Life Sucks
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Life Sucks
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KdONBhx78mk
Video Summary
Life costs an enormously high price. It's very own design (of using pain to direct concern and attention, as well as life eating life) necessitates much suffering. The magnitude of suffering and horrors that have taken place on this planet over the billions of years, by nature and humans (animals), is of a grotesque size.
We (all life) are simply the product of a crude, deterministic universe. Life exists for no other purpose than to consume (/ satisfy desire) and reproduce - a useless (in and of itself) purpose. Just because this is the way nature is, doesn't make it acceptable or good. If life were to become extinct (like it was before the Earth / universe existed), there wouldn't be anything which is missing out. You can't deprive the non-existent of existence. Since they don't even exist, they can't miss out on existing.
Life is extremely costly and unnecessary. It's something we don't need to (and shouldn't) perpetuate.
Update: Added the following two arguments, 24 Oct 2011
The benatarian argument
1. Those who have never existed cannot be deprived.
2. The argument applies not only to humans but also to all other sentient beings.
3. To bring into existence someone who will suffer is to harm that
person, but to bring into existence someone who will have a good life is not to
benefit him or her.
4. Hence existence always constitutes a net harm.
5. Few of us would think it right to inflict severe suffering on an innocent child, even if that were the only way in which we could bring many other children into the world. Yet everyone will suffer to some extent, and if our species continues to reproduce, we can be sure that some future children will suffer severely.
6. Hence continued reproduction will harm some children severely, and benefit none. Sentient existence comes at a significant cost.
7. Benatar also argues that human lives are, in general, much less good than we think they are. We spend most of our lives with unfulfilled desires, and the occasional satisfactions that are all most of us can achieve are insufficient to outweigh these prolonged negative states. If we think that this is a tolerable state of affairs it is because we are, in Benatar’s view, victims of the illusion of pollyannaism. This illusion may have evolved because it helped our ancestors survive, but it is an illusion nonetheless. If we could see our lives objectively, we would see that they are not something we should inflict on anyone.
The imposition argument
1. A child is a separate entity to you, with its own rights.
2. You have the choice whether or not to have children.
3. Before you have the child, there is no way to ask it if it wants to live. It cannot weigh the options, understanding the costs and benefits.
4. Therefore, having a child means that you have voluntarily forced life onto a new, separate entity, without its consent.
5. There is a small but statistically significant risk that the child's life will not be worth living, and the child will wish it had never been born.
6. There is no way in this instance for the child to get a refund and reverse the suffering it has been through. The damage cannot be undone.
7. Therefore, it is irresponsible to have a child, because it is an unnecessary gamble with another person's welfare, forced onto them without consent and without a way to be compensated in the event that it goes horribly wrong.
My transcript of the video
The end game is to get people to get a little rational and realise this whole evolution thing is just consumption and reproduction for no good reason, merely because we are addicted to playing this jackass game. The real point is the only thing that makes it possible to have any capacity at all to see the point of it is the fact that we drop dead, so we can impose all this BS on a new sucker. Start from scratch again, so we have to live through all the BS and all the addictions, all the nonsense and realise it’s all for absolutely nothing. I can watch my kids die, I can watch my siblings die, just sucks. These people keep playing, rolling these dice, keep loading up the roller coaster to hell, full of new victims. They won’t even concede that, but they’ll talk about the horror of somebody imposing circumcision on somebody. They won’t talk about the horror of imposing a futile and stupid life on people, no that’s ok, no problem there, damn hypocrites. Yammering about families... is a big giant tax credit, family this family that. Guess what, it isn’t my obligation to give a damn about this family concept so you’re not talking to me. It really is stupid to build a society on this moronic premise, these people can’t find any purpose in their lives. They’ve got to pretend, maybe I can live a good life through my kids or something, because I’ve obviously failed because I’m having them. You’ve already kind of conceding failure, when you have to resort to committing yourself to an eighteen year commitment to be responsible for the creation of another human being and to do it based on a bunch of fables and lies, just to keep them off base; keep them from actually putting their eye on the ball and seeing the BS for what it is. Your selfish need to contrive a purpose for your life by imposing life which in all practical reality is no better than imposing death, it’s an incredibly arrogant act to say you’re capable of knowing that it’s worthwhile, and that person you’re imposing life on won’t ever figure out that it’s a futile game that they’re not going to win, you’ll get your jollies but in the end you’ll die like a bug like everybody else. They’ll come up with this phantasmagorical crap-olla, for this graceful exit that only exists in one percent of deaths, the rest of them are either ???? in pain or out of your mind delirious. Human beings really don’t give a damn about the truth, the real context of our existence. It’s just a big giant pile of maggots, ok some of the maggots have arms and legs, some of write Shakespeare, but it’s all just maggots. And this pretence that you’re doing something else is just BS. But again it’s this context thing, it’s not just the god delusion, it’s the nature delusion, it’s the where here let’s make the best of it BS. Obviously we should make the best of it, but it should always be with the understanding that we have a responsibility of what we allow to take place is essentially our responsibility, we can end it all tomorrow in a humane relativity expedient manner and we are choosing to perpetuate it and we’re subsidising the perpetuation of it, that’s the real ugly part, that we pay people to have more kids, just stupid. Let’s just create some more addicts, more people so distracted by their needs and wants, so plagued by it that they have to take drugs to even manage to get through it, a big percentage of them. Or else they have to take the drug of a mind warping simplistic bullshit happy face crap-olla philosophy. No one is discounting the existence of intense and powerful pleasures, but they really don’t justify the really high price you pay for that and it’s just not rational to ignore it.
This whole game is just brain BS, stupid silly people, you got a notion in your brain that what you’re doing makes sense, but that’s just a notion in your little brain. My big brain has a different notion, a different perception of the reality. Because there’s only one reality, we’re both walking through it, both living it, how do we have such completely different perceptions of it. That’s how we get into this whole context thing, what we overlay our lives with. If I was a human ten thousand years ago, my concerns would be so immediate, I’d just be preoccupied with getting enough food to eat, a roof over my head, just those basic things. You wouldn’t have time to worry about what life means BS. The point is that you’re full of BS and I’m not. You got it all wrong, you’ve been deceived, you’ve been fooled, you’ve been snookered by life, it has got you caught up in something. The little wheels are turning and you’re ploughing through it and you have this illusion of accomplishment but it’s just an illusion, no accomplishment to be had.
Video Summary
Life costs an enormously high price. It's very own design (of using pain to direct concern and attention, as well as life eating life) necessitates much suffering. The magnitude of suffering and horrors that have taken place on this planet over the billions of years, by nature and humans (animals), is of a grotesque size.
We (all life) are simply the product of a crude, deterministic universe. Life exists for no other purpose than to consume (/ satisfy desire) and reproduce - a useless (in and of itself) purpose. Just because this is the way nature is, doesn't make it acceptable or good. If life were to become extinct (like it was before the Earth / universe existed), there wouldn't be anything which is missing out. You can't deprive the non-existent of existence. Since they don't even exist, they can't miss out on existing.
Life is extremely costly and unnecessary. It's something we don't need to (and shouldn't) perpetuate.
Update: Added the following two arguments, 24 Oct 2011
The benatarian argument
1. Those who have never existed cannot be deprived.
2. The argument applies not only to humans but also to all other sentient beings.
3. To bring into existence someone who will suffer is to harm that
person, but to bring into existence someone who will have a good life is not to
benefit him or her.
4. Hence existence always constitutes a net harm.
5. Few of us would think it right to inflict severe suffering on an innocent child, even if that were the only way in which we could bring many other children into the world. Yet everyone will suffer to some extent, and if our species continues to reproduce, we can be sure that some future children will suffer severely.
6. Hence continued reproduction will harm some children severely, and benefit none. Sentient existence comes at a significant cost.
7. Benatar also argues that human lives are, in general, much less good than we think they are. We spend most of our lives with unfulfilled desires, and the occasional satisfactions that are all most of us can achieve are insufficient to outweigh these prolonged negative states. If we think that this is a tolerable state of affairs it is because we are, in Benatar’s view, victims of the illusion of pollyannaism. This illusion may have evolved because it helped our ancestors survive, but it is an illusion nonetheless. If we could see our lives objectively, we would see that they are not something we should inflict on anyone.
The imposition argument
1. A child is a separate entity to you, with its own rights.
2. You have the choice whether or not to have children.
3. Before you have the child, there is no way to ask it if it wants to live. It cannot weigh the options, understanding the costs and benefits.
4. Therefore, having a child means that you have voluntarily forced life onto a new, separate entity, without its consent.
5. There is a small but statistically significant risk that the child's life will not be worth living, and the child will wish it had never been born.
6. There is no way in this instance for the child to get a refund and reverse the suffering it has been through. The damage cannot be undone.
7. Therefore, it is irresponsible to have a child, because it is an unnecessary gamble with another person's welfare, forced onto them without consent and without a way to be compensated in the event that it goes horribly wrong.
My transcript of the video
The end game is to get people to get a little rational and realise this whole evolution thing is just consumption and reproduction for no good reason, merely because we are addicted to playing this jackass game. The real point is the only thing that makes it possible to have any capacity at all to see the point of it is the fact that we drop dead, so we can impose all this BS on a new sucker. Start from scratch again, so we have to live through all the BS and all the addictions, all the nonsense and realise it’s all for absolutely nothing. I can watch my kids die, I can watch my siblings die, just sucks. These people keep playing, rolling these dice, keep loading up the roller coaster to hell, full of new victims. They won’t even concede that, but they’ll talk about the horror of somebody imposing circumcision on somebody. They won’t talk about the horror of imposing a futile and stupid life on people, no that’s ok, no problem there, damn hypocrites. Yammering about families... is a big giant tax credit, family this family that. Guess what, it isn’t my obligation to give a damn about this family concept so you’re not talking to me. It really is stupid to build a society on this moronic premise, these people can’t find any purpose in their lives. They’ve got to pretend, maybe I can live a good life through my kids or something, because I’ve obviously failed because I’m having them. You’ve already kind of conceding failure, when you have to resort to committing yourself to an eighteen year commitment to be responsible for the creation of another human being and to do it based on a bunch of fables and lies, just to keep them off base; keep them from actually putting their eye on the ball and seeing the BS for what it is. Your selfish need to contrive a purpose for your life by imposing life which in all practical reality is no better than imposing death, it’s an incredibly arrogant act to say you’re capable of knowing that it’s worthwhile, and that person you’re imposing life on won’t ever figure out that it’s a futile game that they’re not going to win, you’ll get your jollies but in the end you’ll die like a bug like everybody else. They’ll come up with this phantasmagorical crap-olla, for this graceful exit that only exists in one percent of deaths, the rest of them are either ???? in pain or out of your mind delirious. Human beings really don’t give a damn about the truth, the real context of our existence. It’s just a big giant pile of maggots, ok some of the maggots have arms and legs, some of write Shakespeare, but it’s all just maggots. And this pretence that you’re doing something else is just BS. But again it’s this context thing, it’s not just the god delusion, it’s the nature delusion, it’s the where here let’s make the best of it BS. Obviously we should make the best of it, but it should always be with the understanding that we have a responsibility of what we allow to take place is essentially our responsibility, we can end it all tomorrow in a humane relativity expedient manner and we are choosing to perpetuate it and we’re subsidising the perpetuation of it, that’s the real ugly part, that we pay people to have more kids, just stupid. Let’s just create some more addicts, more people so distracted by their needs and wants, so plagued by it that they have to take drugs to even manage to get through it, a big percentage of them. Or else they have to take the drug of a mind warping simplistic bullshit happy face crap-olla philosophy. No one is discounting the existence of intense and powerful pleasures, but they really don’t justify the really high price you pay for that and it’s just not rational to ignore it.
This whole game is just brain BS, stupid silly people, you got a notion in your brain that what you’re doing makes sense, but that’s just a notion in your little brain. My big brain has a different notion, a different perception of the reality. Because there’s only one reality, we’re both walking through it, both living it, how do we have such completely different perceptions of it. That’s how we get into this whole context thing, what we overlay our lives with. If I was a human ten thousand years ago, my concerns would be so immediate, I’d just be preoccupied with getting enough food to eat, a roof over my head, just those basic things. You wouldn’t have time to worry about what life means BS. The point is that you’re full of BS and I’m not. You got it all wrong, you’ve been deceived, you’ve been fooled, you’ve been snookered by life, it has got you caught up in something. The little wheels are turning and you’re ploughing through it and you have this illusion of accomplishment but it’s just an illusion, no accomplishment to be had.
Last edited by PlanetOfTheApes on Mon Oct 24, 2011 3:32 am, edited 8 times in total.
I just wanted to say thanks for expressing this opinion, if for no other reason than it makes me feel less alone in my view of things. I'll confess right here and now that I'm clinically depressed, agoraphobic and misanthropic. I have only two people in my life, and one of them is more screwed up mentally than I am, lol. But when you are this way, you have to ultimately accept that people do not see things the way you do. As the band Ministry said, 'The Mind is a Terrible Thing to Taste.'
Don't get me wrong. Just because I'm a misanthrope, it doesn't mean that I don't speak to people in the street or see anything decent about them. That would be rude and disrespectful, and only serve to make me more like the people that make me feel this way, rather than the human I'm trying to be. My misanthropy stems from the belief that it's not just what we are now as a species, but what we seemingly refuse to become: more enlightened and unified.
Allow me to quote something for you. It's from a film called Brittania Hospital, though the film is not how I happened upon it.
"Friends! Fellow Members of the Human Race! We are gathered here for a purpose. Let us look together at Mankind. What do we see? We see Mastery. What wonders Mankind can perform. He can cross the oceans and continents today, as easily as our grandfathers crossed the street. Tomorrow he will as easily cross the vast territories of space. He can make deserts FERTILE and plant cabbages on the Moon. And what does man CHOOSE? Alone among the creatures of this world, the Human Race CHOOSES to ANNIHILATE itself. Since the last world conflict ended, there has not been one day in which Human Beings have not been SLAUGHTERING or wounding one another, in 200 and 30 different wars. And man BREEDS as recklessly as he lays waste. By the end of the century, the population of the world will have TRIPLED. 2/3rds of our plant species will have been DESTROYED. 55% of the Animal Kingdom. and 70% of our mineral resources. Out of every hundred Human Beings now living, 80 will DIE without ever KNOWING what it FEELS like to be fully nourished... While a tiny minority INDULGE themselves in ABSURD and EXTRAVAGANT luxuries. A motion picture entertainer of North America will receive as much money in a MONTH as would feed a starving South American tribe for a hundred YEARS! We WASTE! We DESTROY! AND, we cling like SAVAGES to our SUPERSTITIONS. We give POWER to LEADERS of State and Church as prejudiced and small-minded as ourselves, who SQUANDER our resources on instruments of destruction... While Millions continue to SUFFER and go hungry, condemned FOREVER to lives of IGNORANCE and DEPRIVATION."
There's more; but I think the point is made. And the sad thing is, it isn't wrong. Not essentially, anyway.
Consider that the dinosaurs existed on this planet for about 178 million years. Their existence was incredibly simple, and were it not for a meteor crashing into the Earth and ultimately wiping them out, they'd still be the ruling creature. Our evolution would never have come to pass. We, on the other hand live needlessly complicated lives. In my opinion, life is as complicated as you make it. Pretty much every other species on the planet lives by the need for food, drink and shelter. They're not perfect, and they are sometimes cruel in their treatment of one another. But not on the scale that we are. We're presently murdering each other over oil, when we know full well that it's a limited resource. Yet we seem happier to kill each other over it, rather than invest that huge military budget into finding alternatives to oil. Which to me would make sense, given that oil helps to run the military as much as anything else. No oil = no military.
We have, to date created not one political system that works to make everybody equal. And due to the recent ineptitude of our governments and financial systems, many countries are recovering from a world economic crisis. Some countries are still teetering on the brink of financial ruin. Poverty continues to increase, and so will crime. Rich people don't commit burglary, or any other of the myriad of crimes that poor people do. Rich people commit crimes like living in a house that has more rooms than they could possibly need. The majority of us do the best we can to get by, but never really get ahead. All we can do is dream about living a life that will never be afforded to us. It's my belief that many people take drugs in a feeble attempt to escape the reality of their existence. I don't blame them. Especially those that can never hope to do anything but bust their ass day-in day-out doing some crappy mind numbing, soul destroying job that will only help them to live hand to mouth. And rather than trying to address the root cause of why people take drugs and commit crime, we throw money at the problem in the form of a war on drugs, or a war on crime. Solutions which are destined to fail.
For over two decades now, we've been caught up in the 'need' to save the planet. I'm completely on the fence when it comes to the whole global warming thing. There doesn't seem to be any clear answer as to whether it's happening or not. And if it is happening, there seems to be no way for us to answer if man has in any way influenced it. I'm not against the idea of recycling or energy efficicency though. More than anything, that's because I'm a cheapass, and I don't have a lot of money to live off. So if using energy efficient light bulbs, computer parts and all the the other stuff helps me to have more money in my pocket, then I'm all for it.
But as far as I'm concerned, it's little more than folly and arrogance on our part to think that we will kill the planet. The Earth has survived all manner of things in the last 4 billion years, and all we are likely to do is make it uninhabitable for ourselves. The planet can afford a few thousand or so years (or more) to regenerate things to how they were, and then start the whole process of creating life upon its surface again. Choosing a new dominant lifeform. At best, a lifeform that exists in a symbiotic relationship with its environment (like many of the tribes that we have eradicated). At worst, something that screws up and wipes itself out.
I could go on. But to summarise, while I don't disagree with what PlanetOfTheApes wrote, I'm more inclined to see things not so much as "life sucks", but rather "we suck". The human race needs to get itself in order, and realise that we're not going to evolve physically, but we have a long way to go regarding our so called intelligence. And unless we strive to push ourselves forward and become the species that we know we can be, nothing is going to change, and it's doubtful that we'll even exist the 178 million years that a bunch of oversized lizards did.
Don't get me wrong. Just because I'm a misanthrope, it doesn't mean that I don't speak to people in the street or see anything decent about them. That would be rude and disrespectful, and only serve to make me more like the people that make me feel this way, rather than the human I'm trying to be. My misanthropy stems from the belief that it's not just what we are now as a species, but what we seemingly refuse to become: more enlightened and unified.
Allow me to quote something for you. It's from a film called Brittania Hospital, though the film is not how I happened upon it.
"Friends! Fellow Members of the Human Race! We are gathered here for a purpose. Let us look together at Mankind. What do we see? We see Mastery. What wonders Mankind can perform. He can cross the oceans and continents today, as easily as our grandfathers crossed the street. Tomorrow he will as easily cross the vast territories of space. He can make deserts FERTILE and plant cabbages on the Moon. And what does man CHOOSE? Alone among the creatures of this world, the Human Race CHOOSES to ANNIHILATE itself. Since the last world conflict ended, there has not been one day in which Human Beings have not been SLAUGHTERING or wounding one another, in 200 and 30 different wars. And man BREEDS as recklessly as he lays waste. By the end of the century, the population of the world will have TRIPLED. 2/3rds of our plant species will have been DESTROYED. 55% of the Animal Kingdom. and 70% of our mineral resources. Out of every hundred Human Beings now living, 80 will DIE without ever KNOWING what it FEELS like to be fully nourished... While a tiny minority INDULGE themselves in ABSURD and EXTRAVAGANT luxuries. A motion picture entertainer of North America will receive as much money in a MONTH as would feed a starving South American tribe for a hundred YEARS! We WASTE! We DESTROY! AND, we cling like SAVAGES to our SUPERSTITIONS. We give POWER to LEADERS of State and Church as prejudiced and small-minded as ourselves, who SQUANDER our resources on instruments of destruction... While Millions continue to SUFFER and go hungry, condemned FOREVER to lives of IGNORANCE and DEPRIVATION."
There's more; but I think the point is made. And the sad thing is, it isn't wrong. Not essentially, anyway.
Consider that the dinosaurs existed on this planet for about 178 million years. Their existence was incredibly simple, and were it not for a meteor crashing into the Earth and ultimately wiping them out, they'd still be the ruling creature. Our evolution would never have come to pass. We, on the other hand live needlessly complicated lives. In my opinion, life is as complicated as you make it. Pretty much every other species on the planet lives by the need for food, drink and shelter. They're not perfect, and they are sometimes cruel in their treatment of one another. But not on the scale that we are. We're presently murdering each other over oil, when we know full well that it's a limited resource. Yet we seem happier to kill each other over it, rather than invest that huge military budget into finding alternatives to oil. Which to me would make sense, given that oil helps to run the military as much as anything else. No oil = no military.
We have, to date created not one political system that works to make everybody equal. And due to the recent ineptitude of our governments and financial systems, many countries are recovering from a world economic crisis. Some countries are still teetering on the brink of financial ruin. Poverty continues to increase, and so will crime. Rich people don't commit burglary, or any other of the myriad of crimes that poor people do. Rich people commit crimes like living in a house that has more rooms than they could possibly need. The majority of us do the best we can to get by, but never really get ahead. All we can do is dream about living a life that will never be afforded to us. It's my belief that many people take drugs in a feeble attempt to escape the reality of their existence. I don't blame them. Especially those that can never hope to do anything but bust their ass day-in day-out doing some crappy mind numbing, soul destroying job that will only help them to live hand to mouth. And rather than trying to address the root cause of why people take drugs and commit crime, we throw money at the problem in the form of a war on drugs, or a war on crime. Solutions which are destined to fail.
For over two decades now, we've been caught up in the 'need' to save the planet. I'm completely on the fence when it comes to the whole global warming thing. There doesn't seem to be any clear answer as to whether it's happening or not. And if it is happening, there seems to be no way for us to answer if man has in any way influenced it. I'm not against the idea of recycling or energy efficicency though. More than anything, that's because I'm a cheapass, and I don't have a lot of money to live off. So if using energy efficient light bulbs, computer parts and all the the other stuff helps me to have more money in my pocket, then I'm all for it.
![Wink :wink:](./images/smilies/icon_wink.gif)
I could go on. But to summarise, while I don't disagree with what PlanetOfTheApes wrote, I'm more inclined to see things not so much as "life sucks", but rather "we suck". The human race needs to get itself in order, and realise that we're not going to evolve physically, but we have a long way to go regarding our so called intelligence. And unless we strive to push ourselves forward and become the species that we know we can be, nothing is going to change, and it's doubtful that we'll even exist the 178 million years that a bunch of oversized lizards did.
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My pleasure. It's sometimes helpful for me to express my opinons. Though I try to keep in mind that I (a) shouldn't expect them to be agreed with, and (b) there are over 6.5 billion people on this planet, so what makes me or my opinion special, lol.
Suffering seems to be a byproduct of existing, and it appears that we are destined to never be completely happy. It's like when in 'The Matrix', Agent Smith tells Moebius that they created a version of the matrix were people had anything and everything they could want, yet the mind rejected it as a reality. If you approach the idea of suffering from a more buddhist point of view, then we try to find lasting happiness in the wrong things, and can only hold ourselves to blame for the inevitable suffering that comes from that. Not that I'm buddhist. I was intrigued by it in my early twenties, but in the end, there's dogma within every religion, and I've never been very good at towing the line. So I think it's sometimes best to take what you need from religion. Hence, I now try to live a life where I take the 'middle path' rather than existing at either end of the spectrum.
Suffering seems to be a byproduct of existing, and it appears that we are destined to never be completely happy. It's like when in 'The Matrix', Agent Smith tells Moebius that they created a version of the matrix were people had anything and everything they could want, yet the mind rejected it as a reality. If you approach the idea of suffering from a more buddhist point of view, then we try to find lasting happiness in the wrong things, and can only hold ourselves to blame for the inevitable suffering that comes from that. Not that I'm buddhist. I was intrigued by it in my early twenties, but in the end, there's dogma within every religion, and I've never been very good at towing the line. So I think it's sometimes best to take what you need from religion. Hence, I now try to live a life where I take the 'middle path' rather than existing at either end of the spectrum.
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I guess "we suck" because we allow/impose wasted suffering.
The other proposed solutions, that I'm aware of are:
a) Virtual reality - probably the safest and best place for conscience to exist
b) Only the life lovers (life slaves) are allowed to breed - which is kind of where humans are gradually heading I believe.
The other proposed solutions, that I'm aware of are:
a) Virtual reality - probably the safest and best place for conscience to exist
b) Only the life lovers (life slaves) are allowed to breed - which is kind of where humans are gradually heading I believe.
It's maybe not a matter of wasted suffering, but unnecessary suffering. But if suffering provides us with the opportunity to learn from it, then suffering is not the bigger issue. It's the fact that we don't learn the lessons from suffering that we should. As the saying goes, "those that do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it".
I'm not really certain what you mean by "life lovers (life slaves)", or why you belive that we are heading toward only such people being allowed to breed. As such, it would be improper of me to respond to that subject until I comprehend it better.
I'm not really certain what you mean by "life lovers (life slaves)", or why you belive that we are heading toward only such people being allowed to breed. As such, it would be improper of me to respond to that subject until I comprehend it better.
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My perspective on this subject may be a little one-dimensional and nuance is not really my thing. If you wish to explore this topic further, have a look at the authors other videos on the subject or try contacting him on http://inmendham.com/dog/mail.html
Re: Life Sucks
Life perpetuates itself. There is no "we".PlanetOfTheApes wrote:Life is extremely costly and unnecessary. It's something we don't need to (and shouldn't) perpetuate.
This is a moral judgement with which I doubt that any living creature not of the species Homo Sapiens sapiens would concur, and moreover that few or no members of that species living prior to the few centuries would make any sense of.Life costs an enormously high price. It's very own design (of using pain to direct concern and attention, as well as life eating life) necessitates much suffering. The magnitude of suffering and horrors that have taken place on this planet over the billions of years, by nature and humans (animals), is of a grotesque size.
Likewise the concepts of acceptability and goodness in relation to the workings of the natural world are rather recent in their conception I would propose.We (all life) are simply the product of a crude, deterministic universe. Life exists for no other purpose than to consume (/ satisfy desire) and reproduce - a useless (in and of itself) purpose. Just because this is the way nature is, doesn't make it acceptable or good.
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There is no "point" to life.
The guy in the video is either very depressed or he likes to make other people depressed.
The only way I can watch it is by saying it's a satire and laugh my ass off.
Maybe the smarter one is, the more likely it is to become very depressed or to be overwhelmed with all these questions no one has an answer for (considering some great thinkers of the past few centuries have failed to come up with an answer, it's safe to say no one else will any time soon).
In some 60's short scifi/fantasy story, the devil will go back to hell if someone speaks the unthinkable: "I want to be stupid" - the person saying that has come to the conclusion this is the only way to be truly happy.
Life = suffering. That's the price maybe. You get one, you pay the other. May be a yin/yang thing to balance things out.
It's amazing he hasn't killed himself yet. He's a hypocrite if he really means what he says, or a liar if he doesn't![Confused :?](./images/smilies/icon_confused.gif)
The guy in the video is either very depressed or he likes to make other people depressed.
The only way I can watch it is by saying it's a satire and laugh my ass off.
Maybe the smarter one is, the more likely it is to become very depressed or to be overwhelmed with all these questions no one has an answer for (considering some great thinkers of the past few centuries have failed to come up with an answer, it's safe to say no one else will any time soon).
In some 60's short scifi/fantasy story, the devil will go back to hell if someone speaks the unthinkable: "I want to be stupid" - the person saying that has come to the conclusion this is the only way to be truly happy.
Life = suffering. That's the price maybe. You get one, you pay the other. May be a yin/yang thing to balance things out.
It's amazing he hasn't killed himself yet. He's a hypocrite if he really means what he says, or a liar if he doesn't
![Confused :?](./images/smilies/icon_confused.gif)
Again, all of it comes down to personal beliefs. If you want to believe there is no point, it's certainly your right to believe whatever you want to. I choose life and I choose to believe in something greater than nothing.spookmineer wrote:There is no "point" to life.
Ephesians 2:10 wrote:For we are God's workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.
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I choose life too.AZBrandon wrote:Again, all of it comes down to personal beliefs. If you want to believe there is no point, it's certainly your right to believe whatever you want to. I choose life and I choose to believe in something greater than nothing.spookmineer wrote:There is no "point" to life.
I don't think there is a point to it, though. It just is.
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You don't even have to choose whether it does or not. If your child is killed in an auto accident the choice will be made for you. I have a professor in his 50s with health problems here doing all kinds of stuff, he's trying to leave his mark. He doesn't want it to all be for nothing. I question some of his choices, but not what drives him.AZBrandon wrote:Again, all of it comes down to personal beliefs. If you want to believe there is no point, it's certainly your right to believe whatever you want to. I choose life and I choose to believe in something greater than nothing.
Ephesians 2:10 wrote:For we are God's workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.
Everything tries to survive, it's the most basic hard wiring ever. Ebola tries to survive to the extent it kills its host. What's it going to do? Reason out that only x% of it is tolerable to the host? If we can't figure that out it sure as hell won't.
Herpes, a very old virus, has altered its mannerism through time and now moves forward in a more productive manner. We have no experience with the problems we face now, all we have is our history, and we don't make good use of that either. I took a european history course 2 years ago. The cycle of stupidity (wars) and less stupidity never ends. The lesson is never learned. Worse yet, we now are in a phase where pre-emptive wars is a viable term. If you ever saw Martin Sheen in "The Dead Zone" this is the kind of lunatic that acually has a chance of being president these days, thanks to the extremists who will eventually be calling the shots.
Humanity has not evolved enough to make proper use of the toys it has created. The result is the human race behaves like a kid in a candy store.
I take small steps to make a positive dent in humanity. I don't expect anything major to come out of it. Once a year I cure someone of leprosy. And lately I give to Operation Smile to have a disfigured child fixed. I refuse to pay for research, as I am finding it harder and harder to believe it and Rx companies are anything more than legalized drug dealers. But in any event I much prefer my donations have clearly quantifiable results. This is kind of like that saying back in high school; if you're not part of the solution you're part of the problem.
As wasteful as humanity may seem, the futile struggles, the consumption of resources, those that sit around without any goals are the most wasteful of all. And by goals I mean more than adequate beer and cigarettes and a Harley in the garage.
And if your life seems totally joyless may I make a small suggestion?
Chocolate.
we all quest who we are by nature, if it is good, you get loved.
you want to die? I do not care. you have proven nothing to me...
My mother was suicidal, very natural.. phony fronts ups and downs...
all addiction. she eventually died drunk in the sunny morning. By nature.. she was not like this. 17 in the 60s...yikes. oh the head snapping on the youth. I suppose the needing defense part makes psychologists. The suicidal can go there involuntarily eventually. I do not care. No instinct to live? you have proven nothing to me.
My opposite to my own parent has snapped heads.. and I am not even wrong.
how is that for this philosophical useless conversation?
you want to die? I do not care. you have proven nothing to me...
My mother was suicidal, very natural.. phony fronts ups and downs...
all addiction. she eventually died drunk in the sunny morning. By nature.. she was not like this. 17 in the 60s...yikes. oh the head snapping on the youth. I suppose the needing defense part makes psychologists. The suicidal can go there involuntarily eventually. I do not care. No instinct to live? you have proven nothing to me.
My opposite to my own parent has snapped heads.. and I am not even wrong.
how is that for this philosophical useless conversation?
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If this doesn't make you smile you have more problems than this thread can adequately address.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Bmhjf0rKe8
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Bmhjf0rKe8
Not totally pointless. Reminds me of youthful inebriation.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Existentia ... a_HumanismSartre wrote:Man first of all exists, encounters himself, surges up in the world - and defines himself afterwards.
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There's a guy on YouTube that puts an object on his head, looks at the camera and doesn't say a word for 5 minutes. He makes a new video every week with a different object. I'm sure there are a few SPCR members that would find this entertaining. I'll see if I can locate the channel.aristide1 wrote:If this doesn't make you smile you have more problems than this thread can adequately address.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Bmhjf0rKe8
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What? Babies don't show up by accident? There are plenty of "oops" out there.PlanetOfTheApes wrote:Our parents chose to impose life on us.
Ah here you're talking about just an existence. I was referring to a life.PlanetOfTheApes wrote: And now that you're in the game, you're hooked, no matter how shitty life gets.
This is fantastically morbid for some people, but I am not going to get bogged down in that.
Life exists because it does, there is no purpose because it was not "created", therefore if you must "have a purpose", why dont you think up one for yourself and follow that path. The entire concept of "life" being "extremely costly and unnecessary" is a totally retarded concept thought up by someone who is a product of that "costly and "unnecessary" development of life over a very long period of time, therefore this theory is totally redundant and its only worth is to give people something to think about, and then laugh at.
As for "It's something we don't need to (and shouldn't) perpetuate.", what more can I say to anyone who believes that than the following. OK, start with yourself, and any of your offspring, kill your offspring, and then yourself because you "have seen the light" and now know that you dont need to exist, and if you have already perpetuateed life you need to redeem yourself and extinguish it. Please dont try to persuade anyone else to follow this path though because that is a totally immoral act.
What a moronic concept this is.
Andy
Life exists because it does, there is no purpose because it was not "created", therefore if you must "have a purpose", why dont you think up one for yourself and follow that path. The entire concept of "life" being "extremely costly and unnecessary" is a totally retarded concept thought up by someone who is a product of that "costly and "unnecessary" development of life over a very long period of time, therefore this theory is totally redundant and its only worth is to give people something to think about, and then laugh at.
As for "It's something we don't need to (and shouldn't) perpetuate.", what more can I say to anyone who believes that than the following. OK, start with yourself, and any of your offspring, kill your offspring, and then yourself because you "have seen the light" and now know that you dont need to exist, and if you have already perpetuateed life you need to redeem yourself and extinguish it. Please dont try to persuade anyone else to follow this path though because that is a totally immoral act.
![Rolling Eyes :roll:](./images/smilies/icon_rolleyes.gif)
What a moronic concept this is.
Andy
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You still have a choice to disagree with your parents.PlanetOfTheApes wrote:Our parents chose to impose life on us. And now that you're in the game, you're hooked, no matter how shitty life gets.aristide1 wrote:I'd like to, but sometimes I feel like life hasn't chosen me.spookmineer wrote:I choose life too.
That's what makes the guy in the video a bit pathetic. If it's all so bad, just stop the pain.
That is quite ungrateful towards your parents.PlanetOfTheApes wrote:Our parents chose to impose life on us.
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In any event here's 2 reasons not to have kids.
http://today.msnbc.msn.com/id/37216068? ... PhotosBook
http://today.msnbc.msn.com/id/37216068? ... PhotosBook
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Very witty. I also enjoyed reading the classic Straw Man arguments. E.g. Attack the messenger when you can't attack the message.aristide1 wrote:In any event here's 2 reasons not to have kids.
http://today.msnbc.msn.com/id/37216068? ... PhotosBook
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The belief of "life is pointless" is one of the reasons that I'm glad to be a christian. My belief gives me and many of the people around me a purpose to live. "Love God and love people". Many people mistake christianity for a religion full of ceremonial stuff, strict rules, no fun allowed, and people with a superiority complex (and some unfortunately do act that way). It is most certainly none of those things. It's all about loving God and loving all the people around you. Simple as that.
(just thought I'd state my beliefs, since other people are doing the same. And I wanted to add something a little more positive
)
![Cool 8)](./images/smilies/icon_cool.gif)
(just thought I'd state my beliefs, since other people are doing the same. And I wanted to add something a little more positive
![Smile :)](./images/smilies/icon_smile.gif)
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Re: Life Sucks
What a sad and pathetic outlook on life. It's maybe understandable in teenagers who are having a tough time and trying to make sense of things - like, "Why am I so spotty?", "Why can't I get a girlfriend?" - "Life is so unfair" they wail. "What's the point of it all?" they ask. This mental condition is also understandable in people who have suffered the loss of a loved one. For the rest of us - yes, the world may well be a cruel and pointless place, but so what, we're here and we might as well make the best of it. Nature has actually given us quite a few mechanisms to deal with things - just being busy is enough for a lot of people but there are all sorts of ways that people can get satisfaction out of living.PlanetOfTheApes wrote:
Summary:
We (all life) are simply the product of a crude, deterministic universe. Life exists for no other purpose than to consume (/ satisfy desire) and reproduce - a useless (in and of itself) purpose. Just because this is the way nature is, doesn't make it acceptable or good. If life were to become extinct (like it was *before* the Earth / universe existed), there wouldn't be anything which is missing out. You can't deprive the non-existent of existence. Since "they" don't even exist, "they" can't miss out on existing.
Life is extremely costly and unnecessary. It's something we don't need to (and shouldn't) perpetuate.
In an objective way the statement above (summary) might well be true. I think most reasonably intelligent people know it, accept things the way they are and just get on it. There are many ways people can find a meaning to their lives - family, love of nature, religion - the list goes on. When I put my daughter to bed at night and she says "love you Daddy", all the stress/hassle/grief/sweat/toil of the day fades into insignificance and any thoughts along the lines of "Is it all worth it?" are answered with a resounding YES!
I do believe that we are here because of some random sequence of events that occurred on this planet, that by chance is the right distance from the sun etc. etc. for life to develop.
So what? As we are here, let's make the best of it; there is so much that gives people joy and happiness, why should a few people with fucked up heads bring the rest of us down? There is a way out - suicide is the exit door. Go ahead, get on with it and lighten the load on our overpopulated world. Just don't make it too messy because someone is going to have to clean up after you.
Alternatively:
1. Turn off computer.
2. Leave bedroom. (Wow - what's that bright light in the sky??)
3. Go for a hike in the mountains.
4. Talk to people.
5. GET A GIRLFRIEND/BOYFRIEND
6. GET A GIRLFRIEND/BOYFRIEND
(Although I do think that this condition mostly affects boys for some reason)
And if you really are clinically depressed, medical help is available.
I have no doubt that all of the non-religious people also do that, just without God. I do, and I also do it without any kind of purpose mandated in a 4,000 year old bit of text. I personally have no need at all to be TOLD what my purpose should be, I can make up my own purpose and live my life in a good way that has nothing at all to do with religion.My belief gives me and many of the people around me a purpose to live. "Love God and love people".
(I also wanted to point this out as a more positive point, we can all be good, and lead happy lives, some of us of course will be happier than others, but I always strive for personal happyness regardless of all of the unpleasantness and problems that I am faced with, anything else is practically suicide anyway)/
Andy
Re: Life Sucks
I don't get these whiners.
If they don't like life or existence in general, they should feel free to end theirs. If they suffer and their survival instincts have let them down, no need to keep up the sharade.
But why try to convince others?
Are these people, who are complaining about others finding a purpose in life, finding their purpose by convincing others there is no purpose?
If they don't like life or existence in general, they should feel free to end theirs. If they suffer and their survival instincts have let them down, no need to keep up the sharade.
But why try to convince others?
Are these people, who are complaining about others finding a purpose in life, finding their purpose by convincing others there is no purpose?
"The end game is to get people to get a little rational and realize this whole evolution thing is just consumption and reproduction for no fucking good reason, merely because we are fucking addicted to playing this jackass game."
It is true. There's no purpose to life really. We are just bacteria feeding off this Earth and polluting it like cancer. For example, the oil rigs are giant benign tumors just waiting to turn malignant like just happened not too long ago.
It is true. There's no purpose to life really. We are just bacteria feeding off this Earth and polluting it like cancer. For example, the oil rigs are giant benign tumors just waiting to turn malignant like just happened not too long ago.
So why can't we kill people? Who made these rules? For what purpose? Is there a purpose?andyb wrote:As for "It's something we don't need to (and shouldn't) perpetuate.", what more can I say to anyone who believes that than the following. OK, start with yourself, and any of your offspring, kill your offspring, and then yourself because you "have seen the light" and now know that you dont need to exist, and if you have already perpetuateed life you need to redeem yourself and extinguish it. Please dont try to persuade anyone else to follow this path though because that is a totally immoral act.
Someone actually feels like the human race should exist on this planet? Why? Read my previous post.
We even strive to colonize other planets to no doubt use them when Earth runs out of minerals and is unsuitable for us to live.
We developed the ability to think for the purpose or preserving this life. And that's the only purpose humans have, reproduce and spread.
this always makes me feel better ![Wink ;)](./images/smilies/icon_wink.gif)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DgzHrI61 ... FxchrMAD6s
btw, wear sunscreen.
![Wink ;)](./images/smilies/icon_wink.gif)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DgzHrI61 ... FxchrMAD6s
btw, wear sunscreen.