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Is wanting to exist irrational?

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Philologos
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04 Dec 2010, 9:30 am

b9:

"go back to your castle and spruik to the elite there"

What makes you think anyone else lives in the sandcastle?



b9
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04 Dec 2010, 9:40 am

Philologos wrote:
b9:

"go back to your castle and spruik to the elite there"

What makes you think anyone else lives in the sandcastle?


i see the wit in your post "sand+castle" but i can not give a damn because i am on my feet typing this on my way to bed and i am definitely going to abrogate myself from this discussion and experience unconsciousness which i now crave.

good absolutely night. nothing more will i read or write until i have slept.



Philologos
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04 Dec 2010, 9:52 am

I so sympathize. Be warm be well.



Sand
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04 Dec 2010, 10:17 am

b9 wrote:
Quote:
Sand wrote:
I frequently pass a McDonald's (I am a vegetarian) and see all those dead hamburgers but they never give me the feeling they are at peace, whatever the religious mumblings were made as they passed from their lives. Unfortunately a good many live people behave not much more sentient than those poor creatures interred between buns.


yeah another nothing response from you. do not bother talking to me because you seem to dumb yourself down or something when you talk to me.

go back to your castle and spruik to the elite there and forget what i said. i will also be relieved of the obligation of a reply so it is a win-win situation.
i am sorry i replied to you because it creates the chore of replying to your response


I rarely spruik to the elite. No reply is required. I'm merely presenting my view that dead people are dead meat. Just like hamburgers except they seem not to be so nourishing. Live meat can rest and be peaceful. Dead meat is too busy becoming slime and gooky stuff to rest. This is not a matter of faith. It has been observed many times.



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04 Dec 2010, 10:42 am

@Sand: I understand your disdain for religious views, so I'll be as brief as I can. I actually liked what you said about the dead being too busy rotting (to paraphrase) to rest, whereas rest is only an activity of living beings. If so, then saying that a dead person is at rest only makes sense if there is a life beyond the physical world. After all, it is written that "God is not God of the dead, but of the living." If there were no life beyond death what would we care what God thinks of us?

@b9: Sand certainly has an abrasive succinctness, but I honestly believe that Sand means well and contributes to a lively discussion. Rather than complaining that his points are empty, why not attempt to make equally brief yet pointed statements to effectively rebut what you disagree with? I mean no harm here, but as smart as Sand is and as witty as he is, those kinds of statements make the speaker/writer an easy target. Just don't try to kill a mosquito with a canon and at least try to be respectful. Your opinions are valuable, too.



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04 Dec 2010, 11:03 am

AngelRho wrote:
@Sand: I understand your disdain for religious views, so I'll be as brief as I can. I actually liked what you said about the dead being too busy rotting (to paraphrase) to rest, whereas rest is only an activity of living beings. If so, then saying that a dead person is at rest only makes sense if there is a life beyond the physical world. After all, it is written that "God is not God of the dead, but of the living." If there were no life beyond death what would we care what God thinks of us?

@b9: Sand certainly has an abrasive succinctness, but I honestly believe that Sand means well and contributes to a lively discussion. Rather than complaining that his points are empty, why not attempt to make equally brief yet pointed statements to effectively rebut what you disagree with? I mean no harm here, but as smart as Sand is and as witty as he is, those kinds of statements make the speaker/writer an easy target. Just don't try to kill a mosquito with a canon and at least try to be respectful. Your opinions are valuable, too.


I appreciate your diplomacy, but life after death has always impressed me as one of those promises that religion donates to attract adherents with absolutely no basis in any confirmed fact and safe enough from being disproved or proved since no one has ever come back to verify it. And, of course, God is equally elusive.

I am not all that happy at being considered a mosquito inspite of your good intentions. I do not hold myself as being particularly smart but wit is something I always admire since Groucho Marx is one of my heroes.

Anybody should feel free to kick my ass around since I find the energy expended is good exercise. But I like to kick back.



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04 Dec 2010, 12:58 pm

Sand wrote:
AngelRho wrote:
@Sand: I understand your disdain for religious views, so I'll be as brief as I can. I actually liked what you said about the dead being too busy rotting (to paraphrase) to rest, whereas rest is only an activity of living beings. If so, then saying that a dead person is at rest only makes sense if there is a life beyond the physical world. After all, it is written that "God is not God of the dead, but of the living." If there were no life beyond death what would we care what God thinks of us?

@b9: Sand certainly has an abrasive succinctness, but I honestly believe that Sand means well and contributes to a lively discussion. Rather than complaining that his points are empty, why not attempt to make equally brief yet pointed statements to effectively rebut what you disagree with? I mean no harm here, but as smart as Sand is and as witty as he is, those kinds of statements make the speaker/writer an easy target. Just don't try to kill a mosquito with a canon and at least try to be respectful. Your opinions are valuable, too.


I appreciate your diplomacy, but life after death has always impressed me as one of those promises that religion donates to attract adherents with absolutely no basis in any confirmed fact and safe enough from being disproved or proved since no one has ever come back to verify it. And, of course, God is equally elusive.

I am not all that happy at being considered a mosquito inspite of your good intentions. I do not hold myself as being particularly smart but wit is something I always admire since Groucho Marx is one of my heroes.

Anybody should feel free to kick my ass around since I find the energy expended is good exercise. But I like to kick back.


Haha! No, I don't think you're a mosquito. And yes, I know you like to kick back. I just meant that a person shouldn't put so much exhaustive time and energy into combatting one-liner jabs by writing dissertations. Even I'm guilty of that from time to time, and there's a reason why I've retired from breaking down all the illusions and misconceptions outsiders have regarding Christianity and the Bible. I'm more concerned at the moment with errant claims that a small number of people make regarding Christ and the Bible. Particularly onerous to me are those who claim to believe and follow the Bible when they, in fact, do not.



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04 Dec 2010, 7:22 pm

AngelRho wrote:
Sand wrote:
AngelRho wrote:
@Sand: I understand your disdain for religious views, so I'll be as brief as I can. I actually liked what you said about the dead being too busy rotting (to paraphrase) to rest, whereas rest is only an activity of living beings. If so, then saying that a dead person is at rest only makes sense if there is a life beyond the physical world. After all, it is written that "God is not God of the dead, but of the living." If there were no life beyond death what would we care what God thinks of us?

@b9: Sand certainly has an abrasive succinctness, but I honestly believe that Sand means well and contributes to a lively discussion. Rather than complaining that his points are empty, why not attempt to make equally brief yet pointed statements to effectively rebut what you disagree with? I mean no harm here, but as smart as Sand is and as witty as he is, those kinds of statements make the speaker/writer an easy target. Just don't try to kill a mosquito with a canon and at least try to be respectful. Your opinions are valuable, too.


I appreciate your diplomacy, but life after death has always impressed me as one of those promises that religion donates to attract adherents with absolutely no basis in any confirmed fact and safe enough from being disproved or proved since no one has ever come back to verify it. And, of course, God is equally elusive.

I am not all that happy at being considered a mosquito inspite of your good intentions. I do not hold myself as being particularly smart but wit is something I always admire since Groucho Marx is one of my heroes.

Anybody should feel free to kick my ass around since I find the energy expended is good exercise. But I like to kick back.


Haha! No, I don't think you're a mosquito. And yes, I know you like to kick back. I just meant that a person shouldn't put so much exhaustive time and energy into combatting one-liner jabs by writing dissertations. Even I'm guilty of that from time to time, and there's a reason why I've retired from breaking down all the illusions and misconceptions outsiders have regarding Christianity and the Bible. I'm more concerned at the moment with errant claims that a small number of people make regarding Christ and the Bible. Particularly onerous to me are those who claim to believe and follow the Bible when they, in fact, do not.


As I commented somewhere this site is full of hot air balloons and I have a mind full of pins.



b9
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05 Dec 2010, 10:27 am

AngelRho wrote:
@b9: Rather than complaining that his points are empty, why not attempt to make equally brief yet pointed statements to effectively rebut what you disagree with?

his point was irrelevant and contained nothing but a condescending swipe at me by using "hamburger patties" thinking that was a sufficient argument to use to someone like me. he also probably did not even want to explain to me anything of importance, but he used my post to talk to me as if i was a moron to garner the chuckles of the other PPR posters who are in his clique.
i will say some pointed comments to rebut what he said to me if you like.

sand wrote:
Quote:
I frequently pass a McDonald's (I am a vegetarian) and see all those dead hamburgers but they never give me the feeling they are at peace

how can someone get a "vibe" from something that is dead? one can see that no mcdonalds beef patty is feeling anxious and in a state of disquietude.
mcdonalds pattys are motionless and do not feel any pain.

why use mcdonalds as your stage for example? why use a base line commercial fast food place as the center piece of your reply to me when you are obviously much smarter than that?

do you think i will only be able to understand if you use the word "mcdonalds" in your reply? do you hope i will say "oh yeah...derrr mcdonalds....(drool) now i understand" while you look sideways at your smart comrades from PPR to witness their mirth at your slaughtering of my post?


Quote:
whatever the religious mumblings were made as they passed from their lives.

i never mentioned religion, and for you to impute that my post was imbibed with religious sentiment is incorrect and beside the point.

Quote:
Unfortunately a good many live people behave not much more sentient (sentience????) than those poor creatures interred between buns.


and to who are you referring? what relevance does that have to the content of my post? i was saying many things in my post that i thought about rather strenuously, and yet you
dismiss what i say on the pulpit of your own subjective conclusions.

anyway, what i consider to be the meaning of "peace" is to be eternally relieved from anxiety and disquiet, and death is that.

you say peace is an experience, and i say it is the lack of being. "peace" for me is not a subjective sensation because all sensations carry with them the passage of time and mutability.



AngelRho wrote:
I mean no harm here, but as smart as Sand is and as witty as he is, those kinds of statements make the speaker/writer an easy target. Just don't try to kill a mosquito with a canon and at least try to be respectful.


yes i understand my place. my view that death is "resting in peace" was roundly disproved by sand using his mcdonalds patty argument, and i should be respectful of my intellectual superiors.

i will not disagree with "sand" again.

good grief. if one did not know better, then one would think you all had mud packs on your faces. (think about it)



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05 Dec 2010, 10:45 am

b9 wrote:
AngelRho wrote:
@b9: Rather than complaining that his points are empty, why not attempt to make equally brief yet pointed statements to effectively rebut what you disagree with?

his point was irrelevant and contained nothing but a condescending swipe at me by using "hamburger patties" thinking that was a sufficient argument to use to someone like me. he also probably did not even want to explain to me anything of importance, but he used my post to talk to me as if i was a moron to garner the chuckles of the other PPR posters who are in his clique.
i will say some pointed comments to rebut what he said to me if you like.

sand wrote:
Quote:
I frequently pass a McDonald's (I am a vegetarian) and see all those dead hamburgers but they never give me the feeling they are at peace

how can someone get a "vibe" from something that is dead? one can see that no mcdonalds beef patty is feeling anxious and in a state of disquietude.
mcdonalds pattys are motionless and do not feel any pain.

why use mcdonalds as your stage for example? why use a base line commercial fast food place as the center piece of your reply to me when you are obviously much smarter than that?

do you think i will only be able to understand if you use the word "mcdonalds" in your reply? do you hope i will say "oh yeah...derrr mcdonalds....(drool) now i understand" while you look sideways at your smart comrades from PPR to witness their mirth at your slaughtering of my post?


Quote:
whatever the religious mumblings were made as they passed from their lives.

i never mentioned religion, and for you to impute that my post was imbibed with religious sentiment is incorrect and beside the point.

Quote:
Unfortunately a good many live people behave not much more sentient (sentience????) than those poor creatures interred between buns.


and to who are you referring? what relevance does that have to the content of my post? i was saying many things in my post that i thought about rather strenuously, and yet you
dismiss what i say on the pulpit of your own subjective conclusions.

anyway, what i consider to be the meaning of "peace" is to be eternally relieved from anxiety and disquiet, and death is that.

you say peace is an experience, and i say it is the lack of being. "peace" for me is not a subjective sensation because all sensations carry with them the passage of time and mutability.



AngelRho wrote:
I mean no harm here, but as smart as Sand is and as witty as he is, those kinds of statements make the speaker/writer an easy target. Just don't try to kill a mosquito with a canon and at least try to be respectful.


yes i understand my place. my view that death is "resting in peace" was roundly disproved by sand using his mcdonalds patty argument, and i should be respectful of my intellectual superiors.

i will not disagree with "sand" again.

good grief. if one did not know better, then one would think you all had mud packs on your faces. (think about it)


Please feel free t disagree with me anytime. I merely made a graphic illustration that we are all meat and dead meat does not rest. Being alive is a dynamic action of a highly organized set of very special compounds in a very special arrangement and dead meat or a dead person has lost all that organized ability. It is totally non-functional.



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05 Dec 2010, 11:39 am

Sand wrote:
Please feel free t(o) disagree with me anytime. I merely made a graphic illustration that we are all meat and dead meat does not rest.

dead meat does not anguish either. dead meat has no worry. all worries are contained in the substance of life.

Sand wrote:
Being alive is a dynamic action of a highly organized set of very special compounds in a very special arrangement
and as such, being alive is the basis for consciousness which contains within it all sensations including the sensation of displacement from equilibrium.

Sand wrote:
and dead meat or a dead person has lost all that organized ability. It is totally non-functional.

there is no functionality in quiescence. functionality gives rise to the gremlins that stand in it's way. anything that causes one to be displaced from quiescence is only found in the process of life due to the fact that only when we are alive, can we be displeased at how our life is progressing.

sorry sand i do not mean to divert your energy from other people.
i am seriously more affected by autism than i may seem to be.

i want to end this discussion and play my game that i am playing on my computer.



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05 Dec 2010, 12:39 pm

Subotai wrote:
Is our desire to continue existing just our survival instincts messing with us?


It's our survival instincts but it's far from irrational. Every single living creature on Earth has the desire to continue existing, normally manifested as a "fear of death". Without that fear, an individual would not be driven to survive long enough to reproduce and thus the species would become extinct.



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05 Dec 2010, 1:06 pm

Jono wrote:
Subotai wrote:
Is our desire to continue existing just our survival instincts messing with us?


It's our survival instincts but it's far from irrational. Every single living creature on Earth has the desire to continue existing, normally manifested as a "fear of death". Without that fear, an individual would not be driven to survive long enough to reproduce and thus the species would become extinct.


Exactly, the answer really is that simple. If we didn't have the desire to exist, we wouldn't. That therefore rationalises it.

If we didn't fear death, we would be like couch potatoes because we wouldn't want to live - so we wouldn't breed, we wouldn't eat, we wouldn't go out and enjoy ourselves. :D

Simples ( :roll: Damn I hate that advert, but it seemed relevant).



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05 Dec 2010, 1:45 pm

Do sea squirts fear death?



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05 Dec 2010, 2:03 pm

Philologos wrote:
Do sea squirts fear death?


However seemingly random your post is, I think what you're saying is interesting (If I've interpreted you correctly). However I think the wording of my last post was incorrect, even sea squirts try to live or else they would cease to be (even if they don't fear death). Our fear of death stems from our intelligence, where less intelligent organic lifeforms eat and reproduce they are still doing this to exist - like us. So across the board, every life form has one common goal - to want to exist.

It would be considered irrational to want to die, though more rational in sentient beings. [edit] and lemmings. :P



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05 Dec 2010, 4:59 pm

martyfan wrote:
Philologos wrote:
Do sea squirts fear death?


However seemingly random your post is, I think what you're saying is interesting (If I've interpreted you correctly). However I think the wording of my last post was incorrect, even sea squirts try to live or else they would cease to be (even if they don't fear death). Our fear of death stems from our intelligence, where less intelligent organic lifeforms eat and reproduce they are still doing this to exist - like us. So across the board, every life form has one common goal - to want to exist.

It would be considered irrational to want to die, though more rational in sentient beings. [edit] and lemmings. :P


Lemming suicide is a rural myth. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lemming