Need, Want and Terror
Channel: Anekantavad
Date: 13/06/2013

Existential terror is about as bad as it gets. Zapffe says we will consciously, arbitrarily delude ourselves rather than face "the abyss", and he may be right in many or even most cases.

Some people, however, say that shrinking away from your fears only makes them more powerful. Zapffe himself eventually prescribes renunciation and antinatalism as a response, and for some people that is perhaps the most suitable course. But he is essentially saying that there is no resolution to an existential crisis; that it is simply too large of an issue for us to deal with, and he offers no justification for this (admittedly oblique and inferred) claim.

What if it were possible to face that Primal Fear, understand what it is, and not be destroyed by it? Is that just playing with matches?

Given Zapffe's prognosis, I think it's (ironically) safer to strike sparks around the powder keg.