Today's Meditation

[Jasper]

I'm awfully intrigued by the mythic implications.

Like are we all Sisyphus?  Look at the way we keep fighting death.  Death would be to just stop doing this pointless shit with The Boulder.  Our Boulder isn't money, it's life.  We keep fighting the gravity of the boulder because, even though it's brain-smashingly repetitive, it is still less boring than being dead.

The absurdity is that we keep thinking, yeah, this time will be different.  This time the boulder will balance on top of it all.

And then what would be the point of going on?

That's not the point.  It's a meaningless goal, because the top of the mountain is the same as the bottom, if you're sitting still.

If you're not changing, you're dead one way or the other.

[Doktor Howl]

I don't buy either one (absurdism or nihilism).

My life has purpose.  In fact, it has lots of purposes.  Today my purpose is to make Filthy Assistant miserable.  Tomorrow, my purpose is to roll rocks off of Mt Lemmon, in the hopes of making a trail full of hikers go screaming all the way to the bottom.  Fuckers.

Anyway, life means whatever you decide it means, whatever gets you through the night.  You're here to enjoy yourself, and if you were lucky enough to be born in a nation in which this is possible, then it's a damn sin to pack your head full of nihilist garbage.  People in central Africa would trade the rest of their lives for your worst day.

[Cramulus]

Anyway, life means whatever you decide it means, whatever gets you through the night.  You're here to enjoy yourself, and if you were lucky enough to be born in a nation in which this is possible, then it's a damn sin to pack your head full of nihilist garbage.  People in central Africa would trade the rest of their lives for your worst day.

that sums up the rant, yeah

Your life may have meaning today, a different meaning tomorrow. We can't just accept that there is no meaning, we have to go on making meaning as we go, content that meaning is like a "straw dog" - a sacrificial artifact that is well maintained until it is useful, then ti's cast aside without a second thought.

[Bebek Sincap Ratatosk]

Anyway, life means whatever you decide it means, whatever gets you through the night.

As I understand it, that's basically Camus' absurdism... or maybe the modern existential viewpoint?

Dok as an Existentialist?! That may be the most Absurd of all! 

[Jasper]

Surprised?  What did you expect?  Essentialism? 

And you know how he feels about logical positivists.

[Doktor Howl]

Anyway, life means whatever you decide it means, whatever gets you through the night.

As I understand it, that's basically Camus' absurdism... or maybe the modern existential viewpoint?

Dok as an Existentialist?! That may be the most Absurd of all! 

Balls.  I'm a fucking Discordian.  I don't need any other philosophy.

[Tempest Virago]

I've always identified with Absurdism, from before I knew the word. It's just the only thing that has ever made sense to me. So, naturally, I like this rant. It helps that you have some great imagery. I agree that the "alchemy of capitalism" is brilliant, and I really liked the Sisyphus metaphor.

I swear I am not stalking you.

[Kai]

Thanks Cram. I've identified with Sisyphus for a while now.

[Bebek Sincap Ratatosk]

Anyway, life means whatever you decide it means, whatever gets you through the night.

As I understand it, that's basically Camus' absurdism... or maybe the modern existential viewpoint?

Dok as an Existentialist?! That may be the most Absurd of all! 

Balls.  I'm a fucking Discordian.  I don't need any other philosophy.

[Ob_Portu]

I'm awfully intrigued by the mythic implications.

Like are we all Sisyphus?  Look at the way we keep fighting death.  Death would be to just stop doing this pointless shit with The Boulder.  Our Boulder isn't money, it's life.  We keep fighting the gravity of the boulder because, even though it's brain-smashingly repetitive, it is still less boring than being dead.

The absurdity is that we keep thinking, yeah, this time will be different.  This time the boulder will balance on top of it all.

Semantic line blurring but still...isn't death just primal chaos?!

Balancing that boulder.

[The Johnny]

I agree that we should create subjective meaning, because living by someone else's ("important people" or institutions") meaning just leads to frustration or pleasing someone else at the cost of yourself.

Part of making the work as least absurd as possible is to work on something productive you enjoy doing (i know this isnt a choice for everyone), so that theres a real sense of social cooperation and not just of being a slave-drone.

Now, correlating this to my horror-mirth observation: i do think that life should be about happiness, but i try to not fall for the trappings that i perceive as merely defense mechanisms or passing novelty on which capitalism thrives.

[Golden Applesauce]

Taking this back another step -

Why should we need meaning?  Who decided that meaning was an essential part of a balanced life, and that if you were missing meaning, you aren't really living?

Sisyphus is a little confused by all this philosophy going around about him and his boulder.  Okay, so it always rolls back down.  That doesn't bother him - if it ever stayed up on top of the mountain, he'd have to come up with something better to do.

[Jasper]

I'll try to answer.

Okay, so we could write entire books just setting the groundwork for actually deciding what "meaning" means.  I am not going to do that.  I'm just going to assert that "meaning" in this sense is a feeling of significance, in the sense of being important in some way.  Like having kids increases your significance because you and your kid are really important to each other.  That sort of thing.

My stance is that human life does not have any intrinsic significance in the larger scheme of things, but we are egocentric enough to want to believe that we do.  Human life has significance (meaning) only to other humans, or other morally sympathetic intelligences (such as your dog).

[Jenne]

SEMIOTICS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Ok, I have to be sad I missed this.  It's great stuff, Cram!  And that pyramid...ugh, I noticed that I have more of an "hourglass" shape--that yellow band...meh.  I have some issues there.  All else I think I'm ok, workin' hard or hardly workin'...but that YELLOW band...sheesh.  It's all fucked up to pieces most ways.

Gives me some food for thought.

[Juana]

Taking this back another step -

Why should we need meaning?  Who decided that meaning was an essential part of a balanced life, and that if you were missing meaning, you aren't really living?

Sisyphus is a little confused by all this philosophy going around about him and his boulder.  Okay, so it always rolls back down.  That doesn't bother him - if it ever stayed up on top of the mountain, he'd have to come up with something better to do.

I tend to think we need meaning because otherwise, we're just paddling around in circles. You don't do anything, you have nothing to aim for, and so on. Been there, done that, not healthy, very boring, and I'm a couple years behind because of it. Meaning = goal. The meaning in my life is to do what I enjoy. That gives me day to day meaning. Today, that's study for finals, because what I want to do with the rest of my life requires a degree. Friday, it's watch as much Freakazoid as possible and then go party.

This doesn't mean that everyone with a meaning is happy or whatever - meaning, if it comes from outside yourself and you have nothing invested in it, sucks. "My goal is to make my parents happy, even though I don't want to do it."