Question: THE question

[tekeenator]

As I have changed to an adult human living in America after barely 20 years I have been bombarded with private thoughts concerning the very fabric of reality.

Moreover the "Ultimate Question" of existence itself. Time, space, gravity, and all the forces we are at this time mostly unaware of comprise the clues to the question and answer of what we ultimately stem from.


I like any young person of my age have wondered at some point the purpose of existence after years of going to church every sunday or some other religiously motivated event.


Only to realize that scientifically formulated observations that could be based on factual observations of the physical universe were far superior to the views offered by any church or religion I had learned about in American public schools.



Based on these simple thoughts I have taken my curiosity towards the nature of our reality to the Internets and decided to ask various segments of people from anywhere or everywhere what their theory is on the purpose, phenomena, and end result of our existence in what we call the universe is all about.





Bear in mind that if you google this sort of question in any way shape or form you are going to get governmentally sanitized answers be they religious or scientific and the really juicy answers we would all be well off hearing are currently a secret if they exist at all.






What is your theory on the grand scale of the universe the purpose of it all to include the incredibly uncanny appearance of life on earth.




If your answer sounds like a wierd sci-fi film I would be inclined to take what you say into account.







Please indulge me and after so many truly creative and worthwhile answers I will give my ideas on the purpose and nature of reality from a human point of view with no religious Bull Shit whatsoever.

 

[Trichome Toker]

My theory is simple.

When you die, it is the same as before your born.

 

[Guest]

My theory is simple.

When you die, it is the same as before your born.

Bingo - IMHO

There is no purpose - there is no reason for.

"It" (the universe, human race, whatever) just is - we're just here, it's just there.

Make of it what you can, or what you want - one life, one shot.

Work like a dog, and die rich (or poor). Sit on your ass and enjoy yourself. Makes no diff - it is what it is.

And once yer gone - yer gone.

ws

 

[smokeymacpot]

our only purpose is to live and reproduce, same as every other plant/animal on this planet.

quite simple isnt it

 

[tekeenator]

While that is true for every individual in todays reality give or take a human generation or two we must think of the larger picture and not within the narrow scope of human existance.


Maybe I am fooling myself and you are perfectly correct about the state of the universe not depending one ounce of dark matter whether a human or the entire race is in existence over a span of billions or trillions of what we call years.

In other words your theory implies that although life is quite nice all around when you take the time to enjoy it.

Ultimately nothing you do ever really matters in the grand scheme of things just like you think nothing of smashing a bug that happened to annoy you one minute and was gone the next.





I am leaning towards the longer view and hence like the idea that perhaps humanity will make the grade and go farther into the future of all the space around us for some purpose even if it is merely a purpose we create out of boredom.


That could be alot of different paths.

 

[genkisan]

Life is the only non-entropic force we know of other than gravity.

Life is about being non-entropic in all ways, and always putting more back into every system than you take out.


Now wouldn't it be nice if the human species could learn that as a group behaviour?

 

[Guest]

In other words your theory implies that although life is quite nice all around when you take the time to enjoy it. Ultimately nothing you do ever really matters in the grand scheme of things just like you think nothing of smashing a bug that happened to annoy you one minute and was gone the next.

Plse forgive the edit to your quote

Not necessarily - we can have an effect on anything, from ourselves as individuals to entire universe.

But there is no higher purpose - no ethereal, concorporeal machinations.

We have too high a view of ourselves - shit happens, and we are star shit.

ws

 

[smokeymacpot]

While that is true for every individual in todays reality give or take a human generation or two we must think of the larger picture and not within the narrow scope of human existance.


Maybe I am fooling myself and you are perfectly correct about the state of the universe not depending one ounce of dark matter whether a human or the entire race is in existence over a span of billions or trillions of what we call years.

In other words your theory implies that although life is quite nice all around when you take the time to enjoy it.

Ultimately nothing you do ever really matters in the grand scheme of things just like you think nothing of smashing a bug that happened to annoy you one minute and was gone the next.





I am leaning towards the longer view and hence like the idea that perhaps humanity will make the grade and go farther into the future of all the space around us for some purpose even if it is merely a purpose we create out of boredom.


That could be alot of different paths.

exactly, nothing we do matters except reproducing.
as we evolved and learnt new things, invented new things e.t.c our lives changed from the basics to what we have today. That never stops the basics.

im curious to what your expecting with your question and where your going with it...

 

[tekeenator]

Yes you are right in that we are intrinsically made of the fecal matter of stars.

However you are insinuating that every human alive today and within a given span of time from this conversation is doomed to live and die without consequence to the universe at large which is fair enough to assume as you are almost certainly correct in that answer concerning the vast majority of the human population.




Now you have to diverge from what we commonly feel the human race is doing with our chance in this universe which I might add has progressed exponentially toward machines and machine intelligence within the more advanced sectors of human industry.


Perhaps our ultimate purpose does in fact involve the creation of machine intelligence for some purpose we cannot concieve of yet.






Purpose is truly subjective and to some that may mean that every day is a struggle to earn a living, or gather enough to eat everyday.

Yet there are segments of human society that seem to be approaching an apex of technology that may or may not carry our pointless species towards the eventual expansion or ultimate destruction.


So it then comes to a question of where is this technology going to get us or is it as pointless as finding a cure for disease from a naturally occuring plant.


Ultimately I believe it is machines that will either aid us towards our future or carry on without us pathetic hobos of life.

 

[dude06version]

we are animals just like any other creature on earth. living breathing and procreating thats our only purpose..our so called " higher conscious" has fooled us into thinking other wise... im trashed atm so i dont know if this makes sense.

 

[sow the seeds]

Very strange this thread is made because I was thinking of this last night...hmm.

The conclusion I came from is I have no idea what our universe is, how it was formed, or why we're here....and it doesn't really matter because I don't think we're really meant to know.

 

[tekeenator]

I am not really an intellectual or student of higher learning of the academic persuasion.

Yet I still have the same questions that lie unanswered by incapable peers and unscrupulous governments who fritter away resources upon wars and social engineering as if they knew exactly what they were doing.



I am more and more beginning to gain the view that although the question is worthy of our "advanced" thoughts.

We simply lack the resources, lifetimes, and overall groupthink to accomplish any progress towards what may be the single most important aspect of existence in a "universe".


To solve every problem we come across as a team and ultimately fail and be pointless like the weeds growing on the deserts edge on one of millions of planets or find that perhaps we are here for a bigger role than the scenery.




Just wishful thinking maybe.

 

[treble]

I dont think that any body lives and dies without consequence to the universe...no matter what the purpose of the universe is.

I believe all people get here with a blank canvas and its up to us to put something down on it. The purpose of "ones" life can be grand or not in the eyes of other people. Maybe that should be a persons achievements can be grand or not in the eyes of other people. But not everyone knows everyone else and what they are doing so no 1 perspective will tell you all good things and all grand things that all people have done.

When I hear about so and so famous actor died of cancer and how great they were and how tragic their death was and I think to myself about all the other people who likewise died on that day from what every tragic thing that killed them. Are they not important? Of course they are. To the people who knew them, loved them, cared for them, helped them and cheered for them.

You might not realize it but everyone has their own cheer sqaud who thinks they are important and cares for them. I think that is the "purpose" of life. To ensure that no one is lonely and everyone in their vicinity feels cared for...and not alone. There is nothing tougher than pushing through life alone.

So while I think our main animal brain drives most of what we do and despite our big brains we can't really extract ourselves from instinctive behaviors we do have another layer we can operate in. We call that intelligence though I think thats a loose term sometimes.

Also in the past, community had pretty big sway on purpose. That doesn't happen any more. Now its all ME ME ME or I I I. So some amount of human direction from community is lost now.

I like to say that once you're gone you're gone. The only thing you can hope for is to live on in the hearts of the people who's path you crossed in your life. Thats where people live on...the afterlife if you like.

treb

 

[dude06version]

are you majoring in philosophy?

 

[OneWingedImp]

I cannot get my mind into the state it needs to be in to totally read and understand the different views pointed here, but here is mine, somewhat.


Personally i could talk about this all day, we would need 2 joints and a long walk though.
I think that everyone is just like everyone else, and the way they handle things is what makes individuals into individuals. I think we all had equal odds of ending up anywhere in the universe. Being it dust floating in a ring of saturn, or a human in New York. I think that there is an inner energy. You feel it at concerts, you feel it from trees, from freeways of tons of speeding cars, from the stray cat you see on the corner. All this energy is recycled, the point is to be, learn, and try and make the cycle that others will have to go through, as well as yourself, better. Like Karma, but it isnt always as +1 and then -1 as it is said. I feel that our energy effects the way we live, see things, and even the answers we get back from people.

On a more simple note, i can take you to 10 places within 30 min of each other, all that would make you go "Wow holy shit, this is unbeleiveable", and maybe then you would think that trying to see it all may be the purpose, or you would see that all these cycles everything in the world is going through (on different timelines of course) just has a different face/backdrop/vices/enjoyments, but its essentially the same.

 

[tekeenator]

These are quoted sayings from Eienstein who obviously never found the ultimate insight into all that is and was.

Yet managed to do us all proud in many ways concerning our relationship with the energistic prescence of ourselves and all the matter around us.

Collected Quotes from Albert Einstein





"Any intelligent fool can make things bigger, more complex, and more violent. It takes a touch of genius -- and a lot of courage -- to move in the opposite direction."

"Imagination is more important than knowledge."

"Gravitation is not responsible for people falling in love."
"I want to know God's thoughts; the rest are details."
"The hardest thing in the world to understand is the income tax."
"Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one."
"The only real valuable thing is intuition."
"A person starts to live when he can live outside himself."
"I am convinced that He (God) does not play dice."
"God is subtle but he is not malicious."
"Weakness of attitude becomes weakness of character."
"I never think of the future. It comes soon enough."
"The eternal mystery of the world is its comprehensibility."
"Sometimes one pays most for the things one gets for nothing."
"Science without religion is lame. Religion without science is blind."
"Anyone who has never made a mistake has never tried anything new."
"Great spirits have often encountered violent opposition from weak minds."
"Everything should be made as simple as possible, but not simpler."
"Common sense is the collection of prejudices acquired by age eighteen."
"Science is a wonderful thing if one does not have to earn one's living at it."
"The secret to creativity is knowing how to hide your sources."
"The only thing that interferes with my learning is my education."
"God does not care about our mathematical difficulties. He integrates empirically."
"The whole of science is nothing more than a refinement of everyday thinking."
"Technological progress is like an axe in the hands of a pathological criminal."
"Peace cannot be kept by force. It can only be achieved by understanding."
"The most incomprehensible thing about the world is that it is comprehensible."
"We can't solve problems by using the same kind of thinking we used when we created them."
"Education is what remains after one has forgotten everything he learned in school."
"The important thing is not to stop questioning. Curiosity has its own reason for existing."
"Do not worry about your difficulties in Mathematics. I can assure you mine are still greater."
"Equations are more important to me, because politics is for the present, but an equation is something for eternity."
"If A is a success in life, then A equals x plus y plus z. Work is x; y is play; and z is keeping your mouth shut."
"Two things are infinite: the universe and human stupidity; and I'm not sure about the the universe."
"As far as the laws of mathematics refer to reality, they are not certain, as far as they are certain, they do not refer to reality."
"Whoever undertakes to set himself up as a judge of Truth and Knowledge is shipwrecked by the laughter of the gods."
"I know not with what weapons World War III will be fought, but World War IV will be fought with sticks and stones."
"In order to form an immaculate member of a flock of sheep one must, above all, be a sheep."
"The fear of death is the most unjustified of all fears, for there's no risk of accident for someone who's dead."
"Too many of us look upon Americans as dollar chasers. This is a cruel libel, even if it is reiterated thoughtlessly by the Americans themselves."
"Heroism on command, senseless violence, and all the loathsome nonsense that goes by the name of patriotism -- how passionately I hate them!"
"No, this trick won't work...How on earth are you ever going to explain in terms of chemistry and physics so important a biological phenomenon as first love?"
"My religion consists of a humble admiration of the illimitable superior spirit who reveals himself in the slight details we are able to perceive with our frail and feeble mind."
"Yes, we have to divide up our time like that, between our politics and our equations. But to me our equations are far more important, for politics are only a matter of present concern. A mathematical equation stands forever."
"The release of atom power has changed everything except our way of thinking...the solution to this problem lies in the heart of mankind. If only I had known, I should have become a watchmaker."
"Great spirits have always found violent opposition from mediocrities. The latter cannot understand it when a man does not thoughtlessly submit to hereditary prejudices but honestly and courageously uses his intelligence."
"The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and all science. He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no longer pause to wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead: his eyes are closed."
"A man's ethical behavior should be based effectually on sympathy, education, and social ties; no religious basis is necessary. Man would indeeded be in a poor way if he had to be restrained by fear of punishment and hope of reward after death."
"The further the spiritual evolution of mankind advances, the more certain it seems to me that the path to genuine religiosity does not lie through the fear of life, and the fear of death, and blind faith, but through striving after rational knowledge."
"Now he has departed from this strange world a little ahead of me. That means nothing. People like us, who believe in physics, know that the distinction between past, present, and future is only a stubbornly persistent illusion."
"You see, wire telegraph is a kind of a very, very long cat. You pull his tail in New York and his head is meowing in Los Angeles. Do you understand this? And radio operates exactly the same way: you send signals here, they receive them there. The only difference is that there is no cat."
"One had to cram all this stuff into one's mind for the examinations, whether one liked it or not. This coercion had such a deterring effect on me that, after I had passed the final examination, I found the consideration of any scientific problems distasteful to me for an entire year."
"...one of the strongest motives that lead men to art and science is escape from everyday life with its painful crudity and hopeless dreariness, from the fetters of one's own ever-shifting desires. A finely tempered nature longs to escape from the personal life into the world of objective perception and thought."
"He who joyfully marches to music rank and file, has already earned my contempt. He has been given a large brain by mistake, since for him the spinal cord would surely suffice. This disgrace to civilization should be done away with at once. Heroism at command, how violently I hate all this, how despicable and ignoble war is; I would rather be torn to shreds than be a part of so base an action. It is my conviction that killing under the cloak of war is nothing but an act of murder."
"A human being is a part of a whole, called by us _universe_, a part limited in time and space. He experiences himself, his thoughts and feelings as something separated from the rest... a kind of optical delusion of his consciousness. This delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for a few persons nearest to us. Our task must be to free ourselves from this prison by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty."
"Not everything that counts can be counted, and not everything that can be counted counts." (Sign hanging in Einstein's office at Princeton)

 

[tekeenator]

After reading all of that I just realized that the question has been posed and the answer is still out there.

Kinda like the x-files or something huh.


Really though I appreciate the responses and anyones insight is still welcome on the theory of it all.


Einstein was one stellar guy but he still only move the peg up a notch in the search for something greater than ourselves be it a machine or a purpose we just don't know about yet.

 

[Haps]

We are equations, some good, some important, sum don't add up. We are as important to the planet as we think we are. There are some days that I am not real, because I do not believe I am.
H

 

[treble]

there are definately some good responses here. I liked the einstien lists. I wish I had that yesterday for a speaker intro I gave. Would have dovetailed nicely.

I like this one: "The important thing is not to stop questioning. Curiosity has its own reason for existing."

"Don't ask don't get" is one of my favorite sayings. material things, emotional things and intelect things.

This one is sad but true: "I know not with what weapons World War III will be fought, but World War IV will be fought with sticks and stones."

and this one takes the prize for me:
"Great spirits have always found violent opposition from mediocrities. The latter cannot understand it when a man does not thoughtlessly submit to hereditary prejudices but honestly and courageously uses his intelligence."

Mob rules...rabble rabble rabble.....anything they dont understand...

peace... been awhile since I said that.. wonder why?
treb

 

[Gangabiss]

I ponder these very same questions every hour of my waking life.

So far the only real conclusions I've come to include the following:

Reality as we know it is merely an illusion created by our body breaking up the swarming energy field that is all and everything. This energy arrives at our skin and is seperated by our 5 senses and then pieced together again to give us a much smaller representation of the true nature of reality.

The outside world is simply not real in the most real sense of the world. The truly REAL can never be changed or distorted because it is rock solid and immune to any influence.

What is this one REAL thing? Consciousness.

You cannot have life without consciousness (mind). And just as science has revealed in the past few years there always must be an observer for reality to exist at all...without an observer all there is, is a field of wave energy without any true fixed positiuon. It takes the observer to collapse those waves into a fixed point for observation.

Since energy can never be destroyed and consciousness is energy, consciousness can never be destroyed and therefore it is the only real thing in existance.

Call it the mind of God or whatever you want, we are all this same ocean of mind experiencing itself in many forms.

There is absolutely no seperation in consciousness no matter the distance in time and space. We are all connected at the very deepest level.

When I die, yes my body will be destroyed and Gangabiss will no longer be. However that is not truly who I am, that is simply the body I am in control of at this point in infinity.

Consciousness will live on for all eternity...although it's a hard concept for most people to grasp. Psychedelics help GREATLY with this. Perticularly psilocybin mushrooms and DMT.

In the coming few years I think all of humanity will wake up out of this illusion and realise our true nature...mind.
Until we realise that we will continue to have wars, starvation and all the rest that goes along with being seperated from our true nature of existance.

And it will all happen in the next 5 years. That may be the most radical of all my thoughts to most people. Around me I see more and more people waking up out of this dream world and realising our true nature, it's only a matter of time.

Dec 21st 2012.