Endless Paradigm

I started writing this thread as a part of another, older thread, but it started going on tangents that were no longer on-topic. As such, I decided to make an entirely new topic. If you have a lot of time, go ahead and read, leave a comment, whatever. I don't expect many to care enough about what I have to say to make it all the way through :)

For a while I've been having a problems with motivation due to constantly contemplating certain questions. If wee do go back to Heaven, or wherever else our souls might be sent, then why should wee strain ourselves in our physical bodies to try to succeed? What's the big reason behind it? If there is no god, and at heart, I believe in egoism (i.e, I believe all people behave selfishly, no matter the circumstance), then why should wee strive to do well in our lives? It is all meaningless in the end. So what, you might be remembered in some random history book, but you are not truly remembered for the individual you are, but rather for your accomplishments, or for a specific event you participated in. Many people have said that when they die they don't want to just leave a pile of poo poo behind, my dad being one of those people. Well, this is an extremely selfish reason, and it is a futile grasp for some form of immortality, by keeping your NAME alive, but more than likely you'll just become, at best, a name that is purely meant to be learned as maybe part of a mnemonic device so that some snot nosed 4th grader can get his B- in history.  What is the use?

If there is reincarnation, then again, why bother trying? You just get another chance. If you only get one time to go through your life, then you might say it is a reason for doing the best you can to succeed. Well, if that's the case, then why are so many others forced to start off with so much less than what I've been blessed? What makes it fair for them to have to suffer, while I reap life's rewards?  What of the retarded, the disabled, the foolish, the mentally ill? You could say they serve as a part of God's overall plan, but if that is true, then is fairness completely thrown out the window? Perhaps God gives them a second chance at life once they've "lived" through it as a disabled human or something, in order to allow for fairness. If this is so, then this brings up another argument.

If whatever happens is, in the end, part of God's plan, seeing as his omniscience includes the ability to know what will happen in the future, then whenever someone kills another individual, it must have been God's will. The Commandments might have said that God wishes otherwise, but if they are to be taken as truth, then why does God even allow for such freedom of choice? If it is to force us to choose to be "good" or "evil" then why even force us to make such a decision? How does he take into account those who do not know of Jesus, or how does he take into account those who have been taught their entire lives that their religion is the absolute correct one? I might not heed the beliefs of another religion because I am still up in the air about which one's traditions and beliefs I can find myself following, and then while I'm deciding, I could be killed in an accident. What then? Do I get partial credit for trying? Is it all or nothing?

What of the babies who die early on, before they even develop a memorable consciousness? If they are killed, then do they get a second chance? I've heard some say that the baby wasn't truly a being with a soul perhaps, and is rather just a temporary being, whose sole purpose is to die early in life, and to cause a chain reaction.  If that is true, then what about those grief-stricken parents? Is it fair that they spend the rest of their lives in pain over this particular event? Perhaps it causes them to lose faith. You might say, "Well, they didn't have true faith if they couldn't stay vigilant in the hardest of times", but then you take into account their circumstances. Perhaps they were just starting to try accepting God? Perhaps the child was going to instill a belief in the Lord for them? I've often head babies called miracles, and to have a miracle taken away from you, makes it seem more like coincidence, and perhaps an absence of God?

If there is no God, then how can you explain infinity? Exactly how can you explain a universe that is infinite? The only way I can comprehend it with my feeble human mind is that God created the universe to help us cope with the idea of infinity. This may sound idiotic, but it is the only way I can put my mind at ease: perhaps wee are only able to see what is currently made, and as wee look farther into space, more of the universe is created.  Again, this is a little like one of the ideas behind a solipsist view that one's mind is the only thing that truly exists. For all I know, I just came into existence this exact moment, with my memories in place. What proof do I have that my memories are correct, or that I have truly experienced anything that I remember?

Well, if you take a look at hedonism, or more specifically a mental state account of well-being, one would say that how you currently feel, such as happy, content, satisfied, etc, etc, determines how well off you are. Well, a counter to this argument is a fictional experiment called the "Experience Machine", which gives any individual the ability to live whatever aspect of a perfect life they'd want, but it would be disconnected from reality. That is, once they left the machine, everything would be back to normal. Most say they'd not want to do this machine, purely because it isn't real. Sure pleasure is good, but wee want to actually live a certain way, realistically own certain things, and actually get to endure certain things in life, rather than just have it all modified into our liking.

This brings about the idea of a desire-fulfillment account. This is the belief that wee are as happy as how much wee've fulfilled in our lives, such as having a family, overcoming a great challenge, making a comfortable living, etc. Well, then why is it that some do not have the same opportunity as others to live a comfortable life, or to fulfill their desires as well? Perhaps they have absolutely no credit due to not ever being able to establish it because of no one who could co-sign to help out? Thus, they couldn't apply for financial aid, or couldn't live a reasonable life. Sure, there are government fundings that help out those without a means to pay for school, but there is not always an ability to even get a decent education to make it far enough to get to college. Their family might not have been able to pay for their education, and so the point is moot.  

Basically, trying to answer any question brings even more questions, and to answer those questions requires knowledge of some aspect of the truth, or else the conditions under which all plausible answers must exist cannot be fully analyzed. Myself, I am still looking for guidance. I truly want to believe in a God, and when someone talks to me about it, I always say that I believe in God, but I am just not sure if it is for the "right" reasons, or if it the same kind of belief they hold. Well, that ends my rant.

Read it all the way till the end, but no comment.

I don't believe God by the way.

Hmm... Let me tell you what I believe...

Our souls are a form of energy that have taken form which is different from surrounding energy. There is no God, but there is a source of Life Energy, which does not concern or is involved in what or when is done in the universe.

Life origins could simply be a massive physics+chemical accident.

When you die, your soul (life energy) will simply change form into another form, as yet not discovered.

That is all there is to it.

Theres a lot there. I read it all, but it seemed more like a rant to discuss than something that made a genuine point

That's not to say your opinion has no point, but rather that you weren't pushing one specific one there

I'm with Assassinator, i don't belive in God, although im of the opinion that Science is just another Religion in the end, and people just don't acknowldge it as one, which may or may not be true, but meh, its my right to believe

I definitely agree on some of your tooics though, i can't belive any sane god would let some of the things happen that do, i had a huge discussion about this with a girl at work, which was epically fun, because she believes that he won't do anything, whereas i agrued he can't

I think, to add fuel to this fire, im a purely discussional sense (ie, it might seem like im inciting arguement, but i actually only want discussion as this is something that fascinates me)

Epicurus Wrote:Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is not omnipotent.
Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent.
Is he both able and willing? Then whence cometh evil?
Is he neither able nor willing? Then why call him God?

The obvious follow on question is why do you bother living? (ie meaning of life?)

As for religions, I won't go into them, but you can neither prove or disprove them, only really pose questions which probably only experts in the field can give reasonable? answers to.

As for your infinity point - is the universe infinite?  Is time infinite?
I've seen interesting arguments for stuff like a true infinity doesn't exist - eg, if you kept adding 1 to a number you'd get a really large number, but would never actually reach infinity.  Unfortunately, these fail because you can't base the reasoning on those points.

Is the "Pleasure Machine" really bad?  Most people don't like the idea, but who knows, you could be in one right now...

Don't really get your "desire-fulfillment" point.  But happiness can be relative - eg what makes a well off person happy is different to what makes a not so well off person happy.


At the end of the day, there's no proof for or against God, only arguments which have many possible flaws (one of the most often is the extension/inference principle - that is, you're basing an argument off an idea you understand and applying it to something you don't understand).
So what you believe in is purely your choice.

As you guys have noted, it was more of a stream of consciousness post than it was a fluid essay that built one atop another. I was just letting whatever crossed my mind, as I was addressing one point, be typed. There is some fluidity, but it was mostly to bring up a few thoughts I've had, and seeking your input.

ZiNgA BuRgA Wrote:Is the "Pleasure Machine" really bad?  Most people don't like the idea, but who knows, you could be in one right now...

Don't really get your "desire-fulfillment" point.  But happiness can be relative - eg what makes a well off person happy is different to what makes a not so well off person happy.

But you see, I wasn't bringing in the idea of Skepticism. The idea that wee can't know anything past our own experiences, so wee couldn't really know if wee aren't in a "pleasure machine" right now; this more addresses reality than anything else. I was moving into an idea about what reality is, and if it is fair for all who experience their own reality. That, then was supposed to make you think back on the point of whether God intended such "unfairness" to occur for a reason. And if there was any way to balance it, perhaps through reincarnation, at which point, the less fortunate get a chance to succeed, or perhaps they'd be given another chance to relive that life until they get it right. It wasn't stated clearly, I see, but I was kind of leading one to consider those "arguments".

As for why I brought up desire-fulfillment, I believe one of my main intentions was to say that perhaps having faith or believing in some sort of balance might be essential to contentment, which would fulfill both the desire-fulfillment accounts of well-being, as well as the mental state account.  Also, if people were not as well off as someone else, then they could never achieve a sense of well-being through a desire-fulfillment account. They'd have a "cursed" life. You could argue that perhaps they are content with their lives through a means of their mental state, or that they are still fulfilling desires, such as having a family, having a job, helping the sick, etc, but that would not take into account that they still aren't being treated "fairly" as is seen nowadays. The idea of "fairness" would be that everyone has an equal opportunity as everyone else. Well, some just never will have that opportunity. How about those born missing limbs? Won't ever be in the Olympics using real legs, but instead perhaps they'd be in the Special Olympics using whatever assistance such as a wheel chair or a prosthetic leg, or something, and then they'd again be using slightly different equipment, which might favor the person who could afford a better tool, or he also had weakened muscles vs the person who is just missing a leg. There is always unfairness, and I think that gets me the most.  If there is some form of balance, then there should at least be a form of reincarnation. That is the only belief I can see that might even the playing field for this argument.

Again, my stream of consciousness made me forget to include those details XD  Had just woke up when I wrote the post.

Depends on how you believe in God as well.  If he's some omniscient being who created us, it could be for some purpose wee don't know of.  Unfairness could be a part of his plan, for example - he may not be a "fair" God (though many religions seem to promote that idea), or maybe he is (are those people who wee consider suffering really less happy than people who are better off?).

It'd be so weird if wee were "created" as a lab experiment by the "supernatural being"...

tldr?

diego Wrote:tldr?

tht is fine..