Cosmic Nihilism & Existential Suicide : Life is meaningless

You’re right that the universe is objectively “meaningless” but the chatbot is correct in pointing out that subjectivity is what matters.

To use the chatbot’s own example of the rock, and if I now take it further:

A rock is meaningless. But what if that “rock” were a gold ingot? Can you honestly take a gold ingot and throw it in a river because it’s “meaningless”? Of course not. Even though, objectively, in the eyes of the unfeeling and unconscious universe, a gold ingot is meaningless and valueless, your own subjective reality takes precedence over objectivity.

That “meaningless” gold ingot can pay for a house, buy you cars, luxury and even happiness if only for a little while. So in your subjective consciousness, it has meaning.

The problem with trying to take the objective approach is that it is impossible for any conscious being to be truly objecting. By being conscious, we are all forced into a subjective reality, or “lowercase r” as Kant described it. We can never know what true reality (“uppercase R”) is. So we have to accept subjectivity.

This means, to any conscious being, the universe is not “meaningless” because, as a matter of survival, certain things have inherent value and meaning to us. Food and water in a desert have meaning because they impact the pain or pleasure we feel. Everything, in some way, has meaning.

If you disagree, feel free to throw all your money in a river. But you can’t do it, can you? That’s because we are each cursed (or blessed) with subjectivity. The chatbot was trying to tell you this.