122-826: Deep Thought or Deep Thinking may refer to: Deep Thought ( Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy ) , a fictional computer in The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy Deep Thought (chess computer) , an IBM-produced chess computer, named after the Hitchhiker's Guide's Deep Thought Deep Thoughts (album) , or The Thought Remains the Same , a 2000 compilation album by bands on Nitro Records Deep Thoughts (Lil Durk album) , 2025 album Deep Thoughts by Jack Handey ,
244-453: A Chesterfield sofa , in the midst of a match at Lord's Cricket Ground. In due course, Agrajag harbors a fervent desire for vengeance against Arthur Dent, scheming to redirect his teleportation to a Cathedral of Hate. However, in the midst of articulating his animosity towards Arthur, Agrajag references an incident at "Stavromula Beta" where Arthur inadvertently evaded an assassin's bullet, causing Agrajag's demise. Perplexed by this mention of
366-428: A self causes suffering. Nonetheless, his critics called him a nihilist who teaches the annihilation and extermination of an existing being. The Buddha's response was that he only teaches the cessation of suffering. When an individual has given up craving and the conceit of 'I am' their mind is liberated, they no longer come into any state of ' being ' and are no longer born again. The Aggi-Vacchagotta Sutta records
488-497: A 'decentralization' of authorship, the accumulation of positive knowledge, historical progress, and certain ideals and practices of humanism and the Enlightenment . Jacques Derrida , whose deconstruction is perhaps most commonly labeled nihilistic, did not himself make the nihilistic move that others have claimed. Derridean deconstructionists argue that this approach rather frees texts, individuals or organizations from
610-564: A Lintilla, they both wink out of existence in a puff of unsmoke. Along with Poodoo and Varntvar the Priest, three Allitnils arrived on Brontitall to get the three Lintillas there to "agree to cease to be". Two of the clones eliminate their corresponding Lintillas, but Arthur shoots the third Allitnil, so that one Lintilla survives. Appearing only in Fit the Twelfth of the radio series, every one of
732-441: A colossal rockfall. Miraculously, Arthur emerges unscathed from the debris. For the next few years, Arthur travels the universe, secure in his knowledge that, no matter what happens, he cannot die at least until after he survives his assassination attempt at Stavromula Beta. In the novel Mostly Harmless Arthur's daughter Random Frequent Flyer Dent holds him hostage in a London club. When she fires her weapon Arthur dodges, causing
854-511: A conversation between the Buddha and an individual named Vaccha that further elaborates on this. In the sutta, Vaccha asks the Buddha to confirm one of the following, with respect to the existence of the Buddha after death: To all four questions, the Buddha answers that the terms "reappears somewhere else," "does not reappear," "both does and does not reappear," and "neither does nor does not reappear," do not apply. When Vaccha expresses puzzlement,
976-407: A conversation with his teacher Ajahn Chah , comments that he is "Determined above all things to fully realize Nirvana in this lifetime...deeply weary of the human condition and...[is] determined not to be born again." To this, Ajahn Chah replies: "What about the rest of us, Sumedho? Don't you care about those who'll be left behind?" Ajahn Amaro comments that Ajahn Chah could detect that his student had
1098-485: A denial of truth, but as a denial of our ability to know truth. That is to say, it makes an epistemological claim, compared to nihilism's ontological claim. Lyotard argues that, rather than relying on an objective truth or method to prove their claims, philosophers legitimize their truths by reference to a story about the world that can not be separated from the age and system the stories belong to—referred to by Lyotard as meta-narratives . He then goes on to define
1220-412: A disproportion between what we want to value (or need) and how the world appears to operate." When we find out that the world does not possess the objective value or meaning that we want it to have or have long since believed it to have, we find ourselves in a crisis. Nietzsche asserts that with the decline of Christianity and the rise of physiological decadence , nihilism is in fact characteristic of
1342-479: A half million years of calculation, the answer finally turns out to be 42 , Deep Thought admonishes Loonquawl and Phouchg (the receivers of the Ultimate Answer) that "[they] checked it very thoroughly, and that quite definitely is the answer. I think the problem, to be quite honest with you, is that you've never actually known what the question was." Deep Thought does not know the ultimate question to Life,
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#17327880400801464-545: A large, vaguely humanoid computer, with a gigantic head supported, as if in bored repose, by two arms and has a female voice (provided by actress Helen Mirren ). This particular version of Deep Thought likes to watch television in her spare time and late in the film can also be seen to have the Apple Computer logo above her eye. This is a reference to Adams being a fan and advocate of the Apple Macintosh . It
1586-456: A lot more about the nature of the universe than we do now". The reason behind the bowl's lament is revealed in the novel Life, the Universe and Everything , when Agrajag identifies the bowl of petunias as one of his prior incarnations, and tells Arthur that he had seen his face in a spaceship window as he fell to his doom. In another incarnation, Agrajag was a rabbit on prehistoric Earth (during
1708-404: A morality that is strong or healthy, meaning that the person in question is aware that he constructs it himself, from weak morality, where the interpretation is projected on to something external. Nietzsche discusses Christianity, one of the major topics in his work, at length in the context of the problem of nihilism in his notebooks, in a chapter entitled "European Nihilism." Here he states that
1830-415: A negation of religious principles. Nihilism has, however, been widely ascribed to both religious and irreligious viewpoints. In popular use, the term commonly refers to forms of existential nihilism , according to which life is without intrinsic value , meaning , or purpose. Other prominent positions within nihilism include the rejection of all normative and ethical views ( § Moral nihilism ),
1952-509: A nihilistic aversion to life rather than true detachment. The term nihilism was first introduced to philosophy by Friedrich Heinrich Jacobi (1743–1819), who used the term to characterize rationalism , and in particular Spinoza's determinism and the Aufklärung , in order to carry out a reductio ad absurdum according to which all rationalism (philosophy as criticism) reduces to nihilism—and thus it should be avoided and replaced with
2074-533: A party in Islington. She and Arthur next meet six months later on the spaceship Heart of Gold, shortly after the Earth has been destroyed to make way for a hyperspace bypass. Slartibartfast is a Magrathean, and a designer of planets. His favourite part of the job is creating coastlines, the most notable of which are the fjords found on the coast of Norway on planet Earth, for which he won an award. When Earth Mk. II
2196-412: A place he's never visited, Arthur remains oblivious to Agrajag's grievances, leading Agrajag to realize his premature timing in bringing Arthur to the cathedral. Despite this revelation, Agrajag still attempts to eliminate Arthur, only to meet his demise once again at Arthur's hands while the latter defends himself. In a final act of defiance, Agrajag sets off explosives meant to dispatch Arthur, but trigger
2318-422: A restrictive truth, and that deconstruction opens up the possibility of other ways of being. Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak , for example, uses deconstruction to create an ethics of opening up Western scholarship to the voice of the subaltern and to philosophies outside of the canon of western texts. Derrida himself built a philosophy based upon a 'responsibility to the other'. Deconstruction can thus be seen not as
2440-415: A return to some type of faith and revelation . Bret W. Davis writes, for example: The first philosophical development of the idea of nihilism is generally ascribed to Friedrich Jacobi, who in a famous letter criticized Fichte 's idealism as falling into nihilism. According to Jacobi, Fichte's absolutization of the ego (the 'absolute I' that posits the 'not-I') is an inflation of subjectivity that denies
2562-458: A segment on Saturday Night Live consisting of one-liner jokes written and orated by Jack Handey Deep Thinking , a 2017 book by Garry Kasparov and Mig Greengard See also [ edit ] All pages with titles containing Deep Thought Topics referred to by the same term [REDACTED] This disambiguation page lists articles associated with the title Deep Thought . If an internal link led you here, you may wish to change
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#17327880400802684-445: Is overcome that a culture can have a true foundation upon which to thrive. He wished to hasten its coming only so that he could also hasten its ultimate departure. He states that there is at least the possibility of another type of nihilist in the wake of Christianity's self-dissolution, one that does not stop after the destruction of all value and meaning and succumb to the following nothingness. This alternate, 'active' nihilism on
2806-493: Is a "semi-half-cousin" of Ford Prefect. He is hedonistic and irresponsible, narcissistic, and often extremely insensitive to the feelings of those around him. Zaphod invented the Pan Galactic Gargle Blaster. Zaphod wears unique clothing that contains a mixture of bright and contrasting colours to make him stand out and be the centre of attention wherever he goes. He was voted "Worst Dressed Sentient Being in
2928-450: Is abstraction conquering individuality. Kierkegaard, an advocate of a philosophy of life , generally argued against levelling and its nihilistic consequences, although he believed it would be "genuinely educative to live in the age of levelling [because] people will be forced to face the judgement of [levelling] alone." George Cotkin asserts Kierkegaard was against "the standardization and levelling of belief, both spiritual and political, in
3050-472: Is afflicted with severe depression and boredom, in part because he has a "brain the size of a planet" which he is seldom, if ever, given the chance to use. Indeed, the true horror of Marvin's existence is that no task he could be given would occupy even the tiniest fraction of his vast intellect. Marvin claims he is 50,000 times more intelligent than a human. Trillian (Tricia McMillan) is a mathematician and astrophysicist whom Arthur Dent attempted to talk to at
3172-453: Is also revealed that, in the intervening time, Deep Thought was commissioned by an intergalactic consortium of angry housewives to create the Point of View Gun, a weapon that causes any man it is used on to see things from the firer's point-of-view, regardless of the firer's gender (due to it being originally used by those housewives having got fed up with ending arguments with their husbands with
3294-487: Is always by someone of some thing: it is always bound by perspective, and it is never mere fact. Rather, there are interpretations through which we understand the world and give it meaning. Interpreting is something we can not go without; in fact, it is a condition of subjectivity. One way of interpreting the world is through morality, as one of the fundamental ways that people make sense of the world, especially in regard to their own thoughts and actions. Nietzsche distinguishes
3416-403: Is any viewpoint, or a family of views, that rejects generally accepted or fundamental aspects of human existence, namely knowledge , morality , or meaning . There have been different nihilist positions, including that human values are baseless, that life is meaningless, that knowledge is impossible, or that some other highly regarded concepts are in fact meaningless or pointless. The term
3538-426: Is being made, Slartibartfast is assigned to the continent of Africa. He is unhappy about this because he has begun "doing it with fjords again" (arguing that they give a continent a lovely baroque feel), but has been told by his superiors that they are "not equatorial enough". In relation to this, he expresses the view that he would "far rather be happy than right any day." Agrajag is a tragic and piteous creature who
3660-403: Is continually reincarnated and subsequently killed, each time unknowingly, by Arthur Dent . Agrajag is first identified in the novel Life, the Universe and Everything , but it is revealed that several of Arthur's encounters in the first and second novels (and in previous chapters of the third) were with previous incarnations of Agrajag. The first occurs in the novel The Hitchhiker's Guide to
3782-404: Is different—in some sense diametrically opposed—to the usual definition (as outlined in the rest of this article). Nihilism is one of the main topics of Deleuze's early book Nietzsche and Philosophy (1962). There, Deleuze repeatedly interprets Nietzsche's nihilism as "the enterprise of denying life and depreciating existence". Nihilism thus defined is therefore not the denial of higher values, or
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3904-428: Is essentially a dilettante when it comes to causes such as the search for the question to the ultimate answer of "life, the universe, and everything." Ford takes a more existential view of the universe, sometimes bordering on joyful nihilism . He is eccentric and broad-minded – no doubt due to his vast experience of roughing it around the galaxy – and has an off-key and often very dark sense of humour. Zaphod Beeblebrox
4026-416: Is finished, today it is the precession of the neutral, of forms of the neutral and of indifference ... all that remains, is the fascination for desertlike and indifferent forms, for the very operation of the system that annihilates us. Now, fascination (in contrast to seduction, which was attached to appearances, and to dialectical reason, which was attached to meaning) is a nihilistic passion par excellence, it
4148-464: Is indeed the correct term for this stance, and some question whether Nietzsche takes the problems nihilism poses seriously enough. Martin Heidegger 's interpretation of Nietzsche influenced many postmodern thinkers who investigated the problem of nihilism as put forward by Nietzsche. Only recently has Heidegger's influence on Nietzschean nihilism research faded. As early as the 1930s, Heidegger
4270-438: Is its undoing: in its drive towards truth, Christianity eventually finds itself to be a construct, which leads to its own dissolution. It is therefore that Nietzsche states that we have outgrown Christianity "not because we lived too far from it, rather because we lived too close." As such, the self-dissolution of Christianity constitutes yet another form of nihilism. Because Christianity was an interpretation that posited itself as
4392-436: Is like the stillness of death, where one can hear one's own heartbeat, a stillness like death, into which nothing can penetrate, in which everything sinks, powerless. One person can head a rebellion, but one person cannot head this levelling process, for that would make him a leader and he would avoid being levelled. Each individual can in his little circle participate in this levelling, but it is an abstract process, and levelling
4514-477: Is no God, everything is permitted' , or ' après moi, le déluge ' , provides a principle whose sincerity they try to live out to the end. They search for and experiment with ways for the self to justify itself after God has disappeared." Nihilism is often associated with the German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche , who provided a detailed diagnosis of nihilism as a widespread phenomenon of Western culture. Though
4636-511: Is not a thing you can find, but rather a state where you experience the reality of non-grasping. In the Alagaddupama Sutta , the Buddha describes how some individuals feared his teaching because they believe that their self would be destroyed if they followed it. He describes this as an anxiety caused by the false belief in an unchanging, everlasting self . All things are subject to change and taking any impermanent phenomena to be
4758-528: Is privileged over the other to speak to ultimate truth. Postmodern theorist Jean Baudrillard wrote briefly of nihilism from the postmodern viewpoint in Simulacra and Simulation . He stuck mainly to topics of interpretations of the real world over the simulations of which the real world is composed. The uses of meaning were an important subject in Baudrillard's discussion of nihilism: The apocalypse
4880-511: Is seen guarding the late Hotblack Desiato in the novel The Restaurant at the End of the Universe . His face, according to the book "had the texture of an orange and the colour of an apple, but there the resemblance to anything sweet ended." In episode 5 of the TV series he is portrayed by actor David Prowse , Star Wars ' Darth Vader , as a man of few words who can lift Ford Prefect clean off
5002-560: Is sometimes used in association with anomie to explain the general mood of despair at a perceived pointlessness of existence or arbitrariness of human principles and social institutions . Nihilism has also been described as conspicuous in or constitutive of certain historical periods . For example, Jean Baudrillard and others have characterized postmodernity as a nihilistic epoch or mode of thought. Likewise, some theologians and religious figures have stated that postmodernity and many aspects of modernity represent nihilism by
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5124-412: Is that philosophy, and more specifically metaphysics , has forgotten to discriminate between investigating the notion of a being ( seiende ) and Being ( Sein ). According to Heidegger, the history of Western thought can be seen as the history of metaphysics. Moreover, because metaphysics has forgotten to ask about the notion of Being (what Heidegger calls Seinsvergessenheit ), it is a history about
5246-782: Is the Latin root word nihil , meaning 'nothing', which is similarly found in the related terms annihilate , meaning 'to bring to nothing', and nihility , meaning ' nothingness '. The term nihilism emerged in several places in Europe during the 18th century, notably in the German form Nihilismus , though was also in use during the Middle Ages to denote certain forms of heresy . The concept itself first took shape within Russian and German philosophy , which respectively represented
5368-524: Is the passion proper to the mode of disappearance. We are fascinated by all forms of disappearance, of our disappearance. Melancholic and fascinated, such is our general situation in an era of involuntary transparency. From the 19th century, nihilism has encompassed a range of positions within various fields of philosophy. Each of these, as the Encyclopædia Britannica states, "denied the existence of genuine moral truths or values, rejected
5490-479: Is threatened by a disembodied hand and so offers a Guide write-up instead. This happens in the novel So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish . In the radio adaptation of this novel, the barman was played by Arthur Smith. Another barman takes a galactic sized tip for Elvis from Ford on his Hitchhiker's corporate Dine-O-Charge credit card in an attempt to bankrupt InfiniDim Enterprises in the novel Mostly Harmless and
5612-423: Is what Nietzsche calls passive nihilism , which he recognizes in the pessimistic philosophy of Schopenhauer . Schopenhauer's doctrine, which Nietzsche also refers to as Western Buddhism , advocates separating oneself from will and desires in order to reduce suffering. Nietzsche characterizes this attitude as a "will to nothingness ", whereby life turns away from itself, as there is nothing of value to be found in
5734-557: The rabble or common masses. Later interpretations of nihilism were heavily influenced by works of anti-nihilistic literature , such as those of Fyodor Dostoevsky , which arose in response to Russian nihilism. "In contrast to the corrupted nihilists [of the real world], who tried to numb their nihilistic sensitivity and forget themselves through self-indulgence, Dostoevsky's figures voluntarily leap into nihilism and try to be themselves within its boundaries.", writes contemporary scholar Nishitani . "The nihility expressed in 'if there
5856-533: The Vogons , he supposedly does a few seconds later. In Fit the Fifteenth of the radio series, Douglas Adams plays Agrajag, having recorded the part for an audiobook version of the novel Life, the Universe and Everything . Producer Dirk Maggs added a suitable voice treatment, and Simon Jones as Arthur Dent recorded his lines opposite the pre-recorded Adams. Adams was thus able to "reincarnate" to participate in
5978-405: The interpretation, Nietzsche states that this dissolution leads beyond skepticism to a distrust of all meaning. Stanley Rosen identifies Nietzsche's concept of nihilism with a situation of meaninglessness, in which "everything is permitted." According to him, the loss of higher metaphysical values that exist in contrast to the base reality of the world, or merely human ideas, gives rise to
6100-458: The postmodern condition as characterized by a rejection both of these meta-narratives and of the process of legitimation by meta-narratives. This concept of the instability of truth and meaning leads in the direction of nihilism, though Lyotard stops short of embracing the latter. In lieu of meta-narratives we have created new language-games in order to legitimize our claims which rely on changing relationships and mutable truths, none of which
6222-569: The progressives and traditionalists that came before them, as well as its manifestation in the view that negation and value-destruction were most necessary to the present conditions. The movement very soon adopted the name, despite the novel's initial harsh reception among both the conservatives and younger generation. Though philosophically both nihilistic and skeptical, Russian nihilism did not unilaterally negate ethics and knowledge as may be assumed, nor did it espouse meaninglessness unequivocally. Even so, contemporary scholarship has challenged
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#17327880400806344-511: The 'Heart of Gold' starship and sings Zaphod a cryptic song about the entrance to the planet Asgard . Zaphod does not understand the song. She vanishes after saying "oh for Zark's sake" and then turns into an ice sculpture of herself. The sculpture soon melts into water, the water droplets rise up into the ceiling and every drop disappears after making a 'oh' sound. Zaphod later comments "That girl always could sing". As Disaster Area's earnings require hypermathematics, their chief research accountant
6466-559: The 1960s, a Nietzschean 'renaissance' began, culminating in the work of Mazzino Montinari and Giorgio Colli . They began work on a new and complete edition of Nietzsche's collected works, making Nietzsche more accessible for scholarly research. Vattimo explains that with this new edition of Colli and Montinari, a critical reception of Heidegger's interpretation of Nietzsche began to take shape. Like other contemporary French and Italian philosophers, Vattimo does not want, or only partially wants, to rely on Heidegger for understanding Nietzsche. On
6588-594: The Allitnils is voiced by David Tate . The Allitnils, like the Lintillas, do not appear in the novels or in the BBC television series. The Almighty Bob is a deity worshipped by the people of Lamuella . Old Thrashbarg is one of the priests who worships Almighty Bob; however, Thrashbarg is often ignored by the villagers of Lamuella . The Almighty Bob appears in the fifth book, the novel Mostly Harmless . Anjie
6710-424: The Buddha and Nirvana by stating that a "Person who has attained the goal [nirvana] is thus indescribable because [they have] abandoned all things by which [they] could be described." The Suttas themselves describe the liberated mind as 'untraceable' or as 'consciousness without feature', making no distinction between the mind of a liberated being that is alive and the mind of one that is no longer alive. Despite
6832-409: The Buddha asks Vaccha a counter question to the effect of: if a fire were to go out and someone were to ask you whether the fire went north, south, east or west, how would you reply? Vaccha replies that the question does not apply and that an extinguished fire can only be classified as 'out'. Ṭhānissaro Bhikkhu elaborates on the classification problem around the words 'reappear,' etc. with respect to
6954-476: The Buddha was alive, some of which were viewed by him to be morally nihilistic. In the "Doctrine of Nihilism" in the Apannaka Sutta , the Buddha describes moral nihilists as holding the following views: The Buddha further states that those who hold these views will fail to see the virtue in good mental, verbal, and bodily conduct and the corresponding dangers in misconduct, and will therefore tend towards
7076-467: The Buddha's explanations to the contrary, Buddhist practitioners may, at times, still approach Buddhism in a nihilistic manner. Ajahn Amaro illustrates this by retelling the story of a Buddhist monk, Ajahn Sumedho , who in his early years took a nihilistic approach to Nirvana. A distinct feature of Nirvana in Buddhism is that an individual attaining it is no longer subject to rebirth. Ajahn Sumedho, during
7198-528: The Christian moral doctrine provides people with intrinsic value , belief in God (which justifies the evil in the world) and a basis for objective knowledge . In this sense, in constructing a world where objective knowledge is possible, Christianity is an antidote against a primal form of nihilism, against the despair of meaninglessness. However, it is exactly the element of truthfulness in Christian doctrine that
7320-474: The Galaxy , when a bowl of petunias is yanked into existence miles above the planet Magrathea in place of one of the missiles targeting the Heart of Gold after its Improbability Drive is used, and begins falling, having only time to think "Oh, no, not again" before crashing to the ground. The Guide states that "many had speculated that if we knew exactly why the bowl of petunias had thought that, we should know
7442-462: The Galaxy is a comedy science fiction franchise created by Douglas Adams . Originally a 1978 radio comedy , it was later adapted to other formats, including novels, stage shows, comic books, a 1981 TV series , a 1984 text adventure game , and 2005 feature film . The various versions follow the same basic plot but they are in many places mutually contradictory, as Adams rewrote the story substantially for each new adaptation. Throughout all versions,
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#17327880400807564-584: The Guide's new security force, the Vogons , fire at him with a rocket launcher after Ford feels the need to jump out of the window. Colin was last seen being sent (at the risk of possible incineration) to look after the delivery of the Guide Mark II to Arthur Dent in the Vogon postal system. Colin was named after a dog which belonged to a girl, Emily Saunders, of whom Ford had fond memories. Colin appears in
7686-502: The History of Being (1944–46), Heidegger tries to understand Nietzsche's nihilism as trying to achieve a victory through the devaluation of the, until then, highest values. The principle of this devaluation is, according to Heidegger, the will to power . The will to power is also the principle of every earlier valuation of values. How does this devaluation occur and why is this nihilistic? One of Heidegger's main critiques on philosophy
7808-857: The Known Universe" seven consecutive times. He's been described as "the best Bang since the Big One" by Eccentrica Gallumbits, and as "one hoopy frood" by others. He was briefly the President of the Galaxy and is the only man to have survived the Total Perspective Vortex (In the artificial galaxy created by Zarniwoop). Marvin the Paranoid Android is the ship's robot aboard the starship Heart of Gold. Built as one of many failed prototypes of Sirius Cybernetics Corporation's GPP (Genuine People Personalities) technology, Marvin
7930-455: The Russian nihilist movement can be traced back to 1855 and perhaps earlier, where it was principally a philosophy of extreme moral and epistemological skepticism . However, it was not until 1862 that the name nihilism was first popularized, when Ivan Turgenev used the term in his celebrated novel Fathers and Sons to describe the disillusionment of the younger generation towards both
8052-468: The Seventh of the radio series, where the captain is played by David Tate , and his number one by Bill Paterson . However, some of their dialogue was given to other characters in the novel The Restaurant at the End of the Universe . Leader of the cheese-worshipping Tyromancers on the planet Nano . Appears in the novel And Another Thing... . Three different barmen appear during the series. In
8174-454: The Universe and Everything, but offers to design an even more powerful computer, Earth , to calculate it. After ten million years of calculation, the Earth is destroyed by Vogons five minutes before the computation is complete. Appears in: On radio, Deep Thought was voiced by Geoffrey McGivern . On television and in the LP re-recording of the radio series, it was voiced by Valentine Dyall . In
8296-458: The absolute transcendence of God. A related but oppositional concept is fideism , which sees reason as hostile and inferior to faith. Søren Kierkegaard (1813–1855) posited an early form of nihilism, which he referred to as leveling . He saw leveling as the process of suppressing individuality to a point where an individual's uniqueness becomes non-existent and nothing meaningful in one's existence can be affirmed: Levelling at its maximum
8418-501: The benefit of Arthur Dent. Agrajag makes a brief appearance in his bowl of petunias form in the 2005 film, the moment he and the sperm whale were called into existence being portrayed exactly as it was in the first book. In the 2017 second season of the television adaptation of Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency a dog is named Agrajag with expected consequences. Alice Beeblebrox is Zaphod's favourite mother, lives at 10 Astral Crescent, Zoovroozlechester, Betelgeuse V, and guards
8540-414: The bolt to pass over his head and hit the man standing behind him. Earlier the victim (Agrajag) had dropped a book of matches which revealed the owner of the nightclub to be Stavro Mueller, and the name of the club to be Beta. Thus, what Arthur believed to be the name of a planet was the name of the nightclub, and Agrajag has died once again. Because of this, Arthur is now able to die as well, which, thanks to
8662-425: The denial of meaning, but rather the depreciation of life in the name of such higher values or meaning. Deleuze therefore (with, he claims, Nietzsche) says that Christianity and Platonism , and with them the whole of metaphysics, are intrinsically Nihilist. Postmodern and poststructuralist thought has questioned the very grounds on which Western cultures have based their 'truths': absolute knowledge and meaning,
8784-461: The destruction of Being. That is why Heidegger calls metaphysics nihilistic. This makes Nietzsche's metaphysics not a victory over nihilism, but a perfection of it. Heidegger, in his interpretation of Nietzsche, has been inspired by Ernst Jünger . Many references to Jünger can be found in Heidegger's lectures on Nietzsche. For example, in a letter to the rector of Freiburg University of November 4, 1945, Heidegger, inspired by Jünger, tries to explain
8906-577: The dialogue (Adams himself can be seen in the background of this scene); Steve Conway played the character on TV. This barman was played by David Gooderson in the original radio series and Stephen Moore in the LP recording. In the 2005 motion picture, Albie Woodington portrayed the barman. Ford visits the Old Pink Dog Bar in Han Dold City, orders a round for everyone and then tries to use an American Express card to pay for it, fails,
9028-546: The equating of Russian nihilism with mere skepticism, instead identifying it as a fundamentally Promethean movement. As passionate advocates of negation, the nihilists sought to liberate the Promethean might of the Russian people which they saw embodied in a class of prototypal individuals, or new types in their own words. These individuals, according to Pisarev, in freeing themselves from all authority become exempt from moral authority as well, and are distinguished above
9150-479: The era, for which it was often wrongly characterized as a form of political terrorism . Russian nihilism centered on the dissolution of existing values and ideals, incorporating theories of hard determinism , atheism , materialism , positivism , and rational egoism , while rejecting metaphysics , sentimentalism , and aestheticism . Leading philosophers of this school of thought included Nikolay Chernyshevsky and Dmitry Pisarev . The intellectual origins of
9272-431: The far reaches of the galaxy. In time, he learns how to fly and carves a niche for himself as a sandwich maker. He is also worried about "everything." Ford Prefect is Arthur Dent's friend. He rescued Dent when the Earth is unexpectedly demolished to make way for a hyperspace bypass at the start of the story. Although his heart is in the right place and he is shown to be highly intelligent, resourceful, and even brave, Ford
9394-423: The feature film, Deep Thought's voice was provided by actress Helen Mirren . In the television series, Deep Thought was shaped like a massive black metal trapezoid with a yellow rectangular display that blinked on and off in time with the computer's speaking. The timing of the light's flashing was done on set by author Douglas Adams . Valentine Dyall's voice was dubbed in later. In the feature film, it appears as
9516-416: The final radio series. This bartender was played by Roger Gregg . When Arthur returns to Earth in the novel So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish , he calls his department head to explain why he was absent from work the last six months: "I've gone mad." His superior is very relaxed about it and asks when Arthur will return to work, and is quite satisfied by the reply "When do hedgehogs stop hibernating?" In
9638-416: The floor. In the LP adaptation of the radio series, the character was voiced by David Tate . Arthur attempts to play Scrabble with a caveman, who is not even able to spell "Grunt" and "Agh", and "he's probably spelt library with one R again". However, he does spell " forty-two ", giving Arthur the idea to pull out letters from the letters bag at random to attempt to find the ultimate question; this results in
9760-472: The fourth radio series, the part was played by Geoffrey Perkins , who had produced the first two radio series and who had been the BBC TV head of comedy from 1995 to 2001. In the epilogue of the novel So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish , Blart Versenwald III was a top genetic engineer, and a man who could never keep his mind on the job at hand. When his homeworld was under threat from an invading army, he
9882-555: The idea stems largely from the Nietzschean 'crisis of nihilism', from which derive the two central concepts: the destruction of higher values and the opposition to the affirmation of life . Definitions by philosophers such as Crosby (1998) and Deleuze (1962) focus on extreme critiques of nihilism like those asserted by Nietzsche. Earlier forms of nihilism, however, may be more selective in negating specific hegemonies of social, moral, political and aesthetic thought. The term
10004-531: The idea that all human ideas are therefore valueless. Rejecting idealism thus results in nihilism, because only similarly transcendent ideals live up to the previous standards that the nihilist still implicitly holds. The inability for Christianity to serve as a source of valuating the world is reflected in Nietzsche's famous aphorism of the madman in The Gay Science . The death of God, in particular
10126-500: The latter. The culmination of the path that the Buddha taught was nirvana , "a place of nothingness ... nonpossession and... non-attachment ...[which is] the total end of death and decay." Ajahn Amaro , an ordained Buddhist monk of more than 40 years, observes that in English nothingness can sound like nihilism. However, the word could be emphasized in a different way, so that it becomes no-thingness , indicating that nirvana
10248-517: The levelling process are stronger for it, and that it represents a step in the right direction towards "becoming a true self." As we must overcome levelling, Hubert Dreyfus and Jane Rubin argue that Kierkegaard's interest, "in an increasingly nihilistic age, is in how we can recover the sense that our lives are meaningful." From the period 1860–1917, Russian nihilism was both a nascent form of nihilist philosophy and broad cultural movement which overlapped with certain revolutionary tendencies of
10370-505: The link to point directly to the intended article. Retrieved from " https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Deep_Thought&oldid=1258636471 " Category : Disambiguation pages Hidden categories: Short description is different from Wikidata All article disambiguation pages All disambiguation pages Deep Thought (Hitchhiker%27s Guide to the Galaxy) The Hitchhiker's Guide to
10492-529: The middle of 1880 ( KSA 9.127-128). This was the time of a then popular scientific work that reconstructed the so-called "Russian nihilism" on the basis of Russian newspaper reports on nihilistic incidents (N. Karlowitsch: Die Entwicklung des Nihilismus. Berlin 1880). This collection of material, published in three editions, was not only known to a broad German readership, but its influence on Nietzsche can also be proven. Karen L. Carr describes Nietzsche's characterization of nihilism as "a condition of tension, as
10614-594: The modern age, though he implies that the rise of nihilism is still incomplete and that it has yet to be overcome. Though the problem of nihilism becomes especially explicit in Nietzsche's notebooks (published posthumously), it is mentioned repeatedly in his published works and is closely connected to many of the problems mentioned there. Nietzsche characterized nihilism as emptying the world and especially human existence of meaning, purpose, comprehensible truth, or essential value. This observation stems in part from Nietzsche's perspectivism , or his notion that "knowledge"
10736-665: The modern trends of value-destruction expressed in the ' death of God ', as well as what he saw as the life-denying morality of Christianity . Under Nietzsche's profound influence, the term was then further treated within French philosophy and continental philosophy more broadly, while the influence of nihilism in Russia arguably continued well into the Soviet era . Religious scholars such as Altizer have stated that nihilism must necessarily be understood in relation to religion, and that
10858-431: The new series. At the end of the novel And Another Thing... , Arthur Dent's extreme bad luck in life coupled with cosmic balance mean that as he materialises on a planet shortly before Vogons are due to destroy it, Agrajag wakes up from a coma after six months having won the lottery and been recognised by a long lost love whilst on "Celebrity Coma". This event presumably leads to cosmic balance ruining his other lives for
10980-521: The newly re-organized Guide offices in the novel Mostly Harmless . "Its motion sensors are the usual Sirius Cybernetics garbage." Ford captures Colin by trapping the robot with his towel and re-wiring the robot's pleasure circuits, inducing a cyber-ecstasy trip. Ford uses Colin's cheerfulness to break into the Guide's corporate accounting software in order to plant a Trojan Horse module that will automatically pay anything billed to his InfiniDim Enterprises credit card. Colin also saves Ford's life when
11102-481: The nineteenth century," and that Kierkegaard "opposed tendencies in mass culture to reduce the individual to a cipher of conformity and deference to the dominant opinion." In his day, tabloids (like the Danish magazine Corsaren ) and apostate Christianity were instruments of levelling and contributed to the "reflective apathetic age" of 19th-century Europe. Kierkegaard argues that individuals who can overcome
11224-434: The notion appears frequently throughout Nietzsche's work, he uses the term in a variety of ways, with different meanings and connotations. With regard to Nietzsche's development of thought, it has been noted in research that although he dealt with "nihilistic" themes from 1869 onwards ("pessimism, with nirvana and with nothingness and non-being" ), a conceptual use of nihilism occurred for the first time in handwritten notes in
11346-568: The notion of " God is dead " as the "reality of the Will to Power." Heidegger also praises Jünger for defending Nietzsche against a too biological or anthropological reading during the Nazi era . Heidegger's interpretation of Nietzsche influenced a number of important postmodernist thinkers. Gianni Vattimo points at a back-and-forth movement in European thought, between Nietzsche and Heidegger. During
11468-410: The novel And Another Thing... . Author of Time Traveller's Handbook of 1001 Tense Formations which is handy for those travelling through time, and especially to Milliways . His guide is more complete than The Guide itself, which ignores the time travel tense topic – other than pointing out that the term 'future perfect' has been abandoned since it was discovered not to be. He is also mentioned in
11590-455: The novel The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy , in episode 1 of the TV series , and the film, Ford and Arthur quickly down three pints each – at lunchtime – to calm their muscles before using the teleport to escape on the Vogon ship. Being told the world is about to end he calls "last orders, please." The Red Lion Inn at Chelwood Gate , East Sussex, was used during the TV series, and referenced in
11712-515: The novel Mostly Harmless , and in the radio series he was played by Andrew Secombe . Crew member on the Vogon ship commanded by Prostetnic Vogon Jeltz , and Jeltz's son. Notable for his very un-Vogon-like emotions, ethics and agility, all of which he attempts to keep hidden (with varying degrees of success) from his father and crewmates, lest he be demoted to more unpleasant (even for a Vogon) duties or killed outright for aberrant behavior. Appears in
11834-553: The only crew of an Arcturan Megafreighter carrying a larger number of copies of Playbeing magazine than the mind can comfortably conceive. They brought Zaphod Beeblebrox to Ursa Minor Beta, after he had escaped from the Haggunenon flagship. Zaphod was let on board by the Number One, who was cynical about the Guide's editors becoming soft. He admired the fact that Zaphod was "hitching the hard way" . They only appear in Fit
11956-402: The other hand destroys to level the field for constructing something new. This form of nihilism is characterized by Nietzsche as "a sign of strength," a willful destruction of the old values to wipe the slate clean and lay down one's own beliefs and interpretations, contrary to the passive nihilism that resigns itself with the decomposition of the old values. This willful destruction of values and
12078-538: The other hand, Vattimo judges Heidegger's intentions authentic enough to keep pursuing them. Philosophers who Vattimo exemplifies as a part of this back and forth movement are French philosophers Deleuze , Foucault and Derrida . Italian philosophers of this same movement are Cacciari , Severino and himself. Jürgen Habermas , Jean-François Lyotard and Richard Rorty are also philosophers who are influenced by Heidegger's interpretation of Nietzsche. Gilles Deleuze 's interpretation of Nietzsche's concept of nihilism
12200-419: The overcoming of the condition of nihilism by the constructing of new meaning, this active nihilism, could be related to what Nietzsche elsewhere calls a free spirit or the Übermensch from Thus Spoke Zarathustra and The Antichrist , the model of the strong individual who posits his own values and lives his life as if it were his own work of art. It may be questioned, though, whether "active nihilism"
12322-405: The pathos of 'in vain' is the nihilists' pathos – at the same time, as pathos, an inconsistency on the part of the nihilists. Nietzsche's relation to the problem of nihilism is a complex one. He approaches the problem of nihilism as deeply personal, stating that this predicament of the modern world is a problem that has "become conscious" in him. According to Nietzsche, it is only when nihilism
12444-553: The period surrounding the French Revolution , the term was also a pejorative for certain value-destructive trends of modernity , namely the negation of Christianity and European tradition in general. Nihilism first entered philosophical study within a discourse surrounding Kantian and post-Kantian philosophies, notably appearing in the writings of Swiss esotericist Jacob Hermann Obereit in 1787 and German philosopher Friedrich Heinrich Jacobi in 1799. As early as 1824,
12566-604: The phrase "You just don't get it, do you?"). IBM 's chess -playing computer Deep Thought was named in honour of this fictional computer. Deep Thought can be seen inscribed on a computer in the NORAD VI area of the 1992 computer game The Journeyman Project . Dionah appears in And Another Thing... by Eoin Colfer . Dionah is one of Zaphod Beeblebrox 's favorite singer/prostitutes. She appears out of nowhere in
12688-426: The possibility of knowledge or communication, and asserted the ultimate meaninglessness or purposelessness of life or of the universe". The term Dada was first used by Richard Huelsenbeck and Tristan Tzara in 1916. The movement, which lasted from approximately 1916 to 1923, arose during World War I, an event that influenced the artists. The Dada Movement began in the old town of Zürich, Switzerland —known as
12810-488: The present time, negation is the most useful of all". Despite Turgenev's own anti-nihilistic leanings, many of his readers likewise took up the name of nihilist , thus ascribing the Russian nihilist movement its name. Nihilism was further discussed by German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche , who used the term to describe the Western world 's disintegration of traditional morality. For Nietzsche, nihilism applied to both
12932-453: The rejection of all social and political institutions ( § Political nihilism ), the stance that no knowledge can or does exist ( § Epistemological nihilism ), and a number of metaphysical positions, which assert that non-abstract objects do not exist ( § Metaphysical nihilism ), that composite objects do not exist ( § Mereological nihilism ), or even that life itself does not exist. The etymological origin of nihilism
13054-524: The series follows the adventures of Arthur Dent and his interactions with Ford Prefect, Zaphod Beeblebrox, Marvin the Paranoid Android, and Trillian. Arthur Philip Dent , accompanied by Ford Prefect, barely escapes the Earth's destruction when it is demolished to make way for a hyperspace bypass. Arthur spends the next several years, still wearing his dressing gown, helplessly launched from crisis to crisis while trying to straighten out his lifestyle. He rather enjoys tea, but seems to have trouble obtaining it in
13176-406: The statement that "we killed him", is similar to the self -dissolution of Christian doctrine: due to the advances of the sciences, which for Nietzsche show that man is the product of evolution , that Earth has no special place among the stars and that history is not progressive , the Christian notion of God can no longer serve as a basis for a morality. One such reaction to the loss of meaning
13298-570: The study of core elements of its character requires fundamentally theological consideration. The concept of nihilism was discussed by the Buddha (563 BC to 483 BC), as recorded in the Theravada and Mahayana Tripiṭaka . The Tripiṭaka , originally written in Pali , refers to nihilism as natthikavāda and the nihilist view as micchādiṭṭhi . Various sutras within it describe a multiplicity of views held by different sects of ascetics while
13420-420: The term began to take on a social connotation with German journalist Joseph von Görres attributing it to a negation of existing social and political institutions. The Russian form of the word, nigilizm ( Russian : нигилизм ), entered publication in 1829 when Nikolai Nadezhdin used it synonymously with skepticism . In Russian journalism the word continued to have significant social connotations. From
13542-464: The third radio series, which gives many examples of his tense forms. Deep Thought is a computer that was created by a pan-dimensional, hyper-intelligent species of beings (whose three-dimensional protrusions into our universe are ordinary white mice) to come up with the Answer to The Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe, and Everything . Deep Thought is the size of a small city. When, after seven and
13664-477: The time of Jacobi, the term almost fell completely out of use throughout Europe until it was revived by Russian author Ivan Turgenev , who brought the word into popular use with his 1862 novel Fathers and Sons , leading many scholars to believe he coined the term. The nihilist characters of the novel define themselves as those who "deny everything ", who do "not take any principle on faith, whatever reverence that principle may be enshrined in", and who regard "at
13786-446: The time period recounted in the novel The Restaurant at the End of the Universe ) who was killed by Arthur for breakfast and whose skin was fashioned into the pouch Arthur is still carrying, which is then used to swat a fly who also happened to be Agrajag. In yet another, near the beginning of the novel Life, the Universe and Everything , Agrajag is an old man who dies of a heart attack after seeing Arthur and Ford materialise, seated on
13908-547: The true story of Zaphod's visit to the Frogstar, waiting for "the right price." She is referenced in Fit the Eighth of the radio series. As their names were written to suggest, every Allitnil is an anti-clone of a Lintilla . They were created by the cloning company to eliminate the billions of cloned Lintillas flooding out of a malfunctioning cloning machine. Being anti-clones, when an Allitnil comes into physical contact with
14030-480: The two major currents of discourse on nihilism prior to the 20th century. The term likely entered English from either the German Nihilismus , Late Latin nihilismus , or French nihilisme . Early examples of the term's use are found in German publications. In 1733, German writer Friedrich Leberecht Goetz used it as a literary term in combination with noism ( German : Neinismus ). In
14152-489: The unhelpful "What do you get when you multiply six by nine?" which does not match the answer (except in base-13). The caveman appears in Fit the Sixth of the radio series played by David Jason , the novel The Restaurant at the End of the Universe , and episode 6 of the TV series . Colin (a.k.a. part #223219B) is a small, round, melon-sized, flying security robot which Ford Prefect enslaves to aid in his escape from
14274-513: The world. This mowing away of all value in the world is characteristic of the nihilist, although in this, the nihilist appears inconsistent: this "will to nothingness" is still a form of valuation or willing. He describes this as "an inconsistency on the part of the nihilists": A nihilist is a man who judges of the world as it is that it ought not to be, and of the world as it ought to be that it does not exist. According to this view, our existence (action, suffering, willing, feeling) has no meaning:
14396-498: Was a woman, on the brink of retirement, on whose behalf a raffle was being held in order to buy her a kidney machine. An unnamed woman (played by June Whitfield on the radio) convinces Arthur Dent to buy raffle tickets while he and Fenchurch are in a railway pub, attempting to have lunch. Arthur won an album of bagpipe music. She is referred to in the novel So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish The captain and first officer were
14518-539: Was giving lectures on Nietzsche's thought. Given the importance of Nietzsche's contribution to the topic of nihilism, Heidegger's influential interpretation of Nietzsche is important for the historical development of the term nihilism . Heidegger's method of researching and teaching Nietzsche is explicitly his own. He does not specifically try to present Nietzsche as Nietzsche. He rather tries to incorporate Nietzsche's thoughts into his own philosophical system of Being, Time and Dasein . In his Nihilism as Determined by
14640-508: Was named Professor of Neomathematics at the University of Maximegalon and in his Special Theories of Tax Returns he proves that space-time is "not merely curved, it is, in fact, totally bent." The Guide shows a graphic indicating that most of the earnings ends up with the accountant. Nihilism In philosophy , nihilism ( / ˈ n aɪ ( h ) ɪ l ɪ z əm , ˈ n iː -/ ; from Latin nihil 'nothing')
14762-420: Was popularized by Ivan Turgenev and more specifically by his character Bazarov in the novel Fathers and Sons . Scholars of nihilism may regard it as merely a label that has been applied to various separate philosophies, or as a distinct historical concept arising out of nominalism , skepticism , and philosophical pessimism , as well as possibly out of Christianity itself. Contemporary understanding of
14884-497: Was tasked with creating an army of super-soldiers to fight them. Instead, he created (among other things) a remarkable new breed of superfly that could distinguish between solid glass and an open window, and also an off-switch for children. Fortunately, because the invaders were only invading because they couldn't cope with things back home, they too were impressed with Blart's creations, and a flurry of economic treaties rapidly secured peace. The strong silent type, an unnamed bodyguard
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