Would you die for your convictions? (Part 1)
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Erich Fromm was an atheist but believed in practicing traditional Jewish religious traditions and teaching.
He never would consider God or the Devil as existing in the way a believer of another, non-atheistic type, would but he'd consider your own idea about being the be all and end all yourself to be supremely misjudged.
Whats the point of religion without faith?
Isn't it then a charade? A means to control people?
How can a materialist like Fromm wear the outer garments of the spiritual whilst his mind thinks something different?
Isn't that dissingenuous as if he is not being honest with himself and his community?
I have no doubt that there is no end of people in the world that would consider me that way. This isnt really a religious debate though. Simply stating that given the criteria stated, I dont think its a good way to determine whats worth giving ones life for.
Well, when any remotely religious thing is mentioned there is always going to be an atheist whose gut reaction will be to state and restate why religion should get a look in because they consider it anathema to their beliefs.
And I'll be there to put the counterpoint.
Always.
So what you're saying is that your convictions are a big part of who you are. They give you a purpose in life. A personal identity or a sense of self.
'This is what I believe in. This is what I stand for. This is who I am.' They give your life meaning.
Passion (for beliefs) and purpose seem to go hand in hand.
But let's say we throw in a twist...
Let's pretend it was just discovered and scientifically proven that human consciousness is one big evolutionary fluke, a mutation of sorts. Self-awareness (its by-product) is nothing more than a mutually shared illusion, giving us each the false notion that we are 'somebody', when in fact, we are all 'nobody'. Everything is nothing and everybody is nobody.
This 'mutation' has led us to become too self aware, giving us the false impression of being significant.
The feeling of life holding some bigger meaning is nothing more than our brains working overtime, trying to make sense of time by filling it in with a narrative. A story that gives us some semblance of a purpose. But, it's nothing but a dream. We would be extinct with the dinosaurs if it weren't for this evolutionary slip up.
When you pass on, there will be nothing to anticipate. No eternal salvation, no happy ending. Not even an unhappy ending. No reward for being good. No punishment for being bad. You would cease to exist.
Now that you know this as fact, how do you feel about those convictions? Would anything change for you? Knowing that none of it matters?
And forget part 2, Everyone. I'm onto something else now.
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I should think that the point of living is to 1) Do a cool thing; and 2) Set things up for the kids to do a cool thing.
I mean shit, that takes up plenty of time, what the hell else could you want to do?
Nothing matters and it is this flaw which makes me be alive.
Giving in to inertia or coercion would be akin to death because I lose that sense of mattering. Fuck happy endings. If I give in now I might as well lay down and die now because I see floating around in apathy as being no different than oblivion.
[MENTION=12327]Anywhere But Here[/MENTION]
Also I see life as kind of like a tasty cake. You can either eat it, and then it will be gone, or you can save it, and it becomes stale and moldy and goes to waste.
Purpose is in the moment, not in the future. If one is only concerned about what happens later then of course their life has no meaning. The flavor of life is for now. Try to save it beyond its time and it will be stale like cardboard.
Also I see life as kind of like a tasty cake. You can either eat it, and then it will be gone, or you can save it, and it becomes stale and moldy and goes to waste.
Purpose is in the moment, not in the future. If one is only concerned about what happens later then of course their life has no meaning. The flavor of life is for now. Try to save it beyond its time and it will be stale like cardboard.
I am curious to know in what sense it isnt a religious debate, why you want to exclude religion from the discussion per se, now I'm about to head out to the gym so I must be brief but I do want to discuss that.
I mentioned Fromm, he considered that religion was a frame for reference, particularly in matters such as ethics but in the broadest possible sense comprising existentialism and meaning too, and an object of devotion, although this need not necessary be a deity, he was pretty clear about that, starting out a traditional jew but having great attachment to buddhist ideas as he understood them, ie "non-theist religion", and decided that you could have a devotion to "humanism" or an alternative to deism.
He concluded that in therapy or life if you wanted to truly know anyone or relate to others you had to discover their secret or private "religion", which he thought could be secret even from themselves due to a greater part of it being lodged in the unconscious.
Now I accept that this is an account largely created by an affecado of religion and religosity, in short he liked the idea, even if he felt that larger parts of it were false, mistaken, legacies of earlier less insightful times.
There's a lot of people who would say why bother to employ that language and formulate those conceptions when they are likely to alienate or "turn off" people right away who have different understandings of what those concepts or words mean and see no point in rehabilitating them. I can understand that, although I cant agree with it. To my mind its a pretty superficial or shallow, limiting rather than delimitating knowledge and discussion, narrowing rather than expansive. Reductive.
I dont think reductionist thinking is totally invalid BTW, just that sometimes it hinders rather than helps, especially when its social questions rather than technical points.
There's the possibility I'm thinking too deeply about this though, maybe you just meant that you didnt want to the citations from the bible to derail the thread into a scripture union debate. Which is cool, I can understand that. On the other hand what other literary source could you find quite like the bible? That alone sort of demonstrates the role religion has played in human history. I kind of think that even if you think its the same as Gilgamesh, Homer or mere mythology it all still matters and shouldnt prompt a kind of aversive reaction automatically.
[video=youtube;9oX2xFo7JA4]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9oX2xFo7JA4[/video]
Black Staaar, i've seen your post before, and i'll see it again, and again, for all eternity, the self eating serpent, ouroboros. Black staar... Meet ya in Carcosa
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But I was eagerly anticipating part 2, I wasnt able to post as quickly on this topic as I'd have liked because I was at work, just in case you think I wasnt interested.
I think I would believe as I do whether it was ultimately in vane or not, there is no way of telling, although I do think that in the balance if it is all in vane I have lived a pretty good and blameless life as a consequence of my beliefs in any case.
I think you might be interested in Lord of Light, its a sci fi novel, in it there is a class of superhuman beings, they possess mutated consciousness which can transfer between bodies, also it may transfer between a "cloud" or ethereal, disembodied state, I'm not sure, its hinted at, anyway, they are immortal but they also talk about the "true death" which results from being defeated in combat and killed.
The context could be one of the colonisation of another planet by super evolved humans or it could be a conspiratorial alt history of our own planet, depends how you read it, although, the same a Dune to a certain extent, it makes you think about religion, beliefs, the masses and classes, meta-conflicts etc. Its a good read.
The main divisions between the uber-mensch mutant consciousness beings is between preserving things as they are, allowing them a senses dulling perpetual paradise, and a rebel from their ranks who supports something called accelerationism, that is they want all the human plebs to be raised to the level of the mutant consciousness and immortality.
There's a lot of the sci fi masterworks series which are really good and have philosophical and other underpinnings and depth which are lacking in a lot of books printed up today.
Though you did not ask me you have touched on a large part of my search in life.
Ill answer this by simply saying that at first Id probably start kicking a lot more rocks. Then Id probably do an atmospheric halo jump attempting to break the current world record. Then after that (assuming I pulled my chute) I may sit down in a corner some place and never move again.
What kind of actions do you plan to take in order to be stronger than God or the devil? What kind of training plan will you use?
Do you search for answers out of fear of the unknown? Or do you search to understand? Would knowing the truth (for better or worse) change you and the way you live?
I search to know. Knowing what you indicated yes it would change my life. I would spwnd all my time and energy figuring out how to live forever and then owning the universe.
Sounds like the existentialism and sensualism of Albert Camus.
I dont believe that life is meaningless as you say but I have read a lot of stuff written from that perspective.