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I agree with your professor, especially after the documentary on feminine desire that was on here in England last night. There was a Dutch sex researcher on (why are these people always Dutch?) explaining how the effect on the brain of orgasm was very very similar to that of heroine or cocaine - and the reason for that was that it was nature giving us an incentive to procreate.Quote:
Originally Posted by mono
<the effect on the brain of orgasm was very very similar to that of heroine or cocaine - and the reason for that was that it was nature giving us an incentive to procreate.>
Yet I don't see hordes of unattached women begging for a fix. Do you?
Quote:
Originally Posted by djtru
Was God and his purpose truely known to us the element of faith would be devoid of meaning and God would be another tyrant. Furthermore if the point of God is to give meaning then one could say that all religion is reduced to a comodification of God and those who follow him. Lastly, if the purpose of life was to glorify God, then we have to reach the conclusion that those who are happiest are those who glorify him the best and that all distance from God and the optimum means to glorify Him results from an inability to find purpose and meaning in life. Are all none Christians unhappy? Which is this particular branch of Christianity that results in ultimate happiness? What kind of God creates for his own glorification?
This question, that I have been also asking myself, is a little bit difficult to be answered. It really deppends of the kind of people we are. If you follow a religion, the question is already answerd by your religion. If not, life is meaningless for you. You my warship God, seek pleasur or seclude yourself in an isolated place if that is sutable for you and make a purpose for your life. For some, life is meaningless, for others it is a track leading to another one, others consider it as a weel including death and rebirth in other coditions according to the kind of person you were, and as a test for other kinds of people. It really depends on our believes and cultur. Whether you set a purpose in your life or it is set upon you, by the end you will die. Think deaply about it rather than regrating past mistakes and things that should be done. It's your life it is not mine, so it is up to you to live it the way you see fit.
But to what kind of God do you refer in the first place ? :DQuote:
Originally Posted by Plechazunga
- Is it the nature (its Law) like the PC processor ?
- Is it the Gods who uses the Law of Nature who would have created us like we use the PC processor to create 3D world ?
Then we are just stuffs or slaves or sheeps. What the purpose of the sheeps for us ? Just to eat, entertain or work animal :)
- Is it the Ultimate God who created the Gods who created the Gods who created us but then is he even conscious of us since we are not ourselve conscious of each cell of our body ?
The word "God" itself implies there is only one. As to the nature of God, it would depend on who you ask.
One of the most inspiring books I have ever read is Man's Search for Meaning by Viktor E Frankl. I am a Catholic and for me meaning comes from God. But I liked this book because it is based on true experiences of being in a concentration camp. Frankl is a psychatrist so he is able to annalyze his thoughts and experiences as well as his peers. He claims there are two was to find meaning in one's life which surprisingly aren't directly realated to God or a super natural high power: One is because they love someone and that love makes life worth living or they have a "project" like a novel or a talent that they feel they must complete that no one else but they can. This may sound odd but if u read the book it makes perfect sense. God fits into the love category. It talks about finding meaning in life even when u suffer. If ne one has read it let me know what u think of it.
:) Lauren :banana: <--- this is so random but thats what makes it so funny
Recently I read a book by Thomas Moore called Dark nights of the soul.It discusses about the dark sides of one's life. It also speaks about about one's problems at his lonly hour-long illness or death of a loved one. Twenty years ago Ilost my father and my girlfriend one after another.Sudden demise of a loved one (be it mother,father or friend) leaves one shattered.Suddenly the meaning of life is not known to you.You don't know where to turn?Your mind suddenly becomes blank.Something seems to pushing you deep inside a void.You start asking questions?Whatis life? What is its purpose? Thomas Moore book has a thrapeutic valve in it.
------------------- ----------------------------- ----------------------
What is self?-Consciousness is self.
i had a dream about how to get to the meaning of life faster. my friend, in my dream, told me that the meaning of finding life lies in one of the polyatomic ions squared..!!! i know what does this have to do with anything, but i think now about it and it has to do with everything. life is simple yet we make things come out to be soo complicated that we confuse ourselves and miss the POINT. so perhaps then that the meaning of life has always been and is probably right IN FRONT OF US but we just missed it in questioning IT..good luck out there for all those "searchers"..>!
_what is more important finding the MEANING OF LIFE or LIVING LIFE?_
*i think i would like to spend my life LIVING and not dwelling..."LIfe will come to YOU" (-my uncle told me this ^_^)
Life is not simple.
It's funny because when I was making my engineering class I had to answer this question at an oral exam: "is the virus a living organism ?"Quote:
Originally Posted by Loki
I answered yes because biologically a virus has not DNA but still has an RNA, it parasits others to reproduce but it is clearly the same kind of reproduction than any other more sophisticated organism.
If I was asked rather "Is the virus conscious (of being alive) ?" I would probably have answered no because he doesn't have a brain like superior animals. I think that the reason we ask such question is just due to the fact that we have a brain. But this question could also be asked for any non-brained organism.
Maybe the question is just brain artefact and there is no purpose in life, maybe there is some gods that may be our fathers or ... just children playing with us as toys :D
D'oh! Why wasn't I warned before???Quote:
Originally Posted by atiguhya padma
;)
:lol: so now you are. Better to be on guards. :lol:Quote:
Originally Posted by Scheherazade
I used to think Bertrand Russell was brilliant and humanistic but not any more when I discovered that SIR Bertrand Russell (because he is a British Lord) wrotes things likeQuote:
Originally Posted by subterranean
"Really high minded people are indifferent to happiness, especially other people's."
and if you read in context it's even worse :
"War, so far, has had no great effect on this increase [of population], which continued throughout each of the world wars.... War has hitherto been disappointing in this respect…but perhaps a bacteriological war may prove more effective. If a Black Death could be spread throughout the world once in every generation, survivors would be free to procreate freely without making the world too full." Russell went on, "this state of affairs may be somewhat unpleasant, but what of it? Really high minded people are indifferent to happiness, especially other people's."
Bertrand Russell in "The Impact of Science on Society"
published in 1955 so AFTER nazism period.
Hi, NWO. Yes, I'm not really in to Russell's either. I quoted his words in the attempt to show whether there's a relationship between the existance of divine being (God), and the purpose of life. As we all know, Russell was an Agnostic.
It is natural that you quoted Russell because you ignored the whole nature of the man like 95% of people - in fact like myself a few months ago - but now you know who the guy is, then it's up to you to quote him in your conciousness.Quote:
Originally Posted by subterranean
Hitler was supposedly christian but I don't think any christian today would quote him. As for me I have decided to never quote Russell like I used to because he represents the horror of nazism.
Russell was a sanctimonious hypocrite since he never tired of villifying Nietzsche as a warmonger and the progenitor of Nazism. He even said Nietzsche was a misanthrope because any woman could whip his butt.Quote:
Originally Posted by NewWorldOrder
I agree Nietzsche was unfortunately associated to nazism whereas he wasn't even alived. And when I read Nietzsche I can't see any real nazi idea (just crude thoughts may be) like when I read some book of Russell : I wonder if it wasn't done on purpose to kick off Nietzsche and substitute Russell as the great humanitist philosopher who in facade joined Einstein for a United World whereas he is the beast of Apocalypse :DQuote:
Originally Posted by starrwriter
I also agree that Nietzsche's association with Nazism is unfortunate, however, I can see it. While I do believe that it's a misinterpretation, I think that it's easy to see how Hitler's ethnic cleansing came from the social darwinist undertones of Thus Spake Zarathustra.
I love Nietzsche, don't get me wrong. I just don't think it's that hard to see why people associate the two. Did you know that Hitler passed out a copy of two books for every German Nazi soldier to carry in his backpack during the Holocaust and WWII? One was the Nazi party handbook and the other, none other than Nietzsche's Thus Spake Zarathustra .
Quite a dangerous misreading, no?
I don't really understand your point. What do you refer as the nature of the man here?
And have you even read the book I was reffering to in my first post in this thread?
Quote:
Originally Posted by NewWorldOrder
The purpose of life is to externalize one's idea (or best attempt at the "form") of oneself and then to recognize it in the waking world.
It might be better to ask what is a life of purpose?
A life of purpose is one in which the person leading that life seeks to help others lead a life of purpose, that being to achieve harmony with the universe and most importatnly the inhabitants of it. The sum total for those who don't want to read all the print: don't be a jerk (since those nouns referring to donkeys are edited).
I do not believe there is a purpose to life. To me, it's meaningless, in the sense there is not any specific or general aim for us to be here. Having said that, I do think life is worth living (though there are times in which I contemplate the possibility of suicide). Anyway, if I really committed that act, it would be for concluding that my life was not worth living, but not life in a generic sense.
I think it is not necessory to add some purposes to life. Maybe not everything which exist in the world has a purpose. Life is life, just an "exist". Even the whole human being dose not have a purpose. Who knows where we human being will go, what is our destination.
Through early morning fog I seeQuote:
Originally Posted by Phaedra
Visions of the things to be,
The pains that are withheld for me,
I realize and I can see...
That suicide is painless,
It brings on many changes
And I can take or leave it if I please.
The game of life is hard to play,
I'm going to loose it anyway,
The loosin' card I'll someday lay;
So this is all I have to say...
That suicide is painless,
It brings on many changes
And I can take or leave it if I please.
The only way to win is cheat
And lay it down before I'm beat
And to another give my seat
For that's the only painless feat.
That suicide is painless,
It brings on many changes
And I can take or leave it if I please.
And you can do the same thing if you please.
-- theme song from MASH
I think Nick Drake wrote that, he wrote a lot of dark music/poetry. He aslo wrote that "Pink Moon" song which was on those VW commercials, its pretty happy
Johnny Mandel and Mike Altman wrote to theme song of MASH.Quote:
Originally Posted by ChuckBukowski
And Roald Dahl wrote the screenplay for You Only Live Twice.
Socrates says , " life unexamined is not worth living. "Quote:
Originally Posted by atiguhya padma
God has given you life, now it is YOU who gives meaning to it.
with regards
silver
[email protected]
You know, I spent a long time contemplating "the purpose of life," and I have decided that (if we do have a purpose) it is futile to bother with trying to understand it now...no one, not even the most enlightened, can tell you with absolute certainty that he/she knows what our purpose here is. I look at it like this: if there is a purpose, we will find out soon enough when we die. It is sort of like not understanding something until you "get it" at another stage in your life. Death is just another stage of existence (in my opinion), and (hopefully) we will become enlightened as to what reasons (if any) we have for being here.
Okay, so for example, college. You hear the stories about what happens, you might even visit the campus, but you are never really going to know and understand college and campus living until your first year attending. Then, once you become emerged in it, you are part of it, and just know what it is like. Then when people ask you, "What is college like?" You can tell them, but they won't really know until they experience it. I hope the analogy makes since (if you haven't attended college, you can use pretty much anything for an example: high school, dating, etc. it is all just a matter of the experience which leads to understanding). I mean maybe when we are all dead, in another plane of existence (if there is one), we will look back on our life here on earth and think, "Wow, I can't believe I didn't get it...now I understand." Understanding is the true consequence of experience. No one truly knows anything until they fully experience it, and no one has fully experienced life until death. At least, that is how I look at it.
Quote:
Originally Posted by starrwriter
As I've just finished reading The Myth of Sisyphus, these lines sound very familiar. Yes, we are going to lose it anuway, but that does not mean that playing it is futile. It's worthwhile, I believe, because it's a unique experience, though it may be painful.
The problem sometimes lies in the cards we're dealt.
Simply put, you create your own purpose for living.
I remember once coming upon a scripture that rather jolted me.
I had been spending just years on this very question and was feeling tired, tired, tired.
The scripture said this"The whole obligation of man is to know God."
Animals do not have any purpose, they live a predetermined life. They eat what they are used to and live the same life for ever and ever.
Humans have always exhibited a strong desire to be different. We wanted to understand the self and the world around. Both expands forever.
This urge to master oneself and the world around became a preoccuption for some and the purpose for others.
However this search has always eluded most humans. We invariably miss the point in trying to understand the world without understanding the self within. Then, we try to understand the self through the mind which is limited and conditioned.
Only those who succeed in unraveling the glory of the self, understands the real meaning and the purpose of life.
Purpose! The subject of such misguided effort...fallicy pervades the one who knows not the correct approach to it. Purpose is merely the reason for existence, nothing more. Tell not the architect that he cannot design, tell not the painter that he must be stripped of his canvas! These are the things of purpose, the things of reason! This tangible existence, saturated with the mind and the senses, calls itself life. Purpose resides in every facet of life. Purposes of learning, teaching, living, loving! Above all, purpose lies in life's existence. Is life's purpose not to provide longevity for itself? Our efforts lead us to the future, rather than the present. Life is that which guides itself, there is nothing more. Shall you find purpose in something which contains it not? Nay, thou shall find but a fragment of the fulfillment of what should be. Saturate thy life with purpose, and that is what ye shall find! Enlighten and enrich what seems without purpose, and safeguard that which does. Purpose is reflexive...one need only to find it.
Read the book of Ecclesiastes in the Bible. It will answer this question. But remember, you have to read the whole book, not just a part.
Reading bible, quran or vedha do not solve problems. Why do they unleash reign of terror on innocent civilians. What purpose? In real life some times people who are atheists and fear only their conscience are honest and non-corrupt.
Ah, the purpose of life, indeed.
Once, I heard someone ask what is our purpose here other than repeating the same mistakes over and over again. Of not being content on just listening from those who came before us, but rather, having this irrational need of biting into the cynical bitterness of the apple ourselves.
I guess the purpose of life is to have that choice of making a mistake or not. In my opinion, everything we do has a purpose. A point A in order to get to a point B. Every nuance, every bit of feeling, of experience comprises the purpose or goal to which we are headed for--an answer, The Answer.
Life was meant to be lived, and curiosity must be kept alive. One must never, for whatever reason, turn his back on life.
--Eleanor Roosevelt
Hey you guys, as-la-mu-alai-kum (Peace be upon you)
Why is this topic ending at the end of 2005? We should keep this topic up to date and discuss. Let me state first of all, when you want to look for your purpose in life you have to both go deep within yourself as well expand your knowledge and acquire experience. Responding to the remark about not to be religious, but be spiritual, is not totally true. Being spiritual goes along with religion, therefore it should be seen as one. Since we are in this time in such an influential world (20th century A.D.) the complete purpose of creation has been deviated (Materialism).
Now, there are main believes in the world; christianity (could be covered under Judaism, Hinduism, Buddism, etc. = 48% of the worlds population ) , Islam (22%) and Atheism (14%). Most of them last believers (atheists) believe in science or simply "nothing" because they have mostly denied the believe of christianity (most atheists are westerners). Let me mention, that if the largest population of the world believes in christianity (Islam second largest), why is it that the bible contains thousands of errors, contraditions and out of reality verses, conflicting with modern science and knowledge? And why have during the centuries the christians denied the understanding of Islam????
I am 21 years old former christian from the Netherlands and have inherited the religion from my family (catholic). Though, I have not simply accepted its teachings (blind believe). A short time ago I have converted to Islam, not because I can get 4 wifes, haha, but of its purity. Islam and the Quran teach very precise things relating to daily life, how to optain purity, peace and good friendships, and avoid troubles, sins and anger. Furthermore the authenticity of the book (Quran) is miraculous, cause it contains over 1000 verses relating to science and non of them (so far proved and correctly interperted) are in contradition with modern science. This book is genious (I am currently studying it, plus the bible) and I can advise you to do the same.
To get a good overview of the authenticity of holy scriptures in the past, I advise you to read the book "The Bible, The Quran and Science" by Dr. Maurice Burcaille (translated from French). It opens your eyes!!
The purpose of creation is to submit your will to god (Allah) and do nothing else than good, create peace among the people. By Jihad (no it does not mean holy war but it means "to struggle!!") you will be tested by Allah and if you pass the test, you will be admitted to the gardens of paradise, and that aint no bull!!!
Peace be upon you and that you may find your purpose in life.
Cuno