nihilism

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Dancing with Absurdity
Fred Leavitt argues that our most cherished beliefs are probably wrong.

Empiricists don’t insist that we see the world with total accuracy. They acknowledge the occurrence of hallucinations and sensory illusions; but they say that hallucinations are rare, and that illusions play a trivial role in daily life. They conclude that sensory data are generally accurate.

Again, what is of particular importance to me here is this: that when it comes to what we see and hear and touch and smell and taste, it is often possible to actually demonstrate it to others. Such that they will see and hear and touch and smell and taste the same thing. No "dancing with absurdity" then.

Moreover, empiricists Gilbert Ryle and John Austin argued that our ability to detect illusions is evidence for the general trustworthiness of our senses. That is, from the fact that imperfections are infrequently detected, they made the dubious inferences that imperfections are rare and perceptions are typically accurate.

Indeed. And we live our lives from day to day hardly ever mistrusting our senses.

Nope, the dancing with absurdity part only kicks in [time and again] when we get around to conflicting value judgments.

Yet reliable estimation of the frequency of illusions and hallucinations is impossible. You may be experiencing one this very moment and not know it.

And we all know how far this can be taken...if only [so far] up on the silver screen:

Pick one:
1] red pill
2] blue pill

But then, even in the either/or world, things can get...complicated?

Furthermore, even if our sensory systems were perfect, we’d still face two insurmountable obstacles to certainty. First, the fidelity of human memory is, to put it charitably, considerably less than high. Second, an infinite number of interpretations are compatible with any given perception.

I don't know about infinite, but any number of true crime docs reveal just how notorious "eyewitnesses" can be:

"Studies have shown that mistaken eyewitness testimony accounts for about half of all wrongful convictions. Researchers at Ohio State University examined hundreds of wrongful convictions and determined that roughly 52 percent of the errors resulted from eyewitness mistakes." Constitutional Rights Foundation

And here life and death itself can be at stake.

Maybe it’s churlish to point out yet another problem, but, strictly speaking, empiricism is self-refuting – the claim that all knowledge is gained through the senses is a claim not gained through the senses.

True enough. But until mere mortals acquire the capacity to become omniscient, there's no getting around at least trying to make the best of them. And that's why, in regard to things like crime, eyewitnesses are just one component of any particular case. There is also forensic evidence, circumstantial evidence and [of course] the fact that nowadays there are billions of cameras everywhere.

[iambiguous]

Dancing with Absurdity
Fred Leavitt argues that our most cherished beliefs are probably wrong.

We can never be certain or even mildly confident of the feelings or intentions of others.

Also, in my view, even in regard to our own feelings and intentions, what we imagine is true about our moral and political convictions are instead merely reflections of dasein. In particular, the manner in which the Benjamin Button Syndrome all but insures that there will be any number of variables in our life -- crucial variables -- that we only have so much understanding and control over.

Polygraph expert Leonard Saxe said, “We couldn’t get through the day without being deceptive.” Daniel Ariely and colleagues analyzed several data sets – from insurance claims to employment histories to the treatment records of doctors and dentists. They concluded that almost everybody lies.

Pick one:
1] genes
2] memes
3] a hopelessly complex and convoluted intertwining of both

Note to the Kantians here:

You might want to rethink your own moral philosophy.

Now back to my point...

Self-deception is also very common. Any form of information about anything may be incorrect because of unintentional error, misguided theory, or deliberate deception.

Or, in being fractured and fragmented, you can't quite anchor your self to an objective truth that may well not even exist. If only in regard to value judgments.

Our world of used-car salesmen, pyramid schemes and politicians gives good reason for generalized suspicion. We are constantly fed inaccurate and misleading information.

Here, of course, the reality of capitalism as a political economy comes into play. When, for many, everything revolves around "me, myself and I", almost anything can be rationalized to further your own aims.

And, no, not just in regard to the sociopaths.

[iambiguous]

Dancing with Absurdity
Fred Leavitt argues that our most cherished beliefs are probably wrong.

We are constantly fed inaccurate and misleading information. My book Dancing With Absurdity gives dozens of examples from personal, historic, journalistic, governmental, corporate, and scientific sources.

That's why it's all the more important, in my view, for philosophers and scientists -- working in tandem where possible -- to note that crucial distinction between wrong information that can in fact be corrected [in the either/or world] and information that is deemed wrong given the fact that [in the is/ought world] it is interpreted by different people given further the manner in which dasein predisposes all of us to accept one set of premises regarding human interactions rather than another.

This part:

One starts out with a particular set of assumptions regarding the "human condition", regarding "human nature":

1] that it is more in sync with capitalism than socialism
2] that it is more in sync with "I" than "we"
3] that it is more in sync with genes than memes
4] that it is more in sync with God than No God
5] that it is more in sync with idealism than pragmatism
6] that it is more in sync with autonomy than determinism

And on and on and on given all of the different ways we can distinguish ourselves from others.

Nor do observations tell us about any underlying reality.

Okay, but how far back are you willing to go? Clearly, some observations encompass realities that appear considerably closer to revealing an underlying truth than others. If for example the observations are derived from mathematics or physics or chemistry or biology or one of the other "hard sciences", it allows us to communicate them in a manner that most of us would construe to be the "objective truth". It's just that, say, given Hume's distinction between correlation and cause and effect, the further back we go in grappling with the existence of existence itself the more ineffable reality becomes.

Cue the philosophers...

Friedrich Nietzsche wrote that we can get no closer to reality than our own sense experience, and have no way of evaluating its correspondence with the real world. Immanuel Kant distinguished between noumena and phenomena. He called external reality the noumena. But we perceive only phenomena – the appearances – since all our knowledge is filtered through our mental faculties.

On the other hand, one of them had God to fall back on in order to tie everything together ontologically and teleologically.

And the other didn't.

[iambiguous]

Dancing with Absurdity
Fred Leavitt argues that our most cherished beliefs are probably wrong.

Science

Reasoning and sensory data come together in the leading modern contender for establishing certain knowledge: science. Our ancestors lived in a world of unpredictable famines, floods, plagues, and saber-toothed tigers. To explain such events, the more imaginative among them constructed rich cosmologies of gods, demons and other supernatural forces.

In other words, way back then why not attribute what you don't understand to "the Gods"? After all, it wasn't like there actually were scientists around then to explain things better. Now, of course, that isn't an option. On the other hand, science doesn't have the option to provide us with objective morality. Let alone immortality and salvation.

"Certain knowledge" there is still the domain of a God, the God. Of religion. "Certain knowledge" in the sense that if you claim to know something is certain about them, that actually counts as "proof" among the various flocks of sheep.

A few individuals noticed that some phenomena occur in recurring patterns. These primitive scientists measured, experimented, and theorized. Their intellectual descendants made science the preferred method for advancing knowledge. The scientific method is the most powerful method ever developed for studying the properties of the world. Science is empiricism in its most sophisticated form.

And why wouldn't it be? With science comes the capacity to demonstrate that what you claim to know about something is in fact objectively true for all of us. And isn't that why, by and large, science steers clear of the is/ought world...of God and religion?

That certainly seems reasonable to me.

Shakespeare, Dostoevsky, Freud, and others may have probed deeper into the human condition; but science has dramatically changed how people live.

Folks like them delved into those aspects of the human condition that precipitate all of the drama in our lives. The parts we cannot seem to pin down because there is no equivalent of the scientific method in regard to value judgments. People claim to believe all sorts of completely contradictory things about "good" and "evil". And since no one side has access to "natural laws" there, merely the belief itself need be as far as they go.

Still...

Yet there are reasons to be wary about scientific studies. Errors are common, and there have been cases of scientific fraud, perpetrated by both mediocre and eminent scientists. More importantly, science is always a work in progress, its conclusions open to later challenge and revision, rather than being claims of certainty.

That's not the point though, is it? With science, one way or another, the objective truth is within reach. It has to actually be in sync with the laws of nature. Darwin's theory of evolution may or may not reflect the whole truth regarding biological life here on planet Earth. But it starts with the assumption there is a whole truth that can be grasped regarding why we exist at all.

Science doesn't skip right to God.

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Dancing with Absurdity
Fred Leavitt argues that our most cherished beliefs are probably wrong.

...many philosophers claim that the scientific approach is thoroughly flawed. Consider two syllogisms:

1. Theory T predicts that, under carefully specified conditions, outcome O will occur. I arrange for these conditions, and O occurs. Therefore, I have proven theory T.

2. Theory T predicts that, under carefully specified conditions, outcome O will occur. I arrange for the conditions, but fail to obtain the predicted outcome. Therefore, I have disproven T.

Come on, what theory in regard to what carefully specified conditions resulting in what outcome?

After all, in regard to the either/or world, how often is science "dancing with absurdity?"

And it's not for nothing that many -- most -- scientists tend to steer clear of conflicting goods. For instance, there are those scientists employed by NASA to sustain the space program. But how many of them become preoccupied with whether it is moral to spend billions on space exploration when there are so many programs that money could be spent on to ease human suffering right down here on Earth?

The second syllogism is valid. If the premises are true, the conclusion must also be true. The first syllogism is invalid. Counterexamples are easy to imagine. For example, a prediction O from the hypothesis T that ‘Unicorns run around at night in Golden Gate Park’ is that animal droppings will be found in the park in the morning. But finding animal droppings in the morning would prove nothing about unicorns. Yet this invalid syllogism form is the basis of much scientific reasoning; and of much of everyday reasoning too.

More to the point [mine] once this all shifts away from unicorns into the realm of value judgements, how exactly would ethicists go about creating and then sustaining "carefully specified conditions" in regard to, say, the morality of abortion?

In other words, something that is not in the least bit theoretical.

[iambiguous]

Dancing with Absurdity
Fred Leavitt argues that our most cherished beliefs are probably wrong.

Probability

Without some certainty to rest on, probability cannot be meaningfully assessed. But we assess probability by using ideas that themselves only have a probability relative to further ideas. For instance, in calculating the probability of getting two sixes on a roll of dice, some of the many things that are assumed are that (a) the dice are fair; (b) the roll is fair; (c) the numbers that come up on the two dice are independent of each other; (d) the probability of two independent events occurring simultaneously is the product of their independent probabilities. If any of the assumptions are wrong, so is the final probability.

Of course, in exploring probability here the example given is something from the either/or world. You roll the dice and it is what it is. The laws of physics take over, the dice tumble about and either two sixes is the result or it's not. Providing there is no cheating going on. But what is the probability that you can throw the dice and double sixes come up 10 times in a row. Or a hundred times in row? You can't completely rule it out...or can you?

What is the probability that your next door neighbor or close friend – who you’ve had over for dinner, who has baby-sat your children, who was maid of honor/best man at your wedding – is a serial killer? Al Qaeda terrorist? Participant in a witness protection program? Of the other gender from what you believe? CIA spy? Polygamist? Embezzler?

Again, though, the neighbor either is or is not one of these things. We only "dance with absurdity" when the discussion shifts to whether the neighbor ought to be any of those things. Is it rational or irrational, moral or immoral to be one of them?

You may say “Zero”, but people just like you have been stunned to find out otherwise. The best spies do not look like Sean Connery in his prime, bench press five hundred pounds, and drink double martinis, shaken, not stirred.

Try this...

Spend a few months watching true crime docs like Dateline. Over and again people like you and I are stunned to discover what those they loved are capable of. But, again, people are what they are. The quandaries always revolve instead around why they became that way and why and how, from their own frame of mind, they are able to justify what they do. It doesn't seem absurd at all to them.

[iambiguous]

Dancing with Absurdity
Fred Leavitt argues that our most cherished beliefs are probably wrong.

The nearest star to our sun is about twenty-four trillion miles away. Our Milky Way galaxy has hundreds of billions of stars, some of them thousands of times larger than the sun. A computer simulation estimated five hundred billion galaxies. The prestigious scientific journal Nature published a study suggesting that there are about three hundred sextillion (3 x 1023) stars in the universe. The speed of light is a little over 186,000 miles per second, so light can travel from the Earth to the Moon in about 1.3 seconds. Yet a beam of light would take about twenty-seven billion years to travel from one end to the other of the known universe (and that’s not factoring in universal expansion).

Now, when you try to factor your own life into all of this, how can you not experience a feeling of "dancing with absurdity"? And even when you include all the rest of us in order to encompass the "human condition" itself, how is that to be understand given, say, the existence of a multiverse?

Go out far enough and...

Some people may conceive of a universe infinite in size and duration, or with equal ease imagine a universe with boundaries. Both strike me as wildly improbable, yet I can’t even conceive of a third alternative.

And, of course, what you "conceive" about the universe may bear absolutely no resemblance at all to what it really is. With or without God. Some perspectives here are just considerably more improbable than others.

With that in mind, the leap from our infinitesimally tiny part of the universe to claims about eternal and universal laws seems preposterous. How can anyone consider these numbers and continue to believe that earthlings have discovered universal laws?

That's my point as well. Objectivism being a manifestation of human psychology far, far more than encompassing a philosophical assessment. It's just that we do live in a world where any number of things can be grasped and then communicated as essential truths applicable to all of us.

So, why not everything?

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Symbolism, Meaning & Nihilism in Quentin Tarantino’s Pulp Fiction
Mark Conard reveals the metaphysical truths lurking under the rug in Tarantino’s cult classic.

Nihilism is a term which describes the loss of value and meaning in people’s lives.

Back again to the distinction between essential value and meaning and existential value and meaning. One way or another our experiences and our relationships with others have value and meaning. Where things can become increasingly more problematic, however, is when, given a particular context, we attempt to communicate that value and meaning to others. In some situations the attempts are all but effortless. And in others all but hopeless.

And for many, of course, that comes down to God and religion.

When Nietzsche proclaimed that “God is dead,” he meant that Judeo-Christianity has been lost as a guiding force in our lives, and there is nothing to replace it. Once we ceased really to believe in the myth at the heart of Judeo-Christian religion, which happened after the scientific revolution, Judeo-Christian morality lost its character as a binding code by which to live one’s life. Given the centrality of religion in our lives for thousands of years, once this moral code is lost and not replaced, we are faced with the abyss of nihilism: darkness closes in on us, and nothing is of any real value any more; there is no real meaning in our lives, and to conduct oneself and one’s life in one way is just as good as another, for there is no over-arching criterion by which to make such judgments.

On the contrary, there lots and lots and lots of "guiding forces" available to choose from for mere mortals in a No God world. One of these...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_p ... ideologies
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_s ... philosophy

...for example.

Or "think up" a new one. After all, if you can convince yourself that it's essentially valuable and meaningful that need be as far as it goes. And, besides, it's not like the "scientific revolution" is applicable when it comes to morality, immortality and salvation.

Quentin Tarantino’s Pulp Fiction is an odd film. It’s a seemingly complete narrative which has been chopped into vignettes and rearranged like a puzzle. It’s a gangster film in which not a single policeman is to be found. It’s a montage of bizarre characters, from a black mobster with a mysterious bandage on the back of his bald head, to hillbilly sexual perverts; from henchmen dressed in black suits whose conversations concern what fast food items are called in Europe to a mob problem-solver who attends dinner parties early in the morning dressed in a full tuxedo. So, what is the film about? In general, we can say that the film is about American nihilism.

Well, we don't call it "pulp fiction"....

"...books about imaginary characters and events, produced in large quantities and intended to be read by many people but not considered to be of very good quality..." cambridge dictionary

...for nothing.

It's just that some of the books become pulp movies.

Then the part where each of us will react to Quentin Tarantino’s film given what I construe to be the existential parameters of dasein. We take out of the film what we first bring into it: our own moral and political prejudices, our own philosophy of life. The characters in the film are simply "larger than life" in the sense that most of us live lives far, far removed from that of gangsters.

[iambiguous]

Symbolism, Meaning & Nihilism in Quentin Tarantino’s Pulp Fiction
Mark Conard reveals the metaphysical truths lurking under the rug in Tarantino’s cult classic.

As I said, in general, the film is about American nihilism. More specifically, it is about the transformation of two characters: Jules (Samuel L. Jackson) and Butch (Bruce Willis). In the beginning of the film, Vincent (John Travolta) has retumed from a stay in Amsterdam, and the content of the conversation between Jules and Vincent concerns what Big Macs and Quarter Pounders are called in Europe, the Fonz on Happy Days, Arnold the Pig on Green Acres, the pop band Flock of Seagulls, Caine from Kung Fu, tv pilots, etc.

Still, as others grasp nihilism, any transformation from one frame of mind to another [morally and politically and trivially] is essentially interchangeable. It's the moral and political and trivial prejudices rooted existentially in dasein and the Benjamin Button Syndrome themselves that come to play the crucial role here. To argue that these transformations are for the better or for the worse is no less problematic in a No God world.

Then the reality of sociopathic personalities come into play in turn. Those in the film who do what they do because [as narcissists] doing only what they want to do is the center of the moral universe as far as they are concerned. Might makes right. End of story.

Then this part...

These kinds of silly references seem upon first glance like a kind of comic relief, set against the violence that we’re witnessing on the screen. But this is no mere comic relief. The point is that this is the way these characters make sense out of their lives: transient, pop cultural symbols and icons.

In other words, we life in a world where, increasingly, pop culture, mindless consumption and the worship of celebrity become the main focus for millions. They are less interested in how the world is unfolding morally and politically and more intrigued with how Taylor and Travis will turn out, or who wins what on countless reality and game shows.

The "bread and circuses syndrome" let's call it.

In another time and/or another place people would be connected by something they saw as larger than themselves, most particularly religion, which would provide the sense and meaning that their lives had and which would determine the value of things. This is missing in late 20th Century America, and is thus completely absent from Jules’ and Vincent’s lives.

The postmodern/late capitalist world of "lifestyles". Being a gangster is merely that which, existentially, your own uniquely personal experiences have led you to. And, more to the point [mine], the last place you'll turn to for explanations is...a philosophy forum? Pop culture and all the things that, in being a "goodfellow", money can buy need be as far as you go...teleologically?

[iambiguous]

Symbolism, Meaning & Nihilism in Quentin Tarantino’s Pulp Fiction
Mark Conard reveals the metaphysical truths lurking under the rug in Tarantino’s cult classic.

The pop cultural symbols are set into stark relief against a certain passage from the Old Testament, Ezekiel 25:17 (actually, largely composed by Tarantino himself):

"The path of the righteous man is beset on all sides by the iniquities of the selfish and the tyranny of evil men. Blessed is he, who in the name of charity and good will, shepherds the weak through the valley of darkness, for he is truly his brother’s keeper and the finder of lost children.

And I will strike down upon thee with great vengeance and furious anger those who attempt to poison and destroy my brothers. And you will know my name is The Lord when I lay my vengeance upon thee."

Jules and Vincent. Vicious, amoral gangsters. Marsellus Wallace's bought and paid for thugs...quoting the Bible? Even if only Tarantino's spin on it.

On the other hand, Ezekiel is from the Old Testamnet. And there, God is pretty much a gangster Himself.

The context...

Jules quotes this just before he kills someone. The point is that the passage refers to a system of values and meaning by which one could lead one’s life and make moral decisions. However, that system is missing from Jules’ life and so the passage becomes meaningless to him.

Okay, so what's the point in spouting it? An exercise in irony? But, given just how appalling the modern world we live in can be -- anything goes? -- making this contrast is clearly something that lots and lots of movies, books, music and the arts get around to.

So, if not God and religion...then what?

Late in the film he tells us: “I’ve been saying that shit for years, and if you heard it – that meant your ass. I never gave much thought to what it meant – I just thought it was some cold-blooded shit to say to a motherfucker before I popped a cap in his ass.”

Only now he is convinced he was miraculously saved and has decided to quit the business. Not that he still won't be a "bad motherfucker".

As for how others here connect the dots between thugs, gangsters, religion and nihilism, well, probably not the same way that I do.

[iambiguous]

Symbolism, Meaning & Nihilism in Quentin Tarantino’s Pulp Fiction
Mark Conard reveals the metaphysical truths lurking under the rug in Tarantino’s cult classic.

The absence of any kind of foundation for making value judgments, the lack of a larger meaning to their lives, creates a kind of vacuum in their existence which is filled with power.

Sociopaths let's call them. More or less powerful, they can make the lives of others living hells. And that's because in one sense they actually do have foundations for their own value judgments: me, myself and I.

Though some of them will subordinate their own lives to those who are all that more powerful still...

With no other criteria available to them by which to order their lives, they fall into a hierarchy of power, with Marsellus Wallace at the top and themselves as henchmen below. Things come to have value in their lives if Marsellus Wallace declares it to be so. What he wants done, they will do. What he wishes becomes valuable for them and thus becomes the guide for their actions at the moment, until the task is completed by whatever means necessary.

Ultimately however it's all about the Benjamins. Money becomes the center of the universe for gangsters because we live in a world where money basically is the center of the universe. A world in which it matters far, far more that you have the money than in how you came to get it. In that way, money begets nihilism in a world where nihilism itself revolves more around means than ends.

This is perfectly epitomized by the mysterious briefcase which Jules and Vincent are charged to return to Marsellus. It is mysterious because we never actually see what’s in it, but we do see people’s reactions to its obviously valuable contents. The question invariably arises: what’s in the briefcase? However, this is a trick question. The answer is really: it doesn’t matter. It makes no difference what’s in the briefcase. All that matters is that Marsellus wants it back, and thus the thing is endowed with worth.

And for the moral majority the whole point is to never get between that briefcase and Marcellus. And that's because for those like him, being reasonable is not an option. They may construe their own lives self-consciously as nihilistic, but for most of them philosophy has nothing to do with it. It's all about might makes right.

Think Henry Kissinger and the Bilderberg "gangsters".

lf Jules and Vincent did have an objective framework of value and meaning in their lives, they would be able to determine whether what was in the briefcase was ultimately of value, and they would be able to determine what actions were justified in retrieving it. In the absence of any such framework, the briefcase becomes of ultimate value in and of itself, precisely because Marsellus says so, and any and all actions required to procure it become justified (including, obviously, murder).

On the other hand, for some, having an "objective framework of value and meaning in their lives" can become just as disastrous for others. Think Adolph Hitler and the Nazis, for example. Or think the religious fanatics slaughtering thousands of innocent men, women and children in Israel and the Gaza Strip. The "actions" that they justify.

Are they nihilists?

[iambiguous]

Symbolism, Meaning & Nihilism in Quentin Tarantino’s Pulp Fiction
Mark Conard reveals the metaphysical truths lurking under the rug in Tarantino’s cult classic.

In addition to the pop iconography in the film, the discourse on language here concerns naming things. What is a Big Mac called? What is a Quarter Pounder called? What is a Whopper called? (Vincent doesn’t know; he didn’t go to Burger King.) When Ringo (Tim Roth) calls the waitress “garçon,” she informs him: “ ‘garçon’ means ‘boy.’ ” Also, when Butch’s girlfriend refers to his means of transportation as a “motorcycle,” he insists on correcting her: “It’s not a motorcycle, it’s a chopper.” And yet – and here’s the crux – when a lovely Hispanic cab driver asks Butch what his name means, he replies: “This is America, honey; our names don’t mean shit.” The point is clear: in the absence of any lasting, transcendent objective framework of value and meaning, our language no longer points to anything beyond itself.

What particular language used to describe or articulate or encompass what particular set of circumstances? After all, words that do reflect an objective reality applicable to us all encompass any number of things [interactions/relationships] that transcend mere subjective opinions. It's not like ordering a quarter-pounder in France is going to spark an international incident. Nihilism, for all practical purposes, is moot in regard to any number of things that are named. Sure, with different languages there may well be any number of communication breakdowns; but that doesn't make the Royale with Cheese any less a quarter-pounder.

To call something good or evil renders it so, given that there is no higher authority or criteria by which one might judge actions. Jules quotes the Bible before his executions, but he may as well be quoting the Fonz or Buddy Holly.

Well, if that is in fact how Quentin Tarantino himself intended the dialogue to be understood here. With gangsters however everything here revolves around might makes right. Marcellus gets to name things that Jules and Vincent and Butch are expected to abide by. Then Jules and Vicent get to name things that all of their own lackies are expected to abide by. Butch rejects the name game given to the fight by Marcellus but then through sheer luck [the script] they square things after their run in with a couple of other amoral sociopaths.

Of course, here, the script is what it is. For you and I, on the other hand, our own experiences with those able to enforce their own rendition of might makes right may not unfold at all as we'd like it to.

[iambiguous]

Symbolism, Meaning & Nihilism in Quentin Tarantino’s Pulp Fiction
Mark Conard reveals the metaphysical truths lurking under the rug in Tarantino’s cult classic.

I’ve been contrasting nihilism with religion as an objective framework or foundation of values and meaning, because that’s the comparison that Tarantino himself makes in the film.

Or, perhaps, even more so...Reservoir Dogs? But [in both films] I doubt the main characters involved would have gotten around to that very often. Instead, being sociopaths, morality was likely to be construed by them as entirely narcissistic. Maybe some of them would rationalize their behavior as more in sync with Nietzsche's Übermensch. They boldly exercised their own will to power over the spineless Last Men?

There are other objective systems of ethics, however. We might compare nihilism to Aristotelian ethics, for example. Aristotle says that things have natures or essences and that what is best for a thing is to ‘achieve’ or realize its essence'.

And in fact whatever helps a thing fulfill its nature in this way is by definition good.

Yes, and, here and now, that nature is said to revolve around any number of conflicting assessments:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_r ... traditions
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_p ... ideologies
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_s ... philosophy

And to what extent did Aristotle make a distinction between the either/or and the is/ought world? Between might makes right, right makes might and moderation, negotiation and compromise?

And then the part where he explains the nature of slavery and the nature of women. And how a God/the God or "the Gods" fit into or did not fit into it all.

Then [of course] the dictates of Reason...

Ducks are aquatic birds. Having webbed feet helps the duck to achieve its essence as a swimmer. Therefore, it’s good for the duck to have webbed feet. Human beings likewise have a nature which consists in a set of capacities, our abilities to do things. There are many things that we can do: play the piano, build things, walk and talk, etc. But the essentially human ability is our capacity for reason, since it is reason which separates us from all other living things. The highest good, or best life, for a human being, then, consists in realizing one’s capacities, most particularly the capacity for reason.

Okay, you embrace Aristotle's frame of mind here. So, given a moral conflagration of note, let's explore the capacity of mere mortals to reason their way to the optimal "golden mean" resolution. Whose rendition of the "highest good"?

Then back to the sociopaths...

This notion of the highest good, along with Aristotle’s conception of the virtues, which are states of character which enable a person to achieve his essence, add up to an objective ethical framework according to which one can weigh and assess the value and meaning of things, as well as weigh and assess the means one might use to procure those things. To repeat, this sort of a framework, whether based on religion or reason, is completely absent from Jules’ and Vincent’s lives. In its absence, pop culture is the source of the symbols and reference points by which the two communicate and understand one another; and without reason or a religious moral code to determine the value and meaning that things have in their lives, Marsellus Wallace dictates the value of things.

And if you were assigned the task of coming up with a philosophical argument most likely to bring these thugs over to the "good guys" side -- the side of the angels? -- what would it be?

[iambiguous]

Symbolism, Meaning & Nihilism in Quentin Tarantino’s Pulp Fiction
Mark Conard reveals the metaphysical truths lurking under the rug in Tarantino’s cult classic.

Pulp Fiction is in part about Jules’ transformation. When one of his targets shoots at him and Vincent from a short distance, empties the revolver, and misses completely, Jules interprets this as divine intervention. The importance of this is not that it really was divine intervention, but rather that the incident spurs Jules on to reflect on what is missing.

Yes, that's how it often works, alright. You go about the business of living your life. Day in and day out, week in and week out, month in and month out, year in and year out. As a gangster or not. Then out of the blue an experience unfolds that causes you to question things...to ponder really important assumptions that you had taken for granted.

On the other hand, different folks might come to conclude very different things are missing from their lives. And what they find to give their life new meaning may precipitate behaviors that precipitate calamitous consequences for others who get in the way of this new...meaning?

And suppose it had been Vincent instead. He finds himself born again only to be blown away by Butch.

It compels him to consider the Biblical passage that he’s been quoting for years without giving much thought to it. Jules begins to understand – however confusedly at first – that the passage he quotes refers to an objective framework of value and meaning that is absent from his life.

Right.

And, for him, this new framework is...Christianity? As though it might not have been one of the many other One True Paths to enlightenment. My point always being that it matters less what the "objective framework of value and meaning" actually is -- God or No God -- and more that you find one in which to anchor your own True Self in The Right Thing To Do.

We see the dawning of this kind of understanding when he reports to Vincent that he’s quitting the mob, and then (most significantly) when he repeats the passage to Ringo in the coffee shop and then interprets it. He says:

"I’ve been saying that shit for years, and if you heard it – that meant your ass. I never gave much thought to what it meant – I just thought it was some cold-blooded shit to say to a motherfucker before I popped a cap in his ass. But I saw some shit this morning that made me think twice. See, now I’m thinking, maybe it means: you’re the Evil Man, and I’m the Righteous Man, and Mr. 9mm here – he’s the Shepherd protecting my righteous ass in the valley of darkness. Or it could mean: you’re the Righteous Man, and I’m the Shepherd; and it’s the world that’s evil and selfish. Now, I’d like that, but that shit ain’t the truth. The truth is: you’re the Weak and I’m the Tyranny of Evil Men. But I’m trying Ringo, I’m trying real hard to be the Shepherd."

Okay, now imagine yourself in that restaurant hearing those words from Jules...given the life that you've lived and the meaning that you and others have come to sustain "in your head" for what could literally have been decades. In other words, you have your own Capital Letter words that you insist must be grasped as you grasp them. And if they don't coincide with Marcellus, with Jules...with Tarantino?

[iambiguous]

Nihilism & Philosophy by Gideon Barker
Roger Caldwell scrutinises philosophical revolutions.

The philosopher as nihilist is a destroyer of worlds, a revolutionary who comes to make us see with new eyes and radically change how we live.

Unless, of course, he or she is too "fractured and fragmented" to actually accomplish this. Destroying a world is one thing, suggesting something to put in its place another thing altogether. Nietzsche proposed the Übermensch exercising his "will to power" in a No God world. Whereas nihilists of my ilk are not able even to yank themselves up out of their own essentially meaningless and purposeless existence. Instead, they wait patiently [or impatiently] for godot, accumulating "distractions" and embracing a "whatever works" "philosophy of life".

The nihilist philosopher uses words, not bombs; but not simply to offer us new doctrines or facts. This is philosophy not as a matter for contemplation, but as something to be lived – and if we are to live in a new order, the old one must first be dismantled or destroyed.

Still, the nihilist is no less confronted with the exasperating dilemma that revolves around connecting the dots between words and worlds. Nihilism...theoretically?

Okay, the old world is dismantled. Then what?

To wit...

The question is, once the cobwebs and lies are swept away, what are we left with? Once all our old values and ways of life are gone, do we still have a world at all, and not chaos?

My point then being that each of us, given what can be very, very different lives, will come to accumulate our own rooted existentially in dasein antidote to chaos. One or another "my way or the highway" objectivist dogma that is then challenged by all of the other "my way or the highway" dogmatists.

I don't think it is a coincidence that around the globe today, authoritarians are on the march. More or less fascist in orientation. For example, the yearning to "make America great again" by taking the country back to the 1950s. Anything to keep those who are "one of them" -- the wrong color, the wrong gender, the wrong sexual orientation, the wrong religion -- marginalized.

It's just that some don't/won't stop there. They have their own rendition of "the final solution".