/lit/ - Literature

It keeps us busy and distracted from our impending, unstoppable death.

Like a boulder rolling down a thin corridor towards you with no escape, but you can doodle on the walls in the mean time for others that are going to be there.

>>960755

Progress in terms of increasing the quality of life of people through science and liberty will help make your pitiful and short stay on this earth happier.

And if you believe as I do that life has no objective goal or continuation, then you should come to the conclusion that humanity should focus on being happy and chilling with your bros as possible during this brief period of consciousness.

>>960768
>Progress in terms of increasing the quality of life of people through science and liberty will help make your pitiful and short stay on this earth happier.

That's what I said, just in layman's terms. More doodles equals more distractions equals a more interesting life - it's a metaphor.

OP again, I think progress is a vehicle to help achieve a state where all can be content, and therefore its value expires. But I'm not very well read on the subject and wanted to know what you think, and I probably should have put this in the first post.

>>960768
Also OP, that's exactly what I think, I just hate to cast off a sizeable fraction of philosophy based on my own speculation alone.

>>960768

>and chilling with your bros as possible during this brief period of consciousness.

I meant "as much as possible during this brief period of consciousness"

And OP, you don't have to be well read on the subject to form your own opinions. It's all very subjective and depends on your personal outlook on life.

>>960783
When I said that's pretty much what I think, I was really forgetting a lot of things I'd thought. There is surely in life some purpose that's less subjective than pleasure, in our duty to the species, and I say duty because the vast majority of people end up succumbing to it, in procreation and selflessness and things which we are emotionally compelled to do. If progress lead to the development of a drug which acted as a chemical substitute for everything good life had to offer, then the individual's needs would conflict with this evolutionary duty. Similarly if a cure was found for old age, humanity wouldn't continue with the inate genetic progression that takes place with breeding, given that people stop breeding and dying as a result of this cure. Progression of the species and progression of the state are separate, obviously, but neither to me seems inherently good. tl;dr I am confus

>>960796

What you identify as our 'evolutionary duty' is a concept used by proponents of eugenics. However, I'd like to point out that evolution is a horrendous and unforgiving process.

Although nature may seem at times like the epitome of tranquillity, all animal life is subjected to a torturous and paranoid existence in their evolutionary struggle for survival. The weak and dim never make it, and this macabre machine which we call natural selection is responsible for evolution.

We as a species are very lucky, because we have risen to a level of intellect that allows us to escape the viscous and uncaring circle of evolution and help the poor and weak to live happy and healthy lives. Your point is by no means flawed, and you are right to point out the conflicts between nature and culture.

However, I do not feel that humanity has any obligation to try and ensure the continual development of humanity as a species.

There will always be sexual and other forms of selection to drive evolution, but I would never allow myself to disregard the happiness or lives of individuals for the benefit of collective evolutionary progress.

Think about where you are going with this.

>>960817

Wrong picture.

Believe me I'm no eugenicist. I'm an individualist and a humanist, what I mean by evolutionary duty is just something that we've evolved to do to continue the existence of the species, and given that it can theoretically conflict with our best interests as individuals it implies a more objective (not totally objective) purpose, which almost validates collectivism in my mind, but I rather wish it didn't.

>>960833
Also while I disagree with eugenics firstly on an emotional level, I find it easy to refute the idea, in that it assumes we know best for the species, which defeats the object of being natural selection.

>which defeats the object of being natural selection.

Ignore 'being'. Shit.

>>960821
>fREEdom, with a capital REE

progress as an ideal encourages a degree of progress. if the australian aborigines looked up in the sky and saw a meteor about to hit the earth and kill them all, they might wish they had embraced this ideal, at least to the point of developing ICBMs.

>>960849
ICBMs?

you mean they wouldnt have needed to wait untill a meteor destroyed the world, but they could do so themselves?

Because ICBMs are INTERCONTINENTAL ballistic missiles, you know...

we still can't just turn a warhead on an intercept-course with a object speeding towards us with enough precision and as far away so that the earth wouldnt take any damage...

Have you read The World as Will and Idea, OP?

>>960867
No I haven't. Care to explain?

>>960833

I don't believe we are so subconsciously centric around procreation as you might think. At least, not all of us are. The only hope for human civilisation is that there are enough of us with the intelligence to break from our evolutionary indoctrination and continue to build a society which can enrich the lives of everyone.

>>960844

No, they're all capitals. Look closer.

>>960858
ICBMs are still space-capable missiles. The reason the cold war included a space race was that it was a way to prove that their missiles could hit their targets.

While you have to set up a rocket differently for it to travel out into the solar system (lower payload fraction etc.), the technology for reliable ICBMs is the same as the technology for space launch.

>we still can't just turn a warhead on an intercept-course with a object speeding towards us with enough precision and as far away so that the earth wouldnt take any damage...
That is just ridiculous. Given a little notice, we can put a nuclear blast anywhere in the solar system with high precision.

The question is only whether we detect the asteroid early enough, as the energy required to deflect it becomes greater as the rock gets closer.

>>960858

I think the message that Anon is trying to convey is that through technological and cultural progress we can greatly benefit humanity's survival.

>>960817

Is that you Truman?

>>960833
>I'm an individualist and a humanist

Those two are 100% incompatible polar opposites, bro.

>>960901
I'm an individualist, and an altruist then

>>960901
>implying that either term has a single clear meaning

I'm a humanitarian and a vegetarian.

>>960913
I see what you did there