Pointlessness

>>17399251
yes

Does it matter?

>>17399251

ultimately, whether or not life has meaning is irrelevant. people who believe life has meaning can chase that idea to the end of time and not notice. others can never question if it has meaning but rather whether or not their life has a purpose, and its better than the alternative: death. others believe life has no meaning and take that as an excuse simply to do whatever they want. others interpret that as some sort of meaning.

the basic idea of existnetialism is that the universe itself is random, we are random, and therefore life has no meaning. there was no intent, so there is no goal.

however, as beings who can choose we can give our lives meaning. we cannot control the random acts of an indifferent universe, but we can control how we respond to them. we may not always have a good choice, but we do have a choice, and it is those choices that give our lives meaning.

a man may want to go to war to defend his country, and be a small part of a big purpose. or he can stay home to take care of his elderly ill mother, and be a big part of a small purpose.

which one is the meaningful one? neither. or rather, both. once he makes a choice he makes it for reasons he decide are good and just, and that gives his life meaning.


others subscribe to a less philisophical but more spiritual approach, wherein there is a sense of 'destiny' but rather than it being a single moment we build up to, it is the amalgamation of our entire lives. they believe we are born with a sort of 'spiritual blue print' that we are meant to try and fulfill.

perhaps discovering the 'meaning of life' is part of that. considering how varied life is, the meaning can be different for everyone. ultimately if you feel your life has meaning, even if only to yourself, does it matter what true answers await?

at the end of the day, the most logical thing I ever heard was here on 4chan, some quote on top of a picture of calvin and hobbes.

>you are the universe experiencing itself'.

>>17399283

>a man may want to go to war to defend his country, and be a small part of a big purpose. or he can stay home to take care of his elderly ill mother, and be a big part of a small purpose. which one is the meaningful one?

Best thing I have read today. Thank you for that. :)

Got some tips for reading material?

>>17399309

i hate to sound really shallow and ignorant but 95% of my understanding of existentialism comes from television and reviews of television. namely buffy the vampire slayer.

the other ten percent comes from crash course philosophy.

truth is, most any book on existentialism will point you in the right direction.

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>>17399251
can you point me to a teleological argument that isn't shit? life doesn't seem to have some ultimate goal to reach, or even a goal at all. if you want to do something though, you can make some psychological worth out of doing that thing. that's all the more you really need to say there is "meaning", and i think that's what most people are thinking of when they talk about meaning.
>the real meaning of life is pic related

>>17399309

episode 16 had the example:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YaDvRdLMkHs&index=16&list=PL8dPuuaLjXtNgK6MZucdYldNkMybYIHKR

but a lot of my understanding from existnetialism is from this particular episode of a buffy the vampire slayer review series:

https://youtu.be/eSgvBs8xXXM?t=515

specific time chosen for a reason

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>>17399251
No but that's not a bad thing

>>17399339

you'd have to define 'shit'. without a definition you could present any argument and you could simply say 'nah thats shit'.

What do you mean by meaning? Do you mean like a task we all are meant to do? Or do you mean like if our existence matters?

>>17399347
one that makes any amount of sense and isn't a desperate cloying defense of "my life is meaningful, i swear it is". most, if not all teleological arguments are just an appeal to belief, or a naturalistic fallacy and are rarely worth considering.

Yes, but only whatever meaning you as the observer give to it. The very meaninglessness of life forces man to create his own meaning. Children begin life with an untarnished sense of wonder, a capacity to experience total joy at something as simple as the greenness of a leaf; but as they grow older, the awareness of death and decay begins to impinge on their consciousness and subtly erode their joie de vivre, their idealism — and their assumption of immortality. As a child matures, he sees death and pain everywhere about him, and begins to lose faith in the ultimate goodness of man. But, if he’s reasonably strong — and lucky — he can emerge from this twilight of the soul into a rebirth of life’s elan. Both because of and in spite of his awareness of the meaninglessness of life, he can forge a fresh sense of purpose and affirmation. He may not recapture the same pure sense of wonder he was born with, but he can shape something far more enduring and sustaining. The most terrifying fact about the universe is not that it is hostile but that it is indifferent; but if we can come to terms with this indifference and accept the challenges of life within the boundaries of death — however mutable man may be able to make them — our existence as a species can have genuine meaning and fulfillment. However vast the darkness, we must supply our own light.

>>17399359

well yeah, the idea behind them is that belief is what gives your life meaning.

but again, all you've done is say
>i can call anything shit'

without actually defining what shit is. instead you replaced it with other words like 'desperate'. what defines desperate?

see the issue here. you have, based on your own belief, negated literally any argument. your question itself wasn't even a question. it was rhetorical.

>>17399251
only that which you give it

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>>17399368
want me to just post the fucking dictionary for you faggot? you know that if i sat down and defined every word to maximum efficaciousness, you wouldn't have time in your entire life to read it, nor would i have time to write it. but if you read my post with any amount of sense, or care, you could see I would like to see a teleological argument that avoids appeals to belief and the naturalistic fallacy. I'm not responsible for interpreting my comments to you twice. you know exactly what desperate means in this context, stop trying to make an issue where there is none to seem cool on the internet. you may think you're helping the dialogue, but look at this rant i've had to go on to explain that you're a moron kicking the can down road with this "you need to define everything so matter-of-factly that even a mentally retarded person could get it" bullshit, just so you wont do it again in the future. but you probably will anyways. listen, i get that you think you're doing people a service, but there's an obvious interpretation of what i've said, and you not taking it is either you being fucking retarded or so ignorant of common discourse that you genuinely are not worth taking to.

>>17399405

lol.

seriously though, why are you so mad?

i simply asked you to define the parameters of your question. you asked for arguments that werent rooted in belief, so i asked for definitions that werent.

its like when a feminist says 'were going to end sexism!!1!'

What are the parameters. you, like them, have left the definition vague enough that so long as you want to feel the way you feel, you can dismiss any argument and feel right.

i got what you wanted, but asked you to give a strict definition. replacing 'shit' with 'desperate' doesn't actually define it. because you are the one choosing what is desperate, not logic.

its awfully egotistical of yourself, wouldn't you agree?

No, we are an arrangement of rather complex molecules that by something close to a miracle manages to self-replicate from other molecules in their environment. This in itself I think is pretty neat so there's that to live for.

>>17399283
>as beings who can choose
Objectively and factually wrong

>I can determine the way molecules which are 100% controlled by physical, measurable laws in my brain move
It would make you nothing short of God

>>17399430

ur right, you didnt choose to write any of that. ur just a pawn to your molecules. great science there buddy.

>>17399424
Yea, life is pretty amazing if you think about it in detail

>>17399430

ur not dumb. but your molecules are.

>>17399417
I'm just a latently angry person, can't help it, and don't want to. the type of argument im looking for has been said twice now, but since you're too dumb to root it out, ill say it again, in the most clear way possible. I am asking for a teleological argument that avoids the naturalistic fallacy, and any appeal to belief. after those criteria have been met, i wouldn't mind assessing the argument further. it's not that i've left the parameters vague to discredit as much as possible, but to give the best chance of including as many arguments as possible.

do you get it yet? you can read my last two posts and see that exact verbiage two times. this makes a third, and the end of my patience to deal with you. it's like talking to a fucking middle schooler who thinks they are the smartest nigga to ever walk the halls of their school. either come up with some meaningful critique that holds any amount of content or fuck off kiddo.

>>17399433
i mean, determinism is a thing. im not saying it's right, but he seems to prescribe to it. maybe refute the philosophical idea of hard determinism instead of just saying "nice science, bud".

>>17399443

except how you still grant yourself the ability to say 'nah thats shit' or 'nah thats desperate'.

you've made it, again, so that you could dismiss literally any argument that could be made, simply because its not math.

yet you insist that it is me who 'doesnt get it'. the fact that you feel the need to result to name calling shows how bugged you were when called out on your ego centric approach to debate. you have crowned yourself king of the 'shit' you don't subscribe to. a judge jury and executioner who insists that an argument must betray itself in order to be true.

you are asking for math in philosophy.

>>17399452

why refuse the philosophy when the science itself is irrelevant.

the arguments of existentialism all hinge on the belief that we are beings of choice. if he wants to believe that we are randomly discussing whether or not we can have choice, both of us 'choosing' different sides, then its all irrelevant.

what you are asking is for allah to disprove jesus. two ideas that hinge entirely on what you believe, and the supposed irony that netiher of us actually chose this.

our molecules accidentally disagree.

>>17399344

Cheers, mate. :)

>>17399251
No that's why we should be able do whatever the fuck we want.

>>17399477

hope it helped and opens some ideas for you. theres a lot of information you can get from there just search around for what you are interested in. most any book will do as this video kinda proves.

>>17399459
oh, i get it now. you're a fucking moron. got it. you're assuming things i've never said in this exchange, and offering such a discharitable reading of what i've said that it's like you're reading something else entirely. i'm not asking for a mathematical proof in teleological form, im asking for a teleological argument that meets some base requirements.
fucking christ dude, you've just completely misrepresented everything i've said, in such a backasswards way, i can't really believe it. it's so genuinely different from what ive actually said, that i have to think you're just trolling me at this point. or that i am right, and you really are that fucking stupid.
as for the name calling, that's just how i show i love you bb, don't take it so personally or you might think i hate you.

>>17399509

>how dare you pick up what i drop

top kek anon

>>17399486
Wrong.
We are social cooperative animals.

You must act within the generally accepted rules, written or unwritten, or you alienate yourself and possibly even bring on punishment from the others.

Both very psychologically damaging and life destroying.

Existentialist thinking creates more reasons to live a balanced life than it does reasons to just fuck and do lines of coke all day. Very shallow foolish thinking.

>>17399474
The philosophy is irrelevant, the science isn't. On a fundamental level every single molecule in your body is ruled by strict laws. Just because it's too complex to predict doesn't mean it becomes something magical. If you roll a trillion dices you don't have an entity that can come up with a random number, you just added enough complexity to lose predictability.

>>17399541
well, in quantum mechanics, there is a fundamental, underlying uncertainty to everything. so to say that it is completely determined seems wrong. At most, we can make probabilistic statements about reality and post hoc analyze them.

>>17399541

to consider 'choice' something magical in an argument about how irrelevant science is is a bit ironic, wouldn't you say?

while im not denying that these molecules dictate how we think, it doesn't dictate what we think. these laws that govern the way our brains work still allow us to decide our actual reaction to what is happening.

if you don't want ot believe that, you don't have to, but the irony is certainly heightened by the fact that we 'chose' (or in your example 'forced into') our different opinions (if they can be called that in your science).

>>17399555
Not being able to perceive something doesnt make it uncertain. It blew our minds because now suddenly shit can exist in multiple places as once. Something far beyond our evolution and common sense would ever let us see and truly understand.

Its still all part of a system that is extremely rational on the greater scale.

>>17399556
it isn't even ironic. and it won't be no matter how many times you say it is. To be aware that you don't have a choice in how, or what, we think, it is not, then, ironic to have that thought. you were just bound to have that thought, regardless. plus he said, very specifically, that choice is not magical, but that it can be so complex as to lose predictability. your reading comprehension is pretty low m8. try reading things a few times, and try to understand what is being said, instead of just posting. can you do that for the rest of us? try being a socially complicit animal, k?

>>17399556
You should neurology a bit more.

Our brains love shortcuts and higher thinking and free will are complex, tiring and therefore slow systems.

It would rather just react according to your personality, which is entirely pre wired by both genetics and experiences.

Even though, ill give it to yoy, its possible to make a decision to entirely bypass your personality and do something different, it would take the focus, concentration, and will power of the greatest monk that never lived.

If it was an easy thing to do, noone would have "personalities". Wed all just react in the most ideologized way to everything on a situational basis and have no consistency. Youd literally never make the same mistake twice and youd eliminate any and all bad habits with the snap of a finger.

>>17399561
im not talking about quantum entanglement. that is a single component of pretty much every interpretation of quantum mechanics. I'm talking about the principle of uncertainty, specifically in relation to the numerous, varied, and extremely complex, double slit experiments, that cast a doubt on how we interpret macro reality. there is plenty of info out there, which it sounds like you could bare to have a look at.

As an agnostic, I can't definitely answer the question. Yet it's safe to say that giving your life a meaning yourself is a good start.
Never stop learning, always keep aware and influence the world in a positive way. Be someone people can look up to.

I always thought its all about giving your best and you'll get something out of it. Right now I think its all shit. I just hope I'll make good money after college to live on drugs and hookers till I die on overdose or some shit.

>>17399586

>it isnt even ironic

ti is ironic, and no matter how many times you say it isn't, it is. to claim you have no control over what you believe or even do, while making choices about and discussing it is extremely ironic. using the word 'magical' to describe choice is exactly what was done in that post. because you are claiming choice simply doesn't exist unless it is magical. otherwise its just pre determined. the fact that you cant understand your own post is hilarious.

but sure, im the dumbass.

>>17399587
>you should study neurology
>here is a claim
>but no evidence or studies

tell us then how you know it would take the highest trained monk to do this.

>if it was easy to 'choose' no one would have 'personalities'

on the contrary, our personalities are made up by the choices we make. yes it can be reciprocated with our personality influencing our choices as well. but to say only one determines the other shows a complete lack in understanding of basic human psychology, let alone neurology.

>>17399604
Quantum entanglement is not one thing existing in two places at once. Its two things synchronized across seemingly limitless distances. So i think its you who needs to read a bit more...

Also its been obvious to scientists forever that reality isnt what we perceive, which is what i was getting at.. Everything has always been uncertain. Its why we invented the scientific method (in what? The middle east over a thousand years ago?) knowing that nothing is just as it is and we need to keep asking questions and experiment and confirm our findings, and knowing that we still know shit all.

Quantum mechanics did not introduce to us that things are uncertain. Its just the new frontier.

>>17399615
the nigga is saying that choice doesn't exist. it really is like talking to someone who is reading a completely different post. you need to just fucking read what was written and interpret that, not what you want it to say, or what you need it say to make your point. seriously, consider being less retarded.

>>17399251
my spiritual side wants to say yes. as for the side of me that wants to say no, I can't tell if it's my logical side, or if it's the depression talking. or maybe my logical side is just being ruthlessly honest and the answer is making me more depressed.

obviously if life doesn't have meaning, then you can give it one. it can be whatever you decide it should be. I could never decide. could never find one that felt genuine.

>>17399620
yeah, re-read your post. i fucked up, my b senpai. i don't really disagree with you, i just misread it. this is a formal redacting of the post you replied to

nope
babbys first touch with nihilism
now go full hedonist and fuck up a lot
then its back to nihilism but with not much despair

I think it has the meaning we ascribe to it, which is to say your life is meaningless if you think that's the case. Kind of a tautology, but I think it's true.

>>17399615
>monk

First off i meant what i said when i said that 'never' lived. Meditation is empirically proven to enlarge the pre frontal cortex and help with self control and emotion control. It is one of the best ways to strengthen your free will and always choose your feelings and actions. Even then youre somewhat a slave to your neurology.

>personality

Is defined by a "consistent set of traits" as in repeated over and over again. You have habits, good and bad, and you have reactions. Sometimes things look fun to you and you try it and hate it.

Sometimes you do something wrong, maybe gossip or whatever you can think of, and you say "jeez, that didnt turn out. I should never do that again." and yet the next day youre at it again.

Again ill repeat you 'have' choice but its not as strong a system as you like to think. You dont carefully craft your sentences and conversation when in a live chat situation, you drive pretty much subconsciously, you are annoyed by things and hate things you know damn well you shouldnt be annoyed by or hate, and yet day after day these traits continue.

Your "willpower" is your ability to override that. It is very difficult to keep it going.
Youll mostly default to repeated behaviour, personality change if you can bring it about will be slow and gradual, and you will never be perfect and always have traits you dont like.

Ill repeat, if choice was so strong and important, youd start living as your complete ideal self immediately with zero struggle or determination.

>>17399630
Nah problem friend.
It happens. Things get heated.

The better question to ask yourself is why this question is so timeless. What draws people to the state of mind where they seek to derive some innate meaning from their existence? Why is it that all who live and have lived seek refuge in the comfort of greater purpose and assigned meaningfulness to be imposed upon their lives? Why do people hate freedom so much?

>>17399681
Life hasn't changed since it's conception, nor has this question, and nor have it's answers.

The question has never been important. The only important thing is why we bother asking it.

Unless you plan on writing books on philosophy, there is no reason to pursue an answer to this question. Nobody will give you your answer, only theirs.