Re: Nihilism
Nihilism is the belief that existence has no fundamental value and all actions are meaningless. It's a pretty immature viewpoint imo. It can be a good way to break out of the belief system you're born into, but eventually turns into self-pitying narcissism. That existence has meaning is self-evident from a subjective viewpoint (which is all we have). The simple truth that you desire to live (proven by the fact that you are alive) lends meaning to your experience and thus to your existence.
Compassionate nihilism I see as a logical contradiction. If you don't believe in value, there's no way you can make a case that compassion is better than cruelty. You can't make a case than anything is better than anything else. The real model for "compassionate nihilism" is Buddhism, but it's not true nihilism.
By the way, when Nietzsche speaks of nihilism he uses it almost exclusively in a pejorative sense. Nietzsche, if he truly was a nihilist, wasn't at all happy to be one. He saw it as a deplorable state of affairs.
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