Destroy My Belief System, Please!

@cicerone imposter,

C.I.,, you use "normal" in a moral sense; I used it in a statistical sense. The "norm" can refer to both the mores or the prevalent practices in a society.
By the way, would you agree that wars are mainly the result of both political disagreements and economic-financial ambitions (not to mention ignorance)--under the guise of "freedom"?

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@JLNobody,

Both definition applies. Political and economic are human classes, but the ultimate human events are normal.

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@cicerone imposter,

Quote:

Those human organizations are full of pitfalls and unequal treatment. How can they be "normal?" Humans are not in a position to be the judge and jury of other humans. Wars are the result of political disagreements that ends up killing millions of innocent people - all under the guise of "justice."

yes, and all of life including animal, plant, bacteria, is full of pitfalls and unequal treatment. predators kill. natural disasters kill. the universe is full of life killing itself and giving itself more life, constantly.

if you want to pick and choose about how life should operate, then you can go on endlessly. these people should have lived, these people should have died. yes it is true human consciousness has a unique ability to be kind and caring, and TRY to aim for things like world peace etc. but the idea that we should definitely be able to achieve that is naive. humans just want only positivity, eternal happiness, eternal peace, eternal life, no death, no pain, etc. this is just not the way life works. positivity and negativity always balance out ultimately, that's life.

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@carnaticmystery,

I agree.

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@carnaticmystery,

Ok...but there is such a thing as the food chain when it comes down to human individuals. It is based on power. And yes, there are climatic events and disasters that can affect us all, but we are all at the mercy of our legal system. I was recently reading an article on a website about mugshots, inc. Apparently these people resort to extortion and ruin peoples lives...and it is legal. They can post a mugshot (DUI, domestic altercation, etc). They can post a mugshots, .numerous on different sites, even if you are not convicted, if you haven't the money to pay for them to take the negative info down, the info will be on the internet forever. Even after being acquitted, or having charges expunged, these sites post arrests but NOT disposition of cases. Only the people with financial resources will be released of their torment. So money puts you at the top of the food chain. Even if the case gets thrown out of court, no money means you're screwed. Some states are in the process of revising laws concerning this matter. So much for living in the free world.

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@Germlat,

Quote:

Ok...but there is such a thing as the food chain when it comes down to human individuals. It is based on power. And yes, there are climatic events and disasters that can affect us all, but we are all at the mercy of our legal system.

yes, it is all part of naturality. the legal system is part of us, created by us, by people exactly like you or me, just doing the best they could.

Quote:

I was recently reading an article on a website about mugshots, inc. Apparently these people resort to extortion and ruin peoples lives...and it is legal. They can post a mugshot (DUI, domestic altercation, etc). They can post a mugshots, .numerous on different sites, even if you are not convicted, if you haven't the money to pay for them to take the negative info down, the info will be on the internet forever. Even after being acquitted, or having charges expunged, these sites post arrests but NOT disposition of cases. Only the people with financial resources will be released of their torment. So money puts you at the top of the food chain. Even if the case gets thrown out of court, no money means you're screwed. Some states are in the process of revising laws concerning this matter. So much for living in the free world.

yes ok? how does all that happen? some people want to ruin other people's lives. why? to get money or this or that. or just pure hatred, people kill each other all over the place. why does any of it happen? because people are people. the same as you or me. the same process which makes you angry at a person, but not quite enough to kill them, is the reason for any killings in the world. those circumstances just happened to be a bit worse than yours.

i am not condoning negativity in any way. obviously try and avoid it if possible. but having an expectation of eternal happiness is the only problem with talking about all this negativity. if you really look at the world, there is plenty of happiness and positivity also. the reality is they will always be coexistent.

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@carnaticmystery,

I agree to a certain point. There are the haves and the have nots. Life will never be fair. If a person expects that, or to always be happy, then that person will always be dissatisfied and disappointed . Change is something we can always expect. But, it is important to stand up for fairness and help those with less advantages. After all, that person could be anyone of us, and personal circumstances can change at any point in our lives. That may sound naive to many who discard what's "fair and just", and opt for the mentality of survival of the fittest. I have seen wealthy people go broke, healthy become sick, beautiful turn unattractive , young turn old, intelligent people loose mental capacity...its part of life.

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@Germlat,

But a kind of general equanimity and even joy can be maintained if we accept things as they are. One can work to change injustices, cure diseases, alleviate the woes of poverty yet accept Reality (especially its impermance and suffering) as it is. This is the best we can do. Unification (or realization of one's extant unity) with Reality is an aspect of complete acceptance.

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@JLNobody,

Yeah but...reality can be self-generated . So can be obstacles... Watch out !

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@JLNobody,

JLNobody wrote:

But a kind of general equanimity and even joy can be maintained if we accept things as they are. One can work to change injustices, cure diseases, alleviate the woes of poverty yet accept Reality (especially its impermance and suffering) as it is. This is the best we can do. Unification (or realization of one's extant unity) with Reality is an aspect of complete acceptance.

This is one of the best, most cogent comments I ever read of yours, JL. Thanks for it.

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@JLNobody,

JLN, I don't think we should "just" accept suffering. We should assist those who are suffering through our contributions to charities and other ways by volunteering to improve their lives - balanced against reasonableness (as we perceive it), and try to ease their pain.

My nephew is a doctor, and he goes to third world countries in Asia to train doctors. He was in Bhutan in January through March of this year to train doctors at his own expense.

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@cicerone imposter,

Quote:

JLN, I don't think we should "just" accept suffering.

Good point. In other words, while accepting the world as it is can be soothing, it can also become "fatalist", and work against one's capacity to say "no" to things, to revolt, to shape reality rather than just accept it as it is. Fatalism is consistent with the idea that there is no agency, everything is predetermined and we can't change naught.

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@cicerone imposter,

I'm using this notion of "acceptance with reference to a non-fatalistic adjustment to what is in the sense of the past as it has produced the present, a rejection of denialism. Your nephew's sacrifices for the sake of others is an attampt to alter the future. (as it will affect the "not yet present"). His efforts can benefit from a knowledge of history, meaning an acceptance rather than a denial of what has happened in the past. We have no "freedom" to alter the past as a reality. As I understand the term, "revisionism," it refers to the deliberate distortion of "evidence" of the past. What I am referring to is acceptance of the past, but not acceptance of the not yet existing future, which may be considered an area of essential freedom or potentiality.There we are fundamentally free to influence, if not totally shape "the future" That is what your nephew is attempting to do. "Fatalism" is a pre-deterministic acceptance of the future not the past.

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@JLNobody,

I challenge you to find an individual who accepts fatalism as a norm. Nobody does. There are some however, who believe those who experience misfortune must deserve it...it's said in different terms, but the outcome is the same.

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@JLNobody,

You wrote,

Quote:

non-fatalistic adjustment

as if it has some insight into life experience. All life is neutral when born; it doesn't know much of their environment, but realizes when its hungry. That's a biological reaction for all animal forms; no food equals hunger pangs.

Most acclimate to their environment - no matter how harsh it may be. Look at those folks who live in places where it freezes over most of the year, and stays dark several months out of the year. They acclimate.

Anyone who visits there from a different climate will react, because they're not acclimated to that kind of environment. Some will not be able to bear staying there for any period of time. Some may even go crazy.

That's because human experience is subjective, and it's impossible to foretell how anyone will react by changing their environment.

Non-fatalistic adjustment just doesn't make any sense from the perspective of any individual's perception of life.

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@cicerone imposter,

We are experiencing a failure to communicate.

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@JLNobody,

Yes, but the past is what determines what the individual will do in his/her future.
We all understand what's past is past; we cannot control the past.
Climate change is but one example of how any person will react in the future.

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@JLNobody,

If I may, a person who believes in free will or agency can deplore fatalism, but if you don't believe in human agency, if you can't be an agent of change, what's wrong with fatalism?

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@Fil Albuquerque,

I prefer irrational conversations.

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@Olivier5,

I don't believe in "free will" or agency because I do not believe in the existence or reality of ego-selves as substances. But I also do not accept the attitude of fatalism because change happens constantly without "agents" bringing it about. "I" bring about change and "I" am changing constantly, but keep in mind that this sentence, dependent as it is on the subject-predicate grammatical structure is not evidence for the reality of dualism. I reject fatalism because of it's ontological absurdity as I noted above in my discussion about the nature of the future.

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