Yet, you have offered no real solution other than words like "connection, collaboration, and awareness". Funny how easy that part is. Vague notions are a dime-a-dozen. — schopenhauer1

Because there IS NO one-size-fits-all, ‘concrete’ solution. Because everyone’s situation is different, and changes all the time. Because any step-by-step instruction manual for life is going to be relevant to only those whose situation is identical to yours was.

These are not vague, pie-in-the-sky notions, though. They are the basic switches to change any situation, and are most effective when it appears there is nowhere to go, nothing to see, nothing to do. These three switches - ignorance/awareness, isolation/connection and exclusion/collaboration - are how we engage with the world as will; NOT the world as representation.

Language describes the world as representation, so any ‘concrete’ examples I attempt to give will just seem to be more of the same. And my efforts to get into the science that supports the metaphysics is just ignored or dismissed as ‘word salad’, so clearly that’s going over your head. I’m actually at a loss as to how else I can present this, but I’m also getting the sense that you’re not really interested in what you claim to be asking in the OP. You don’t really WANT to know ‘what is one to do?’ because you prefer this situation of vocal pessimism - it gives you a sense of purpose to take the moral high ground against existence...:chin:

It is funny how people confuse leading out of a bad situation to putting people in the situation in the first place so that they can lead them out. I'm not saying you are doing that, but surely that is and has gone on trillions of times over. I'm trying to prevent the latter situation. I don't want people to even have to lead people from X to Y, or from ignorance to enlightenment, or whathaveyou. I certainly don't want people to follow Wonka's "loving" agenda of which way to survive, get more comfortable, and overcome dissatisfaction. — schopenhauer1

Oh, for crying out loud...

I didn’t say it was a ‘bad’ situation - it’s a situation. Most people prefer to be blind, to be led around by ‘forces’ they can complain about. They’d rather have a boss they hate than acknowledge they can change their situation. They deliberately reduce perception of potential, arranging and defining their situation so it appears as if they have no choice. They harp on about how their life sucks, and gravitate towards those who feel the same, sharing consolation of suffering, using cynical humour etc. They ignore or belittle anyone who proposes an alternative, and they take great pride in pointing out how every opportunity to change just appears to be more of the same. It’s a crab in the bucket scenario.

"It is better ..." is a value judgement. There are no objective sets of values. So every statement "X is better than Y" should be read as "Given my values A, B, C, ... it follows that X is better than Y". Only then can a discussion arise if it really follows or if there is a flaw in the logic.
E.g.: Are squares better than triangles?
If symmetry is a value then, yes, squares are better because they have more symmetries.

And to your original problem:
An often cited value most people can agree upon is human well being. To have human well being, humans have to exist so existence is better than non-existence. But if the existence of more human beings doesn't increase the overall well being of all humans, more human beings is not better than fewer human beings.
An argument can be made that humans have overshot that threshold of optimal numbers a long time ago. — ArmChairPhilosopher

This makes sense to me. But what about the question:

Are squares better than shapelessness?

I wonder what value would one have that would lead them to decide on shapelessness. Or perhaps it is more a feature of shapes in general that they find repellent, and not just squares. Just a thought...

No. From what I've seen, insiders understand it immediately to be about the idea that one should "postpone" one's enlightenment in favor of "helping others".

It's a belief that the blind are nevertheless fully qualified to lead the blind and to be trusted (blindly).

Mahayana criticizes Theravada for being "selfish", for not caring about others, and only focusing on one's own development. Theravada points out the folly and the danger of the blind leading the blind.


I brought this up in reference to your proposition that we should help others, even at the expense of our own lives. It's an absurd proposition that serves no other purpose but to bolster one's ego. — baker

Some interpret it this way, sure. Doesn’t mean they’re correct, just because they’re ‘insiders’. That’s like assuming Christian fundamentalists understand the bible correctly.

It highlights a fundamental disagreement within Buddhism, though - and there is no standard doctrine or interpretation that resolves it, as evident by the Mahāyāna vs Theravāda criticisms back and forth. It comes down to this question of ‘individuality’ that is at the heart of these discussions. Is there more value in attaining individual enlightenment - non-existence - or in reducing suffering across existence overall? So yes, it does depend on your perspective. Because there is meaning in both.

Not sure what a ‘no-self’ approach to reduction in suffering has to do with bolstering one’s ego. The value/expense of one’s ‘own’ life is unquantifiable - it’s inseparable from a relation to others. Nor do I see how ‘individual’ enlightenment through ignorance, isolation and exclusion reduces anything more than the appearance of suffering in relation to the ‘individual’, who then effectively ceases to exist.

We are all blind until the moment we attain enlightenment, at which point we are no longer in a position to lead. This is the dilemma we face.

Just because “we” are part of a changing social arrangement or dynamic or that we learn by social means largely, doesn’t mean there is no individual whereby no one actually is doing the thinking, decision-making, who feels, who is the person writing this right now. — schopenhauer1

Doesn’t mean there is, either. It’s a concept that’s entirely constructed from perceived value/potential/significance in relation to an ongoing sensory event. This ‘individual’ is an heuristic device that enables us to use language in describing, discussing and rearranging a relative structure of potential that determines and initiates an actual relational structure of ongoing thinking, feeling and decision-making in the variable form of a living human being. But ‘individuality’ as a feature of this structure of potential is, on closer inspection, found to be false. It’s a useful idealisation - tied to cardinality as a matter of meaning - to simplify our conceptual framework and predict/discuss behaviour.

The structure itself is real, the quality of individuality is pure imagination - wishful thinking on our part. If only we could each just BE meaningful in ourselves...

So no, there is no where to go, nothing to do, nothing to see, nothing to be. But ironically, that includes the achievement of "no-thingness" of the whole ascetic enterprise, which I question as anything that is real or achievable or even necessary. Schopenhauer was an ardent platonist (infused with Kantian concepts). That is, there are some "grades" of "being" beyond the material. That brings up a whole other discussion on what "gnosis" is in ancient Platonic thinking, etc. He had ideas of "Ideas" that are somehow existent "beyond" material reality.. in the realm of pure Idea/form.. and that one can "access" this in some way through acts of will-lessness like "art", "compassion", and "ascetic practice". Yet, the whole scheme of "higher reality" I question.. As much an admirer I am oh Schopenhauer, it doesn't mean I think he is beyond questioning. He thought long and hard about the most important things (human condition, existential stuff, etc.) but this doesn't mean he is absolutely correct in all his conclusions.

In this case, I think he was too optimistic, oddly enough.. That Plato for him allowed an "escape hatch" whereby we can get "true glimpses" of some other "sublime reality".. if only temporary.. and that meditation and asceticism somehow will bring about even more "sublime glimpses" and for the ascetic who goes all the way (suicide via starvation?) they have achieved the ultimate escape.. Buddhist-parallels for sure. But this does not mean that this conception of "true glimpses" are correct. They seem to me to be romanticized ideas of feelings we get when we encounter certain things.. We might feel awe or a sense of amazement looking at something, or listening to something.. We might feel a sense of sincere compassion with someone's suffering, and we might have a sense of our own constant desires by meditation techniques.. But these I believe are not somehow connected through a higher gnosis of "will-lessness". They are just discrete feelings that are part of our reactions to various concepts and stimuli.. I don't give them any more divine status beyond that. — schopenhauer1

I’m not talking about divine status or ‘higher reality’, only metaphysics. And I’m not talking about escape, either. It’s an opportunity to increase awareness of reality. I don’t see asceticism as an escape but a learning process - not to simply cope with the striving, but to understand it from a perspective beyond mere appearance, as we do with everything else.

Exploring the effects of non-compliance and suffering on being is a learning process. Deliberately approaching the limits of being confirms our capacity for non-compliance, and with that the variability of the agenda as it stands. Likewise, recognising the variability of our being, our capacity to be affected simply by looking at or listening to something, points to information available in experience that isn’t accurately subsumed under concepts such as ‘awe’ or ‘amazement’, and awaits to be understood.

The idea that what we feel in relation to the world has little to no bearing on our understanding of the world is ignorant, at best. Kant’s third critique showed that qualitative ideas and affect contribute to reason alongside logic, but this aspect of his work is too often ignored or dismissed. Schopenhauer’s writing on aesthetics, too, deserves far more serious attention than it gets. And your own tendency to legitimise negative feeling but dismiss any positive ones as ‘romanticised’ just goes to show how significant feeling is in philosophy, despite attempts to downplay it to suit the argument. Having excluded all positive affect (for no reason other than a preference for pessimism), your structure of potential appears binary, as arousal (comply) vs valence (die). But it’s literally only half the picture. Without positive valence, there is no attention to new information, and you really are stuck - in your intentional ignorance, isolation and exclusivity.

Is this a justification for birthing more people? No. Because the agenda is real. — schopenhauer1

AGAIN - NOT arguing for birthing more people. There is no point in bringing this into our discussion.

So I think you are missing my point completely. Did. you. read. the. Willy. Wonka. discussion? The reason I ask, is that is basically my start with this particular argument we are having. There are options, but on closer inspection, those options are much more limited.. For example, I can't not comply with the dictates of life because I will die.. We are bound to a certain extent to the realities we are born into. The capacity for change or variety doesn't negate the boundaries that we are born into as humans. Don't sugar coat the picture. Don't romanticize it. Don't try to sublimate it. Certainly don't try to obfuscate it. — schopenhauer1

I’ve already commented on Willy Wonka. Go back and read what I’ve written. Your ‘closer inspection’ on these options is to view them as limits of being, and yet you won’t do the same for acts of compliance - which, by the way, are subject to the same limits. It’s the ‘because’ that implies a false relation. I will die, whether I comply with the dictates or not - that’s the reality of being. Compliance/non-compliance changes the overall arrangement or relational structures of being, not the limits. But our awareness of structures of potential enables us to rewrite the agenda, changing the conditions of our compliance. Our overall arrangement of being is much different now than it was a thousand years ago, because the agenda has changed. Human reasoning has changed it. And we’ll continue to change it.

What Schopenhauer argues is that this agenda increasingly prioritises the false notion of an ‘individual’ will, which leads us to strive and suffer for an ideal that is fundamentally unattainable. This priority is due to the conditions or limits of sufficient reason that Kant described. Schopenhauer proposed the world in itself as will: the faculty by which all actions are determined and initiated. Both Kant and Schopenhauer point to the need for an additional Copernican turn that Darwin’s work enables, de-centring the human experience of being (what appears to be) as a mere participant in the unfolding universe, rather than its central, invariable observer.

But neither Kant nor Schopenhauer were able to recognise that the tense-dependent structure of language, in describing the world as representation according to subject-predicate-object, is insufficient to accommodate a full correlation of the faculties of human reason (logic, ideas and affect) in developing a predictive relational structure of the potential world as will, without a reliance on being for empirical testing. It’s not our reasoning that limits us, but this reliance on an outmoded language structure that appears to ‘force’ the agenda, to produce more ‘individual’ observers in being.

Carlo Rovelli points out that grammar in language structure fails to account for an experience of reality in which ‘now’ for me might occur in the past for someone/something else. He proposes that the world as representation be more accurately described as interrelating events in potentiality, rather than as ‘individual’ subjects interacting with objects in ‘time’. No central, invariable observer, just events that change in relation to each other. The world as will - the faculty by which all actions are determined and initiated - makes sense in relation to how these events change in relation to each other, and can be arranged as a distribution of effort and attention over time, adhering to the ultimate limits of being without reference to an ‘individual’.

This only seems pessimistic if you’re hung up on the illusion of the ‘individual’, which it appears that you are.

Read it again in context. I was saying that to what you said here, somehow entailing lack with "individuality is false".. huh?
Lack is just an awareness that ‘individuality’ is false at any level of existence.
— Possibility — schopenhauer1

But it does go together. Lack - as an awareness of feeling I don’t have something - entails EITHER an expectation that I should have it - that there is a wholeness to be had as an ‘individual’ existence, OR an awareness that this feeling is false, and that ‘individuality’ as a whole concept is an illusion. So, which is it?

I’m not looking for a way out, just a more useful description of ‘the way’, because it’s obvious that ‘comply or die’ is NOT it...
— Possibility

Bullshit. You live in the situatedness of history, physics, socioeconomic reality. You can deny it, but I can deny gravity and that wouldn't mean jack shit on its truth. — schopenhauer1

I’m not denying the situatedness, only your claim of our incapacity in relation to it. Without denying that gravity exists, we can simulate a zero gravity situation. It’s a start. When we understand how to counteract its effects, we’re no longer ‘slaves’ to it - it only appears that we are. Once we understand how to simulate the effects of gravity in situations where it’s lacking, then we won’t be bound by it.

Same with this situatedness - understand how to counteract its effects, then understand how to simulate those effects where it’s lacking. We do this already, with language. All your carry-on about HR management and corporate motivation is exactly that. We’ve been spinning this cultural agenda bullshit to each other for so long now, we don’t even realise that we’re the ones doing it. We’ve drawn so many lines in the sand that we have no clear perspective of the full capacity available to a global humanity in relation to conceptual reality. Instead, we’ve been chasing this myth of ‘individual’ wholeness, as if it’s the answer to all our needs and wants.

Schopenhauer recognised the egoistic ‘individual’ as illusion, and saw interconnectedness or compassion, aesthetic contemplation and asceticism as ways to relate this world as representation (what appears to be) with the world as will (how to be). It is in these temporary, will-less states, free from striving and suffering, that we can perceive the potential of this world as will, and the way to be laid out before us. We then simply need the courage and understanding to choose that way despite the striving and suffering of what life appears to be. Easier said than done, granted. Still, the way isn’t hidden from us, and we’re not entirely incapable of following it.

There is an old inside joke in Buddhism about Mahayana heaven:

Outside of the heavenly gates, crowds of bodhisattvas bowing to eachother, making a gesture with the hand, saying, "After you!"
— baker

:ok:
— Possibility

Why the :ok: ?

The joke is actually a harsh criticism of the idea of postponing one's own enlightenment in favor of others. — baker

That depends on your interpretation. The idea of ‘getting through the gates of heaven’ seems to me a misunderstanding of enlightenment in the first place. The joke portrays an incongruity between the Buddhist notion of ‘no-self’ and a self-actualising perception of enlightenment. Given there is no consensus on this in Buddhism, I guess it depends on your perspective, doesn’t it?

Not really. Yes, we die, but it's one or the other at the same time. You either comply or you die. You will die eventually, but at that point, you no longer will be or have to be complying. — schopenhauer1

Yes, really. Every moment you exist as being, you are also dying, and no amount of compliance can change that. Life isn’t one or the other, but BOTH. You can’t prevent death by complying - all you’re doing is rearranging deck chairs.

You’re confusing a description of ‘what life appears to be’ with a description of ‘how to be’. ‘Comply or die’ assumes that one either appears to ‘comply’ (ie. acts) or chooses ‘death’ (by inaction) in any moment, and assumes that it isn’t possible to do both. But every day, people can and do take a deliberate step towards death while still appearing to comply - without actually dying - right up until that moment when one is no longer... well, appearing to comply, of course. But that’s a completely different moment.

Here’s what I’ve noticed: when you say ‘comply’, you’re talking about perceived potential in terms of observable, quantitative effort. Every act appears to be complicit, regardless of direction. But when you say ‘die’, you’re talking about a perceived outcome or directed attention, describing a qualitative goal based on an observable trajectory. Immobility is apparently aiming to ‘die’, regardless of effort over time. These are non-commutative variables - it isn’t possible to be observing both the momentum and trajectory of an event (being) in the same moment - so it appears as if “it’s one or the other at the same time”, at that point.

This is a perceptual illusion. The world appears to be flat, the solar system appears to be moving around the earth, the universe appears to be a created event that begins and ends, and the agenda (potential) of existence appears to be an ideological conscription to reject the idea of non-being - to comply in direct opposition to dying.

Explorers setting out towards the horizon were heading towards what appeared to be inevitable failure, but was simply the threshold of their understanding. When Jesus set out on a path that would hasten his own suffering and death, it appeared to be inevitable failure, too. No procreation, no dominance, no survival - no immobility, either - and yet, more than 2,000 years later, observations of his life (the structure of his apparent compliance) in relation to his death continue to interact with humanity on a perceptual level, regardless of what we believe. So, too, with the life and death of Siddhartha Gautama as an understanding of apparent inaction, or what Taoism refers to as wu-wei.

So the idea that the potential of existence is bound to its apparent being is false - just as the expanse of the world is not bound by the horizon, the structure of the solar system is not bound by the apparent movement of celestial bodies, and the universe is not bound by the appearance of time. Quantum physics also supports this, in its own way, and makes use of it to direct qualitative attention in anticipation of observable events by calculating the quantitative potential of surrounding interactions.

How we can be is not bound by what life appears to be at any point in time, pessimistic or not. This applies to the moment we die as much as any other.

But every act of ignorance, isolation or exclusion brings ongoing harm and suffering to ourselves and others that we cannot avoid, because we’re not paying attention to it. And if we value a reduction in suffering overall more than the existence of any single being (which appears to be the essential argument of antinatalism), then we should be willing to endure a little more suffering ourselves, even risk our own death, rather than choose to ignore, isolate or exclude any longer. We just need to be honest with ourselves about this - that nothing we will ever do with our existence is worth more than what we do to reduce suffering for others. And if we’re still alive, then it means we haven’t done enough.
— Possibility

There is an old inside joke in Buddhism about Mahayana heaven:

Outside of the heavenly gates, crowds of bodhisattvas bowing to eachother, making a gesture with the hand, saying, "After you!" — baker

:ok:

We don’t need to be a slave to lack - we feel it, sure, but it doesn’t own us unless we let it.
— Possibility

This I believe is just not true unless death. Comply or die. Anything besides immobility would be acting on it so de facto X would be acting on it, and it "owning us". — schopenhauer1

There’s no point in saying ‘unless death’, because death is undeniable. This whole mantra of ‘comply OR die’ is false: rather it’s AND, and both terms are highly variable in context. When you speak to young people today, they KNOW this. Many of them live daily with suicidal thoughts, so trying to convince them that death is NOT an option only reveals the lie as an attempt to control. And the more we try to control them with this ‘comply or die’ crap, the more they demonstrate just how wrong we are, and in the simplest way available to them. We need to stop pretending these are THE options, and acknowledge that ‘comply’ is just as frighteningly varied, valuable, filled with potential and available as ‘die’ appears to them. Then we can begin to understand just how ignorant we have been.

No that doesn't go together. Lack is an awareness of a feeling of what one doesn't have at the moment. The fact that we are a social animal in order to meet needs is not entailed in that point, though it's entailed in being a human animal. — schopenhauer1

So, you’re saying that it’s possible to BE ‘complete and whole’, wanting for nothing as an individual human animal? Do you really think that’s true? Lack is a basic quality inherent to EVERY existence. Any feeling in relation to this is based on expectations with regard to ‘individuality’.

It is all the same, no matter what form. Your words have the appearance of meaning, but no context to chew into.

Give me a glimpse of a vision of what your recommendation how to live looks like? Start there. You give me something, I'll show you where it breaks down into the same. That will be this dialogue over and over. — schopenhauer1

I’m not going to recommend ‘how to live’ - that’s as ridiculous as recommending ‘how to die’. Of course you can reduce any observable action to an arbitrary binary value structure of ‘comply or die’. You might as well say 1/0. So, you describe ‘reality’ using 1s and 0s, but that’s a virtual reality that has nothing to do with actual being. Because how you ‘die’ has as much complex and differentiated value, potential and significance as how you ‘comply’. So the relation between 1 and 0 is different for each of us, which effectively renders this basic ‘language’ arbitrarily useless in determining ‘how to live’. It just describes ‘how life appears to be’.

The way I see it, our only universally useful information on ‘how to live’ is a relative sense of direction in a state of ongoing flux. Whenever you come to a crossroad that you recognise as between awareness and ignorance, with whatever time, effort or attention available, turn towards awareness.

You clearly haven't found some way out.. You too are living in the situatedness as much as I am.. You can write here like you are a sage that knows a different way but you don't have one. — schopenhauer1

I’m not looking for a way out, just a more useful description of ‘the way’, because it’s obvious that ‘comply or die’ is NOT it...

Actually, even if you were a deaf, mute, and blind tetraplegic, you could still be in compliance mode. The comply-and-die is first and foremost in the mind. — baker

I notice you’ve written it as ‘comply-AND-die’ - the difference in relation to ‘comply OR die’ is important.

You seem to be overlooking the superstructures already in place. The situatedness of the current political, economic, and social arrangement. We went over this. I cannot just will whatever arrangement I want. I am always working on something that is a system that is not what I would have wanted. — schopenhauer1

What you want isn’t as important as you seem to think it is, and is certainly not a reliable foundation on which to structure anything to last. We’re continually constructing a political, economic and social arrangement based on the idea that what we want matters - but it doesn’t matter in the way we’re commonly led to believe. It has meaning, but only relative value. And the problem is that most of us can’t tell the difference, or more likely don’t want to.

The thing is, I am at least potentially capable of choosing my actions according to whatever arrangement I want (and many people do), but it isn’t necessarily going to align with the political, economic or social arrangements that most people are working with. Depending on the differences, my actions might come across as rebellious, ascetic, destructive, criminal, pathological, or just plain nuts.

We’re taught from a very young age to align our conceptual structures with those of our parents, broadening to our social group and influenced by the educational system and prevailing cultural, political, economic and social arrangements, etc in which we are situated. But in reality this current arrangement is only a temporary situatedness - it’s so amorphously constructed that any attempt to render it it may be already outdated to some extent before the ink dries.

The most accurately simple way for me to describe this conceptual reality, interestingly, seems to be, as you say: ‘not what I would have wanted’. It’s a linear relation of value between my conceptualisation and the one in which I am ‘situated’ - much like observable ‘time’ is a linear relation of change between observer and observed (or ‘not what I measured’). But the linear relation is not as accurate as we think. It’s just enough to get by.

So, when we’re done with just getting by and want to get at the truth, we need to recognise that what seems to be a linear relation is in reality much more complex. And I could try to explain this, but I don’t think you’re interested in the complexity, because you don’t seem to want to DO anything.

Because the endgame is the only one. It is what Schopenhauer's thesis is (and my OP) from the start. That is, it is all dissatisfaction all the way down. It is at the heart of why we are here, why we need help, why there cannot be a utopia. And in my conception, why we can't meditate our way out. — schopenhauer1

The only one what? it’s not a bad thing to reach a point where everyone and no one needs help. This is neither utopia nor a way ‘out’ - it’s just a more accurate understanding of reality that isn’t focused on suffering or dissatisfaction as if they’re some affront to all sensibilities.

When your relation to reality is linear, then it always looks like there’s an endgame. Like heat death, or utopia, or escape, or zero value. But the linear structure at this level is heuristic only, like time, or the line we draw to render a beam of light. It’s just an oversimplified indication of direction. Describing the endgame as ‘everyone and no one needs help’ seems meaningless to you because this contradiction appears to have no real logical value. But someone can still act on it, if they choose.

In other words, all our needs and wants as a consumer, producer, are inextribly tied up in other people doing work. Work that you wouldn't do otherwise unless cohersion from your own needs and wants.. There is a "lack" at the bottom of things that we are all unfortunately a slave to. No rearrangement makes this go away.. — schopenhauer1

We don’t need to be a slave to lack - we feel it, sure, but it doesn’t own us unless we let it. Lack is just an awareness that ‘individuality’ is false at any level of existence. Any sense of completion is always in relation to something else. And we’re not forced to see ourselves as ‘consumer’ or ‘producer’ - this is all part of an arrangement to which we keep binding ourselves in ignorance - feigning completion in ‘community’ through isolation or ‘teamwork’ through exclusion, with the false notion that we might ‘individually’ appear to suffer less. Rearrangement isn’t about making lack ‘go away’, but about rendering it as a tool, instead of being led around by our own needs and wants as if they have ‘individual’ value to anyone but our ‘selves’.

Dissatisfaction is the rule.. It is the comply or die in one word. The social-economic-historical arrangement is simply how it is carried out. But the core is still there, putting a proverbial gun to our heads. Cultural mores, expectations, and are simply epiphenomenal social "memes" that simply make it easier to accept the situation. Nothing more. — schopenhauer1

You claim to be rebelling against this ‘forced agenda’, but all I see here is you perpetuating it, only with a pessimistic slant. We’re helpless, it’s hopeless, we’re powerless, all we can do is accept the situation, or die. This, to me, is the voice of the agenda, the very cultural illusion we keep arranging to protect ourselves in fear of non-existence.

But perhaps our positive vs negative evaluation - this process to render, criticise, redesign and redevelop - is precisely how we’ve been evolving conceptual reality all along, together. Some of us are focused on rendering and criticising, and some of us on redesigning and redeveloping...:smile:

No. I am not being imprecise in my language. The problem is that others use language in a sloppy way.

A thing - or substance or object - is a bearer of properties. An event is an occurrence. A happening. — Bartricks

Sorry, you are being imprecise. An event still has properties.

Note, you can have a thing without there being any events. My mug is not an event. It is a thing. And things do not depend on events. You can't, however, have an event without any things, for events always involve things. Happenings happen to things. They undergo a change or initiate a change or whatever. But the dependency is clear: events depend on things, things do not depend on events. — Bartricks

Beg to differ. Any object is the result of events, the happenings of which you may just be unable to directly observe, occurring either in the past, at a smaller scale or a slower pace. You cannot have a mug without there being any events. To observe an event requires observing change in objects, but this is not a dependency of all events on things - our ‘observation’ of change is dependent on our observation/measurement of objects. Yet we can define and predict an event such as a photon without any dependence on objects.

Yes - specifically because of the softness (ie. 3D variability) of the cushion in relation to the ball. You can’t extend this same quality of softness to an eternal entity - if there is no 4D variation (it never changes), then there is no 3D variability (no softness). Case closed.
— Possibility

What on earth are you on about? If a cushion exists eternally it is not soft? What? — Bartricks

Show me an object with the property of softness that would persist even a thousand years without change. A variable object guarantees a variable event, and precludes an eternally consistent one.

How many times has this phrase been used to gloss over or justify human suffering? Repackage it so it is just inevitable. But it isn't. — schopenhauer1

You’re right, it isn’t inevitable and it isn’t justifiable, but nor is it entirely avoidable. Those of us who do exist are going to suffer to some extent, purely because we interact as dissipative structures. The point is to arrange this dissipative structure in such a way that it effects a reduction in suffering overall, instead of just for this illusion of ‘individual self’. I’m not saying we MUST do this - I’m saying this is how we put the philosophy into practice.

So life should be a horror show of extreme sacrifice to reduce suffering.. Then we really really gotta double down on that prevention part...more antinatalism. — schopenhauer1

Life IS a case of sacrifice to change suffering, either way. But you orchestrate the overall direction and depth of focus.

Yes Schopenhauer was about compassion to the extent of sacrifice. Lessening other people's suffering to a "saintly" extent. The problem is, without proper context it is just doing to do.. I can volunteer at charities all my waking life and give away all my belongings.. Now let's extend this to everyone in existence doing this.. Oh wait.. everyone and no one needs help now.. It is rearranging the chairs on the Titanic as an ethical end.. That doesn't make sense. — schopenhauer1

You’re trying to predict an endgame, but in the end you’ll always come face-to-face with a contradiction. Have another think about your prediction: ‘everyone and no one needs help now’. Regardless of whether or not it makes sense, how is this a bad thing?

Rather, the context is that we were all brought here and have to deal in the first place. Ironically, religion, with all its mythos and bullshit had the function of reorienting people to existential context. Most people in a post-modern mindset only know the context of the small... little screens of discrete information or simply work/home contexts. The whole Big Picture is lost and given perfunctory anything. Yet the Big Picture is what I am advocating we are constantly aware of (to use one of your lauded words). The picture is We are Fucked and to recognize it.. Dark/existential humor is one way to deal with it.. But that's not enough.. It has to be taken to the conference room, the board room, the political sphere and beyond. In other words... We all love to laugh at dark humor until it's time for work or "something X must get done or Y will happen" (getting fired, products being made, output getting outputted.. losing a house).. Banks, and customers, and investors, and consumers, and owners.. need their flesh and they don't give a fuck if you think life is a burdensome whatever.. Our Desires and Demands and Wants and Needs fuck each other over and over.. Humor is lost.. time to put the "nose to the grindstone" and "self-actualize" and "develop one's skills, talents, and usefulness". In other words comply... There is no getting around it.. No Ultimate Compassion Theory that will drowned the situatedness of existence and historical contingency of human life out. — schopenhauer1

I get this, but what I’ve been trying to explain is that there’s an even bigger picture than what you’re describing. It’s one that explores beyond our desires and demands and wants and needs. And I get that you don’t think there’s anything ‘real’ about that, but the reason we can even describe this Big Picture you’re referring to is because we have the capacity to not only perceive it, but replicate or recreate its political/ideological arrangement using language. And if we can replicate its arrangement, then we can rearrange it, too. The trick is to not just be aware of the Big Picture, but to understand it - how each aspect connects and collaborates, but also where it fails to connect, where it’s ignoring, isolating or excluding information, and how this relates to our desires and demands and wants and needs fucking each other over. Because the problem is that there are serious logical and structural errors in the Big Picture that we’re afraid to dismantle, and it has to do with how WE structure politics, money, potential, value and significance in relation to our desires and demands and wants and needs.

The truth is that NO ONE except you gives a fuck if you think ‘life is a burdensome whatever’ - not even those who say they agree with you. The trick is not to ‘drown out’, but to recognise that our desires and demands and wants and needs are ours alone - they have nothing at all to do with objective reality. Our situatedness, at the end of the day, is the only thing that is NOT shared. This is what the Tao Te Ching is all about: the most useful description of objective reality consists only of everything that wouldn’t give a fuck how we feel about it or how we might affect it - including this aspect in ourselves and in other people. Once we identify this aspect, then we simply relate to it from an understanding of our own unique situatedness (ie. affect), and accept that everyone and everything else will do the same. The Tao Te Ching refers to this aspect as ‘the Way’: not a set of specific instructions, but an inherent directional structure to reality, logical and qualitative, through which all energy (affect) naturally flows.

But the English language doesn’t lend itself to an unaffected description of reality. So, when I use the term pairings of awareness/ignorance, connection/isolation and collaboration/exclusion, you immediately want to position them somewhere in a SUBJECT-PREDICATE-OBJECT structure. Each of these pairings, however, refer to a relation of quality in a logical structure, and it simply needs our affect. When we add affect to the first structure, for instance, all energy flows naturally either from ignorance to awareness or from awareness to ignorance. You just decide which way you align with it, and it’s pretty clear which is the recommended ‘way’, but it’s easier said than done.

WHAT are you trying to say?? Say it plainly or explain neologistic terms meticulously before using them. Your moral/value recommendation is to "collaborate, connect, and be aware". Besides the obvious that we do this already to get by every day.... — schopenhauer1

The difference is that we do it only when it appears to be in our own best interests, when it helps us to get by, to survive, dominate, or procreate - because we’ve been told that’s what’s important. This means when a new opportunity comes to be more aware of what’s going on, to reach out or to help out, we draw the line and consolidate existing value instead. We remind ourselves how much we’re already doing, especially the stuff we don’t really want to do, ‘to get by every day’. We strive to avoid the risk of humiliation, pain or loss, avoid sitting with this feeling of boredom, dissatisfaction or lack, which is all part of the human experience. We make small, consolidating moves to ignore, isolate or exclude ideas, people, information and we easily justify it to ourselves as pragmatic self-interest, as ‘getting by’, as being ‘forced to comply’ rather than risk death.

But every act of ignorance, isolation or exclusion brings ongoing harm and suffering to ourselves and others that we cannot avoid, because we’re not paying attention to it. And if we value a reduction in suffering overall more than the existence of any single being (which appears to be the essential argument of antinatalism), then we should be willing to endure a little more suffering ourselves, even risk our own death, rather than choose to ignore, isolate or exclude any longer. We just need to be honest with ourselves about this - that nothing we will ever do with our existence is worth more than what we do to reduce suffering for others. And if we’re still alive, then it means we haven’t done enough.

I know...this all seems rather extreme - but this is the argument of Schopenhauer and antinatalism, FULLY applied to human existence. And interestingly, it has Buddha at one extreme, and Jesus at the other. It’s fucking scary to take it this far, but this is basically what it’s saying - we’re just too frightened to apply it to this extreme, if we’re honest. This is why ‘the agenda’ persists - it’s our excuse, our safety net, our illusion, nothing more. And we can’t quite bring ourselves to dismantle it, even though we know it’s harmful. It’s not forced, it’s preferred.

You can come up with any number of cases in which there does 'not' seem to be causation. What's the point in that?

The ball and cushion case is a case in which the depression is being caused by the ball and we do not need to know whether the ball was ever not on the cushion in order to be able to conclude that the ball is causing the depression. — Bartricks

Yes - specifically because of the softness (ie. 3D variability) of the cushion in relation to the ball. You can’t extend this same quality of softness to an eternal entity - if there is no 4D variation (it never changes), then there is no 3D variability (no softness). Case closed.

And I gave TWO examples. As you are clearly having trouble with the first one, question beggingly insisting that we have to know if the ball was ever not on the cushion before we can conclude that it is causing the depression, why not focus on the other example? Only one has to work. — Bartricks

I only noticed the one example, sorry.

Presumably you accept that not every event can be caused by a prior event, for then one would have to posit an actual infinity of prior events. So, all events must ultimately trace to causes that are not events, but things.

So, substances can cause events. But when do substances cause the events that they cause? Well, when the events occur. That is simultaneous causation. — Bartricks

I accept that there comes a point in our relation to events where ‘cause’ is a meaningless term - I’d say it’s about where we posit an infinite, either as quantity or quality.

I’m going to be pedantic for a sec: aren’t events still things? Do you mean things as in concepts or only tangible 3D objects? You also call them ‘substances’, which is another ambiguous term that allows you to play with dimensional quality as it suits you. I’m going to insist on you clarifying the dimensional structure of entities here, because it makes a difference in relation to causation.

Events are four-dimensional structures, so it’s important to recognise that time is not simply a linear relation of change or causation between objects and events, the way our language structures it. It only appears that way because in language we reduce the observation/measurement event itself to a zero-point value, and treat all other events and ideas as objects. It’s only in the quality of each concept that different relational structures are evident.

So, when you state that ‘substances can cause events’, you need to be clearer in your language to avoid people misinterpreting what you mean.

From what I understand, a relation between differentiated potentiality can theoretically ‘cause’ events without any necessary relation to actual objects or things. This makes more sense to me than substances causing events or simultaneous causation.

The problem is that you lot don't understand how thought experiments work! — Bartricks

No - the problem is that you don’t understand the qualitative aspect of a thought experiment.

If we imagine coming across a ball in contact with a cushion, we cannot simply discard their qualitative structure as if it’s irrelevant. From our imagined observations, we infer that at some point the cushion existed sans depression, and that the ball was not eternally impacting on the cushion in this way. There is nothing about the relation of ‘ball’ and ‘cushion’ in any thought experiment that would imply this is not the case.

You can’t expect to ignore the inherent qualitative structure of the concepts ‘ball’ and ‘cushion’ when it suits.

Consider two entities A and B: A has an invariant 3D structure, while B has a different and slightly variable 3D structure. If we observe these two structures in contact, and notice that the 3D structure of B is shaped in inverse relation to A at the point of contact, we can infer that A caused the variation in the 3D structure of B, because we know that the 3D structure of A is less variable than that of B.

Now consider two eternal entities, X and Y, existing in an invariable 4D event - that is, there is no variation in their 4D structure in relation to each other. How then, is it possible to infer that X was the cause of a 3D structure in Y when there is no way even to distinguish a 3D structure of Y from the invariable 4D arrangement of XY?

But is it the case that causes precede their effects? Well, there is no consensus on it, but probably most philosophers would accept that simultaneous causation is coherent. Kant used a famous example of a ball on a cushion. The depression in the cushion is being caused by the ball on the cushion even if both call and cushion have been in that arrangement for eternity. Thus in this case we have simultaneous causation. The depression is being caused by the ball, but there was no time when the ball came to be on the cushion. — Bartricks

In that case there is no cause for the depression, because there is no existence of the cushion with any other shape than that in which the ball fits. There is no evidence that the ball caused the depression - there is only your understanding of a ball and cushion as temporally related objects, which these are not. So you can’t apply that understanding here.

The problem is, you’re using actual objects and their interaction in time as a model for eternity. Causation refers to the potential relation of an event between the objects involved. You can say that a depression in a cushion is ‘caused by the ball’, but in reality the depression is caused by the impact between the cushion and ball: an event. There is no potential relation between eternal entities without the potential for change. If the arrangement has no potential for change (as described here), there is no cause to be determined.

Again, no. It's that any kind of seeking happiness outside cannot provide satisfaction. Whether one seeks happiness through obtaining things, relationships, or sophisticated pursuits such as art, it's all still unsatisfactory. — baker

So why is seeking ‘happiness’ or ‘satisfaction’ the most important thing?

All HR spin of "You are in this for the community!". But the community doesn't make decisions and feels and thinks and does.. I, the individual does.. So even if I am not "truly" an individual in some art house, new age way (as baker explained a few posts ago), I am the locus of the concretion of all the ways the universe impinges on me.. Working within a community and being the locus of what actually feels, thinks, does, etc. are two different things that your obfuscating language can never combine, no matter how hard you try to equate them. — schopenhauer1

...and its this ‘locus of concretion’ that’s most important, right? Your identity: cardinality or ordinality?

What I’m saying has nothing to do with forming a ‘community’. That’s your interpretation (for some reason you need something ‘concrete’, although it seems straw is sufficient), but I’ve not said anything about forming anything in particular.

I don't get your question. I am constantly "working together" whether I fuckn like it or not because I am existing in a world interconnected with others. So your collaboration thing is just an odd de facto truth of living as a human.. I work with people I have nothing in common with or don't particularly agree with in almost anything except getting some task done all the time. What does that have to do with the fact that I wouldn't want to do this in the first place, and including the decision for suicide? Guess its too late for that so I got to "lean in" :lol:. You must know this is like a parody of itself right? — schopenhauer1

Your job has nothing to do with it. You work with other people because want to get paid, and for some reason you thought that work situation was a good deal. That’s on you.

You said:

We can try to work together but it would be in this recognition of the tragedy — schopenhauer1

The truth is that I’ve been collaborating with your perspective over a couple of years now. When I first read your arguments for antinatalism, I was firmly in the ‘but life can be wonderful, everyone should try it’ camp. But I’ve never considered my position to be set in stone, and whenever I encounter a view so diametrically opposed to my own, then I tend to work on the possibility that we’re arguing from two points in a broader picture. So I’ve been working to construct that possibility, and in turn my perspective has changed somewhat - and so I appreciate your participation in that. I do recognise the apparent ‘tragedy’ of your perspective, but from what I can see, it’s nothing that can’t be changed. Except that it gives you a sense of purpose to BE the victim, so it seems that you’re not really interested in changing the situation much at all.

even if I am atoms, quantum events, or neurons, it is only the subjective "self" that I feel at any conscious moment, so it means nothing to point to the "real" substrate, as that doesn't change the situation.. if I "change" from this notion, it would still be the subjective self changing and feeling it. — schopenhauer1

And how I feel at any conscious moment is always the most important thing, right? This idea that I should be happy and satisfied? That’s what my life should be? The meaning of life, as defined by...?

I don't judge procreation as necessarily immoral, but misguided, though I think it does have moral components of being callous with suffering. — schopenhauer1

See? We do agree on some points. My argument has been that procreation is ‘misguided but not necessarily immoral’ throughout this thread.

Still, the morality of procreation aside, neither of these points negate the non-individual potential, value and significance of being an undefined change in suffering. If we consider our identifying preference for the illusion as a useful idealisation, I think we can philosophically determine how to more accurately develop and structure change - eg. into a reduction of suffering overall.
— Possibility

That's what work and public policy is in modern day.. Work, work work, and left-leaning politicians will cry for mitigation of externalities (environmental, racial, educational, etc.). Right-leaning will cry for business freedoms (less taxes, less government, more private ownership of resources, etc.). So at the end of the day, you are just advocating what we have now.. Comply, comply, comply. But no, you are going to make vague references to change, and potential, etc.. and start the BS all over again as if you are not saying that. — schopenhauer1

It only seems that way. Nothing changes when we stand still. Standing still, doing nothing, recognising the ‘tragedy’ of our situatedness - this just enables us to get a clear sense of where we are, so we can determine the next step in the direction towards where we want to be. Because taking a step is the only way to change anything. And I get that NO step seems to be the right direction, because to step anywhere just looks as if you’re complying, even though all you’ve done is accept the situation as a starting point. Because there potentially exists a relational structure of change between this situatedness and an overall reduction in suffering, which would render a step worth taking, even though it looks like you’re just complying.

But back to what baker was saying, you can deny the dissatisfaction while living out the dissatisfaction. It's okay, that happens. Dissatisfaction is the rule of this world. We are born into it and must deal with it. As for your collaboration scheme.. as I said, it's already what is going on. You are just saying to do more of the same, but "lean into it". — schopenhauer1

I said lean into the interconnectedness, not the overall agenda - big difference in my book. What is going on is mostly exclusive, isolated incidents of task-oriented ‘collaboration on...’ with limited connection, or even without awareness. Examples include pleasure, entertainment, productivity, etc. But there’s also a whole lot of activity that involves deliberate exclusion, isolation and ignorance, all of which actively contributes to dissatisfaction and suffering in the name of survival, dominance, individuality, etc.

So if we’re going to live out dissatisfaction and suffer anyway, let’s do so in a way that is directed specifically at reducing the existing and ongoing dissatisfaction or suffering of others, long-term. Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day; teach him to fish and you feed him for life. And no, I don’t mean push the agenda that he needs to fish in order to ‘survive’. I mean actually spend time with the man on his terms and share a way to reduce suffering, that he can share with others to reduce suffering, and so on.

Nor do I mean that if I know how to fish I should be out there looking for starving people who don’t know how to fish so I can teach them something. I’m not talking about self-actualisation, it’s just a recognition that BEING changes the experience of suffering in every relation, one way or the other, and whether I like it or not. The more I am aware of this in terms of how I plan and structure being as ongoing attention and effort over time, the less damage I’m likely to do. But this is more information than the mind can process alone, so it is the extent to which we are also aware of connecting and collaborating that enables us to maximise the effectiveness of being a change in suffering.

No, the idea is that any kind of existence is burdensome. It's about a dissatisfaction that would persist even if one had all the health, wealth, beauty, fame, family, friends, etc. in the world. — baker

I’m aware of that. And I’m saying that any kind of existence can appear burdensome and dissatisfying in relation to the illusion of ‘individual potentiality’.

When you continually claim we have more efficacy than we actually do, and ignore the rules created by our situatedness in physical and social reality, I’m gonna continually call you out on it.

However even more pertinent. The fact you don’t recognize that we are all burdened with the task of subsisting at all and overcoming it, is denied by you. We can try to work together but it would be in this recognition of the tragedy and not through obfuscating misdirection of vague optimistic slogans. — schopenhauer1

I’m not claiming efficacy, only potentiality. The difference is desire. I cannot have the life I want wrapped up in a bow and delivered to me, free of suffering. You say this is a ‘tragedy’, but I say get over yourself - what makes you think that was ever an option, let alone what you deserve? I might want to see a unicorn flying through the sky, throwing rainbows everywhere - that doesn’t mean I deserve to see it.

The idea that this potentiality or value I can imagine is all for me as an individual, deserved and mine alone, is a lie we’ve been led to believe against all evidence to the contrary. That’s the tragedy. The potential of human life is unavoidably intertwined with everything and everyone else, and the more we try to pull back from this, to define our selves as ‘individual’, the more we suffer from it. You can say this is a ‘burden’ if you like, but I don’t have to agree with your evaluation. These are not ‘rules’ made up by some creator ‘boss’ with the intention that we suffer. It’s the natural law of existence, and the ‘rules’ you describe are simply an interpretation, based on how we feel in relation to our situation as ‘individuals’.

We can, of course, wallow in the apparent tragedy of our ‘individual’ situation, clinging to the illusion like a lost love. And we can even band together in a first wives club of individualistic misery, finding temporary solidarity in a pessimistic relation to being. It’s an option, sure. Connection, even without collaboration, is better than isolation. But this approach does categorically exclude those of us who relate to being without misery. So, you and I cannot work together until I agree that ALL life is a tragedy, not just that it appears to be?

The way I see it, we can, instead, lean into rather than resist the interconnectedness of potential existence, and realise our value/significance in relation to BEING an undefined change in suffering, rather than the illusion of an ‘individual self’. This is a paradigm shift, granted, but is neither inherently optimistic nor pessimistic, except for this FEELING that we’d ideally prefer (if it were possible) to realise this ‘individual self’ - even though we know it’s an illusion. Identity (as in quantum non-individuality) can still be a ‘useful idealisation’ to simplify our conceptual framework and predict behaviour, but it isn’t metaphysically real. Potential existence has cardinality without ordinality, so to speak.

I’m honestly not trying to obfuscate, I’m just moving on from this shallow realism towards a more constructive empiricist view of how the world could be (not should be). But perhaps the reason you won’t explore existence at this level is because:

- it renders pessimism as relative. I don’t see how we can morally judge ALL acts of procreation based on the apparent tragedy of life, when this isn’t necessarily apparent to everyone. I don’t think my position justifies procreation, though. It simply means that I judge morality in terms of perceived intentionality, rather than the act itself.

- it opens the door to parents justifying an act of procreation as a reduction in their own individual suffering. I agree that this is a common misinterpretation of potential existence, and its intentionality is sufficient reason to consider it immoral. But this immorality is inherent in the ‘individual’ intentionality over another being, NOT in the act itself.

Still, the morality of procreation aside, neither of these points negate the non-individual potential, value and significance of being an undefined change in suffering. If we consider our identifying preference for the illusion as a useful idealisation, I think we can philosophically determine how to more accurately develop and structure change - eg. into a reduction of suffering overall.

Survival is the result of the process. The fact that a result or consequence occurs in the natural world is not evidence of intent. — universeness

Survival is A result of the process, not THE result. And it’s the one we FEEL is most important, based on our fears. Any intent is in those writing the narrative, interpreting the evidence.

All you offer is your opinions which is fair enough as on some points I am not offering much more.
I simply disagree with your imo generally pessimistic viewpoints. I think your 'scientific points' are trivial and incorrect. — universeness

Then please point me to evidence that will set me straight. And I do mean evidence, not interpretations or conclusions. You’re not wrong that I offer little more than an alternative interpretation of the evidence, but I don’t think it’s pessimistic - what gives you that impression?

It just all appears to be moving in a particular direction, and we happen to be part of that.
— Possibility
You type that you don't believe in a Universal intent and then you type that it appears there might be. — universeness

Direction is not necessarily conscious intent. It exists without any need for awareness whatsoever of a final destination or purpose, let alone any action or force.

Direction: a general way in which someone or something is developing; a trend or tendency.

So, give us some actual examples of what you think we should stop doing and what you think we should do more of. Don't make any obvious suggestions such as 'stop hurting the planet,' or stop warring with each other etc — universeness

Choose with every interaction to increase awareness over ignorance, connection over isolation and collaboration over exclusion - despite fears and assumptions. Suffering comes from ignorance, isolation and exclusion, and infects every interaction with more of the same. If I feel excluded, I’m inclined to ignore those who exclude me, or to isolate myself from situations where I might feel this way. The only way to break the cycle is to face any fears we have, put away any assumptions, and choose to increase awareness, one step at a time. The more we learn about something or someone, the easier it becomes to connect, and the more we connect, the easier it becomes to collaborate.

There’s different homeless guys who sometimes sit alone outside my regular shopping centre (I live in a regional town, so we don’t see many). As a young girl growing up it was always drummed into me to “steer clear of strange men, especially if they look ‘dodgy’” - so it’s taken a while for me to work past my own fears and assumptions here, despite knowing how ridiculous they were. Action is more difficult than thoughts. The last couple of times one of them has been there when I walked in, I’ve added a bag of healthy snacks, bottle of juice, toothpaste, etc to my shopping trip and handed it to him on my way out, with a smile. The most recent time I stayed to chat about the weather and ask him where he’s from. It’s such a small thing, and it seems even more so describing it here - but it felt like a big change for me, and if it helps one person to feel a little less ignored and excluded, a little more connected, then it’s a small step in the right direction.

Well, you sound like you would be attracted to a more buddhist or tao type approach to life and living. Not for me. I am happy to be labeled anthropocentric in general but not to the extremes of fanaticism. — universeness

I don’t like labels much, and I’m notoriously difficult to define. While I am attracted to both Buddhism and the Tao Te Ching, I wouldn’t place myself within that category.

What would you consider to be extreme or fanatic anthropocentrism? Where would you draw this line?

So yes, humans are lucky to be here and not be extinct but the reason they are still here is due to their evolutionary path. — universeness

But the evolutionary narrative is not ‘survival’, as much as we wish it was. The reason humans are still here is due to a series of variably stable structural relations.

Evolution has no 'purpose,' it is what happens when vast variety combines in a vast number of ways.
Evolution is ongoing and always will be. — universeness

Agreed. So why configure it as a narrative of ‘survival’, except to allay our primal fears?

I think it might be easier to understand what you are typing about if you offer one or two real-world examples to illustrate the points you are trying to make rather than offer a list of generalities.
For example, carbon-based lifeforms are all we know of yes but I don't see what that's got to do with your attempted downplay of the facts of evolution. There may be other base lifeforms in the vast Universe. That would not downplay the facts of evolution as they happened on Earth either. — universeness

I’m not downplaying the facts of evolution, only questioning the narrative, and suggesting an alternative. And these are not generalities, but ‘goldilocks’ system structures. The imagined possibility of non-carbon-based lifeforms, for example, is along the lines of alchemy. There is nothing beyond logical possibility and curious fascination to suggest it’s worth pursuing. That doesn’t necessarily mean we won’t find any, but it’s hardly a reason to justify our resources at this stage. And preserving the current evolutionary narrative based on this imagined possibility doesn’t seem reasonable, despite the logic.

The logic behind silicon as the most likely candidate for alternative lifeforms is its similarity to the carbon atom in stable variability. The carbon atom is the ‘goldilocks’ of atomic structure: an optimal relation of stability and variability. Before it on the periodic table are less variable atomic structures, after it are less stable ones. This makes it systematically ideal to maximise awareness, connection and collaboration with everything else.

So are these just words in support of a panpsychist viewpoint or are you trying to make some other rather esoteric or metaphysical point I am missing?
I certainly don't think there is a self-aware, manifestation of individuality that we can assign to the word 'cosmos,' which has a 'plan,' or a 'trajectory,' that it's trying to ensure happens.
What do you mean 'go with the flow?' Do you mean stagnate? wait for the 'cosmos' to demonstrate its plan whilst we just watch the pretty flowers grow? Is that the alternate choice to 'stick with our own plan?' — universeness

It’s interesting that I say trajectory, and you assume conscious intentionality. No, I’m not supporting a panpsychist viewpoint, or saying that the cosmos is trying to ensure anything in particular happens. It just all appears to be moving in a particular direction, and we happen to be part of that. Evolution, which we agree to be ongoing and without purpose, is also part of that. We can work with this direction, and in doing so maximise our survival with minimal effort, or we can insist that we’re inherently equipped to determine our own survival plan, and continue to wrestle with forces we’ve yet to fully understand.

Go with the flow does not mean stagnate - that should be obvious. But why fight against a natural flow simply because it’s oblivious to us? Does it make us feel weak? This is where the Tao Te Ching talks about wu wei. When you’re caught in an ocean rip, do you struggle against it to get back to shore? Or do you accept that it will move you in a particular direction, and work with that to reach a better situation without exhausting yourself? We don’t own the effort, attention and time we have available to us. It comes to us from the cosmos and we return it, and everything else does the same. When we understand that, it’s no longer so important that WE are the one to achieve anything.

This sounds much more hopeful! I don't care whether you go top-down or bottom-up as long as you are part of the solutions rather than part of the problems. You sound a bit downhearted to me and a bit disappointed in your whole species. In my opinion, the majority of human beings are good and strive, damn hard, every day, to give, build, create, embellish, enhance and pass the baton, not take, destroy, control, indulge, use up and wear out, as the nefarious do. I think you are in the majority. — universeness

I don’t think I am in the majority on a lot of this, but don’t mistake this awareness for disappointment or pessimism. ALL humans retain some potential to increase awareness, connection and collaboration - even the so-called ‘nefarious’. Most just need a particular type of interaction under ideal circumstances...

That’s evidence of diversity, not of ‘survival’ as the reason for diversity. The question isn’t ‘why are all these other species extinct?’ It’s ‘why has evolution led to our particular arrangement of systems and structures?’ This myth that survival, dominance and procreation are the prime directives - you know that’s not true. I believe we will go extinct only if we keep insisting that this is the plan
— Possibility

This is a very skewed logic in my opinion and It makes very little sense to me. — universeness

From the website you cited: “Zooming out to look at the bigger picture this means that everything living today is the result of an unbroken sequence of ancestors that goes back at least two billion years. You, me and everyone else on this forum are part of a lucky chain of survivors going back countless generations. Many others didn't make it (even very large groups that are abundant in the fossil record such as the dinosaurs, trilobites, ammonites, graptolites etc.) and most scientists agree this is more to do with luck than some inherent superiority of modern forms.“

If most scientists agree that survival is more luck than superiority, then the notion that they’re extinct because ‘they couldn’t do what humans can’ is unfounded. So, too, the notion that the purpose of evolution is survival, dominance and/or procreation. That, and ‘natural selection’ is a misnomer borrowed from the practice of pigeon breeding - the fact that some variations survived while others didn’t is circumstantial, not by deliberate selection (teleological). Not to mention the fact that our own ‘survival’ over the last 160,000 years is, relatively speaking, a minuscule achievement so far. Nothing to write home about next to so many species that have survived unchanged for many millions of years.

And our relative ‘success’ in terms of dominance and procreation have come at the cost of this ecosystem that sustains us. You said yourself that our prime directive is to ask questions: so what does ‘winning’ really look like? If we do manage to get through this, do you honestly think it will be because of a focus on maximising our individual/species survival, dominance and procreation, or on maximising awareness, connection and collaboration - ie. with the ecosystem/cosmos and each other?

And if we look at a broader, cosmic evolution of structures of existence, a slightly different pattern emerges to the one Darwin saw. A minority of collaborative, homeostatic systems with high variability arise as the foundation for cosmic development at every level, including atomic structure, a carbon basis to life, natural selection, DNA and sexual reproduction, neural networks, social value structures, etc. The high variability in each system enables awareness, which in turn enables connection, which opens the door to collaboration... it seems the cosmos has a trajectory with or without us. So, do we go with the flow, or stick with our own plan?

Well I appreciate you giving me a little room as maybe having genuinely beneficent intentions. — universeness

No problem - I sometimes get caught up in arguing over the little things, and forget to credit the ‘big picture’ thinking going on.

I applaud and approve of your skepticism. You would perhaps make a good scrutineer of those who have been trusted enough, to be given a position of power. I am an advocate of powerful checks and balances fully established and representative of the people who are being represented.
You are right not to trust what people say, only trust what they do and demonstrate. We must insist that if a person holds a significant position of power and influence then their actions must be in the full view of everyone they represent. No autocracy/plutocracy/aristocracy/cult of personality/cult of celebrity/religious doctrine etc should ever be able to gain and hold power at any significant level of society. — universeness

While I do believe in speaking truth to power, my approach is not so much top-down, but more about encouraging a groundswell that leaders will eventually be unable to ignore, isolate or exclude - even if democracy fails. I can really only determine what I think, say and do, after all. If I can’t start there, what hope do I have to change the world?

Ok, but I am positing the separation of organisms as a prerequisite. — Daemon

Yes, and I’m disagreeing with you on this point. I think that consciousness is hindered to the extent that the organism is separated from its environment. When the brain’s connection to the nervous system is impeded, we lose consciousness. Configuration as whole is not the same as separation.

But awareness is an aspect of consciousness. The chemical process isn't aware of things in the way you are aware of things. — Daemon

No argument with you there. But the way a chemical process is aware of things does contribute to the way we are aware of things.

Same goes for you. You have no way of proving your own evaluation to be objective - it will always be relative to the affect of your limited experience. — baker

And I’ve repeatedly said so. My point is that we’re capable of living our lives without setting this evaluation in stone, and that it’s inaccurate to morally judge someone else’s actions based on your own evaluation of life. But anytime I suggest here that life might be worth the effort, I’m told I’m not thinking for myself, just doing what the ‘boss’ (whoever that is) tells me. I’m only making sense when I agree with Schop...? And yet, I’m the one accused of gaslighting...?

F Scott Fitzgerald said: “The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposing ideas in mind at the same time and still retain the ability to function.”

Just google "create a life you love". But it's still all craving, granted, sometimes more sophisticated, but craving nonetheless. — baker

I’m not saying it isn’t. I’m saying that we have the intellectual capacity to reconfigure how we make sense of reality, so that craving, dissatisfaction or suffering is not a ‘problem’ to be overcome. This may sound to Schop like PR spin, but there’s little difference between what I’m doing and what he’s doing - we’re just pointing people in different directions. Only he’s insisting that his description of the world is the truth, while I’m just plain wrong.

It’s all language and value-laden concepts, either way. Craving is just a sense of being a dissipative structure - any value relation is arbitrary, subjective. I’m not going to defer to his perspective as ‘the truth’, and he’s not going to acknowledge my perspective as anything but an invalid default, because apparently only one of us can be right, and it must be him.

But I honestly think that BOTH our perspectives are valid, and the fact that I choose to live my life as if it has value doesn’t negate his choice to live his life as if it doesn’t, and vice versa. I’m okay with that, and I actually think there is potentially a lot we can gain from a charitable discussion. But apparently I need to be discredited by any means, because everyone needs to defer to his perspective as ‘the truth’. I’m not okay with THAT.

99% of all species that have ever existed on the Earth are extinct. This is an estimate but is based on fossil evidence etc. http://www.askabiologist.org.uk/answers/viewtopic.php?id=556
Pretty strong evidence if you ask me. I think the why is simply 'they couldn't do what humans can,' but we can of course still go extinct due to our own behaviour or if we continue to exist only on this planet. — universeness

That’s evidence of diversity, not of ‘survival’ as the reason for diversity. The question isn’t ‘why are all these other species extinct?’ It’s ‘why has evolution led to our particular arrangement of systems and structures?’ This myth that survival, dominance and procreation are the prime directives - you know that’s not true. I believe we will go extinct only if we keep insisting that this is the plan.

Oh come on! did you really expect it to explain the list you mentioned? and for you, the fact that it does not explain the contents of the list you typed means it might be wrong about the events it does cover?
Einstein didn't explain the origins of human altruism or unconditional love either does that devalue his theories as well? — universeness

Einstein’s theories aren’t being used to try and explain these; Darwinian evolution theory is.

Sure, you can combine primal fears with any other human emotion/intuition/instinct you like to get to the origin of the god posit but primal fear is the foundation. — universeness

I respectfully disagree. Our prime directive is to ask questions - you said so yourself.

I have no problem with declaring my wish/purpose/goal to increase the pace of scientific breakthrough, discover new technologies, improve the human condition, and the range of choices each person has.
I advocate for better/wiser/immune to nefarious ba******, global politics as well as much more focus and support of scientific endevours, without ignoring the everyday needs of people and planet and all flora and fauna on it.
I declare it loudly and proudly but I don't advocate a 'blunderbuss' approach at all. I agree with a cautious approach which must have democratic majority mandate before it can be actioned. — universeness

That all sounds noble, I’m just cautious of the attitude. There’s a lot of competing needs there, and it seems like all your confidence is placed in science tempered by common sense and democracy. I wish I had your confidence in this combination at the moment, but I don’t.

What do you mean by 'variable?' There is more variety in dog type or bird type than human type.
If you are saying that we have more variety in actions then this is part of the evidence which supports:
The idea that we evolved to be the best at species-level ‘survival
— Possibility
as are:
enabling us to maximise awareness, connection and collaboration.
— Possibility
Which further supports 'best at species level survival.' You provide support for this 'ridiculous contrivance.' — universeness

There is insufficient evidence to assume that ‘survival’ is the purpose of evolution, just because it happens to be a result of natural selection. Natural selection explains how diversity occurs, not why it occurs.

Soft, porous skin, very little body hair or armour, forward-facing eyes, external auditory structures, extremely versatile and malleable brain structure, Humanity has evolved high variability (sensitivity) in relation to environmental factors, such that our offspring (if left alone) are among the most vulnerable of all the animal kingdom upon birth. It’s not about ‘type’, but development. Our potential for survival is contingent upon, and often takes a back seat to, our capacity for awareness/ignorance, connection/isolation and collaboration/exclusion, maximised by developing education, socialisation and communication with other humans. Altruism, unconditional love, youth suicide, curiosity, invention, art, mathematics, music, literature, etc are all insufficiently explained by Darwinian evolution theory.

Yet you offer no alternate view of why the god posit was initially formed. If not from human primal fear then from what human thought processes/needs, do you suggest god formed from? or do you think it was in direct communication with the ancients? — universeness

The notion of god or gods can just as easily develop from curiosity as from fear, even from a combination of both. From our imaginable possibility, some things are more likely to happen, and some things are not. There has to be a structure to this we can’t quite figure out yet - some source or system of power and knowledge out/up there. It’s only natural to want to relate to this personally, to ask questions, to try and find a way to connect what you do to this system of power and knowledge. Trial and error until something seems to work. And if, by chance, this attempt to connect appears favourable, naturally others will be curious as to what or who you’re getting this increased value/potential from. And how is that fair, or what if they tried it too?

It seems to me that the favourable relations would develop into gods of religion more often than unfavourable ones; natural selection, and all that.

Where did I suggest abandoning horses or pens because we have cars or computers? I advocate prioritising new tech over old but old tech can be very useful at times. The point you make is trivial. — universeness

The point I make is analogous to claims that we should focus on prolonging life and getting off this planet, as if they’re the answer.

When we pursue science for it’s own sake, we tend to pursue our own destruction. And when we pursue it purely for our current interests, we whittle away at our future.
— Possibility
Not a viewpoint I share. We are creatures that ask questions, that is our prime directive. We are incapable of stopping our need to question, in my opinion. We must be wise, yes, we must tread carefully and consider the consequences of what we do and why we are doing it but we must not become too afraid to do anything. If taking a chance is the only alternative to stagnation then I vote for taking the chance. I would be content to die in pursuit of new knowledge but I would also be devastated if others died because of my decision to take the chance and I would have to live and die with that decision but I would still understand why I made it. No one has ever said life is always easy. — universeness

Not denying this (it fits with what I wrote above) only pointing out that science is a tool, and our current interests are motivation - neither should be mistaken for a purpose or goal in itself.

Darwinian evolution is fact, it is not an interpretated construct. Natural selection is also fact.
Survival of the fittest or those that develop the most successful survival strategy is evidenced by the fact that we have more control over our fate compared to any other species on the planet. — universeness

No - natural selection is fact, Darwinian evolution is a theory, and ‘survival of the fittest’ is an interpretation. The idea that we evolved to be the best at species-level ‘survival’ is a ridiculous contrivance - we evolved into the most highly variable organism, enabling us to maximise awareness, connection and collaboration.

Are you saying that the god posit is a surprising/unexpected one, given the ignorance within which it was first suggested by the ancients? — universeness

I’m saying that you’re assuming this is how the god posit was first suggested, when there is no evidence to confirm this. The story sounds believable, sure, but it’s just a story - a way of arranging the information so that it makes sense. This is what I mean by interpretation.

Well I understand what you are saying but its similar, in my opinion, to me chiseling on a clay tablet addressed to you 1000 years ago that I think that in 1000 years we will be able to communicate with another human anywhere on the Earth, using machines and my words will reach you seconds after I despatched them, no matter how far away from me you are on the Earth.
I am sure the response of many, would be:
'We like to think/hope that future science will enable us ALL to communicate so quickly but this is just a bedtime story.' — universeness

Sure, and saying we should therefore focus on building machines rather than fashioning writing implements or training horses would be presumptuous, don’t you think?

The most significant science on this planet is performed only by humans so in what way are these human scientists ignoring their own humanity?
Transhumanism satisfies both, unashamedly! self-interest and philanthropy. Nothing wrong with that is there? — universeness

That’s right - science requires humanity not just as a conscious observer, but a self-conscious, ethical participant. When we pursue science for it’s own sake, we tend to pursue our own destruction. And when we pursue it purely for our current interests, we whittle away at our future. Science is as destructive when carelessly handled as it is useful. There is a framework needed here, and transhumanism doesn’t appear to be it.

Transhumanism doesn’t account for the inevitable hierarchical distinction between self-interest and philanthropy, let alone between ‘some’, ‘most’ and ‘all’ humans. Nor does it hide its anthropocentric priority. It harks back to the wide-eyed enthusiasm for Humanism, and all the marketing hype that hits us right in our primal fear, promising the world...

So don't accept the answer 'it depends,' exclaim an imperative to balance between both in all judgments and don't exclude either. — universeness

In other words, talk as if loving but act as if living, and pretend you offer the ‘best’ of both - just like every other religion. You’ll pardon me if I don’t buy it...

'Need of god' is only still true for those who still have little control over their primal fears and need god the superhero to reassure them when they are alone or scared or close to death.
I have not completely conquered my own fears, primal or otherwise, nor would I want to, but I have made enough progress to not need a god fable to help me when I am in trouble. I would rather rely on fellow humans. If I am in pain, I will turn to medical personnel, not useless prayer.
If I am close to death, I will revel in the fact that I am going to disassemble and become part of that which I came from, universal raw materials. I am content with that. — universeness

I’m not talking about a god or superhero fable, but a logically qualitative framework to help us reasonably determine what is potential/valuable/significant from what’s possible, given our current limitations as variably affected, fearful humans. We don’t need reassurance that something else is in control - we just need confidence in the accuracy of our next move. That’s all we’ve ever needed.

Right…so if I somehow plot and plan a person to materialize so I can punch him in the face, the second that person materializes, and I punch him, is the violation. Non identity no more. Also, as I’ve been stating the whole time, the parent is creating collateral damage when they could have not created this for someone else. — schopenhauer1

You’re not answering my question. You can plan anything you want - that’s potential, not actual. Punching is a violation against an already materialised person. Whether you were the one to materialise them or not is relevant only in the sense that the punching was premeditated. Materialising them violates nothing, because nothing exists to violate. They could just as easily have materialised them and then changed their mind about punching them. Two separate actions.

Another example I give often is that if a parent chooses to birth a child into a volcano, surely they can’t be doing wrong to that child that will be born in the volcano :roll:. — schopenhauer1

You’re using an example where the risk to both child and parent is obvious and immediate - that’s not the case with life.

It is your opinion that the chance of someone’s life being less than their potential is sufficient enough to warrant non-being. Plenty of people disagree with this evaluation, and you claim they’re wrong, but all they’re doing is evaluating life differently to you. You have no way of proving your own evaluation to be objective - it will always be relative to the affect of your limited experience. For most people, this evaluation will vary across their lifetime, and is far more complex than a binary reduction.

I have no issue with accusing parents of violating the dignity of their child, and even reference to collateral damage based on their methods of parenting. But it’s a separate issue to procreation. You cannot automatically assume their intention to violate based only on the act of procreation. That assumption is determined by your personal evaluation of life.

I’m not arguing for procreation here, only arguing against your blanket moral judgement. A parent is usually ignorant, commonly naive, and often selfish in choosing to procreate, but they are not violating any existing dignity at this point. This is simply false. But if you want to acknowledge potential existence, then we can go there.

While I agree in a sense that humans conceptualize their survival as they do it, that doesn’t negate the survival. In fact it may make the situation worse. Instead of instinctual programs we must conceptualize. We can even be aware of a negative value of a task and realize it must be done despite not preferring it if we want to achieve X. We are aware of our shitty options. — schopenhauer1

Conceptualisation instead of instinctual programs enables MORE options. What you’re referring to here is awareness of a conflict between value systems. It allows us to question the accuracy of our value systems, and choose a conceptual structure that minimises overall prediction error (suffering). Why do we want to achieve X? Is this really more important than avoiding Y right now? Would it be better to avoid Y at this time and delay achieving X, or is this the only opportunity for us to achieve X? How are these shittier options than a single instinctual program based on the experience of previous generations?

I’m arguing that the entire agenda, these ideals we’ve convinced ourselves to strive towards, are a false construct. Which is not to say the potential is non-existent, only that it’s been constructed to give the illusion of definitive goals, when the reality is far more open-ended.
— Possibility

But it’s not. Try not eating for a couple weeks. Try living in extreme cold or heat over long periods of time. Not to mention that “where” you put yourself is determined by outside principles like property arrangements. There are quite a few things that de facto happen due to physical, social, and historical situatedness. — schopenhauer1

Yes, there are more options to think about, so more to be aware of, to adjust and to get wrong. This increases the chances of prediction error (suffering) if we lack awareness, but if we maximise awareness then it increases the chances of reducing suffering overall. Humans do choose to live in extreme cold or heat over long periods of time - usually because they prefer it to their perceived alternatives, or because it brings them value/potential in other ways they consider worth the effort. We simply change our distribution of effort and attention over time.

There are limits to how we can live, sure - but no-one is forcing us to live, except our own preferences which are open to negotiation, so long as we’re aware of alternatives. You can go on a hunger strike for several weeks if you believe it will achieve something you consider more important than your own life. These are choices we’re free to make, against survival, towards a value we decide is greater. It doesn’t make death any more inevitable.

But they do. Every possibility of action is one whereby I need to figure out how to maintain my being. Willy Wonkas Forced Game is really a limited one, and you can piecemeal it further if you want but they fall under the categories listed..if I want none of that? Death. Comply or die. — schopenhauer1

No, you don’t need to maintain your being, you’re choosing to. Death is inevitable. You can bring it closer or try to delay it, but it’s coming for you either way. Doesn’t change your value one iota.

Cause he’s peddling bullshit. It’s doubling down on the agenda..it’s not bypassing it cause you are doing it with more conviction or extremely. — schopenhauer1

You personally disagree with his perspective. That’s all this says to me.

Right, yet you don’t mind literally forcing people into a “choose your own adventure story” that can’t be escaped and is actually limited in options. Then you blame the person forced that how dare they question the situation. Willy Wonka lovingly forced this game for which you can comply or die. You still haven’t addressed Willy Wonka scenario..you, who got indignant at being even mentioned in a silly tertiary way as a fictional character gaslights the fact that people are literally forced into a real situation of inescapable, non-trivial, suffering and an agenda of comply or die. — schopenhauer1

This is not my view at all. Every situation is limited in options, especially non-being. I would encourage everyone to increase their own awareness of and question the unique situation they’re in, and to recognise and develop their own unique capacity to effect changes.

Your Willy Wonka forces existing characters into his game. You attempt to violate the respect and dignity of my existing identity, and I feel entitled to object, as one human being to another. But in procreation there is no existing character/identity to violate.

Prior to self-awareness, a person’s potential/value exists in the minds of anyone interacting with a developing being (especially the parents), and their actualisation is subject to countless conflicts of ignorance/awareness, isolation/connection and exclusion/collaboration. The temptation for parents to align ourselves with the agenda can be overwhelming. I cannot hope to maximise my child’s potential for awareness, for instance, until they’re aware of my own ignorance. To the extent that I seek to avoid suffering humiliation in this, and maintain an illusion of dominance, I am multiplying their potential for future suffering. But no-one explains this beforehand, and reducing to it ‘procreation = forced suffering = bad’ is obviously inaccurate, as is ‘parenting = self-sacrifice = love’. It’s much more complex and irreducible than that.

A person gradually develops self-awareness of the situation they’re in, questions its suitability in accordance with their conceptual structures, and seeks to make changes (either to their situation OR to their conceptual structures) which they consider important.

A person’s immediate situatedness is predetermined, but highly variable and ultimately as temporary as they determine it to be. To observe this situatedness as ‘constrained’ is to recognise one’s unrealised potential/value at that point in time. To judge it ‘inescapable’ is to reduce this actualising relation with potential/value to a binary (potential = good, actual = bad), even though both are continually subject to change, and subject to our conscious determination.

So... none of the above.

You do realise that all of this is interpretation. Even Darwinian evolution and this notion of ‘survival of the fittest’ are constructed according to assumptions (fears) and preferences (desires). There is no ‘of course’ about it. We like to think/hope that science and transhumanism will enable us ALL to gain control over death, but this is no less a bedtime story than religion is. Science is motivated by answers to questions and pays zero attention to humanity when left to its devices. And frankly, transhumanism smacks of self-interest masquerading as philanthropy, tbh.

In the end, I think all these interpretations of who we intend to be as humans point towards a fundamental question we need to ask ourselves: if it came down to a choice between living and loving, which would I choose? And if the answer is ‘it depends’, then perhaps we still have need of god, after all - if only as as a framework for our understanding.

I personally think that an Eternal, self existing Mind, that is the very essence of Being, is far more parsimonious
— Watchmaker

I think many theists take this position. They reject the infinite regression or 'first cause' problem by claiming that god is 'outside of time,' and 'outside of causality.' I think this is just the same as saying 'you can NEVER approach the concept of god using a mere human mind, the scientific method, and empiricism.

My counter is that I personally, therefore, have no need for god, AT ALL.
I further suggest that the need for such an entity is down to human primal fears. — universeness

Interesting that you cite ‘human primal fears’ as the basis of a need for god - where do they fit into your list of ‘human mind, the scientific method, and empiricism’?

I’m with you that maximising awareness, connection and collaboration is most likely to lead us to what could satisfyingly be called ‘god’. I also think this question of whether or not we need this ‘god’ would have no objective answer, even at that point. It will always be a personal relation - but then, that’s kind of the idea. It’s the relation that matters, that renders ‘god’ existent (even in the distant realm of possibility/impossibility) - not need or any other quality, as such.

Once you violate dignity of X time (birthing that new person), THAT is the violation.. That person doesn't have to exist prior to that to violate the dignity. — schopenhauer1

Your sentence makes no sense. Something has to exist in order to violate a pre-existing dignity.

Violate: 1. Break or fail to comply with (a rule or formal agreement). 2. treat (something sacred) with irreverence or disrespect.

Dignity: the state or quality of being worthy of honour or respect.

Explain to me what this ‘rule or formal agreement’ is that is broken, or what this ‘something sacred’ is that is treated with disrespect. Because I get that the violation is the birthing, the actual existing, but it’s unclear what an unviolated ‘new person’ is. Seems to me like this violation is committed against an unrealised concept, a perception of value.

For example, not wanting to do the whole survival thing is off the table, lest death, depredation in the wilderness or homeless or free riding etc.. Utopia is off the table because there is no utopia. Some people aren't going to be X because they simply want X. — schopenhauer1

Do you even understand what ‘the whole survival thing’ is? Survival was never on the table - it was always a false goal, doomed to failure. Nobody survives. Someone sold you a bill of goods, buddy! Let me make it clear: you will NOT survive, no matter how hard you try. Death is not something you can avoid. Survival, Utopia, Ubermensch, the individual dignity of non-existence - all ways of thinking about human potentiality. They’re not promised actualities at all, just ideas to which we attribute value based on quality and feeling, and then conceptualise.

Any promises made regarding life are falsely stated, and what makes procreation so unconscionable to you is that you interpret the act itself as a promissory note, made apparently without the means or inclination to fulfil it. But your interpretation is constructed according to this ‘agenda’ that you’re trying to subvert. I’m arguing that the entire agenda, these ideals we’ve convinced ourselves to strive towards, are a false construct. Which is not to say the potential is non-existent, only that it’s been constructed to give the illusion of definitive goals, when the reality is far more open-ended.

We are not aware of what we are not aware of. — schopenhauer1

Ignorance is not a permanent condition. Human awareness is a process.

Ugh, I knew you were going to say something like that :lol:. No, I literally mean, I cannot become a bird.. Meaning, I cannot change certain physical and social realities of life. They are off the table. — schopenhauer1

Is that what your problem is? Would you rather be a bird? What is it about literally being a bird that is so valuable and so unattainable? Seriously, though - physical or social realities don’t determine your dignity or respect unless you buy into the agenda. They can be taken off the table, and all it changes is the distribution of time, attention and effort.

I noticed here that you didn't even deny my comparison to Nietzsche's coked out model. — schopenhauer1

Why bother? It’s as similar to my philosophy as it is to your own. The fact that you refer to it as ‘coked out’ is just your subjective view, and bears no reflection on my philosophy at all - only your subjective view of it, stubbornly held. I don’t consider my position to be better than yours (which is an option), but I do think it deserves due consideration and respect, which you stubbornly refuse to give, presumably because you think there can only be two moralistic ways to view reality (the right way and wrong way)...

Yeah that's right, life is a leaky boat of survival and dissatisfaction that has to be overcome. The whole point of the thread is that if being were positive in itself there would be no need for anything. — schopenhauer1

Subjective opinion, again. Life is neither positive or negative. The fact that you NEED it to be inherently positive goes back to your sense of entitlement, and this desire for a definitive goal. ‘I never get out of bed for less than $10,000 a day’...

Don't know, don't care.. Doesn't mean anything as this is written. — schopenhauer1

Ignorance is bliss...

But notice, the indignity you felt, even of just your forum persona being a character in someone else's agenda (fiction). That indignity and disrespect, is like the indignity and disrespect of forcing (causing) someone into the world to comply with the dictates of life.. You can pretend moralize to me that it's different because life provides "options".. But AGAIN, it's the Willy Wonka's Forced Game again.. The options are not really options on closer inspections.... — schopenhauer1

Your fiction is pretend - the fact that life provides options aside from compliance is not. I have already agreed that ‘forcing someone into the world’ is worth arguing against. But I disagree with your argument that the limitations of an actual life in relation to perceived potential is a case of forcing them to ‘comply with the dictates of life’, let alone any specific agenda. What you want is the maximum value - the dignity and respect - without the life, but that’s not how value exists.

Your namesake presumably comes from metaphysics like Whiteheads.. His idea of universal possibilities for each event.. But those possibilities were finite.. The possibilities of a human animal in a physical world with certain laws and historical developments is finite.. I cannot just be a bird cause I wish it... One must only use the gauntlet allowed by circumstances of reality (both social and physical). Thus, telling someone to "collaborate more awareness and you'll be better off" is like saying to someone, "I'm forcing you into the game and you are going to double down on it if you don't like it". Because the possibilities are there, but they are again, finite. At the end of the day you sound like Nietzsche's super-coked up Ubermensch philosophy which tries to embrace the absurdity through trying to be the most extreme version of the possibility.. It's all the same game.. I'm sorry, there is no "pat" answer that lets you escape the fact of the situatedness of reality.. No Eternal Return superheroes.. No Mother Teresea gods of charity and kindness.. It's just forced game of dissatisfaction overcoming.. — schopenhauer1

Not Whitehead - don’t presume. I’m well aware that the possibility for an event is finite, but human capacity for awareness is not. What you will BE is limited - but it’s also highly variable. If you don’t like it, you can look for ways to change it. You cannot BE a bird, but with awareness, connection and collaboration, you can fly or perform pretty much any other action that a bird is capable of, if you choose.

Nietzsche’s Ubermensch is not a proposed actuality, but the conceptualisation of an idea - rather like your notion of maximum value apparently owed to the individual upon existence. It’s a way of thinking about the relational structure between human being/actuality and human value/potentiality. There is a common misconception that it’s linear - much like we assumed the relation between space and time to be linear. It isn’t.

So for ethics, what do we do now that we are here? Surely, not much other than live out our life course. We can take away some understanding like "don't burden others" and "community recognition that we are in a forced game/leaky boat". There is some consolation in communal understanding of our situation. There is trying to alleviate undo suffering when one can. Okie dokie.. That doesn't mean thus life good. — schopenhauer1

What life course? How you interpret ‘don’t burden others’ is not as straight-forward as you seem to think, and your description of this situatedness as ‘a forced game/leaky boat’ is highly subjective and charged with affect. It doesn’t mean life is good OR bad, except that you choose to interpret it this way. Life is diverse and ever-changing, and so is our potential relation to it.

When we evaluate life, we reduce this perceived relation to a linear equation, with our (temporal) being on one side and our (eternal) value on the other. What is not acknowledged in this equation is that our temporal being is a four-dimensional existence, while our eternal value is a five-dimensional existence. They will never be equal, and any argument that they should be is illogical.

My contention is that it is separate from its environment in a particular, crucial way. Non-living things are not separated in the same way. — Daemon

Then I would disagree with you here. Just because living things move in relation to a stationary environment does not render them separate from it. There is no gap or space in between, and both entities continue to relate, interact and connect. The difference is that the limits of this interaction are determined by the overall organisation of the cell, as an integrated structure of highly variable chemical processes. Any ‘separation’ is assumed by a conscious observer.

Integration seems to me the prerequisite here for consciousness.
— Possibility

Can you say more about why? — Daemon

From what I can see it is a configuration as whole, rather than a boundary (appearance of separation) itself, that enables consciousness.

The non-conscious mechanism I am using as an example, chemotaxis in bacteria, is a series of chemical reactions resulting in swimming behaviour that tends to take the bacterium closer to an attractant. There is no awareness. The behaviour does look like it involves awareness (how can the bacterium swim towards the attractant if it isn't aware of its location?) but we know about the chemical process in exquisite detail, and we can see that the process is non-conscious. — Daemon

I get this, and I do think there is awareness, but not consciousness. The bacterium as a whole is not aware of the attractant’s location. But a chemical process within this group is aware of changes in the chemical gradient of the attractant (allowed through by the chemical process in the cell wall). The chemical process has a relation of change with this gradient, which in turn has a relation of change with other chemical processes within the bacterium - ie. they demonstrate awareness of changes in this chemical process.

I wonder if your "integration" is another way of talking about the boundary, about the way the organism is separate from its environment? — Daemon

It is, but it refers to internally organised limits in particular, not just any boundary. The organism is not really separate from its environment, it’s just set certain limits of interaction as a whole by its internal configuration.

What is "integration" in the sense in which you are using it? — Daemon

To integrate is to “bring (entities or groups with particular characteristics or needs) into equal participation in or membership of a group or institution.”

The sea sponge demonstrates an intermediate level of integration, similar to a hive or ant colony. There’s an internally organised (weak) upper limit, but the lower limit is a single cell looking for fellow members of... something...

‘Non-conscious sensory mechanisms’ are just members with particularly useful awareness characteristics, like the cell wall. It’s likely that earlier cells had systems with variable awareness characteristics making up their cell wall, allowing too much or too little interaction. We see only the structures that survived this long, not the potential diversity of failure.

I'm not imagining that a sea sponge is conscious. It has the non-conscious sensory mechanisms from which I think consciousness developed. — Daemon

That’s okay - I wasn’t implying that you were. But let’s say a collection of cells bounded by a Petri dish would not have these non-conscious sensory mechanisms. I think there’s something more than simply boundedness in the development of consciousness. I’m suggesting integration, although I’m willing to consider that boundedness can motivate integration.

I just don’t think boundedness is equal to identity. What we lose when unconscious may be understood as identity (retaining the potential for consciousness), but non-conscious is something else.

I've been reading and watching lectures about "What Is Life?". Living organisms are described by the biologists as "bounded entities". Identity then is something a bacterium has, without being conscious.

This kind of non-conscious identity is a prerequisite for consciousness.

I think bounded entities developed, by chance, perhaps around deep sea vents. I think consciousness developed out of non-conscious sensory mechanisms in those bounded entities. — Daemon

I think perhaps identity is more than just boundedness. Integration seems to me the prerequisite here for consciousness. It’s hard to imagine a sea sponge, for instance, being conscious. Have you seen one reassemble after being passed through a sieve?

WTF?

Completely unnecessary - sexist character attacks with zero substance are not welcome here.

You want to write fiction - do it somewhere else, and leave me the fuck out of it!