I think this is a great example of why pure materialist answers are so unsatisfying. Knowing that events which we deem significant trigger a certain part of the brain tells us little about why these events are meaningful or significant (at least, not in any non-circular way).
Sorry, but if you can’t seem to appreciate the meaning that someone else’s mind might make the world into for them, then I think you’ve just negated everything you’ve said in your OP.
Yea, I’m a hippy; I’m not lazy, I’m not dirty, I don’t do drugs, and I try not to prejudge.
That is exactly right.
You are missing the point of what I said.
I did not actually mean everyone who calls themselves a hippy is that, but the ones who are “lazy, dirty, drug taking loosers”. All though it is not all, you will have a hard time convincing me, and I believe most folks, that that is not the vast majority of them. Even if it is not, as I admit I did imply, the essence of them.
First part:
You are right, but what may have once been helpful in nature (such as some folks having a very easy time putting on weight) can turn into a hinderance in the modern world.
Second part:
You are also right. I should have said that it being against nature, the order of the universe or whatever you want to call it is what the anti-queer crowd base their arguments on. Although homosexuality does go against the biggist and most pragmatic reason for sex (and it lends itself to a whole buch of extra hassles in the life a a gay person), it is not wrong in the same that saying 2+2=5, it is wrong in a sense (or appears to be at first glance) of walking backwords, not evil or really wrong it is just being different without any apperent benifit.
Maybe it would sense to you guys if you knew that I am suspected (but not quite positive by a recent doctor) of being high-functioning autistic and am supposed to be physically incapable of realizing any of this; learning it through logical deduction, yes, but really understanding it, no.
In the same way that a person with OCD is not actually a neat-freak, but is completely incapable of truly understanding what organizing things is and must either live in total chaos, or in an infinitely tightly wound world where everything is organized in every possible way because although you can sort of figure out organizing, you can never “get it”. It is exactly like that Monk detective. It is not that he is a great detective, but he is so incapable of filtering out the important information that he has had to tediously and mind-numbingly go over every meaningless detail no matter how silly or unrelated it was until he could consciously and logically determine if it was pointless. The minor benefit of this is that although he is forced to go over everything, he does not miss much.
It is not so much that I “like to think about things”, but that it never payed off in the way it was supposed to before.
How ecstatic would you feel, how increadible would it seem if you were able to just see things instead of conciously going over every pixel of vision and calculating from there like a computer?
For the first fucking time in my life, I get it.
Well, okay, you’ve said that or variations on it twenty or thirty times. It doesn’t help clarify what your insight actually is and your original post, though you’ve disavowed it, amusingly and confusingly melds Ayn Rand (an objectivist if ever there was one) with some kind of solipsism.
Can you give us a summary in 500 words or so?
The influece of genes on behavior is incredibly complex, and we are only scratching the surface in out attempts to understand this. Assuming that homosexuality is at least partially genetic, the fact that it exists at the levels it does in the population should give pause to syaing it has no “apparent benefit”. Better to assume that there is some benefit that we simply don’t understand at this point. It might simply be the fallout of a suite of genes that allows us to both fall in love and to have close friendships with people we are not in love with. We may benefit, as a population, by having the “gay genes” in our gene pool even if certain individuals end up having a lower possibility of passing on their own genes. And when we encounter our next extinction possibility, the more diverse (no pun intended) our gene pool is, the better off we’ll be as a species. And we will, at some point, encounter an extinction possibility.
You are right but missing the point. It would be highly illogical to assume that a behavior so, seemingly, aberrant must not be overly harmful.
Any way, arguing this point is missing the forrest for the trees.
- smiles *
I know what you mean, of course, and epiphanies of this kind can do a great deal of good in our lives. I’m glad that your response so far has been rather more - contained - than that of Another Person Whose Name Escapes Me For The Moment. 
However, there are three problems which I’m afraid you’re going to have to face before long.
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Monday. No matter how spiritually ecstatic you may feel at the moment, the time will come when you have to go to work (or equivalent), buy your food for the week, wash your clothes, clean out the toilet, and return to mundane reality. It’s going to be a let-down; make sure that it doesn’t let you down too far.
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Communicating your vision. You will, if you want to take this further, put it into a form that someone who has not experienced something similar will understand. Depending on your particular talents, some sort of creative work (poetry, art, music) may be a more effective vehicle than trying to explain it to us unregenerate rationalists.
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The worst one - dealing with people who don’t understand. No matter how well you express yourself, you can guarantee that some, if not most, of your audience will turn their backs on you, reject you as “just another mystic”. Don’t let this reaction make you lose sight of what you have now; and know when to stop trying to convince the unconvincible.
Best of luck!
What would be highly illogical is assuming that a behavior that is highly selected against on the individual level doesn’t have some value to the population as a whole. Otherwise it would quickly select itself out of existence.
I have to admit that the forrest here looks more like drug induded ramblings. 
I’m just trying to correct your misunderstandings of biology and genetics. Also, if your premise leads to incorrect conclusions, there is probably something wrong with your premise.
Ok, so straight, christian Americans are the closest to "getting it’?
Damn, and I thought you were going to tell us how David Blaine does that hovering thing.
Bush already informed of us of this ‘epiphany’.
Sorry to hear about your recent diagnosis.
Hmm, we do seem to be ruining the OP’s enlightenment.
We’re like epiphanic ants.
[sub]or we’re stealing his ep-i-phan-ic basket, whatever[/sub]
Muad’dib: I’m glad you had this moment of clarity. Enjoy it fully. There will be fewer and fewer of them as you get older.
Why is this in Great Debates?
It’s witnessing, man. That’s why it’s in Great Debates.
I think your OP is interesting. What I’m going to say to you is not meant to make fun of what you are experiencing. And I really don’t want to debate you on these topics. I’m just hoping that in your private writing and thinking, maybe you will consider exploring some of these thoughts.
What is a hippy actually? Is it possible that you have created an image and a label to go with it without actually knowing individuals? Most “hippies” don’t refer to themselves as such and didn’t even back in the sixties and seventies. About the only time that we 'fess up is when someone drags out the old stereotype that you used: He is a hippy because he is a lazy, dirty, drug-taking loser. And he is a lazy, drug-taking loser because he’s a hippy. Round and round.
Is it possible that the sunlight falling on the flower is not pointless when you focus your awareness on it?
What happens when a mindless thing that is an essential link in the food chain becomes extinct?
Isn’t there a difference in prejudging and in being discerning? The person in the restaurant who chooses to eat fresh meat instead of rotten is not acting out of prejudice, but out of informed judgment.
Sorry, I hit submit a little soon.
The United States was founded on some beautiful ideals. Someday I hope they will be fulfilled. They are not yet. All citizens are certainly not treated equally in this country. And I see our leaders lapsing into conduct that is totally against everything that I was taught that I could count on from my government. Our health care system is a disaster. Our homeland security system failed.
I know of other countries where there is no poverty and no one has to worry about health care. I don’t think they are torturing any prisoners at the moment.
Our founding documents are incredibly moving. But we have to make them real. When will you become aware of the awareness of others and of their rights to their own Life, Liberty and Pursuit of Happiness?
I agree with everything you said about creativity! Find those activities that just absorb your time and all sorts of interesting things can start to happen. One thing leads to another.
Enjoy!
You two guys honestly can’t think of a reason why seeing your mother or a predator might elicit a different reaction than seeing an umbrella?
You are going to hell in a handbasket!
At one time, this place was a resting place for the best and brightest. Now it’s a stomping ground for the insane.