There Is No Value Higher Than Your Own Life

[RCSaunders]

If you did not exist, nothing would matter.

You are given life and the means to preserve and maintain it, but survival is not given. It is the same for all living organisms. Life is given with the means to living, but an organism must sustain its own life by its own action and behavior.

For all organisms the issue is always, "to be or not to be," but unlike all other organisms, you must discover or learn how live and choose to do it.

If you fail to live your life successfully, you have lost all there is worth having.

[surreptitious57]

By that logic then parents have absolutely no moral responsibility to their children but themselves and absolutely no one else
Yet all loving parents unconditionally love their children and so would if necessary willingly sacrifice their own lives for them
And so your argument fails to acknowledge the existence of unconditional love as a consequence of the propagation of genes

[RCSaunders]

By that logic then parents have absolutely no moral responsibility to their children but themselves and absolutely no one else

If the parents are dead, they cannot love or have a responsibility for anything. One's own life is the "highest," value, does not mean there are no other values, but there can be no values to those who do not exist.

Yet all loving parents unconditionally love their children and so would if necessary willingly sacrifice their own lives for them ...

"unconditional love," is the love of a whore. Love is appreciation of the value of something worth cherishing and nurturing. To love anything, "unconditionally," means loving one's wife and loving the "rapist" who violates and kills her as well.

And so your argument fails to acknowledge the existence of unconditional love as a consequence of the propagation of genes.

There is something insidiously evil with the view that the propagation of genes is a higher value than the lives of individual human beings.

[Gary Childress]

If you did not exist, nothing would matter.

I would clarify that if I did not exist, it might be the case that nothing would matter to me (depending upon whether there is an afterlife or something along those lines or whatever). However, things might conceivably still matter to others who do exist. I'm, of course, assuming that other people exist independently of me--which seems like a reasonable assumption to me.

[RCSaunders]

If you did not exist, nothing would matter.

I would clarify that if I did not exist, it might be the case that nothing would matter to me (depending upon whether there is an afterlife or something along those lines or whatever). However, things might conceivably still matter to others who do exist. I'm, of course, assuming that other people exist independently of me--which seems like a reasonable assumption to me.

The words "your," and "you," refer to any individual. If there is no, "you," (no individual) for things to matter to, nothing matters, and for each individual, it is their own life to which things matter.

"Afterlife." is an oxymoron. There is already a word for what is after life; it's called death. What people mean by, "afterlife," is not something after life, but some mystical alternate version of life. There is no such thing, but if there were, the principle would remain the same, whatever kind of life you have or where you have it, it is your life to which anything matters, because if you weren't alive in some way, nothing would matter.

If something is of no value to you, if it in no way can lead to the furtherance of your own life, no matter how many others might value it, it is not a value to you.

[Immanuel Can]

If you did not exist, nothing would matter.

If this were true for every person, then it would mean that the death of anyone would entail that nothing further would matter for anyone. That's obviously not the case, as the world continues long after people pass off it. And if something mattered once, to one person, it surely still matters in the same way to others, does it not?

So what can you mean by that?

[Immanuel Can]

If you fail to live your life successfully, you have lost all there is worth having.

This reminds me of Jesus Christ's injunction: "What shall it profit a man if he gains the whole world but loses his own soul?" Worldly "success," if it means no more than pleasing myself, is paltry gains, and really nothing by comparison.

[RCSaunders]

If you did not exist, nothing would matter.

If this were true for every person, then it would mean that the death of anyone would entail that nothing further would matter for anyone. That's obviously not the case, as the world continues long after people pass off it. And if something mattered once, to one person, it surely still matters in the same way to others, does it not?

So what can you mean by that?

Just what I said to Gary:

The words "your," and "you," refer to any individual. If there is no, "you," (no individual) for things to matter to, nothing matters, and for each individual, it is their own life to which things matter.

[Gary Childress]

If you did not exist, nothing would matter.

I would clarify that if I did not exist, it might be the case that nothing would matter to me (depending upon whether there is an afterlife or something along those lines or whatever). However, things might conceivably still matter to others who do exist. I'm, of course, assuming that other people exist independently of me--which seems like a reasonable assumption to me.

The words "your," and "you," refer to any individual. If there is no, "you," (no individual) for things to matter to, nothing matters, and for each individual, it is their own life to which things matter.

"Afterlife." is an oxymoron. There is already a word for what is after life; it's called death. What people mean by, "afterlife," is not something after life, but some mystical alternate version of life. There is no such thing, but if there were, the principle would remain the same, whatever kind of life you have or where you have it, it is your life to which anything matters, because if you weren't alive in some way, nothing would matter.

If something is of no value to you, if it in no way can lead to the furtherance of your own life, no matter how many others might value it, it is not a value to you.

Maybe I'm misunderstanding, But what I took you to imply is that one individual's cares and concerns are irrelevant to another unless they intersect directly such that we both of us feel their impact. However, if I am gone, then my particular concerns end.

So for example, I may become a billionaire, thoughtlessly polluting the world so that when I'm gone the world becomes less livable for people who follow. My life was great because I was a billionaire and the world was fine while I was alive, however, I left the world in worse shape than when I started and later generations suffer the consequence, however, if it only matters when I am alive, what does it matter to me what I left to following generations?

[RCSaunders]

If you fail to live your life successfully, you have lost all there is worth having.

This reminds me of Jesus Christ's injunction: "What shall it profit a man if he gains the whole world but loses his own soul?" Worldly "success," if it means no more than pleasing myself, is paltry gains, and really nothing by comparison.

Worldly "success," is your idea of living life successfully. It is not mine and it is not correct.

If you live in the way you believe you are supposed to live, are you displeased? Does it displease you to obey God? Are you not pleased to serve Him? Do you regard whatever you do in obedience to God as a, "paltry gain?"

Before you denigrate one's success as, "paltry gains," shouldn't you first know what one means by success?

[RCSaunders]

So for example, I may become a billionaire, thoughtlessly polluting the world so that when I'm gone the world becomes less livable for people who follow. My life was great because I was a billionaire and the world was fine while I was alive, however, I left the world in worse shape than when I started and later generations suffer the consequence, however, if it only matters when I am alive, what does it matter to me what I left to following generations?

If you actually believe living as your hypothetical billionaire lived is living successully as a human being, that's your view of human values, not mine.

First of all, no one becomes a billionaire by, "thoughtlessly," doing anything, unless they are a crook, a gangster, or a politician, and they are not living successful human lives but the lives of parasites and predators. (Could you enjoy their kind of life?) Secondly, everything has a cost and a consequence. It is not possible to produce great wealth that benefits millions of people without any disruption of any kind to some things some people who have never produced a thing of value for themselves or anyone else happen to dislike.

Anyone who believes that their own life can benefit from what harms the life of any other human being has a problem with their own values. If that is what you believe, you need to examine your values. If it is not what you believe, what is your question? How can you object to every individual pursuing their own life and values if that cannot possibly harm others and will almost surely benefit them?

[Sculptor]

If you did not exist, nothing would matter.

But mattering would not matter. So the second part of your sentence does not even mean anyting.
Nothing can follow from "if you did not exist".

You are given life and the means to preserve and maintain it, but survival is not given. It is the same for all living organisms. Life is given with the means to living, but an organism must sustain its own life by its own action and behavior.

You emerge. You are not "given".
When your parents had sex they were not giving anything to YOU. Because YOU did not exist.

For all organisms the issue is always, "to be or not to be," but unlike all other organisms, you must discover or learn how live and choose to do it.

If you fail to live your life successfully, you have lost all there is worth having.

During life we build meaning and value from our experience, and many people discover that through their own understanding of their relationship with the universe they can easily learn to value other things way beyond their own life, and would gladly give it up in the preservation of a loved one.

[Gary Childress]

So for example, I may become a billionaire, thoughtlessly polluting the world so that when I'm gone the world becomes less livable for people who follow. My life was great because I was a billionaire and the world was fine while I was alive, however, I left the world in worse shape than when I started and later generations suffer the consequence, however, if it only matters when I am alive, what does it matter to me what I left to following generations?

If you actually believe living as your hypothetical billionaire lived is living successully as a human being, that's your view of human values, not mine.

First of all, no one becomes a billionaire by, "thoughtlessly," doing anything, unless they are a crook, a gangster, or a politician, and they are not living successful human lives but the lives of parasites and predators. (Could you enjoy their kind of life?) Secondly, everything has a cost and a consequence. It is not possible to produce great wealth that benefits millions of people without any disruption of any kind to some things some people who have never produced a thing of value for themselves or anyone else happen to dislike.

Anyone who believes that their own life can benefit from what harms the life of any other human being has a problem with their own values. If that is what you believe, you need to examine your values. If it is not what you believe, what is your question? How can you object to every individual pursuing their own life and values if that cannot possibly harm others and will almost surely benefit them?

OK. What do you mean by there is no value higher than your own life? Are you simply saying that one's life (existence as opposed to non-existence) is their most valuable possession in the sense that nothing else should be more valuable to them than that in itself, including freedom and dignity?

[Immanuel Can]

So what can you mean by that?

Just what I said to Gary:

The words "your," and "you," refer to any individual. If there is no, "you," (no individual) for things to matter to, nothing matters, and for each individual, it is their own life to which things matter.

But NOTHING more worthy of value than personally surviving -- a thing which all of us are 100% guaranteed not to succeed at doing?

I mean, I guess you could imagine that in most cases, each person might generally CARE about it more than other things...but even that doesn't seem right, because some people give up their lives for others.

[Immanuel Can]

If you live in the way you believe you are supposed to live, are you displeased? Does it displease you to obey God? Are you not pleased to serve Him? Do you regard whatever you do in obedience to God as a, "paltry gain?"

Before you denigrate one's success as, "paltry gains," shouldn't you first know what one means by success?

Please...go ahead. I seem to have misunderstand what you meant by "success."