That's certainly a dilemma that one can face. I suppose I'd want to live forever. I can always choose to die if I wanted to; but, again that's futile. Schopenhauer and moreso Camus talked about the futility of death. — Posty McPostface

I don't understand what you mean by the futility of death. IMO, Schopenhauer's notion that suicide was futile was an attempt to plug a fundamental defect in his system* and a kind of hypocrisy that haunted his life. I still think he was a truly great philosopher.

And Camus took a ride with a known speed-devil, and he probably liked that proximity to death. It probably made him feel sexy and alive.

*The defect I mean is that Schopenhauer's cosmic vision is very close to the suicide's cosmic vision. Life is a stupid stage on which meaningless pain stalks. It is a bad thing to be dealt with. But I don't think Schopenhauer was sufficiently conscious of the immense pleasure he took in being the guru of pessimism. He loved his complaint. He would have (in his heart of hearts) kept humanity alive and suffering only so that they could read his books and appreciate his genius. 'Oh that Schopenhauer really tells it like it is. Ouch! Ouch ! Ouch!'

Basically Schopenhauer's vision is 'essentially' suicidal, which makes 'selling' it a little absurd.

More truth than mumbo-jumbo, or otherwise? — Posty McPostface

For me the truth or mumbo-jumbo is only real or alive in the person making use of the tradition. A book, for instance, only really exists for a living, breathing reader.

I think it's sincerity. — Posty McPostface

Yeah, that's a good word for it. A serious fool will persist in his folly and become wise. There's an old quote: people usually get what they want. As a rule-of-thumb (and allowing for time and chance), I think that's roughly true. And you find out what you really wanted to some degree by seeing what you ended up with and thinking about how you actually spent your time to get there. It's quite common to think one wants one thing and all along act toward some other goal. These things become clearer, though, usually when it's just about too late.

What do you mean? — Posty McPostface

For me it's never about some dead system of statements or rituals. On their own they are neither true nor false, profound nor mumbo-jumbo. They merely set the stage for a certain kind of existence, and setting the stage is not going to magically get the job done. I can't say exactly what gets the job done. I think the traditions are hints, poems, technologies that have helped others exist in the certain way.

But I think there is a limit to what can be formulated.

Yes, this is the moral dilemma that the simulation hypothesis faces. It's a path that one can always take, but, would you be willing to forsake death, which is going to become a reality sooner or later? — Posty McPostface

This reminds me of vampire fiction, which I think is pretty suggestive. Would I become immortal? Would I choose to become a vampire? I really might. But vampires can be destroyed. So let's imagine vampires that can't be destroyed, so that one is stuck with immortality. Now the question is heavy. I'd now say that one should be very careful here. Old fashioned religious notions of hell are entering the picture along with absolutely irreversible decisions. Death adds a certain lightness to existence. However bad you mess it up, you eventually get to go home.

So, what are your thought's about Buddhism, and the cessation of suffering? Is it all mumbo-jumbo or is there some truth to all of it? — Posty McPostface

I'm no expert, but I have dabbled. I'd say that there is some truth to it and some mumbo-jumbo. My main response would that what the individual makes of it is primary. Every tradition, let's say, has a profound face and shallow face. Or maybe a continuum that runs from depth to triviality. Anyone can gossip with no real understanding about anything. Language allows that.

Even crappy philosophers can be transformed into gold by the right kind of seriousness. And truly great philosophers can be interpreted into bumper stickers in the other direction. Traditions are nice, but show me the individual.

Yes, this sounds like something Wittgenstein would say. I agree. What is life without death? Just something? Not really. — Posty McPostface

If I use my imagination, I'd say that life without death would be very different. There would always be time to procrastinate. You could always go back to take the right path having at first taken the wrong path. In some ways it would be nice. But it would also reduce life to a flat kind of video game. Decisions would have no real weight.

Understood. I was unsure what you meant by that analogy. But, thanks for clarifying. — Posty McPostface

My pleasure. I really like the candle analogy. As far as I know, that one is all mine. Thought someone out there probably also used it, given that candles are such old technology.

Hmm. You drive a hard bargain. I'm a fan of logotherapy and have read Viktor's Man's Sear for Meaning. We always have the chance to choose our attitudes; but, not circumstances towards death. — Posty McPostface

Right. We don't choose our death. But most of us live knowing that it will come for us eventually, probably when we aren't expecting it. Or at least the cancer diagnosis will be a surprise.

So we live with this knowledge in the back of our minds, like a kind of dark laughter that puts the long-range importance of the projects we take so seriously into question.

You asked me how facing death connects to the petty versus the transcendent self. The petty self is the wax, the little details of a life that are erased. The transcendent self is the flame. Sometimes the 'wax' is sacrificed to the flame. Schopenhauer writes about this kind of thing. Let's say I jump in front of a bus to save an absentminded child. I have a sense that the child and I are one, that our individuality is a kind of 'illusion' or at least inessential. I manifest a sense of profound connection by truly risking my flesh (and not by merely talking about it, which would be less convincing.)

But, what is life without suffering? — Posty McPostface

I agree. And most people don't want to die, so much so that they will believe unlikely stories to fend off the notion of being erased as particular persons. My point would be that facing death 'forces' the lit candle to identify more with the flame than the wax.

I just fail to see the merit to martyrdom with suicide. Sure, people get remembered for it; but, so what? — Posty McPostface

Again, I'm not talking about suicide anymore, except maybe self-sacrifice that saves others or for some cause. My focus is on facing death more generally. We are all mortal. So the question is how we face this death and how this mortality might encourage us to think philosophically and make peace with death. And the question is also how the knowledge of mortality is integrated within our grasp of existence as a whole, perhaps making that grasping-as-a-hole more possible or profound.

What in me dies when I die? My particular memories? Yeah. But what was the best part of me all along? What it my little particular face? Was it my little habits?

Or was the virtue that lit up my life the same virtue that lit up other people's lives? Is essential virtue a flame that leaps from melting candle to melting candle? I'd say so. So death loses some of its sting as we sincerely find ourselves in the flame and not the candle.

A memory dies. That's unacceptable. But, true, people commit suicide, and then the world keeps on turning. It's just such a futile act though. — Posty McPostface

I'm not thinking of suicide in the above quote. I'm talking about the things we die for and why.

True, I meant to just highlight the fact that egalitarianism commands otherwise. — Posty McPostface

Sure, and I'm a 'blue' guy in a 'blue' city. But as a philosopher, I don't take on the moral fads without criticism or reservation. [Which is not to say that you do, but only to clarify my position.]

What do you mean by that? — Posty McPostface

What is it that dies? Who is it that dies? And who is it that is died for? For whom does the soldier die? For whom or what did Socrates die? For whom or what do we die in lots of little ways when not completely?

I don't think it's a matter of manliness as you portray it. After all, Stoicism appealed to women also. — Posty McPostface

Well, sure, it's not really about genitals. But traditionally it's men who go to war and women and children who get the first lifeboats. I may be a little bit old-fashioned for 2018 in this regard. On the other hand, I don't think my wife could love and respect me quite the same way if she didn't know in her uterus that I would jump between her and danger with a willingness to die and/or kill if necessary.

It's natural that a peaceful society wouldn't emphasize these old-fashioned notions much. But I suspect they would be back in a flash if things became universally dangerous again.

Had Marcus Aurelius committed suicide, he would have been remembered as a proto-Jesus, above and beyond that of Socrates. — Posty McPostface

Well you do bring up a point that has always interested me. Two of our primary cultural heroes (Jesus and Socrates) were [complicated] suicides. So facing death is at the very heart of the heroic, at least in these figures. I think death connects to the small self as opposed to the big self, or the 'petty' self as opposed to the 'transcendent' self.

Yes, the Stoics, would have advocated suicide in strict conditions. Such mandates were imposed to prevent the needless loss of life at your very own hands. — Posty McPostface

The stoics are a good example. Suicide was appropriate in certain circumstances. In such circumstances, it was one more manly facing of death.

The Stoics warranted suicide under strict conditions. Seneca must have welcomed the idea of suicide as salvation from a despotic ruler. As to delineating when suicide is warranted instead of unwarranted could be an interesting topic question.

What do you think? — Posty McPostface

Honestly, for me talk of 'warranted' or not is usually talk that moves into politics and system-making. In my opinion, this 'assumes' a kind of scientific pose toward issues that trivializes them and makes them toys for the intellect or axes-to-grind for 'theoretical' politicians. But I'm biased. To me the manufacture of 'oughts' is not at all interesting. Now what would be interesting in such a discussion would be hidden in the margins, as people illuminated their 'oughts' with personal experience and linked them to their grasp of existence as a whole.

Cynicism would point out that 'profoundness' is a symptom of a mediocre life. I try and live my life as mediocre as possible though. — Posty McPostface

Surprising. I usually think of profound as something like the opposite of mediocre. The profound is dark, hidden, esoteric. Or it is associated with 'limit' situations that we all face, the birth and death of loved ones, falling in love, conceptual revolutions with which we re-invent ourselves, etc.

Don't you find the prospect of suicide, as a no win game? I mean, there's nothing to be gained at the end of the day, when one thinks too seriously about suicide. It's just another act of 'resistance' from futility. — Posty McPostface

Well I am far from being pro-suicide, but I think that suicide connects to some other profound issues. For instance, is it better to risk your life in a fight when you are being abused or just tolerate the abuse to minimize mortal risk? Should a person tolerate slavery to increase longevity, in other words? Should we prioritize long lives over brave lives?

In short, how does the issue of facing death figure into our broader grasps of existence?

I'm an advocate for philosophical quietism, despite my rampage of posts. I don't know what to think about 'profoundness'. It seems like lipstick on already red lips. — Posty McPostface

I can relate to any ambivalence. But I guess for me it's a form of stimulation. I need 'hard' conversation, risky conversation, heavy conversation. It's clear to me though that I am tuned so that I am on one side of the spectrum. Don't get me wrong. I'm pretty good at playing the usual games. I'm a charming extrovert when I have to be. But 'really' I am a creature of solitude and heavy thoughts.

I see you added this. I don't know what to think about suicide. If one believes in unrestrained individualism, then so be it? — Posty McPostface

I'm just trying to paint how they see it, or at least how I've seen it.

When it comes to suicide, the political question seems unimportant to me. Because you can't stop it, and a successful suicide transcends all law enforcement and whatever people will say about it. It leaps into the 'truth.' That's part of its allure. Death is transcendent.

Profound. I guess we're delving too deeply into the topic when things start sounding profound. — Posty McPostface

Maybe. I've always been comfortable in all of this deep stuff and bored when things are just cutesy small-talk. So people come to me sometimes when they are desperate. I'm a good friend for heavy conversations, but maybe not much fun when frivolity is called for.

But, wasn't their loss tragic in some sense? I would hate to leave more pain behind than happiness and such. — Posty McPostface

Sure. It was tragic. But having been in some very dark states of mind, I understood it too well to feel judgmental. The suicidal person feels like a disease. So they think they are doing good by doing away with themselves. They feel the guilt of being an individual, the guilt of entanglement. And even being loved is part of the entanglement. In a certain state of mind, being loved is terrifying. The fantasy is to be in a place without the 'guilt' (debt, responsibility) that comes with mattering.

Usually the psyche involved is aware of too many contradictions. Reality is cracked through the center of their soul. They want opposite things, and it is hell, like being torn apart. And they 'see' that it is their own nature that is their hell. They are their own prisons. They don't have the comforting illusion that the problem is outside them.

Indeed. That's true. But, after all, resistance is futile in the case of suicide. — Posty McPostface

Not to cause a suicide wave, but I do think suicide solves the problem. It's just an awfully expensive solution. I have friends who killed themselves via direct suicide and also with heroin needles (maybe not intending to die but playing with something with well known dangers.) Am I wiser and better than them? I don't know. I'm here to think about it. They aren't. I will join them in the grave at some point.

Life is a mystery. Death is a mystery. Or maybe I really do have faith in death as nothingness, so it's less of a mystery than life. I'd rather be alive just now. I know/feel that. At some point (when this body is sufficiently broken) I will probably prefer to be dead. In the meantime I try to amuse myself and treat people well, especially those who treat me well.

I'm an avid fan of the simulation hypothesis. It seems as though each person exists on a plane of solitude and loneliness sometimes. But, the simulation hypothesis renders suicide as futile in-of-itself. — Posty McPostface

I don't know the details. Can you sketch the hypothesis?

I do think there is an ineradicable 'core' of loneliness as we become unique adults. No one ever 'exactly' gets us.

Why not? If one commits oneself to the prospect of eternal bliss that is suicide, then they ought to think about it abstractly. — Posty McPostface

Oh, maybe I misunderstood your question.

Also, I think most people (or most atheists/agnostics) think of death as a neutral absence of experience. Not positive infinity but zero, let's say.

BTW, do you believe in the simulation hypothesis of reality? — Posty McPostface

Hmmm. Given my 'meaning holism,' I'm likely to see it as just a new name for reality.

Q: So you think this reality is all a simulation?
A: Yes.
Q: So you are naturally not afraid to eat poison and walk into traffic?
A: Errr. Well. No I wouldn't eat poison or walk into traffic.

In short, something-like-reality is a shared sense of what constrains our 'freedom.' Let's say I decide that reality is a simulation and it doesn't change my behavior in the least. What, then, have I really decided?

Can one face the prospect of suicide with a straight face? I don't know. — Posty McPostface

People can and do. And it is a form of overcoming resistance. They leap 'over' the fear of death into the 'truth.'

Why don't more people realize that resistance against resistance is futile? — Posty McPostface

I'd say most people never even think about it so abstractly.

Suicide is always futile. It's an idealistic dream world. I'm surprised so many people find it comforting when the uncertainty of existence points the other way. I would want to live forever, not erase myself. Such are the pangs of existence, yes; but, suicide is too big of a leap to overcome via rationality. I heard that suicide is done either by passion or cold analysis. I can't fathom what kind of analysis must operate to lead to such a conclusion. Time to eat something then. That's simpler and easier to obtain rather than eternal bliss in a never-ending dream. — Posty McPostface

I've contemplated suicide before. It is the coldest calculation imaginable. It is truly arctic, terrifyingly arctic.

I've known impressive, charismatic people to take that path. I think they felt a strong urge toward purity. They therefore saw the world as a place full of filth and futility. And they saw themselves as a rooms that would always be messy. I personally think death is an escape from all pain. But the price to be paid for that escape is all pleasure --and all everything.

And of course it hurts the people that love you. That alone can keep it from actually happening. You may really want it, but still care enough about others to not be selfish that way.

Yes, that's true. Resistance is futile, then? — Posty McPostface

Resistance to resistance may be futile, since we actually want it as much or even more than we hate it. Most of us are sufficiently invested in life so that suicide is not a 'living' issue and that instead concrete situations are our living issues. Philosophy does give us wise rules-of-thumb (reminds for particular purposes) and an overall orientation within or grasp of our own existence.

For me a big part of this grasp is the uniqueness of my (or your) particular existence. We ultimately synthesize unique 'partial' (always-still-in-progress) 'solutions' for our unique situations.
If you read Wittgenstein, for instance, then that's you reading Wittgenstein. The 'meaning field' generated by that reading is a fusion of you and Wittgenstein. You read Wittgenstein or Marcus Aurelius with your entire soul. I do the same. And as we talk we slowly get a global sense of who we are talking to. Lines at the beginning of our conversation take on new meaning if we re-read them. 'Oh that's what he meant, or that's more like what he must have meant.'

Spot on though. I think that the purity of simple existence is more easily obtainable than the complexity of existence. Why don't we all become simple folk then? — Posty McPostface

But that's the resistance we crave. We don't want easy, or not in a simple way. We want to shine in relation to others. We want to feel ourselves overcoming the difficult. And even the pursuit of the simple life is a form of overcoming the drift toward complexity of modern life.

Oh dear. Not suicide. Such a decision is irreversible and morally wrong towards other people who care for you. Did I mention I'm a big Nel Noddings fan? — Posty McPostface

Yeah, I'm not suggesting suicide. I'm only saying that wanting resistance-in-general permanently gone is a kind of death wish. Similarly the desire for perfect clarity or perfect purity and so on strikes me as a death wish. And the desire for some 'mission' stated in simple terms is also suspect. This itch for perfection inspires good philosophy, but it also drives people mad. I think the itch has to be balanced out with a kind of lust for life in its visceral complexity and plurality.

I don't know Nel Noddings.

But, what about tackling this 'resistance' itself? Is that possible? Doesn't that mean the cessation of desiring and wanting itself? Isn't that the most logical route to take? — Posty McPostface

We start to get to the terrible heart of the issue. If we really want the cleanest solution, then BANG it's suicide. But I would rather be a little dirty and still alive, at least while I'm healthy and still fascinated by existence. I do think the quest for a certain kind of purity tempts some to the grave. It's simple and quiet down there I hear. Or actually I don't hear. Corpses are way too cool to gossip about nonexistence the same way we the living gossip about existence.

Surely, ecstasy and happiness are forever a goal but not directly obtainable. — Posty McPostface

If I may interject, I know how to get ecstasy once in a while. I just don't know how to live constantly in a state of ecstasy. We aren't designed to live there. With drugs we can trick our systems quite spectacularly, but this is dangerous, since we are messing with a machine that took millions of years to tune.

Indeed. Overcoming resistance; but, what's this "resistance" you talk about? — Posty McPostface

It's a generalization from many particular narratives. Maybe one person makes chasisty the fundamental virtue. Then their resistance is just lust. They push against lust with 'will power.' Another person thinks clarity in thinking is the fundamental virtue, so they push against ambiguity, logical fallacies, etc. Still another person thinks freedom is the fundamental virtue, so they push against their cowardice and go to war, or they push against the apathy of their neighbors to get their favored candidate elected. Basically they choose their enemy or resistance as they choose their virtue. We crave something in our way so that we can shove it out of our way and feel alive, powerful, meaningful.

It would be a peaceful existence, no? — Posty McPostface

Yes, I'll grant you that. And if we didn't have a need for stimulation, then the stoics would have a stronger case. But IMO we have a strong need for a sense of ascent. As Nietzsche might say, we love the feeling of overcoming resistance. I'd use the metaphor of a 'height itch.' We like to climb ladders.

Even the stoics work at overcoming the resistance of their irrational nature. It's one more heroic task that we can choose to assign ourselves. One more way to shine in relation to others. What we don't seem to choose is this need to assign ourselves mission.

That mission is assigned by I-know-not-what. And if I define this I-know-not-what, it will probably be in terms of my idiosyncratic personal assignment (partially chosen and endlessly debated.)

What do you mean by that? Interesting, as all your posts... — Posty McPostface

I'd say: ask yourself what it would mean to be alive and want nothing at all. Experience is usually structured by a kind of pursuit. The 'drama' of life depends on us being fragile beings that value some things and dis-value others. Kissing the girl is better after not knowing for a long time whether she will ever want you to kiss her, etc. We are structured so that greater pleasure depends on a greater preliminary tension.

There's a Twilight Zone where an A-hole goes to Heaven. It's a little casino where he always wins. It slowly dawns on him that he is actually in Hell. His victories are meaningless. He is meaningless.

*Thanks for the kind words about my posts.

I like Cynicism because it bypasses the Stoic into pure simplicity. What do you think? I've become an avid Cynic as of late. — Posty McPostface

I like the cynics too. I like all the philosophies that address life as a whole. Epicurus is pretty great. Maybe I'm an epicurean, but in the classic sense.

The Schopenhauer in me says that we never really get what we want. It's a constant illusory goal. To want something is to place it in the highest priority of our motivations. Is there any use in chasing after happiness or ecstasy? I don't think so. — Posty McPostface

Have you ever had a great sandwich when you were hungry? Laid down for a nice nap when you were sleepy? Had a great cup of coffee when you were really in mood for coffee? Taken a pain pill after dental surgery and the thing worked like a charm? Solved a complicated puzzle?

The question is not whether we ever get what we want but whether we ever abolish all wanting. To abolish all wanting, though, is to abolish life itself, since life 'is' care.