As I am holding up a flower*, in an utterly quiet room, I will take the time to say that my view of the universe is pretty similiar to yours, except that I don’t feel it is important to “truly” know someone, it is important to mostly know those you are close to. I hardly know myself sometimes.
*The flower comment is a quote from Joseph Campbell relating a Buddhist story. The relevance to it is when thinking about the meaning of life, or the universe, you must ask what is the meaning of a flower. The answer is, there is none, except that which you make for yourself. A few posters have already said as much. But you must partake of the journey to learn what it is that causes you to have awe, gives you bliss, and provides the arena in which you develop your spirituality and centre of life.
But don’t take it from me, watch “The Power of Myth”
Just remember, if failure is inevitable, there’s no pressure to succeed, and you’re free to do whatever you want. Have fun, and try not to take it too seriously.
My worldview is very much like yours, Satasha, with a couple of exceptions. For #3, I think we have very limited free will, though I certainly see how the argument can be made that we have none at all. For #8, I think perfect knowledge of another is not a prerequisite for real love, though I also don’t see love as the magical, transcendental thing that poets write about, at least not usually.
But I don’t see this as depressing at all. I find it wonderfully liberating. Nor do I find this worldview an impediment to ethical behavior–I’m not nice because of anything like karma or an afterlife; I’m nice because I like it better that way, and because it sometimes encourages others to be nice to me, which I also like. (Immediate returns for niceness are not karma, though some use the word loosely in that way.)
When I first started seeing the world in this way, it was a little difficult. It wasn’t really depressing, I would say it was more disappointing. It was so different from what I had been told as a child. But as time has passed, I’ve become perfectly comfortable with it. No master plan, no ultimate meaning of life, and I’m happy.
Your life is still real, and it’s still important. It’s better to take good care of it, to live it well and enjoy it. Loneliness comes and goes, and so do friends. Some friends come and don’t go. We can’t ever really know each other, but we can enjoy each other’s company, and the feeling of connectedness, even if illusory, is important, at least for most of us.
When it’s over, yeah, it’s over. So what? Doesn’t mean it’s worthless or meaningless while it’s here.
You’re all suckers trapped in a twisted and solipsistic view of the world, which you must break free from, if only for your own sanity.
I’ll start with point 3 – the classic cop-out argument. Not only is it wrong, it’s whiny too. Go read Philip Jose Farmers Riverworld series, and focus on the Mark Twain character. He spends every novel he’s in making the same complaints you have, and he’s miserable the whole time.
Which is, quite frankly, stupid.
If you don’t have free will, and you’re just plodding along in the tracks dictated to you, then why are you miserable about it? You can’t change it, so at least enjoy it.
On the other hand, if you do have free will-- exercise it and do something with yourself.
Given that most of your peers worldwide believe they have free will, and the power to make their own choices as long as they have the courage to do so, you may want to reconsider point 3.
Points 6 through 9 are full of logical fallacies. I’ll tackle them later.
What you describe isn’t just negativity–it sounds like hopelessness. Which isn’t a good way to feel.
I used to be a highly negative person. I could put a negative spin on anything. I was cynical. People had to prove themselves to me before I found them worthwhile to know. I relished finding flaws with things. I was bitterly smug when awful things happened because it proved me right. I mocked people. I hated being around happy people, and I equated a cheerful disposition with being too stupid or naive to know better. I sought out people who felt the same way, and we’d go off into our own bitter little world and sneer at everything and be grinchy.
It got old.
When I was 21 a friend of the family killed himself, and my mom suddenly made changes in her life because “Life is too short to spend time doing something that makes you unhappy.” And I took that to heart, deciding life was too short to spend being miserable. I made an effort to be less nasty, to like people more, to see the sunny side, to embrace little joys. It took a few years, but I changed. And I keep changing. I had to distance myself from people whose worldviews I used to share, and work hard at breaking habits of mind that had been a big part of my personality. But life for me is much better now.
Speaking only for myself, what makes you think I’m miserable? I consider myself quite happy. But thanks for your concern.
**
Considered it and reconsidered it many times, thanks. Again, I tend to believe that we have some limited free will. As for what my peers think: most of my peers also believe that the government is here to help us, that Jesus will make everything okay after we die, and that pro sports are entertaining. I don’t. To those who believe those things, well, I say: good for you! Why do you need me to share that belief?
**
I’m pretty sure the OP said that an argument is specifically not wanted. It’s just the way some of us see the world; it isn’t a question of logical argument. I just want to say that this worldview isn’t necessarily negative, or hopeless. To me, it’s only negative and hopeless when I try to reconcile it with the fairy-tale sweetness-and-light worldview that I learned at Vacation Bible School.
Again, I’m as happy as anyone I know, and I hope that Satasha can find some happiness too. Cynicism doesn’t equal unhappiness, or anger, or sadness.
False assumptions, condescension and reading comprehension problems aside, thanks again for replying everyone. I assume you mean well.
MrO: You Rock!
I am not miserable IRL (or bitterly smug? for that matter). My emotional reaction to these conclusions (other than the second one) is simply not positive. I don’t understand how not having freewill can be seen as an OK thing. If someone threw me into solitary confinement, I would not see it as a positive. I am curious as to how, other than ignoring it, it is not a bad thing to some people.
Edward The Head: I went through my Rand phase 10 years ago, thanks anyway.
There is some wisdom (that I can see) in some posts here. I thank you for that. It is appreciated.
There is no point to the universe? Pick one. ‘Greatest happiness to the greatest number’ or ‘perpetuation of my genes’ are popular. You can justify it later, but you’ll feel a lot better, trust me.
No free will? But what is free will? At any choice you can choose the way you want - without a time machine, this is as good as it gets. When you find a choice you aren’t free to make, complain, but until then, just go with it. As a bonus, it’s ok if it doesn’t work (so long as you’ve done your best), as you’re just acting out predetermined scripts.
A lot of hogwash, perhaps, but it cheers me up when I’m philosophically worried. Remember, whatever philosophical system you adopt, helping at the local chairty is generally better than not.
Dare I say ‘Carpe Diem’?..for that is all we really have.
Unfortunately Satasha, without wanting to sound intellectually arrogant, your worldview is the only reasonable one that can be held by an intelligent, aware person. Of course it is going to be seen as negative, and it is not the most comfortable way to go through life. But it is something that most of us confront at some stage or another. Me, I’d rather ponder the ‘Big Questions’ than blithely sail through my existence never having thought about them. There are many out there who don’t, and while my own life has been plagued at times by such depressing angst, I’d never trade places with them.
A couple of years back when I was VERY depressed, a very wise friend gave me some advice that I have since taken as a sort of motto. It went something like this: “There is no inherent meaning in life, but the search for meaning is what can give your life purpose. This search can take you to some very special places, some wonderful, some to the depths of despair. All of these experiences are valuable, although they may not seem so at the time, for together they make you the unique person you are. It is your very existence that gives meaning to an otherwise meaningless world.”
Some people find meaning in a deity, some turn to alcohol/drugs as a way of dealing with the existential uncertainty. Others become philosophers, and hide behind the intellectualisation of such issues. There really is no way of avoiding the questions though. Our angst is what makes us so delightfully human, and sharing our qualms with others allows us to ‘touch’ them and be touched in ways that unselfconscious creatures never can. Love is not just a biological function.
So, celebrate your uncertainty and your ‘negativity’, and be grateful that you have the capacity to feel these things. In a deterministic universe, self awareness and reflectivity would be unnecessary (IMHO) so your sense of helplessness might in fact give you a hint that things are not so bleak as you propose.
I think I essentially share your philosophy. And it doesn’t depress me.
No there isn’t. But that’s a purely intellectual issue. I can think all the day “there’s no purpose to life”, but still there are things I like, things I dislike, things which make me sad, things which make me happy, things I want to do, things I want to have, things I want to try, things I want to change, etc…I feel tired or I’m in love, a piece of music makes me happy, a piece of news makes me sad. It doesn’t import whether or not there’s some ultimate purpose to my life. My motivations, my will to live, my will to act, don’t come from philosophical considerations, but from my feelings. Desire is the master. The brain only a servant.
Yes. It could very well be. It lets all the doors opened. And even if there was a creator, he wouldn’t necessarily benevolent or concerned.
Nope. There’s no free-will in the sense that we could be able to act independantly from the physical, chemical and biological processes in our bodies. But we aren’t puppets or slaves of these processes, either. We are these processes. I am these thousands of neurons which are firing at each moment. I’m creating myself at each instant, not by an act of independant will, but because I am all these changes which occur inside me.
That’s not depressing, but exciting! There’s already so much to know, to experience, to discover on this small rock, that we can’t possibly exhaust all it has to offer. And now, we know that this rock is essentially nothing at the scale of the universe. It’s like having lived in the same room for all your life. Then, someone opens the door and you discover that the room is only a little part of a great mansion, and that around the mansion, there’s a whole world to discover. An universe bigger than what you could encompass, bigger than you could imagine, bigger than you could dream. Hostile? The seas also are hostile, but we crossed them and found new islands…
True. This is somewhat depressing, indeed, at times. But it fuels our desire to act, to do something, to change something.
There’s nothing you can truly know. Not even yourself. Even if you were me, you wouldn’t truly know me. And why would you want to? It’s the path which is fascinating, not the destination.
There’s no need to fake or to pretend. Just accept your, our, limitations. Even though there are things we’ll never fully understand, we can reach each other. And we want to. We are made that way.
Do you need to know the position of each grain of sand to tell that the beach is beautiful?
Who cares? Does it make you feel it less strongly?
There was a time you still didn’t exist. And you didn’t know. There will be a time you won’t exist anymore. And you won’t know. All that imports is your life and the future you can imagine. And you’ll leave your footprints in the world. Perhaps deep or perhaps barely noticeable. But they’ll be there.
Perhaps. Or perhaps not.
What is important for us are these driving forces and motivations. Not the reasons why they are present in us.
You’re not independant from your body and your life. You’re not trapped in them. You are them. And the world is a playground so huge that you’ll never exhaust its possibilities.
I don’t quite see how my experiences nor my biological inclinations force me to do things. as clairobscur said we are the physical processes of neurons withen us. As a natural consequence I see that at very worst we have limited free choice.
If we have free will, from us. If we don’t, then oh well. Nothing can be done, doesn’t matter.
So? You’re damned right i’m selfish. That doesn’t mean I can’t be simultaneously selfless. Either way, doesn’t matter at all.
Yep.
I don’t see the correlation between knowledge of someone and “real love”.
Does it make it any less real?
First prove there is no afterlife, then you are allowed to make this statement. This is not a logical conclusion, it is a presumption pulled from your ass.
Satasha, I have basically the same worldview. However, rather than wallow in remorse, I revel in my cynicism. It’s probably a mechanism to make myself feel superior to others (BTW, I revel in my hypocrisy, too).
“The unilluminated lead such short lives, it suits them well.”
-Thorne Packard, quoted in The Transcripts of the Seville Sessions, 1890.
Damn, and people call me cynical! If you really don’t think that it’s worth your while to see a mental health professional (I’m not a doctor, but I’m the only one in my family who isn’t being treated for clinical depression or bipolar disorder, and your post is a bit too familiar) you may well be a happier person if you put your energies into creating something and taking control of at least small aspects of life that wouldn’t exist without you. Create a distopia in a story, knit a blanket for an AIDS baby, write a song or poem…doing something that takes creative energy requires purpose, so even if the universe has none, you do. Moreover, if you share some of your creativity with others, they’ll remember you, even after you die, and in effect you will still exist in the minds of others.
You say you’re not miserable, but your post makes you sound like you are because it’s so bleak. I suppose it’s a matter of how much time you put into that line of thinking, though, that would make the difference.
I generally agree with kambuckta and most of your (Satasha’s) points (I’m not so sure about 6 through 9, as I don’t feel that “love” necessarily requires complete knowledge of the other person).
However, I strongly disagree with elfkin477 who seems to be of the opinion that having a rational worldview means that you ‘need help’. I guess you could get yourself depressed if you think about it constantly, but if you’re religious and you thought about hell or sin constantly you’d be in the same boat. Misery/happiness are not one and the same as worldview!
Personally, I accept (though I do get very interested in debate on such and related matters such as objectivity and morality) that Satasha’s first 5 points (the key ones) are the way the world really works, and I think of my life as, yes, ending when I die, but hopefully having an effect on the world that will persist long after I’ve gone. Not everyone will do this, but many will.
bluecanary: it does mean you need help, if your correct then being correct is worthless therefore you should do everything in your power not to belive it. so what if that makes you wrong? nothing matters by your own theory. at least your happy and wrong.
bluecanary: it does mean you need help, if your correct then being correct is worthless therefore you should do everything in your power not to belive it. so what if that makes you wrong? nothing matters by your own theory. at least your happy and wrong.
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As Satasa originally said. You can believe this and still be happy. They are not cause and effect although i’m sure theres a correlation.
There really is no way of avoiding the questions though. Our angst is what makes us so delightfully human, and sharing our qualms with others allows us to ‘touch’ them and be touched in ways that unselfconscious creatures never can. Love is not just a biological function.
