Philosophical Nihilism: A New Logic For Technological Modernity?

Abstract

The term “nihilism” is currently resurfacing in various approaches of post- and transhumanism and in the semiotics of digital media theory. This new employment of nihilism, a term that had its heyday in the late 19th century, is due to the fact that nihilism was always more than a catchphrase in fashionable Russian and French novels. As a critique of theology and deism, nihilism is a constituent part of the legacy of the French revolution. Today its radical questioning of the epistemological status quo and established systems make it relevant to the heirs of the intellectuals of the 1969er generation. Through Martin Heidegger’s interpretation of Nietzsche’s nihilism and through his applying it in regard to “the question concerning technology”, nihilism is now emerging in technoscience as an example of a philosophical anthropology that contextualizes the ethics behind the “new technologies”. In this framework, nihilism is shedding some of its negative connotation; it is now not only seen as an non-constructive concept, but as a positive force that allows for a better understanding of the new symbolism of digital modernity.