<<<Pardon me while I drop a turd in the punch bowl>>>
[[in my best Ralph Wiggim voice]]
“My tropical punch has a tropical island.”
Erislover:
Wow. That was deep.
Life is a game we play. A game with high stakes. The word “game” however has pleasant, well… inconsequential qualities.
Many aspects of life are quite the opposite.
I do agree with Maeglin that games help humans deal with conflict, because conflict is a bitch.
Scylla:
What is the point of life if not to be happy? I believe that by happy Erislover meant utterly fufilled… goal-less, and complete. Not happy like "I won 5 bucks on my scratch-off today… I’m supersizin’!
Really? Do you know this in your gut, or just intellectually? Is it an abstract thing that you understand is going to happen at some point down the road, or is it breathing down your neck?
They guy in the burn ward with all his skin gone, in constant agony, and hardly able to breathe from the heat damage in his lungs is most certainly not playing a game as he suffocates for weeks on end.
My father plays games. He’s played wargames, and, he’s fought in a war. These were not the same thing.
No and no.
Seeing as that statement is false, it wouldn’t change my views at all.
Well, your wrong.
Insects don’t play games. A praying mantis can sit on a twig for days on end waiting for a meal to come by, and no diversion is necessary.
That’s because a mantis runs on preprogrammed skills, and has no capacity to acquire new ones. It does not play.
Similarly you will notice that we as humans have certain hardwired behaviors, and, like the mantis, we do not make or play games centered around developing these behaviors. It’s not interesting.
What you fail to understand, and which is a difficult, but not impossible concept to grasp: is that like the Mantis being programmed by its instincts to sit on a branch and wait for food, so are you programmed with the need and desire to play games. Your instincts have programmed you to think about life in terms of those games so that you can use the skills and knowledge you’ve acquired playing them.
Thinking that simply because you are set up this way as a human being that therefore the rest of the universe must also be set up this way is as provincial and narrow minded (and as predictable,) as the goldfish who thinks all the universe must be a bowl of water.l
It would seem to me, that if the Creator Consciousness that you postulate has created us to make itself happy, then the purpose of life (Assuming that you take your purpose from the reason you were created NOT necessarily something that should follow.) would be to make other people happy as well.
It also seems to be, however, that if we were created for entertainment, then perhaps we are not all supposed to be happy. Ever watch a movie where everyone is happy? Can you imagine how boring that would be? Of course you could speculate that the interaction of the creator consciousness with the lesser C’s is very different that that of a movie watcher. This would be because the lesser C’s are part of greater C. (This is a little like what I tend to believe- "we are all cells in the mind of God/Goddess.) I would still follow that you would wish to help others be happy, (and yourself as well)
)
Yes, human beings play games. Games are a vital part og human intellectual and social development. Many aspects of life can be modeled by game theory, though the models are not perfect given our limited understanding of “the rules” in so many cases. Game Theory is a descriptive discipline. It is pretty good at describing a bunch of things.
So what. I just can’t fathom how the statements above could lead one to conclude that human consciousness must therefore be an element in the game of some meta-conscious entity. Are we having another of those “the model is the reality” moments?
Seriously. I’ve gone back and re-read the OP. I just can’t seem to make sense of those words in that order. You want to reject Occam. OK. You declare that explanations are superfluous. Fine. Then you conclude by explaining both the nature of reality and the meaning of life based upon the razor-like principle that if it models like a game it must be a game.
Go to a Surgeon with a problem, he’ll tell you you need an operation.
Go to a Chiropractor, he’ll tell you you need an adjustment.
Go to a Psychiatrist, he’ll tell you you need to be analyzed.
Go to a priest, and you’ll need a prayer.
Find somebody who plays a lot of games, and what do you think their gonna tell you about the meaning of life.
Everybody assumes that because something is big in their life it must be big in the universe.
Erislover is like an A. Square who never met a sphere.
Everybody tries to fit things into their own terms.
Breathing down my neck BIG time! Since I’ve come to accept this belief my life has become nearly dedicated to trying to make other people be happy-- both with me and while I’m away (give a man a fish/ teach a man to fish). I see suffering in the world. This suffering is not necessary as the diversioanry games show. What I see is that the diversionary games are there to give us a big old hint: you can be happy.
Get your mind off blackjack, then. We live in a world of rules. While I choose to liken that to a game I think it is straying you from the point of The Game: we “win” when we are happy.
Except the game isn’t for us. Our suffering is inconsequential. Our pain is not important. Hell, even our happiness is essentially unimportant. The Cosnciousness in all likeliness didn’t create us to give us pleasure, but to give It pleasure: unbounded pleasure. It is running a simulation of events to see if there is a solution. That solution is total happiness, unbounded even in a bounded existence.
I would love to agree with that, but first could you explain some of the reasoning behind that statement? I mean, oranges are not potatoes, they aren’t even both vegetables, but they are both plants. Are you imposing unnecessary restrictions on your definitions to reach a self-misinformed understanding? I think so, but I reserve my judgement because I would really like to hear your opinions. I cannot stress this enough.
Social conventions are not arbitrary? Now you’ve got my interest piqued. how do you account for the disparities between them? Are you implying that there is some implicit social code that we need to (and seemingly do) recognize? How do you distinguish that from unnecessary social codes? And once you’ve recognized that we are subject to rules (wherever they’ve come from) how is it that you can’t compare this to a game?
Neither do chess pieces. Are you saying chess isn’t a game?
Yes! We are a simpler version of The Consciousness!
But this dodges the question again and pawns it off on evolution. Why do we live in a universe where playing games is possibly advantageous?
In the end I see that one either accepts that we are living in a game, or is content to respond with the Anthropic principle which is essentially no answer at all.
Hey, I’m not saying that the universe was created for humans. I’d be willing to bet that there are other “conscious” life forms out there running the same track we are with some different limitations. I’d bet that we are not the first go at this understanding-through-simplification but I am hoping we can be the last.
Spiritus
I can’t fathom why you find that I am saying that. I’m not trying to have a consequence prove the cause.
I’m not even saying there was ultimately a first cause, just that there was for us. The universe has a certain structure. That structure lent itself to our existence. You are welcome to feel that this was an accident. I think it was deliberate. you are welcome to feel our consciousness and feelings are useless. I feel they are crucial. You are welcome to reject an analogy we can understand because is doesn’t jive with the model of reality.
A model that was made in this reality. Do you recall our discussion about how if QM completely suggested that everything was made up of discrete packets that I felt we should try and change our math accordingly to come to the same conclusion for consistencies sake? And you told me, paraphrased, “But erl, we came to the ‘discrete packet’ theory through our use of non-discrete mathematics!”
The same applies here, but this time it applies to both of us. You accuse me of doing the same thing here. I accuse you of assuming that chess players can only move according to chess rules.
Back to scylla on a preview,
The “meaning” of life is not that I’m going to tell you to go play a game. You can’t avoid that. Everything you do is either you playing a game, making a new game up to play, adjusting the rules of a game… all in a universe which gives you no other choice.
The meaning of life is to see that we are in a game, a very serious game: the struggle to find unbound happiness in a bounded situation. Oh, we say there are an infinity of numbers between 0 and 1, Scylla, but do we know it in our gut or is it just an abstract principle?
beltane
Well, the process of diversion allowed The Consciousness to see that it was not happy. Using its diversionary practices it set out to make mental entities which were microcosms of It and apply some far more simplistic rules to existence. Can the problem be solved at this level? No? Well, I will make it a little more complicated. Now can it be solved?
We are little consciousnesses running around in a limited construct trying to find unbound happiness. If we can find it, It may be able to find it. At which time, there is no more need for us to exist in Its mind. See ya!
Our happiness itself doesn’t matter to It-- I think!-- only that we can find it.
erl, perhaps instead of questioning the axioms in this universe-view you’ve presented, we should help you develop the moral implications and see what, if any, real differences there are between a morality based on being a gamepiece and other moralities.
Assuming for the moment that the pervasive utility of game theory to explain all aspects of existence (which is a large assumption for me to swallow, but whaddahell) actually implies that existence is a game set up by a Creator Consciousness, then are you quite sure you’ve guessed correctly about the object of the game? Before we consider the possible existence of an Absolute Game Morality, we’d better be confident in our understanding of the rules.
I mean, why do you assume the Creator’s boredom and unhappiness are the contextual bases for this game, rather than, say, the C’s quest for self-knowledge? Couldn’t “enlightenment” be the ultimate game-ender, rather that utter happiness? Couldn’t “love” be the deciding win/lose parameter?
Obviously, our own individual strivings towards any of these goals may produce results towards the real object, but shouldn’t the basic setup of the game point us toward that object? I submit that the program doesn’t necessarily lead a reasonable gamepiece to conclude that “happiness” is the meaning to the game, or even a winning strategy.
How does the guy in the burn ward win? How can he be happy; drugged up, in agony, suffocating?
Really? Have you ever been to a burn ward? I have. Go walk through the Shriner’s Children’s hospital in Mass. Do that and see if you can tell me that it’s inconsequential. There are not many things that I can guarrantee in this world, but I will guarrantee this: Go there. Meet this kids. There you will into some of the fundamental truths of this Universe and humanity. If you’re human it’ll make you weep with sorrow and joy at the same time.
No. That is not the solution. Happiness is fleeting and ultimately selfish. Giving it is nice; really nice. But, there’s much better things to be given.
Well, it ain’t self-misinformed. I’m sharing my father’s attitudes here. Unless you’ve been to war, or want to cite somebody that has, I’ll just appeal to the ole dad athority. I think it’s a good one.
Actually, if you think about it, our social conventions are remarkably similar worldwide. The question should be "Why aren’t they more different. The differences that exist are accountable to environment, and the fact that sometimes there are more than solution to a problem.
Silly question. We don’t. It’s humanities adaptation. Not all life finds it advantageous to play games, adn some are doing better than us: Plants, bacteria, insects, etc. Playing games is mostly a mammal thing, I think.
Life as a game is the kind of philosophy I got past at puberty. I don’t know what you mean by bounded or unbounded, but there are things far more important than the triviality of happiness. That much, I’m sure of. And, the infinite numbers between 0 and 1 isjust an abstract principle. Space and time are not infinitly divisible.
Ah, but we have come to the conclusion for quite some time that there are questions which are fundamentally unknowable in our universe. Even if they are “knowable” in one sense, they aren’t testable in another. We are limited creatures in a limited universe with limited resources with which to understand it, and definitely no philosophical guidance.
I think that happiness is something each individual strives for in their own way. If there is one thing I can think of that links all humans’ consciousnesses together it is the quest for happiness.
But have we been led to such a conclusion? We have here people comparing me to pot smokers, to someone who has no idea what their talking about, to someone who may or may not know what they are talking about but isn’t making any sense…
I don’t think it is very obvious that we’ev been led to believe this. Hell, to tell you the truth it isn’t even necessary to the bigC that we realize it. Only that we find it. It is only *I *who thinks that knowing the goal eases its achievement.
Scylla, the chess player losses pawns as a means to capture the king. The game of chess is oriented to make it virtually impossible to do otherwise. We don’t care about the pawn. It is a piece of plastic. It is inconsequential.
But should we be that pawn, and that knight, and that rook, we might tend to take a different opinion. Please do not ever suggest that I cannot empathize with suffering when my entire purpose is to remove it. Ever. You are welcome to call me ignorant in any fashion you choose but it is simply not the case that I consider suffering to be inconsequential, merely that outside of the human construct human suffering is inconsequential.
He doesn’t. And as long as there is a guy in a burn ward who is not completely happy, nobody wins. The Game goes on, as does suffering, injustice, natural disasters, man-made disasters, etc. Everything is following the rules. The rules allow us to be happy in at least a temporary way. Are the rules set up such that complete happiness is forbidden? I don’t think that has been answered. I think we should try. Above that, I think we are in this situation specifically to try.
This is the largest self-fulfilling prophecy I have ever been privvy to.
Sometimes, erl, I wonder whether you and I speak the same language.
Um . . .because it’s what you said? Or was the entire preamble about game theory and it’s general applicability just a space-filler?
Then perhaps you can tell me why you believe we are creations of a greater Consciousness? The only support for the idea that I could find in your OP had to do with a modeling of reality that matched your imagined consequences of such a creation. It wasn’t very good support, especially considering your rejection of Occam and assertion that “explanations are superfluous,” but it’s all that I saw.
Well, to make clear the positions I actually take as opposed to the straws whirling in your wind:
I do not feel the structure of teh Universe is deliberate, though accidental is a poor alternate word choice. I prefer natural.
I do not feel that either consciousness or feelings are useless.
I neither accept nor reject analogies based upon our ability to understand them. I do reject analogies when they are unsound, non-utlilitarian, inapt, or obfuscating.
The real issue, though, is whether the reality your analogy represents is substantiated by compelling reason or evidence. I found the reasoning in the OP to be ironically self-contradictory. I find your current position that you never made the argument to be mystifying.
Since you seem to like “why” questions, allow me to phrase it thusly: Why do you think human consciousness exists in the context of a game played by a greate Consciousness?
Wrong on both counts. I accuse you of writing a self-contradictory OP. I observe that I can make no sense of the arguments you use (or don’t use, apparently) to reach your conclusion. If you did not mean to offer rational support for your witnessing, I wish you had just said, “Imagine that the Universe is . . .”. If you did mean to offer rational support, then (like so many other witnessing threads) the OP falls short of target.
Why? What argumant of mine do you imagine that his metaphor represents?
Y’know, the Bard said much the same thing with “all the world’s a stage.” It could easily be “all the world’s a movie” or a book, or a painting, or it’s all about sex, or it could be all about Leggo, just as easily.
These are interesting thoughts, but not to be taken seriously or literally.
I’ve seen no special reason offered as to why the correct answer is “games theory” other than you seem to think so.
Finally, there is nothing provided to make us take Game’s theory more seriusly than “all the world’s a stage,” much less try to build a religion or at least an ethos around it.
I can just as easily apply all your arguments to asserting that life is a metaphor for song, and it would work just as well (maybe better,) than your game theory idea. That is, it would be trite and bad.
I’m trying to debate this seriously, but there doesn’t seem like an awful lot of substance here.
Does evidence = proof? I would think not. Evidence leads to an idea which may or may not have predictions.
So, I see something like gaming in everything we do. I look for instances where this is not the case. I cannot find any. i look for things that all humans have in common. I find the search for happiness and some level of consciousness.
Why, I ask myself, is this the case? Is there an answer? And I saw an answer. The point of this thread is not to thresh out, necessarily, whether how I came to offer this explanation, but whether this explanation was satisfactory at all.
RE: explanations are superfluous. Your resistence to my thoughts on why such a thing is true is evidence a-plenty of this. Has I started a thread that said, “Let’s assume a lone consciousness exists in nothing. What does this imply? What sort of things are likely to happen?” Where would your focus be then?
All explanations are space fillers, but some people like to follow them anyway. Why is it bright in here? Because I flipped a light switch. Did that answer the question? Did that change the fact that it was light in here? If I lied to you and said, “Because I just farted” would that matter?
Does saying “one requires eyes to see” explain sight? Have you correctly applied the razor, or simply answered the question with another statement that will cause a question? All our explanations bottom out on unprovable assertations. I have an unprovable assertaion: There is a Consciousness existing in nothing. You, perhaps, might disagree with the implications I think that brings. Please do, I welcome your input and xen started that path.
It is the only thing which actually explains our existence. Much like the First Cause ploy, but I make no claims about The Consciousness’s creation, permanent existence, or existence in any way except in how it applies to us. I see games everywhere: this is the consequence of a mind busy with diversion. I see the struggle against some incredible odds everywhere: this is the consequence of the rules of The Game.
The Game is the start for us. We are a consequence of it. You will find no evidence of anything outside our universe. That is forbidden by the rules.
I think it is quite simple, if you are into those sort of things. If not, then ignore the explanation of why I think such a thing; it is, after all, incidental to the core assumption.
The universe had no choice schtick?
If you say so. Things I think my analogy says: happiness is possible, however temporary. Permanent happiness is not strictly or obviously forbidden. It is our goal to achieve this happiness if we can. Once we achieve this happiness there is nothing else.
Evidence for the above: diversionary games enjoyed by man for recorded history. The drive for liesure as a commodity. The seeming importance of kinship. The struggle to obtain things which are limited in quantity, and afterwards the struggle to use that limited quantity for as long as possible.
Hard evidence for the above: 0. Expected evidence for a pretty religious viewpoint: depends on who we ask, I guess, and the rules they like religious views to follow.
So you say. Not interested in the pizza if the pizza guy can’t park the way you expect people to? This debate is a huge game, and that comment may make some people think I am trolling but I assure you that isn’t my intention. It is hard for dumb plastic chess pieces to imagine a world outside their board, or that their petty struggles in life have a purpose entirely seperate. But yes, the debate is a game, and you’ve got rules you’d like to introdcue to play. Well let’s compromise so we can both play. Forget the explanations, and take the assumption anyway. What does it imply to you?
Don’t think I don’t get that impression myself
Scylla
Now that’s interesting. Why don’t you begin with bacteria?
Ah, and there is no metaphor here, Scylla we are certainly in this for the long haul.
The stage bit is somewhat interesting too, I have thought it so very similar to my own view, but actually incorporated in it to a certain degree. However, being actors on a stage does a bad job at explaining why we seem to have free will, why we are performing in the first place, and some other points that, so I find it cute, but lacking.
How do you know you have free will? Maybe you were just destined to think you do, but your moves are all predetermined. You can’t prove it one or the other, so free will isn’t an issue.
Acyually, “all the world’s a stage,” works better than your game theory. We’re of course performing a play for the amusement of your “Cosmic consciousness” or “God” or whatever.
The whole “games within games” thing doesn’t do a very good job of explaining people who were dealt a losing a hand, and have no game to play, nor does it explain why it’s just mammals that tend to play. Also, it doesn’t fall victim to Occam’s razor in that it can’t be explained as a developmental evolution.
It also does a better job explaining cruelty inequity and suffering in general. The purpose is to amuse the deity.
And personally, I find a good play to be a better amusement than any game, and I’d much rather go see Les Mis than play Stratego. I assume a deity will feel the same way.
As for bacteria in a world based on song, that’s easy. Bacteria are just a part of the works. Like the works in an organ, not every part makes music, some parts merely support the ones that do…
I see many parallels between the ‘Game Theory’ and the basic Hindu understanding that we are all playing at a ‘Game’ so diligently that our laughter and tears are real.
There you go again, silly, choosing which rules to follow as to what sort of argument you are willing to accept.
What makes you say that? I think the stage explanation fails to be sufficiently ubiquitous. Furthermore, because we are both diversioanry and serve a purpose, the “all the world’s a stage” is already incorporated into The Game. The Game doesn’t add the clutter of determinism necessarily, it does deal with why the BigC needs a diversion, it does explain why we seem to even be conscious at all.
I think it is cute, but still pretty lacking as a construct.
Errr… um, mammals aren’t the only creatures that play The Game; even sunlight plays The Game. We seem to be the only creatures that make our own games, to be sure, but that is because we are lesser versions of the BigC and are formed in its image in some way.
Lets take a look at the heirarchy of gaming in this, my way of thinking. We have the first game as far as the BigC is concerned: the ideas it has about happiness, and that it is unhappy. So it uses a diversion to achieve this. the are Games. through repeated Games which are more or less complicated, we come to The Game. It is really only The Game to us, to It it is simply another game in a long line of games. But the point of all these games is to be happy. The point of this game, our The Game, is to successfully be completely happy when playing by the rules. These are the rules: the laws of physics as we know them.
Question: can the Game be won?
So why does cruelty amuse the deity? Gaping hole there.
:shrug: As You Like It. They’re your rules, and if that’s the only way you’ll play we either go our seperate ways or find some common ground.
I still think the play structure is not really all that ubiquitous and does a poor job explaining motivations for those that are inclined to look for such things.
I didn’t realize organs were songs.
CheapBastid, if you think on it some more you’ll find a smattering of Buddism in there, a bit of Christianity, Judeaism, Greek mythology, and just about every damn religion that I’ve heard of. I didn’t seek to put those things in there, I think they just sorta precipitated out.
I would like to stress that calling this “Game Theory” could draw some parallels to actual game theory, of which I know little to nothing about.
I tend to agree with Scylla here; you’ve kinda put the cart before the horse (and then got tangled up in the reins (or is that les riens?)). But I take an altogether lighter approach. You want to believe in Games with a capital G, go ahead for as long as it suits you. According to my beliefs it won’t matter at all, just as long as you continue to behave like a mensch.
Do check out Scott Adams’ new ebook though called God’s Dust. He explores a number of very similar themes to you.
And as for happiness, I’m inclined to agree with you. I have been influenced from childhood by the work A. S. Neill did. Check out Summerhill, I think you might like it.
