Aphorism #1: Ancient Nihilism; Modern Aporia
Scepticism through the ages
“human affairs are so manifold and obscure that nothing can be clearly known, as is rightly taught by my friends the Academics, the least arrogant of the philosophers.” — Erasmus, The Praise of Folly (1511)
“Is it not better to remain in suspense than to entangle yourself in the many errors that the human fancy has produced? Is it not better to suspend your convictions than to get mixed up in these seditious and quarrelsome divisions?” Michel de Montaigne, An Apology for Raymond Sebond (1576)
“Let us weigh the gain and the loss in wagering that God is. Let us estimate these two chances. If you gain, you gain all; if you lose, you lose nothing. Wager, then, without hesitation that He is.” Blaise Pascal, Pensées (1660)
Nihilism is not a uniquely modern problem. It is a problem of paradigmlessness. It is a problem of living at the confluence of many tectonic plates; it can't be understood by those who live far from these earthquaking volcanic edges.
Platonic aporia, 16th-century scepticism and 20th-/21st-century Nihilism are more alike than the centuries of peace in between. Ptolemy, Newton and Einstein are more akin than the million and one scientists temporally punctuating them. Philosophers of science talk about Normal Science vs Revolutionary Science; anthropologists about Structure vs Liminality; fallen psychologists speak about Order vs. Chaos (or the Local and the Transcendental) — they are all speaking about the same thing: aporia — que sais-je? We don't know. Or is it that too many people think they know? "The best lack all conviction, while the worst/Are full of passionate intensity".
Either way, we have history to remind us: all this too shall pass. The liminal Nihilism will give way to a new continent of belief and our doubts and disorientation will slumber for a few centuries longer. In the meantime grab some popcorn pull over a pew, and let's wait and see together “what rough beast, its hour come round at last, Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born”.