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Existential nihilism is the philosophical theory that life has no objective meaning or purpose. [1] The inherent meaninglessness of life is largely explored in the philosophical school of existentialism, where one can potentially create their own subjective "meaning" or "purpose".
The phrase is based on a sentence of Augustine of Hippo (crede ut intellegas, [4] lit. "believe so that you may understand") [5] [2] to relate faith and reason. Augustine understood the saying to mean that a person must believe in something in order to know anything about God. [6] This sentence by Augustine is also inspired from Isaiah 7:9. [7]
The wise decision is to wager that God exists, since "If you gain, you gain all; if you lose, you lose nothing", meaning one can gain eternal life if God exists, but if not, one will be no worse off in death than if one had not believed. On the other hand, if you bet against God, win or lose, you either gain nothing or lose everything.
Now I make known to you, brothers and sisters, the gospel which I preached to you, which you also received, in which you also stand, by which you also are saved, if you hold firmly to the word which I preached to you, unless you believed in vain. For I handed down to you as of first importance what I also received, that Christ died for our sins ...
unless: A decree nisi is a court order (often for divorce) that will come into force on a certain date "unless" cause is shown why it should not. nisi Dominus frustra: if not the Lord, [it is] in vain: That is, "everything is in vain without God".
The etymological origin of nihilism is the Latin root word nihil, meaning 'nothing', which is similarly found in the related terms annihilate, meaning 'to bring to nothing', [5] and nihility, meaning 'nothingness'. [21]
The most prominent recent defender of the argument from desire is the well-known Christian apologist C. S. Lewis (1898–1963). Lewis offers slightly different forms of the argument in works such as Mere Christianity (1952), The Pilgrim's Regress (1933; 3rd ed., 1943), Surprised by Joy (1955), and "The Weight of Glory" (1940).
Fideism (/ ˈ f iː d eɪ. ɪ z əm, ˈ f aɪ d iː-/ FEE-day-iz-əm, FAY-dee-) is a standpoint or an epistemological theory which maintains that faith is independent of reason, or that reason and faith are hostile to each other and faith is superior at arriving at particular truths (see natural theology).