The notion of the Absurd contains the idea that there is no meaning to be found in the world beyond what meaning
we give to it. This meaninglessness also encompasses the amorality or "unfairness" of the world. This contrasts with
"karmic" ways of thinking in which "bad things don't happen to good people"; to the world, metaphorically speaking,
there is no such thing as a good person or a bad person; what happens happens, and it may just as well happen to a
"good" person as to a "bad" person.
Because of the world's absurdity, at any point in time, anything can happen to anyone, and a tragic event could
plummet someone into direct confrontation with the Absurd. The notion of the absurd has been prominent in
literature throughout history. Many of the literary works of Søren Kierkegaard, Franz Kafka, Fyodor Dostoyevsky,
Jean-Paul Sartre, and Albert Camus contain descriptions of people who encounter the absurdity of the world.
It is in relation to the concept of the devastating awareness of meaninglessness that Albert Camus claimed that "there
is only one truly serious philosophical problem, and that is suicide" in his The Myth of Sisyphus. Although
"prescriptions" against the possibly deleterious consequences of these kinds of encounters vary, from Kierkegaard's
religious "stage" to Camus' insistence on persevering in spite of absurdity, the concern with helping people avoid
living their lives in ways that put them in the perpetual danger of having everything meaningful break down is
common to most existentialist philosophers. The possibility of having everything meaningful break down poses a
threat of quietism, which is inherently against the existentialist philosophy. It has been said that the possibility of
suicide makes all humans existentialists
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