But I would then step back from the phenomenological justification to inquire about the natural basis. Why would humans have evolved (both biologically and culturally) to feel this way? And that is where we can see that it makes sense thermodynamically. Life exists as negentropy, or little pockets of organisation, so as to assist the Cosmos in its general entropic flow. — apokrisis

ou just want to start with "how it feels to me". I am interested in the hypothesis that "how it feels" is always going to be naturally rational. And the hypothesis is holding up pretty good. — apokrisis

Yet a scientific ethics does not necessarily satisfy what we perceive to be moral.

Tell a person whom you're helping that you're helping them because they can go on and make more entropy, and not because they're a person who is valuable because they can suffer, and they might just shake you off and tell you to buzz off.

We don't "assist" the universe in its entropic flow. WE ARE the universe, at least part of it. A better term to be used is "forced" by the universe. i.e. instrumentalized as me and schop1 and others have repetitively said. The universe has an agenda - thermodyanamic equilibrium - and it uses us as means to this end.

From the universe's dormant perspective, the ends justify the means. Yet surely these ends do not match with what we want - and surely what we want is more important than what any anthropomorphized universe "wants".

There is no ethics in the void.

As I say, many might be puzzled by climate denial, rampant consumerism, neo-liberalism, gated communities, McDonalds. These seem unnatural and unethical behaviours - according to PC romantic notions that are widespread.

Yet a shift in the entropic basis of the species now can make those behaviours "ethical" and natural. If we endorse the desires of fossil fuels, the things we might object to are in fact morally right.

And if we still feel they are wrong (which I tend to) then we have to dig into just why. And that is where the alternative of a slow burn sustainable entropification can be considered. We can now argue objectively why this is a better moral paradigm. — apokrisis

No, no, no. This is where you intuitively find this behavior wrong, and then justify them as wrong by appealing to science in an ad hoc manner.

These behaviors are not wrong because of some entropic principle. They're wrong because we find them wrong, and then apparently some of us try to ignore this and shoehorn science in.

So my approach to ethical systems presumes nothing except that the Cosmos is rational. Nature has an over-arching self-organising logic. And that then presents us with the choice of either living within that logic or acting counter to it. And in fact, we can't act counter to it in any fundamental sense. But that still gives us a range of choices about the level of "harmony" we opt for. — apokrisis

Query: what if the universe was malignant to us? What if, no matter what we did, we could never manage to escape its malevolent grasp? Would it still be "good"?

Hardly.

Science has the advantage it is an open-ended process of learning. So we can get as close to the truth of things as we feel it matters. The answers one might have given 300 years ago would be much less informed than the ones we can give today. — apokrisis

You claim that goodness is not some abstract principle yet are claiming there is also a truth to ethical claims that resides in the external world. Pick one.

As I have argued, I would always seek to begin with the fewest presumptions about what might be the case. — apokrisis

And yet it is intuitive that we should give non-human animals the benefit of the doubt despite this being a presumption. It's not necessarily rational, it is ethical.

Nature lies there waiting to be discovered. Morality grows out of nature and so it would be questionable to hold to any ethical systems that go against nature. That would be - by definition - irrational and unsustainable (from a personal phenomenological point of view). — apokrisis

Because of the inherent harm to welfare it is to go against the cosmos' agenda...?

Once again, welfare is the identifier of the moral. If the universe went against our wishes, we would not find it moral. A tornado is not moral. It is destructive, albeit amoral. So why call entropy moral?

But that cuts both ways. We can't just cherry-pick the findings that support our preconceptions while not listening to the others that question them. — apokrisis

And we can't just ignore the possibility that we might be wrong in our prescription, or that we'll never know something. Don't play dice when we're ignorant.

Your "out there" is my immanent nature. And your phenomenological "in here" is my hearing you assert transcendent dualism. You treat the mind as if it could exist without a body, without a world. — apokrisis

No. Yet a body without a mind (specifically a rational and capable self) has no sense of morality.

However the evidence that only humans have articulate speech, and thus only humans can evolve culturally encoded habits of "self-conscious introspective awareness", is just as scientific. — apokrisis

Yet is the theory that articulate speech corresponds to ethical importance scientific? Nope.

You are trying to talk about "sentience" as some generic property - a mind stuff abstracted from the world. This, as I say, is a Romantic hang-over - a dualistic belief in the mental as causally something apart from the world. — apokrisis

No, I'm talking about the ability to suffer, however that manifests. Sentience is just a placeholder.

What are your thoughts on this? — Blue Sky

Integration and differentiation are both part of the same game. So it is completely natural that everything is all part of the one ecosystem, and yet ecosystems also tend towards complex richness - a hierarchy of divisions.

To talk about "interference" is to think about this unbiologically. If there were no competition or boundary drawing, there could be no co-operation that acts across those boundaries.

Prey needs predators to keep their numbers in check. Otherwise growth is unregulated. the prey consumes its environment, the whole system collapses of starvation.

Yet a scientific ethics does not necessarily satisfy what we perceive to be moral. — darthbarracuda

But that's just you pushing your personal wheelbarrow again and claiming it to be the everyman view.

Tell a person whom you're helping that you're helping them because they can go on and make more entropy, and not because they're a person who is valuable because they can suffer, and they might just shake you off and tell you to buzz off. — darthbarracuda

There's no point replying to nonsense like this. It is just a sign of desperation on your part.

Yet surely these ends do not match with what we want — darthbarracuda

You are getting it half right in accepting that there is a thermodynamic framework at play. But I've already said that then itself creates our "free" choice about what we then do about things once we have that accurate picture.

We could go with the flow or instead swim against the tide. That's the choice.

And the choice becomes rational to the degree it is both possible and has some agreed goal.

Is the goal to make DC blissfully happy? Is the goal to remove the very possibility of psychic suffering? You might very well say so. I don't feel particularly moved to agree.

These behaviors are not wrong because of some entropic principle. They're wrong because we find them wrong, and then apparently some of us try to ignore this and shoehorn science in. — darthbarracuda

You keep talking about this "we". I realise you mean the many like yourself brought up on a steady cultural diet of vague romantic notions.

Query: what if the universe was malignant to us? What if, no matter what we did, we could never manage to escape its malevolent grasp? Would it still be "good"? — darthbarracuda

That is an adequate answer to your own strange question. But it is irrelevant to anything I've been saying.

And yet it is intuitive that we should give non-human animals the benefit of the doubt despite this being a presumption. It's not necessarily rational, it is ethical. — darthbarracuda

It is rational to give the benefit of the doubt when faced with uncertainty. But there is far less uncertainty about things like grades of sentience than you pretend.

So what we have here is only your weakly informed "intuitions" (ie: prejudices) against readily available scientific knowledge.

No, I'm talking about the ability to suffer, however that manifests. Sentience is just a placeholder. — darthbarracuda

Why doesn't it surprise me that you not only abstract the object but even its properties? Your approach is Platonic and dualistic in classic romantic unbounded fashion.

There's no point replying to nonsense like this. It is just a sign of desperation on your part. — apokrisis

How psychoanalytic of you... :-}

Calling people desperate, it seems to me, is a sign of desperation.

And the choice becomes rational to the degree it is both possible and has some agreed goal. — apokrisis

Right. The goal is what we're arguing out.

Is the goal to make DC blissfully happy? Is the goal to remove the very possibility of psychic suffering? You might very well say so. I don't feel particularly moved to agree. — apokrisis

And I wonder why this is so.

You keep talking about this "we". I realise you mean the many like yourself brought up on a steady cultural diet of vague romantic notions. — apokrisis

You keep using this word "romantic" as a cop-out.

It is rational to give the benefit of the doubt when faced with uncertainty. But there is far less uncertainty about things like grades of sentience than you pretend. — apokrisis

With stakes as high as they are, uncertainty is practically unacceptable.

So what we have here is only your weakly informed "intuitions" (ie: prejudices) against readily available scientific knowledge. — apokrisis

As if your scientism isn't a prejudice itself.

You said we have freedom. So why are you opposed to going against the entropic goal of the universe? Essentially you're advocating a scientific taoism - just be one with nature and it'll all be cool.

Why doesn't it surprise me that you not only abstract the object but even its properties? Your approach is Platonic and dualistic in classic romantic unbounded fashion. — apokrisis

How can you abstract an object without abstracting its properties?

No, I am not abstracting anything apart from recognizing suffering as a distinct mental phenomenon of negative value.

But in terms of an emotional connection, I think "nature" is what makes existence meaningful. — Apokrisis

I would suggest it's relationship, or, more precisely, 'relatedness'. But, out of scope, please carry on.

Calling people desperate, it seems to me, is a sign of desperation. — darthbarracuda

You mean exasperation.

You keep using this word "romantic" as a cop-out. — darthbarracuda

No, I'm describing the cop out. But you are never going to address this confused dualism of yours no matter how often I point back to its familiar cultural basis.

It's been amusing as always.

You mean exasperation. — apokrisis

Then it's mutual.

No, I'm describing the cop out. But you are never going to address this confused dualism of yours no matter how often I point back to its familiar cultural basis.

It's been amusing as always. — apokrisis

Because I see no problem with it. Maybe you should actually make a post on this instead of having a assert it every single time.

Maybe you should actually make a post on this instead of having a assert it every single time. — darthbarracuda

Don't just be a dick. I've explained plenty. For example....

The conflict here is between the Enlightenment and the Romantic point of view.

The Enlightenment was about recognising humans as natural creations with a natural logic. We could consider the basis of human flourishing and create the social, political and ethical institutions to foster that. And recognising the continuity between humans and other animals was a big part of the new thinking.

So it is Enlightenment values that have steadily changed our treatment of animals (and races, and sexes, and the infirm/mentally ill/infantile) to reflect what we actually know about their capacity to suffer. That is what rationality looks like - consistent decisions based on accurate information.

Unfortunately you appear to be backing Romanticism instead. Every individual is a special creation. Absolute rights apply because something "is a mind" or "has a soul" in black and white fashion. Romanticism rejects shades of grey. A papercut is as bad as the Holocaust. Any flicker of suffering at all becomes a reason to say life in any form simply should not exist.

Who was talking about "good" in some abstract absolutist sense?

Again you betray your Romantic ontology in worrying about what might "inhere" in material reality as if it might exist "elsewhere" in Platonically ideal fashion. If you understood Naturalism, you would see this couldn't even be the issue.

You point to the indifference of Nature - even its sinister character - as a way to sustain the standard mind/body dualism of Romanticism. You have to "other" the world in a way that justifies your absolute privileging of the self - the individual and his mind, his soul, his inalienable being.

But absolutism of this kinds works both ways - which is what historically makes it so philosophically dangerous.

In removing all moral determination from "the world" - and society and culture are the principle target there - the Romantic reserves all moral determination for "the self". So it suddenly becomes all right if you are a vegan or anti-natalist "like me". You don't actually need a reason. You get an automatic high five as a kindred spirit. Morality becomes reduced to a personal preference - the preferences the Romantic knows to be true because of the certitude of his feelings about these things.

Point being I think you should make a thread (I meant thread not post) on this because talk of enlightenment vs romanticism, absolutism vs relativity, etc is not exactly obvious or well-accepted in the general community.

Part of the reason everyone has so much difficulty discussing stuff with you is because you present a historical narrative of philosophy as fact, and then go on to rip on one half of this binary debate while promoting the other half, when nobody really understands the justification you have for seeing history in this way, nor why the romantic notions are just automatic dead-ends. In fact, as far as I can tell, there's no good reason to see history in this binary fashion anyway! You just assert that this is the way it is and glaze over the important details that would otherwise potentially help us understand what the hell you are even talking about. It may make sense to you, but for everyone else who doesn't understand it looks like a biased fiction.

Explain to us all what Romanticism entails, what Enlightened thinking entails, so that we can stop beating around the bush every time you use these terms. I don't understand what the essential characteristics of Romantic or Enlightened thinking even is to grasp when something is Romantic or Enlightened according to your binary view. And every time I think I get something you're saying you end up denying it. Just put it all out in the open once and for all.

In any case, I disagree with a lot of what you said in the last reply, so if you make a specific thread on this I'll post there so we don't keep derailing all these threads unnecessarily. Keep the threads on topic, not hijacked by some meta-level question. I would enjoy actually reading a thread started by you instead of just posts where you try debunking everyone else.

Jeez, if the Enlightenment and its Romantic reaction are that unfamiliar to you, where could I even start....

Apo is ignoring what the "Romantic reaction" entails. It's actually description of the individual within a social context or environment. The individual who is hurt, in pain or treated worse than another. What he describes as the "Enlightenment" tradition is profoundly dishonest about the world. It tells us people (or animals) don't "really hurt" or aren't treated lesser, so long as "nature" is respected.

He's also confusing the "Romantic reaction" with anti-natalism. Just because there is a wide range of unavoidable suffering, paper cuts and Hitlers, which is terrible for respective individuals, it doesn't amount to an argument the suffering makes existence not worth living. Many people have the "Romantic reaction" which is aware of the suffering of the individual, yet argue life is worth continuing.

Point being I think you should make a thread (I meant thread not post) on this because talk of enlightenment vs romanticism, absolutism vs relativity, etc is not exactly obvious or well-accepted in the general community.

Part of the reason everyone has so much difficulty discussing stuff with you is because you present a historical narrative of philosophy as fact, and then go on to rip on one half of this binary debate while promoting the other half, when nobody really understands the justification you have for seeing history in this way, nor why the romantic notions are just automatic dead-ends. You just assert that this is the way it is and glaze over the important details that would otherwise potentially help us understand what the hell you are even talking about. — darthbarracuda

Indeed.. Romanticism vs. Enlightenment is another of his themes mixed in with Naturalism and Semiotics.. It's like a jigsaw that you have to put together through the various criticisms. Any "positive" explanation he has to put forth (as opposed to being inserted after a criticism) makes it more exposed to its own criticism so, its best couched in terms of criticism. I'm not saying its intentional but it certainly is a result.

As I can piece his theories together (separated from the criticism) is that he believes that semiotics as propounded first by Peirce and probably a dozen or so "modern" semiotic proponents, is a field that explains nature and metaphysics. Its inherently emergent and thus from biology leads to semiotics in language leads to semiotics to society, etc. At the human ethical/value level of emergence, semiotics informs ethics/values through social/anthropological/psychological empirical research. The social level of organization can be described in semiotic terms which essentially involves some combination of group/individual sign, interpretant, object, (or more elaborate/jargony version thereof).

Anywho, despite the inherent problems of emergence (especially from biology into the linguistic realm.. shades of old mind/body problems).. Semiotics is somehow trumpeted as a continuation of the Enlightenment (with the assumption that the Enlightenment is a purposeful movement rather than a collection of varying ideas). Anyways, its at least trumpeted as part of the empirical, and thus Scientific Image (though semiotics itself does not seem empirical as much as a speculative interpretation of the scientific findings.. but I that is another issue).

Anywho, somehow now, apokrisis takes a leap into the world of values as social/individual interaction.. I have not seen as much semiotic talk in this realm, so I am not sure where that fits in, but I'm sure he might pull some semiotics articles on anthropology, sociology, and/or psychology to prove some point using semiotics as a basis. What I am sure of is that he tries to use empirical findings to try to justify what humans should strive for. So he claims entropy, being the basis of universal teleology (and in the background of the semiotic process I guess) is a big deal, and that at the self-conscious social level that we humans experience, we can actually slow down or speed up entropy, at least as it pertains to our little organizational part of the universe. So somehow this hypothetical imperative (which itself may be speculative) is deemed as a necessity rather than a preference (I don't know how though other than simple assertion based on its supposed existence). Also included in what we should strive for is flourishing, which apparently is not much else except tenets and research from the Positive Psychology movement. So apparently humans can/should know what makes them happy through research made from positive psychology research and strive for this. Again, how this hypothetical imperative is deemed as a necessity rather than a preference is not explained.

So to give a summary of nested concepts Enlightenment = Scientific Image > Semiotics > Semiotics as applied to physics/chemistry/biology > Semiotics as applied to linguistics/anthropology/sociology/psychology > All this semiotics from the social level somehow leads to a necessity in the imperative to slow entropy in our part of the universe (specifically through being less dependent on fossil fuels) and pursue the recommendations that come from findings for what makes happiness or a more self-actualized human through the research found in the Positive Psychology movement.

Addition: So the top part there was a summary of how I interpret apokrisis based on piecing together what I have seen him write. Additionally, in classic binary fashion, he juxtaposes Enlightenment with what he claims to be its opposite, Romanticism. Romanticism here seems like an accusation of Communist in the 50's for him.. wrong thought.. should report to philosophical detention..

Anwywho, unlike the Enlightenment point of view (which I attempted to explain his version above) which supposedly takes into account the individual in the context of the group/social, Romanticism supposedly does not take this into view (how he can paint someone's philosophy as not taking into account the social when that account had not actually discounted the social and thus may be misreading the other person's view is another issue). Anyways, Romanticism puts the individual experience on a pedestal (which is a base characterization and not a comprehensive understanding of most of what these Romantic proponents are saying).. and thus are limited in their narrow, merely phenomenological interpretations of personalized experience.. He also claims that the Romantics do not take into account group dynamics and how the group shapes the human. Despite the fact that he may be taking the Romantic's argument out of context to bolster a false characterization and thus a false juxtaposition with his "superior" account. Finally , this leads to several odd conclusions that he seems to make which may or may not be connected with either semiotics or group/individual dynamics:

1) Suffering of the individual is not a problem because at least partial solutions may exist, and the individual must try their best to find these solutions

Of course, why someone needs to be brought into a world where suffering exists, only to try to constantly find solutions to the suffering is not explained other than a majority of people think it is good.. And here we have a weird fallacy of the is-ought.. an odd mixing of two concepts.. If the majority agrees this is true.. somehow the group knows best and the individual must conform to this because it has collectively gathered wisdom from passed individual/group dynamics and thus cannot be changed by the mere whims and idealistic visions of an individual who does not like what is going on.

Also, individual/social dynamics aside, the fact that I am shaped by social means and that solutions may be attained, suffering for individuals is not shared. I can share my experiences through language and make a sort of empathetic understanding through intersubjectivity, but this is not the same as actually living and experiencing the pain of the individual. There may be similar experiences, but the actual pain that is being experienced is by the individual.

2) Somehow continuing the group is important.. the individual must help continue and contribute to the group in order to keep it sustained in some way..

Of course, why someone needs to keep the group going merely to keep the group going is not really explained. It is just assumed that because it is the group, it somehow is self-evident that it should continue and the individual should know his place in continuing it. Besides the fact that it is a truism that we are shaped by the group no matter what we do (even living as a hermit), it does not provide much of anything to say that we must contribute to the group for no reason other than to just continue things to continue them. My criticism of instrumentality applies here. Why humans have to continue upkeep, institutions, and goal-seeking to continue upkeep, institutions, and goal-seeking becomes absurd. We have no choice if we are alive, have a linguistic (yes thus environmentally and socially shaped) brain that must put forth energy to keep going in order to keep going in order to keep going. However, the fact that we are social and use social means to survive does not justify any position for doing this or that action.

I agree completely.

Jeez, if the Enlightenment and its Romantic reaction are that unfamiliar to you, where could I even start.... — apokrisis

Oh, they're "familiar", just not in the way you're using them.

It's like a jigsaw that you have to put together through the various criticisms. — schopenhauer1

Yes, which is why I asked him to make a thread on this that would resolve any uncertainty once and for all. It may not be his intention but it certainly feels like he dodges all our attacks by presenting new clouded information that we had no access to before. He's speaking Chinese and getting mad that everyone else doesn't speak Chinese, nor accepts that Chinese is the one true language of the world.

Semiotics is somehow trumpeted as a continuation of the Enlightenment (with the assumption that the Enlightenment is a purposeful movement rather than a collection of varying ideas). Anyways, its at least trumpeted as part of the empirical, and thus Scientific Image (though semiotics itself does not seem empirical as much as a speculative interpretation of the scientific findings.. but I that is another issue). — schopenhauer1

It's also trumpeted that ancient philosophers, with no scientific background nor methodology, somehow are part of this historic pragmatic movement and are vindicated by modern science. If science is the best guide to truth here, then you can't be appealing to philosophers who weren't scientific!

So he claims entropy, being the basis of universal teleology (and in the background of the semiotic process I guess) is a big deal, and that at the self-conscious social level that we humans experience, we can actually slow down or speed up entropy, at least as it pertains to our little organizational part of the universe. — schopenhauer1

Indeed, we have practically no influence on the overall entropic heat death.

nyways, Romanticism puts the individual experience on a pedestal (which is a base characterization and not a comprehensive understanding of most of what these Romantic proponents are saying).. and thus are limited in their narrow, merely phenomenological interpretations of personalized experience.. He also claims that the Romantics do not take into account group dynamics and how the group shapes the human. — schopenhauer1

Additionally some of these so-called "romantic" philosophers weren't even interested in pursuing what apo's metaphysics supposedly does. It's a category error to expect them to align with physics when this just wasn't their intention - see Heidegger and his "tool analysis" - consistent with physics, but not attempting to answer what physics tries to.

It is just assumed that because it is the group, it somehow is self-evident that it should continue and the individual should know his place in continuing it. — schopenhauer1

Indeed.

The issue it can only ever define itself in biological and economic terms. In the mythos of transcendent freedom and immortality, the culmination is a seeking of biology and economics; if only we had the resources, the biology, to exist forever and ever and ever.

Yes, but that doesn't negate the transcendent, it is merely a comment on the manifest world we inhabit. The transcendent nature of humanity is such that people who realise it will work towards the gradual direction, or husbandry of manifest material, or biology, in the direction of the physical circumstances in which,what are now, transcendent ideals become manifest in the world. A process which will continue in an ongoing process of elevating( in terms of density, or concrete state) the emanation of vibrational state of matter. Thus we have an overarching mythos encompassing the whole of creation in an ethos of progress toward the divine. A deeply subtle, enriching philosophy of life which provides the psychological sustenance for a healthy society(I am well aware of the issues presented by organised religion).

I don't mean this in the crass sense of our bodies or earthly possessions, but rather in the sense of our presence. If only we existed in a way that gave us more and more all the time into perpetuity. Endless resources such that our existence would extend into perpetuity without cost or hitting limits.

This is merely the response in our being of being confined within the rigid parameters of the material world we find ourselves in. A condition which is accentuated by the restlessness of human behaviour. If we found ourselves in a less rigid and more fluid, or ethereal world things would be quite different.

The modern world's endless quest for economic growth is, quite literally, the mythos of freedom and immortality transplanted into the world. Like it pre-modern counterparts, it views the goal of existence to endless get more, to live forever, to be free of any Malthusian limits. In neither transcendent camp does anyone have the respect or self-awareness to say: "That's enough. I've obtained all I need. It's okay for me end."

Along with Wayfarer, I agree with the first two sentences in this paragraph. But your comment on the "transcendent camp", is incorrect. I know this, because I have personally affirmed "That's enough. I've obtained all I need. it's okay for me end". Many people who have embraced and embodied the transcendent have made this affirmation in their own way. One is made whole, repleat and is in the right frame of mind to act constructively in the progress of the humanity and the biosphere.

Without such insight all humanity is going to produce is a race of mindless Donald Trumps gallivanting around the universe, self destructing at any opportunity. And we would be back to square one. The transcendent allows and enables real progress.

It seems at times that humanity is superfluous, it is the relentless march of entropy towards heat death which is the be all and end all.

I would say though, that I am not in favour of personal attacks, we are all entitled to our personal view.

Of course, why someone needs to keep the group going merely to keep the group going is not really explained — schopenhauer1

That's the group's need clearly. It doesn't have to be the individual's. It is just likely to be the individual's as logically the group would need to be able to make that kind of individual as the way it has managed historically to persist.

So sure, you the individual could suddenly rebel. You could top yourself. And if enough others felt the same way, then there would be no society eventually.

Of course your problem there is even if only a few individuals did not want to drink the Kool aid with you, they would survive, breed, and pass on their habits of thought. All you would prove is something about your own mental quirks. The circumstances which produced a persistent social entity in the past would roll on probably better adapted for its self perpetuation in the future.

So it doesn't matter if individuals opt out. But it shouldn't be surprising that the collective expresses a different opinion, and not necessarily a very patient one.

Stepping back, are you thinking that existence itself must have a meaning, and so your realisation that it doesn't have a meaning is then a meaningful lack?

My argument only needs to be that meaning is what a system constructs. Goals are emergent regularities that exist because they foster their own persistence. That's the basic difference between taking the immanent view vs the transcendent view.

So in that light, a social system is free to form its own goals, it's own identity - and do so via the particular kinds of individuals it creates. That is as high as we need to shoot in finding a meaning in existence, or equally, as far as we can go in making some complaint about a lack of meaning.

That still leaves the individual free to construct his own life meaning, or equally, construct a notion of his own cosmic meaninglessness. Maybe the individual can even start up his own small movement - like antinatalism - as a gesture that appears to imbue his existence with the meaningful lack of meaning which he seeks. That is a lack of meaning of suitably trans-social, trans-historic, cosmically-absolute scale.

Such a moral construction - an anti-goal - can be proclaimed. On rarer occasions, it might even be acted upon. But as I say, it is unlikely to impact the collective system if that system already has up a head of steam and will simply end up reproducing via the kind of thought habits which are in fact functional in regard to its persistent being.

You can't stand in the way of natural selection anymore than natural selection can stand in the way of thermodynamics.

And again I say that from the point of view of pansemiotics - reality's own construction of meanings or habits of interpretance. It doesn't matter that goals don't pre-exist and are only found as whatever are the habits which permit persistence. The claim is never that meaning could have a transcendent status such as what instead exists counts as some kind of cosmic failure.

I wonder if you see this yet? The very basis on which you want to mount your fundamental criticism doesn't even exist from my point of view. There is no standing outside existence that could count as meaningful here.

No, it's not genocide. It's humanitarianism. Animals cannot take care or advocate for themselves in the way humans can. They live more on instinct than rationality - yet they can suffer all the same. All non-agents are free of responsibility - ethically innocent. — darthbarracuda

Animals have been taking care of themselves for billions of years before humans came around and not one ever charged sexism, racism, or specieism against another.

Animals have been taking care of themselves for billions of years before humans came around and not one ever charged sexism, racism, or specieism against another. — Harry Hindu

Because they weren't capable of doing so. But now humans have entered the stage, and I'm arguing that it's time we put down the mirror of narcissism and start acting more productive and responsible.

In any case it is clear that non-human animals have not been taking care of one another. Look at predation, social rejection from disease/disability, and r-selection.

Because they weren't capable of doing so. But now humans have entered the stage, and I'm arguing that it's time we put down the mirror of narcissism and start acting more productive and responsible.

In any case it is clear that non-human animals have not been taking care of one another. Look at predation, social rejection from disease/disability, and r-selection. — darthbarracuda

We didn't "enter the stage", we have always been on stage -- along with the rest of the evolving species. Around 40 million years ago, the Infraorder of Simiiformes, "Higher" primates (Simians): apes and monkeys started the evolutionary path that eventually produced the modern primates, including homo sapiens.

We, like all the other animals, must pursue our essential nature. We didn't intrude hugely on other species until we mastered tool making and became hunter gatherers. We were doing no more than meeting our basic survival needs, and being what our essential nature made possible. Granted: Once we got ourselves organized, around 12,000 years ago, we did start being a bigger problem to other species.

The worst things any of our species can say about us are only outcomes of our nature -- which we, mind you, were not in charge of forming, any more than geese were in charge of their evolution. Evolution has no long-term plan. It didn't intend us, any more than it intended a goose.

Here we are, victims of blind fate. Now we are a problem not only to ourselves, but the other species as well. Do we really have the wherewithal to see ourselves in context so clearly that we can shift gears from our forward superdrive into ecological neutral? I don't think so. Just about everyone here (a few excepted) recognizes that we have huge problems. That doesn't mean that we insightful ones are also able to climb off our technological bandwagon. This conversation requires the technological bandwagon to be in excellent working order.

We are screwed, the plant species are screwed, and our furry little friends that are not extinct yet are screwed too. Blame it on evolution's lack of foresight. Step by step a bigger brain seemed like such a good idea at the time--and it probably was. Fast forward a few million years, and you have a disaster resulting from overspecialization.

I'd just like to comment that the fact that you focused on one sentence from a very large summary and criticism of your views is pretty illustrative of your way of obfuscating and trying to dodge criticism so as to only be on the attack and not defense. I'm not even sure I should dignify you with a rebuttal of this last post seeing that you managed to skip over all the parts that were critical of your philosophy to go straight back on the attack on the very last sentence of a very long post.

Your post was vague and rambly. So most of it I neither agreed with nor disputed in any particular fashion. It didn't constitute a criticism as such.

I focused on the most salient point, or at least what I felt worth pursuing. I appreciate your only desire now is to get at me in whatever way you can.

So continue with your little psychodramas if you can't respond to the substance of my post. It's all good entertainment to distract us while we wait to die, heh?

But your comment on the "transcendent camp", is incorrect. I know this, because I have personally affirmed "That's enough. I've obtained all I need. it's okay for me end". Many people who have embraced and embodied the transcendent have made this affirmation in their own way. One is made whole, repleat and is in the right frame of mind to act constructively in the progress of the humanity and the biosphere. — Punshhh

I'd go a step further than that. Plenty who consider the transcendent means "going forever," and are attracted to the idea because of its endless resources, end-up saying they've got enough. Our actions are different to our myths. If humanity has shown us anything, it's that greed occurs whether one's philosophy says life is about constantly possessing more or not. Some people who disavowal transcendent beliefs (whether they be pre-modern or modern) end-up having a life driven by possessing more and more, often under the guise of "just being themselves."

My point about the "transcendent camps" (whether pre-modern religions and traditions or modern consumerism) is to do with the motivations and understanding of the word. What I'm talking about here here is not a "magic pill" of myth or philosophy which will save our world from resource depletion (that requires actions, no matter one's myth, traditions or view of meaning), but a reflective inquiry into what the "transcendent" says about the world and its people.

In either the pre-modern or modern sense, transcendent philosophy is defined by an inherent meaningless to the world and humanity. We need to believe, else we are meaningless heathens or irresponsible hippies. It's is to scoff at everyone else. An understanding that only believers are the only ones with appropriate meaning, with a superior life, with a special insight which makes them so much more wonderful than everyone else.

Believe--follow this tradition, buy this latest watch, then your life will be better than anyone else's. You'll be worth more and a more meaningful life than any of those who are content in themselves. The transcendent is defined by saying other people (nonbelievers) are worthless. It's a move of hierarchy, performed to initiate and win an immediate conflict, a way of getting more people follow your tradition rather than any other. An act to, for example, make some people Christian (rather than say atheist, Muslim, Jedi, etc., etc.) or to buy a your car, rather them be content without the car or have them purchasing a competitor's product.

This is merely the response in our being of being confined within the rigid parameters of the material world we find ourselves in. A condition which is accentuated by the restlessness of human behaviour. If we found ourselves in a less rigid and more fluid, or ethereal world things would be quite different. — Punshhh

It's more than that. Far more. It's a dissatisfaction with the limits of our material nature. Within the context of knowledge and myth, it means we want more then we ever are. So worthless is our material existence, that we must go to the transcendent to approximate something worthwhile, else suffer the ignominy of meaninglessness.

No doubt it's a response to the burden of rigid parameters of the world. In the transcendent there is the promise of a world free of the worldly restrictions which, but the idea entails "wanting more and more." In such an idea a person is not content with what they have. The motivation is to avoid having a limit in the material world.

In this way, any instance of transcendent philosophy is about wanting more and more. It's motivation is to "superior" to whatever exists at any point in time. Many with transcendent beliefs are content in their lives, but the philosophy itself never is. It's always saying we need more than the world. Even the pluralistic mysticism is defined by thinking how much better and more meaningful their life is for having transcendent beliefs. Such a mystic is considered to have insight which makes their point of view more meaningful than anyone else's. The joy and awe of the transcendent is great enough to qualify for meaning, unlike the joy and awe of that shallow (and material) artwork, sports game or rock concert which isn't really meaning at all.

The thing about "transcendent experiences" is they're worldly. Moments of awe, joy and meaning we experience. They are instances where meaning is extended beyond the mere question of information of an object. It's us all along. We aren't delivered from the limitation of the material world. Our ideas, meanings and fictions just mean there something more than a mortal body in space.

"Transcendent" generated out of the notion of impossible meaning. Whether we are talking afterlives, resolution of sin, having meaningful lives, tripping or creating a Trumpless world, we describe experiences as "transcendent" because in our everyday lives, we think the meaning is impossible. It's "mysterious" because we think, in expressed meaning of our experience, there's meaning which the world just can't do--i.e. "Oh wow... look out at there at creation.... there's simply no way the world could do something that meaningful. For the world to express that on it's own is just inconceivable. God must have done it. It couldn't just an expression of the fluctuations of the finite world itself."

Within the post-modern culture, this "mystery" collapses. People have learnt meaning is an expression of the world. Myths and narratives are generated out of us. There is no "constraint" on meaning. We understand the world may express any meaning, no matter how contradictory or seemingly absurd. Any combination of idea, thought, meaning and sensation makes sense.

Someone who comes out of a drug trip saying everyone else is them and they have seen how they are immortal has an experience that makes sense. What they are saying might be wrong and incoherent, but it is something the world can express. In their experience, they haven't gone beyond the expression of world and logic.

The hierarchal nature of the "transcendent" is laid bare. "Meaningless" is recognised as a local power play, a way of saying that other way of thinking and feeling aren't even possible. It's a means of making an idea dominate though denying the world can express any other meaning. The concern is not honesty about meaning, but ensuring people stick to a particular transcendent tradition-- you will follow God, else be a meaningless wretch.

With respect to "making the world better" this sort of argument has a powerful hold. Ethical improvement and meaning well becomes necessarily attached to a transcendental condition. We even see it in your argument here, despite your more pluralistic outlook. Supposedly, the world needs a transcendental outlook to avoid an abundance of Trumps. Unless we believe the transcendent, we are doomed.

This is not true. What matters is our actions and our ethics. We could put forward and enact a policy regarding a more harmonious use of resources without mentioning the transcendent at all. If we are to avoid calamity, it is the world which will do it, whether we have transcendent beliefs or not. What matters is our actions, the way we use resources and how much damage this causes to the wider world.

This is what brings me into conflict with Wayfarer all the time, despite our occasional agreements and shared interest in the importance on meaning. He thinks meaning must be granted by the transcendent. I say there is no meaninglessness, so there is no work for the transcendent to do. There are those who are depressed, anxious or despairing, but those are instances of meaningful lives, who find themselves in some unethical situation. A worldly change is what they need (it could even be a belief the transcendent), so they realise their meaning/end the horrible state that's haunting them.

Supposedly, the world needs a transcendental outlook to avoid an abundance of [various kinds of problems]. Unless we believe the transcendent, we are doomed.

This is not true. What matters is our actions and our ethics. We could put forward and enact a policy regarding a more harmonious use of resources without mentioning the transcendent at all. — TheWillowOfDarkness

Yes; I agree. All our experience and meaning is housed in this world, and there is no other world, transcendent or merely more of the same. What is, is; what is not, is not, and "transcendent" is not.

Other people are not having transcendent experiences whether they think so, or not. The may have been transported, transformed, transfixed, transplanted, and so on but they did not transcend. I hate to say that because two of my heroes, Flannery O'Connor and Dorothy Day, seemed to have transcendent experiences. But these two Roman Catholic ladies also had very dry, flinty views of the world; their feet were firmly planted in terra firma. Angels would have had to twist both their arms and necks to get them to let go of material reality.

Day's biography (A Harsh and Dreadful Love) is taken from a quote by Dostoyevsky, one of her favorite writers: “Love in action is a harsh and dreadful thing compared to love in dreams.”

That's the group's need clearly. It doesn't have to be the individual's. It is just likely to be the individual's as logically the group would need to be able to make that kind of individual as the way it has managed historically to persist. — apokrisis

But just as antinatalism does not sound appealing to some, telling people that they are here to keep the group going would probably not get much fanfare either. So your own claim would not pass your own "appeal to the majority" test, oddly enough.

Of course your problem there is even if only a few individuals did not want to drink the Kool aid with you, they would survive, breed, and pass on their habits of thought. All you would prove is something about your own mental quirks. The circumstances which produced a persistent social entity in the past would roll on probably better adapted for its self perpetuation in the future. — apokrisis

Whether the group persists, there would be less people that suffered that could have otherwise. The harm prevented from preventing one birth does not get nullified by someone having a child. If you saved someone from getting hurt and someone in the town over does get hurt, that other person's pain does not nullify that the person you saved did not get hurt.

Stepping back, are you thinking that existence itself must have a meaning, and so your realisation that it doesn't have a meaning is then a meaningful lack?

My argument only needs to be that meaning is what a system constructs. Goals are emergent regularities that exist because they foster their own persistence. That's the basic difference between taking the immanent view vs the transcendent view.

So in that light, a social system is free to form its own goals, it's own identity - and do so via the particular kinds of individuals it creates. That is as high as we need to shoot in finding a meaning in existence, or equally, as far as we can go in making some complaint about a lack of meaning. — apokrisis

Oh boy, I don't want to upset the sensibilities of the social system.. This is too vague to even criticize so I have to deduce what you are saying by inference. So individuals who presumably want the goals of survival and pretty much the status quo of the current society create an institution that makes more individuals that want these goals.. and the goals of status quo are the meaning..

Again, even if this was true, "knowing" that people are created by social institutions that want to ensure survival for individuals and the institution itself, does not negate the absurdity one may feel if one self-reflected on the fact that we are keeping our own individual upkeep going, the group going, and pursuing more goals simply to keep it going.. Hence the instrumentality of things. One thing you seem to do is think that describing a (purported) fact about something makes it valuable because it exists. This is where you make the category error. Humans do not just exist with no internal reflection and simply take in information and output actions... They have emotions, reactions, attitudes, etc.. Reflecting on the "fact" that we are just doing to do to do, can lead to an understanding of the absurdity of this situation. We must keep moving forward to keep moving forward as there is no other choice.

That still leaves the individual free to construct his own life meaning, or equally, construct a notion of his own cosmic meaninglessness. Maybe the individual can even start up his own small movement - like antinatalism - as a gesture that appears to imbue his existence with the meaningful lack of meaning which he seeks. That is a lack of meaning of suitably trans-social, trans-historic, cosmically-absolute scale.

This may be the case that it is not suitable for survival obviously.. but I am not sure what you are trying to say. Is it that "most" people will not agree? Most likely not, but that does not mean that it is not correct. Maybe its futile, but that does not mean it is wrong. You are making the is-ought fallacy.. just because something is a certain way, does not mean that this is what someone ought to do. This implies a hypothetical imperative that one must follow what has always been the case.

Such a moral construction - an anti-goal - can be proclaimed. On rarer occasions, it might even be acted upon. But as I say, it is unlikely to impact the collective system if that system already has up a head of steam and will simply end up reproducing via the kind of thought habits which are in fact functional in regard to its persistent being.

You can't stand in the way of natural selection anymore than natural selection can stand in the way of thermodynamics. — apokrisis

Again, I am fine with this.. So it's futile.. that doesn't mean much to me. What it does mean though is that we have no obligation to make the current aim of the group's persistence keep continuing. There is no reason to keep anything going. Because we have the ability to self-reflect to the point of not following some survival imperative, that shows that we are not necessarily bound by it. Social enculturation via historical developments may help compensate from more instinctual ways to keep the species going, we can still think beyond merely survival.

And again I say that from the point of view of pansemiotics - reality's own construction of meanings or habits of interpretance. It doesn't matter that goals don't pre-exist and are only found as whatever are the habits which permit persistence. The claim is never that meaning could have a transcendent status such as what instead exists counts as some kind of cosmic failure. — apokrisis

There is no cosmic failure.. rather we have the ability to self-reflect on the situation and have emotions, attitudes, and such on the human condition itself.. something that is not merely there to keep the group surviving.

I wonder if you see this yet? The very basis on which you want to mount your fundamental criticism doesn't even exist from my point of view. There is no standing outside existence that could count as meaningful here. — apokrisis

And like I just said, we have the ability to self-reflect on the situation and have emotions attitudes, and such on the human condition itself...something that is not merely there to keep the group surviving.

So continue with your little psychodramas if you can't respond to the substance of my post. It's all good entertainment to distract us while we wait to die, heh? — apokrisis

Finally, something I agree with.

But just as antinatalism does not sound appealing to some, telling people that they are here to keep the group going would probably not get much fanfare either. So your own claim would not pass your own "appeal to the majority" test, oddly enough. — schopenhauer1

This is nuts as there is hardly a crying need to protect the human population from the dangers of cultish antinatalists.

With 2.5 billion people in 1950, 6.5 billion in 2005, and 9 billion by 2050, there just ain't a problem in that regard.

Antinatalism is as meaningless as a possum throwing itself under a passing truck and trailer.

Whether the group persists, there would be less people that suffered that could have otherwise. The harm prevented from preventing one birth does not get nullified by someone having a child. If you saved someone from getting hurt and someone in the town over does get hurt, that other person's pain does not nullify that the person you saved did not get hurt. — schopenhauer1

More crazy arithmetic.

The way societies actually think is that small global changes can improve the average lot of the many. You only have to focus on shifting the mean a small degree to make a large difference for the many.

Again, even if this was true, "knowing" that people are created by social institutions that want to ensure survival for individuals and the institution itself, does not negate the absurdity one may feel if one self-reflected on the fact that we are keeping our own individual upkeep going, the group going, and pursuing more goals simply to keep it going. — schopenhauer1

Yeah. But you hardly invented this idea yourself, did you? You are simply repeating what you heard others say. So you speak for a familiar vein of thought - the romanticism that became existentialism that has become pessimism. And you are looking around on this forum for moral support for this stance, along with seeking to "other" me so as to confirm the social validity of that way of thinking.

You can't escape the very game you pretend to reject. If you could, you wouldn't even bother coming on a forum like this to argue with someone like me.

This is where you make the category error. Humans do not just exist with no internal reflection and simply take in information and output actions... — schopenhauer1

And humans only have such capacities due to social evolution.

There is a reason why you might be a dissatisfied, questioning, quarrelsome, social-approval seeking, kind of critter. That is the kind of individual that perpetuates the social system that produced it.

And if in fact you happen to have some collection of dysfunctional traits, then you will disappear from the meme pool in the not so distant future.

I'm presuming you have parents. Well they had at least one kid. And if you have siblings, are they breeders? Or is it dead-end for your lineage?

Even if it is, it would be less than a drop in the ocean. There are over 7 billion people on the planet. Even a billion antinatalists could only slow the increase.

Maybe its futile, but that does not mean it is wrong. You are making the is-ought fallacy.. just because something is a certain way, does not mean that this is what someone ought to do. — schopenhauer1

I've already pointed out your fallacious reasoning in demanding that existence have transcendent meaning. So I know that is-ought is classically a big deal. But that's only a hangover from Platonism and theism. It doesn't apply to my position.

There is no cosmic failure.. rather we have the ability to self-reflect on the situation and have emotions, attitudes, and such on the human condition itself.. something that is not merely there to keep the group surviving. — schopenhauer1

So you say. But to the degree it matters to the survival of the group, an attitude that is actually socially dysfunctional will simply be erased by time.

The group doesn't even have to worry about that. Question all you like. See ya latter buddy. Life goes on.

My point about the "transcendent camps" (whether pre-modern religions and traditions or modern consumerism) is to do with the motivations and understanding of the word

Yes I am aware of these misgivings, I did point out that I am aware of the problems brought about by religions. I don't really want to get into a discussion of religion because that is a different issue than what is being discussed here. But it is partly relevant in that it has supplied us with a tradition of the transcendent to work with.

Your criticisms are relevant concerns, but merely point out the social and political issues around any product or goal which is to be desired in the human condition, but which can be restricted and controlled by an elite. Also if it, the transcendent, as the desired goal were absent, then it would be replaced by something else, because as I pointed out, this is an issue about politics and control of the society. This also applies in regard of the personal self and personal greed, or desires. The goal of transcendent here is simply a tool employed in ones life to control, or passify greed and desires, or to act as an excuse to indulge them and if it were absent, it would be replaced by something else.

To address the transcendent absent religion one should consider humanity before religion, or the origin in society of ascetics and their teaching, which resulted in the origin of religions. Simply, people on the event of the development of intellect began to think philosophically about their predicament. Naturally this brought them to questions of our origin, purpose and whether there are agencies behind the appearance of this world. Thus the birth of mysticism and philosophy. These are contemplations and can be carried on in isolation of ones physical life. However they can be used as an philosophy of action in the world and in the case of the ascetic Jesus, can be viewed as teachings in practical and constructive strategies in lifestyles.

It is a mistake to consider that transcendent insight is in any way in opposition or conflict with pragmatic, scientific, or down to earth practical living. It is not and it's message is simply to enable one to extend ones view of our directions and goals a little further and provide a value in seeking to follow that course. For example, for humanity to seek to live in harmony with the biosphere, manage the ecosystem and develop long term stable cultures within humanity to secure our long term survival and gradual expansion beyond the planet(which is vulnerable to meteorite destruction).

Now if you imagine one of the first early humans to really contemplate their predicament, to really do some philosophising. I would not be surprised if they had come up with a conclusion similar to this example I have just given. It is not mysterious, profound, unattainable. But it does require an effective cooperation between the members of our society at large.

This is what brings me into conflict with Wayfarer all the time, despite our occasional agreements and shared interest in the importance on meaning. He thinks meaning must be granted by the transcendent. I say there is no meaninglessness, so there is no work for the transcendent to do. There are those who are depressed, anxious or despairing, but those are instances of meaningful lives, who find themselves in some unethical situation. A worldly change is what they need (it could even be a belief the transcendent), so they realise their meaning/end the horrible state that's haunting them.

There is no necessity for a conflict here, as I said transcendent insight is in alignment with constructive practical living. I do not see Wayfarer falling into the religious cliches regarding the transcendent, although his stance is towards the other end of the spectrum from your own.

So what is your assessment of its credibility? — apokrisis

I am harking back to the evidential: ants appear to recognise themselves in mirrors, and this is a surprise to us.

To me the research looks robust but I agree, it makes me think that 'the mirror test' may not be telling us what we thought it told us. I watch my cat prowl behind the mirror looking for the cat it just saw in the glass and am unconvinced that there is some step-change up to the ant; rather, they have different ways of seeing because of (the genealogy of) their different ecologies.

Nevertheless, apo, I am more sympathetic to the op than you are. I read you as presenting a kind of naturalistic ethics. I think that culturally we have developed our 'natural' relationship to other creatures into a cruelly exploitative one. The lives of the chickens we subsequently eat, for instance, are horrible; once someone becomes aware of that, I'm surprised they can ever tuck into kfc with anything other than a heavy heart (to go with the bloated stomach). 'Disgust' as an emotion points to something ethical in this instance. We treat these animals as our instruments and in doing so we show a lack of respect, in our sophisticated culture, for the nature of which we are a part. We industrialize their lives and slaughter, insulate ourselves from how it happens, and protect ourselves from the ethical dilemma that face-to-face knowledge would involve.

It's in this vein that I suspect our science about human and other animals is itself corrupted by our instrumental view of our fellow-creatures. It is in our interests to imagine that other animals 'are instinctual' or 'don't feel what we feel' or 'can't possibly be conscious in the way we are conscious'. All these propositions may be true but I suspect them because I suspect that we taint the evidence by our very approach. Historically most of our research has been on captive creatures, and studying the same creatures in the wild has shown us in some cases how wrong we were. In the present, perfectly decent people argue that we must experiment on other animals 'or we wouldn't understand human heart disease'; that needs the ethical counter-weight of saying, there is another viewpoint from which such a purportedly ethical statement is unethical, for it cannot imagine that other animals deserve respect, it can only seem to place value on human lives. The natural world itself has value, and when we eat factory chickens, experiment on rats or monkeys, use other animals as our pets or for our sport we make a value judgment which we should at the least acknowledge, and attempt to weigh.

Because they weren't capable of doing so. But now humans have entered the stage, and I'm arguing that it's time we put down the mirror of narcissism and start acting more productive and responsible.

In any case it is clear that non-human animals have not been taking care of one another. Look at predation, social rejection from disease/disability, and r-selection. — darthbarracuda

Right. So we start putting down the mirror of narcissism and start acting productive and responsibleby eradicating all other species except human. *<Extreme sarcasm begins> Yep. That sounds so not narcissistic, productive and responsible. <Extreme sarcasm ends>*. Humans are the only ones to cry about these things because some humans have a depleted sense of self-worth. When your parents beat it into your head that you will never get ahead because the system will always hold you down, then you get ideas of sexism and racism and specieism. Even the runts of a litter struggle to survive without any idea of them not being unequal and their demise allows the rest of the litter a better chance at survival.

Animals have been taking care of each other. If they didn't then how is it that they exist at all? Mothers must care for her offspring or else a species would be extinct.

The ability of humans to be rational (and I'd argue that most humans aren't rational - just look at all the humans who can't mesh their political, metaphysical, religious, and ethical ideas into a consistent whole. Dividing things up into separate forums doesn't mean that they aren't linked or don't have an effect on each other. Everyone is a hypocrite. If you don't believe me, then read Robert Kurzban's book, "Everyone (Else) is a Hypocrite".) then that is simply a survival strategy that we developed. We use our big brains to survive. Elephants use their big trunks. This doesn't make us better than other animals. It just makes us different. You want to use this difference to commit genocide and to contradict yourself - just like it's explained in Robert Kurzban's book.

There's this other quality of nature that you are forgetting - balance. Nature has achieved a balance among organisms where prey need to have their population limited by predators in order for them to not over populate and eat all their food to extinction and then they become extinct.

The most important aspect of life is competition. Without it life would never evolve into the variety of forms and behaviors that we see today.

There's this other quality of nature that you are forgetting - balance. Nature has achieved a balance among organisms where prey need to have their population limited by predators in order for them to not over populate and eat all their food to extinction and then they become extinct. — Harry Hindu

Except that it hasn't done any such thing. 99.9% of the species that have existed on Earth are now extinct and that ratio will at best remain constant although as nature has failed to find a predator to keep the human species which is doing a bang up job of exhausting its food sources that's pretty unlikely.

The most important aspect of life is competition. Without it life would never evolve into the variety of forms and behaviors that we see today. — Harry Hindu

Somebody's been drinking a little too heavily at the Dawkins trough. Symbiotic and co-operative relationships between species are far more effective at preserving diversity than competition. Competition, by definition, results in a winner and a lot of losers. Co-operation results in a lot of winners. Evolutionary theory tends to fixate on higher order animals as single organisms when in fact they are a co-operative colonies of thousands of species constantly constantly interacting with thousands of other such colonies.