| What is most important to talk or think about?
Posted: 4/16/2009 1:54:38 PM | Vancer wrote:
Lets talk about the ultimate path of least resistance for everything.
I am tired and stressed out so much recently.
I need an option for everything to be set on automatic soon. But if it was, how would you know? Would you let yourself stop running in the hamster wheel long enough to find if all the running was still necessary or not? Is the running for the sake of the wheel really, or for you? Don't let yourself burn out -- too much stress has horrid consequences.
PullMyTrigger wrote:
Isn't improving the quality correlating to improving the duration? If you want to have a really good time, you could get wasted and high on drugs, but burn out abruptly. Your definition of a *good* life and my definition of it are worlds apart! That's part of what makes it difficult to make choices that others experience as being supportive rather than destructive. A good life isn't just about being high, it's (to me) about becoming who you are: tuning in, not tuning out. Maybe, anyway. | |
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| What is most important to talk or think about?
Posted: 4/16/2009 2:00:02 PM | Preserving our mother earth. Without her everything dies.
The natives died out on Easter Island when the last tree was cut down.
Are the rest of us going to be that stupid too? | |
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| What is most important to talk or think about?
Posted: 4/16/2009 2:05:30 PM |
Preserving our mother earth. Without her everything dies.
Right. It's one of the most important things, but the problem is people are so selfish, they say "why should I sacrifice for the future?" So in some ways we need to deal with selfishness so things like the ecological crisis can be dealt with. But I am in agreement with it -- it is one of the most important things we need to work on! | |
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| What is most important to talk or think about?
Posted: 4/16/2009 2:19:43 PM | doctorwhofan wrote:
the problem is people are so selfish
Why are people "selfish", I wonder. What does that even mean?
Anything that you do, the motivation/energy to do it comes from you, so whether you get a kick out of helping others or out of kicking them, it's "selfish" either way. It seems like what we commonly think of as "selfishness" is more like a tendency to take rather than give. Is that through habit/conditioning or feeling/instinct. Are people takers through fear or through the default behaviour that comes from simple thoughtlessness? Or something else? Wondering.. | |
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| What is most important to talk or think about?
Posted: 4/16/2009 2:27:34 PM | Rune
So many aspects of your answer are illogical. Let's go through them quickly (it could be done in more depth)
Anything that you do, the motivation/energy to do it comes from you, so whether you get a kick out of helping others or out of kicking them, it's "selfish" either way.
If it comes from you therefore it is selfish? That doesn't make sense. What does it mean to be selfish? It is to be focused on oneself at the expense of others. If the motivation came from yourself, it doesn't mean the focus is on the self. One can be motivated to "die to the self" for the sake of others, and if it comes from the self itself, so be it. However, the idea that the "motivation" comes from "yourself" is questionable, just as the notion of any "self" to have energy come from. Both are questionable and need to be shown. Anatman suggests we reify the notion of the self which doesn't exist, and so try to establish something which ultimately does not pervade, and selfishness is the attempt to make it pervade at the expense of others, causing suffering to others and even, in the long run, to that which is trying to reify a self.
It seems like what we commonly think of as "selfishness" is more like a tendency to take rather than give
It's better to say that it is the attempt to create a self, reify it, and keep it when it doesn't exist. And it is the focus on this self which doesn't exist (whether or not there is a real self) which causes selfishness. It's the prison of a false sense of self which doesn't realize the interdependent nature of reality, and reifies a point as closed, when fundamentally, it should be open.
Is that through habit/conditioning or feeling/instinct Are these supposed to be two different options? | |
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| What is most important to talk or think about?
Posted: 4/16/2009 3:12:41 PM | "Mother Earth" is so much bigger than we all think. Mother earth has survived for millions of years and (geologically speaking) the little burp that humans may or may not have caused is so insignificant that it is hardly worth mentioning.
From an alarmist point of view, humans have been the most devastating thing that has ever happened to mother earth, when the truth is that natural events are much more devastating than anything we do. It has been said that every time a volcano erupts that it spews forth more contaminating material than all of human civilization can create in a year. Well volcanos erupt several times every year.
Mother earth always has and always will cleanse itself, we are not the problem. The problem lies with the special interest groups that want to profit by placing guilt on us. | |
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| What is most important to talk or think about?
Posted: 4/16/2009 6:50:10 PM | It is true that Easter Island became uninhabited AFTER the last tree was cut down (the other way around would be logically impossible, since only humans can cut down trees), but the causation may not be there, only a chronological order.
There are too many alternatives to explain the treelessness and the peoplelessness on that island. We must not allow ourselves to drive into foregone conclusions without a helmet, without having a seat belt on and without a supply of aspirin. If we do, it will hurt. | |
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| What is most important to talk or think about?
Posted: 4/17/2009 3:41:27 PM | "The problem lies with the special interest groups that want to profit by placing guilt on us."
Roverdisk, I agree with you wholeheartedly. It is a scaremongering tactic of some people or some organization that may not even have a human will behind it.
I have been saying the same thing to all my friends and enemies. I don't think the paradigm is new at all. Humans need to tighten their azzoles, for some strange psychological reason. State ideology in communist countries, Xtianity in European countries, beign wasted in capitalist countries, in fact all great cultures need a fear-factor for the masses. Orwell's book "1984" was a great vehicle to depict this. (I actually lived through that year.)
Fear in this sense was born in our evolutionary past of the unknown, of the unpredictability of the future, which became so very self-evident and in-your-face after man or pre-man became so smart that he could successfully and dependably predict a few things. Being able to predict that there is going to be winter each year after summer was contrasted to man by his inability to predict if it was going to snow the next day. Ever.
Intense unpredictability, realization of intense dependence for survival on some unpredictable events, the growth of intense fear arising because of the unpredictable future, an intense wish of being able to influence unpredictable events in the future gave rise to religion: Man needed some higher being he thought was organizing events, but only so that he could beg the higher being to be merciful to man and make the events favourable to man, or at least not catastrophic. Man would never have invented gods if no event was unpredictable.
It is written down in my book in precise detail. The title is "The Meanings of Everything" and it's available from me. The plural in the title is not a typo. It is intentional. | |
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| What is most important to talk or think about?
Posted: 4/17/2009 3:55:21 PM | You're joking about the book, aren't you? Otherwise I'd love to read your thoughts on this.
To the OP, I've found that in life the two most important things to contemplate are (1) your own lack of knowledge and (2) cultivating a disdain for arguments from authority. (1) leads to learning and (2) to a kind of internal intellectual liberty. | |
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| What is most important to talk or think about?
Posted: 4/17/2009 7:32:09 PM | "most important things to contemplate are (1) your own lack of knowledge "
I wonder if you're using the general "you", Robinson, or you are talking to and about a specific person, such as the OP.
Send me a private email here on PoF -- I accept messages from males as well, any age, despite being 98 percent hetero (some say nobody is 100%, that's why I settled for 98. If it makes you feel more comfortable, then I'm 100 percent a woman-loving man, which I believe I am anyway, but hey, you gotta satisfy all politically fortunate fractions. BY "SATISFY" AH MEANT TO CONSIDER THE FEELINGS AND SENTIMENTS OF ALL. BY "FEELINGS" I DID NOT MEAN TACTILE ONES, BUT INTERNAL EMOTIONS, RESPONSES TO OTHERS' ACTIONS. BY "RESPONSES" I DID NOT MEAN ANY OF MASTERS' AND JOHNSON'S EXAMPLES. BY SAYING "MASTERS" I WAS NOT REFERRING TO SOME SORT OF KINKY SEXUAL DOMINANCE. FOR CRYING OUT LOUD, I MEANT NOTHING SEXUAL, KINKY, SPICY, SICK, PERVERTED, DEVIANT, ABERRATE, GOOEY, GLUEY, BIOLOGICALLY REPRODUCTIVE, OR EXPIRED PARROTS!!!
(Wipes forehead) My word...
Signed: Friday | |
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| What is most important to talk or think about?
Posted: 4/17/2009 8:36:12 PM | | It is kind of hard when there are so many things which urgently need to be discussed. I think the most important personal question is 'How do you come to terms with death.' On the community and global level, I think how to best make use of science and technology and also foster better economic progress are the most important questions we face today (the solution to the world's population, social and ecological problems, including climate change, will depend on how we answer those). | |
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| What is most important to talk or think about?
Posted: 4/17/2009 9:04:59 PM | Hmmmm.
religion + philosophy = theology
politics + philosophy = ideology
science + philosophy = metaphysics
one more thing
The origin and specific function both physiological and epistomological
of boogers
nose hairs + nasal mucus = proof of a loving and generous God
just ask your lungs if that isn't true. Some truths are self-evident | |
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| What is most important to talk or think about?
Posted: 4/18/2009 8:44:24 AM | whatever needs doing within your reach to do....
Change on any scale is proportional to the size of the object being moved.
I know a good lever..are you the fulcrum?
focus has to be developed to the degree needed to do..unfortunately it makes us all a bit crazy as we obsess enough to succeed... and all the one issue wonders...
a symphony indeed | |
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| What is most important to talk or think about?
Posted: 4/18/2009 10:24:10 AM | Hmmm... knee jerk response.
The most important things to talk about are those things which are the least subject to change, the most permanent, and therefore the most real. | |
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| What is most important to talk or think about?
Posted: 4/18/2009 7:09:14 PM | Re: Post 36, by Phinished
Yestereday I had to go and get ultrasound pictures taken of my Achilles heels because they are very paiful. The technician asked me if there are swellings; I said yes. She then, after the procedure was done, told me that there are no swellings. I said, run your finger over my Achilles heel, you see, there is a bump in the middle. She did, and said that was a bone. I said, there are no bones in the Achilles heel. She insisted it was a bone. I said the closest bone there is the ankle bone. She realized what she was saying, and agreed. Then she spewed a whole bunch of latin words describing the bones in the area. She's Muslim, I live in the Iranian neighbourhood in Toronto, and I asked her, she's from Pakistan. A relatively new immigrant. No burka.
Then as I was getting dressed, I told her what I thought was causing the pain (inflexible muscles, tight with no or very little elasticity.) She said, yes, that could be the cause of my knee pain. I looked at her: ??? She said, yes, your knee pain. I said, today we looked at my Achilles heel. She looked at me and we both laughed.
She was not putting me on. I think she was extremely nervous that day. I have an easy time putting people at unease. She may have had some issues she brought to work from home. She may have some mental-developmental issues (she was strange, but not retarded at all; just jumpy, bossy, hurting, accusative, explaining only the obvious and not explaining anything essential I needed to know during the process of the procedure. I am talking about her inability to tell me to lie on my left side, and such.) I was on my best behaviour, and I think I tamed her, because she was laughing with me at the end, at herself. I have that knack, too, to bring that side out of people. She had to lie down on the exam bed to get my glasses that I left on the window sill, in a blocked-off spot. She could not bring herself to do that. She moved a three-metric-ton piece of equipment screwed down to the floor, she pushed it to the side to get to my glasses in order to avoid to having to lie down, as I was putting my socks and shews back on.
To the topic: A reality is in my head, in your head, and though there is a high possibility that the two have a high correlation, it is really impossible to tell if that's true, because for one thing I can be proven to exist (from my point of view) but you can't, and vice versa (from your point of view). So how can two people agree on what's the nature of reality, when the two can't even be sure if the other who participates in the discourse exists in the first place?
Oh, this is the "what to talk about" thread. I think the most important thing to talk about is what you have to say at any given moment, in order to enjoy your own voice, and give others the ultimate gift of letting them enjoy it too.
This is a reply to the apropos of your "ask your lungs" explanation. | |
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| What is most important to talk or think about?
Posted: 4/18/2009 11:43:18 PM |
“What is the #1 topic that people should focus on and why?
Seek and find the meaning of life and why we even exist. We should not settle for an explanation passed on to us by our forefather through some single spiritual enlightenment or justifications. I am sure it is more complex than any given explanation available but I do believe the answer or should I say, “the truth is out there”!
I think that is what we should focus on. And if we find some sort of explanation that makes somewhat sense to us then we should not stop there but keep on searching until we are convinced our explanation is closest to the truth.
By the way, this world is a learning place and someone died to erase humankind’s sin doesn’t make any sense.
An explanation that is seemingly flawless – will not only reveal our true identity but also our destiny. It should tell us – not only who we are and where we come from but also where we are heading.
So, I think the most important thing to find out is – “our true identity and why we exist” (and you know I am not talking about our name etc.) 
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| What is most important to talk or think about?
Posted: 4/19/2009 2:56:32 PM |
“What is the #1 topic that people should focus on and why?"
In a word, Truth. Why? Because nothing is more important; everything we do and say is based on our idea of Truth, and our understanding of it as a human race affects the lives of every person on the planet. | |
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| What is most important to talk or think about?
Posted: 4/19/2009 5:04:59 PM | I think about Zombies, killing zombies, leading, decapatating, and guiding the 9 to 5 American/Zombie mentality. Who doesn't love zombies, they are easily manipulated, controlled, guided, and plentiful. Kind of like a lot of people if one uses their imagination | |
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| What is most important to talk or think about?
Posted: 4/20/2009 8:22:03 PM | Probably the least important things to talk about are people, especially discussing the personal missteps of publicly humiliated individuals and/or celebrities.
I don't care if Britney and Paris don't wear undies.
The next least important things to talk about are things: cars, boats, houses, gadgets, possessions, things. We all have them, we all use them, get over it. If they all burn up I can replace them.
That leaves ideas as the best topic for thought and conversation. Law, philosophy, culture, spirituality, the intangible things that give our lives meaning: those are the stuff of great minds. | |
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| What is most important to talk or think about?
Posted: 5/6/2009 3:00:27 AM | I'm with ms fartsalot. I had a horrible nightmare tonight. It involved trying to resolve something on my own. And it quickly became a never ending nightmare. Such a burden is best divided amongst all of our parts. We need to be able to diversify and then find any ways we can help ourselves live with each other...lest we go beyond hopelessly mad. 
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| What is most important to talk or think about?
Posted: 5/6/2009 10:32:35 AM | As a species composed of (allegedly) intelligent & rational individuals, we should try to answer & act on three questions:
1) Is this the way we want things to be? (I can only speak for myself - NO!)
2) If not, can we establish a common vision for a better world than the one we live in? (Probably not, but, for all our sakes we have to try.)
3) If so, how do we bridge the distance between current reality and our vision of a better future for all? (I wish I knew!) | |
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