What is YOUR philisophical view of life!?!

[WJesus4ever]

I've been pondering on this question for quite some time now for myself. I see that everything you do is a challenge! Some are extremely easier than other of course, and may not seem like a challenge at all, but in reality they are....are they not?

Second, you never get something for nothing in this world........ so the question remains as to what your philosophy of life is!?

 

[Eudaimonist]

That's a broad question. I'll describe my philosophy of life on one foot:

Reality is natural. Every thing acts as it does because it is what it is. Also, there are no gods, supernatural realms, or afterlives.

Reality is comprehensible. Reason, using the perceptual material provided by observation, is our means to understand reality.

A human being has a natural function, which is to flourish by means of reason, virtue, and friendship. This is what well-being is for human beings, and it is what is naturally worthy of choice as an overall purpose in life.


eudaimonia,

Mark

 

[WJesus4ever]

That's a broad question. I'll describe my philosophy of life on one foot:

Reality is natural. Every thing acts as it does because it is what it is. Also, there are no gods, supernatural realms, or afterlives.

Reality is comprehensible. Reason, using the perceptual material provided by observation, is our means to understand reality.

A human being has a natural function, which is to flourish by means of reason, virtue, and friendship. This is what well-being is for human beings, and it is what is naturally worthy of choice as an overall purpose in life.


eudaimonia,

Mark

Okay. Describe time? What is time, when did it exactally begin, and is it natural or supernatural?

 

[Eudaimonist]

Okay. Describe time?

Time is a measure of change. It is because entities change that there is "time".

What is time, when did it exactally begin, and is it natural or supernatural?

Time is completely natural -- it is an aspect of the existence of natural entities. Entities change because it is in their nature to do so.

Time began at the beginning -- when else?

I don't know precisely when time began relative to us. Perhaps several billion years ago, and perhaps much longer.


eudaimonia,

Mark

 

[WJesus4ever]

Time is a measure of change. It is because entities change that there is "time".



Time is completely natural -- it is an aspect of the existence of natural entities. Entities change because it is in their nature to do so.

Time began at the beginning -- when else?

I don't know precisely when time began relative to us. Perhaps several billion years ago, and perhaps much longer.


eudaimonia,

Mark

If time is natural, could not we alter it? We can alter anything that is natural. Trees, earth, animals, plants, man, ect...

 

[Eudaimonist]

If time is natural, could not we alter it? We can alter anything that is natural. Trees, earth, animals, plants, man, ect...

Time is not an "it" separate from trees, earth, animals, etc. It is an aspect of trees, earth, animals, etc, and their relationships with each other.

We can alter time in the Einsteinian sense of accelerating to relativistic speeds. If you get on a spaceship and go fast enough, and you will experience time differently than people on Earth.


eudaimonia,

Mark

 

[WJesus4ever]

Time is not an "it" separate from trees, earth, animals, etc. It is an aspect of trees, earth, animals, etc, and their relationships with each other.

We can alter time in the Einsteinian sense of accelerating to relativistic speeds. If you get on a spaceship and go fast enough, and you will experience time differently than people on Earth.


eudaimonia,

Mark

Yes I have heard of that theory.

But let me classify your statement. If time is not an "it", and yet "it" is natural, what does that make time?

 

[Eudaimonist]

Yes I have heard of that theory.

But let me classify your statement. If time is not an "it", and yet "it" is natural, what does that make time?

If you will notice, I wrote:

Time is completely natural -- it is an aspect of the existence of natural entities.

The "it" in that sentence is purely a convention of language. I'm not asserting time as something separate from natural entities, but as an aspect of them.

You had written:

If time is natural, could not we alter it? We can alter anything that is natural. Trees, earth, animals, plants, man, ect...

...which led me to think that you were thinking of time as a separate entity. I may have misunderstood you, of course.


eudaimonia,

Mark

 

[WJesus4ever]

If you will notice, I wrote:

Time is completely natural -- it is an aspect of the existence of natural entities.

The "it" in that sentence is purely a convention of language. I'm not asserting time as something separate from natural entities, but as an aspect of them.


eudaimonia,

Mark

Ah! Okay I see. I wish I could discuss this further, but I must retire for the morning. I have to start my math in less than six hours! G'night for now...hopefully we'll continue this in the near futer God willing.

 

[Robbie_James_Francis]

I see life's primary characteristic as its being good.

Life, in my opinion, is good in a huge number of different ways. It is good to enjoy the pleasures that life has to offer, it is good to make goals, to acheive goals, to love, to be loved, to become close with other human beings. It is good to be yourself, to better yourself, to love yourself. It is good to explore life, to ponder why, how, when, where, what and even if it really is. To wonder what it has come from and what it is going to. It is good to look inward, good to look outward and good to just sit back and enjoy the ride.

Life is somehow inherently good. It is beautiful.

Knowledge is the fundamental goal of life, of life in general and all individual lives. Free scientific enquiry is one of the searches for knowledge that is part of human life.

But knowledge is also much bigger that positivist knowledge. It is knowledge of art, music, literature, poetry, films and all cultural expression that can be both tangible (e.g. I know that the _____ tribe expresses its origin myths by singing the _____ song) and incommunicable...there is a sense in which simply hearing, seeing, listening to, experiencing, being and living a piece of art is a form of knowledge.

It is knowledge of the self, of relationships, culture, humanity, loved ones, the universe and life itself, that can both be specific linguistically commuicable knowledge about history, geography, anthropology, psychology, astrophysics or whatever, and also the knowledge of experience.

To explore all this 'knowledge' involves, in a large part, simply being all we can and not just technically knowing of all we can. Life is a journey.

There is undoubtedly something other than the material world. Even if human emotions, for example, are controlled entirely by specific chemical changes in the brain then they still form something above and beyond. The whole is always greater than the sum of its parts.

If, however, there is something (or Someone) really other, really supernatural, then It/We/She/He couldn't care less if we go to a church, gudwara, mosque, temple, synagogue or just go to the park. I doubt that material death is really the end, but there can be no eternal hell, only reincarnation, temporal purgatory, eternal paradise, enlightenment or self-realisation.

I'm not sure how to put that in a nutshell...maybe undecided agnostic Epicurean pandeist Buddhist Hegelian hedonist...or something along those lines

peace

 

[elman]

I've been pondering on this question for quite some time now for myself. I see that everything you do is a challenge! Some are extremely easier than other of course, and may not seem like a challenge at all, but in reality they are....are they not?

Second, you never get something for nothing in this world........ so the question remains as to what your philosophy of life is!?

My philosophy of life is we exist to be and to become loving beings.

 

[The Nihilist]

Frankly, I've learned more about existence from Homer than I've ever learned from philosophy. It is my opinion that the only useful thing that philosophy does, which it only does sometimes, is to free us from our incorrect beliefs. Socrates was the best philosopher, and good philosophers who followed him were good only insofar as they wre effective in undoing existing incorrect or pernicious beliefs.

 

[uberd00b]

In my opinion;

Life is what you make it (ugh).
Grab it by the balls (ew).

Horrible cliches aside, we find ourselves here on this earth, through no choice of our own. We can do as we wish. Everybody seems to largely do their own thing.
My philosophy is do what you can for others, as I find helping other people to be one of the greatest things you can do.

 

[RedAndy]

My own philosophy is summed up quite nicely in a little soundbite: "The meaning of life is to discover the meaning of life."

For everybody, that meaning is different. As long as you pursue your own path, and attempt to discover your own meaning, you will be happy. Nobody can tell you what your path is or what your personal meaning is; that is only something you can do for yourself.

(The more I put this in words, the more I'm reminded of that scene in Life of Brian: "You're all different!/Yes! We're all different!")

 

[spdnet75]

I have stopped three times in the past year to help people who seemed a bit stranded.

On one occassion, this young lady kissed me on the cheek and told me that she was so happy to be on the way with her man. They were both frightened and I managed to help them.

I live my life for thoses sorts of things. Is there a GOD? I don't know, but is there is, he would seem to be on my side when others need it.

I've been left without it, but I won't stop caring. I'm just that kind of person I guess.

Stephen

 

[Lord_Marx]

Naturalism, although I think that there is much in this universe that we will not ever know or understand. The universe is a big place and we're tiny and ultimately insignificant. On an individual level, I place a lot of value on finding one's own meaning in life.

I think most people are good, but that ignorance, hate, fear, and insanity can all drive someone to become “evil” (although no one 100% evil).

 

[Lord_Marx]

Oh yea, one more thing. Don’t take things too seriously. A sense of humor is one of the best survival mechanisms that humans posses.

 

[Shadowsun]

Funny coincidence, because I discovered the meaning of life a few days ago. Richard Dawkins told me.

Hehe, this is my view on the matter of course, but I think some people will agree with me. As I firmly believe in no God and no afterlife, our ultimate purpose is to spread our "selfish genes". But because I don't believe in an afterlife, this time I spend here on this world is so much more magical. We humans have the gift of being able to think about these things, to learn more things about our world, the secrets of the universe are ours to unravel. What an adventure. Enjoy, you only get one chance and you're VERY lucky to be here. I'd like to quote Dr. Dawkins:
born
We are going to die and that makes us the lucky ones. Most people are never going to die because they're never going to be born. The potential people who could have been here in my place, but who will, in fact, never see the light of day, outnumber the sand grains of Sahara. ...In the face of these stupefying odds, it is you and I, in our ordinariness, that are here. Here's another respect in which we are lucky. The universe is older than a hundred million centuries. Within a comparable time, the sun will swell to a red giant and engulf the earth. Every century of hundreds of millions has been in its time, or will be when its time comes, the present century. The present moves from the past to the future like a tiny spotlight inching its way along a gigantic ruler of time. Everything behind the spotlight is in darkness, the darkness of the dead past. Everything ahead of the spotlight is in the darkness of the unknown future. The odds of your century being the one in the spotlight are the same as the odds that a penny, tossed down at random, will land on a particular ant crawling somewhere on the road from New York to San Francisco. You are lucky to be alive and so am I."

This truly touched me and gave me my answer. To me, no creator makes everything seem more magical than with one.

 

[elman]

In my opinion;

Life is what you make it (ugh).
Grab it by the balls (ew).

Horrible cliches aside, we find ourselves here on this earth, through no choice of our own. We can do as we wish. Everybody seems to largely do their own thing.
My philosophy is do what you can for others, as I find helping other people to be one of the greatest things you can do.

I agree with your philosophy.

 

[elman]

My own philosophy is summed up quite nicely in a little soundbite: "The meaning of life is to discover the meaning of life."

For everybody, that meaning is different. As long as you pursue your own path, and attempt to discover your own meaning, you will be happy. Nobody can tell you what your path is or what your personal meaning is; that is only something you can do for yourself.

(The more I put this in words, the more I'm reminded of that scene in Life of Brian: "You're all different!/Yes! We're all different!")

So do you think you will ever discove why you exist? What you are here to accomplish?