The Andromeda Test

[An young being]

2 hours ago, kenway said:

Because that's not one of the options available as laid out in the exercise.

The point of the exercise is to bring to the fore the reality of how you identify with yourself, and your loyalties and priorities that expand out of that identity. Do you identify as human, or do you identify as God? By forcing to make a choice in who lives and dies, you are exposing the extent to which your animalistic programmings are a significant force relative to your angelic instincts or spiritual understandings.

 Coming to preference, the fact that she is very young, and she has more time to experience life compared to the homeless person gives an edge to saving your daughter even after removing your attachment to her. As Leo said, you have to make the question more difficult.

2 hours ago, kenway said:

In addition to preference, it also exposes the ontologically meaningless instinct to survive, relative to the greater understanding that you are eternal by default.

Ironically, life can become meaningless when we leave the desire for survival entirely. Also, not only your attachment to her affects you, but also her attachment to you affects your life even spiritually.

 

 

 

[kenway]

59 minutes ago, An young being said:

Coming to preference, the fact that she is very young, and she has more time to experience life compared to the homeless person gives an edge to saving your daughter even after removing your attachment to her. As Leo said, you have to make the question more difficult.

In that case, suppose the homeless person is your father and is someone that you know well and in affectionate terms. In contrast (in this case) you know nothing of the 5-year old girl - she is merely a random 5-year old living in a different part of the world belonging to a totally different culture than your own. 

How would that change things?

 

59 minutes ago, An young being said:

Ironically, life can become meaningless when we leave the desire for survival entirely.

I agree that the survival instinct gives stability to temporal finite experiences.

 

59 minutes ago, An young being said:

Also, not only your attachment to her affects you, but also her attachment to you affects your life even spiritually.

I’m not convinced that it affects things spiritually. The magnitude of love experienced might be enough to emulate or uncover a kind of euphoric bonding, but it’s still fundamentally anchored to the animal experience. It doesn’t change any underlying ontology. 

You cannot convince God to not love the homeless person in the same way that you love your daughter. Hence the issue of how you identify. God or human after all?

[An young being]

13 minutes ago, kenway said:

 You cannot convince God to not love the homeless person in the same way that you love your daughter. Hence the issue of how you identify. God or human after all?

Human, of course! If you want to become God, you have to become independent of all thoughts. There are some who indeed are able to see his family and an unrelated one or an insect as the same, but still it's difficult for them to avoid feelings like guilt and other emotions as thoughts all the time. So, yes, you can momentarily become what we call a God.

As a human, I believe it's not necessary to be impartial towards everything. But we all can strive to become God through practicing unconditional love and it's children such as compassion, gratitude, forgiveness etc. For example, you can save your daughter and still be compassionate towards the man whom you cannot save and yourself for not being able to give up attachments altogether and not act like a God.

[An young being]

1 minute ago, An young being said:

Human, of course! If you want to become God, you have to become independent of all thoughts. There are some who indeed are able to see his family and an unrelated one or an insect as the same, but still it's difficult for them to avoid feelings like guilt and other emotions as thoughts all the time. So, yes, you can momentarily become what we call a God.

As a human, I believe it's not necessary to be impartial towards everything. But we all can strive to become God through practicing unconditional love and it's children such as compassion, gratitude, forgiveness etc. For example, you can save your daughter and still be compassionate towards the man whom you cannot save and yourself for not being able to give up attachments altogether and not act like a God.

And love yourself for acting like a human.