Einstein: Why We're Alive

[Received]

Einstein on Why We Are Alive | Brain Pickings

A chick writes him and he responds so excellently:

In a sense this answer is a huge copout, because you can always ask "why?" to this beautiful and concise ethical response. Then again, you can ask "why?" to absolutely everything, leading to an infinite regression bottomless pit from which you can never take a stance to find time to brush your teeth in the morning.

And the point about God is equally satisfying for the same reasoning: answering "God" to anything (for the vast majority of the time, at least) just kicks the can down the road.

 

[Eudaimonist]

In a sense this answer is a huge copout, because you can always ask "why?" to this beautiful and concise ethical response. Then again, you can ask "why?" to absolutely everything, leading to an infinite regression bottomless pit from which you can never take a stance to find time to brush your teeth in the morning.

Been reading G.E. Moore?

One can ask "why?" to any statement, but not always in a destructive way. When asking "why" of the ultimate end of human life, that same ultimate end-in-itself is always a legitimate answer.

So, when Albert Einstein suggests that creating satisfaction for ourselves and other people is the "why" (the ultimate end) of life, asking "why?" yet another time is pointless. It assumes that the ultimate end is just a means to an end, when it may be an end-in-itself and done for its own sake.

Of course, one may get into meta-ethical questioning of how it is that one knows an ultimate end truly is an ultimate end, but that's a different sort of question.


eudaimonia,

Mark

 

[Gadarene]

"Why?" is not positing an entity however; "God!" is.

 

[Received]

Que?

 

[Gadarene]

Que?

"Why?" is a question.

"God!" is an assertion.

 

[prov1810]

Let's say you want something, like money. What will that get you? If you say "security", what will that get you? We can keep asking the question until we get to something final like peace or beingness. At that point your state changes to something peaceful - joyful yet stable. Beyond words.

Connirae Andreas discovered this process and called it Core Transformation. I think it shows that we really can get somewhere when we ask "why?". But this is a spiritual place beyond materialistic desires and political agendas.

 

[Received]

"Why?" is a question.

"God!" is an assertion.

Are you saying we should only have "why" and no assertions to "solve" this "why"?

 

[Paradoxum]

Why continue to live is a personal choice. People can give you reasons to live, but if you don't accept them then you can kill yourself if you want.

I suspect people tend to want to live though, either because they value experiences, or they want to be happy, or change things for the better, etc.

 

[leftrightleftrightleft]

"Why?" is a question.

"God!" is an assertion.

But, unless you go down the infinite regression of asking why, you have to make an assertion at some point.

Atheists have opinions about philosophical things that contain assertions as well.


The only good way to stop the "why infinite regression" is to say, "I don't know". And both theists and atheists can do that any time they like.

 

[Received]

But, unless you go down the infinite regression of asking why, you have to make an assertion at some point.

Atheists have opinions about philosophical things that contain assertions as well.


The only good way to stop the "why infinite regression" is to say, "I don't know". And both theists and atheists can do that any time they like.

Yes, but I'd go a bit further and say the buck can stop at "I just feel or intuit it to be this way." Like when some annoying dude asks you how you know the world outside your brain exists, and you're just like, "I just *know* it does." Which is unambiguously a type of faith that theists and atheists share.

 

[KCfromNC]

Yes, but I'd go a bit further and say the buck can stop at "I just feel or intuit it to be this way."

I intuitively know that this approach is wrong.

 

[Received]

So you're implying that if people have contradictory intuitions, that intuition in general is whack?

 

[Eudaimonist]

So you're implying that if people have contradictory intuitions, that intuition in general is whack?

If you mean that he is implying that intuition is of questionable epistemological value, I intuit that you are right.


eudaimonia,

Mark

 

[Received]

You goose.

 

[KCfromNC]

So you're implying that if people have contradictory intuitions, that intuition in general is whack?

No, I'm outright saying that we have good evidence that intuition and gut feel are not a reliable source of knowledge. They can be useful in some circumstances as a survival mechanism when we need to make a snap decision, but they're no match for better approaches if we have the time to use them.

 

[Received]

How do we know that evidence is a reliable standard?

 

[KCfromNC]

How do we know that evidence is a reliable standard?

Because we've tested it and it works.

You admit as much by using your computer. The science and engineering used to build it is certainly evidence-based. If you don't think that's a reliable standard, you're being irrational by expecting that anything you do with that computer would work correctly.

Did you mean to say "how do we know that evidence is the only reliable standard?" The answer to that is - what other standard are you proposing and how what reason do you have to think that it works?

 

[Received]

Because we've tested it and it works.

So you're saying that if Neo's non-Matrix world "works" for him, or if it works for others in the Matrix, that's all he needs to know.

You admit as much by using your computer. The science and engineering used to build it is certainly evidence-based. If you don't think that's a reliable standard, you're being irrational by expecting that anything you do with that computer would work correctly.

Did you mean to say "how do we know that evidence is the only reliable standard?" The answer to that is - what other standard are you proposing and how what reason do you have to think that it works?

Reliability in the sense of *truth* is not in any way indicated by the fact that something simply works. "Works" is so loaded with non-truth, subjective stuff that virtually *anything* can be said to work, and therefore the thing in question can be supported given that works for the person.

 

[KCfromNC]

So you're saying that if Neo's non-Matrix world "works" for him, or if it works for others in the Matrix, that's all he needs to know.

Obviously not or it would have been a very short movie.

Reliability in the sense of *truth* is not in any way indicated by the fact that something simply works. "Works" is so loaded with non-truth, subjective stuff that virtually *anything* can be said to work, and therefore the thing in question can be supported given that works for the person.

So you say. Please demonstrate how intuition works as a reliable way to gain knowledge.

 

[Received]

So I question the use of "works" as a standard for determining truth. And you say, "hey, show me how your perspective works."