I'm bored and want a discussion . . . which never seems to happen in discussion threads, so big topic, lots to blabber bout. SO BLABBER! Plus Im interested in finding different and contarsting views so blah . . .

What's your view on life and death and whatever else is cool these days?
Do you think their is a meaning to life, or is life just an accident that happened?
Are you pessimistic or optimistic?
Do you believe in an afterlife?
Are you afraid of dying?
Do you even think you exist?

I'll talk later cause otherwise this post be miles long and I'll put people to sleep :D

Life and death are every-day things.. it's a way of life, not the latest fad.
I'm pessimistic most of the time, but I'm trying to be more optimistic.. the glass is half full; 'half empty' just sounds weird.
I did believe in an afterlife in the sense that one could come back as an animal or something.. then my sister said that such things don't exist. So, I don't know really. I don't believe in it, but I don't not believe in it.
I'm not afraid of dying, but I'm afraid of how I will die.
Do I exist? Dunno, I'm sure I do in some sense though.

I like answering questions :)

What could be better on a sunny Friday afternoon in summer than a little deep introspection? I agree with Sardine that life and death are an everyday thing. But when it’s your life you should make it extraordinary and when it is the death of someone close to you it is devastating.
I am an optimist much to the consternation of my best friends who sometime want to shove a sock in my sunshine spouting mouth.
I do believe in an afterlife.
Consequently I am not afraid of dying. Well that is not exactly true sometimes I am afraid I will die and leave a young child motherless, but I fear death more for my daughter’s sake than for mine.
I know I exist. I think therefore I am.

Indeed life and death are everday things, though I woudn't say it is a way of life as techinically you cannot have one without the other.

Here's a question, just why should you make it extraodinary and why is death of friends, famliy etc. so devastating?

Past lives and the like? I have been meaning to do some research in such beliefs but I just haven't gotten around to it despite my own view that death is not the end and is meerly part of a continuos cycle. All living physical matter is in a cycle for example as all cells come from pre-existing cells so I have the same view for spiritual/mental matter for lack of a better term. I don't really like the term spiritual as it is generally associated with religious beliefs which I personally don't believe in and see no point to.

Anyway for myself I am a complete and utter pessimist, though I am quite cheerful about it if that makes sense? :lol: This is partly why I don't believe in things in a religious sense for religions seem to require there to be some greater point or meaning in life or death and I honestly do not think their is a point for us.

I haven't fully decided on existence yet but I do not believe in the ability of knowing. People cannot know they can only assume that what their senses is telling them is fact, this beliefe is enforced by the fact that the brain filters the majority of what we sense so we are not overwhelemed by it so for all anyone knows the brain could be misinterprating everything. Ergo we know nothing!

More questions then:

Do you believe in good and evil?
Why do people care and love etc?

Judging from you this:

I think you might want to read Ralf Waldo Emmerson. He has a theory about an Oversoul that you might really like.

Also I think you misunderstand my think therefore I am quote. I made no claim about knowing. I think about big questions like this as well as small things like will the milk last until tomorrow. But the point is I push my mind out of the hear and now and into the future as well as the abstract. It has nothing to do with my senses because I think/worry about as many things in the dark silent night as i do in the bright of day with phones going off all around me.

I believe in good and evil.

People care about love because it holds us together. I forget who said it, but it may have been Emmerson, but someone once said, no man is an island. we need each other. Now i can't tell if love is a creation or an extension of that need or what, but it is real. And it starts with a mother and a child. When you look at that little pink lump (or whaterver color your lump happens to be) and see that it is a helpless extension of yourself love just blooms. Everything else just kind of evolves out of that. People are set up so that it takes two to create a life even though in this economy sometimes i think it might take three to support a life. ideally the two parents already love each other by the time the lump comes along. but sometimes not. my point is someone has to step in and care for that baby. and it's hard. harder than you can imagine if you've never done it. this fragile system needs something to hold it together. and that something is love.

I know that I just wanted to ramble on about knowing :) One word will have me going off on complete tangents when I'm thinking so that's basically what was heppening their.

I'm not sure exactly what you are saying with all this but I believe everything has to do with your senses, without them there is nothing as one cannot imagine or think without something to base their thoughts off. I'll have to explain myself better later as I have to be off now so blah . . .

I'll finishing rambling later and I'll look into Emmerson, I'm pretty sure I've heard of him before.

I am cool with rambling. that seems to be what this thread is all about. Rambling about these things is a good way to explore your beliefs. :)

I think this whole senses thing is where you and I part company. And that is ok. the way I think about it is there are things that come from within that don't have anything to do with ones five senses of sight, hearing, smell, touch or taste. It is tied up in my religious beliefs. Most of how i think about these big questions are tied up in my religious beliefs, which to my way of thinking is the way it should be. But that is just me.

And Ralf Waldo Emmerson is a 19th century American Poet.

That's a good question. Also one that I don't think will ever have a definate answer. I guess it could be a result of habit? How do we know that what we feel is dread, or loss, or anger, or shame etc? Who pointed at the sky and said "that is the sky, it's blue"? For all we know, trees could be the sky. All these things ARE, and I want to know WHY.

Now that you ask that, I'm not so sure. Good and evil in what sense? Dark over light? The fiery depths of Hell and the pearly gates of Heaven? I don't know, but I'm sure there is something beyond the earth as we know it, beyond life.

So we can have a reason to fight and complain?

Fair enough though, the main reason I don't believe in that is simply because originality doesn't exsist. It's a rather useless word in my opinion. Anyway just try and think or something completely original that isn't based off anything and you will simply find that you can't . . . all thoughts and feelings etc. orginate from something we 'know' and we can only 'know' things through our senses. :)

:P Cool I climbed in sky when I was a kid. Now that would be fun . . . anyway random much?

Lol. Probably.

For me love and caring and just emotions in general are the biggest mystery for me and that's mainly because of my own lifestyle and how I view relationships. Sometimes I think there is something wrong with me because I sincerely do not care about people the way everyone else seems to but anyway . . .

I think compassion and love etc. stems from the survival instinct but not completely. I don't believe it is exclusive to people but is definitely found in animals as well. Wether it is unique to mammalian animals I need to do some research in but if it is exclusive to mammalians then as ladeeknight said I think it would stem from the need to have one's child survive etc., etc.

As for good and evil . . . I don't believe in it. There is only differences in opinion.

Yeah, I guess.

I've started trying to make myself not care as much as I normally do. Why? I want to join the air force and I could end up killing people. No, I'm not a cold heartless [Censored Word].
I don't like pity, so I don't give other people pity. I don't like being fussed-over, so I don't do that to other people.

I care about animals more than humans. Why? Probably because humans are stuck-up snobs that think they're better than the next person. I can talk to my dogs, I can hug them, and poke them and cry on them and lie on them, and they don't care. If I've had a break down and am now hugging my dog 'til his eyes pop out, he licks me, sighs, and goes to sleep. That's all I need, that's all I want.

Random, yeah, I know :D

I disagree with your thoughts on originality. Each one of us is original. No one has the same genes, and even siblings have slightly different upbringings. That is where originality comes from. How you think about yourself and your place in an ever changing world. And yeah most problems and joys aren’t new, but they are unique to the person suffering from them.

I don’t think I can answer you about why you should make your life extraordinary. Maybe that’s the only way I know how to be. And I guess if an outsider looked at my life it would look pretty tame. About the only thing extraordinary thing about my life are my friends. I have been blessed with amazing people to share my life with. And that is more than enough for me. All those things you do with your dog Sardine I can do with my friends. I know it is easier to relate to animals because if they are judging you, you don’t know. It’s hard to be vulnerable enough to really let someone get to know you. I have no advice on how to do that. I think I was born with my heart on my sleeve. As for caring less about people because you might have to kill some I am not sure if that is the way to go. That seems like the road to unfeeling monsterhood. Maybe you should try to continue to care so that you never find you enjoy killing or are indifferent to it. This is just a cautionary suggestion. I have never killed anyone, but I know people who have, in war, and it is a hard thing to come back from. And if you don’t cling to a scrap of humanity you don’t come back.

Ooo that's another good few questions, what defines humanity? What makes people unique?

Identicle twins do :P They can have slightly varying phenotypes though but yeah . . . when I was yabbering bout orginality before I was more talking about thoughts and ideas and such but even with genes they still aren't original in a sense. It's just a different type of arangement but I'll have to think about all that more. :)

As for you Sardine, I to an extent agree with ladeeknight. You can't completely shut yourself off without loosing yourself but you also have to be able to shut yourself out if there is ever a time where you have no choice but to kill. I can only imagine what it would be like of coarse but one can't go into a war or whatever and care about everybody who is hurt or killed in such a situation without loosing it in some way. Sometimes not caring is a survival technique . . . Of coarse then it can always come back to haunt you later in life so I dunno.