is the chaotic system which governs our lives based on competely chance.
Think about it. Because of the traffic jam or because your alarm clock doesn't be activated properly, you are late for your plane and it crashes or is hijacked by terrorists or whatever. how can this situation be explained?
you would be born in palestine or africa...
you would be born unhealthy or disable...or can be in the future...die early before you expect...
etc...etc..
your parents would by very rich...whatever...
That's God. Ä° guess pantheistic...
So, there is just statistics... asking ''why me?'' is meaningless.. Because this is statistics.
Quote from: SoldierofFortune on May 02, 2016, 07:07:30 PM
is the chaotic system which governs our lives based on competely chance.
Think about it. Because of the traffic jam or because your alarm clock doesn't be activated properly, you are late for your plane and it crashes or is hijacked by terrorists or whatever. how can this situation be explained?
you would be born in palestine or africa...
you would be born unhealthy or disable...or can be in the future...die early before you expect...
etc...etc..
your parents would by very rich...whatever...
That's God. Ä° guess pantheistic...
So, there is just statistics... asking ''why me?'' is meaningless.. Because this is statistics.
I agree--there is no inherent meaning to life. You can improve some chances for the better for yourself, but not all. Forrest is right--Shit happens!
Quote from: Mike Cl on May 02, 2016, 09:42:07 PM
I agree--there is no inherent meaning to life. You can improve some chances for the better for yourself, but not all. Forrest is right--Shit happens!
Human wants to play the God's role, to control and idealize their world. But often it is not possible. I'm not fatalist and try hard shaping what my will want to realize. Sometimes there are a lot of external factors, variables that you have to leave them to the hands of chances.. God give me serenity to accept the things that i cannot change : )
Quote from: SoldierofFortune on May 02, 2016, 10:31:50 PM
Human wants to play the God's role, to control and idealize their world. But often it is not possible. I'm not fatalist and try hard shaping what my will want to realize. Sometimes there are a lot of external factors, variables that you have to leave them to the hands of chances.. God give me serenity to accept the things that i cannot change : )
Well, either you give yourself that serenity or you won't have it. God has nothing to do with it.
Quote from: Mike Cl on May 02, 2016, 09:42:07 PM
I agree--there is no inherent meaning to life. You can improve some chances for the better for yourself, but not all. Forrest is right--Shit happens!
That's one of the great life lessons mum taught me growing up, shit happens, and we learn to deal with it. And coming from a woman who had to bury her 12 year old son, she knows the real meaning of learning to move on and live
Simple fact of the matter is, we live in the here and now, and the best we can do in life is make the best from it, that might mean working hard to achieve that, even doing things like uprooting ourselves, putting ourselves through years of education and hard work.
And then the old matter of chaos happening just messes it all up, we could develop cancer, or get hit by a car, or the opposite where we win a huge fortune, or meet the perfect someone.
Life's a series of events, and everyone has something different. Gods always just been an attempt by humankind to try and make sense of the chaos
Hopefully, we're moving towards a society that minimizes the risks and deals well with the unfortunate. We'll have to get to know our neighbors to facilitate this. Unfortunately, there is a trend of isolationism.
All those slasher movies were real, and your neighbors starred in them ;-(
Quote from: SoldierofFortune on May 02, 2016, 07:07:30 PM
is the chaotic system which governs our lives based on competely chance.
Think about it. Because of the traffic jam or because your alarm clock doesn't be activated properly, you are late for your plane and it crashes or is hijacked by terrorists or whatever. how can this situation be explained?
you would be born in palestine or africa...
you would be born unhealthy or disable...or can be in the future...die early before you expect...
etc...etc..
your parents would by very rich...whatever...
That's God. Ä° guess pantheistic...
So, there is just statistics... asking ''why me?'' is meaningless.. Because this is statistics.
Well we found another misanthropic, nihilsitic romantic. :lol:
Quote from: drunkenshoe on May 03, 2016, 01:08:33 PM
Well we found another misanthropic, nihilsitic romantic. :lol:
Well i don't know what misanthropy means in philosophical jargon, taking its literal meaning, i can't tag myself so. Maybe this is a point of wiev of a defence mechanism to avoid to feel pity for myself and not to regret from my past. I have an ego like everyone...So i find myself important. Someone who has an ego can't be an exact nihilist : ) But from cosmic perspective, i know i have no value, just a organic material loaded with an ego...
Quote from: SoldierofFortune on May 03, 2016, 01:58:29 PM
Well i don't know what misanthropy means in philosophical jargon, taking its literal meaning, i can't tag myself so. Maybe this is a point of wiev of a defence mechanism to avoid to feel pity for myself and not to regret from my past. I have an ego like everyone...So i find myself important. Someone who has an ego can't be an exact nihilist : ) But from cosmic perspective, i know i have no value, just a organic material loaded with an ego...
I quite agree that we have no intrinsic value. Nothing does. We, and it, has the value that we give it for ourselves. I fully realize that when I die, the universe will not care. There are a few who will be a bit sad I'm not around then, but the world and the universe doesn't give a rip................because it can't. I do enjoy living, and enjoy the things I do and the people and furry people I'm around, and so I give myself that as value. I live as I value my life; but I am fully aware that that is a subjective value. And I can live with that and really don't care what others value. These are all decisions you have to make for yourself.
On the bright side, we supply more nutrients to the world than a squirrel….so….there's that.
I see no good reason to use the word "[G]od" in reference to the universe or anything else that doesn't answer to the name/title. If it isn't God, why call it that?
Quote from: Unbeliever on May 03, 2016, 07:03:50 PM
I see no good reason to use the word "[G]od" in reference to the universe or anything else that doesn't answer to the name/title. If it isn't God, why call it that?
If you see the "whole" as impersonal, there is no reason. Also there is the baggage that goes with that ... that might be negative for a particular person.
If you see the "whole" as personal, then you are some kind of theist, as I am. It is the coercion that bothers me ... just because I had a salad and a baked potato for supper, is no reason for me to force everyone else to have the same thing.
I see nature as completely impersonal, having never experienced the mystic oneness of the transcendent All.
Quote from: Unbeliever on May 03, 2016, 07:26:10 PM
I see nature as completely impersonal, having never experienced the mystic oneness of the transcendent All.
Yeah, I'm with you on that. I've tried a couple of times to experience or find the All. Usually ended back at the grocery store to find and use All. It does smell nice.
I thought I had a mystic experience once, but it turned out to be just a really nice sunset.
In this way or that way, we are affected, can't be isolated...Actually we are a part of the whole...If you kick a stone when walking on a street, you affect the whole...as far as it's a little effect but there is that.
Being a living thing is a special behaivor style of the whole...
What does shape our mind? The experience by perceiving with our eyes which see, our nose which smell, etc...
Right...The nutrient of an apple from the grocery may have came from our faeces...So...?
Quote from: Unbeliever on May 03, 2016, 07:40:18 PM
I thought I had a mystic experience once, but it turned out to be just a really nice sunset.
I can remember at the height of my Unity experience, that I suggested to all that nature was a place to experience that inner peace and connection to the universe--the 'all'. Well, one day in the back yard, reality set in. A spider was wrapping up a fly, which was still alive--and would stay that way until the spider wanted to suck it dry. Not sure why it took me so long to see the realism of nature.
Quote from: SoldierofFortune on May 03, 2016, 07:49:15 PM
In this way or that way, we are affected, can't be isolated...Actually we are a part of the whole...If you kick a stone when walking on a street, you affect the whole...as far as it's a little effect but there is that.
Being a living thing is a special behaivor style of the whole...
What does shape our mind? The experience by perceiving with our eyes which see, our nose which smell, etc...
Right...The nutrient of an apple from the grocery may have came from our faeces...So...?
Yep--we are star stuff--and so is everything on this earth. In that way we are connected.
Quote from: SoldierofFortune on May 03, 2016, 07:49:15 PM
In this way or that way, we are affected, can't be isolated...Actually we are a part of the whole...If you kick a stone when walking on a street, you affect the whole...as far as it's a little effect but there is that.
Being a living thing is a special behaivor style of the whole...
What does shape our mind? The experience by perceiving with our eyes which see, our nose which smell, etc...
Right...The nutrient of an apple from the grocery may have came from our faeces...So...?
Being a part of something larger, gives a kick in the pants to reductionism. Reductionism can only be valid, if you ignore context. But approximation is usually good enough. Senses do stimulate the mind, but the mind also self-stimulates. With materialism, it is all context and no focus. With spiritualism it is all focus and no context.
"Being a living thing is a special behaivor style of the whole..." ... in theistic terms, being an image of G-d. We don't want to reflect badly, do we? ;-)
Quote from: Mike Cl on May 03, 2016, 07:53:40 PM
I can remember at the height of my Unity experience, that I suggested to all that nature was a place to experience that inner peace and connection to the universe--the 'all'. Well, one day in the back yard, reality set in. A spider was wrapping up a fly, which was still alive--and would stay that way until the spider wanted to suck it dry. Not sure why it took me so long to see the realism of nature.
That is what first stimulated the compassion of the Buddha ... creatures eating creatures, man destroying creatures when plowing the field. A Jain kind of idea.
Quote from: Baruch on May 04, 2016, 06:43:40 AM
That is what first stimulated the compassion of the Buddha ... creatures eating creatures, man destroying creatures when plowing the field. A Jain kind of idea.
I do feel the angst of Buddha. But I also know that in the scheme of things I can make no difference. Except that I can in the starfish sort of way. You must remember the old story of two people walking along a shore covered with starfish. One is stooping and grabbing starfish and flinging it back into the sea. The other tells him that that task is so big that it matters not; the flinger suggests that it matter a whole lot to that particular starfish. So, I render aid when I can, but try not to dwell on nature's lack of caring.
Quote from: Baruch on May 04, 2016, 06:41:32 AM
Being a part of something larger, gives a kick in the pants to reductionism. Reductionism can only be valid, if you ignore context.
Reductionism has its uses, but emergence is - well, emerging - as the new ball game in town. It seems that on different scales we have different organizing principles in effect, allowing - nay, demanding - that complexity arises.
Quote from: Unbeliever on May 05, 2016, 07:22:43 PM
Reductionism has its uses, but emergence is - well, emerging - as the new ball game in town. It seems that on different scales we have different organizing principles in effect, allowing - nay, demanding - that complexity arises.
Complexity is just another name for chaos and turbulence ... not cosmos of the Greeks. Differential entropy in space and time. Nature might not abhor a vacuum, but it does abhor simplicity and uniformity.