LastThursday

Because they have a desire to be "seen" and express themselves in a public space for their own satisfaction, but they just don't want the interaction. Imagine going to a park because you like open spaces and fresh air, but you don't want strangers coming up to you all the time asking who you are. As for features maybe certain folks don't want a theme park, just basic grass.

@soos_mite_ah either just ask him straight what he would like or... give him something unique or unusual that represents you in some way.

Recently rediscovered Very cheesy but it's like meeting an old friend from years ago. I like the syncopation.

Keep away from people who smoke! The only way I quit was when I changed jobs (and city) and nobody around me smoked. Keep away from activities where people might be smoking around you. Distracting yourself when you get cravings is critical, but after a few weeks it's a lot easier. Maybe chew gum instead. If you "accidentally" buy cigarettes, then throw them away at the first opportunity (a public bin is best). Personally I found chewing nicotine gum helped a great deal with cravings, and it was way less addictive. But obviously it's not cold turkey. I've been smoke free for seven years. I spent the previous 28 years smoking on and off, the longest break being a year or so. It's hard.

The selfishness angle is hard to get a handle on I would say. Is a cheetah that kills a gazelle for food acting selfishly? Or is it just that it has no other choice than to be a cheetah? Does that same logic apply to a human? It seems to be a human's innate flexibility - via copying each other and using imagination (a.k.a culture) - that is the source of its disruptive power over nature. So for example if a cheetah can't find gazelles to eat it will die because it has no problem solving ability, other than what nature gave it. Whereas humans can build on experience and share and record those experiences with each other over time. Evolutionarily that's a huge advantage over other animals. But, the ultimate source of that experience is still nature itself, our "problems" came from that source. There's this ratchet effect with culture and it builds up (exponentially) over huge timespans. At some point human population densities and numbers get high enough that they start disrupting the dynamic equilibrium of the local environment. Once that happens every "problem" that is solved creates further problems down the line. Instead of being unconscious animals evolved by millions of years of adaptation, we have to start being conscious custodians of the Earth and masters of our own fate. But a human is no different from a cheetah in that a human has no choice than to be a human. In that sense we aren't selfish. The most nuturing state is that where nature is left to its own devices. So it comes down to really understanding deeply how our imaginations and actions are affecting the dynamic equilibrium of the Earth. Or basically understanding how even good intentions can create bad outcomes in hugely interconnected non-linear systems. After all a farmer will nuture their crop and feed their communities, but at the expense of biodiversity and ecology. The reward here is knowing that every problem solved has a cost (or negative consequence) and being aware of that.

And... immediately locking all threads talking about, dissecting, gossiping or analysing over specific forum members. Especially if the members are not active and can't defend themselves. Or even giving warning points if anyone starts this sort of thing.

For the forum at least by balancing out the demographic (I know, easier said than done). Of course the ideal being a one to one female to male ratio, and a wider spread of ages. More female mods maybe? Banning the use of the word "Leo" in forum topic titles. Banning the use of the phrase "I became enlightened" or the like in titles (boo! hiss! I know yeah yeah). And for the love of god being able to control who can post in your journal or even blocking everyone from posting in your journal. Personally I don't care about this, but others do very much.

For a more out there perspective: I can't help that think before humans the system of the Earth was in perfect dynamic equilibrium. There were no problems to solve. Then people came along with their fancy imaginations and dreamt a new reality for themselves, and over time pushed the whole thing out of equilibrium. When you have a perfect system any perturbation upsets the whole thing in the wrong direction. Every "problem" people try and solve manifests yet more problems - they are architects of their own misery. For me the fact that humans have such a large effect on Earth, is the smoking gun for high weirdness in our reality. If the Earth is an organism then why did it choose to kill itself? After all the Earth birthed us. And why am I here to witness it? Anyway enough woo woo.

A smörgåsbord for your tasting delight

@Something Funny don't be a petulant child. Stick to the topic.

The appearance of an Amazon package is a literal miracle as are all other appearances. You're correct that there is a process, but it's not the one you think it is. To get a handle on it, if you ask yourself "what did I have for breakfast?" then it's clear the breakfast is not literally existing right now. It's just your imagination. You have a strong feeling that it's something you experienced, but it's just a feeling nothing more. You may even feel your breakfast in your stomach right now, but it's still not your memory of the breakfast. There is no functional difference between something that "happened" to you and it never having happened. The only thing that exists is what you experience right now in the moment, and you work backwards to create a story of how it got here. It's a story of cause and effect; where does a cause end and an effect start? Any process you imagine is no longer in existence - it's all effect and no cause. So what's the process? Reality is constantly being created from nothing (dreamt) along with all your memories. Stuff over there seems to be connected to stuff over here and you call it "cause and effect" or "process". Reality is like an unfolding fractal with repeating patterns, those repeating patterns are what to materialists refer to as "real" and "matter" and "cause and effect".

@Something Funny, @AndylizedAAY why not have a private conversation about it, so we can stick to the topic instead?

Why not? We all live in cages, why not set each other free? @Julian gabriel lead by example not by analysing her, show her what it's like to be free.

The universe has no narrative or story. It's only you that has one. Some challenges don't help you grow but actually suppress you. The only "guide" is your ever increasing awareness.

It's interesting. In a public setting a woman will check you out (if you're a man) when you first enter a place and there will be prolonged eye contact. Then nine times out of ten she won't look at you again. You can safely ignore that sort of eye contact, it means nothing. Also there is the reciprocal eye contact. Women will sense when they're being checked out by a man, and some women will enjoy the attention and play up to that attention. Again this doesn't mean anything. Who doesn't like being flattered? But there is what I call "the stare" or "the blink" where genuine interest is being shown. It's very difficult to describe, but there's kind of focused prolonged attention and undertone of excitement or tension in the woman's body. If you get that then you should immediately start talking.

@r0ckyreed everything in your experience is highly correlated. You ordering a book from Amazon is correlated to you receiving it tomorrow. Notice how you don't actually perceive the process of how it happens just the end results. What actually did happen if you didn't receive your book tomorrow? You have no idea, it's completely fuzzy. What you're calling logic is actually an "inference engine" that is constantly filling in missing information and guessing what happened. Nothing is 100% certain. That inference engine of yours has to be trained over a lifetime. How does it get trained? It notices the same things happening over and over again. It then learns to extrapolate when there's missing information. It's a self re-enforcing system, so it only learns to notice the things that are actually correlated to each other and ignores those that are not. So reality "crystalises" out of a soup of random experience, by noticing correlated things in an ever increasing way. Since reality is actually a unified whole everything has to be correlated with everything else without exception. It's like cutting a cheese in half, the left side is inversely correlated in shape with the right side, but the correlation occurs because it's all one cheese to begin with. Awareness itself cuts the cheese of reality and creates perception out of it, so all perceptions are correlated to each other. What you choose to correlate together with your inference engine ends up being "your perception" and "your reality". Do you think babies have any idea about Amazon deliveries? It's not part of their reality.

Music to procrastinate to

Society - the Western based ones, which is most of the world now - is missing a trick by not persuing existentialism more widely. If we were able to connect a lot more deeply with reality as a collective, then a lot of things would naturally fall out of that. The main one is a much richer connection to reality: we would stop behaving in such brutal and shortsighted ways. We would naturally recognise each other as being one, and stop hating, enslaving and hurting each other. Well, that's what I would hope for - that and world peace (sorry Miss World joke, you have to be old enough). I don't know what's harder, having no choice or having choice but not being able to exercise it. Us first worlders are constantly told we have choice, but the reality is that exercising that choice is either very hard or impossible in a lot of circumstances. This leaves us with a bitter taste in our mouths. What are we supposed to do if we can't "get sex" or "be creative" or "be authentic" or "be loved", and yet we see others not so different from us getting those things? For some the torture of being teased by the ghost of choice is too much (sorry for the flowery language I'm exercising my creativity) and pulling the rip cord on living is tempting. Personally, when I repeatedly depressed about topping myself, in the end I came to the conclusion that I wasn't actually willing to do it at which point I simply gave up on the suicidal ideation, it was simply too wearing and idiotic (in my case) a thing to continue desiring. But this is what resonates for me about what you wrote, my depression was ultimately existential. In my case I also feel like I'm running out of runway because of my age, either I take off now or I hurtle into god knows what - anyway I digress. Talking to you as I would talk to myself, my advice would be simply to face things head on. If you're in your twenties or thirties then you have plenty of runway left. Don't be too rigid in how your express your creativity, hedge your bets. Society does actually provide you with a huge playground of avenues to explore - some will excite you enough that you will know what to do with your ideas. I don't know what turns you on, if it's art or chess (I think I've seen you mention) or a million other possible things, go do it, master it! If you feel you're not in a position of choice (real or apparent) then get yourself into that position, you still have time. If you need money to express yourself, strategise and then do the short-term grind to get there (trust me in hindsight it will seem short). Pragmatism and taking action can be very good for mental health - and you can create narratives which do match your reality. But. Also continue to do the existential investigation and master this side of things. Why not even start at "suicide" and investigate it, think about it deeply? There's nothing more existential than the threat of death itself. After all WTF is death anyway? Some Camus quotes about death: https://www.azquotes.com/author/2398-Albert_Camus/tag/death

@GalSource coming out of hiding and showing your true colours to others is always a process of self discovery and takes courage. By not hiding you give the world the light of your love, that's the most important bit.

The way I see it (Abrahamic) religions gives us explanations for our existence and why things are what they are, but devolves that origination to a being that is like us, but different and powerful enough that it could conceivably have done the job of creation. All religions are carried by narrative and this use of narrative appears to be the antidote to bad mental health. If you're a replaceable cog in the machine of society, then the narrative of constant hope is what keeps you mentally healthy: I will earn more, live better, be happier; for the religious there is salvation and the afterlife to look forward to, or the end of suffering through letting go. The same use of narrative is seen in ideology and its use as a cohesive force when belonging to a group: you endure the same hardships together against a common foe, have the same stories of triumph against adversity. The more simplistic, emotionally driven and repeated the narrative is, the stronger its power. The use of simplistic collective narrative is completely counter to individual nuanced contemplation. Investigation into existential matters is seen as dangerous because there is the potential to veer away from convential narrative and norms - and anyway religion has it covered, no need to re-invent the wheel eh? We give away our responsibilities for answers to other authorities. I agree that killing religion has left a lot of us in a bit of a no-mans-land with regards to existentialism. Science itself has poked many holes into the narrative of religions, but it's not wholly to blame, the church itself is responsible for the split away of science from religion in the first place. We rely on science and politics as the new religions instead. They have brilliant narratives and science has a great creation story of its own, but it doesn't have a patch on religion in the existential realm - electrons and photons are just not the same as almighty God. All this leaves us like inexperienced kids groping around with lots of questions but no comforting answers. Why do people avoid existential investigation? Mostly because it contradicts the narrative of society and so is potentially damaging. Also because it appears to have no direct utility in every day life. For example, how does contemplating our inner natures help with being more productive at work? We are actively discouraged from investigating it's just not part of our cultures. When a kid asks their mum: "where do I go when I sleep?" the parent is so inexperienced with existential matters, that they don't have a proper answer. We are never encouraged or instructed in existential investigation. All this leaves us with a fear of even thinking about existential things. It's a fear of the unknown and complete inexperience. But it's like knowing you're gay and having to behave straight. Everyone feels existential questions and problems arise, but tries to pretend they don't exist and constantly have to distract themselves as a facade. Drama, hard work and hardship make for very good distractions and good narratives to get behind and share. Really, meaning and hope is driven by narrative. When you start poking holes in the narrative of distraction by contemplating existence deeply, you're attacking your identity and attachment to society. People avoid this for obvious reasons. I think some suicidal ideation comes about not because of existentialism or lack of it but because of the friction between what we're allowed to do (work and distract ourselves) and what we're not allowed to do (introspect reality). Being a cog in the machinery of capitalism is ultimately empty and unsatisfying because we know that we're being made to behave like a character in a story (that we have no control over), but deep down also we know we're much more mysterious and expansive than that. It's a deep potentially depressing dissonance.

These questions always remind me of this illusion Do the faces exist? Does the vase exist? Can one exist without the other? Is it something or nothing?

I totally resonate with this. It's like once you've seen through the superficial veneer of busy-ness you can't unsee it. There's a cold stark reality of, I don't even know the word: absurdity, meaninglessness, incredulity? For example I find it completely absurd how every day passes and I do all this "stuff" and yet it's just completely bizarre. It's not that I'm shitting on being alive, I'm not, it's just that it's all patently ridiculous and I can't trick myself into seeing or feeling about it any other way. In a strange way it's given me a certain amount of courage I didn't used have. Because most of the things I do are forgotten about or just make absolutely no difference to anything. I can't even remember what I ate a few days ago. So why be worried about the consequences of things when most of the time they're of no consequence? But you're right this sort of existential angst is not good for mental health in general. It seems like we're wired to ignore this existential stuff (for the sake of our mental health), until at some point the flame is lit and the existential moths are attracted to it. Once you start to question your existence and so on, it's hard to stop. Really the existential stuff is always there just beneath the surface. I think nearly everyone suffers from it now and then. You're standing in the queue for coffee and then suddenly poof: "WTF am I doing?". Then you quickly try and gloss over it just in case you fall into a hole you can't get out of. But you're right existentialism is the driver of our lot of our behaviours. Not least of which is the biggest one of all: how much do I really need to survive? Most people are so scared shitless of losing everything that they contort themselves in absurdity just to avoid it. However, the bigger fear is losing everything but somehow still surviving and having to endure the pain indefinitely - that's existential angst. Society is a completely made up fairy tale and reality is an absurd dream.

I don't know, but it seems like you can have two different types: towards and away. Maybe someone grows up poor and as a consequence has a deep passion for becoming rich - this is away. Maybe someone has an inate talent for music and so develops a passion for it - this is towards. Is passion just an obsessive interest, for example chasing beauty?

Thanks for the recommend @Asayake. Which colour goblin am I...? Indigo.

Thing is we don't have a consciousness measuring device. And even if we did, could we really collapse all of conscious experience into a single number indicating "how conscious" something is? The best measuring device we have is our own intuition and comparing with the gold standard of consciousness: us. When we ask "is a rock conscious?" we intuitively know that even if it was, it wouldn't be very conscious, because it has very little in common with human beings. We crank up the consciousness scale for dogs, because they are more like humans and so on up. It seems like the nub of the argument is whether a thing has any form of 1st person perspective at all. A 1st person perspective naturally excludes all other perspectives including yours, so it's impossible to "get at" that perspective and to know if it exists. We can only treat it like a black box and try different inputs to see what different outputs are in response. Then we can try and guess its perspective if it has one.