Philosophy in a Meaningless Life: A System of Nihilism, Consciousness and Reality

Description

Philosophy in a Meaningless Life provides an account of the nature of philosophy which is rooted in the question of the meaning of life. It makes a powerful and vivid case for believing that this question is neither obscure nor obsolete, but reflects a quintessentially human concern to which other traditional philosophical problems can be readily related; allowing them to be reconnected with natural interest, and providing a diagnosis of the typical lines of opposition across philosophy’s debates. James Tartaglia looks at the various ways philosophers have tried to avoid the conclusion that life is meaningless, and in the process have distanced philosophy from the concept of transcendence. Rejecting all of this, Tartaglia embraces nihilism (‘we are here with nothing to do’), and uses transcendence both to provide a new solution to the problem of consciousness, and to explain away perplexities about time and universals. He concludes that with more self-awareness, philosophy can attain higher status within a culture increasingly in need of it. Cover Half-title Title Copyright Dedication Contents Preface Introduction 1. The Meaninglessness of Life 1. The truth of nihilism 2. Attunements to nihilism: Anxiety and boredom 3. Heidegger’s rejection of nihilism 4. The priority of boredom 5. Existence and nihilism 6. Nietzsche’s nihilism 2. A Survey of Misguided Coping Strategies: Does Nihilism Ruin Your Life? 1. The consequences of nihilism 2. Absurdity 3. Transcendence 4. Humanism 5. Relativism 3. On What Philosophy Is 1. The persistence of philosophical questions 2. What is philosophy? 3. Enframement and ontology 4. Against philosophy-scepticism 5. Meno’s paradox 4. The Problem of Consciousness 1. Consciousness and objective thought 2. Indirectness and self-awareness 3. Consciousness as the brain: Revisionism 4. Consciousness as the brain: From identification to revisionism 5. Consciousness: The Transcendent Hypothesis 1. Consciousness and transcendence 2. The problem in a dream 3. The transcendent hypothesis I: Two traditional themes 4. The transcendent hypothesis II: Introspection and perception 5. The transcendent hypothesis III: Appearance and reality 6. The transcendent hypothesis IV: Idealism and realism 7. Is it true? 6. Time 1. Time in and out of the framework 2. Time and objective thought 3. The block theory 4. Time and transcendence 5. Respite without consolation 7. Universals 1. Universals and the meaning of life 2. Universals, ontology and mind 3. Universals and the transcendent hypothesis 4. Representation and the objective world 5. Plato’s nascent nihilism 8. Nihilism, Transcendence and Philosophy 1. Living with nihilism 2. The role of philosophy 3. Spirituality and the framework online Notes Bibliography Name Index