tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8580258.post3873342727281036431..comments2024-03-28T12:10:26.197-07:00Comments on One Cʘsmos: Thank God for Accidental Things!Gagdad Bobhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14249005793605006679noreply@blogger.comBlogger66125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8580258.post-61386534587143269792014-08-10T22:04:46.602-07:002014-08-10T22:04:46.602-07:00You might not set out to do it Bob but in my world...You might not set out to do it Bob but in my world of spiritual progress not perfection you accomplish a lot...and I am extremely grateful for what you write.Stevehttp://www.stevechandler.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8580258.post-18160809091240786272014-08-10T15:48:16.592-07:002014-08-10T15:48:16.592-07:00Happiness would also depend on how thankful we are...Happiness would also depend on how thankful we are.<br />John and Peter were overjoyed to have an opportunity to be imprisoned and beaten for Christ.<br />USS Ben USN (Ret)https://www.blogger.com/profile/07492369604790651538noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8580258.post-36156784444945905942014-08-10T14:03:10.909-07:002014-08-10T14:03:10.909-07:00Leslie,
Every day, same time, same people. It was...Leslie,<br /><br /><i>Every day, same time, same people. It was very routine. The surprises were the hilarity that would take over, or the competition between the kids and the adults..pure happiness in hindsight.</i><br /><br />Yes, just so. juliehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15975754287030568726noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8580258.post-39701516071756860872014-08-10T14:00:24.679-07:002014-08-10T14:00:24.679-07:00After a little research, it was clear that that on...After a little research, it was clear that that one is the obvious choice. Good for dipping.Gagdad Bobhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14249005793605006679noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8580258.post-5635828960353361692014-08-10T13:45:19.068-07:002014-08-10T13:45:19.068-07:00Ooh! I didn't know that was available, click, ...Ooh! I didn't know that was available, click, bought, done. Van Harveyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08470413719262297062noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8580258.post-83246441539824261632014-08-10T13:44:56.616-07:002014-08-10T13:44:56.616-07:00Van-
Well said, and well taken.Van-<br /><br />Well said, and well taken.Jackhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06708393262849661076noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8580258.post-63699148990054744862014-08-10T13:43:15.303-07:002014-08-10T13:43:15.303-07:00In the abstract, I can only assume it is possible ...<i>In the abstract, I can only assume it is possible for such a man to be content and even happy. And yet, the idea of any life having such a complete lack of surprise is essentially unthinkable.</i><br /><br />Yes, my portrait of this stoic monastic is probably much too stringent. There are always surprises, perhaps "only" very small ones. If the doors of perception were cleansed, as it were.<br /><br />Jackhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06708393262849661076noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8580258.post-19836561556055735512014-08-10T13:21:36.061-07:002014-08-10T13:21:36.061-07:00Jack, regarding your bookish fellow, I think we ne...Jack, regarding your bookish fellow, I think we need to distinguish between being content and happiness, but also between surprise and startling. You can feel a great deal of surprise between reading one word and the one that follows it, and the thoughts it sets bursting within you, without the outside world being able to detect any sign that a revolution just occurred in your life. <br /><br />Also, is he choosing such a sedate life in order to avoid anything that might cause turmoil in his life? Or because that path truly reflects a life that to him is thoroughly worth living? The first would be a fairly benign failure, the second could be surprisingly successful. Van Harveyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08470413719262297062noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8580258.post-19194776979854005322014-08-10T13:11:43.315-07:002014-08-10T13:11:43.315-07:00Julie said,
"Shorter version: To say "su...Julie said,<br />"Shorter version: To say "surprise" is to say "routine;" happiness is having the kind of routine that leaves room for good surprises."<br /> I have been missing my mother this summer. For years and years, my kids spent the summer afternoons, swimming in her pool, then we would all play cards; Uno, or North Dakota Poker, or Hearts.. Every day, same time, same people. It was very routine. The surprises were the hilarity that would take over, or the competition between the kids and the adults..pure happiness in hindsight.Lesliehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02284936021406079076noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8580258.post-63998045204477793492014-08-10T13:07:59.629-07:002014-08-10T13:07:59.629-07:00Just ordered this baby. Like Davila, he's emi...Just ordered <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Samuel-Johnson-Oxford-Worlds-Classics/dp/0199538336/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1407701199&sr=1-1&keywords=samuel+johnson" rel="nofollow">this baby</a>. Like Davila, he's eminently quotable.Gagdad Bobhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14249005793605006679noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8580258.post-85623037419288084652014-08-10T13:05:44.064-07:002014-08-10T13:05:44.064-07:00Rassellas is one of my favorites! A real tonic to ...Rassellas is one of my favorites! A real tonic to the relatively shallow 'Candide', by Voltaire. Similar plots, written at a similar time, and with ...surprisingly different results. <br /><br />I've got a volume of his letters, Unfortunately only the first of two or three, but it's one of those you can pick up and start reading anywhere and get the unexpected out of it. <br /><br />One of his later letters on education, especially regards to Geometry, goes an indication of how impoverished or conception of education is today. Van Harveyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08470413719262297062noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8580258.post-85737470646015545952014-08-10T12:49:15.865-07:002014-08-10T12:49:15.865-07:00I have come late to the Samuel Johnson party -- re...I have come late to the Samuel Johnson party -- reading a big biography at the moment -- but he certainly addressed all of these questions, for example, in <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_History_of_Rasselas,_Prince_of_Abissinia" rel="nofollow">The History of Rasselas</a>. Gagdad Bobhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14249005793605006679noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8580258.post-44453404812964711772014-08-10T12:39:50.482-07:002014-08-10T12:39:50.482-07:00In the abstract, I can only assume it is possible ...In the abstract, I can only assume it is possible for such a man to be content and even happy. And yet, the idea of any life having such a complete lack of surprise is essentially unthinkable.<br /><br />Would he not find surprises in the books he reads? Or are all the plots completely predictable, and if so why read them? Amongst his hobbies, does he never make new discoveries? I don't know if I can think of any hobby at all that isn't centered around either creativity, discovery or mastery, all of which depend on the element of surprise in some form.juliehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15975754287030568726noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8580258.post-19587385769675842312014-08-10T12:20:53.975-07:002014-08-10T12:20:53.975-07:00Yes, the God of the Stoics is quite unlike the Jud...Yes, the God of the Stoics is quite unlike the Judeo-Christian God. To the degree that this God is pantheistic or simply the material universe. <br /><br /><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stoicism#Christianity" rel="nofollow">But</a><br /><br /><i>The major difference between the two philosophies is Stoicism's pantheism, in which God is never fully transcendent but always immanent. God as the world-creating entity is personalized in Christian thought, but Stoicism equates God with the totality of the universe, which was deeply contrary to Christianity. The only incarnation in Stoicism is that each person has part of the logos within. Stoicism, unlike Christianity, does not posit a beginning or end to the universe.[33]<br /><br />Stoicism was later regarded by the Fathers of the Church as a "pagan philosophy";[3][4] nonetheless, some of the central philosophical concepts of Stoicism were employed by the early Christian writers. Examples include the terms "logos", "virtue", "Spirit", and "conscience".[33] But the parallels go well beyond the sharing and borrowing of terminology. Both Stoicism and Christianity assert an inner freedom in the face of the external world, a belief in human kinship with Nature or God, a sense of the innate depravity—or "persistent evil"—of humankind,[33] and the futility and temporarity of worldly possessions and attachments. Both encourage Ascesis with respect to the passions and inferior emotions such as lust, envy and anger, so that the higher possibilities of one's humanity can be awakened and developed.<br /><br />Stoic writings such as the Meditations of Marcus Aurelius have been highly regarded by many Christians throughout the centuries. The Stoic ideal of dispassion is accepted to this day as the perfect moral state by the Eastern Orthodox Church. Saint Ambrose of Milan was known for applying Stoic philosophy to his theology.</i>Jackhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06708393262849661076noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8580258.post-19272316154813157842014-08-10T12:17:56.004-07:002014-08-10T12:17:56.004-07:00Sounds like monastic life, though one might hope t...<i>Sounds like monastic life, though one might hope that such a man would have an overriding passion for the Absolute.</i><br /><br />Let's assume that this man did have a yearning for O, but that no great insights ever came. <br /><br />Jackhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06708393262849661076noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8580258.post-83104263756595722332014-08-10T12:10:13.300-07:002014-08-10T12:10:13.300-07:00The problem with the stoics, I think, is that they...The problem with the stoics, I think, is that they defined happiness more in negative terms, i.e., the absence of pain and turbulence as opposed to the presence of joy. Nor, to my knowledge, did they orient themselves to a source of joy beyond the self.Gagdad Bobhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14249005793605006679noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8580258.post-12543237928566068582014-08-10T12:06:13.632-07:002014-08-10T12:06:13.632-07:00Sounds like monastic life, though one might hope t...Sounds like monastic life, though one might hope that such a man would have an overriding passion for the Absolute.juliehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15975754287030568726noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8580258.post-34308599381463522842014-08-10T12:01:37.852-07:002014-08-10T12:01:37.852-07:00RE: Happiness and Surprise. I have wondered about ...RE: Happiness and Surprise. I have wondered about this a lot lately. The Stoics say, "only the virtuous man is happy". <br /><br />Which I read as: only one who lives according to his nature as a rational/imaginative creature, and all that implies morally and spiritually etc will be happy.<br /><br />Imagine a man that lives a fairly routine life. Over large stretches of this person's life, there have been little to no surprises. Let's postulate that, at least in his youth, it wasn't for a lack of putting himself out there. He is fairly introverted, with an increasing aversion to drama as he get older. He gets up, goes to work, comes home, reads a book, goes to sleep...then repeats. No wife; no kids; no real career to speak of, simply a job; many hobbies, but no real overriding passion. He does this for years, decades even.<br /><br />I have to believe (and maybe it is just that, a belief) that if this man were never surprised once in his life, but nonetheless lived according to the best of his nature to the best of his ability, he could still be happy.<br /><br />Jackhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06708393262849661076noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8580258.post-74981641982396455052014-08-10T10:20:44.184-07:002014-08-10T10:20:44.184-07:00Gagdad said "if there were no Surprises. This...Gagdad said "if there were no Surprises. This wouldn't be heaven but hell"<br /><br />Agreed. My problem with the study is that it tries to equate physical sensations - a reaction to concrete events - with actual happiness. Can't go along with that. Pleasure yes, does it happen that way? Yes. Must it happen in that surprising way in order to be pleasurable? Yep. Are there varying levels of pleasure, from pure sensory stimulation to satisfaction with how events turned out? Definitely. Is that the same thing as Happiness? Nope.<br /><br />However I don't think that in any way goes against the necessity, requirement even (I suspect there is a kind of corollary between 'Free Will' and something like 'Free Result'), in some sense, of surprise to your being able to feel a true and abiding sense of Happiness. <br /><br />Even if (and maybe especially if) you manage to lead your life according to a conceptual plan, honestly, virtuously; while such a person might succeed in foreseeing the high level plot of their lives, the particulars cannot not be mostly unforeseeable. We live not in our minds but in the world and in the world with others, seen and unseen, and each has a role in contributing to the <i>Surprise!</i>.<br /><br />Thank God.Van Harveyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08470413719262297062noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8580258.post-81866054291434674302014-08-10T09:17:12.346-07:002014-08-10T09:17:12.346-07:00Shorter version: To say "surprise" is to...Shorter version: To say "surprise" is to say "routine;" happiness is having the kind of routine that leaves room for good surprises.juliehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15975754287030568726noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8580258.post-54185428876025424202014-08-10T09:09:53.165-07:002014-08-10T09:09:53.165-07:00In fairness to Van, when I first read that article...In fairness to Van, when I first read that article last week I had essentially the same reaction. The kind of surprise they are talking about would seem to make, for instance, the satisfaction one gets from steadfastly doing one's job each day and thereby supporting oneself and one's family, no expression of happiness at all. Or rather, it equates "happiness" with mere instances of pleasure. Kind of like the reward mechanism that makes gambling so addictive.<br /><br />For surprise to be effective requires that there be some baseline "normal" from which it (positively) deviates. I was surprised when water started pouring out of my wall a few weeks ago, but it certainly didn't make me happy. Fixing it myself, however, brought its own kind of reward. Would have been nicer if the two professionals I had out to take a look had handled it first, though, and if I never have that kind of surprise again I could hardly call this life hell.<br /><br />Anyway. I guess my point is surprise requires stability, or some degree of predictability. <br /><br />Or looked at another way, these posts wouldn't happen without some kind of routine that clears the space so that the daily surprise is possible.juliehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15975754287030568726noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8580258.post-75720467341816255562014-08-10T08:41:15.456-07:002014-08-10T08:41:15.456-07:00Imagine if one could know ahead of time exactly wh...Imagine if one could know ahead of time exactly what would happen, i.e., if there were no Surprises. This wouldn't be heaven but hell. It is one more factor that inclines me to the Hartshornean idea that God surprises even himself, i.e., that his Creativity is irreducible. Gagdad Bobhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14249005793605006679noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8580258.post-13776844133534496412014-08-10T08:25:17.050-07:002014-08-10T08:25:17.050-07:00Yes, but, what the wapo's study is talking abo...Yes, but, what the wapo's study is talking about is how the unexpected results in pleasurable sensations, but calling That happiness is expected, boring and wrong. What's in a (misused) name? Deception, propaganda... and the wacademic MSM. Van Harveyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08470413719262297062noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8580258.post-17395772150015414722014-08-10T05:30:15.796-07:002014-08-10T05:30:15.796-07:00On the road to happiness, a pleasant surprise beat...On the road to happiness, a pleasant surprise beats a sure thing<br /><br />http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/to-your-health/wp/2014/08/08/on-the-road-to-happiness-a-pleasant-surprise-beats-a-sure-thing/Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16652102016905951809noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8580258.post-46271279260507692042014-08-09T05:00:55.051-07:002014-08-09T05:00:55.051-07:00Man, I'd hit the tip jar, but I'm afraid o...Man, I'd hit the tip jar, but I'm afraid of ruining all this!<br /><br />It's the best, "How I Spent My Lifetime Vacation" post of the season. :)Joan of Argghh!https://www.blogger.com/profile/14729682908266300507noreply@blogger.com