Nihilism is value-unmooring, not value-absence, dissolving truth and fake news distinctions
Evidence
Nietzsche’s nihilism, Sluga writes “is not one in which there are no values at all; nihilism is not a condition of anomie; it is rather a state in which the values we possess have become unanchored. This will show itself in a multiplication of values, in the production of ever new values, but also in their ever-continuing devaluation, in their constantly being discarded and replaced. Values themselves have thus lost their value; and there are, consequence, no higher or lower values; all values are equal; they have become fashions that come and go all equally trivial. In this condition, no greatness is possible anymore; triviality itself becomes one of our values. One sign of this form of nihilism is the dissolution of the distinction between true and false, the moment when we can no longer discriminate between real and fake news.” — Wendy Brown, In the Ruins of Neoliberalism, 657
Categorization
- XREF: This bears directly on the earlier chapter-9 claims about ‘unmoored values lose force but persist as fungible instruments.’ — connects to: Unmoored values lose force but persist as fungible instruments — Wendy Brown, In the Ruins of Neoliberalism: The Rise…, 278; Nihilism frees the will from the very values meant to discipline it — Wendy Brown, In the Ruins of Neoliberalism: The Rise…, 291; The elimination of effortful judgment erases the distinction between truth and falsehood (+3 more)