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Nihilism is not just an idea — it is a feeling, a heavy sense that life has become futile. This lecture from Academy of Ideas takes that feeling seriously and looks at how modern people escape it. Without religion to lean on, many now surrender to mass movements, parties, and causes just to feel part of something bigger. But Nietzsche drew a crucial line: the passive nihilist gives up, while the active nihilist uses the emptiness to tear down false beliefs and rebuild something real. The video shows why one path leads to the herd, and the other to the free spirit.
Full Video Transcript
The Ideas of Nietzsche, Nietzsche and Nihilism, Lecture 5, Active and Passive Nihilism.
We are approaching the end of our journey through Nietzsche’s ideas on nihilism.
In this lecture we will examine the important but often overlooked emotional dimension of nihilism,
and introduce how individuals, especially today, utilize secular means to avert nihilism.
We will then look at some of Nietzsche’s key ideas about nihilism which we have yet to cover,
including his view of nihilism as a mere transitional stage,
along with his interesting demarcation between active and passive nihilism.
In his book Beyond Good and Evil, Nietzsche made a comment which seems especially relevant to nihilists.
Gradually, it has become clear to me what every great philosophy so far has been,
namely, the personal confession of its author in a kind of involuntary and unconscious memoir.
are. This seems to be especially true of one who tries to defend nihilism. Nihilistic philosophical
arguments are usually invented afterwards to defend feelings of despair and dread over
the utter futility of life, rather than being what leads one to such a position in the first
place. Viktor Frankl emphasizes this point. Nihilism, he states, cannot be treated as
an abstract problem. Rather, it is an existential problem that arises when one’s existence
in the world becomes problematic. As he puts it,
Nihilism as it is experienced, the actual existential sense of the meaningless and futility
of life, is not the product of an intellectual theory.
As has been noted in previous lectures, in order for a meaning or purpose in life to
be satisfactory, and thus to prevent the onset of the emotional feelings associated with
nihilism, most individuals need to be convinced that the purpose they believe in is objective.
In other words, they must believe that such a purpose is not the arbitrary creation of
one or a handful of individuals, but rather that it exists written in the fabric of the
universe, so to speak.
Nietzsche emphasized the point that historically human beings have been granted this assurance
through teachings espoused by what he called a superhuman authority.
In The Will to Power he explains,
The nihilistic question for what is rooted in the old habit of supposing that the goal
must be put up, given, demanded from outside, by some superhuman authority.
Belief in otherworldly sources for the answers to our existential questions has for many
over the past century been harder and harder to swallow.
However, this need to find a purpose to one’s life is an unrelenting force, and today individuals
are increasingly finding ways of averting nihilism which do not involve beliefs in the
supernatural.
But many are utilizing what can be seen as a secular alternative for finding meaning
and purpose in life.
This alternative, which is a modern phenomenon, is the participation in mass movements.
Such participation often includes supporting a political party or leader, a war, or just
strongly identifying oneself with their nation.
In the early 20th century, which as we mentioned in the previous lecture, was the generation
Nietzsche prophesies would witness the rise of nihilism, this secular way of averting
nihilism was taken to the extreme, and often resulted in totalitarianism and other revolutionary
movements.
The two most infamous mass movements of the early to mid-20th century were Nazism and
Communism.
In an article titled The Hungry Sheep, published in the early 1950s, an astute writer described
the appeal of Communism and showed how it provided followers with a purpose.
From the outside, the communist may look like an ant in an anthill, but to himself he may
seem to be a comrade helping to carry out a great design, what in another context would
be called the will of God.
The author says later in the article in regards to those who join the communist movement,
“…for the first time they belong to something, to a cause, good or bad as it may be, but
something at any rate which transcends their narrow personal interests and opens up a world
in which each has his part to play and all can pull together. Through the feeling that
one is an active and contributing member of one’s society, it is possible for many to
obtain, to one degree or another, the existential certitude regarding the meaning of life which
religions used to provide.
We will now proceed to examine some more of Nietzsche’s key ideas regarding nihilism.
As we have already noted in a previous lecture, Nietzsche himself went through a period of
nihilism, writing that he had lived through the whole of nihilism to the end, leaving
it behind outside himself. Through the process of enduring and eventually overcoming nihilism,
Nietzsche obtained intimate knowledge regarding its nature. Nietzsche didn’t think of nihilism
as a satisfactory philosophical position so much as he thought of it as a disease, calling
it pathological. Like any disease, those afflicted with nihilism should strive to rid themselves
of it, and for this reason, thought Nietzsche, nihilism could be considered as a transitional
stage in one’s life. If one is stricken by nihilism they must use it to their advantage
and learn the lessons which it has to offer, but ultimately it should not be the stopping
point in one’s philosophical journey. The reason for Nietzsche’s view of nihilism
as a transitional stage was because he saw the nihilistic conclusion that life is meaningless
as mistaken, a mistake resulting from an erroneous generalization. Nihilists, after coming to
the realization that the beliefs they had previously held regarding the meaning of life
are false, all too often take this to imply that all beliefs in regards to life’s meaning
are equally delusional. Instead of merely rejecting their old set of beliefs and continuing
the search, they see the search as futile and give up on trying to find meaning altogether.
This erroneous generalization is similar to the line of reasoning taken by an individual
who has their heart broken and proceeds to claim that love does not exist.
The nihilist, in a similar manner, ashamed at themselves for believing in a meaning to
life which they now understand to be false, makes the erroneous claim that there is no
meaning to life whatsoever.
Nihilism, Nietzsche wrote, represents a pathological transitional stage.
What is pathological is the tremendous generalization.
inference that there is no meaning at all. It is when the nihilist realizes the error
in his reasoning that nihilism becomes a transitional stage. Nietzsche arrived at this insight when
he realized that the search for meaning and value in life is not futile. It is just that
human beings have traditionally looked for meaning in the wrong places. In fact, not
only did he think it was possible to live a meaningful life, but Nietzsche thought all
previous interpretations of existence had greatly underestimated just how meaningful
human lives could be. As we have discussed in earlier lectures, traditionally meaning
has been found in a true world, apart from this earthly existence. The benefit for the
nihilist who rejects true world beliefs is that they are then forced to search for meaning
on this earth, if they are to have any hope of overcoming the nihilistic disease. Those
bold enough to undertake such a task would according to Nietzsche soon find that life
is far more valuable than they ever could have imagined.
He wrote,
Nietzsche didn’t think everyone in a state of nihilism was capable of curing themselves.
He in fact differentiated between two types of nihilists, those who have the strength
to overcome it and those who do not. The former he called active nihilists, while the latter
he called passive nihilists. Nihilism. It is ambiguous. Nihilism as a sign of increased
power of the spirit, as active nihilism. Nihilism as decline and recession of the power of the
spirit, as passive nihilism. The passive nihilist is the individual who, when confronted with
nihilism sees it as an end point or a sign to stop the search for meaning. In short,
this type of individual lacks the strength to make anything of their life, and unfortunately
many who reach this stage will, as we discussed earlier, out of sheer desperation attach themselves
to some form of mass movement in a final attempt to find a purpose to life.
Eric Hoffer, in his book The True Believer, provides an intriguing analysis of such an
individual. To the frustrated, a mass movement offers substitutes, either for the whole self
or for the elements which make life bearable, and which they cannot evoke out of their individual
resources. Like the passive nihilist, the active nihilist experiences the existential
confusion and disorientation which accompanies the feeling that life is utterly futile and
meaningless. However, instead of succumbing to this despair, or diving blindly into a
mass movement in order to soothe one’s fears, as the passive nihilist does, Nietzsche envisioned
the active nihilist as an individual who charges forward and consciously destroys all the beliefs
which previously gave meaning to their lives. Nihilism reaches its maximum of relative strength
as a violent force of destruction, as active nihilism. After ridding oneself of all the
beliefs and attachments which previously gave their life meaning, the active nihilist stands
alone in the universe, a true independent free spirit able to create meaning instead of having
it imposed on him by an authority figure. In Thus Spoke Zarathustra, Nietzsche poetically
emphasizes this point. A new pride my ego taught me, and this I teach men. No longer to bury one’s
head in the sand of heavenly things, but to bear it freely, an earthly head, which creates a meaning
for the earth. In the next lecture, the final of this series, we will investigate some of the ideas
Nietzsche thought could help one overcome nihilism, and thus allow them to create a fulfilling and
meaningful life.
Source: Academy of Ideas