A Depressing Thought That Just Occurred to Me

[sequio]

It's depressing, but I think that this generation, the next, the next, etc. are going to die eventually and maybe a long time from now there will be an overwhelming movement to try to make the Earth more floral and still keep digital technology or something better around. Either that the humans war each other to extinction (infertility biological weapons?) and the Earth just heals itself like the heartless self correcting system that it is.

 

[Duck Sandwich]

consider the analogy of indians letting their children be stung by young scorpions so that they later would become immune to the toxins. by eliminating your fears you make yourself a stronger person.

That is a good analogy. However, negative emotions can be used towards positive ends as well. For example, an angry guy blows off some steam by working out. Not only is he motivated to push himself harder by his anger, thus achieving a better result, but he is calmed down by having expended his anger. Of course, positive emotions, such as (in this case) knowing the rewards that await after a good workout, can have the same effect.

Sure, it would be better to be motivated by positive emotions instead of negative ones, but negative things are a part of life. And in many cases, negative emotions are a normal, healthy way of reacting to them.

 

[theklng]

consider the analogy of indians letting their children be stung by young scorpions so that they later would become immune to the toxins. by eliminating your fears you make yourself a stronger person.

That is a good analogy. However, negative emotions can be used towards positive ends as well. For example, an angry guy blows off some steam by working out. Not only is he motivated to push himself harder by his anger, thus achieving a better result, but he is calmed down by having expended his anger. Of course, positive emotions, such as (in this case) knowing the rewards that await after a good workout, can have the same effect.

Sure, it would be better to be motivated by positive emotions instead of negative ones, but negative things are a part of life. And in many cases, negative emotions are a normal, healthy way of reacting to them.

i would say this is very subjective. some people are able to cope with their anger by working out, some are not. some keep their anger inside until a certain point where they become fed up and go berserk, while others regularly vent to avoid this. it depends what the body of a given person is accustomed to, and the mind will take the most cost effective solution, leaving less energy drained of a given body in any situation. i would reckon this would be true for all emotions.

 

[TheHorizon]

Hooray! Humanity is a virus!

But seriously, why is that bad? Did you even put thought into this "horrible reality"?
And if it is any consolation, there is the rest of the universe (as we know it) left completley and utterly untouched.

 

[Tattaglia]

Maybe where you live, although you could just go to those untouched places and bask in its wonder. Or something equally awe-inducing, like riding a motorcycle through a fire hoop.

Yeah there is like thousands and thousands of square miles of untouched forest here in the Northwest. Including places where no man may have ever stood. ever.

No one in the world has stood on my garage wall. Take that, conservative!

 

[TheHorizon]

As far as you know...

wink

 

[Dr.Doctor]

I agree with all of you but jim doki. I'm not saying I want to go back in time. I just wish I could see it.

I think they got pictures.

 

[Hunde Des Krieg]

Maybe where you live, although you could just go to those untouched places and bask in its wonder. Or something equally awe-inducing, like riding a motorcycle through a fire hoop.

Yeah there is like thousands and thousands of square miles of untouched forest here in the Northwest. Including places where no man may have ever stood. ever.

No one in the world has stood on my garage wall. Take that, conservative!

What did you just call me? What the hell is your problem? All I did was make a statement about where I live and how places that at least don't look like they have been touched still exist.

 

[Tattaglia]

Maybe where you live, although you could just go to those untouched places and bask in its wonder. Or something equally awe-inducing, like riding a motorcycle through a fire hoop.

Yeah there is like thousands and thousands of square miles of untouched forest here in the Northwest. Including places where no man may have ever stood. ever.

No one in the world has stood on my garage wall. Take that, conservative!

What did you just call me? What the hell is your problem? All I did was make a statement about where I live and how places that at least don't look like they have been touched still exist.

...what? Are you being serious? You do realise I was kidding, right?

 

[Hunde Des Krieg]

Maybe where you live, although you could just go to those untouched places and bask in its wonder. Or something equally awe-inducing, like riding a motorcycle through a fire hoop.

Yeah there is like thousands and thousands of square miles of untouched forest here in the Northwest. Including places where no man may have ever stood. ever.

No one in the world has stood on my garage wall. Take that, conservative!

What did you just call me? What the hell is your problem? All I did was make a statement about where I live and how places that at least don't look like they have been touched still exist.

...what? Are you being serious? You do realise I was kidding, right?

You understand that
A. Sarcasm is a little hard to pick up on through text and,
B. Conservative=Fightin' words.

 

[samsprinkle]

What depressed me more than anything else is the knowledge that in this modern era where we can instantly communicate with people across the globe, have invented robots the size of human cells, have simulated the fusion reaction of our sun within a laboratory, and have gone so far as to set foot on another celestial body, there are still people in this world who believe a benevolent, sentient being created the world in seven days.

-Dread_Reaper

HAAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! agreed...

 

[Mrsoupcup]

Only the striper, games, illegal substences and the good old red haired girl are good about were i live but if I walk 10 minutes I found a little patch of green.

Edit: A girl got raped there last time I vist, shit well its back to the concrete jungle.

 

[RebelRising]

If you really need the comfort of thinking there is some omnipotent watching over you to get you through the day, whatever, that's your problem. I prefer reality.

-Dread_Reaper

Never said I believed in it myself (agnosticism, yo.). Just that a lot of people are into the religion thing for various reasons (rewarding good/punishing evil, purpose, immortality, etc., are attractive concepts to a lot of people). Personally, I don't like the idea that because I don't attend weekly meetings to sing and drink "blood" and eat "flesh," I deserve to suffer untold sadistic torture for an unspecified amount of time.

I just prefer not to take a side in the eternally overdone conflict of Invisible Dude In The Sky VS Explosion.

Wrong. Knowing that one day your body will die and your remains will be eaten by worms is not a depressing thought. Rather, it gives you all the more reason to make the absolute most of out every day. If you live forever, what is there to live for?

-Dread_Reaper

Say I live my life to the fullest. Accomplish all my goals, have the job of my dreams, a sweet, caring, beautiful wife, and children whom I've raised well and can be proud of. Knowing that all of that will eventually mean absolutely nothing? That can be kind of depressing. That, and you can't experience everything life has to offer in one runthrough. Come to think of it, I'm becoming rather fond of the concept of reincarnation.

Also, the movie Waking Life brings up an interesting point. The brain continues to live on for a few minutes after a person's death. During that time, the person/brain's sense of time becomes distorted, and since it's deprived of any external stimuli, it begins to create its own (hallucination). So for those who believe in Heaven/Hell, it could very well become true once they've died - except it will only exist in their minds.

I'm pretty much with you here. Reincarnation is cool, because regardless of your belief system (or lack thereof), you still have opportunities to fulfill multiple lives. Absolute death or absolute paradise/agony is limited in that you are still the same person, with the same qualities and flaws and prejudices and people. I like to think that reincarnation renews everything about your being, making such absolutist decisions about your life on Earth irrelevant when reality is something that's continuous and constant. The relinquishing of power over "morals" vs. power over intellect is something not worth holding on.

Also, to Death-Reaper, you're making all atheists look bad with your comments. Trust me, to get worked up over that just gives the religious ammo to label us "scientific evangelists" or whatever nicknames they've come up with these days. I don't resent the belief in God, just the act of putting words into the mouth of a God who creates limitless stars, planets and galaxies, can raise mountains from the bottom of the sea, is time and space, and using him to suppress human rights.

I'd like to think that if there is a God, we would be unable to apply human thinking to him, provided he supposedly created us in the first place. He would be impossible to rationalize, simply because our minds would be unable to comprehend just how much power he wields and how vulnerable we are. I'm probably slipping into Lovecraftian ideas now, so I think I'll stop here.

 

[Tattaglia]

Maybe where you live, although you could just go to those untouched places and bask in its wonder. Or something equally awe-inducing, like riding a motorcycle through a fire hoop.

Yeah there is like thousands and thousands of square miles of untouched forest here in the Northwest. Including places where no man may have ever stood. ever.

No one in the world has stood on my garage wall. Take that, conservative!

What did you just call me? What the hell is your problem? All I did was make a statement about where I live and how places that at least don't look like they have been touched still exist.

...what? Are you being serious? You do realise I was kidding, right?

You understand that
A. Sarcasm is a little hard to pick up on through text and,
B. Conservative=Fightin' words.

It's still ridiculous to call a person a conservative as an insult, unless I'm insane. Sorry for the confusion.

 

[KarumaK]

Personally I would like to be able to go somewhere and not see nature. Nature sucks, it's violent, dangerous, and decieving. Humanity kills and destroys its fair share, but nature makes us look like noobs. We can keep the water, but other than that I want a Corusantesque (that's...not a word) world.

 

[Ultrajoe]

That's my main hope in life, actually.
To be able to stand somewhere and not be able to see any signs of humanity.
No civilization, roads, cars, etc., just wilderness in its purest form.
By the look of it, though, that dream is going away fast.

Welcome to Australia.

We have nothing in big bucketfuls. We could export empty space. From anywhere in this country it's less than a 2 hour drive (Excluding traffic) to somewhere like that.

It's not that impressive, really.

 

[Adam Jenson]

That's my main hope in life, actually.
To be able to stand somewhere and not be able to see any signs of humanity.
No civilization, roads, cars, etc., just wilderness in its purest form.
By the look of it, though, that dream is going away fast.

Welcome to Australia.

We have nothing in big bucketfuls. We could export empty space. From anywhere in this country it's less than a 2 hour drive (Excluding traffic) to somewhere like that.

It's not that impressive, really.

aye. Now Alaska, that's a place I imagine would be still untouched by man

 

[falcontwin]

That's my main hope in life, actually.
To be able to stand somewhere and not be able to see any signs of humanity.
No civilization, roads, cars, etc., just wilderness in its purest form.
By the look of it, though, that dream is going away fast.

You could come to Tasmania weve got lots of that stuff here. most of the state seems to be national park/wilderness

 

[ThePoodonkis]

Been to Alaska, Kodiak and Anchorage. Those were pretty close.
Never been to Australia or Tasmania. Apparently I need to.