Idealism

Cyracuz: as George Carling said, "Inside every cynic is a dissappointed idealist."

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to any thinking individual, the universe as it exists, is merely the result of what happens when forces act, matter is affected, and life reacts, over an immense timeframe with no intelligent intervention.

out of chaos, via chance, comes the default result; masquerading as 'ordered chaos'.

[what is, simply is; therefore the only sensible course is to attempt to make it work - idealism! Idea

]

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As we are being capable of action, we have ideals. Economics follow a certain ideal; Perfect competition in economics does not exist, but it is an ideal that is very useful. Animals might not have ideals, but people certainly do (the sane ones).

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BoGoWo: But what was before what is? And what was before that? And before that? And before...

And don't say "It's turtles all the way down."

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Mills, all idealists are or will be disappointed. That is within the nature of the ideologies, and thus they will serve their purposes. But they have no other purpose than education of individuals to stand independantly. If you try to use your idealism as a ladder to climb the world you will either fall or push others to do so.

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Mills75 wrote:

BoGoWo: But what was before what is? And what was before that? And before that? And before..........

I see 'time' as a local phenomenon, there is no need for a beginning on the 'Ultiverse' scale, or even on the universe scale, nor must there be an end, it just 'is', was, and will be.

'Beginning' and 'end' are 'pedestrian' human limitations!

[the 'spaceframe' is an equally or 'more' interesting (and obvious) concept; why should space stop at the edge of our 'known' universe (how egocentric of us!), surely it occurs infinitely in all directions, or exists in some other way that we will never see.]

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Cyracuz wrote:

Mills, all idealists are or will be disappointed. That is within the nature of the ideologies, and thus they will serve their purposes.

True. But aren't all humans in the group that "are or will be disappointed"?

Not just idealists. Doesn't everyone eventually face disappointment?

Or am I such an idealist, it just seems like a natural state of affairs...

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Cyracuz wrote:

Mills, all idealists are or will be disappointed. That is within the nature of the ideologies, and thus they will serve their purposes.

True. But aren't almost all humans in the group that "are or will be disappointed"?

Not just idealists. Doesn't everyone eventually face disappointment?

human condition?

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Quote:

Not just idealists. Doesn't everyone eventually face disappointment?

Yes, we do. And then we adapt and move on, or we perish in our own misery. But I maintain that it is the idealist part of a human that enables this dissappointment. The part of us that makes predictions and wishes for the future, forming in a way a utopian blueprint of how you envision tomorrow. This is not something that we do conciously, so it is no ideology. But we do this for the same reason that we accept ideologies. Presets make us feel safer.

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I don't know...there's disappointment and there's DISAPPOINTMENT. We all experience disappointment, but do we all experience DISAPPOINTMENT? I'm not so sure we all do, and as for the idealist--it really would depend on the ideology involved.

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What is the difference between disappointment and DISAPPOINTMENT?
I think it's just the level of disappointment you're thinking about. Something I care that goes wrong is much more disappointing than somthing that was merely amusing. But it is the same feeling, only with varying intensity.

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Certainly they're of the same species, but one is of a degree that will only make you a little depressed for a discreet period of time while the other has the power to change your world outlook for the rest of your life; 'disappointment' is not getting what you want for Christmas, being shot down when you ask a beautiful woman out on a date, or perhaps not being accepted to what you think is the "right" college; 'DISAPPOINTMENT' is when you have, consciously or unconsciously, invested your faith in something important to the way you view the world (it's important to you personal ideology, in other words), and have that faith broken. It's finding out that the clergyman you've love, trusted, and looked to for spiritual guidance for years has been cheating on his wife and embezzling funds from the church; it's seeing all your ideological compadres sell out their ideals for BMWs and homes in the suburbs; when Malcolm X came to believe that the Honorable Elijah Muhammad had fathered children with several young women, that was 'DISAPPOINTMENT.'

Idealists can easily withstand 'disappointment' without losing their idealism ; it's 'DISAPPOINTMENT' that might break it. However, I'm not so certain every idealist suffers enough DISAPPOINTMENT, or of the right sort, to become disillusioned.

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I disagree. In order to feel this DISAPPOINTMENT and never recover you'd need an ego the size of jupiter. It is logical that if you get the setback after three years of hard work and after you have used all your efforts and assets, it stings a whole lot more than if you get it one month in.

You're talking levels of the same thing. Some people might break just because their husband leaves them. They may never recover, and live the rest of their lives like dried husks. It is called "stuck in a moment". Others give the husband the finger and roll up their sleves to take on the world alone.

The world works in a way that ensures that you will be tried in just the thing you need to in order to grow. The disappointment you are talking about is a refusal to take this callenge. It is not a justifying reason to sit down and weep. It is just cowardice.

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Cyracuz wrote:

.........The world works in a way that ensures that you will be tried in just the thing you need to in order to grow.............

my my, Cyracuz, what an 'evangelical' thought! [i'm disappointed..........]

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Cyracuz wrote:

I disagree. In order to feel this DISAPPOINTMENT and never recover you'd need an ego the size of jupiter. It is logical that if you get the setback after three years of hard work and after you have used all your efforts and assets, it stings a whole lot more than if you get it one month in.

You're talking levels of the same thing. Some people might break just because their husband leaves them. They may never recover, and live the rest of their lives like dried husks. It is called "stuck in a moment". Others give the husband the finger and roll up their sleves to take on the world alone.

The world works in a way that ensures that you will be tried in just the thing you need to in order to grow. The disappointment you are talking about is a refusal to take this callenge. It is not a justifying reason to sit down and weep. It is just cowardice.

We're talking about idealism and, more specifically to this tangent, what might cause an idealist to cease being an idealist. Nobody's arguing that people tend to stop functioning because of disappointment of varying degrees (though some do and for some of the psychological defects you mention), but that disappointment, if it's of a high enough degree and cuts to the heart of a person's world outlook, will permanently alter that person's world outlook. The woman whose husband left her would very probably be able to recover, but if she was deeply in love with her husband and trusted him completely, then she will not recover without psychological scars--she'll probably have major trust issues that will interfere with, though not necessarily prevent, the development of future romantic relationships. When the Christian loses his or her faith and becomes an atheist or an agnostic, that person will likely continue to function (for better or worse), but his or her world outlook has changed dramatically. The point isn't that people shut down when they suffer DISAPPOINTMENT, but that DISAPPOINTMENT is what has the power to shatter someone's idealism.

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Quote:

Cyracuz wrote:
.........The world works in a way that ensures that you will be tried in just the thing you need to in order to grow.............

my my, Cyracuz, what an 'evangelical' thought! [i'm disappointed..........]

What? The only evangelical aspect of this thought is your interpetation of it. Let me rephrase: Imagine putting equal strain on all parts of a muscle. The weakest parts will hurt first. Now imagine yourself to be this muscle and the world to be the "equal strain". To some it is a trial to talk to strangers, so each time a stranger approaches them they are faced with this trial. This would not be a trial to anyone who didn't have that inhibition.

Mills, I still say there is only one kind of disappointment and the variations thereof. Of course life leaves scars. One might even kill you, but dissapointment itself cannot kill you. It can rob you of all will to live though, so the difference is probably not that great.

You say in closing that dissappointment has the power to shatter someone's idealism. I say idealism is a disappointment waiting to happen. Then comes how you deal with it. That's all.

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