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humans love brute.

Humans love brute; brute loves no one. Is brute a cat?

If so, no worries. I've long suspected that Jacob is a cat, so brute is in good company.

Thoughts on the meaning of life: https://markmanson.net/the-meaning-of-life

He says meaning does not exist outside of ourselves, and the meaning of life is to create meaning; helping others and solving problems are two ways. I also just finished his book which asks what kind of problems are you willing to struggle through. http://tinyurl.com/hqvuy5y

Problems are unavoidable and recursive. Solutions cause happiness and also more problems. Happiness comes from finding the problems you enjoy having and solving. People who enjoy the struggle of being at the gym, being an artist, entrepreneur, long work weeks, live it and make it. It's not willpower or grit.

Suffering, insecurity, dissatisfaction are biologically useful. They keep us innovating, striving. Perhaps allowing yourself to feel more of those emotions is good. Personally, I get a lot more done after getting pissed off about something or experiencing pain and it feels more meaningful.

Is it meaningful that I saw this and thought of your journal? Only brute can decide.

that seems like a good description of happiness - finding the struggle brute enjoys.

Mark Manson is generally good. brute thanks jen.

...

that's awfully nice of classical_Liberal to say. and good movie to quote from

maybe it's not apparent from brute's posts here, but existential dread is, in brute's opinion, not a bad thing and it doesn't make him sad. it just is.

most humans on this forum seem to perceive that when brute faces existential dread, it's making him sad, or that he would prefer not to face it. thus they suggest getting a dog to distract himself from facing it.

but distracting himself from existential dread does not make it go away, just as opiates don't make problems go away, they just provide a temporary escape. and sure, it's possible to accumulate elaborate distractions to never have to face existential dread until death. but then why not just overdose on opiates? seems cheaper than buying dog food and can be done from the comfort of home.

brute actually likes facing the existential dread, to an extent. in a fight club sense, it's "real". it's real like riding a motorcycle fast is real, or getting hit in the head is real. that probably means it taps into some kind of biological switch in the brain that is hardwired for intense awareness or adrenaline.

just as brute enjoys fight-club-real activities from time to time, brute enjoys facing the existential dread from time to time, just to know he's still alive.

thusly, brute is slightly confused when humans try to "cure" him of his nihilism - brute's not sick, and nihilism is not a disease. if it were, non-nihilist humans would be equivalent to opiate addicts telling brute to do opiates to avoid this problem, hardly in a position to give sound advice. brute appreciates a rare semi-nihilist on a similar path.

brute actually likes facing the existential dread, to an extent. in a fight club sense, it's "real".

I disagree. There need be no dread when contemplating existence.

OK. Let me try a different tack. I'm going to live maybe 50 more years. In that time, measured against the universe, I will get nothing done. I will make no mark. I am not distracting myself from that, I just don't find it very interesting.

I have my time. What I do with it is up to me, and at the end, I want to feel I have used it well.

I don't "spark joy" in most people I meet. Sometimes confusion, often bemusement, but rarely joy. So I won't recommend you form meaningful relationships to find meaning.

I do recommend you think about what you want to tell people about yourself, when your body breaks down, and you have years to go. Not because I think you should try to impress them, but those are the things you should be doing between now and then. Not for them, for you.

If we live long enough, we will all have years when we will be doing more talking than doing. I intend to have things worth talking about.

Riggerjack wrote: I am not distracting myself from that, I just don't find it very interesting.

I don't "spark joy" in most people I meet. Sometimes confusion, often bemusement, but rarely joy. So I won't recommend you form meaningful relationships to find meaning.

I do recommend you think about what you want to tell people about yourself, when your body breaks down, and you have years to go. Not because I think you should try to impress them, but those are the things you should be doing between now and then. Not for them, for you.

If we live long enough, we will all have years when we will be doing more talking than doing. I intend to have things worth talking about.

Antipodal Riggerjack here. Everything he said, only the opposite.

I find the question very interesting and derive a great deal of joy from meaningful relationships. I don't spend time thinking about how others will think about me when my body breaks down because I am too busy using it.

Most importantly, I have absolutely no intention of having years when I will be doing more talking than doing. Ever.

Yesterday I had a good talk with two friends (age 77 and 75) who I think of as peers because we were talking about the bike ride we had just finished together. Sure, they struggled to hang on the back but we were in it together and after the ride they were giving pointers to a twenty-something guy.

I certainly intend to have things worth talking about when I reach their age but, like them, the topics will revolve around what I am doing at the moment, not things I did long ago.

I might adopt the philosophy of nihilism (circa 1860 something) IF I could honestly say that I had read "A Mathematical Theory of Communication" by Claude E. Shannon (1948) with full comprehension. Since I remain too lazy or stupid to do this, the door to the black cave of dread remains forever shrouded in a happy little haze of doubt for me.

this might be key, as brute's education contained a lot of Mr. Shannon's work.

@Riggerjack && Ego: (<-- boolean Shannon reference)

neither accumulating stuff to talk about nor doing stuff for the sake of being active seem to provide meaningful counter to the intrinsic meaninglessness of a cold, dead universe. this is no offense, but these are not answers to the question in question. if there even was a question.

BRUTE wrote:this might be key, as brute's education contained a lot of Mr. Shannon's work.

@Riggerjack && Ego: (<-- boolean Shannon reference)

neither accumulating stuff to talk about nor doing stuff for the sake of being active seem to provide meaningful counter to the intrinsic meaninglessness of a cold, dead universe. this is no offense, but these are not answers to the question in question. if there even was a question.

Meh. You revel in a sense of superiority that requires you to speak in riddles and obfuscations, tell us how bored you are and meaningless life is. Double meh. Wear sunglasses indoors, black clothing and start smoking Galois and the self-image will be complete.

But it is only an image of self that you are cultivating. That is all that the character of brute is. brute the caricature is not real and never has been. Odds are the character will not last another decade -- these things have short half-lives and burn themselves out.

7Wannabe5 wrote:I might adopt the philosophy of nihilism (circa 1860 something) IF I could honestly say that I had read "A Mathematical Theory of Communication" by Claude E. Shannon (1948) with full comprehension. Since I remain too lazy or stupid to do this, the door to the black cave of dread remains forever shrouded in a happy little haze of doubt for me.

OT, but if you have not read Ed Thorp's memoir and his recounting of the roulette wheel beating computer that he and Shannon developed in the early sixties, its well worth reading.

@Dragline

if that makes Dragline feel any better, brute finds him boring as well.

Roark

BRUTE wrote:@Pagliaccio: how does the universe originate from meaning?

If you accept as a premise that the universe issued from a random accident, then affirming that there is no such a thing as "meaning" is simply taking the matter to its logical conclusion (so, very consistent of you); just take the opposite paradigm as the foundation to my post and it will make sense—Creation being understood as the impartation of form (and meaning) to the primeval matter.

BRUTE wrote:@Pagliaccio: how does the universe originate from meaning?

If you accept as a premise that the universe issued from a random accident, then affirming that there is no such a thing as "meaning" is simply taking the matter to its logical conclusion (so, very consistent of you); just take the opposite paradigm as the foundation for my post and it will make sense—Creation being understood as the impartation of form (and meaning) to the primeval matter.

double post bug strikes again

@Pagliaccio

brute wouldn't necessarily subscribe to the idea that the universe is created (is that what Pagliaccio means by issued?) from a random accident. rather, brute has no clue how the universe came into being. with regards to order of atoms or formations thereof within the universe, brute doesn't think these are "random" as much as "arbitrary and deterministic" - it's no accident, it's a clockwork with maybe some random-like pockets in there.

if Pagliaccio says that meaning came first, does this imply some sort of god-like first mover with a (meaningful) plan?

@BRUTE: God, specifically.

I think people waste time with the Brute trying to dissuade him from his nihilism. If Brute is truly a nihilist, it matters to him not. Nihilism is a snake eating its own tail. Think about it - if all is meaningless, then contemplating or believing in nihilism is meaningless in and of itself.

My own philosophical leanings are more in line with "I think therefore I am, ergo, if I think my life has meaning, it does." Brute can have his nihilism, and I'll have my meaningful purpose. Different strokes...

Pagliaccio wrote:@BRUTE: God, specifically.

brute's not super into the whole God-thing, so he finds it hard to entertain that train of thought.