I curate a gaming Youtube channel where I livestream regularly. In pursuit of increasing views and subscribers, I adhere to a strict schedule for those streams, despite the fact it has cost me time with my friends and loved ones to continue to do it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The Stochastic Nihilist By: Michael Boehmcke Nowhere to go, and nothing to do. I consider myself to be a nihilist, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"normal-width-container","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"disabled","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"disabled","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-130","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sitebeyondsight.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/130","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sitebeyondsight.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sitebeyondsight.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sitebeyondsight.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sitebeyondsight.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=130"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/sitebeyondsight.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/130\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":155,"href":"https:\/\/sitebeyondsight.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/130\/revisions\/155"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sitebeyondsight.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=130"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sitebeyondsight.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=130"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sitebeyondsight.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=130"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}