Nihilism And Cosmic Horror

Cosmic horror frequently gets associated with nihilism, as anything particularly grim is routinely mistaken for something nihilistic even though dark stories do not automatically imply that nothing actually matters.  The primary tenets of this subgenre include superhuman entities that can drive humans to madness upon discovery or telepathically bring them to desire an apocalyptic release of the entities, which are often imprisoned in another dimension or deep underground or underwater on Earth.  The creatures, some of which could be explicitly, strictly supernatural and some of which could be advanced aliens, represent how grand truths could be overpowering or terrifying.  The most renowned cosmic horror author, H.P. Lovecraft, identified with "cosmicism," which is very close to nihilism if it is not identical.  Still, only a certain type of cosmic horror either affirms nihilism in its fictional world or is conceived of by storytellers who believe in nihilism.

Consistent atheistic cosmic horror would always be inevitably nihilistic, even though Lovecraft's own atheism did not stop him from putting an uncaused cause called Azathoth at the center of the beings in his fictional universe, with Azathoth's dreams literally sustaining the existence of humans, the Old Ones, and the physical world alike.  I have never once seen this immense irony specifically brought up, yet it contradicts the very basis for Lovecraft's nihilism--not because theism automatically excludes nihilism, but because atheism is inherently nihilistic no matter what individual atheists or theists are willing to realize.  Lovecraft's cosmology is deeply theistic even if Azathoth, as the "blind" deity who slumbers and has no awareness of his incidental creations, is quite different from typical religious versions of the uncaused cause.

To understand why nihilism is not necessarily part of general cosmic horror, though, one has to of course know what the concept of nihilism is.  Nihilism is the idea that nothing has significance in the sense of objective value, not the idea that there are no truths (which refutes itself), that no truths are deep (which is easily disproven by deduction), or that various goals are futile, though some foolishly use the term to refer to multiple or all of these and switch the meaning from case to case.  An endeavor could be futile and yet still have objective meaning; there is no logical contradiction here.  Inversely, an endeavor or belief might have no futility in the sense that the goal can be accomplished, but absolutely nothing is existentially meaningful.  All of these are logically possible in themselves, and to think that one could know from mere perceptions and preferences if meaning does or does not exist is utter folly.  Only preferences, logical possibilities, what logically follows from various existentialist concepts, and the evidence in favor of an existentially charged worldview like Christianity can be known.

When it comes to cosmic horror, a story must only render awareness of or efforts to oppose the eldritch being(s) futile, but there is no inherent aspect of the story that automatically endorses or suggests nihilism, in part since futility and a lack of objective meaning are not even the same thing.  Neither the characters in the story nor the author need to believe in or flirt with nihilism for a cosmic horror story to remain authentic to its general subgenre.  If anything, absurdism is a better component of cosmic horror because then the themes and intentions of the author do not have to embrace anything that is an assumption, just an honest exploration of the fact that there is no way to prove whether or not anything is truly meaningful.  The insanity-inducing sight of Cthulhu and the potential of Azathoth to wake and destroy the very universe and all other minds besides his own work just as well or better with absurdist themes instead of nihilistic ones.

The epistemological dilemma over whether human existence has any objective meaning in spite of the presence of Azathoth and the lesser eldritch pseudo-gods (Azathoth himself is God), something that could not be verified or falsified, is no less valid an approach to cosmic horror than the assumed nihilism the subgenre is associated with.  The fact that something is temporary does not logically establish that it is therefore meaningless, after all, so even an eventual triumph of the eldritch beings over humanity would not prove that humanity's existence has no objective meaning.  An absurdist approach to cosmic horror is both fully compatible and free of philosophical errors, for nihilism is logically possible but unprovable, yet the absurdist stance that the possible existence of objective meaning is epistemologically unknowable because of human limitations is correct.