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18-05-2012 In my opinion, the funny thing is that in serious religions there is a deep recognition that life is a terrible trial, and salvation only comes through ceasing to exist. This is explicitly stated in Buddhism and more implicitly in Christianity (don't know enough about other religions to comment).It's in secular, liberal societies where individual hedonism is the order of the day that 'the show must go on' becomes the unquestionable rallying-cry. 'Humanity is worth it', 'We're making progress', 'Life is a journey','It's all good'. These are the rallying cries of today's mob. |
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18-05-2012
Yes, but even though religions view life as a tough trial, most (all?) still celebrate procreation, because this trial is 'god's will'. So its not enough to recognize life as shit, if you're still going to say 'but the invisible man wants us to eat it, so we must'. In secular societies, where religious justifications for the continuation and enduring of misery are out of fashion, people invent new rationalizations for why show must go on. Downplaying the suffering and emphasizing that we've sent a cosmonaut to outer space. |
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18-05-2012 I was looking at people in the park today as I was walking back from my local cafe. I saw the preparations for the beginning of a wedding ceremony and two women sitting on a bench, talking about life and dating.It all of a sudden became obvious to me with crystal clarity that these things that make people happy are not based on truth at all. No one wants to know the whole truth about anyone really. Before you date someone, when you are attracted, you don't want to hear all their problems, do you? What is at the center of these rituals is the fantasy that we will have an amazing supra-natural experience. That we will be the one to make it work and find a better life which other people failed to realize. The basis for this is selective truth speculation - which becomes a lie if you don't follow through on it, but if you do, it's great and everyone lauds you for it. I have become more convinced lately that the basis for happiness is selective delusion. The brain must filter out negative experiences to 'curate' (in today's lingo) an experience that is more positive than it truly is. By this, it creates a forward motive force that is the center of 'hope', the 'amazing human spirit', etc. I don't see it as anything amazing at all. It is the survival mechanism of a complex bacterium. I work on instruments for a living, and I realize that I seldom think a job will be full of problems or take me weeks to finish. I always find my brain visualizing the next job will be perfect and take only a few hours to fall into line. This is seldom true. The funny thing is, this makes me more enthusiastic about life and makes the jobs easier once I get to them, even if they never turn out like this. The danger is going from a positive bias into a completely delusional world where you forget the often alter agreements of reality. For those who have been hurt in life and have sat down with the strength to be honest.. they look around and see many others who are clearly delusional and feel very alone with their realizations and then even more depressed. They realize they must join the mass delusion or die, literally. Ostracizing eventually results in some form of death for us social animals. This is a sad thing for me to see because I witness those who live in different realities.. and it seems deeply cruel to me that those who can keep a form of delusion going can have a happy life with the masses on their side, while those who have seen and acknowledged more truth are often sad, with few people around them. Most 'healthy' people are just too weak and afraid (in my opinion) to be reminded of the darker realities these people see, and so they get left.. kicked out of the party. It seems survival in itself is the capability of the brain to remain happy and strong by patching over unpleasant experiences with various delusions. This is what the strong people, the winners do: lie to get by. I have great inner turmoil over this process.. isn't it an optimism? Aren't we engines of reality and by keeping the fire strong, we actually create a more optimistic future? Or is it just a lie? I have a problem when optimism turns into delusion (as in the coping mechanisms of religion and nationalism). |
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18-05-2012
This is a sad thing for me to see because I witness those who live in different realities.. and it seems deeply cruel to me that those who can keep a form of delusion going can have a happy life with the masses on their side, while those who have seen and acknowledged more truth are often sad, with few people around them. These were my thoughts when I was deciding whether to start writing (and talking) about the depressing realities of our existence. On one hand, I felt this could potentially put lots of people down, robbing them of their comforting delusions, but on the other hand, I thought, keeping silent about them would contribute to the alienation of those who have already realized the brutal nature of life. Should I value the well-being of those who choose to live a lie just because there are more of them? What about people like myself? Are we less important because we can't keep lying to ourselves and thus unworthy of support and understanding? Because it means a lot when you can read somebody's blog and realize you're not alone in how you see the world, that there are others going through similar things. They realize they must join the mass delusion or die, literally. Ostracizing eventually results in some form of death for us social animals. Precisely. We as social beings have another kind of death - a symbolic one, social death. Perhaps thats one of the reasons self-esteem is so important. And it largely depends on the evaluation of others.
Yes, and no. "Although the optimism bias occurs for both positive events, such as believing oneself to be more financially successful than others and negative events, such as being less likely to have a drinking problem, there is more research and evidence suggesting that the bias is stronger for negative events. However, different consequences result from these two types of events: positive events often lead to feelings of well being and self-esteem, while negative events lead to consequences involving more risk, such as engaging in risky behaviors and not taking precautionary measures for safety." [wiki link] I remember seeing a lecture, I think it was on TED. They said optimism bias was probably to blame for the financial crisis. People keep taking way too many risky decisions until the whole thing collapses.
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19-05-2012 Irina,I'm glad you decided to write about the grim realities of life, since some of us who think as you do need some sort of fellowship with others who see things this way, especially since we cannot reveal our thoughts even to those we love, without soft-peddling them. Please keep it up! |
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19-05-2012
That's encouraging. Thanks)) In fact, I also do not talk about the grim stuff with people in real life too often either. |
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22-05-2012 Have you read Celia Green's "The Human Evasion"? It's online at http://deoxy.org/evasion/toc.htmShe is a brave soul who is willing to visit some of the darker places of human consciousness. |
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25-05-2012 Hi, I've recently discovered your blog and videos. Very interesting thoughts .I have just finished reading a book entitled 'Better Never to Have Been: The Harm of Coming into Existence' by David Benatar. I find his arguments very concise and logical. From the way you talk and think, I thought you might enjoy it. I have a pdf if you struggle to find it. Anyway, I will keep an eye on your posts and try to be more constructive with my comments next time rather than just dropping stuff in your lap to read |
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25-05-2012
Thanks, Nevar. Its a good book, I have it. I mentioned it in my first post on antinatalism. Wil be good to see you back with more comments. |
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25-05-2012 Ah. Once again I learn that I should explore, before I assume. I will read that post and others you have on the topic before I embarrass myself again. |
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25-05-2012
Nothing embarrassing, you're not obliged to read my whole blog before commenting on one post :) But it would be nice to have yoiur thoughts on my writings as well. |
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27-05-2012 Verily I am struggling about the issue of whether optimism is hardwired.The evidence against: it seems that maintaining optimism is admitted by many people to be delusional in nature. People even go to the insane extent of accepting (optimistic) delusions as a good thing (see http://francoistremblay.wordpress.com/2011/11/23/achieve-happiness-by-lying-to-yourself/ ) The evidence for: This study that you linked to, as well as the fact that depression is an exception, not the rule. A possible solution is that, as the study says, about 80% of people are optimists, and the resulting 20% struggle to be "normal"... resulting in the delusions, depressions, etc. |
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30-05-2012 So what do you think, any ideas?BTW, I don't know how you keep writing all these entries. I've written about all the main arguments, and now I really have no ideas. The other antinatalist blogs seem to have considerably slowed down too. I will try to get some inspiration from you. |
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30-05-2012 Oh by the way... hope you don't think I'm commenting too much right now. LOL! But I just remembered I wanted to give you this link:http://gizmodo.com/5726667/the-agonizing-last-words-of-bill-zeller I don't know if I'm gonna write about it or not, but feel free to do so if you want... |
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30-05-2012
Thanks, a powerful message in that link. Not to religious nuts, though, if you check the comments underneath. I have a few ideas on the future posts. And a limited amount of time to spend on this blog. So I don't know if I will write about it. Mayhaps)) I loved your post on 'Life Lie'. And thew illustration on top that says it all))) Good question. Whether optimism is ingrained, or culturally cultivated. Because we're born ito the culture that influences us from the very first day and nowhere is it trying to present how things are in fact, its all about trying to teach a kid to emphasize on the pleasant side of things and distort the reality. So us growing up with an optimism bias can be the consequence of either or both of these factors. I don't think you're commenting too much. You're staying on the subjects, thats important. |
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30-05-2012 Yes, you're right that in the end it's the existence of this tendency that's most important, although theoretically it would be nice to know if it can be eliminated or not. I'm always going to stay on the subject, so don't worry about that. |
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17-06-2012 Hello again, Irina.I read this post again, having a difficult time myself lately. It is so piercingly true, so why aren't there more people with whom I can talk about this?? I started to think back to my father's death 8 years ago. I still haven't 'gotten over' it. It changed the fabric of life as I know it. Some could say I'm using that grief as an excuse and I should just get over it and move on.. but I just can't. That and other things fundamentally washed the delusion out of my eyes.. removed the curtain behind the puppet show. I saw things during that time about death, the nature of people's true care, the hospital and hospice systems, my family, my mother, the working world and life in general. It is brutal with a veneer of kindness. Those creatures among us who are more sensitive and intelligent have a more difficult time I suppose. What I saw? I saw the weakness and frailty and grossness of death; the loss of my father's dignity. The pointlessness of his struggle. I saw the selfishness family members and colleagues who came in for a minute to wish him well, but not care for him. I saw people send cards.. all this to alleviate their guilt to continue living their lives only for themselves. I saw the greed in family members swooping in to amend his will while I was grieving. I saw no one help me concretely after, just pats on cheek and 'give me a call if you need anything'.. which never materialized into anything. I saw no one in the working world care what I was going through.. I had to do the same thing every day no matter what. Who cares, life must go on. I wonder sometimes if I'm the only one who sees what a selfish society we live in. That people really don't care about each other anymore. It's rare if someone actually cares.. people are shocked.. call that person a saint. Is this really the way life should be? I haven't wanted to live since I saw the realities I did. I could no longer lie to myself out of ignorance or hope that it would be different. I saw it and have struggled to be happy about anything since on a day to day basis. |
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17-06-2012
Good to see you back, John. I can totally understand what you're saying. Ever since my grandmother died I started thinking something is seriously wrong with this world and peoples attitudes of 'well, thats life'. Everyone of us is expendable, every person will be grieved but then stepped over because show must go on. I started wondering what was so increadibly wonderful about life, so sacred that made it always worth celebrating, continuing and passing on regardless of what happens in it. Yeah, they say time heals all wounds. Like hell it does. The pain just gets thrown somewhere deep, where it is forgotten, but one day life hits you again and then you look inside yourself and see that nothing actually healed, its all there and now you're getting even more of it. Crazy how people proclaim life is worth all the costs payed for it. Loving and loosing, burrying your own parents, sometimes - your children. Arent this things simply utterly horryfic? And if they are horryfic, what corresponding positive experience is supposed to compensate for that? These things being hard to handle, when you're being told you're abnormal for treating these things too seriously, it makes it worth. Which reminds me of a quote I read from this book someone sent me a link to. "The sane person prides himself on his ability to be unaffected by important facts, and interested in unimportant ones." link Still havent read it but did check out some parts. |
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17-06-2012 Thanks Irina, that was good to hear from you. Time doesn't really heal pain in my experience, either.It has dulled the immediate feeling of it, for sure. But that is only because more experiences have been layered on top of it, occupying my short term memory.. rather just distancing from the pain, not healing. Oh the human evasion, yes I did read some of that. I'll take another look. Sanity needs to be questioned. It probably still won't change most people because they still have to survive, and to do this they need to be 'sane'. I think that if we really shared in this existence in a kinship.. that there would be a joy and reason to live life. I think a lot of the suffering and making life not worth living is the allegiance to the evil economic system now almost controlling the entire globe. When I was 18, I was effectively kicked out of the house to 'find my own way as a man'. I went through military service and then on to find a job when I got out. My father died and my mother only took care of herself. It was kind of a shocking experience for me.. where I realized this world is built on the economy that the ruling elite class have set up. Everyone must 'find their own way in the world', almost as a rite of passage. Where is the kinship in that? It is every man for himself in this soulless machine. That is accepted now! Long ago, a rite of passage would be where a man faced challenges that linked him closer to his brother. A long odyssey.. going on a long hunt to prove his worthiness.. etc. All of this was in relation to his loved ones, working together, not split off into individual (go fend for yourself now) packets. This was when people were connected, and not split off by the banks into individuals allegiant to the system and not their brother. I think this is one of the central causes of marital strife. No one can just go out and 'do it', or take care of one another by their own hands. They must find a job which yields dollars, go through the banking system, pay a large sum of taxes, etc. A lot of a person's ability to affect change in their world is taken out of their hands by the forced separation of the monetary system. The more people who take part in this, give the system more power. I see this as a root of a lot of fakeness in the world too.. when people no longer really look to one another, it breaks their ties in a real way, no matter how much they try to care. They now look to an abstract system of money and jobs for their care. The ties, and hence freedom and power, of people are split. Taking it back to this post, I think people have real reasons to be happy about life - if they were tied in together and not living life so separate, split by this evil system. Instead, they go back to their slave existence, only neurotically trying to survive and do what the system says, not live life on fire and alive in their shared power. Only thoughts.. hope I didn't get too far off topic of this post. |
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