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Hunter S. Thompson on Finding Your Purpose (1958)

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Re: Hunter S. Thompson on Finding Your Purpose (1958)

#251

Post by ajuc »

genegc2 wrote: post #245
ajuc wrote: post #243

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> In order to escape all pain and suffering, we would have to surrender our freewill Why? I can write a game where you have choice, but no pain or suffering. Is God worse programmer? > and then what would be the point to life anyway? There's no "point to life". It's a sandbox game you have ~80 years to experience. Enjoy, while you can, and don't be a dick.

> Why? I can write a game where you have choice, but no pain or suffering. Is God worse programmer? If our choices were reduced to those which could not cause pain and suffering, life would resemble a game; our choices would lack any consequence. Thankfully, life is much more than a game. > and don't be a dick This advice is curious to me. How do you derive this from your beliefs? I can understand you saying "don't b…

> our choices would lack any consequence

consequences doesn't have to cause suffering. You can live in one country or another - meeting different people, eperiencing different thigs, learning different cultures. How is it less of a consequence than developing a cancer?

The rest of your argument is taking a mataphor literally, and asserting it's less true thanks to the existence of evil. Why? How would the life be worse if there were no diseases and wars?

> How do you derive this from your beliefs?

I'm not special. Other people have their lives too, and by being a dick I decrease their enjoyment of their short lives. I don't have any reasons to value my enjoyement over theirs (or vice versa).

I have counter-question BTW - would you go around murdering people and stealing from them if there was no hell and no police? That's what your argument boils down to - "without a stick and a carrot why bother with morality"?

Re: Hunter S. Thompson on Finding Your Purpose (1958)

#252

Post by chebastian »

pests wrote: post #18
chebastian wrote: post #6

Was about to repost this but then i saw, "10 foods that most def will give you cancer" that host page gave me cancer.

The source of information is not a valid complaint if the information in nonetheless useful or valid.

I would argue that the source is a valid complaint, but i might have overreacted after reading atleast one more article.

Like this one, http://tranquilmonkey.com/19-super-foods-naturally-cleanse-l...

They actually do write in the article that there is no research done to back up the "superfood detox" and actually seem to provide some good tips instead. But I still cant understand why they go for that style of article headlines.

Re: Hunter S. Thompson on Finding Your Purpose (1958)

#253

Post by sireat »

coldtea wrote: post #249
sireat wrote: post #246

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd love to hear more about great artists/makers/scientists etc who started in their 30s/40s. Only one who comes to mind as far as writing goes is Chandler, but he must have done his own share of writing (oil business in 1920/30s must have required some writing)before that. Joseph Conrad is another interesting case mastering English in his late 20s. My premise: To be great you have to perspire early with some talent…

Bukowski published his first novel at 51. He had written a couple of stories and poems before his 30s, but spend most of the next 1.5 decade drunk and not writing. Burroughs published his first noval at 39. He had just written a few articles until then. Walt Whitman first published a poetry book at 36. Toni Morrison wrote her first novel at 39. Bram Stoker wrote Dracula around 50. He worked as a public servant before…

Your list is inspirational although I could argue that it is flawed because those late starters actually had early practice.

Jules Verne is one of my favorite childhood writers thus I knew he had an early start.

Wikipedia concurs: By 1847, when Verne was 19, he had taken seriously to writing long works in the style of Victor Hugo, beginning Un prêtre en 1839 and seeing two verse tragedies, Alexandre VI and La Conspiration des poudres (The Gunpowder Plot), to completion.

Same deal with Bukowski, sure he had not written a novel but he knew he was a writer much earlier + plus he devoured the whole library ages 15-24.

Same deal with Fleming: His wartime service and his career as a journalist provided much of the background, detail and depth of the James Bond novels. Emphasis on being a journalist.

Still writing is indeed one of those fields where you can get by with not being fluent in your skill as long as you got a good editor.

Programming is the same thing, you can write a decently sized program without knowing the language and its idioms very well but it is oh so painful.

So yes you can achieve outside success in some craft without being really gifted/skilled but that's not the same thing as achieving proficiency and being in flow. Yeah you can fake being a modern painter but someone like Rothko or Pollack had the early classical training.

My lament is that past the age 40 you can not achieve proficiency in some new craft that you have taken up. There are no neurosurgeons who started at 40.

You have to settle for less, pick your battles very carefully and delude yourself with special prizes.

Re: Hunter S. Thompson on Finding Your Purpose (1958)

#254

Post by genegc2 »

ajuc wrote: post #251
genegc2 wrote: post #245

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Why? I can write a game where you have choice, but no pain or suffering. Is God worse programmer? If our choices were reduced to those which could not cause pain and suffering, life would resemble a game; our choices would lack any consequence. Thankfully, life is much more than a game. > and don't be a dick This advice is curious to me. How do you derive this from your beliefs? I can understand you saying "don't b…

> our choices would lack any consequence consequences doesn't have to cause suffering. You can live in one country or another - meeting different people, eperiencing different thigs, learning different cultures. How is it less of a consequence than developing a cancer? The rest of your argument is taking a mataphor literally, and asserting it's less true thanks to the existence of evil. Why? How would the life be wor…

There are more consequences than just hell and jail - and a faith or belief system purely motivated on hell and/or jail is an immature one.

My argument boils down to Natural Law, and it sounds to me like yours does too. When you say "I don't have any reasons to value my enjoyment over theirs" - I would totally agree, but I still don't understand how you arrive at that without a belief in Natural Law.

An argument that doesn't rely on Natural Law goes something like this: We have evolved into highly social beings, so our internal physiology naturally rewards us for socially constructive behavior, so we choose to not be a dick because being a dick feels bad. It's a purely selfish motivation because that is what is purely rational.

My limited understanding of Natural Law comes from CS Lewis and Thomas Aquinas, but I did a quick search before writing this reply and I see that it has some backing in atheistic thought. Is that where your coming from?

Re: Hunter S. Thompson on Finding Your Purpose (1958)

#255

Post by [deleted] »

brokenmachine wrote: post #250
genegc2 wrote: post #241

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You bring up two issues here - the need for evidence, and the problem of pain and suffering. There are of course a lot of resources on both sides of the coin about those issues. I'll just summarize my very limited understanding - my personal approach. My faith is evidence based - but it can't be 100% proven beyond the shadow of a doubt. Since it can't be proven, I'm forced to continue to grow in my understanding, and…

> My faith is evidence based - but it can't be 100% proven beyond the shadow of a doubt. Since it can't be proven Actually evidence is proof. You're just writing a bunch of words. All your mysterious and humble, "can't know everything...", "learn for yourself" patronizing garbage that doesn't make sense. blah blah blah. How exactly do you decide which particular ridiculous idea to believe, when you don't need any pro…

[deleted]

Re: Hunter S. Thompson on Finding Your Purpose (1958)

#256

Post by pests »

chebastian wrote: post #252
pests wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The source of information is not a valid complaint if the information in nonetheless useful or valid.

I would argue that the source is a valid complaint, but i might have overreacted after reading atleast one more article. Like this one, http://tranquilmonkey.com/19-super-foods-naturally-cleanse-l... They actually do write in the article that there is no research done to back up the "superfood detox" and actually seem to provide some good tips instead. But I still cant understand why they go for that style of article…

The facts should stand for themselves without care who expresses them.

I agree to always check who the source is. Be aware of its baises and so on.

Still, in 1945 Raymond L. Libby invented an oral delivery method for penicillin. Had Hitler done this, would that discovery not still have been important or valid?

Re: Hunter S. Thompson on Finding Your Purpose (1958)

#257

Post by ajuc »

genegc2 wrote: post #254
ajuc wrote: post #251

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> our choices would lack any consequence consequences doesn't have to cause suffering. You can live in one country or another - meeting different people, eperiencing different thigs, learning different cultures. How is it less of a consequence than developing a cancer? The rest of your argument is taking a mataphor literally, and asserting it's less true thanks to the existence of evil. Why? How would the life be wor…

There are more consequences than just hell and jail - and a faith or belief system purely motivated on hell and/or jail is an immature one. My argument boils down to Natural Law, and it sounds to me like yours does too. When you say "I don't have any reasons to value my enjoyment over theirs" - I would totally agree, but I still don't understand how you arrive at that without a belief in Natural Law. An argument that…

> I still don't understand how you arrive at that without a belief in Natural Law

I don't believe in things that seem unlikely and have no proofs.

The theory that my feelings are more valuable than that of other people seems unlikely (why my out of all people) and I have no evidence supporting it. Therefore I assume it's false and act accordingly.

Why would you need some external law for that train of thought? All you need is logic and probability theory.

Re: Hunter S. Thompson on Finding Your Purpose (1958)

#258

Post by brokenmachine »

ajuc wrote: post #257
genegc2 wrote: post #254

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are more consequences than just hell and jail - and a faith or belief system purely motivated on hell and/or jail is an immature one. My argument boils down to Natural Law, and it sounds to me like yours does too. When you say "I don't have any reasons to value my enjoyment over theirs" - I would totally agree, but I still don't understand how you arrive at that without a belief in Natural Law. An argument that…

> I still don't understand how you arrive at that without a belief in Natural Law I don't believe in things that seem unlikely and have no proofs. The theory that my feelings are more valuable than that of other people seems unlikely (why my out of all people) and I have no evidence supporting it. Therefore I assume it's false and act accordingly. Why would you need some external law for that train of thought? All yo…

I get the impression that religious people actually have no internal moral compass of their own so therefore need a set of external rules in order to not be dickish.

Because of this necessity, they can't understand how other people can have morals without a set of rules, even self-contradictory, ambiguous rules passed down from a supernatural being via the mysterious hallucinations of desert people thousands of years ago.

Re: Hunter S. Thompson on Finding Your Purpose (1958)

#259

Post by ajuc »

brokenmachine wrote: post #258
ajuc wrote: post #257

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I still don't understand how you arrive at that without a belief in Natural Law I don't believe in things that seem unlikely and have no proofs. The theory that my feelings are more valuable than that of other people seems unlikely (why my out of all people) and I have no evidence supporting it. Therefore I assume it's false and act accordingly. Why would you need some external law for that train of thought? All yo…

I get the impression that religious people actually have no internal moral compass of their own so therefore need a set of external rules in order to not be dickish. Because of this necessity, they can't understand how other people can have morals without a set of rules, even self-contradictory, ambiguous rules passed down from a supernatural being via the mysterious hallucinations of desert people thousands of years…

> I get the impression that religious people actually have no internal moral compass

I'm quite certain that's not true. At least it wasn't true for me when I was religious, and it's not true for most of the religious people I know (and I live in 95% Catholic country, at least in theory).

For one example - I've spoken with many Catolics who thought it's "not fair" that a serial murderer can escape eternal punishment with last minute atonement, but a women that was in a marriage with abusive husband and then met her "other half" - has to sacrifice her love till death because of 1 unintentional mistake in the past.

If people actually believed morality comes from God only - they wouldn't think twice about this. God says so and that's it.

On the other hand it's hard to distinguish external and internal motivation when you have it constantly mixed by the religion, rituals, etc. And people like to find explanations fo why they (and you) need religion - external morality seems to be a popular excuse.

Re: Hunter S. Thompson on Finding Your Purpose (1958)

#260

Post by [deleted] »

ajuc wrote: post #259
brokenmachine wrote: post #258

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I get the impression that religious people actually have no internal moral compass of their own so therefore need a set of external rules in order to not be dickish. Because of this necessity, they can't understand how other people can have morals without a set of rules, even self-contradictory, ambiguous rules passed down from a supernatural being via the mysterious hallucinations of desert people thousands of years…

> I get the impression that religious people actually have no internal moral compass I'm quite certain that's not true. At least it wasn't true for me when I was religious, and it's not true for most of the religious people I know (and I live in 95% Catholic country, at least in theory). For one example - I've spoken with many Catolics who thought it's "not fair" that a serial murderer can escape eternal punishment w…

[deleted]
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