Thoughts on Religion and the State

[Xant]

Nah.

Its merely saying "this has value to me" not saying its anything meaningful. One can say both and not be contradictory. Value and meaning are not the same thing.

I can say that playing crpg is something I value but I can also say it has no meaning overall. The value statement is just a personal statement and the meaning statement is saying something about it on a universal level.

Yes, exactly.

If you really understood that nothing was worthwhile, you wouldn't even attribute value to enjoying things.

It is this I take exception with. Why would I not want to enjoy my life even though I understand that it's "meaningless"? Why on Earth should I care if my life is meaningless according to the "universe"? Humans might have the power to create and shape universes of their own not so long from now; why should I care that something unthinking does not give me or my life inherent meaning? It is no different from being upset that a rock doesn't care about you.

[Taser]

Yes, exactly.

Glad we agree.

It is this I take exception with. Why would I not want to enjoy my life even though I understand that it's "meaningless"? Why on Earth should I care if my life is meaningless according to the "universe"? Humans might have the power to create and shape universes of their own not so long from now; why should I care that something unthinking does not give me or my life inherent meaning? It is no different from being upset that a rock doesn't care about you.

Again, its an emotional response to the logical conclusion. Once you go down the path of "what really means anything" some people can't handle it. The ones that do realize they still can attach value to things even if nothing means anything and they keep on keeping on.

And I think you misunderstand that statement. Its not thinking whether your life is meaningless to the universe but to yourself. Once you get to the point where you cannot give yourself a reason as to why your life is valuable, you spiral down into depression. And that's why I made my original statement in which nihilists either distract themselves or commit suicide. Once you get to the point where you cannot logically answer "Why is my life valuable?" to yourself, which cannot be answered in any logical fashion, some people cannot handle that and spiral down into depression and then commit suicide. Others would simply say oh well and keep on keeping on. It does give some people an existential crisis, whether or not it would give you one.

Not too many people would commit suicide over thinking that the universe doesn't give them meaning but some would if they cannot answer why their life is meaningful or has any value to themselves. That's when people lose all hope.

[Yazid]

Xant and Taser both of you fail and haven't said anything. Pseudo-intellectual mental masturbation, showing us all the true value of Nihilism.

[Taser]

Xant and Taser both of you fail and haven't said anything. Pseudo-intellectual mental masturbation, showing us all the true value of Nihilism.

Prove it wrong rather than saying simply its not useful.

You have yet to do so and have instead posted nonsensical feel good posts.

Now if you would like to add anything of value, go ahead. You can start by trying to answer my post in response to yours earlier.

[Yazid]

Prove it wrong rather than saying simply its not useful.

You have yet to do so and have instead posted nonsensical feel good posts.

Now if you would like to add anything of value, go ahead. You can start by trying to answer my post in response to yours earlier.

Nonsensical feel good. Haha, youre the kind of people that needs to suffer in order to learn anything, there's no easy path for you.
That's fine there's a million hurdles in life to get over and maybe you can climb everest or balance a pin on your nose or roll a peanut up mt. tamalpais with your nose.
In the end it doesn't matter nothing I can say will satisfy the likes of you two.

[Havoco]

Xant and Taser both of you fail and haven't said anything. Pseudo-intellectual mental masturbation, showing us all the true value of Nihilism.

This guy is like Mike Myers in The Love Guru.

[kinngrimm]

Taser, ty for your explanations. I had pretty much written 3 times now an essay to explain myself, nihilism and why it fucked me up. I deleted it 3 times and decided now to not go into it any further detail then: I was never a very religious guy, but there was a time i had a strong believe of my purpose in life, when i got in contact with nihilism, that changed and i changed. It wasnt a pleasent experience, that one can be shaken badly by only thinking theoreticly about ... a Theory, a concept ... something which nearly had been my job description before ^^

...Your existence always has meaning to you.

Sadly there you are wrong, it may not be concievable to you, then just let this one go. This is a well ment advice.

There's no one free of conceit.

true

I'm more intrigued with the idea of the universe observing itself- and what's more, playing with itself, through us.

Like us being parts of a body, or part of a cell, which in the end extends to be a consious being, not nessarily conciousness about its parts though ^^?

Anyway, for those of you arguing for religion, or at least, acknowledging the benefits of religion, what kind of relationship should the state and religion share?

while i am not part of either of those categories, i can play the part of advocatis diaboly.

advantages for the religion
a) taxes which are regularly and without big fuzz are colelcted by teh state and transfered to the organization backing the religion ( the church for the christian westerners )
b) having influence onto the education of childreen, thereby imprinting concepts on the young minds like getting them used to see tehmselves as f.e. christians or muslims or ...
c) tax free income for priests and other religious handymens ^^

advantages for the state
a) having a way of influencing the voters f.e. "vote for the good christian kinngrimm, kinngrimm for president" (who gives a shit that he is an agnostik, when the other message had been repeated a thousand times)
b) You can scare people pretty good, the texts of the books koran and bible, leave quite soem room for interpretatiosn, depending who doing the interpreting the sinners could be punished quite extremly
c) stability. remember why in Konstantinople the first bible had been put together? Peace around the mid terrainien sea. One religion without struggles betwen different interpretations, therefor one book, where the preists from all over the empire of rome would come to Konstantinople and talk about, what goes into the bible what stays out of it.

advantages of such a symbosis for both, state and religion
controll, you think devide and conquer doesnt count here. Think again. What had been shared/devided, to what outcome? Who is in controll of what? Taking here the cathlic church as an example comes quite naturaly to my mind ^^

[Xant]

Xant and Taser both of you fail and haven't said anything. Pseudo-intellectual mental masturbation, showing us all the true value of Nihilism.

The irony is strong in this one.

[Yazid]

This guy is like Mike Myers in The Love Guru.

the fact you saw that movie says a lot about you

[Xant]

Waiting for Muhammad to back up or justify his fucked up religion with a) logic, b) evidence or c) proof:

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[kinngrimm]

Waiting for Muhammad to back up or justify his fucked up religion with a) logic, b) evidence or c) proof:

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sofar i dont even know which religion that would be.
The name as indicator could be a troll. The posts of his would lead to Taoism , Laotze it was right? Wasnt that the chinese philospher who was all about the state? *yawn* 4 in the monring wtf, i am off.

[Taser]

Taser, ty for your explanations. I had pretty much written 3 times now an essay to explain myself, nihilism and why it fucked me up. I deleted it 3 times and decided now to not go into it any further detail then: I was never a very religious guy, but there was a time i had a strong believe of my purpose in life, when i got in contact with nihilism, that changed and i changed. It wasnt a pleasent experience, that one can be shaken badly by only thinking theoreticly about ... a Theory, a concept ... something which nearly had been my job description before ^^

No problem. I understand that feel.

For about a month I basically weighed whether or not I should continue to live. Just played with the question and kept going over it in my mind. I just couldn't answer the question of why my own life was meaningful to myself. There was no logical answer to it that I could come up with. And once you hit that, its just.. depressing. Sure I came up with other reasons.. stuff is fun, I like doing this.. family.. whatever but once you hit that idea of "I cannot justify my own life", you fall into an abyss of not being to justify anyone else's either or anything that is considered "good".

But then you push that aside and realize you still like doing things in life that give you pleasure and value. It still sticks around but its more manageable after that first brush with the question. Not everyone does though. Your experience will vary of course and I don't know what happened to you and how hard it was for you.

There are competing ideas and so forth. I just can't see why they're right though.

[zagibu]

No problem. I understand that feel.

For about a month I basically weighed whether or not I should continue to live. Just played with the question and kept going over it in my mind. I just couldn't answer the question of why my own life was meaningful to myself. There was no logical answer to it that I could come up with. And once you hit that, its just.. depressing. Sure I came up with other reasons.. stuff is fun, I like doing this.. family.. whatever but once you hit that idea of "I cannot justify my own life", you fall into an abyss of not being to justify anyone else's either or anything that is considered "good".

But then you push that aside and realize you still like doing things in life that give you pleasure and value. It still sticks around but its more manageable after that first brush with the question. Not everyone does though. Your experience will vary of course and I don't know what happened to you and how hard it was for you.

There are competing ideas and so forth. I just can't see why they're right though.

Personally, I came to the conclusion that I don't even have to justify my own life. It just is.

[Taser]

Personally, I came to the conclusion that I don't even have to justify my own life. It just is.

Alright. That's one way of circumventing the question. Long as it works for you, there you go.

Its kind of an ego problem really. This is why buddhists and others probably don't struggle with the question as much as those aren't. If one believes they are part of the whole, then the ego is simply an illusion and the idea that you need to justify your own life is meaningless since "you" don't really exist.

I don't know if that was completely accurate when it comes to buddhism and other beliefs in which the ego is an illusion but nihilism is far less an issue then when one believes you are a part of the whole rather than separate from everything. Interacting still with your surroundings and so forth but a separate unit from the whole.

I will admit ignorance on buddhism and ego illusion beliefs. I just know from secondhand. Dunno if that's where you're coming from or not though.  I may have misread you completely lol.

[Yazid]

sofar i dont even know which religion that would be.
The name as indicator could be a troll. The posts of his would lead to Taoism , Laotze it was right? Wasnt that the chinese philospher who was all about the state? *yawn* 4 in the monring wtf, i am off.

Confucious was about the state. The Tao is long dead and gone, the Tao is like Jazz, if I have to explain to you what it is, you just don't get it. Blame the 17th Century Qin dynasty for the loss of Tao in East Asia  and that shitty ying yang symbol you see at every McDojo.