Philosophers tend to avoid that question and argue about extremely niche things like Ship of Theseus problems.
Lol what are you on about. There is an entire body of active philosophical work about the meaning of life: https://scholar.google.com.au/scholar?as_ylo=2024&q=meaning+of+life+philosophy&hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C5
That’s what makes philosophy interesting.
I am on my seventh Ship of Thesus, my D: contains /DOSGAMES/ and has a “folder created date” of August 1996.
As far as I’m concerned, it’s the same ship because I can load up my original SAVEGAMES, they still work, and they can kiss my ass. My ship has gone through the swamp man paradox and emerged the same on the other side. :>
Bust a nut, pass your genetics and perish. Thats it. What you do in between that is up to you.
If reincarnation were real, I’d hope that people who think the meaning of life entails procreation end up getting stuck as mayflies forever
No, social behavior has always been a party of biology. Even after you reproduce how you care for your young and your extended family has a huge impact on the species. Herd animals or anything that flocks can’t function solo. If all the adults just left after they reproduced the species wouldn’t survive. Reproduction is key for the individual, but it’s never that simple. The version you’re told in school is always a highly simplified version of the truth.
Honestly the entire idea that the only purpose of humanity is to make the next generation or support that process in some way just feels gross in a very eugenics adjacent way. If you start with that premise, it’s just too easy to conclude that anyone who isn’t working towards that end is disposable.
Not just humanity. That is the purpose of all living things, insofar as we can be said to have a purpose at all.
From a biological point of view everybody is disposable
…well in the long view, that’s how we got here and eventually that’s all that matters: it’s a bit nihilistic but that’s the essence of nature in the cosmos…
How about I do something which will make life better for people who are actually alive already instead of increasing total human suffering by making new people.
That’s the philosophy group to the left
Having kids can be extremely fulfilling, doesn’t increase human suffering at all. Having kids subjectively improved my life and the lives of many people adjacent to me, e.g. the lives of my family members and friends and my kids’ friends.
I don’t understand how the Internet is so anti kids, it’s pretty baffling.
Human suffering is caused in part by overpopulation (as is the suffering of all creatures - we are invasive, destructive and afflicted with a superiority complex) and in part by religious indoctrination, so while you procreate, as long as you don’t force offspring into a single and restrictive belief system, I suppose it’s okay, and all the best to you.
Virtually every sentient life experiences a non-zero amount of suffering. Progeny that doesn’t exist categorically doesn’t suffer; progeny that does exist is virtually certain to suffer to some degree. The hedonist argument that progeny may get to experience some joy falls apart because progeny that doesn’t exist categorically doesn’t experience any lack of joy (i.e. that would-be joy is not mourned by that which does not exist).
Ensuring the certainty of the sum total of suffering in another person’s life just for one’s own self-fulfillment is incredibly selfish. Procreation is a cycle of blithe selfishness that perpetuates universal suffering and is at best wrought by apathy for others’ suffering and at worst wrought by enthusiasm for others’ suffering.
I’m anti-kid because I didn’t consent to the sentience that I have experienced and I have the empathy to want others not to suffer.
You say it’s improved your life and the lives of those adjacent to you, your family members, friends, and your kids’ friends. But you haven’t said its improved your kids life. I think that’s what the OP was talking about. A being who doesn’t exist doesn’t desire to exist so making new life isn’t doing them a favor and only exposes them to harm.
Don’t project your own depression onto others, and non-existent beings.
If you think existence “only exposes [living things] to harm” and nothing else, nothing even potentially good?
If you truly believe that, I’ve got no nice way to say this: You need therapy.
I mean I’m not depressed and I love living, so I wouldn’t be projecting depression on to others.
I agree that people can experience good things as well as harmful things, but it’s not a risk worth taking. Giving birth is gambling with human life. You never know if someones life experience is going to be overwhelmingly positive or negative, but if they are never born, that’s not even an issue to worry about.
Come on, it’s worth it but it certainly brings a lot of suffering that wouldn’t exist otherwise. Telling my teenager that he needs to shower 5x, every day that he does sports, is suffering for both me and him.
Y’all need to look into some of the less boring fields of philosophy, plenty of philosophy says physical pleasure is good and we should be having and enjoying it!
At uni the biologist parties were always the ones with the most sex. So that checks out.
The least sex was electrical or mechanical engineering. Just the couple of ay dudes had some fun.
Weirdest sex was for sure psychology student parties.
And there was me, who entrapped himself in a terrible relationship and had neither sex nor fun
Imo, the meaning of life is to experience as much as possible. Simple as that.
The meaning of life is to live.
And to live is to experience. 😝
Not necessarily, living longer could be at odds with experiences like sky diving or bull running.
Are you saying that it’s all about how long we live? If so, I disagree. I think it’s about how -much- we live.
I don’t think that, but saying ‘the purpose of life is to live’ implies more life is more better.
Then we agree, lol. “Living” more is experiencing more, right?
I didn’t think living=experiencing.
Seems like that’s how you’d get murder, cannibalism, sadism, and things like that if you don’t put limits on it somewhere.
No one can experience all things, and there are plenty more things to choose from than what you listed.
Totally unrelated, but what does this ink blot look like to you…? Just curious! 😜
How would you prioritize what to experience? By novelty? Or would you be happy to watch every movie ever made?
I mention those because it’s a common trope in fiction for curiosity of experiences to lead down disturbing paths. Slanesh in 40k comes to mind.
It’s all up to the individual. Whatever makes your motor run. But I’d universally suggest traveling to other countries to experience different cultures first hand. Other than that… Just interact with and experience as many new things as you’ve got the bandwidth for.
On the other hand, if you go with reproduction as the main goal, then that gets you to eugenics from an uncomfortable number of very different paths.
Absolutely, that’d lead you to as many partners as possible while discouraging birth control. Plus tangentially it’d incentive trying to reduce the number of children other people have to increase your share of the gene pool. (Which I think is one of the paths you were getting at with eugenics)
As much of what the biologist is having as possible
That’s 100% valid, too! Whatever makes your motor run.
Someone’s channeling their inner Caligula…
I swear I was just checked last week and it came up clean!
Women looking at this meme: so am I supposed to be a lesbian?
Yes, you have to reproduced by impregnating a woman or you are an evolutionary failure.
Yup, we are now gay :3
Yes.
women? on the internet? looking at memes?
Creepy. I just watched this scene seconds ago after not watching the film for years…
Yes I was scrolling while watching, I’m sorry.
Weird, I just watched this year’s after not watching the film for years…
Its crazy how unlikely things happen frequently with enough participants.
Yes I was scrolling while sitting on the toilet, I’m sorry.
Lemmy silver 🥈
Is it colloidal?
?
The silver
Sorry I don’t understand
(English isn’t my primary language :/)
Old saying in is: In Internet men are men, women are men and children are FBI officers.
Edit: 4chan rules of the Internet:
Rule 29: On the internet men are men, women are also men, and kids are undercover FBI agents. Explanation
GIRL
guy in real life
Yep. Sorry hetro women, the meme has spoken; you’ve got to be gay now.
Well, at least bi.
It’s not necessarily a POV…
No you don’t understand. Women don’t matter.
TIL that we evolved opposable thumbs for feeding our loved ones
Mascara?
Pynchon from Gravity’s Rainbow:
“Don’t forget the real business of the War is buying and selling. The murdering and violence are self-policing, and can be entrusted to non-professionals. The mass nature of wartime death is useful in many ways. It serves as a spectacle, as a diversion from the real movements of the War. It provides raw material to be recorded into History, so that children may be taught History as sequences of violence, battle after battle, and be more prepared for the adult world. Best of all, mass death’s a stimulus to just ordinary folks, little fellows, to try ‘n’ grab a piece of that Pie while they’re still here to gobble it up. The true war is a celebration of markets. Organic markets, carefully styled “black” by the professionals, spring up everywhere. Scrip, Sterling, Reichsmarks, continue to move, severe as classical ballet, inside their antiseptic marble chambers. But out here, down here among the people, the truer currencies come into being. So, Jews are negotiable. Every bit as negotiable as cigarettes, cunt, or Hersey bars.”
…god wants dollars, god wants cents, god want pounds, shillings, and pence; god wants guilders, god wants kroner, god wants swiss francs and god wants french francs; god wants escudos, god wants pesetas, don’t send lira, god don’t want small potatoes…
I struggle to read these days and I couldnt get through gravity’s rainbow. Worth a read? Should I get the audiobook?
It’s one of the more difficult books to get through frankly but it is rewarding. The thing to appreciate when attempting it is that mid-30s Pynchon was inventing his own English grammar. Some sentences are a full page long and it will challenge your memory. So the best approach I think is to just let it wash over you. After a while your mind adapts. You’ll miss a ton the first time through and that is OK. I think I had to start it three times before I eventually got through it and I was younger then. I have reread it a few times since, once with a companion book that annotated each chapter and offered commentary on the book’s structure which is actually impressively plotted. But don’t let it intimidate. Just let it wash over you and enjoy the funny parts. There are a lot of funny parts. The audiobook route sounds less fatiguing. Fickt nicht mit dem Raketemensch!
It wasn’t until I got to the cigarettes and cunts as currency that I realized this was not a particularly hardcore monologue from Gravity Falls, a popular show I had not watched, but Gravity’s Rainbow. Great excerpt though.
So who is that on the right
Seconding, source (NSFW) is an onlyfans post on 2022-05-24 titled wish it was u? ;D
Ok, so who’s that on the left?
The skeleton? Well, that would be me. I am a bit underweight.
No clue. Saved it to my meme folder back when I was on Reddit and decided to put it up here to keep the community going.
Thank you for your service
Someone about to be strangled by a ghost’s hand.
Oh lol that one on the left is the meme where xianxia fighters explain their move in the middle of battle.
Pretty much.
Sorry, blah blah research purpose.
