Hrm, I thought this might be a problem. The separation of what is personally important and the things that impact the world, or at least the human race, at large.
In the case of what's personally important, Loop Stricken, you're perfectly right in pointing out the individuals current status: Food and shelter are important to being alive, but most of the human race have got that covered, so we've moved on to other important things.
On the other hand, thinking too far ahead - how our things fit into the Grand Cosmic Scheme of Things - leads to some grim fatalist conclusions. As you say, "nothing is important, everything is rendered ultimately pointless." A person who genuinely thinks like that is a disturbing thing to think about, but still unbelievable, if only because that person's instinct for survival would most likely override any feelings of personal unimportance.
In the case of what impacts the human race and the world at large, Epiceps, you're perfectly right in pointing out that we humans are just a bunch of ultimately arrogant tools - collectively, termed a "toolbox" - of a species among the billions that exist now. We're hardly perfect, and we don't need the hatred and misery to know it; evolution marches on. Just because this is the form we've had for a pretty long time, that doesn't mean we'll eventually change somehow in the next couple hundred-thousand years, especially if genetic manipulations and alien cross-breeding happens sometime between now and then.
Let me reel in the scope of the topic. My first paragraph referenced issues like Justin Beiber and Twilight and the PETA Mario game and DRM. Let's focus for a moment on those little things, and introduce others.
Things like, say, the music industry as a whole. Music is an art, but the popular opinion seems to be that the majority of modern music is shite, meaning there's a good segment of art that is detrimental to culture. SO, does that make the apparent decline of quality in the music industry an important thing?
Grammar nazis will yell all day about a single misuse of your and you're or there, their and they're. I think they have a good argument about the possible degradation of the use and apparent respect for the English language. After all, are the words we speak an important thing? And yet, the popular opinion seems to be that grammar nazis are just that: people who got butt-hurt and OCD and whatever just because someone uses "there" instead of "their." Does that make it not such an important thing?
I'm sorry if my thoughts are seeming less coherent. It's about 5am where I am, my brain is working at less than optimal capacity.
In the case of what's personally important, Loop Stricken, you're perfectly right in pointing out the individuals current status: Food and shelter are important to being alive, but most of the human race have got that covered, so we've moved on to other important things.
On the other hand, thinking too far ahead - how our things fit into the Grand Cosmic Scheme of Things - leads to some grim fatalist conclusions. As you say, "nothing is important, everything is rendered ultimately pointless." A person who genuinely thinks like that is a disturbing thing to think about, but still unbelievable, if only because that person's instinct for survival would most likely override any feelings of personal unimportance.
In the case of what impacts the human race and the world at large, Epiceps, you're perfectly right in pointing out that we humans are just a bunch of ultimately arrogant tools - collectively, termed a "toolbox" - of a species among the billions that exist now. We're hardly perfect, and we don't need the hatred and misery to know it; evolution marches on. Just because this is the form we've had for a pretty long time, that doesn't mean we'll eventually change somehow in the next couple hundred-thousand years, especially if genetic manipulations and alien cross-breeding happens sometime between now and then.
Let me reel in the scope of the topic. My first paragraph referenced issues like Justin Beiber and Twilight and the PETA Mario game and DRM. Let's focus for a moment on those little things, and introduce others.
Things like, say, the music industry as a whole. Music is an art, but the popular opinion seems to be that the majority of modern music is shite, meaning there's a good segment of art that is detrimental to culture. SO, does that make the apparent decline of quality in the music industry an important thing?
Grammar nazis will yell all day about a single misuse of your and you're or there, their and they're. I think they have a good argument about the possible degradation of the use and apparent respect for the English language. After all, are the words we speak an important thing? And yet, the popular opinion seems to be that grammar nazis are just that: people who got butt-hurt and OCD and whatever just because someone uses "there" instead of "their." Does that make it not such an important thing?
I'm sorry if my thoughts are seeming less coherent. It's about 5am where I am, my brain is working at less than optimal capacity.
