Philosophy Now Forum

Dontaskme wrote: ↑Wed Mar 31, 2021 4:27 pm

Walker wrote: ↑Wed Mar 31, 2021 2:40 pm

“Contradiction is not a sign of falsity, nor the lack of contradiction a sign of truth.”
- Blaise Pascal

No, it's a sign of a two way conversation with yourself. Don't you know.

The Tension Between Inner and Outer Self is what holds you ALL Together...else you'd collapse into a loose pile of goo, puss, and blood, oh and in your case ..shit. I hope you are going to clean up after yourself, and not expect someone else to do your dirty work.

Suspend your arrogance for a moment and speak for yourself.
Your comments demonstrate no capacity to speak for others.

Suggestion: do yourself and everyone else a favour and begin cultivating objectivity.

Walker wrote: ↑Wed Mar 31, 2021 5:48 pm

Dontaskme wrote: ↑Wed Mar 31, 2021 4:27 pm

Walker wrote: ↑Wed Mar 31, 2021 2:40 pm

“Contradiction is not a sign of falsity, nor the lack of contradiction a sign of truth.”
- Blaise Pascal

No, it's a sign of a two way conversation with yourself. Don't you know.

The Tension Between Inner and Outer Self is what holds you ALL Together...else you'd collapse into a loose pile of goo, puss, and blood, oh and in your case ..shit. I hope you are going to clean up after yourself, and not expect someone else to do your dirty work.

Suspend your arrogance for a moment and speak for yourself.
Your comments demonstrate no capacity to speak for others.

Suggestion: do yourself and everyone else a favour and begin cultivating objectivity.

Why don't you start by stop telling people what to do. Your ego loves it, I know.

DAM wrote:No, it's a sign of a two way conversation with yourself. Don't you know.

The Tension Between Inner and Outer Self is what holds you ALL Together...else you'd collapse into a loose pile of goo, puss, and blood, oh and in your case ..shit. I hope you are going to clean up after yourself, and not expect someone else to do your dirty work.

The following changes your direction, from subjective projection, back to your objective view.

New and Improved DAM wrote:No, a sign of a two way conversation with DAMself. Don't you know.

The Tension Between Inner and Outer Self is what holds DAM ALL Together...else DAM would collapse into a loose pile of goo, puss, and blood, oh and in DAM’s case ..shit. DAM hopes to clean up after herself, and not expect someone else to do her dirty work.

These changes, which objectively set the parameters for “objectivity,” and the method of how, apply to all, so don’t feel all special over the attention you’re receiving on this matter of instruction, which obviously, so obviously, you sorely need. After all, as the saying goes, you’re not exactly the historical Christ at the center of the New Testament.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Mar 31, 2021 5:23 pm

And that the genuine and true decision is to live a life where sentient creatures suffer pain...

That part is not a matter of choice, but of observation. The important question is not whether it happens that way, but what it means when it does.

It means OUCH...it's means this is bad...IT'S a bad IDEA. It means I'd be sure not to want to experience this ever again.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Mar 31, 2021 5:23 pmI don't doubt that's true, that you would. But since nobody's asking us to do that, it's a moot point. What's important is "What does THIS plan mean?"

It means OUCH...it's means this is bad...IT'S a bad IDEA. It means I'd be sure not to want to experience this ever again.
No human being, or any other sentient creature should have to suffer pain and suffering ever, not once.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Mar 31, 2021 5:23 pmImagining away the evil and suffering we realize is around us doesn't actually speak to the problem at all: it just denies the problem even exists.

Suffering and pain is a tangible experience, it's real, it's disgusting, and it's stupid to keep imposing it on other people who never asked for it. It's not imagined. The God you believe created this whole mess is the imagined thing.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Mar 31, 2021 5:23 pm After all, if all of what we think we are seeing is merely imaginary, then, as the movie caveat always says, "No animals were harmed in the making of this film." It's not real. It didn't happen as you think it did. So there is no "problem of evil," then.

Feeling is real. It's not imagined. The God who created this mess is the imagined one. The problem is what to do about this mess, if no thing is creating it, then there is no way out of it EVER.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Mar 31, 2021 5:23 pm I think pain and suffering and evil are real, and are a justifiable concern. The darkness in this world demands an answer, and I think people are perfectly justified in wanting one.

Sensation is real, I agree, but I do not agree that God is the creator of a sentient feeling being capable of experiencing. Perhaps there is no way out of this mess EVER, that seems more logical to me. I'm sick of hearing about how Jesus loves you. Or love Jesus and you will be saved. When this place is obviously a torture chamber. It's a constant game of Gladiator Wars. Not just between humans but all throughout the animal kingdom aswell.

Stop pretending their are mythical creatures called Jesus that can save us all. There is no such thing as a saviour who is going to save you from hell and put you in heaven. Save that nonsense for the Unicorn God worshippers.

The Intelligence of life already knows that life for sentient creatures is a constant battle for survival, and for what, a moment of dick in hole fleeting pleasure.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Mar 31, 2021 5:23 pmNo such answer is possible or available in an imaginary world. Unicorns don't suffer.

Neither does a creator God suffer, that mythical God who has no more reality than that of a unicorn, who gave free will to humans knowing the ones who chose the good life would still have to live side by side with the ones who chose the evil life. The plan was an epic FAIL ...This is a story don't you see?

Sensation is not a STORY, it's tangible and real. No intelligent creator God would want this for his creation, except in the created story, no one ever wrote.

I guess, we're all stuck here in hell...and death is the only rest bite we will ever get, for a brief moment, until it starts all over again, forever and ever and ever...glorify the gore all you want, but I just happen to think it's a disgusting way to live.

.

Speak for yourself.

Walker wrote: ↑Wed Mar 31, 2021 6:54 pm.........

Go away Creep. You're nearly as bad as that other hound dog on here, always sniffing around my threads, and since this is my thread, I will direct and moderate it the way I want it to go...and there is nothing you can do about that.

Dontaskme wrote: ↑Wed Mar 31, 2021 6:55 pm No human being, or any other sentient creature should have to suffer pain and suffering ever, not once.

"Should," you say? So you're making a moral claim? To what moral framework are your referring?

Evolutionism doesn't promise you "no pain." Nor does Hinduism, nor Buddhism, nor Judaism, nor any other perspective of which I know. So if it's "wrong" for things to experience pain "even once," as you say, under what code, precept or promise do you claim that?

The God you believe created this whole mess is the imagined thing.

If He created it, then maybe you can complain; but then, He's real. If He didn't, then He's not to blame, and your complaint has no object.

Which way is it?

Feeling is real.

Feelings are often imagined. There are many things, I'll warrant, that you "felt" once, that you now no longer feel. There may even be things you felt (and I'll bet this is true of most people) and felt strongly, that you are now embarrassed you ever felt.

The God who created this mess is the imagined one.

He cannot be. If He "created this mess," he's not "imagined." If he's "imagined," then He never "created this mess."

Which way is it?

The problem is what to do about this mess, if no thing is creating it, then there is no way out of it EVER.

Yes, that would be a terrible problem. And there would be nobody you could blame, nobody you could complain about, and nobody to get you out of it ever. All that is true.

I'm sick of hearing about how Jesus loves you. Or love Jesus and you will be saved.

Surprising. That comes to me as good news.

There is no such thing as a saviour who is going to save you from hell and put you in heaven.

As I say, if you believe that, then you're right: nobody's going to save you.

But just where does that leave you?

The plan was an epic FAIL

That depends on what "the plan" was, in the first place.

I guess, we're all stuck here in hell

Is that what you want?

...it's a disgusting way to live.

Then it seems to me you'd want a way out, if you feel that way. And it seems to me that almost anything -- even some delusory happiness -- would be better than stewing in the kind of misery you describe.

But what if there were a real, actual and truthful better way, a way out of the situation you now deplore? Why does despair seem to you somehow noble, if it's also unnecessary? Or even if it is necessary, who is there to admire you, to praise you, or to think you brave and good?

Who will reward you for all your fidelity to ineluctable misery?

Walker wrote: ↑Wed Mar 31, 2021 7:00 pm Speak for yourself.

I always do, there is no one esle who can do that for me, I'm just reporting what I see. I'm looking around to see what condition my uncondition is in, you know, the idea that is in the story where God's love is unconditional, yet throws us to the wolves when ever we violate his unconditional love.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Mar 31, 2021 7:13 pm Then it seems to me you'd want a way out, if you feel that way. And it seems to me that almost anything -- even some delusory happiness -- would be better than stewing in the kind of misery you describe.

I cannot see a way out EVER as I've already pointed out earlier. That's why I get frustrated at the religious kooks. So just lets look at the idea of no way out, to see if there is a way out or not.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Mar 31, 2021 7:13 pmBut what if there were a real, actual and truthful better way, a way out of the situation you now deplore? Why does despair seem to you somehow noble, if it's also unnecessary? Or even if it is necessary, who is there to admire you, to praise you, or to think you brave and good?

Who will reward you for all your fidelity to ineluctable misery?

I'm personally not in despair at the moment, but I have been, until I fully accepted it for what it was. I can now deal with it very well when it arises, without it ever overwhelming my being, and that is what gets me through. Suicide is not the answer, because other people are still being born and will continue to do so after I've gone. And besides, how awful must that be for people who are suicidal to then have no other way than to go through the horror of what that must be like to experience. Imagine what that must feel like, that's another thing we don't think about when we create a new life. We don't think that they might not have ever wanted to be here.

My point is ...religion and it's wacky belief systems just makes things worse not better. I just want humanity to be able to face the real truth, to tell the real truth about life and living, and not be carried off by some fake promises of heaven by imaginary Gods.

Dontaskme wrote: ↑Wed Mar 31, 2021 6:55 pm No human being, or any other sentient creature should have to suffer pain and suffering ever, not once.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Mar 31, 2021 7:13 pm"Should," you say? So you're making a moral claim? To what moral framework are your referring?

Evolutionism doesn't promise you "no pain." Nor does Hinduism, nor Buddhism, nor Judaism, nor any other perspective of which I know. So if it's "wrong" for things to experience pain "even once," as you say, under what code, precept or promise do you claim that?

As far as I've come to understand things that are happening here, there is no way to avoid pain and suffering, nor the evil acts that are commited by thinking humans who can use their knowledge to know that pain is not good. So in their knowing they can intentionally inflict bad on others. So even when we are being a good person we still have to live side by side with evil people. That's never going to change, it's been going on for thousands of years. I already know that evolution or nature, doesn't promise anything, since it doesn't have a brain of intelligence to know that creatures are hurting other creatures when they torture them to eat them.

It does seems as though the only intelligence around here is the human brain. We seem to have taken charge of life so far, and I suppose it would have been a different story had the elephants had been in charge of everything. There was a time when the dinosaurs ruled the earth for millions of years. This is why the biblical creation story makes no sense to me. I mean what was God supposed to be doing before humans ever showed up to worship him? And why didn't the dinosuars worship their creator God? So many things do not make sense.

It's known that the dino's went extinct, so it's a possible scenario for every other sentient creature. Then what will God do without his worshippers to adore him.

Only we can save ourselves. By choosing not to be born. And if we do choose to be born, then we are just going to have to accept that the world will never be a utopian heaven. And that suffering is here to stay. And if we are ok with that, then we have only ourselves to blame, not some imaginary God.

We shouldn't have to live a life believing we are going to be punished for eternity just because we chose not to believe in a God we are told existed, when we didn't even want to be born in the first place.

Human Life is a very expensive, high maintenance, messy business, and religion just makes the mess a whole lot more magnified.

Dontaskme wrote: ↑Wed Mar 31, 2021 7:33 pm

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Mar 31, 2021 7:13 pm Then it seems to me you'd want a way out, if you feel that way. And it seems to me that almost anything -- even some delusory happiness -- would be better than stewing in the kind of misery you describe.

I cannot see a way out EVER as I've already pointed out earlier.

I don't doubt your word on that. But "I cannot see..." is surely not the sum and total of possible knowledge, is it? There are times in one's life when one "sees" something, and in the time before that, one "has not yet seen" it...true? And as for the future, you have no way of knowing what you will, to use your word "EVER" see, correct? You may tomorrow "see" something you have not yet seen today, fair enough?

So you haven't yet seen a way out. It doesn't mean there isn't one. Just that you haven't "seen" one, so far.

Fair enough.

I'm personally not in despair at the moment, but I have been, until I fully accepted it for what it was.

Well, well...I find that quite astonishing.

You say you were once "in despair," but are "not at the moment," because you "accepted" that you had no "way out...not EVER," as you put it?

You were sad until you became Nihilistic and resigned to your fate, and then you became okay?

Suicide is not the answer,

Agreed. Besides, you said this place is all "a dream" and "imaginary," so suicide isn't even possible. There's nothing to kill, just as there's nothing to be in pain and suffer. It's all an illusion, you say.

And there's no God for you to be upset with, you insist.

I have to wonder, then, why you seem to be so upset. You seem to be displeased with the God you insist doesn't exist, for creating a reality you insist is only a dream, because it has illusory pain and suffering in it that cannot be real either.

So what's your complaint? And who will hear it?

I just want humanity to be able to face the real truth,

Well, you don't believe in objective truth, do you? So there's no merit in "facing" something that doesn't exist, is there?

But if so, which "truth" do you think they need to "face"? The truth that there's no such thing as reality? The truth that this is all a dream, an illusion? The truth that there's "no way out"? The truth of Nihilistic resignation? Which truth do you want to make "humanity" (that apparently doesn't actually exist) "able to face"?

And how is it you think you're doing them a favour?

IC...the illusory dream is still a real phenomenon...just as we can wake in terror from a nightly dream that also felt real.
Just as watching a movie on tv can evoke tears or laughter or terror because these emotions are stimulated by images appearing real.
Emotions and sensations are chemical reactions we have no conscious control over. That’s what I mean by no one driving the dream bus.
The imagination is real. And we react to it as if it’s all real, that’s part of the illusion...but what I talk about is that it’s all emptiness appearing full, it’s nothing being everything...nothing is really happening and yet it feels very much as if it is happening just like we are being aware of the dream ...anyways this is all explained away and understood by the nondual writers.
And so until you believe in nondual nature of reality you won’t see what I’m talking about.

And I suppose it’s the same for me, until I believe in god the creator being, I won’t see what you are talking about.

Can you see how it’s all just an entangled mess.

I’m not upset either...I’ve just learnt how to be comfortably numb to it all.

I just don’t want to ever experience anything like this illusion ever again, I know you have difficulty understanding what I am trying to express...but then it’s understandable because no two minds can ever know the other mind, it can only ever know it’s own mind, the one it imagines is real.


If there’s no one at the controls then there is no one to stop it...and that is too scary to contemplate and is why I learnt to endure it.
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Anyways, I can see you exude a compassionate aura...so that’s a comfort. I mean no harm in these conversations..which I enjoy bye the way...take care mannie.

Dontaskme wrote: ↑Wed Mar 31, 2021 10:25 pm IC...the illusory dream is still a real phenomenon...just as we can wake in terror from a nightly dream that also felt real.

But they're not. That's what differentiates "dream" from "reality."

You see the problem, I'm sure: if there's no "reality," there's no "suffering" either. There is only what you call "the phenomenon" of feeling as if there were some actually suffering. But there's no actual cause, and no God causing it, so no reason to be angry at God.

Can you see how it’s all just an entangled mess.

I can certainly see how your beliefs are, yes. In order to have a real grounds for protest of suffering, you need there to be a reality. But in order to sustain your beliefs, you need there not to be. So you are certainly entangled.

But it's your own fault, I'm afraid. It's the product of choosing to believe things that are not even rationally sustainable.

Dontaskme wrote: ↑Wed Mar 31, 2021 10:25 pm IC...the illusory dream is still a real phenomenon...just as we can wake in terror from a nightly dream that also felt real.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Mar 31, 2021 11:32 pmBut they're not. That's what differentiates "dream" from "reality."

They're different in appearance only, but it's the same one light that sees both realities.
You seem to think I believe there is no reality. I have never denied reality, I've just said it's not happening to a 'someone' rather it's life living itself. It's the Absolute Relative where the human ego is an illusory appearance, just another one of a multitude of appearances within the Absolute.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Mar 31, 2021 11:32 pm There is only what you call "the phenomenon" of feeling as if there were some actually suffering. But there's no actual cause, and no God causing it, so no reason to be angry at God.

There is an awareness of feeling/sensation. It's known as pleasant or unpleasant. There is an automatic response reaction to pain, that is happening on an unconscious level, so there is nothing to control it. That's the problem all sentient creature are stuck with. Pain and suffering forever, until life extincts itself.

Can you see how it’s all just an entangled mess.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Mar 31, 2021 11:32 pmI can certainly see how your beliefs are, yes.

How typical of you to say, when what I was actually referring to was that both our beliefs are just different and poles apart, and by that I meant entangled beliefs can be messy, it wasn't meant to be seen as a personal thing, implying I was a mess just because my belief is different to yours. But typically, you have made it personal, because according to you, your belief is so perfect and true and the only real one to follow to endure a perfect mental health. Even though your belief is totally without evidence and based purely on blind faith and intangible imagination.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Mar 31, 2021 11:32 pm In order to have a real grounds for protest of suffering, you need there to be a reality. But in order to sustain your beliefs, you need there not to be. So you are certainly entangled.

I know you are a decent person, but you and I are poles apart in our own unique understandings of how we believe reality works. I'm at fault for ever daring to think we could possibly meet on a mental level of like minds ..but I was wrong, I make this mistake with people I chat to often, but I never give up hope in believing two people of opposite beliefs could ever understand each other. I try, but it's usually a waste of energy.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Mar 31, 2021 11:32 pmBut it's your own fault, I'm afraid. It's the product of choosing to believe things that are not even rationally sustainable.

Yeah of course someone of your belief would say something like that. I mean it's totally irrational to have a concern for the endless suffering and pain that sentient creatures endure. I should think about it more rationally shouldn't I ..yeah that'll fix it, if only I believed in God then I would know that all this pain and suffering is for a purpose, so it's really ok to justify it, because it's all going to be worth it.
Jesus is going to return and make it all go away and bring heaven to earth. Yeah, it's all my fault for ever thinking it is not ok for sentient creatures to suffer over and over again, because it's a rationally sustainable way to live because it's all God's will and plan.

So yeah, it's ok for the killing and slaughter to continue on and on, because the belief in God makes the whole thing rationally justified. After all, it's all God's creation, his plan, and his will, and his call to end it or allow it to continue. So we'll just keep pretending this is a very enjoyable experience and we should make more of ourselves so that they too will have to go through the exact same suffering and pain we went through. Seems like an excellent plan, lets worship that, yeah, great idea. And to hell with those people who do not think it's a good plan, all because they didn't get right with Jesus.

So yeah, don't get angry about anything, just enjoy and be happy, lets give a big thumbs up to suffering and pain. Lets all pretend we are having the time of our lives, it's such a wonderful gift and we should be grateful, suffering is good for us, stop complaining.


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The problem with belief structures, is that they cause an artificial division, causing a war of minds, a violent clash is inevitable, mental instabilty is born and passed on from generation to generation. There's is no way out of these self inflicted mental prisons.

Nonduality paved away out, but you don't believe in that belief. And I do not believe in a creator God. You are so sure you are right, even though I think you are wrong, and I am so sure I am right, even though you think I am wrong.

The mental battle continues. This is the dilemma with owning knowledge, we fight to preserve our own knowing.

Only the ones who have learnt to live in total solitude ( the only real reality that exists) are the ones who will endure the battle.