Chapter 1

There are many forms of depression, all of which may have different causes. This book is specifically about the depression that comes from disillusioned beliefs. Sometimes it’s called a crisis of faith, or an existential crisis, but other times, it’s simply labeled depression and treated as though a chemical imbalance is to blame. In an attempt to not slant the issue towards a specific belief, we shall call the depression that results from disillusioned beliefs “philosophical depression”. Throughout the book, we will only be referring to this depression. We will leave it up to the social scientists and neuro scientists to discern when to differentiate between philosophical depression and other forms of depression.

The thoughts of depression

Philosophical depression seems to stem from the loss of meaning, or purpose in life, and/or the loss of ethics, values, or worth. This disillusionment has a lot of implications. Beliefs on the subject will affect nearly everything about a person’s life, including their feelings, decisions, relationships, event interpretation, and self-perception. And there is a specific process that occurs with this disillusionment: despair followed by disorientation. This chapter will explore in further detail each of these implications and the process of disillusionment.

Rather than opposing the perspective of the depressed person, this book endorses it. We will not, however, be making a philosophical case for the endorsement of this system of nonbelief, though recognizing the meaningless of existence is a typical and logical result of not believing in God. From here on, the thoughts of depressed people related to meaning will be referred to as unveiled truths of existence, or simply “truths”. For those interested in reading about the justification for this shit, I refer you to blah blah blah.

What is true though, is that so long as an individual possesses the potential for a belief to be disillusioned, the potential for the pain of disillusionment remains.

Feelings

Let’s face it, a lack of meaning is a whole lot less enticing than possessing some sort of meaning. For many people considering this point of view is like gazing into the abyss.

Loneliness is a pretty obvious result of possessing a bleak outlook that nobody else seems to understand. Most people believe in some form of meaning. If you’ve become disillusioned, not only will people disagree with your position, they will think seek to change your mind on the subject, which, in effect, is a form of rejection. Whenever a person is trying to change you, they are rejecting that part of you. You’ve just discovered that your life doesn’t have the fantastical meaning you once ascribed to it, and your friends and family aren’t capable of supporting your new position.

Emptiness is also a reasonable result of disillusionment. You had something, and you’ve lost it. This loss creates a void. Your whole perspective on yourself and your relation to the world has been shattered, and is in need of rebuilding.

Physical Symptoms

Thoughts lead to feelings, and feelings have physiological symptoms. Philosophical depression is not immune from the loss of energy and other physical issues of depression.

Decisions

We make decisions based on the things we believe. The whole process of arriving at a decision is going to be heavily weighted by the beliefs you possess. The only exception from the decision making process is to act on impulse, or instinct. If you decide to lift your arm up and dangle it in front of you like a robot in the presence of a stranger, you’ve assigned some valuation to entertainment, and your creation of it. If you didn’t have those values, you wouldn’t have raised your arm in such a manner.

Self-perception

Self-perception is almost entirely belief based. There are aesthetic beliefs (which is a heavily disputed sect of philosophy) such as “I am beautiful, ugly, fat, cute”, etc. There are beliefs about one’s abilities, such as “I can achieve anything, I can’t be a doctor”. There are also beliefs about ones character, such as “I am a good person, I am not strong willed.”. There are beliefs about ones value such as “I am worthless, I am insignificant.” All of these thoughts are beliefs. They are not known facts of the universe.

When a person loses meaning, self-perception is affected. What is a “good person” when there is no justification for good? What value does beauty have if life has no meaning? Where does one derive worth from, and how can a person’s life be significant? What does it even matter if a person has done good if life has no meaning? Self-perception becomes negative when meaning is lost.

Relationships

Disillusioned meaning has a tendency to take precedence over everything in a person’s life. Ultimately, the justification for action has been lost. Of course, a person will likely continue living and will perform a lot of their habits and obligations as a sort of survival instinct. It shouldn’t come as a surprise that relationships are strained. Other people will notice the difference in the disillusioned. Many will seek to change the person’s mind on the subject so that they can return to the friendship they had before the disillusionment. Others will simply stop coming around.

There will be misunderstanding. There will be pressure. Very few will be able to identify with the situation in a productive way. The most important thing is that others recognize the same truths you’ve uncovered. If they do not see your revelations, then they can’t help you cope with them.

Event Interpretation

Take the example of the man who pulls a lever to kill one man and save 10. He will be regarded as a hero or a villain. Courageous or disgusting. The situation may be considered a test by God, a divine intervention, or a freak accident. The people who die may be deserving, or helpless victims. What you believe is going to mold every circumstance surrounding you. Not just fringe, unrealistic scenarios. If you believe people are trustworthy, you will believe more people around you are acting in a manner consistent with trust. If you believe people are not trustworthy, you will take extra precautionary measures to protect yourself. The entirety of your existence will be affected by your beliefs.

Despair

Despair is the result of believing that what is most important to us is unattainable. In the case of the philosophically depressed, meaning is lost, but the individual still seeks meaning. They will never get meaning, but it is of importance that they attain it.

Disorientation

Disorientation is the realization that human life is meaningless because there is nothing that is of real value and thus nothing objectively worth doing.

If the metaethical revaluation alone is successful (on either the fictionalist or subjectivist grounds), while the values previously held are retained, disorientation will be averted but despair will still arise—the previous held values will be as unattainable as ever. On the other hand, if our first order values are adjusted but we don’t undertake the metaethical project then worries about the objectivity of our new values will again arise, resulting in disorientation. There is a kind of symmetry between the two projects, then, as nihilism cannot be overcome by either project alone. Still, Reginster is right to point out that the metaethical project needs to be pursued first so that the ensuing substantive revaluation can proceed in terms of the proper metaethical views.

Common Result

If you’ve come to lose the central belief of meaning, but are still assigning the same values as though there was meaning, this is disorientation without a reevaluation of values or something.

“I am not worthy of love.” Worth is a valuation. Without meaning, values are lost. It’s a little silly that without an arbiter of worth, a person would decide to be the arbiter of worth themselves and decide that they are unworthy. That person is the one inventing the value system to begin with! Because you are still trying to assign worth to yourself, but the foundation of valuation is lost, you will settle forever in despair, unless you can reevaluate your desire in this area, also known as, accept that you will never be worthy nor unworthy of love.

“I can’t do anything right.” While the statement is true, the sentiment is false. You also can’t do anything wrong. If you continue to feel as though you need to do right, but have no foundation for rightness, despair will follow. How can you do right if there is no right?

Chapter 2

While we’ve discussed mostly the disillusionment of meaning, there is an unraveling of sorts when one belief falls out of favor. Our belief systems are very interconnected. For example, if you believed in God, then it is typically illogical to conclude that life has no meaning. Beliefs do not operate independently. They are often contingent upon other beliefs being true. If you’ve come to find that your life is meaningless, or that your actions are pointless, etc, then you’ve already lost the foundation for the entirety of your belief system.

Before we go any further, let’s look at what beliefs are, how they come to be, and why they sometimes will not quit.

What are beliefs?

Definitions

An acceptance that a statement is true or that something exists.

A state or habit of mind in which trust or confidence is placed in some person or thing.

A feeling of being sure that someone or something exists or that something is true

Types of Beliefs

Prediction (Probabilities)

If I told you that washing your hands will decrease your chances of early death by 99%, if you valued a normally timed death, you would likely wash your hands. It is still unknown whether or not washing your hands will prevent your early death, but you think, or believe, that you may be preventing an early death. From this position, to unequivocally state that “I will not die early because I wash my hands.” would be an unwarrantedly firm position. You will most likely survive, thus making your affirmation appear on the surface to be correct. Of course, the claim is merely missing one word, “probably”, which is a measure of probability.

Material

Science

If I see a flame and touch it, it is probably going to burn me. If it doesn’t burn me, there is a wide range of diagnostics that will need to be done to see what is causing a difference between my expected material experience (my beliefs) and reality. It could be that my fingers are no longer feeling sensations due to nerve damage. It could be that my brain isn’t processing what my nerves are telling me. It could be that the flame was a delusion. It could be that the flame was simply an illusion. Or it could be that there is something fundamentally wrong with science’s explanation of everyday phenomena. Considering there are 6 billion people on the planet who have access to common languages and the methods to communicate ideas, with significantly more people historically to have existed, the least likely explanation for not feeling the burn is going to be that we’ve fundamentally misunderstood fire. It’s not impossible, however. The most likely culprit for the discord between beliefs and reality here is either with the subject, or the object. In this sense, it makes little sense to disbelieve in science. But it is also inaccurate to assume that the scientific explanation for fire is perfect.

Another form of material belief is in relation to objects around us. There is disagreement about what an object like a chair is, for instance. Some posit that because a chair is made up of millions of components, it is not a singular object. Some people posit that objects do not exist (or at least allude to the possibility.

Partial Beliefs (Probabilities) (Varying Degrees of Certainty)

Immaterial

Social Beliefs

Possession of property is a great example of this form of belief. We’ll use an example story to demonstrate this. “Jeff walks into Josh’s house and stole his laptop.” If one didn’t believe in property, then the story would become “Jeff walked into the house Josh resides in and picked up the laptop to bring back to where he resides.” Notice how much longer the belief-less story took to tell. We’ll be discussing that issue further in Chapter 4, but for now, this is about property beliefs. Some people believe you can only own what you can protect. Some people don’t believe in ownership. Some people believe that if you purchase something, it becomes yours. Belief in property is one method we can use to engage with other people, and survive. So long as everyone agrees in property, and the protection thereof, it will create a unity between people so they can have harmonious relations. Inversely, if a society disagrees with property, they will also have unity and harmonious relations.

Justice, government, origin, ethics,

Answers/Solutions

A belief is an answer. So long as you don’t possess a belief on a subject, the possibility of seeking the answer remains. Choosing a belief is ending the world of possibilities. Since beliefs often solve a lot of problems, such as how to live, possessing a belief solves one or more problems.

A great example of this is belief in God. Without God, the possible explanations for the origin of existence are seemingly endless. What if the whole world were created 5 minutes ago by a magic genie, with all our memories implanted? What if some other immaterial “entity” created everything? What if creation is just a human concept stemming from our experiences of everything possessing a beginning and an end, and the universe has existed eternally? Answering this question solves a lot of problems. And one answer can often answer other questions as well.

Beliefs are boundaries

Beliefs are boundaries. Beliefs limit your mind and actions. They limit the world of possibilities. Take away a belief, and there is immense freedom. If your ethical framework were shattered, the range of possible actions you could take in a given situation are nearly limitless. They are only limited by the physical boundaries of your existence. You could fake your own death to see how people might talk about you. You could eat human flesh. You could sleep with your sister. You could break church windows, incite riots, and act selfish. You could lie about everything all the time.

Sources of Beliefs

Nature/Nurture

In a lot of ways, your beliefs are guided by your birthplace. Tribal cultures often have what we consider wild, uneducated beliefs. Just the same, most people in the world are Hindu or Buddhist because they are surrounded by these belief systems. This, of course, doesn’t solely apply to religion. All of your beliefs are going to spring from or against the culture you find yourself in.

It seems as though we are hardwired to possess beliefs. Considering that throughout human history, there has never been a culture that didn’t believe in things, and very few human beings have ever proposed it as a possible way to live, there is some pretty solid ground to stand on for a biological mandate.

2B2

Indoctrination/Faith – Data Culmination/Logic

Beliefs come to be through a specific process. A person is given information. If the source is trusted, then the information is accepted as true. The person then has accepted a fact, or a belief. Alternatively, a person may approach new information skeptically. They may check the validity of the source as to whether or not they trust the information, and then accept it as true. Or, they may compare the information against other accepted beliefs/facts they possess, checking for logical consistency. Then they will accept it as true.

Indoctrination is when a trusted source knowingly gives false information to deceive someone. It can also happen if the information a person possesses after they check the information for logical consistency falls short of disproving the information.

Faith is a choice to believe something regardless of anything else. It shortcuts the whole process of how we might otherwise handle information. Typically, faith will not happen without a trusted source implying that a person take this shortcut, but faith is trusting information.

Applying logic to information, and approaching it skeptically requires significant effort. And we typically do this in order to put the matter to rest. Where will I put this new information? Does it eliminate other information I possess? Some beliefs are easier to eliminate than others.

2B3

Three Needs Filled by Beliefs

There are 3 functions that belief possession bring to the individual, knowledge filling, emotional regulation, and decision enhancing.

Knowledge filling: Humans, by nature, are curious creatures. Combine that curiosity with intelligence, and this is part of what makes us survive in ways unseen in other creatures. We quest for knowledge and understanding as a survival instinct. If we have satisfied our minds on a subject, we no longer need to quest for answers. With other human attributes demanding our attention that are not curiosity, settling on a belief is a way to put to rest an issue in life.

Emotional Regulation: Different people will find different things in life tough to cope with on an emotional level. Whether these differences are by nature or nurture is irrelevant, beliefs fill the holes the same way for each. “Everything happens for a reason” “Trust that the universe will provide” “Good will come to good people” are great examples of irreligious cosmic forces that protect the individual.

The fact that a cosmic guiding force is such a widespread belief among people alive today and all throughout history lends credence to the fact that this fills one of the most important and common holes in man. It’s also a multifunctional belief that kills two birds with one stone. Loneliness has a solution. Purpose is given. When you look at the full belief structures of religions, you see that they kill all of the birds with one giant boulder. The cosmic force type beliefs tend to be narrow and will therefore be applied more to areas of weakness specific to the believer.

Decision Enhancer: At any given moment, within the boundaries of human limitation, I can do any action. I could go stab my roommate. I could jump on my car repeatedly and smash in the windows. I could call everyone I know pretending to be reporting my death. Beliefs, in this case as it relates to ethics, limit the range of possibilities for my actions of the moment, and oftentimes will dictate what to do. If the range of choices were not narrowed down, analysis paralysis is a serious threat to daily life.

Sometimes we create self imposed limitations on ourselves for the same reason. A common example among college students is that they “can’t read books for leisure while they have to read college textbooks”. In fact, they can read books, and would probably enjoy the reprieve from intense reading. But the limitation is a belief about abilities, and it aides in their studying.

Similarly, while writing this book, I decided I would be better served writing outside of my home. It didn’t take long before I had taken a “I can’t write at home” position and felt that I had to go outside of my home to write. It didn’t seem to matter in my belief that I had already written 18 pages of material for the book from inside my home. Since this revelation, I have written the majority of the book from my home.

The Ultimate Source (The ethics question)

Ultimately, every belief stems from a singular question. What do I do? The first thing one must do to answer this question is to ask what “I” am. This often leads us back to the origin question. Origin may then dictate what to do, like in the case of religion. If it doesn’t, then the quest continues. Recognizing that all of your beliefs are trying to answer this singular question is the first step toward overcoming the pain of disillusionment.

Beliefs That Won’t Quit

There are times when a belief is created through data culmination and reason, yet the believer will not relent on their belief when confronted with overwhelming evidence against the beliefs validity. One of the reasons this may occur is that the belief holder sees all of the problems in relation to the other side of the debate and wouldn’t know how to not have an answer to the question. Social obligations require that they take a position on a stance. If the belief isn’t due to social obligation, then it is likely to be because that belief is being used for emotional regulation.

Some beliefs are simply hard to give up because the beliefs make them feel good about the events of their life (their life story), or about their existence. An example of this is God’s love. Human love is imperfect. You’ve spent X years of your life with the belief that God knows who you are in your entirety, and he loves you. Oftentimes, human love is dependent upon the things they perceive you to be. And you control what they see of you. If you’ve got some weird or dark fetish that you closet, or some hidden skeletons in your closet, you may be wary of revealing these things to other people for fear of losing their love. This is not the case with God. He knows all of this and loves you still. That love has given you self esteem and assurance that you are ok. Take that love away and you are left with imperfect human love.

Imagine if you spent your whole life dedicated to the notion that doing good in life will give you eternal life in heaven. I don’t know about you, but I wouldn’t want to give that up, for one. And secondly, I would have a hard time coping with a wasted life. This might help explain why people are pretty firm in their beliefs as they get older. It becomes much harder to switch beliefs since so many of the actions you took in life were was dependent upon that belief being true. All of your actions would need to be put up on a board to see if you’ve actually been doing anything right.

Now the last example was a little light on the self-hatred inspiring situations. Imagine if you hurt some people for your beliefs. Imagine if you left a wonderful relationship because of your beliefs. Imagine if you killed for your beliefs. Welcome to a life of regret. A painful life of regret. The more actions you take based on a belief, the more difficult it will be to switch beliefs. If you ever encounter an old racist, you might consider how many times they acted on that racism. You might wonder if they every hurt someone because of their skin color.

Your entire social circle might also be dependent upon a belief being true. While you believed in God, it made sense that your circle of friends would ostracize nonbelievers and try to convert them. Now you perceive it as harmful. When you were an anarchist, a noble end was being achieved through the destruction of city property, but now you see these kids ruining things that you’ve paid to have collectively with your neighbor while they seek to destroy the enjoyment that these public offerings provide. Cutting ties with your social circle is a very difficult thing to do, and as a result, there is a lot of resistance in losing beliefs that your social circle possesses.

Another reason that people might stand by their beliefs in spite of evidence against them is that many people are simply not very good at data interpretation. Logic is mathematical, and the world includes people who are not very good at math. The believers gain validation in their beliefs from other people who stand by the same belief. They may find validation in the subjective nature of beliefs, which somehow makes their belief valid. The subjective nature of beliefs actually serves to invalidate beliefs as an acceptable method of thought.

Chapter 3

Problems with solutions to philosophical depression

Medication

Depression is considered a mental disorder, or a “…cluster of symptoms that research has shown to correlate highly with a specific emotional state.” (1) Typically, we’ve found that mental disorders result from biological, psychological, and environmental factors. Regardless of the cause of depression, it appears as though medication to affect the neurological/chemical effects of a depressed state seem to improve the depression. Resulting from this, antidepressants have been handed out like candy, regardless of the cause of the depression.

One of the symptoms that is labeled under the blanket of depression is actually a defensible philosophical position. If you think about it, that’s pretty dangerous. It’s akin to psychology labeling gay people as mentally ill people in the 60s. The symptoms in question are nihilistic thoughts, which are thoughts related to the philosophical position, nihilism.

It’s easy to see why these thoughts are widely regarded as a problem. For starters, they are significantly more bleak perspectives than fantastical beliefs. Second, since cultures and people embrace beliefs as a system of thought, anti-beliefs are widely regarded with disdain and misunderstanding. Third, the process of disillusioned beliefs leads to depression, which is typically regarded as a problem in need of solution. Finally, few people maintain nihilism as a position, therefore the chances of having it be widely recognized are diminished.

Drugs, Suicide, Avoidance

Avoidance is not recognizing the problem. Let’s not talk about it. Holding things in, and coping with an existence that you have serious problems with at core, is asking for some serious trouble with life. Many people find that avoiding issues is much more easily done with drug use than distractions.

Drug use, abuse, and addiction are common solutions employed when disillusioned beliefs occur. It’s pretty widely known that these are not productive solutions. They are a temporary reprieve from the issue. Eventually, they may act as the final solution, holding back the problem until you die. When you are dead, the problem ends.

Suicide is the ultimate solution. Albert Camus once famously said “the only serious philosophical question is whether or not to kill oneself”. The dead seemingly don’t have any problems. To take this action as a solution to disillusioned beliefs, and it’s resulting despair is concluding that it can’t be overcome. Perhaps it would have made sense before you picked up this book, but there is now another solution that doesn’t involve deluding oneself with beliefs!

Belief Substitution as a solution

Oftentimes, people who find themselves depressed will turn to their loved ones for guidance. These are often the people who have helped mold us into who we are today, like our siblings, role models, etc. If they are not one of the people who have molded us, then they are likely people who shared a lot of the same thoughts and beliefs on various subjects. When it comes to the pain of disillusionment, one will often find these people are not able to help. To them, they will want to bring you back to their perspective.

Even if one doesn’t go back to the same belief, they will be seeking a new perspective. They will be seeking to replace the lost belief with an alternative belief on the same subject. The following are the reasons that this is not the most beneficial path to take.

Cyclical Depression

So long as one possesses a belief capable of disillusionment, one possesses the potential for reopening the pain of despair. That means that the resulting beliefs allow for cyclical depression.

The only way to really protect against the potential for recurring disillusionment while still choosing to believe in things is to discontinue learning, or stave off information with ignorance. There is of course, an alternative, which is what this book is about.

Statistics of Rightness

If you look through history and at undeveloped cultures, you will find a great deal of beliefs that in hindsight are absolutely silly. The hard thing for many people to understand and embrace is that these beliefs make complete sense given the information that was and is available to these people. It’s awfully arrogant to assume that we have reached a point in time where our beliefs are correct. Our beliefs are based on a culmination of information just the same. The methodology we use to arrive at our beliefs is the same as people in history and undeveloped cultures. We have more information, but use the same brains, and same justifications.

A person who studies cosmology is going to have a different picture of the world than a person who studies microbiology. Both people possess important information to complete complicated puzzles about life that we use to piece together our belief systems. But it is flatly impossible for a person to know everything about the world, and therefore flatly impossible for them to possess accurate beliefs.

Harm to Society

Beliefs are harmful to society. Not just religious beliefs either, but it is readily evident how religious beliefs can be harmful. A few examples of religious harm can be seen with their suppression of scientific research through history, their wars and their terrorism. The unnoticed harm is the distance they create between neighbors. Some religions are more inclusive of nonbelievers, but many are not. Some religions are more inclusive of other religions, but again, many are not. All religions embrace beliefs as a method of thought, which allows for the pain of disillusionment.

Distance between neighbors is also readily evident in the world of politics. It may not have always been as tense, but in the US today, the right wing and left wing are very adamantly in opposition with one another. There is a clear need for people to come together on various issues, but the divide brings a lot of harm to our political system. On a personal level, people say many mean and hurtful things to people who believe differently than them. Oftentimes, they are using insults to try to get the other person to see their point of view. If they didn’t embrace their own beliefs so adamantly, then they might spend their time trying to see another point of view, another piece of the puzzle.

The Power Of Positive Thinking

There are a great many books out there about the power of positive thinking. Some of the message is scientifically based, some of it straight up mysticism. Positive thinking is a powerful tool with a great host of psychological effects. In fact, for some circumstances, positive thinking will overcome depression in and of itself. It is likely going to depend on the cause of the depression as to whether or not this is an effective tool.

There are a few ways in which positive thinking can be misapplied. Ignoring serious discrepancies between your understandings of reality through positive thinking is avoidance. Disillusioned beliefs absolutely must be addressed if a person is going to overcome the resulting depression. Countering negative thoughts such as “there is no meaning” with “there is meaning” is an active force of will to delude oneself. This form of positive thinking will ultimately not hold up for the rational minded.

Chapter 4

Embracing Nihilism

There is only one sustainable solution to the problem of philosophical depression, and that is embracing nihilism. This chapter will explore what it means to embrace Nihilism.

Discarding Beliefs as a system of thought

We spoke earlier about how we come to believe things through our thought processes. We accumulate data, then apply logic and reason, and then arrive at conclusions. Arriving at conclusions assumes perfect knowledge. Really though, how does one person really acquire perfect knowledge? Even when you are specialized in a field, the field is often incomplete. The different fields of study have effects on other fields of study. And most importantly, all of the fields of study have an effect on the ethics question. All fields of study effect philosophy and are capable of uprooting beliefs.

Why I’m Not A Consequentialist

Consequentialism is a pretty widely accepted perspective on what is good in life, or what should be judged as the right action. The greatest good for the greatest number is their mantra. The results of our actions are how we are judged good or bad. Do the means justify the ends? On the surface, it’s a pretty pleasant ideology. We pretty much all agree that pain sucks and pleasure rocks. And we pretty much all agree that promoting well-being (at minimum for ourselves) is superior to promoting agony. But in application, there are a couple of serious problems with this perspective.

For the individual, if we are being judged based on the results of our actions, this leaves us not knowing whether we’ve done right or wrong until we see the results of our actions. In the meantime, we may be judged for the means we used to seek our ends. We also can’t possibly ever feel satisfied with our actions the more we think about them. As an example of this, there is a common situation that’s brought up when talking about Consequentialism.

There are 3 people about to get hit by a train. You have the ability to throw one fat man in front of the train to derail it, and therefore save the 3 people. This situation commonly throws in a caveat, that you know that the fat man will derail the train. Of course, it has to to defend the Consequentialist position. But this perfect knowledge is part of the reason it’s untenable. We can not possibly understand and know everything in the universe, so we can’t possibly know what the right thing to do is. If the three people saved were prison escapees hellbent on raping and pillaging the next town, and the fat man a scientist possessing the cure for cancer, then the consequentialist position would clearly indicate that the three prison escapees must die.

We also must consider future consequences and unintended consequences. There are a variety of global issues to consider beyond the scope of the situation. When it comes to saving a life, there is the consideration of overpopulation, which is namely a problem because of the potential issues that result from it. People may end up starving on a massive scale. The earth may be depleted of it’s every resource and civilizations unravel in chaos. Three lives may not tip the scales completely, but saving these lives may be aiding and abetting even worse consequences.

Consequentialism is an impossible standard, because we never know enough information to accurately gauge the maximum benefit. If the reason for the action is where the judgment comes from, rather than the consequences, as in “it’s still right to try to do the most good” then we are exploring another system of ethics.

Accepting Science/Material Beliefs

4C

Ethics

There are three major ethical positions that people possess: deontology, consequentialism, and virtue ethics. Most ethical theories are some variation of these position, as there are three distinct approaches to what the foundation of an ethical position is. Each of these ethical positions has some major problems. Overall though, the problems with each one are similar in nature. Let’s look at some of the problems philosophically with each position:

Deontology

Consequentialism

Virtue Ethics

The reason we can’t all come together and agree upon one of the ethical positions is that ethics are purely a human invention. And that human invention comes necessarily from the cultivation of a society. There is a very interesting case where people will often excuse someone from behaving within the framework of their ethics, and it’s very telling about the nature of ethics and how they serve society. Often people will excuse actions taken in the desert island scenario. A person is starving, and cannibalism is sometimes excused. While it’s not a comprehensive ethical position that allows for cannibalism here, it is indicative of the purpose of ethics in the hearts of the believers.

The whole book up til this point has been laying the foundation for making the case for nonbelief. Ethics exist because we need to figure out which actions to take. Without ethics, or a system of valuation, a person would act solely on whims in a short, brutish existence. So the individual needs ethics to engage with society. The depressed person, in order to overcome their depression, needs to accept that absolute ethics are unattainable, because they don’t exist. Morals are relative to different cultures and persons.

There is a balancing act between serving the self and serving society. One can see that it’s not optimal to serve oneself exclusively, nor is it optimal to serve society exclusively. A depressed person is not going to serve society very well, and someone who serves society to the exclusion of themselves is going to be depressed. By the same token, a person who serves themselves exclusively will miss out on the many benefits of serving society (psychological benefits!).

Given that ethics exist to dictate how to beneficially engage with society, for the individual and society to varying degrees, there is still the possibility of having better ethical positions. Ultimately, ethics are about the well-being of society and the individual. They are the preserver of their respective survival instincts. The methodology used to meet the end goal of well-being is not inherently good or evil. It is functional, or not. Even a functional piece of equipment can be improved upon.

As an example of this, the mutilation of female genitalia is not inherently evil. There is a specific function that this action takes for some societies. There is a belief that the society will be better off if female’s promiscuity is curbed. If we invented an injection to achieve the same goal (that was equally affordable and accessible), it would assuredly be used instead (after tradition is overcome through it’s slow process). There are many things to weigh in this scenario, many valuations to employ, to discern whether a society should engage in this activity in the realms of freedom, pain, birth control, etc. At the root of the issue is an attempt to improve society. Accepting genitalia mutilation as an ethical position is often hard for people outside of these cultures, but the ultimate goal is a better society. Whether or not this action achieves that is how it ought to be judged. Does it do what it claims to do?

Abortion is an interesting topic that displays how beliefs serve as tools. At the heart of the issue for people who believe in abortion is freedom. Freedom is presumed to make for a better society than the lack of freedom. And in a lot of ways, this seems to be true. Economic liberty has catapulted the rate of technological advancements. But freedom is simply a tool to employ towards the aim of a better society. It isn’t, in itself, a better society. Restrictions of actions are still utilized, seemingly effectively. Freedom, as an ideology, typically comes with the restriction that a freedom doesn’t impede on other people’s freedoms. But what exactly is meant that freedoms are not “impeded” upon? In the UK, hate speech is illegal. This may be consistent.

Meeting Your Psychological Needs

Acceptance

Acceptance is the most powerful tool of overcoming depression. When the world has a conflict with you, it will seek to destroy, alter, or change you. When you have a conflict with the world, you will seek to destroy, alter, or change the world. Everything you reject leaves you in a negative state. Alternatively, if you accepted every facet of your existence, then there would be no inner turmoil between you and your existence.

The myth of Sisyphus by Albert Camus is a great example of this scenario. Sisyphus was condemned by Zeus to spend eternity pushing a boulder up a mountain, only for the boulder to fall down the other side. Camus imagines Sisyphus happy the moment he chooses to embrace this reality, and push the boulder up with great fervor, excitedly running down to get it once more. His acceptance of his fate, of his situation in life, brought him relief.

Many people will find it disgusting that one might accept some of the brutish parts of existence, and cowardly to accept them rather than try to make a difference. Some examples include: starvation, war, inequality, false imprisonment, discrimination. It seems wrong on the surface to accept these parts of existence. They do exist, though, and will likely exist eternally. It’s important to note here that rejection of these things does not make any difference towards the solution. What makes a difference is what one does about the brutish parts of existence. So I propose an exercise.

Determine how many years of life you have left to live. Assume that you will live to an average age, 81 for women, 76 for men. Now write down everything about existence that you reject. For each thing you reject about existence, write down some things you could do to aid in lessening their impact. When you have a full list, start assigning those things to the years you have left.

Ideally, after you have mapped out the things you are going to do about the brutish parts of existence, you should be able to accept what is left. There is nothing more you can do as an individual about these things. It would no longer be wrong to accept them. Acceptance is the recognition that you can’t do anything about it, and that it exists. If you think you can do more, go ahead and remap your life. If you think that you should do more, then you should be mindful that “should” is a moral imperative. Which ethical system are you ascribing to, and does it make sense to ethically mandate that humans should do more than they are capable of doing? Fabricated ethical positions that are unattainable do nothing for the individual but wreak havoc. Choosing to embrace an unattainable position such as this is choosing to embrace misery. There should be no confusion as to the source of depression here. Accept or be miserable.

You must also accept yourself. If you are in conflict with yourself, you are sure to despair. You literally can not be anything but what you are right now. Sure, you may want to improve some areas. And improving those things will benefit you. But not accepting yourself as you are is once again choosing misery.

Perspective

You’ve heard the common phrase “perspective is reality”. There is a reality beyond your ability to interpret the surroundings you encounter. You do not experience this reality. You experience the reality that is interpreted by your perspective. Before you were a depressed individual, you experienced nearly the same exact world, except your circumstances have changed. Despite this, you may perceive yourself negatively, you may have a future outlook on the world that is more negative, you may see relationships as negative. The world is always changing, but it is essentially the same world. Mostly, what has changed is your perspective. And it clearly has an enormous effect on you. Perspective can cripple us, or it can invigorate us.

Beyond the perspective is the area of focus. For example, “the world is meaningless” is a perspective that we have embraced in this book. Thinking about the meaningless of existence, however, is not essential if we have accepted it. Our focus is wasted on this subject, and should be redirected. Another great example is a gray, rainy day. Some people may enjoy them, but most people would say it’s ugly outside. You can focus all day on how ugly it is, or you can turn your attention indoors. You could also start a beauty hunt outdoors, seeking a gem of beauty in a sea of ugly. What we choose to focus on is largely going to dictate our feelings. This is not, however, and endorsement of ignoring feelings. Letting emotions run their course is extremely important toward the aim of well-being, or happiness.

Positivity

There is a power in putting out positive spirits vs negative. At the individual level, they say a smile is infectious and can bring up the moods of those around you. Making a conscious decision to put out positive energy toward the world, or at least impersonating it, in most circumstances, will bring more positive experiences to the giver. Have you ever met someone who was so externally bubbly and happy, and wondered how they stay so positive? There is always the possibility that they are faking it, but what is true is that it is easier to be positive when you treat the world positively. You experience a better version of the world. Sometimes you might hear this people say that they bring out the best in people because of this. Putting out positive energy will bring back positive energy, and not because of any mystical qualities of the world, but because of simple psychology.

Chapter 5

Now, I never said this was going to be an easy task, overcoming depression. There are a great many challenges you will now be facing. Nonbelief itself is challenging in and of itself. Let’s talk about some of these challenges.

5A

Relations to Others

While overall, nonbelief should lead toward more positive relationships with your fellow man in that you don’t so adamantly disagree with a perspective, but rather seek to understand it and verify, falsify or grow it, it does cause some friction.

There are linguistic challenges of explaining nonbelief. In fact, unless you are extremely practiced at explaining this position, you will encounter a slew of misunderstandings. Given that the entire history of mankind has involved beliefs as a system of thought, every language is laden with beliefs. Beliefs are even stated explicitly as fact, and nobody bats an eye, unless, of course, you disagree with the assertion. The most common linguistic challenge is also tied to a misunderstanding, that your position is a belief itself. This stems from the notion that people have to have beliefs in different areas, which is an assertion based on evidence, where everyone has beliefs in different areas. But it is not fact, people don’t have beliefs in various areas, however this book should have adequately shown why beliefs are so ingrained in the individual.

For example, moral relativism is a position. It is regarded as a philosophical belief. But the components are simply a conglomeration of facts. There is no proven entity to mandate/enforce/justify an ethical code. Different people and cultures have different opinions about what is moral/ethical. Morality is relative. What this means is, if there were a proven entity to mandate/enforce/justify ethics, then the moral relativist position would be wrong. So long as there is no entity, people will have differing opinions on what morality is, since it is a concept invented in the minds of men.

The nonbeliever will also find a serious lack of support in the world for their position. Most people they align with in philosophy are depressed. There are no textbooks on the subject. Doctors misunderstand it. Family misunderstands it. The APA misunderstands it and tells them their thoughts are a symptom of a disorder. Perfectly rational thoughts are regarded as symptoms of a disorder by the people best suited to help people. This book is to serve as a call to action for a new form of help!

Beliefs are heralded as a system of thought. It is pretty intuitive that when you tell someone that something they herald or cherish is patently wrong, they will not respond well to you. Your very existence, as a put together, intelligent operator, is a challenge to the entire foundation that holds them together. It’s only natural for others to either attack or avoid you, even if you don’t specifically reject their position amongst other positions. In fact, it would make sense that you hold their position as equal to other positions, thereby granting it validation. But your validation is also invalidation. And you reject the methods they use to arrive at conclusions.

Habits of Thought

Pretty simply, you are accustomed to thinking with beliefs. You’ve spent your entire life using beliefs to make sense of the world around you. No matter how firmly you stand in opposition to this system, you are going to think like a believer because that’s how your brain has operated.

Inundation

Everything you hear is going to involve beliefs. Beliefs will be presented as facts. Advertisements presume beliefs. People referring to why they do things, what they plan on doing, EVERYTHING is going to be laden with beliefs. It’s an unavoidable facet of life, and easy to fall for. Remaining on guard against belief oriented thinking is an insurmountable challenge that requires vigilance. And that one forgive themselves for falling for the common traps over and over again. Personally, I’ve always found it funny that I would fall for belief traps. I could imagine others might not find it as humorous.

Chapter 6

Utopian possibilities

Theoretically, if everyone rejected beliefs, there would be a lot less disagreement. In the area of government and in the realm of the social, different regions could be assigned different variations of the all the possible systems, measured by what would be the best system to employ. While the best would be subjective, people could be allowed to navigate and choose the system they want to live under. It may be that one system is simply the best for the majority of mankind, and is discoverable.

At a basic level, rejection of beliefs would turn human beings into robotic scientists. It wouldn’t deprive us of our emotions in any way. It would simply reject the fanciful in favor of the fruitful. And a cohesive, productive, positive environment for all of mankind may be a better place to live than one where people need illusions to cope with their existence.

Sources

(1) – http://psychcentral.com/lib/what-is-depression-if-not-a-mental-illness/000896