tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8580258.post8503715350995992705..comments2024-03-28T12:10:26.197-07:00Comments on One Cʘsmos: The Meaning of Meaning, or Nihilism and How it Gets that WayGagdad Bobhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14249005793605006679noreply@blogger.comBlogger13125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8580258.post-13375542820174822212008-05-23T20:26:00.000-07:002008-05-23T20:26:00.000-07:00Anonymous said "Just try, sincerely, to believe th...Anonymous said "Just try, sincerely, to believe that the universe is meaningless except for whatever arbitrary "meaning" one can inject into it from the mental grab bag of fears, desires, ambitions, beliefs, and motivations."<BR/><BR/>Now think about that... see if you can find the key issue that excludes any of existentialisms believers from being given any intellectual respect. <BR/><BR/><I>'Which of these words just don't go together, which of these words just doesn't belong...'</I> ready? Here we go:<BR/>'Believe' , 'Meaningless', 'Happiness', 'Fear'<BR/><BR/>If the universe is meaningless, if there is no truth, no beauty, no good... the concept of 'believe' is more meaningless than any other word... to be able to say either word with a straight face, or even a centimeter or two of honest mental depth, you not only have to pretend that you don't grasp the meaning of basic words, or whether or not they refer to what you think they do; it takes a willful act of selective blindness in order to ignore the fact that you say "the world has no meaning for me", rather than "the crab marbles twinkies burp, scotch please'... because words do have meaning, you know it and that you can use them correctly or incorrectly only because you choose <I>not</I> to have your words understood as being meaningless; they don't want that, they don’t believe that, they only want to pretend it. <BR/><BR/>You cannot honestly speak a single sentence, while denying that there is truth. You can only do so as a big fat blatant fraud... and you need a gullible audience to even pull that off.<BR/><BR/>So what you've got are people who want to glom onto the image of 'a deep thinker', but don't want to go through the intellectual work of learning, integrating and discovering what is true, and the willful tempering of developing the habit of making your actions match what you know and believe to be true (Virtue); the existentialist is one who grasps that they can <I>easily</I> pose as if 'everything is meaningless', 'there's no point to anything at all', 'happiness is an illusion'... which is why they are usually young teens, college students or lazy artsy fartsy types eager for free sympathy and an unearned reputation for being ‘deep’.<BR/><BR/>"Perhaps, because once again on safe ground, they are fearless."<BR/><BR/>If there is no point, if there is nothing with meaning, nothing to lose, nothing that makes anything better, then there is nothing to gain, keep or lose - and so nothing to fear. You have to believe in order to have fear - even before you can deny that you believe anything, you must believe It IS, in order to deny <I>that</I> it is.<BR/><BR/>"The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom"<BR/><BR/>For the existentialist who says that beauty is just an arbitrary arrangement of dots, <I>welllll</I> without humans able to perceive and appreciate Truth and Beauty, they <I>would</I> be nothing but dots - but if there is a 'You' to perceive them, then the Good, the Beautiful and the True are present and accounted for - just waiting for you to admit it.Van Harveyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08470413719262297062noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8580258.post-59496618265303862652008-05-23T15:07:00.000-07:002008-05-23T15:07:00.000-07:00Unless he's shoved out of the way by Anderson Coop...Unless he's shoved out of the way by Anderson Cooper, I assume Geraldo will be live on Mars covering the event as the lander digs up a Twinkie.robinstarfishhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15665546554663005609noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8580258.post-20330729454555585902008-05-23T14:50:00.000-07:002008-05-23T14:50:00.000-07:00Forget the Twinkies, get your popcorn ready & coon...Forget the Twinkies, get your popcorn ready & coongregate for real-time cosmos-watching: Phoenix Mars Lander<BR/><BR/>After a journey of 10-months and more than 400 million miles, Phoenix arrives at the Red Planet just before 8 p.m. EDT this Sunday, beginning its study of water and possible conditions for life.<BR/><BR/>Phoenix Mission Briefings<BR/>May 24, 3:00 p.m. (12:00 p.m. Pacific)<BR/>May 25, 3:00 p.m. (12:00 p.m. Pacific)<BR/>May 25, NASA TV coverage begins 6:30 p.m. (3:30 p.m. Pacific)<BR/>May 25, Landing on Mars at approximately 7:53 p.m. (4:53 p.m. Pacific) <BR/><BR/>http://www.nasa.gov/multimedia/nasatv/<BR/>index.htmlAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8580258.post-4957347420797761552008-05-23T14:43:00.000-07:002008-05-23T14:43:00.000-07:00Existentialism requires a good portion of bravery....Existentialism requires a good portion of bravery. <BR/><BR/>Just try, sincerely, to believe that the universe is meaningless except for whatever arbitrary "meaning" one can inject into it from the mental grab bag of fears, desires, ambitions, beliefs, and motivations.<BR/><BR/>Yes, says the existentialist, the Cosmos means whatever we want it to mean. There is nothing else. <BR/><BR/>Yuck. Who could live like that? Hour after hour, day after day? <BR/><BR/>It seems to me that depression and suicide would be the natural adjuncts of existentialism (which leads to absudism).<BR/><BR/>And yet, if an individual can achieve happiness under those bleak conditions, as some do, think of what bliss she could achieve under a sunnier set of assumptions! <BR/><BR/>The functioning existentialist must be regarded as spiritual savant of sorts. An analogy would be that of a daredevil or a tight-rope walker. Sure, they can walk that rope, but why do something so terrifiying? <BR/><BR/>Perhaps, because once again on safe ground, they are fearless.<BR/>Existentialism may well be one of those sources of suffering which can be used as a spiritual springboard, as can addictions, serious illness, and the like.<BR/><BR/>However, as Bob suggests, existentialism cannot be taken seriously as a truthful philosophy, for the very reason that it is nigh on insufferable.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8580258.post-10612703438755356252008-05-23T14:29:00.000-07:002008-05-23T14:29:00.000-07:00"Sitting right there where I left them was a 20 ye..."Sitting right there where I left them was a 20 year old carton of Hostess Twinkies, still sealed in their original wrappers. All of the preservatives had kept them in better condition that my 8" floppy disks.<BR/><BR/>I opened a package and broke open a Twinkie. The creamy white center was bigger than a Quarter. It felt much more substantial than the Twinkies of today. I remembered the good old days when Twinkies were the staple of any late night programmer's diet. Only last week I bit into a Twinkie (it was forced upon me by my daughter) and couldn't even find the cream filled center.<BR/><BR/>Yes, this could be why the quality of computer software and studio maintenance has become sloppier. The Twinkies on which they have depended on for sustenance for a generation, are inferior. Would you expect your dog to fetch the paper or wash your car if you rewarded him with substandard treats? I think not."<BR/><BR/>"The Twinkie Factor"Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8580258.post-63503721549183481312008-05-23T14:08:00.000-07:002008-05-23T14:08:00.000-07:00You're right. When there's no life n the planet e...You're right. When there's no life n the planet except cockroaches, they will be eating Twinkies.<BR/><BR/>You know what I heard the other day is that cockroaches are essentially tropical creatures and can only exist in places like NYC because people provide them with heat. Which leads to the obvious slogan: "Support Global Warming. Save the Roaches!" <BR/><BR/>GB says, <I>[the materialist claims ] It is foolish -- not to say an act of existential cowardice -- to suggest that the random dots actually mean anything beyond what we project into them (which leaves one wondering how the materialist can know this -- or anything, for that matter -- but we'll leave that to the side.)</I><BR/><BR/>But I've noticed when you point this little problem out to the materialist the response is to accuse <I>you</I> of denying that real knowledge is possible. <BR/><BR/>Along similar lines, I thought Smoov's <I>Scientific American</I> quote on yesterday's thread was illuminating.mushroomhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07651027035577798096noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8580258.post-46790558637418497432008-05-23T13:41:00.000-07:002008-05-23T13:41:00.000-07:00Mushroom - point taken, though I must wonder if ev...Mushroom - point taken, though I must wonder if even fine spirits have the staying power of a Twinkie ;)juliehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15975754287030568726noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8580258.post-55471435756768057502008-05-23T13:34:00.000-07:002008-05-23T13:34:00.000-07:00While I agree with Julie's point, I would have use...While I agree with Julie's point, I would have used something other than Twinkies. Maybe a good single malt.mushroomhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07651027035577798096noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8580258.post-25534650440024271562008-05-23T12:12:00.000-07:002008-05-23T12:12:00.000-07:00Existentialism is not to be taken seriously. It i...Existentialism is not to be taken seriously. It is just an abuse of intelligence, or intelligence used to deny its own object and source, and therefore sufficient reason. <BR/><BR/>I agree with Schuon that it is the quintessence of the cosmic inversion, or the very opposite of the nature of things, an "esoterism of stupidity" devised by inferior men for whom contingency is absolute; this is the very opposite of wisdom, which seeks the absolute in the contingent.Gagdad Bobhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14249005793605006679noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8580258.post-59929272849978750672008-05-23T11:48:00.000-07:002008-05-23T11:48:00.000-07:00Bob: What about the idea that an existentialist ha...Bob: What about the idea that an existentialist has even more responsibility then a believer because they are then responsible for all the actions of humanity. I am speaking of the "anguish" that Sarte talks about concerning the freedom that comes rather then when you have all the structure and rules that the church or religion brings into your life. Do you think that is reasonable or just a cop out?Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04973448750714819716noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8580258.post-75509255802716884032008-05-23T11:46:00.000-07:002008-05-23T11:46:00.000-07:00Cain and Salieri being graphic past examples of th...Cain and Salieri being graphic past examples of that envy you talk about. It's hard for me to see it in contempories.<BR/><BR/>(Just to jump in very late to the discussion, but I hope you make your posts whatever length they were meant to be.)Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8580258.post-67086448416290158022008-05-23T11:07:00.000-07:002008-05-23T11:07:00.000-07:00Correction: Having now read the post I'd still lik...Correction: Having now read the post I'd still like to note that your posts are like Twinkies, Bob - properly coontained, it'll be a mighty long time before they go stale. In fact, this one was remarkably apropos of (to?) this week's discussion.juliehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15975754287030568726noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8580258.post-58942047581109880492008-05-23T10:47:00.000-07:002008-05-23T10:47:00.000-07:00This comment has been removed by the author.juliehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15975754287030568726noreply@blogger.com