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The point of human existence, the purpose of society, and how to run it

1 pointsby pHollda7 months ago

5 comments

blackbear_7 months ago
&gt; The obvious argument for the existence of a creator is that we have no other explanations for how things come into being other than that they were created by someone or something. Since we have no other explanations for things coming into being, it is only reasonable to accept the only one that we do have to be true.<p>Lolwut? This guy seems to have missed the intellectual developments of the last 400 years.
gryfft7 months ago
&gt; The obvious argument for the existence of a creator is that we have no other explanations for how things come into being other than that they were created by someone or something. Since we have no other explanations for things coming into being, it is only reasonable to accept the only one that we do have to be true.<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;God_of_the_gaps" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;God_of_the_gaps</a><p>&gt; Our world is very clearly a programmed environment.<p><a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;Teleological_argument" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&#x2F;wiki&#x2F;Teleological_argument</a><p>&gt; The failure to understand the point of existence is what leads people down false paths and focus on all of the catastrophic ideologies which are contemporarily popular or becoming increasingly popular.<p>I&#x27;d ask which ones but I think I know what the author&#x27;s answer is.<p>Not really seeing any new or interesting takes here, just the same old palingenetic fluff.
RiverCrochet7 months ago
Article is a big-ass non-sequitur.<p>&gt; What is the ultimate long-term goal? &gt; Exploring and conquering all of the universe.<p>This is never really explained. The whole article uses this as a justification, but doesn&#x27;t really explain why this is. It leads to a &quot;nowhere&quot; that is equally strong as the hedonism it denounces in my opinion.<p>&gt; The boringness of existence without definite goals.<p>If you need external goals to feel non-boring, that&#x27;s fine. But you are in some sense going to be a slave to those goals, and if another person has handed you these goals, you are a slave to them.<p>I am honestly fine without definite goals. There are common background activities and values, such as keeping myself healthy and strong so I can do what I want, and being friendly and helpful to others to make friends-good friends are pleasurable. But why &quot;conquer&quot; a universe when you can be happy with much less work? What are you going to do after that anyway?
clejack7 months ago
&quot;The obvious argument for the existence of a creator is that we have no other explanations...[so] it is only reasonable to accept the only one that we do have to be true ... [but] if a creator created us, who then created our own creator?<p>Given that we can only operate based on knowledge that exists within our own world, it is hard, and maybe impossible to answer that question. And it is maybe possible that we come to develop very good theories about that the more we understand about our own world in the future.&quot;<p>This morning I woke up thinking about human behavior as it relates to various beliefs we hold. I was mainly focused on the more irrational ones like religion, and I&#x27;ve come to believe that it is not always a lack of raw intelligence that undoes us (though that is certainly an issue), but it is a lack of consistency that harms us the most.<p>The opinion expressed at the end of the quoted message undoes the entire blog post, and it begs the question, if you can acknowledge that there are simply things that we do not currently know and that we may discover in the future, why not take that view when thinking about God?<p>The simple fact is we do not know regardless of any hypothesis we come up with because we don&#x27;t have a good test currently.<p>The author&#x27;s reasoning is inductive in nature. I.e. it takes specific facts and tries to make a general rule from it. This type of reasoning is strong in certain mathematical context, but it&#x27;s weak in many real life applications.<p>I&#x27;ll give you an example with 3 sequences of numbers. The first two will be easy. Guess the next number.<p>Sequence 1: 5,5,5,5,5<p>If you guessed 5, you are correct.<p>Sequence 2: 1,2,3,4,5<p>If you guessed 6, I would tell you that I lied earlier. There is no 3rd sequence and the lesson is here at the second. The above sequence is an infinite loop of the sequence &quot;1,2,3,4,5,&quot; and the number 6 is your &quot;rational&quot; conclusion on God. If you honestly guessed the sequence was a loop, you have a strange mind, but hopefully at this point you can see the answer was arbitrary and subject to my whims.<p>I could have come up with multiple answers.<p>We collectively have no more insight into the workings of universe, than any of you have into the workings of my mind. A simple &quot;I don&#x27;t know&quot; will suffice sometimes.
beardyw7 months ago
I was hoping for something interesting.