You're just confusing empathy with sympathy. — Isaac

I don't believe I am. If you replace the words "sympathy for the words "empathy" in my paragraph it makes no sense.

"What is it Like to be a Bat" — Grre

It's literally impossible to know what it is like to be a bat because bats do not have empathy. https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/8464/the-blind-spot-of-empathy

Brother Cornel West:

What caused the big bang.

In the beginning there was a God and nothing else. Eventually God got really depressed and lonely. So he sacrificed his life with a big bang and created the universe.

(Delete)

I guess where I am going with this is just to ask, is there any aspect of the drift to insanity that is not scary and terrible? — ZhouBoTong

Yes. In some ways I feel more free, like I'm not abiding by societies expectations of how I should behave. I feel like the need to be sane is a way of society keeping us in line so we can be controlled. Society wants everyone to be sane, but sometimes, I think, it is in the interest of the individual to experience some insanity.

I feel like my mind is much more creative now, yet I see the fear in other people wanting me to act "normal".

Life is risky. — A Seagull

It sure is.

I would say that someone who responds in such a way to negative feedback is not actually confident. — Tzeentch

There are many different conceptions of confidence.

True confidence isn't just about believing in one's own capabilities, but also the acceptance of one's own imperfections. — Tzeentch

Isn't that called humility? Correct me if I'm wrong.

It is preferable to take feedback only from people with skin in the game. — alcontali

Furthermore, we had better be aware of the fact that we will generally receive lots of unsolicited feedback from bystanders who are merely sitting on the fence. Their ideas are usually not even really theirs. They are often merely repeating mainstream propaganda. — alcontali

Really good points.

What if over the long run this heuristic is detracting from life, but it's hard for you to notice because your focused on the trees and not the forest. — Coben

What if my confidence in that heuristic just went down? :joke:

Dunning-Kruger effect? — TheMadFool

Everyone needs to start with some confidence to play the game, hence the Dunning-Kruger effect.

Call a doctor? — Wallows

I'm getting all the help I can get. I'm just bitching.

I agree too much. I wish I disagreed more, that way I would be able to respond to a replies to me more often than I do now.

I wish I was special.

Not really. I doubt it as well. — Monist

I might not have any unshakable beliefs.

I am not able to establish unshakable beliefs — Monist

Is that an unshakeable belief?

This is a poem I wrote 4 years ago about feeling really sad. (I fixed it up a bit)

A wave of meaningless has washed upon me.

Friends turned into strangers, their stories turned into sounds.

The sun is chased out of the sky, and darkness is upon me.

Goals have revealed themselves to be dead ends.

The only unbroken road is the one that leads to itself

There is no energy there is no motivation, but for sadness there is.

I’m not worthy of respect, not worthy of dignity, not worthy of anybody to feel bad for me.

The will to live now is the will to die, but I cannot die because any idea of escape has been locked away, in the chest of hope with no key to be found.

I am withdrawn; I am within sight but will not be seen.

Death is my only hope; Death is the only thing that makes sense; But death is a goal, so death is a dead end.

I am stuck in this world not wanting to be alive, but cannot die.

Too tired to do anything, but not tired enough to fall asleep.

Happiness is a lie, sadness is the only truth.

But tonight I will feel relief, though tomorrow will repeat.

. I've always wondered at the expression "shed light on" which to me sounds like the way it's probably meant; as leading to illuminating experience, discoveries, new insights, and so on, all very nice to hear and imagine. — TheMadFool

That's funny because my name is Meir, which means "one who shines" in Hebrew.

However, as one of those persons who is completely alien to the concept of cleanliness, I feel very uncomfortable switching on the lights in my filthy room. — TheMadFool

I also struggle with cleanliness. When my room gets really messy, it fucks with my mind, and that's when I start requesting help to clean it. I don't know why it always gets messy, probably because I live by the philosophy of getting through life with the least amount of effort. :wink:

I feel very uncomfortable switching on the lights in my filthy room. Perhaps humanity shouldn't be "shedding light on" things in the world and is better off "putting out the lights" lest we see the filth we're wallowing in. Just a thought. — TheMadFool

Clean your room -- Jordan Peterson

Go off into the jungle, find a nice cave and enjoy your, probably hard-won, solitude. There's nothing like being alone when all you can have as company are... — TheMadFool

I might do that. :cool:

The trouble with using masks too often is that one can get confused about who one really is. — Bitter Crank

I don't think so because I know who I am. I am a man without an identity; I don't belong to any group, nor denomination. I'm on my own, and it is necessary for me to play roles to get by in life. Or perhaps I just need to wait for my anti-psychotics to kick in.

Whatever mask you don you still want to, with the mask on, find that sweet spot between the paparazzi and the back alley. — TheMadFool

Fine with me. But when the mask comes off, when I no longer need to play a role at that moment, I'll be the worlds biggest recluse that I am; Invisible.

In other words, some amount of visibility is desirable. The sweet spot is between a celebrity hounded by paparazzi and a nonentity who no one cares about. It's a difficult balance don't you think? — TheMadFool

Nah, I want to be invisible through and through. But just because I want remain invisible it doesn't mean I can't put on a "mask" and pretend to be someone I'm not. My real me will be invisible, but my fake me will be as visible as I desire. Kinda like spider man.

I'm invisible — Frank Apisa

Me too, and so is this thread. :rofl:

(All General Sanders Conversations Here)

Like I said, I don't want to get into a debate about what art is; that's not what this thread is about. If we seem to disagree about the definition...well, there we are. Which cycles back to what you initially said...it's ok to disagree... — Noble Dust

Oh, well. It's not that important anyways. Artists are going to continue writing statements, whether you like it or not. :wink:

@Noble Dust

I'm struggling with the "functions creatively" part.

Art is human creative expression. How's that?

Okay.

You sure?

Art is a human expression which functions creatively/via the intuition. — Noble Dust

Give me time to digest that.

Why couldn’t it pervade the universe? — Noah Te Stroete

As far as we know conscious awareness is a biological phenomenon. Its function is to help creatures react to their environment.

That's fair. I'll give it a shot.

Where do I begin? First it's important that we both have the same understanding of what art actually is.

I disagree; make a case. — Noble Dust

It's okay if we disagree.

No, you provide the contextual lens through which the work is viewed. I mean, is this really debatable? — Noble Dust

I feel like your twisting the word "context" to suit your position. It's not a big deal, just pointing that out.

Educating oneself about works of art is a rich pastime which I recommend indiscriminately to anyone. But, for maximum aesthetic experience, education should follow experience. — Noble Dust

I don't think it's fruitful to make such broad statements about art, as if there's an essence to art. There are many different kinds of art and many different ways to appreciate it. Let's not oversimplify things here.

You provide the context. — Noble Dust

You mean "you provide most of the context"? I don't think I agree with this. As a viewer, you don't provide any context. The context is whatever inspired the artist, which you had nothing to do with. How you perceive a context is a different story. If you're happy with merely perceiving a context, my hat is off to you.

I like to think I will have an enhanced perception of the art piece when I know more about it. :up:

If a work of art I make requires an explanation, then it's not worthy of anyone's time. — Noble Dust

There's much more to art than the actual art piece. There's context to art such as the background and culture behind it. To fully appreciate art you have to have a certain level of knowledge. An artist statement simply provides some context to the artwork, nothing wrong with that.

I think that current philosophy is accessible only to a narrow range of people. It takes a certain level of intelligence to appreciate philosophical concepts, so that's a good portion of the population excluded right there. Of those who are smart enough to understand philosophy, much less have the time, patience, or the interest to engage in philosophy. And of those who show interest and are intelligent enough to study philosophy, fewer of them are actual readers who would open a philosophy book.

The question: What do most people think about philosophy?

Answer: "Not for me."

A few a weeks ago I decided to implement a couple of rules. No electronics near my bed, (except a book light) and one book at a time (I don't start another book until I'm finished with the first one). I created a bit of a reading habit, lying in bed with nothing else to do. I found out that I can read, after all.

In the past few weeks I read (in chronological order):

The Wind in the Willows by Kenneth Grahame
Little House on the Prairie by Laura Ingalls Wilder
Atomic Habits by James Clear
A Long Way Gone: memoirs of a boy soldier

I don't think you "locate" mind. Can you point to it? Extract it? Throw it around? No, then you can't "locate" it can you. — khaled

If the mind really is inside your brain then I don't think you would able to do any of those, at least not with current technology.

I don't believe your reasoning is correct here. Can you point, extract, throw around, all brain activity? No. Does that mean that some brain activity doesn't have a location in the brain? No.