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Politics : Sharks in the Septic Tank -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Neocon who wrote (7400)	3/5/2001 12:21:24 PM
From: epicure	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 82486

Things live, things die and when they die they cease to be what they were, whatever that was, and whatever they will become is unknown but that doesn't make living futile if you enjoy it (imo)

To: Neocon who wrote (7400)	3/5/2001 12:42:42 PM
From: one_less	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 82486

"only to have it all end in the grave, our effort come to nought." Years ago people were fond of saying, "After all what have you REALLY got when all is said and done?" I took this question to heart and eventually came up with an answer that I am comfortable with and believe. Answer: After all, when all is said and done you have to live with all you've said and done, or not said or done...REALLY. "We do not know how we will fare, or fit in." True, but I figure, the above still holds true and I am ok with standing on that and taking my just deserts. "and worry about not being their for my son, or wife, or, when they come, grandchildren." A couple of weeks ago my daughter asked me what my greatest fears were. My answer was to become incapacitated to the point of not being able to care for my dependants and as a result, seeing the suffering it causes. The second fear would be to know that I am going to my death without the confidence that I had left adequate provisions for them.

To: Neocon who wrote (7400)	3/5/2001 12:42:52 PM
From: thames_sider	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 82486

If we do not [persist], then most of the things we care about are transient and futile: Transient, maybe. Futile? Hardly. At the risk of sounding poetic, is a rose futile because the beautiful flower it grows each year withers and dies? I guess it depends how you define futility. If you enjoy your life - for that matter, even if you don't - how is it futile? Because it hasn't changed anything? Persistence wouldn't alter that... I have yet to see any proof of anyone personally and verifiably affecting anything after their death [their ideas are another matter...]. We have one life each - some shorter than others. It's wasted if you don't make the most of it, however you choose to define that. If you can contribute something to the lives of others, which they enjoy or can build on, so much the better... but even the most wasted life is no more and no less futile than (say) Shakespeare's - for Shakespeare - however much more the latter may have contributed to the rest of us...

To: Neocon who wrote (7400)	3/5/2001 12:58:48 PM
From: cosmicforce	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 82486

I don't think the choice is binary. We could persist in some modified form (like liquid water persisting after the ordered structure of ice melts). Our information states (read:consciousness) may persist in some form but that is speculative. The analog may be the forest outliving the individual tree. That tree's experience is never forgotten even though its individuality may be.

To: Neocon who wrote (7400)	3/5/2001 8:53:39 PM
From: Solon	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 82486

Either we persist as individuals, with a life history and memories, or we do not. If we do not, then most of the things we care about are transient and futile: in the end, it all comes to nothing The only way around an individual end is an individual eternity. Whether one dies in 100 years, 1000,000 years, or 861 thousand trillion years--the argument that things we care about are "futile" has not been altered. If you believe it true that things we care about are futile (either because we or they do not live forever), then you have a belief that individuals endure for eternity--or you believe that things we care about are futile. This seems a very harsh and limiting way of looking at the opportunities in our short lives. In actuality, you are defining existence as futile, unless there is an eternal life ahead for the individual. This is not a necessary definition, and I doubt that it will enhance the joy that informs your daily experiences. I wonder what continuity one would have with the past--after several trillion years of memories? Would our loved ones now, still be the center of our attentions then? In the case that we did not have absolute PROOF that all these trillions of years would go on forever, would you still hold the disquietude that: "Either we persist as individuals, with a life history and memories, or we do not. If we do not, then most of the things we care about are transient and futile: in the end, it all comes to nothing"?? I cannot imagine having the will to endure a trillion years--as one consciousness with accessible memories--especially not if I had distress over the question of futility. How could the next world remove the quality of uncertainty (especially as addresses the pertinent question here of a guaranteed eternity). Would God (for example) remove my capacity for doubt? I wonder what that kind of a life would be like?? No thanks. I love this actual life--not that potential one.

To: Neocon who wrote (7400)	3/6/2001 12:59:56 AM
From: Dayuhan	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 82486

Either we persist as individuals, with a life history and memories, or we do not. If we do not, then most of the things we care about are transient and futile This is really an extraordinarily bizarre notion. Is it futile to take care of a child because that child will eventually die and cease to be aware of all that we did? I see no relationship whatsoever between transience and futility. If an action has consequence, it is not futile, even if it is transient. D we say that it is futile to eat because we know we will be hungry again tomorrow? Does the certainty of death make the avoidance of pain futile? We do not know what happens after we die. There is no way that we can know, except by dying. All of us will, sooner or later, and then we will know; I can imagine no greater waste of time than trying to figure it out before then. What we do is not futile because it has consequences here and now, and in the future of the world we inhabit here and now. That's what we know, and that's all that it makes sense to dispute.