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Nihilist

   Also found in: Medical, Encyclopedia, Wikipedia, Hutchinson 0.04 sec.
ni·hil·ism  (n-lzm, n-)
n.
1. Philosophy
a. An extreme form of skepticism that denies all existence.
b. A doctrine holding that all values are baseless and that nothing can be known or communicated.
2. Rejection of all distinctions in moral or religious value and a willingness to repudiate all previous theories of morality or religious belief.
3. The belief that destruction of existing political or social institutions is necessary for future improvement.
4. also Nihilism A diffuse, revolutionary movement of mid 19th-century Russia that scorned authority and tradition and believed in reason, materialism, and radical change in society and government through terrorism and assassination.
5. Psychiatry A delusion, experienced in some mental disorders, that the world or one's mind, body, or self does not exist.

[Latin nihil, nothing; see ne in Indo-European roots + -ism.]

nihil·ist n.
nihil·istic adj.
nihil·isti·cal·ly adv.
ThesaurusLegend:  Synonyms Related Words Antonyms
Noun1.nihilist - someone who rejects all theories of morality or religious belief
nonreligious person - a person who does not manifest devotion to a deity
2.nihilist - an advocate of anarchism
radical - a person who has radical ideas or opinions


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Father was branded as a nihilist and an anarchist, and in one cartoon that was copied widely he was portrayed waving a red flag at the head of a mob of long-haired, wild-eyed men who bore in their hands torches, knives, and dynamite bombs.
Perhaps the word is misused, and he is better described as a nihilist, or an annihilist.
A Nihilist who rejects all authority, because he knows authority to be evil, and welcomes all pain, because through that he realises his personality, is a real Christian.
 
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