Well, I was thinking about something like that pool of potentiality, something that is not, but could be - it is just waiting for some mind to see it and make it real...

So, only administrators can do that?

Yes, I think it would be a good option.

reason and logic can lead us to an acceptable and perhaps irrefutable answer. — A Ree Zen

That is just the problem. People think their reason is capable of going beyond itself. Should we go back to Kant and ask him?

You are the universe's way of experiencing itself. — griefkebab

Could be. But what is Universe?

there was nothing before which caused matter [or God] to spontaneously emerge or always exist. — A Ree Zen

Exactly. Because before time (and space) nothing exists! We think in terms of time about things that are outside of it. I wonder how long will we be so blind?

Does this follow that a purpose or reason for a god or matter existed only after a God or matter already existed? — A Ree Zen

Not after, but parallel to it. Those are things interdependent - the Universe and the purpose (in general).

did purpose necessarily not exist until a mind capable of considering "purpose" evolve into existence? — A Ree Zen

Right. But the Universe itself did not exit prior to mind capable of seeing it.

I think we can narrow down the nature of the first cause or the First Thing that ever existed. It either did indeed emerge spontaneously from nothing, or it always existed. Is there any other option? — A Ree Zen

I would say it did came from nothing (but not nothing as opposed to something, rather nothing as beyond any dualism), but not spontaneously.

The more we are aware of our surroundings and ourselves, the things that influence us, the stronger our will gets. If I know what is making me do this and why, I will be able to fight it. We are determined until we become conscious.

omnipotence, is only truly free will, that can do literally anything — batsushi7

Sorry, but that is just not right. Free will is about being able to choose willingly from options that are possible to the subject of free will. It's about making a choice. So the question here is: did I chose to post this (rather than not) without any impetus different from my will?

No, I did not. There is a lot of things that pushed me to do this. But in the end, it was still I who accepted that push by not going against it.

it'd be nice to live in a world where people freely discussed how much they hate life without repercussions — darthbarracuda

I do think freedom of speach on this issue is needed. We should be able to talk about everything openly because that is the only way we can correct our thoughts and ideas if they turn wrong. There shouldn't be tabooes. Keeping dark thoughts for oneself only makes them darker and harder to understand. The one with the struggle needs to see his situation from a different angle and he could get that only from another person (if he is not able to transcend himself).

other people kill themselves for completely rational reasons — darthbarracuda

And rational is everything you plan for a long time? It is something you are sure of? I wouldn't agree. Take people with mental illnesses for example. People with suicidal thoughts are ill, whether you want to admitt that or not. I myself only thought about it hypothetically, but it was in times of my mental distortion (I'm not a loonatic, don't worry), in times of psychological instability. It's always like that. There are no rational reasons to kill yourself. There are hard times under which your mind cracks, and it can last for ages before it breaks. But if you have a strong and healthy mind, you will survive. It's all about your mental strenght. No man is purposless. There are just some week people whose head is so bent under the pressure of life that they don't see anything but dust under their feet.

Suicide is totally self-centred just as the phrase I quote above indicates. And necessarily, a self-centred view cannot reach a use, a purpose, a meaning, or a reason to live. — unenlightened

True.

The thing that most of the people, and all atheists, don't understand is that only God which can be grasped by reason exists. And that God is not perfect. Perfection and wholeness is beyond existence. Existence is bounded by non-existence and the True God is Absolute. You cannot put it in a box of logic.

Would you really call a God, an Ultimate reality, something smaller than yourself? Something you can catch, put in a laboratory and study it so you could later manipulate it?

If only people understood that, there would be no need for discusions like this. There would be no need for theodicy. One problem less.

Are the layers of body and mind the only one or is there something else? What do you think? And why would reality be layered?

So, nothing and something (non-being and being) are one and the same. Being is a part we can think and non-being is a part we can't think, and that is the difference we see between them, right?

But if that is the case, then there is no switching between ways of thinking because nothing is impossible to think. There is just one way of thinking, and that is being. We can touch nothingness but never grasp it with our reason. We would have to transcend ourselves to do that.

But I think I do see what you are trying to say.

And there are logically consistent but mutually inconsistent theories out there. — fishfry

Right. It's the same thing with religions, for example (closer to my home). There are many religious systems consistent within temselves, but inconsistent with other systems. And then we ask which one is true, if any?

Why couldn't they all be true? But to answer that we would have to define the truth. Are we talking about some absolute truth or relative? Is there such thing as absolute truth?

Sure. But the "apsolute nothing" exists in a way different from existence we know and existance we can grasp, right?

And the splitting of this first Apsolute does happen when the mind (or consciousness, or whatever you want to call it) comes to be. The mind is the one that differentiates and that "creates" everything that is. With no mind to seperate being from non-being out of apsolute oneness, there is no our phisical world. There is just chaos of possibilities, everythig mixed and undistinguishable.

And I'm not really sure if I understand what you think by "switching back and forth between ways of thinking"? Could you try to explain it a bit more?

What is the profit of drinking beer, my friend?

What you need is to find an ultimate purpose, a purpose of all that is.

And what is the purpose of all being?

I can almost agree with everything you wrote, but there are some things I would say differently. Like the concept of nothing. It's an interesting concept, and like any other negation it pressuposes the thing that it negates, and that means that nothing, by negating something actually affirmes something - something is metaphisically prior to nothing. Nothing cannot "be" without something.

So, there you go. It's simple as that. That is why something has an advantage over nothing.

But yes, as someone already mentioned above, nothing, thought as opposite of something, doesn't exist, and that is why IT DOESN'T EXIST.

The kind of nothing (or should I say nothingness?) that "was" metaphisically prior to nothing-something dualism is actually the One, that which is beyond every conception and every dualism.

So, the One was first, then it split in two: being and non-being. And why that "happend" is another story. I'm not even sure if I was clear enough on what I wanted to say here, but... Oh, well.