In the first instance, what I got from the OP was more a question of whether we are reaching our full potential. It is completely true that the endeavour itself is pointless but I guess what I am trying to say is it is in the way that we treat knowledge, to see it as a behavioural ability rather than a mental process that follows rules similar to Bourdieu' conception of knowledge that doesn't separate it as something mutually exclusive. Have you ever found yourself realising something new that you were completely oblivious to because of behavioural rather than cognitive limitations? We calculate irregularities and piece solutions voluntarily.

Anyway it doesn't make any sense to go looking for new question words. That would mean looking for new functions. As if we don't have it covered. Language is always complete in its context. It doesn't need any help. — Baden

This is what I said about relational interactions between a number of various factors but accessing a function whose nature is abstracted from this model of experience or consciousness may enable unique ways of questioning reality. What would perception look like without the arrow time?

Are bloodless coups and "benign" dictatorships ruled out? I'm thinking here of the example of Thailand where the establishment of a military junta halted a conflict that was spiraling out of control and in the process almost certainly saved lives. — Baden

The establishment of the military junta in Syria in '63 initially saved lives but what is questionable is the longevity. Corruption in Thailand is rampant to say the least, not least the drug and human trafficking.

In Turkey, the military has saved the country from political corruption a number of times [think '83 and the sweeping changes to the constitution] but at the cost of many lives; however, there is a long historical tradition behind it and though there is currently a gradual decline in their powers due to the AKP' political and social influence, the condition of this stability is becoming a major concern as seen with their consistently deranged and paternal outbursts to the international community.

Assad and the Kremlin are clear examples of kleptocracy and strong, bloodthirsty businessmen in governance. Nuclear deterrence may be the price of stability but the fact that we have nuclear weapons is the very reason for the deterrence; it is only an option the other way around, when an apolitical society has enough of being exploited.

English is strange. — Bitter Crank

That's what I love about it; it is almost organic and constantly evolving that learning about it never seems to end.

Modal verbs are auxiliary verbs that expresses necessity or possibility. English modal verbs include must, shall, will, should, would, can, could, may, and might. — Bitter Crank

What about need?

But I think all questions can be reconstructed in terms of the existing 7 available question types. — TheMadFool

Can you tell me why?

How can something be the cause OF something else and yet also be defined AS the change of something else?

This example is one of many that I think can show that without any direct history and future experimentation with the world, the concepts used in classical physics (and other sciences for that matter) do not really tell us anything at all. — darthbarracuda

What are you talking about, ol' horse? 1+1=2 and 2 is the product of that addition. An impulse (N*s) is the effect, a measure of change (in momentum viz., time), you know cause and effect so - of all the inadequacies in classical physics you could have nitpicked like atomic spectra or the big doozy black body radiation - 'tis quite an odd choice to use as a way to disregard science. What is torque, power, resistance, density?

It appears that ''could'' or ''would'' or maybe others too are different from the 7 questions in our bag. — TheMadFool

This is the point i was making about tenses. Could is past tense. So I am not sure how it fits in with:

However, isn't there any aspect of our present reality that demands a new line of questioning? — TheMadFool

Where does the tenses fit into this? As in, things like was/are/is/will etc. Even further still, is language wholly required [think semiotics]? I assume, however, you want to see whether we can reach a unique way of enquiring about reality, but if questioning through 'why' differentiates the human mind as something unique, modelling a unique dialogue that challenges interpretative principles may perhaps require access to hidden phenomenal processes. Questions develop because of relational interactions between a number of various environmental, social and cognitive factors, including visual, physical and spatial so accessing an area whose nature is abstracted from this configural model of experience may enable unique ways of questioning reality.

Individual ‘A’ ... the individual concerned is characterised by a consistently benign and tolerant disposition towards others – he has an instinctive tendency towards empathy and an alive awareness of the poignancy that can be involved in the predicament of those more unfortunate than himself – he nonetheless is somewhat aimless and apathetic in his general outlook towards life and utterly devoid of ambition so that consequently, regardless of whatever talents he might happen to possess... He will never suspect or aspire towards anything beyond his harmless, routine and mundane environ and is in practice content to make it through life merely as an untroubling and unquestioning follower. — Robert Lockhart

Individual ‘B’ ... He is, firstly, psychologically stable... He was ambitious and soon became cognizant of the world existing out with his own birth environment, and such ambition then acted to motivate his personal industry so that now his situation is a socially and economically dominant one. He has his beautiful 'trophy' wife and... he privately relishes the opportunities his status now affords to belittle and humiliate those inescapably dependent for their survival on his patronage - and these experiences now further inform his attitude of general disdain towards others, acting to fuel his appetite for yet greater advancement together with the potential for absolute intimidating dominance likely to be enabled, which ever more now motivates his (privately grotesqe) 'barage-baloon' ego! His life he feels, is absolutely superb and he perceives the prospects likely ahead for him to be absolutely wonderful! — Robert Lockhart

I would choose Individual A.

Individual B is aware insofar as the system goes and as systems are predictable, his 'cognizance' is nothing more than an acute subordination - that is, subject to the system. Individual A' awareness, however, transcends the system as he has a level of moral consciousness that B lacks, meaning that B lacks humanity and is nothing more than a cog in a machine. His almost sadistic and cruel behaviour towards others is an extension of his subjective ressentiment and his almost hate for himself for being subordinate to the system that he projects to his subjects. It is the disillusionment or unheimlich that A has towards the system that enables him the tools to use advantageously, that is, provides him with the capacity to make a moral difference and become superior to B [even though appearances may seem contrary to this]. Traversing systems are easy, going beyond it to create your own marks intelligence and so with the right motivation, Individual A has the tools to create his own system that is greater since he will only be subordinate to himself.

It is simply a matter of will.

Any transcendence out of the system - the system of appearances - means reaching a level of authenticity and only in doing so can one ever truly understand happiness. That is, it may appear that Individual B is "happy" with his amazing family and trophy wife, but he is actually miserable.

I was Individual A in the sense that I had no direction or motivation other than my awareness of the system and my desire to learn. I have $0 in my bank account but I am morally aware, however with the right motivation I am now using both this awareness of the system and moral consciousness to my advantage (using the system against itself) since I stand above it (for instance, fundraising thousands of dollars for charity using my social image). The only problem with the 'system' is that it is heavily masculine, so no matter how much I can manipulate it, it will never be good enough since I am a woman.

Nevertheless, I have always respected and even admired the simple, traditional man with a genuinely good heart. They are more greater to me than men in fine, expensive suits and top jobs trying to make a lot of money.

As a newbie to the philosophical community, a lifetime member of the 'metaponderings' club', and a newly attached partner to an (disappointingly) abstainer of philosophy, I have found myself not only unsuccessfully debating the possibility of comprehending AND navigating the theorized 'multi-verse', but also cornered into a position that can easily be mistaken as "stupid" due to my lack of "lower-level science to back it up." — Victorie

Hey Victorie, welcome to the delightful world of the multiverse :P

I am curious as to whether you are searching for philosophical or scientific answers as I am more than happy to chat with you about both. The philosophy of cosmology brings a joyous twinkle to my eye and a good resource to start with can be found here. For more science, it really depends on the theory but I am a giant fan of inflationary cosmology but there are many others to consider. Here is a list to consider.

I don't have many people in my life interested in science so if you want to 'metaponder' the subject more, please feel free to do so here and I would be happy to respond.

My greatest fear was insanity. — Mongrel

Was? :-O


Should I start calling you Tony?

That's what the supernatural does to people.

What sometimes gets under my skin is not a particular philosophical question, but the misuse of philosophical questions. For example, when the problem of demarcation in the philosophy of science is used as a means to get away with pseudo-science, fake news, mysticism, or other shady businesses that thrive on a mistrust of the intellect. — jkop

I second this. Pseudo-science, mysticism and anything New Age just turns me into:

Are you alluding to the theory of Forms?

We don't create the concept of suffering, we are just intelligently evolved enough to understand it. — MonfortS26

Are you saying that there is no such thing as suffering?

Alice Bailey's work is an example of a western interpretation of Hinduism, as such it derives from the eastern philosophical tradition and is inline with my perspective on philosophy. — Punshhh

Occultism has plagiarized from Hinduism to try and legitimize its position, so it is grossly incorrect to assume it derives from the eastern philosophical tradition. Esoteric interpretations of satan by Blavatsky in the Secret Doctrine ameliorates your limited awareness of the subject.

I don't see how the western philosophical tradition is addressing universal love other than in arriving at some logical positions from the starting point of an emergent(by evolution) intellect blind to the reality it finds itself in. As such western philosophy can't address any reality there may be in existence, because it is a-priori in ignorance. — Punshhh

You dont understand because you are not willing to research and read on the subject. You have made your choice and this - in line with your willfully stubborn and immoveable ego - would make it impossible to discuss the subject with you. As I said, you love yourself too much. I gave you philosophers to read. So, go read and stop presenting rubbish.

We've been tricked by our own abstraction. Universal love, in sense, takes the significance of being loved by someone and pretends it can be given by no-one, as if love was an infinite with didn't requires anyone else or anything of the world. It's myth which destroys our ability to describe those we love and those who love us.

Our understanding of love becomes a solipsistic pretence, where we think love is only about our own beliefs and feelings, about finding the universal, accessing the transcendent, attaining Nirvāṇa, getting the hottest wife, possessing the perfection of having a soul mate, etc., rather than any person we care about. The selfish desire to have a perfect idea or belief overpowers concern for the people and world around us. — TheWillowOfDarkness

Really well said, however I think incorrectly interpreted, though an easy oversight. Humanity stands above nature as we are capable of manipulating it and communication between people in a social atmosphere is a necessary requisite for our learning and development. The transcendence from this determinist environ is consciousness - by free-will - and upon doing so we become aware that our individuality is established by the determined components or properties that make our lives; our mind is merely an object that becomes the tool to enable consciousness in order to become aware of our own personhood. In doing so, we become aware of the greater ‘whole’ - that 'I' is no longer since we are finite but that 'we' are eternal as we continue to exist. This transcendence or consciousness of both the 'I' and 'we' encourages the desire to protect the determined plurality or 'nature' by seeking to prevent or stop evil - injustice, environmental depletion etc - anything that may jeapordize this initial state and thus moral consciousness becomes this very transcendence. Moral consciousness is love. Moral consciousness itself contains no contingent parts [the categorical imperative] and our death becomes meaningless or we - in the Heideggerean sense - overcome the fear of death. This is authenticity, our authentic state of mind and awareness.

When you love someone who is also aware or morally conscious, who works hard for good things, for justice, for the environment to ensure humanity - as it stands above nature - does not mindlessly destroy itself, you admire them for their principles, the fruits of their achievements, who they are as a person. It is no longer about what they look like, how old they are, how much money they have, how sexually appealing they are, what other people would think or anything 'worldly' since you have transcended society and all its teachings. It would be as I say: “I love through you the world and back into myself” rather than only loving an object because it has some sort of benefit to you alone. It is where two people share a bond that is both friendship, sexual, filial, affectionate all the types of love that rolls into something enduring where together they make one other better as you make the community or the environment better.

Just as much as being with 'any person we care about' - a person possessing the hottest wife would care about a hot woman because he cares about the image he would represent and that others would pat him on the back for, which is what he really cares about and not actually the hot woman that he painfully and deceitfully tolerates because he cares about possessing the hottest wife - clearly shows it is not full-proof of the danger of solipsistic pretence; what makes the clear difference is authenticity. If you have transcended society and no longer require institutions or religions or societal norms and expectations because you have become self-aware and thus transcended all that, the clarity of your motivations [applying love through moral consciousness] enables you to genuinely perceive and feel without the rubbish of all that.

Only through this universal love - that is to love all things - are we able to access the capacity to love what is authentically true in someone else.

See, the problem here is that sometimes going through subjective or mental anguish enables you to transform or transcend toward something much better that protects you from ever experiencing the anguish again. Suffering is an option, yes I agree with that, but sometimes a necessary one. Like getting injected with a disease that actually protects you by training the immune system from fighting the disease should you ever contract it; the mental suffering trains you to become strong enough to never suffer again.

I only mentioned Alice Bailey as a reference where a definition of the part of my experience, or being that I was referring to can be found. If you don't like the school of thought referenced, just read my meaning as of the soul, rather than the intellect. It's a simple but important distinction. Your summary of love, came across as a description of the intellectual processes involved in self realisation. I was pointing out with an example that it entails other levels of being. — Punshhh

Alice Bailey is a terrible reference. There are a plethora of philosophical arguments on the subject of soul, perhaps give McTaggart a shot or maybe even Schopenhauer if the subject of transcendence is appealing (though I disagree with both). The former is perhaps more in line with what you seek vis-a-vis 'universality of souls' and if this bond is genuine, perhaps love is an experience where time does not exist and that she too is waiting for you.

Why do you somehow assume that the intellect has no relation to this ambiguous and intuitive domain within - what is termed as 'soul'? Intellectual invalidity exemplifies why 23 years later you realised that you were in love. They are not mutually exclusive.

As for 'levels of being' - again, gobbledegook if you are looking at it from a New Age perspective. There are no spiritual beings floating about the place on higher planes, no amount of listening to waves and whale sounds while humming and meditating is going to make you a better person. You can become a better person by reading the right books, having the right friends and people in your life, loving and caring for others in need, fighting injustice, having fun and giving love.

Regarding my "weird shit", you seem to have gone off on some tangent and projected lots of your own ideas onto it. There doesn't seem to be much point in trying to explain it further, other than to point out that your interpretation of the situation is wildly off the mark. That I am not in love with the person mentioned, and there isn't anything tragic going on. Have you not in your youth been a "fool", or regretted the one that got away? Come on be honest now? — Punshhh

The only projection is my dedication to authenticity and there are multiple ways people destroy love due to their inauthenticity - either for their ego or because they are cowards, or for social standards and the image they create, both completely narcissistic. I am not sure if you have ever felt the joy of having a genuine, close friend who cares about you and vice versa, but friendship is the beginning of learning how to give love and to be friends with a woman who you also share intimacy with, who you admire, and all the benefits of sharing a life with someone who actually understands and can see deep within you or your 'soul' and vice versa, what does that make you to turn away from that?

I don't know about tangent; calling you a fool and feeling disappointed that it took you 23 years to realise you were in love is not projection; it is logic.

But I can see why it took you so long. Your excuses are really good. It seems you are more in love with yourself.

As for me, no, I regret nothing because I seek genuine friendship. I never give up on the prospect of love but I do demand authenticity and being mistreated with impropriety by being seen as a mere sexual object is a dishonour I have never allowed any man to make of me. Flattery, conceit, poetry, superficial sagacity and appearances do not work with me, I will and do everything in my power to rid such people from my life and I regret none of the actions that I have done to ensure my virtue remains in tact. But even so, my love for them (care) never ceases.

“Never cease loving a person, and never give up hope for him, for even the prodigal son who had fallen most low, could still be saved; the bitterest enemy and also he who was your friend could again be your friend; love that has grown cold can kindle.”

I don't think evolution has failed at all. Just survey the natural world. All animals have a pain system. What we don't see are painless organisms - did they lose the survival race? I think so. — TheMadFool

When I had a car accident, my leg was in incredible pain and I suffered from severe angina-like pain induced by myocardial contusion [together with anxiety] for several months afterwards. Having no car and being on my own, I had to walk 4k in that pain just to get something to eat. Add PTSD to that, constant trembling, fear, unable to sleep, weight loss. The latter was entirely subjective and the worst experience I have ever had.

I did not need to suffer so much in order to survive.

I think, yes, we need physical pain to stop ourselves from chewing our fingers off. But suffering?

I am finding it very hard to connect these two passages:

Also I do think that there are many people who are philosophically minded, but who are not academically trained who do look into such ideas, or don't rule them out. — Punshhh

With:

*i will reference the egoic plane(Alice Bailey) to be more precise. — Punshhh

Alice Bailey? Madame Blavatsky? Egoic plane?

Theosophy - which endorses evil - is not only a New Age fashionable tool used by the ignorant to justify irrational behaviour, but I would hardly consider it anywhere near philosophical.

Ever wondered why Hitler used the swastika?

The form that my weird shit took was a crisis of the heart brought about by a brief and fleeting recollection of a brief meeting with someone in India 23 years ago and the crushing realisation that this person was a soul mate, a candidate for true love, as you describe. And the pain of the acceptance that I failed to go with this person, but rather turn away for petty egotistical reasons and subsequently regret it ever since. — Punshhh

It took you 23 years to realise you were in love with someone?

That is just horrifying. I am sorry and not for you, probably the feelings that I have toward you at this moment are somewhat resentful. Clearly you were a fool and missed out on an experience that could have filled your life - and possibly hers - with something unique, even if it may or may not have worked out, only honesty to yourself would have allowed you to ever know.

That is the only problem here, authenticity. Your dishonesty to yourself. No new age planes that are used to divert your attention away from the truth by the management and even the desensitization of your inner feelings are ever going to change what you did. The problem is, you probably maintained this dishonesty because of the deep guilt you felt, almost repressing it that it may have even hurt you in different ways, until that brief moment in New Zealand where you faced it.

What a shame. It always catches up on you, though, one way or another.

I didn't suggest it is about erotic love. I am refering to the mating/pairing between partners and the bonding process between family members etc, as the basis for the experience of love in humans(and other animals). — Punshhh

The bonding between two people that transcends to something like 'true love' rather than just mating or what is social or customary, is the mutual connection between two people who have both reached that same state of transcendence or consciousness. This is because of the authenticity of their perceptions. Being genuinely self-aware, they admire their partner who shares the same awareness and for the way that they are as a person, virtuous and principled.

So by erotic, I meant the sexual pairing (Fromm, The Art of Loving) but the authenticity of this bonding process requires much more, as said by him: "If a person loves only one other person and is indifferent to all others, his love is not love but a symbiotic attachment, or an enlarged egotism." He shows perfectly well here that when someone doesn't care about all things save for specific objects that he needs, his love is false. That is why we as individuals need to first dissect and understand the intricacy of our own mind in order to reach a frame of mind capable (since it is our mind that is the apparatus of reason) of thinking correctly.

My opinion of transcendence is a type of Kantian consciousness, that whilst we are formed in a deterministic environment, we transcend through free will to become self-aware and a rational, autonomous agent. Moral consciousness - love - becoming aware of our moral obligations and our rational and decisive realisation that a life of virtue aimed at identifying the Platonic form of Good [universal love] as the best way to live is a natural a priori extension of this.

Hence the reference to be 'born again' through love, that is, to transcend what we think we understand of love and apply ourselves consciously and authentically by using the mind as an apparatus to draw rational inferences vis-a-vis the awareness of the interconnectedness of all things.

I bring this up because about 2 weeks ago, while travelling in New Zealand, I had an experience of something which I interpreted as a realisation of universal love and I seek to account for it philosophically. — Punshhh

Weird shit happened to me in New Zealand too :D

Philosophers get in a mess when they write about love, in my opinion. — mcdoodle

This is such a big problem, though. You mention 'love' and suddenly he is screaming and running away naked into the wilderness while you just stand there scratching your head thinking, wha? There is so much that can be discussed on the subject and I often have to consistently reiterate that I view love to be moral consciousness to avoid the continuous penetration of historical and emotional influences that challenge any rational discussion on the subject.

Read the full Song of Solomon here ! (I know, King James' version, I'm a sucker for its rhythm) — mcdoodle

Song of Solomon is not about divine love, not how it is often interpreted. It is highly erotic but nevertheless shows how her sexual attraction toward him did not defeat her into succumbing to his sexual advances and his games where he hid 'behind the trellis' from her; though she loved him, she wanted more. She is a virgin or 'a garden enclosed' who went through hardships by her siblings or 'mothers children' having had to work in the fields and unaware of her beauty, the intense sexuality between them made her realise that she was a 'wall and her breasts like towers' that is, self-love. She found peace in the end by saying that she hopes he is happy with his other women. It is hard to tell if his love is 'awakened' when he is ready coming out to her and where she crowns him king on his espousal that gladdens his heart (as in, they get married).

It is a story between two lovers with the same affection, desire, passion who fail to tell each other how they really feel. In the end, he still wants her but never says anything and she is still waiting for him to say something.

KJV is the best.

Do you mean some people have an avoidance behavior that prevents them from facing the real cause of their suffering? By that do you mean suffering fails to achieve what it was evolved for? — TheMadFool

Suffering exposes nothing but the failure of evolution.

The suffering itself is imagined by fear that becomes the very cause of their suffering. They create their own suffering. As per my previous example, when one is in a relationship where they feel miserable and unhappy but continue with that relationship because they fear being alone - since being alone will cause them to 'suffer' - all they are doing is prolonging the actual reasons for their misery by remaining.

There is no instance where one can say physical suffering is a good thing. It is shit and the only thing it produces is pain. Subjective suffering, however, is vastly more interesting and it is the instinctual faculty of mind [think Freudian or Triune brain model] that automatically alleviates tension and anxiety that it considers negative. If you instinctually want to have sex with a girl you find attractive, this is managed by the [superego] mind that reminds you of an external world and you repress the instinct; a mind that fails to do this has cognitively not evolved. Fear is another instinct. We automatically repress the angst fear produces in order to alleviate the tension. It then comes out in different ways, depression or anxiety, anger, sadness, whatever. Only when we face the actual problem are we able to find peace.

The most important thing is myself if I'm being honest: my conscious experience, my ideas, beliefs, and well-being. — VagabondSpectre

(Y)

The question is how do you know whether you are honest to yourself? Does honesty precede love and moral consciousness?

Emotions evolved simply to reinforce the processes of sexual reproduction and the survival of the species. — Punshhh

Why does it necessarily need to be about erotic love? And, as for the survival of the species, why just humans? What about animals? The environment? Earth itself? If we assume by universal we are speaking about all things or Leibniz's teleological dimension of the interconnectedness of all things, what if universal love is a capacity to give love, of caring for all?

You're right, it is fear; fear of pain, injury, hurt, anguish, death, etc. all of which are about survival - in a relationship, in a group of friends, in a community, etc.

Granted avoidance behavior perpetuates suffering but this in no way means that avoidance doesn't have a survival function. — TheMadFool

What I was attempting to convey was that sometimes survival itself is imagined, so while the function is there, it doesn't necessarily need to be there. A cognitive, instinctual confusion. The fear of pain and hurt can lead to an avoidance of what the actual reasons are that are causing you the pain and so one simply prolongs the suffering.

There are, you should know thousands of graduates of Philosophy, English Lit, and Cross-Cultural Studies in Gender and Race who populate the homeless shelters across America and who queue up daily for stale cheese sandwiches, long-past sale date apple sauce packets, and hard, indeterminate cookies. News Flash: Soup kitchens haven't make soup in decades. It's stale cold food you get. — Bitter Crank

There is a girl I once worked with - who is 25 now - who attempted suicide about six months ago. I had not seen her for a long while except for once or twice just after I had a car accident a couple of years back as I was going through my own thing, so when I heard about her I was determined to help her through it. It turns out that there were a plethora of reasons for her desire to end her life, but it was one reason alone that caused her to attempt it.

She could not, for the life of her, think for herself.

She did not know who she was at all. She just had no clue as to how to actually make a decision for herself, no ability to articulate herself and she did everything, all the 'choices' in her life were based on others. When she was around me, for instance, she copied me, she tried to absorb the things that I did and mimicked it as her own; she even messaged my friends on FB and tried to connect with them. Her suicide attempt came when she got married and her partner left her; when such people end up alone, they have no idea what to do and it is also the reason why people keep bad people in their lives as they would rather be miserable then alone.

She worked in sales and other dead-end jobs for money, but after talking with her and getting to the root cause of her problem, I realised all she needed was a helping hand toward her learning how to think for herself. She was originally religious, for instance, but not because she actually wanted to be, so I helped her build the confidence to be herself. We talked about the things she liked to do and together I convinced her to apply for a graduate course in education to become a teacher, which she has started to do. I took her to the gym and talked to her about the benefits of healthy eating and she developed an eating plan and joined the gym. Step by step, you teach the bird how to fly.

But it is amazing how many people that age are clueless. And 25 is no child. That is a full adult, there should be no excuses by then, but it amazes me how many people in their late twenties have no idea how to think.

Sheltered lives leads to their inevitable destruction.

Given the above is true what can we say about suffering? Suffering seems to be a higher-order pain since it includes mental anguish too. However, consider the causes of mental anguish from failing in exams to losing in love - they're all critical aspects of social survival. We can literally see the similarity between physical and mental pain at a very fundamental level - SURVIVAL, either as an individual or as a member of society.

Therefore, suffering is necessary to the wellbeing of individuals alone and as members of a society. — TheMadFool

Sometimes our attempts to avoid suffering - such as the self-deceptive behaviour necessary for the survival of a miserly relationship - becomes the root cause of the very mental anguish that we end up prolonging through the self-deception. It is like smoking; you deceive yourself thinking the cigarette will help alleviate the stress, but it soon forms into a habit that you become dependent on that without it you fear you will suffer as it slowly kills you. The cycle of self-deceit. Subjective suffering such as anxiety and depression really only exists because our bodies and emotions are attempting to convey the truth that we are unable to articulate, just as our lungs cough out the truth about cigarettes.

I think 'survival' is self-deceptive. It is just fear.

Also another idea is that organic material might also turn up on comets and in interstellar dust, which actually alters, or contributes to, Earth's gene pool. — Wayfarer

Yeah, there are quite a lot of theories on the astrobiological origins of life, I mean, what was earth before our sun captured it? But, if you want to think of particularly mass-distribution effects, a more interesting subject would be earths' "wobble" - whether precession as it rotates around the axis or the violence of natural causes - that causes the earth to shake, including droughts, earthquakes and heavy rainfall. So the distribution of mass, basically, is affecting climate change particularly with polar melting, which is pulling the axis. Pretty spooky.

Shiiiit. You so cre cre.

Ok, but what is the concern here, you haven't answered that? There is a lot of cosmic dust hitting the earth - tonnes of it actually if you check out CODITA - and to be sure the impact can certainly cause environmental phenomena and damage just as coronal rays during polar interaction influence auroras, but most of the space junk disintegrates as it collides with air and evaporates. It effects the stratosphere but not mass and in turn gravity.

Because it is simple Newtonian physics.

What exactly is the reasoning behind your assumption that there would be any measurable effect on the overall gravity of the earth? Are you afraid that if earth' mass increased, the earth' orbit will decay or that it may even collapse out of orbit?

Poor shiny little sun of ours, so underestimated.

This is hilarious.

Love. All types.

• Friendship, first and above all because it is only in friendship that one can learn how to give love ("brotherly" love)

• To create a family of my own where I can trust and care for others and likewise in return (familial love)

• To share a life and give love to someone I genuinely admire (a best-friend) and likewise in return (erotic love)

• To fight injustice and support in righteousness those at a disadvantage or those who are vulnerable (God's love)

• To dedicate myself to learning and knowledge so that I know and understand the world and become aware of myself and my place in it (self-love)

• To never stop caring for others; to never hate, only hope that they will get better (unconditional or "motherly" love)

Since life is vanity, a life lived in virtue is the only way to truly be happy.

No, I am quite indifferent to the actually programming/software engineering itself. Ofcourse when I do manage to program something that works and I pass a test then I get some sort of gratification. At the the moment the act of programming is not particularly fun to me and I have to really put my head down to it, my reptilian brain would rather do something that is fun/in my comfort zone like making music, listening to music, talking to people, watching youtube, researching all kinds of topics or questions I have, and playing games or just doing nothing that has any market value whatsoever( I realize this is because of my privileged position, this is how I led my life the past 18 years). — rohan

Indifference is a horrible state. To say you will marry someone because you are indifferent to their personality is like officially committing soul suicide. The saying 'married to career' is really because your time is mostly spent in your working life, so let it be what you really love. To sit, day in day out, indifferent to your work would be so meaningless just like sitting at a restaurant with your partner and looking at your phone the whole time rather than actually having a meaningful conversation (since conversations make up the bulk of a relationship). I find indifference to be worse than the state of anxiety or subjective fear because at least there is a part of you screaming to live. Fall in love with life, man, it has so much to offer.

I like how you say reptilian, not sure if you are referring to the Triune Brain Model, but whether you are or not you would need to set aside your instinctual nature and welcome yourself to the desert of the real too and I think this is where your conflict lies. Our creative desires often keep us short on cash. I never had a privileged position, I spent my undergraduate days trying to stretch out a loaf of bread for a week and sleeping on an airbed, but I did that because I have ambition to get to what I really love despite the fact that I have to work full-time just to live and pay my bills and rent. You can find a middle ground, so think about what it is that you would do happily on a full-time basis and work towards it. Once you have a plan, life becomes interesting.

The structure and apparent motion of stars doesn't match what we're expecting given our gravitational model. Hence the need to invent black holes. — Terrapin Station

What a load of rubbish. If something is inconceivably dense like a black hole, even without the emission of radiation including light, it doesn't mean it is without energy and they have been detected through the x-rays emitted by expelled gas falling toward a black hole. It's not an invention.

So. There was no chance of them dying. What were they whinging about, then? Or, had they been here, whining about?

When "hwinan" became "whinen" in Middle English, it meant "to wail distressfully"; "whine" didn't acquire its "complain" sense until the 16th century. "Whinge," on the other hand, comes from a different Old English verb, "hwinsian," which means "to wail or moan discontentedly." — Bitter Crank

Oh yeah, I forgot about your whole words thing, haha, I am so going to write posts to you full of Aussie slang.

Anyway, well in the arvo the girls started sooking because they went overboard with the bikkies during lunch and thought they were going to cark it from the climb, so they wouldn't stop earbashing me. I am a bit of a figjam when in my sporty moods and get frustrated at kangaroos loose in the top paddock.

Of course they were whinging -- after 2 of them had just splattered on the sharp rocks at the bottom of the cliff. — Bitter Crank

:-O

No, it was indoors...

This is intriguing but I don't see how it figures into the cingulate cortex and to shocked reactions. Unless, of course, your saying "to be loved is something earned" was a sudden, shocking, traumatic event to the guys you were speaking to. — Bitter Crank

What I was attempting to convey - albeit poorly as I tend to get assumptive that people would simply get it - was that people adopt false perceptions of the world based on notions like masculinity and their identity over time forms under the umbrella of these misconceptions and so solidifies as reality. When these misconceptions are shaken, somehow, where they are shown that the structure of their perceptions and identity are actually false, they are confronted - shockingly - with the 'truth' or with self-awareness because they realise that the way that they viewed and believed in the world around them was not actually real. This can be confronting when you tell them or show to them that they are thinking incorrectly and sometimes such people exhibit violent or aggressive behaviour towards the party that exposes their false idea of the world since it may result in the complete collapse of their identity.

I guess what I was trying to show was how ideas of love are rejected by some men who only do that because it is a masculine attribute and so go on living brutish lives that when they are confronted with real 'love' get completely shocked and baffled and start displaying odd behaviour.