Matt Arnold @matt@penguicon.social

I took the afternoon off work today for various reasons, and on my way home I stopped by the new location of Vault of Midnight comics and game store. It's just a few blocks from my house in Detroit! The mural on the building is dazzling. It's a great place that I hope to patronize frequently!

On this episode of the Fluidity #audiobook #podcast: "The False Promise Of Nihilism", and "What Is It Like To Be A Nihilist?"

https://fluidity.libsyn.com/the-false-promise-of-nihilism-and-what-is-it-like-to-be-a-nihilist

Nihilism promises you don’t have to care, because nothing means anything. But you do care—and you can’t escape that.

https://meaningness.com/nihilism-promise

The end-state of nihilism is not suicide, but catatonia.

https://meaningness.com/accomplishing-nihilism

This mid-week bonus episode of the Fluidity #audiobook #podcast is another interview with David Chapman, in which we discuss nihilism-- both as a book section of _Meaningness_ titled "Nihilism", and nihilism itself.

Since the time that I started recording, he has since written six more episodes worth of chapters in the Nihilism section. I could move on and record "Meaningness And Time", but instead I'll loop back and read his newly-written chapters out of order.

https://fluidity.libsyn.com/bonus-metacast-nihilism

Mingling mission and materialism attempts to gain both self-indulgent and self-justifying goals—but loses both enjoyment and empathetic joy.

https://meaningness.com/mingled-mission-materialism

In this episode of the Fluidity #audiobook #podcast: "Materialism"

https://fluidity.libsyn.com/materialism

Materialism says that only mundane purposes like money, sex, and power count. It wrongly rejects higher purposes—but those too are not ultimate.

https://meaningness.com/materialism

Common critiques of materialism, from religion, political idealism, personal idealism, and nihilism.

https://meaningness.com/materialism-rejection

Matt Arnold's blog: OK, Socko https://nemorathwald.dreamwidth.org/400711.html

In this episode of the Fluidity #audiobook #podcast: "Mission"

https://fluidity.libsyn.com/mission

The delusion that you can find your true, unique personal life-purpose causes only suffering and failure.

https://meaningness.com/mission-defects-obstacles

Just discover your unique talent, follow your passion, and success is guaranteed—this is terrible advice!

https://meaningness.com/do-with-my-life

In this episode of the Fluidity #audiobook #podcast: "Purpose"

https://fluidity.libsyn.com/purpose

Dividing purposes into higher and mundane, mission pursues higher ends and rejects pragmatism; materialism seeks only selfish goals. Both are mistakes.

https://meaningness.com/purpose

It is attractive to think that we each have a unique, transcendent, ultimate purpose in life. Unfortunately, this belief is both false and harmful.

https://meaningness.com/mission

In this episode of the Fluidity #audiobook #podcast: "Selfness"

https://fluidity.libsyn.com/selfness

Abandoning selflessness and egoism equally, we can play with the ambiguous self/other boundary; supple, skillful selfing for successful, satisfying interaction.

https://meaningness.com/self

Shortwave is a decentralized messaging platform. "Yes but, what about the other failed attempts?" Under the hood, this one works on the email protocol.

"Our mission is to ensure the future of messaging is open, decentralized, and secure."

https://www.shortwave.com/blog/future-of-messaging/

Employers can extract an enormous financial advantage from the financial desperation of those who love it when their co-workers drink with them at a bar-- even those who adamantly do not want to drink at a bar. That personality type benefits from managers mandating group recreation. And so it is, in point of fact, accurate to say that company productivity is now a result of the scintillating personalities of the managerial class. [3 of 3]

It has become almost impossible to climb out of the precariat, or avoid falling into it, without working in I.T. Almost everyone has to do it, whether they like it or not, and so there is no longer anything stereotypical one can say about the personality and preferences of programmers. [2 of 3]

Happy International Programmer's Day.

I thought better of what I was going to say: that the best way to celebrate programmers on this day is to cancel all their meetings and put them alone with tools that work in a room with a door they can close.

I was going to remark that "rewarding" them with mandatory group recreation is how the managerial class flatters itself that company productivity is the result of the scintillating personalities of managers.

But I no longer agree with that. [1 of 3]

In this episode of the Fluidity #audiobook #podcast: "Unity and Diversity"

https://fluidity.libsyn.com/unity-and-diversity

Stances concerning connection and separateness: monism, dualism, and participation.

https://meaningness.com/monism-dualism-and-participation

Monism and dualism are opposites. But because each is obviously wrong, each turns into the other when cornered. Sneaky!

https://meaningness.com/monism-dualism-recursion

Errors of monism and dualism: denying and fixating object boundaries and connections.

https://meaningness.com/boundaries-objects-connections

Since this episode ties together what we have learned so far, it references previous episodes. They are:

Stances Are Unstable
https://fluidity.libsyn.com/stances-trump-systems-and-stances-are-unstable

Meaningness as a liberating practice
https://meaningness.com/meaningness-practice

Exiting eternalism
https://fluidity.libsyn.com/accomplishing-and-exiting-eternalism

Obstacles To The Complete Stance
https://fluidity.libsyn.com/peak-experiences-plus-obstacles-to-the-complete-stance

Finding the complete stance
Textures of completion
https://fluidity.libsyn.com/finding-the-complete-stance-and-textures-of-the-complete-stance