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Nothing Exists

The Sum of Awe

Brought to you by the moment that spacetime began.
Grr... No comment.

I guess in other words, I don't know what to reply. If I think of something later I'll reply.
 

idav

Being
Premium Member

I hate when people always talk about good and evil, how to make everyone happy... It's not going to work, the closest we can get is just not being unhappy, though even that isn't happiness, rather it is only possible by not having thoughts on things, equilibrium.
Perhaps being apathetic makes one happy. Hard to say what it takes for someone to be happy. One thing to consider is not making people miserable and we are very familiar with what pain and misery is. I would consider intentionally making someone miserable to be evil whatever their version of misery might be.
 

idav

Being
Premium Member
You do agree that your perception that it is not objectively real is subjective itself. :p

It's just like saying "No one is right" it is hypocritical.
There is a right answer but the objective isn't usually agreed upon. If my objective is to annoy as many people as possible there would certainly be a right and wrong ways to go about it. However is annoying people right or wrong?
 

Requiem

Lurker
There is a right answer but the objective isn't usually agreed upon. If my objective is to annoy as many people as possible there would certainly be a right and wrong ways to go about it. However is annoying people right or wrong?

I used objective as a counterpart to subjective, not as a meaning for goal.
Please read more carefully.

Regardless, answering your question, it is either one depending on who is interpreting as it is always dependent of subjectivism.
 
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idav

Being
Premium Member
I used objective as a counterpart to subjective, not as a meaning for goal.
Please read more carefully.
I know that but what I am saying is that the goal has to do with whether something is objectively true. I guess 'objective' was bad word to use. hehe
Regardless, answering your question, it is either one depending on who is interpreting as it is always dependent of subjectivism.
Yes it seems it always comes down to it being subjective. There is always some presumption that has to be made and everything is either true or not as long as the premise is true. Like defining happiness and then using objective truths to reach this definition of happiness.
 

ManTimeForgot

Temporally Challenged
Fact 1: It is not possible to ever leave Plato's Cave. You can only ever move into a larger Cave.

Contingent Fact 1: It is beneficial to move into a "larger Cave" as it means your perspective is enhanced by the greater field of view. Being able to take in more information is better than being ignorant.

Fact 2: Subjectivity is not the same as Relativity. Just because something is contingent upon perception does Not mean that it is also indiscriminate or unable to be understood without being a function of something else.

Contingent Fact 2: It is detrimental to focus entirely on the subjective nature of your existence to the point of precluding meaningful interaction with your surrounding world. Sollipsism fails for a reason. It is one thing to say that you live in a completely subjective world where we have no knowledge of the underlying objective reality; it is quite another to actually try to live as though you do.

Fact 3: Humans existed in groups of roughly 15-50 in size (A Band) for far longer than humans have used any other social organization system.

Contingent Fact 3: Humans are more satisfied when conditions approach that of the Band. We find things which look natural or remind us of important portions of nature more appealing than those which do not. We are more moral in our behavior when we know everyone else's names and cannot dehumanize them.

Fact 4: Humans have traits held in common many of which are instinctual or non-conscious in nature.

Contingent Fact 4: The shared nature of human learning behavior (up to a certain age); drives for reproduction; drives for pleasure mean it is not impossible to make everyone happy. Society is currently too complex and possesses too many institutions and traditions designed to specifically deprive people of choices, pleasure, reproduction, and learning in order for all people to be happy.


The world around us is indeed an exercise in probabilities. Most of us only ever process this at a subconscious level. To even the most rational of minds i suspect it would be best viewed as a waste of time to process the probability of gravity suddenly failing at each step forward on a conscious level... But it is certainly demonstrable that taking into account the likelihood of many events leads to better achieving one's goals and satisfying the human drives.

But concluding that "Nothing Exists" or that all belief systems are just a house of cards (absolute nihilism) fails miserably. "Nothing Exists" is apriori false. If one were to conclude that "Something exists but we have no direct knowledge of any thing" then you would not have strayed. Nothing is an impossibility. The absolute version of the statement "Nothing exists" portends the possibility of a complete lack of everything. This is pure nonsense. We can't even comprehend nothing; our brain's architecture is not designed to handle infinities; and an infinite lack of qualities just doesn't correlate with anything we have ever experienced. The definite or limited version of the statement "Nothing exists" portends that there are no real things and no reality to support any things should there be some impetus for their becoming real. I apologize if that statement comes across as clunky, but it is pretty much impossible to successfully describe impossibilities. If Nothing is real, then what is being communicated; who are you communicating with, etc?

Supposing that all belief systems are merely a "house of cards" and then going on to act accordingly is problematic not because the supposition that all beliefs are ultimately impossible to prove beyond all doubt, but because acting upon infinite doubt is catastrophic to one's ability to interact meaningfully with anything including yourself.

To use a comprehensible analogy: Set 0 = A where A is any other single number in the number system. This action completely destroys any and all possible value in your number system. You basically end up setting everything equal to zero (aka everything is Nothing).

What this shows is that Either: There is Nothing (no possibility, not one shred of quality anywhere and everywhere) or Something exists (and consequently nothing is impossible) & Acting as though you have a zero value when you do not in fact have a zero value means that you cannot interact with anything else with a non-zero value without failure of some kind.

Try to act as thought the wall in front of you does not exist and you will inevitably smack into the wall when you try to walk forward. Try to act as though you do not have a sex drive and you develop all sorts of neuroses. Try to act as though other people lack sex drives and you will foment the formation of frustrations, resentment, etc in the people around you.


In point of fact the single greatest mistake you can make in life is to try and convince other people you are not playing any more. You can do things which are obviously cheating or act like the rules are very different than they actually are and still be forgiven (or forgiven eventually in the case of some crimes), but ignoring everything and pretending as though there were nothing and people will stop interacting with you.



On a personal note: I find absolute morality to be far more stable and rewarding than moral relativism. Ethical relativism is fine, but I have not one shred of a clue how someone can try to act as though the principles they use vary based upon circumstances (or perhaps time of day? mood?). Meta-ethical moral relativism; the supposition that morality is too complex to successfully derive long term stable principles which can satisfy a large number or all people is fine. We obviously haven't managed such a thing.

But I have always found that when someone says something is not possible and they are not talking about a logical impossibility (i.e. something derived from contradiction), then inevitably they turn out to be wrong. History is full of people making claims about how humans reached the pinnacle of knowledge or capability or how something couldn't possibly ever be accomplished. In almost every case these people turned out to be lacking one crucially important quality: Imagination.


MTF
 
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Otherright

Otherright
Nobody can be evil, evil doesn't exist, only things that are less happy than another, but even that is subjective. It seems that everything is subjective. There is an objective reality, but it seems that we are living in a dream, and that dream is subjectivity. Subjectivity is the house, objectivity is the world, and we're all living in the house.

Sight is even subjective. The colours we see are just part of the human eye view at the light spectrum, non-humans that can see beyond black and white probably see things in different colour, some may have similar sight, but still it isn't objective.

Emotion, good and evil, perspective, sight, sometimes sound, etc. It's all just in our mind, how our mind interprets it. Yes, there is an objective reality, but basically our subjective mind hides us from it.


I hate when people always talk about good and evil, how to make everyone happy... It's not going to work, the closest we can get is just not being unhappy, though even that isn't happiness, rather it is only possible by not having thoughts on things, equilibrium.

Sum, for a 15 year old, your an incredibly intelligent young man. There is a lot of thought and wisdom in your ideas. But, evil and happiness aren't correlatives. You can't posit that evil doesn't exist because of levels of happiness. You will learn in your life that evil does exist.
 

The Sum of Awe

Brought to you by the moment that spacetime began.
Sum, for a 15 year old, your an incredibly intelligent young man. There is a lot of thought and wisdom in your ideas. But, evil and happiness aren't correlatives. You can't posit that evil doesn't exist because of levels of happiness. You will learn in your life that evil does exist.

Thanks. :D


Subjectively, evil does exist though, but objectively it just determines on one's perspective whether it exists or not.
 

Gjallarhorn

N'yog-Sothep
Thanks. :D


Subjectively, evil does exist though, but objectively it just determines on one's perspective whether it exists or not.
You pretty much just said "Objectively, evil only exists subjectively". Not really worth the effort to say...

Why do you never include good in your "doesn't exist" bit?
 
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