# IS life a curse? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [October 29, 2016, 6:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-life-a-curse/770040 "2016-10-29T18:40:10Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Machinaforce](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/aeb1de/32.png) [@Machinaforce](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Machinaforce)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2016, 2:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-life-a-curse/770040/21 "2016-10-30T02:46:42Z")
So we just live because that’s what we do? That seems odd. But what about those born into pain and suffering? Life is a curse to them ---
**Author:** ![eschereal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eschereal/32/18939_2.png) [@eschereal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eschereal)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2016, 2:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-life-a-curse/770040/22 "2016-10-30T02:56:39Z")
> [@monstro](#): > > People are mentally well are able to find reward in the smallest of things. Exactly. Even if you are lucky enough to win the gold in front of a full stadium with a world-full of TV cameras sharing your victory with gazillions of people, the moment eventually passes. Big accomplishments are wonderful, but then they are done and you move on. Growing those lovely tomatoes, watching a flaming sunset while the breeze carries stray raindrops across your cheek, reading a picture book while seeing it with the very eyes of the three-year-old on your lap, all kinds of little shit makes it worthwhile. You just have to learn to appreciate the moment. Drag the joy/value right out of it. I have no idea why they do not teach that in fourth grade on up. Imagine how much better off we would be if everyone were trained to discover happiness right there. ---
**Author:** ![Guinastasia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guinastasia/32/5751_2.png) [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2016, 3:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-life-a-curse/770040/23 "2016-10-30T03:03:36Z")
> [@Machinaforce](#): > > So we just live because that’s what we do? That seems odd. But what about those born into pain and suffering? Life is a curse to them Dude, seriously – what is the point of all of these threads of your’s? ---
**Author:** ![Bill\_Door](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/50afbb/32.png) [@Bill\_Door](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bill_Door)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2016, 12:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-life-a-curse/770040/24 "2016-10-30T12:26:51Z")
My life may be a living hell, but on the bright side it’s almost over, so I’ve got that going for me. ---
**Author:** ![Velocity](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/velocity/32/18006_2.png) [@Velocity](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Velocity)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2016, 9:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-life-a-curse/770040/25 "2016-10-30T21:43:23Z")
> [@Machinaforce](#): > > To live is to suffer, or so the buddhists say with the first noble truth. > > But it seems like we go through much pain and suffering to keep on going with our lives. Sometimes that is met with little reward and yet we keep going. So might say life is pointless and that we are just degrading bags of flesh who feel short changes when life is less than what we want it to so we make it out to be more than what it is. Is there little more to what life offers than breathing, reproduction, death. Is it a curse of the advanced mind to find purpose and meaning in the life that we live even though we live in a universe absent of it? Is that why we create such complicated structures, rules, and rituals in order to feel like our lives have meaning (which is because of our advanced intellect)? Is there any meaning to the things that we do when the methods by which we judge such acts are rather arbitrary as are our judgments about the quality of the acts themselves? It seems like we live in a world of our own design to make life just be more than a struggle and more than simply reproducing. Are we hiding from some truth that living is a curse? Why do we continue to struggle and stay alive? What are you proposing? That everyone just lie down and die? ---
**Author:** ![snfaulkner](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/snfaulkner/32/433_2.png) [@snfaulkner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/snfaulkner)\ **Post date:** [October 30, 2016, 10:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-life-a-curse/770040/26 "2016-10-30T22:27:24Z")
I’m miserable and I want you all to know about it! Then I’ll reject any counter argument to my bleak worldview! ---
**Author:** ![Machinaforce](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/aeb1de/32.png) [@Machinaforce](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Machinaforce)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2016, 2:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-life-a-curse/770040/27 "2016-10-31T02:20:22Z")
> [@eschereal](#): > > Exactly. Even if you are lucky enough to win the gold in front of a full stadium with a world-full of TV cameras sharing your victory with gazillions of people, the moment eventually passes. Big accomplishments are wonderful, but then they are done and you move on. Growing those lovely tomatoes, watching a flaming sunset while the breeze carries stray raindrops across your cheek, reading a picture book while seeing it with the very eyes of the three-year-old on your lap, all kinds of little shit makes it worthwhile. > > You just have to learn to appreciate the moment. Drag the joy/value right out of it. I have no idea why they do not teach that in fourth grade on up. Imagine how much better off we would be if everyone were trained to discover happiness right there. But aren’t such feelings just the chemical impulses going through the body. A physiological response from us flesh bags? Isn’t that what it ultimately boils down to? DOing things to repeat that chemical high that we get from it? Isn’t that just what a drug addict does? All the sound and bluster we make about goals and dreams seems more like just reaching for another needle. Isn’t it just placing too much importance on humans? Doesn’t existence seem much larger than the tiny world we made, almost large enough that the things we do and strive for seem so small, insignificant? ---
**Author:** ![Machinaforce](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/aeb1de/32.png) [@Machinaforce](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Machinaforce)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2016, 2:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-life-a-curse/770040/28 "2016-10-31T02:27:03Z")
I mean isn’t that what life boils down to? Just a stimulus and a response? You can dress up the stimulus all you want but it seems like it all leads to the same end. A brief feeling of goodness as the result of a chemical. Action-chemical, action-chemical, that seems to be the sum of our lives. ---
**Author:** ![Penfeather](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/penfeather/32/384_2.png) [@Penfeather](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Penfeather)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2016, 3:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-life-a-curse/770040/29 "2016-10-31T03:49:05Z")
Dude. That is _deep_. You must be some sort of philosophical individual, to think as deeply as that. Not for you the painted facade of fruitless purpose that the mass of humanity cower behind to vainly shelter them from the yawning abyss of despair that lies beyond, you march right up to that grim pit and whimper into it, “What’s the point of living?”. Deep, man. Have you thought of writing poetry? ---
**Author:** ![ReticulatingSplines](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e274bd/32.png) [@ReticulatingSplines](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ReticulatingSplines)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2016, 4:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-life-a-curse/770040/30 "2016-10-31T04:04:12Z")
> [@Amateur\_Barbarian](#): > > Because the alternative is to not exist at all. > > Make the best of the cards you’re dealt, because there is no other game. > [@cochrane](#): > > Or as I’ve heard it, “Life may suck, but the alternative is unimaginable.” Can someone explain this to me? What’s so bad about not existing? You didn’t exist for millennia and I don’t think it particularly bothered you at the time. It reminds me of that Nabokov quote: “The cradle rocks above an abyss, and common sense tells us that our existence is but a brief crack of light between two eternities of darkness. Although the two are identical twins, man, as a rule, views the prenatal abyss with more calm than the one he is heading for…” ---
**Author:** ![Ulfreida](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ulfreida/32/8014_2.png) [@Ulfreida](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ulfreida)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2016, 4:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-life-a-curse/770040/31 "2016-10-31T04:26:32Z")
> [@Machinaforce](#): > > I mean isn’t that what life boils down to? Just a stimulus and a response? You can dress up the stimulus all you want but it seems like it all leads to the same end. A brief feeling of goodness as the result of a chemical. Action-chemical, action-chemical, that seems to be the sum of our lives. Did you ever get past the First Noble Truth? There are actually four. ---
**Author:** ![Machinaforce](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/aeb1de/32.png) [@Machinaforce](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Machinaforce)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2016, 4:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-life-a-curse/770040/32 "2016-10-31T04:35:04Z")
> [@Penfeather](#): > > Dude. That is _deep_. You must be some sort of philosophical individual, to think as deeply as that. Not for you the painted facade of fruitless purpose that the mass of humanity cower behind to vainly shelter them from the yawning abyss of despair that lies beyond, you march right up to that grim pit and whimper into it, “What’s the point of living?”. Deep, man. Have you thought of writing poetry? Nice sarcasm, but it still doesn’t address the statement. ---
**Author:** ![Machinaforce](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/aeb1de/32.png) [@Machinaforce](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Machinaforce)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2016, 4:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-life-a-curse/770040/33 "2016-10-31T04:36:08Z")
> [@Ulfreida](#): > > Did you ever get past the First Noble Truth? There are actually four. The rest seems more like mystical nonsense than anything beneficial. It also doesn’t answer the question of why bother living. ---
**Author:** ![eschereal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eschereal/32/18939_2.png) [@eschereal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eschereal)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2016, 4:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-life-a-curse/770040/34 "2016-10-31T04:45:24Z")
I’m aware of my tongue[!](http://www.everythingesteban.com/2010/02/09/im-aware-of-my-tongue/) ---
**Author:** ![Leaper](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/4bbf92/32.png) [@Leaper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leaper)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2016, 4:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-life-a-curse/770040/35 "2016-10-31T04:51:14Z")
“It’s a gift. And a curse.” - Adrian Monk ---
**Author:** ![Machinaforce](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/aeb1de/32.png) [@Machinaforce](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Machinaforce)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2016, 5:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-life-a-curse/770040/36 "2016-10-31T05:16:07Z")
> **[Life has no meaning other than our own pleasure and suffering - Tiny Buddha](https://tinybuddha.com/topic/life-has-no-meaning-other-than-our-own-pleasure-and-suffering/)** > > This is a detailed explanation that explains some more things that are not included in my other explanations and is something very important for you to read in order to try and convince you. It has some of the same things, but also has different... This is similar to what I’m getting at. But you still haven’t addressed my stimulus-response comment ---
**Author:** ![Larry\_Borgia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/larry_borgia/32/156_2.png) [@Larry\_Borgia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Larry_Borgia)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2016, 5:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-life-a-curse/770040/37 "2016-10-31T05:19:42Z")
Go away. ---
**Author:** ![eschereal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eschereal/32/18939_2.png) [@eschereal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eschereal)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2016, 5:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-life-a-curse/770040/38 "2016-10-31T05:53:04Z")
> [@Machinaforce](#): > > But you still haven’t addressed my stimulus-response comment Because, who cares? You are stuck in your tiny vessel, tossed about on the heedless gales. You cannot step out of it, for there will be even less to your existence than what you are already whining about. This is what you get, so trim your foresail and lay about for smoother waters, such as you can. Or be a courageous coward and make for the undiscovered country, from who’s borne, no traveler returns. Those are basically the options available to you. ---
**Author:** ![cochrane](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cochrane/32/10441_2.png) [@cochrane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cochrane)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2016, 6:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-life-a-curse/770040/39 "2016-10-31T06:17:05Z")
> [@ReticulatingSplines](#): > > Can someone explain this to me? What’s so bad about not existing? You didn’t exist for millennia and I don’t think it particularly bothered you at the time. It reminds me of that Nabokov quote: “The cradle rocks above an abyss, and common sense tells us that our existence is but a brief crack of light between two eternities of darkness. Although the two are identical twins, man, as a rule, views the prenatal abyss with more calm than the one he is heading for…” Because I don’t remember not existing. I like my existence and I don’t want to give it up. There’s no proof that nonexistence is preferable to existing. ---
**Author:** ![Penfeather](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/penfeather/32/384_2.png) [@Penfeather](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Penfeather)\ **Post date:** [October 31, 2016, 6:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-life-a-curse/770040/40 "2016-10-31T06:26:04Z")
> [@Machinaforce](#): > > [Life has no meaning other than our own pleasure and suffering - Tiny Buddha](http://tinybuddha.com/topic/life-has-no-meaning-other-than-our-own-pleasure-and-suffering/) > > This is similar to what I’m getting at. > > But you still haven’t addressed my stimulus-response comment Stimulus. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-life-a-curse/770040.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-life-a-curse/770040.md?page=3)