If you are only familiar with high school mathematics then you have literally no clue what mathematics actual is.

At your level you are basically learning about tools and preparation. It has nothing to do with mathematics. Most people have no idea what mathematics is and I myself didn’t realise until I was way into my thirties.

I think I know what you mean now.

‘Existing’ rather than ‘living’ is how I differentiate. Others say ‘to live an empty existence’.

The main difference is you see ‘truth’ in ‘existence’ but not in ‘living’. Why is that?

From what I am getting here you are saying ‘dissatisfaction’ is ‘suffering’. We are never FULLY ‘satisfied’ so all life is ‘suffering’.

Correct summation?

Note: There is no premeditated ‘gotcha’ awaiting.

Although you still haven’t noted the difference between ‘striving’ and ‘challenging yourself’ as far as I can see.

I was not looking for a ‘gotcha’. I was simply asking you to answer my questions as best you can.

That is all. Thanks for trying … eventually.

@schopenhauer1 I would still like a reply to the other question. I’ll ask once more.

What is the difference between ‘striving’ and ‘challenging yourself’?

The most obvious problem that follows is if EVERYTHING in waking life is ‘dissatisfaction’ then the term ‘dissatisfaction’ is fairly meaningless as no antonym for it can rightly exist.

I guess this means ‘satisfaction’ is a non-thing.

So you meant everything NOT “just about everything”. Okay.

Explain to me how ‘striving’ and ‘challenging yourself’ are different please. That was not really a response I can make sense of.

Try saying X is … and Y is … and that is why they are different.

If “just about everything” in waking life is ‘dissatisfaction’ what is not ‘dissatisfaction’?

As an answer to the title … BADLY more often than not :D

Because you misunderstand the uses of ‘feminine’ and ‘masculine’. Like I said, they don’t mean ‘male’ and ‘female’ nor do ‘feminine traits’ (which compassion IS) mean they are exclusively an item of either sex.

It is an old fashioned generalisation that has survived in the terminological categorisation.

“No” … how are they different to you?

If it is notthe right question why is it not. It is one I am asking.

It doesn’t matter what your opinion is here.

Compassion is classed as a feminine trait. You cannot simply change how language is used to suit our needs and beliefs and expect everyone else to get on board … which is kind of what some here are arguing against when saying female and woman are the same thing. Colloquially I agree that gender and sex and used synonymously and we’ve yet to fully adjust to technical terminology.

If rules contradict each other are they rules?

A big problem I have with Schopenhauer framing life viewed in reference to ‘suffering’ is that he states that all ‘fighting’ and ‘struggling’ involves suffering. Also, the idea of ‘disssatifcation’ only holds if the world is viewed as black and white, where people are either satisfied or not with no apparent room for partial dis/satisfaction.

If we ‘suffer’ in the form of ‘dissatisfaction’ (weak form of suffering in my mind) then is this not balanced by places where we are satisfied in the very same moment?

As a simple example of human life I take satisfaction in drawing and I am sometimes dissatisfied with what I produce somewhere along the way too. The ‘suffering’ of dissatisfaction here is merely seen as a way to reflect on my situation and what I am attempting/producing.

If this is then taken into the realm of moral theory then I am assuming you and Schopenhauer are/were striving (‘suffering’) to produce a better moral theory. It kind if follows that we should not strive for a better moral theory because such is suffering and suffering is necessarily worse than not suffering (as you have stated elsewhere).

Maybe you can comment on this a bit?

Thanks

Is ‘striving’ the same as ‘challenging yourself’ in your mind?

Is ‘striving’ necessarily something negative, as it appears you are implying it is?

Are all hobbies, loves, likes and passions merely purposeful ‘distractions’ from the reality of inevitable existential angst?

Also, I have always been puzzled by the idea that asceticism is somehow viewed as ‘abstaining’ when it is actually just a means to achieve the best situation. It cannot be a selfless act if it made as if it is thought to be ‘better’ than what others are doing.

It is the idea of ‘doctrine’ itself I have issue with in any religious format.

I addressed this all on other page by agreeing with Praxis. I was just checking for clarification of how they meant ‘feminine’.

It was cleared up. End of story … you probably missed it.

The KEY point was that a ‘feminine’ trait is not a ‘female’ trait. The example I gave was ‘compassion’ … clearly men and women both possess ‘compassion’.

If we are talking about personality traits and differences between the sexes; there is not a massive difference at all. In fact, taking any random woman or man from the street and having them take a personality test then showing said test to a qualified psychologist and asking them ‘which is a man and which is woman’ would get you the answer ‘I have no clue whatsoever’.

The differences are averages across huge samples. Physiologically there are quite distinct differences between men and women. Psychologically the differences are all that pronounced at all.

Therefore ‘feminine’ and ‘masculine’ traits are, at best vaguely associated with one sex or the other, but it is nothing like a hard fast rule of thumb. Due to basic distribution the differences do stick out more often than not at the extremes.

And please note that ‘pink’ is generally considered a ‘feminine’ colour today around the globe. This is a modern cultural shift away from Catholicism - blue for virgin Mary was associated with girls and pink boys.

I hope that clears up any misunderstanding here. If not so be it.

So compassion is a feminine characteristic and you know of no men who are compassionate? Maybe noting that will help you understand that mere categories set up for convenience are not actual reflections of reality. As I said, ‘race’ is meaningless in its scientific technical sense when people talk about being this or that ‘race’.

You have never studied and Spanish, French or German? There are plenty of example where mundane objects are given masculine or feminine labels.

Then there is pink. Is pink ‘masculine’ or ‘feminine’? Did you know that only a few generations ago newborn boys were dressed in pink and girls in blue.

Trends change. Biology doesn’t - at least not so fast.

Colours, tables, houses … the list goes on.

But the point was that it is an old term (like ‘race’) that has morphed into some other meaning depending on context.

I would recommend looking for some discord channels that suit. There was a guy here who invited people to join book chat thing. Good entry level stuff I think.

Here it is a mixed bag. Sometimes it get ‘philosophical’ sometimes it is like a school playground :D

Okay. All good. Just fishing for clarity :)

It is a VERY good point that shows the problem some people have with distinguishing ‘gender’ from ‘sex’.

Thanks

Feminine does not mean female any more than masculine means male. It is unfortunate that those are the terms used now just like ‘race’ is used to describe cultural groups rather than actual different ‘races’.

A terminology overhaul is quite a difficult thing to do and takes time.

Where all of this started, for me, was with the conviction that ideas (not information) are real in their own right, and not because they're derived from or supersede on (neuro)physical matter. — Wayfarer

Can you expand this a bit? ‘Ideas’ ?

As Stephen Fry put it “bone cancer in children?”

Thanks for the cryptic bullshit your highness

Sorry, brain fart! I meant phase space.

something he wrote 25 yrs ago for popular science books? Be serious!

What are you talking about? He is not a philosopher nor a psychologist.

Have you read ‘Cycles of Time’? The way he explains matrixes is utterly breathtaking! Makes something so abstract almost tangible.

I have the feeling the Peterson had not even bothered to read anything Penrose had written or done?

The fact that Peterson didn’t seem to get that the tiles were not actual tiles but part of a mathematical problem made me feel embarrassed for him.

Penrose’s time would have been better spent if Peterson had actually done some research. Some of the questions were silly. Just goes to show how pretentious Peterson can be sometimes by suggesting x or y from outside his field of expertise can possibly back up any idea he has that springs to mind.

At least when he gets to talk to Dawkins it could be interesting. I have felt for a long time that Dawkins goes overboard a little and that Peterson has a pretty damn good point to make with the connection between memes and Jungian archetypes … I hope he stays on topic because it would do Dawkins a lot of good to look more carefully at this.

Anyway, always a delight to listen to Penrose. He is someone who probably won’t be appreciated more widely until after he has gone. One of the few living legends of physics still with us - far outshone Hawkings imo!

Fuck off … please?

It is basic physics - but hard to get your head around too so ‘basic’ does not mean it isn’t mind blowing!

Everything with mass ‘feels’ time/change. Things without out mass do not - time does not exist for them.

What is called ‘logical’ in common parse has only a small connection to logic.

Time is only a thing for mass.

Possibly. The general view as the concept of god growing from a ‘loss of parental guidance’ thingy theory is kind of along those lines too. I don’t buy that completely, but it likely plays a part in human psychology.

Cause and effect is quite distinct from logical necessity. One deals with physical reality (space-time), whilst the other cares not a jot for it.

Anyway, thanks for making your points. I think I am getting some idea what this thread is about now.

There seems to be a conflation of physics and mathematics mixed in with conscious experience. Messy, as it appears the OP is driving at a mixed question - conflating mathematics and physical reality - and trying to tackle it philosophically.

I might be wrong. If I am right it is going nowhere fast.

That doesn’t exist. It is an abstraction.

Time is not a thing anyway. It is just our poor human way of measuring something we don’t understand much about (something called entropy).

I still don’t get what is going on here?

Logical Necessity is not Physical Necessity. One deals in the abstract (where causality is of no consequence) and the other deals with, well, physical stuff (ie. Physics). In physics it is quite plain to see that causation plays a part … I am clearly missing something.

I will just read instead

The origin is probably little more than a physical craving for something and some belief that it can be obtained. Hunger/Thirst is likely the ‘first’ prayer to arise in a conscious being that had a reasonable enough appreciation of its place in an environment.