Nihilism- Meaning and Life+Philosophy

I just wrote a paper about how I would respond to the idea of Nihilism. Nihilism is the belief that nothing you do in life matters and everything is meaningless. I chose to counter argue with Carpe Diem. It was just a one page paper so I thought I'd just copy and paste it onto here and see what other people have to say.

Carpe Diem

In class we defined Nihilism as the belief that my life is meaningless. We went over various ‘solutions’ to this quite depressing belief, the two main ‘solutions’ are that life is not meaningless, so we have to find a meaning to it, or that life really is meaningless. I think that the best ‘solution’ or way to go about not having any meaning is to live life with the motto Carpe Diem. Carpe Diem translates to “Seize the Day.” This is a great way to not necessarily find meaning, but it kind of accepts that there is not a huge meaning to life and that everyday should just be filled with what you want to do.

I think that some people search way too hard for the meaning of life instead of just enjoying the life they have. Just like in the story of Actaeon from Ovid’s Metamorphoses, once Actaeon sees something that he is not supposed to (The goddesses bathing in the lake) He was turned into a stag by the angry goddess. It occurs a lot in The Metamorphoses that bad things happen to people who see things they either were not meant to see or should not have seen. Also from a mythological standpoint there is a beginning, middle, and end to everything. We had our beginning, we are in our middle, and we never know how close to the end we are. It could be at any moment, you could literally die where you stand. So live in the moment and be great.

A lot of people will agree that it is how brief, and fragile life is, is what makes it so beautiful. If you think about it nothing that we do on earth really even matters. Not only has it all been done before, but the amount of time and impact we can have on the earth is so minute it doesn’t even seem to matter a whole lot. That is why I believe that you should seize life day by day and make it great. I mean, why not? Why not spend the little time you have living having fun, being dangerous, and loving. Love is such a special emotion that sets humans apart from almost everything else. The ability to love separates us from animals, machines, and nature. Love is such a strange and amazingly beautiful characteristic that humans possess we need to focus more on loving everyone around us.

There is no reason to make life the best it can be, it has so much to offer and it can be great. So why not? Take every day as it comes, and have a ball with it. Life should be fun, and it is! Seize the day, because that is all you are guaranteed.

Gather ye rosebuds while ye may,

Old Time is still a-flying;

And this same flower that smiles today,

Tomorrow will be dying.

-Herrick