Dutch Uncle
* Tertia Optio * Defend the Constitution
So we're all ambulatory meat computers simply responding to biochemical programming to eat, sleep and fuck until we die? Nothing more, nothing less?
Agreed on more power to them.
Their name is Legion
- Thread starter Tranquillus in Exile
- Start date
So we're all ambulatory meat computers simply responding to biochemical programming to eat, sleep and fuck until we die? Nothing more, nothing less?
Agreed on more power to them.
Dutch Uncle
* Tertia Optio * Defend the Constitution
Do you think a lion can build a nuke and, if it could, would it use it? A gun?
Humans are good with tools. Very good. Animals not so much.
Take the poster Bob. Surely a dolphin is more intelligent.
On balance, humans are probably the cruelest species, bar none.
Which sometimes makes me think there is a tiny kernel of truth to that story about humans corrupted by original sin.
Animals will kill for food, or to give their genetic information an advantage over others. Humans have engaged in unrestrained homicide, genocide, torture since the dawn of recorded history.
But that said. I am under no illusions about a benevolent natural world. It's an arms race out there and has been for at least for 600 million years.
We are not as significant as we think we are. Our own conscientious gives us an unearned arrogance.
Nope they can’t. Can humans sense their food source from their scent at a great distance? Can they see a mouse moving at a distance of a mile like birds of prey?
Just because humans have evolved with a brain and the physical ability to build things does not make them superior.
Yeppers
I think you are right. Stories like Aesop's Fables pass down wisdom from one generation to the next. 'Laws', like those of Hammurabi, establish 'right and wrong'.
You don't need 'religion' for that, but it is a source of 'right and wrong'.
"By the 22nd century BC, the ancient Sumerian ruler Ur-Nammu had formulated the first law code, which consisted of casuistic statements ("if … then ..."). Around 1760 BC, King Hammurabi further developed Babylonian law, by codifying and inscribing it in stone.
Law - Wikipedia"
Concerning your other thoughts on a 'AfterLife', or 'Something More', I can't disagree that there may be 'something more'. I don't know what it is, and I don't think anyone else does either. I don't worry about it since there is nothing I can do about it either way. I want to live a Full Life here and now. If there is 'something more', I'll try to live that when I get there.
This guy lived in the 4th century, and came up with the classic about 'Gods'. Thousands of years later, people still believe a Savior is at hand. (This has to tell us something about Human Beings)
"Epicurus was an ancient Greek philosopher and sage who founded Epicureanism, a highly influential school of philosophy. He was born on the Greek island of Samos to Athenian parents. Wikipedia
Born: February 341 BC, Samos, Greece"
'Christians' didn't exist then. It's about the notion of 'Gods'. Real? Or a Human invention?
Agree.
For some, this idea of a small mudball hurtling through space and time is so unnerving that the idea that 'Someone is in the Wheelhouse' gives then comfort.
(I don't want to say 'Like a child with a blanket', but something along those lines)
Dutch Uncle
* Tertia Optio * Defend the Constitution
A fair example as a snapshot, but you and I both know Bobbie has seen better days than any dolphin ever had.
Humans have that "spark" that makes them different. Some animals have glimmerings but only an uneducated idiot sees a mother mourning a dead cub as a sign of intelligence.
Emotions are part of who we are because human beings are animals. We're also very smart. Smartest creatures on the planet. Sometimes too smart for our own good as shown by several examples of mankind developing tools more sophisticated than their maturity to use them. Blackpowder wars and nukes are examples.
While there may very well have been other creatures with the "spark", human beings prevailed while they became extinct....usually because of human beings.
Dutch Uncle
* Tertia Optio * Defend the Constitution
I see you either took your meds or simply a cold shower, Jack.
Sure, there's a reason why there's no atheists in foxholes; people can be afraid of death. Are you afraid of death, Jack?
“Death comes for us all; even at our birth-- even at our birth, death does but stand aside a little. And every day he looks towards us and muses somewhat to himself whether that day or the next he will draw nigh. It is the law of nature, and the will of God.”
Jesus. Some believe JFK, Jr. will appear and reinstate Trump as president.
Dutch Uncle
* Tertia Optio * Defend the Constitution
Duh! No shit. So what? What do you expect people to do with their one life? Just eat, sleep and fuck?
Dutch Uncle
* Tertia Optio * Defend the Constitution
Absolutely. Death is coming for you, Jack. You can run but you can't escape it. You can try to hide, but that never works. No person on the planet can escape death. All we can do is choose to face it or not.
Have you ever faced death, Jack? Have you ever been in a situation where you thought you'd die? How many friends have you buried? Any?
Your parents? How did they face death in the end, Jack? Or did you run away so you didn't have to watch?
