rationalskepticism.org

PensivePenny wrote:I'm not sure what to make of this. On one hand, saying "Or take Sagan's..." sounds like you're equating Dawkins' and Sagan's optimism, but I don't see the optimism in your comment about Dawkins. I agree that your Dawkins comments are nihilistic, in the existential sense. I share that view with him. I've read the Selfish Gene, but I don't recall specific moments of optimism where some arbitrary value is seen as good or desired. Maybe I just chose not to accept those? Nevertheless, Dawkins does paint a kind of rosy picture of the universe, it's beauty and grandeur awe inspiring. Is that optimism? Or is it just an appreciation of what is?

Right. The optimist looks at the world and approves.

I only use the word as an aesthetic. Dawkins can paint an extremely inhuman picture of humanity, but chooses not to refine it into a rejection of humanity or a vision of horror. Instead, he wonders whether he should have wrapped the cover in sugar and titled it "The Immortal Gene", the sort of title, he thinks, Sagan would have liked.

For me, pessimism is a tool that sometimes counters the optimism that surrounds us, the human practice so many engage in, to help us see from perspectives that help us identify those truths.

As I say, for me, it's just an aesthetic judgement, and one I'd maybe like to see a bit more popular. I only get to imagine what Lovecraft would have spun out of the nightmare fuel that is the Selfish Gene, because Dawkins isn't interested in writing it. That such horror is so readily evaded by Dawkins and his fans nevertheless impresses me. I guess I see how the opposite attitude wouldn't help promoting science and would instead give ammunition to dull theists who think you need a god to be optimistic. I say we give them the ammo and continue to laugh at them.

As for Sagan, I think I know what Lovecraft would have thought of the pale blue dot. "For small creatures such as we the vastness is bearable only through love." Pffftt.... The vastness is unbearable. The only thing to do is try not to think about it.

I too have a twisted sense of humor. It sometimes makes me giggle when overly optimistic people come face to face with the unavoidable hard truths. The look of fright as the monster's head appears from beneath a cloud, only to vanish an instance later, veiled in the individual's rosy optimism, and quickly dismissed as an aberration, a trick of their own mind. What I find most depressing is the loneliness. The certainty of reality depends upon the confirmation of others perceiving the same, no? When so many fools chase silly superstitious notions of gods and myths, without justification or evidence, I might as well be floating on a rock in cold dark space.

That does sound pretty depressing. I suppose I'm fortunate that, here in the UK, and perhaps even moreso in my chosen field, everyone is assumed to be an atheist, and the few religious people only admit it with some embarrassment. I'm not sure how I'd be in your environment. I know that my thoughts about humanity aren't popular among my colleagues, but I have a mate down the pub who's a card carrying anti-natalist and so I can share stuff with him, even if he takes it all a bit too seriously to my mind.

Ahhhhh! was delightful. I have never read Lovecraft... but after your most apropos quote, I had to read more before responding to your post. I'm only part way into Cthulhu, enough to see it's probably not my genre, but the sentiment in your selected quote, Lovecraft's opening paragraph, is the most eloquent way I can imagine saying what I so clumsily attempted earlier. I will read more of Lovecraft, if for no other reason than to find more gems like the above example.

My emphasis above, I agree with this sentiment. However, like a moth to the flame, for me the truth is a mightier draw than the desire to remain ignorant of it... regardless the cost.

You might enjoy his novella "At the Mountains of Madness". The story shows Lovecraft's love for scientific detail even if it opens with a dire warning of the dangers of exploration.

You said you liked True Detective, so I really would recommend Conspiracy Against the Human Race, which talks about Lovecraft in a dozen place. I wasn't exaggerating above. The creators of True Detective have been accused of plagiarising the book, with Matthew McConaughey's lines sometimes word for word taken from Ligotti. I guess I thought this was quite cool, though I think Ligotti's got more of a sense of humour and, as an imaginative author, isn't the dead and dreary Rust Cohle. The book is full of deliciously dark quotes and reflections (if you like that sort of thing).