Love doesn’t work. Love is an illusion and everybody would be better off committing suicide. Just fuck it all, there is no reason for life and the angst and struggle is meaningless and God is dead. I am going out and buying a shotgun right now. Bye Straight Dope. It’s been real.
Wait, can I borrow your black book since you won’t be using it anymore?
Wait, don’t be too hasty. It’s likely that life is all an illusion. We have another genius – this one in GQ – whose Mom lost the TV remote control and then found it right where she had already looked, thus proving that objects disappear and then reappear again, proof positive that we are living in a simulation and that there are glitches in The Matrix. He should get together with Machinaforce and discuss. This would be great, as long as they don’t discuss it here.
Jesus Freud on a pogostick-the asshole is at it again. If you must respond to him, remember that he is NOT looking for explanations or fixes-he is in it for pity points.
flinch
Ouch. Damn.
My mother is both a solipsist and a social narcissist. She needs constant positive feedback and attention from people who exist solely in order to provide her with constant positive feedback and attention.
Yeah, it makes my head hurt too.
The majority of Machinaforce topics summed up: “Buddhism is the most wonderful, perfect, correct religion in the world–why does it suck so much?”
Nope, still just a troll.
An intervention, either on the board or in reality (if reality even exists) won’t do any good.
It seems that he’s not interested in getting help, which is too bad. I’ve known a lot of people like him. IANAPDoc, but he seems intelligent, but depressed, and prone to wandering down pathways that don’t help his situation.
I often will check out his threads, hoping that in his search for enlightenment, he will have discovered that enlightenment is like a butterfly: run after it, and it will elude you. Sit still, and well…it’ll probably ignore you. But at least you won’t exhaust yourself. So far, it’s all the same shtick.
"To crush your enemies – see them driven before you, and to hear the lamentation of their women!
toss me a slow pitch, why don’t ya?
My dog used to run after butterflies. One time he caught one and ate it. I don’t know if he found enlightenment, but he seemed pretty proud of himself.
You are CORRECT, Sir!
My dog tasted a toad once. He found lots of mouth-foam.
I think this could be used as a plot summary for all of his threads.
I’ve been exchanging PMs with him for weeks - I get the impression that he initiated the exchange because I’m one of the few people that generally doesn’t attack him personally.
He’s given up solipsism and consciously recognizes that Buddhism-as-he-understands it is substanceless and doesn’t make sense. I mostly get the impression that he for some reason has got it lodged into his head that things should make sense and, when faced with literal nonsense (which is what most of the links he forwards to me contain), there must be some underlying logic behind it.
Essentially he’s a sucker for nonsense and deliberately obtuse philosophical psychobabble, and the reason he’s a sucker for it is because he has a hard time believing that anybody can seriously present or believe in nonsense. Unlike the rest of us who can glance at things and reject them with a shrug and a “that’s dumb”, he has to actually disprove them before rejecting them, and it’s hard to disprove something that you can’t be sure you properly understand. And we can assert stuff all day, but until he understands the thing and the disproofs of it, he’s not going to be able to let go.
In any case he’s not a troll; he genuinely is seeking these answers. And he’s certainly not a danger to himself or others.
I disagree, and I think you just got played.
My basis - my own PM exchanges with him, that I reported to the mods because of the implied suicide threats that mysteriously dried up as soon as reported.
My take also. He doesn’t just ignore people that (rightfully) get pissed off at him-he also ignores all responses that point to possible solutions to his unending list of complaints and problems. To get a positive response you have to show acceptance and sympathy. he is here to bitch and moan because he wants to be a victim.
I agree which is why I no longer waste any time with him.
I acknowledge that I can’t prove that he’s not merely putting on a persona. A multi-years-sustained persona.
(I also can’t prove he -and you- are not bots. Sophisticated bots.)
I’d worry a lot more about being “played” if I ever spent any time on here that I could be spending doing something else more interesting elsewhere. I mean, no offense, but you guys are sort of my entertainment of last resort. If I’m killing time chatting with a pointlessly sustained persona, no harm no foul as far as I’m concerned. Honestly you should thank me for taking up a smidgen of his time.
Naah, at this point I’d rather he just goes away.
I mean, imagine someone else was toying with the idea of looking into Buddhism, and then they come across his bullshit?
Okay, I’m imagining it, just as you asked. I’m imagining the dude coming across a typical Machinaforce thread about Buddhism, which typically includes links to Buddhism-related blog articles written by people who are not Machinaforce, along with Machinaforce making dubious interpretations of the contents of those articles, often along with other people ripping his dubious interpretations to shreds. What would their reaction be?
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They instantly believe Machinaforce’s interpretation, don’t bother to click and read the links, doggedly ignore everybody’s refutations, and sink into a pit of despair.
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They click the links, read the articles, roll their eyes at Machinaforce, and become devout Buddhists because Machinaforce helpfully gathered Buddhism-related blog articles to help start them down the path.
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They read the articles, read Machinaforce’s interpretations, and then read the refutations to him, including ones like the ones I make which incidentally mention that Buddhism sounds stupid. They abandon Buddhism, become an atheist, and live happily ever after and the whole world is slightly better as a result.
Which outcomes do you suppose are more likely?