Theoretical Question - Life Question 5

[galexcd 0]

So over the years I've thought of many strange questions related to math, science, and physics, and there are way too many and they all go way too much into depth to all be put into 1 thread so I shall make separate threads for them all when I think of them.

Alright I know its been ages since I've posted one of these... And I am dropping that stupid format I had before. From now on I'm just going to quote the intro and get right into the "question" although most of these haven't really been questions anyway so I might start calling these "theoretical thoughts"... or something similar... Anyway on with my crazy rantings...

 

LIFE! So to introduce the crazy thoughts that I am bringing up today I want to first bring up what made me think of it. It was Kobra's stupid new sig image about going green... It got me to thinking. All this hype about going green. Well of course I know what it is for, to "save our planet" from these horrible things we are doing to it. But then think for a minute... The planet will soon be destroyed anyway no matter how "green" we go. Even if we limit down our amount of emissions to a tenth of a percent of what they are now, the planet will be destroyed eventually anyway and we will soon need to find another place to live, so instead of "saving" our planet we are just going to try to stall the inevitable destiny of it being uninhabitable until we find an alternative location for us to create a civilization?

 

Now many argue no. They say we are trying to save our planet for our decedents, so they can live in a world as good as ours. But why? Why are we bonded so closely to our own kind? Why is any creature? What would be the big tragedy of us all going extinct anyway? I'm sure I'm going to get a lot of annoyed replies for that comment, but think for a moment. We're acting like people who commit suicide to "get back" at the people they don't like, but they don't realize that the'll be gone and it doesn't even matter. So what if a couple trillion people aren't born and have to face life and then die. How is that going to change that much? Nature is the force that decides what lives or dies and we have sure done a number on nature to try to stay alive. Perhaps we have come to a point where we need to back down and let nature take its course, even if that means our kind going extinct.

 

Now that being said, I would like you all to know that these are marly thoughts floating through my brain that I felt like sharing with you... No I do not believe that we should destroy our planet and no I do not actually believe that it doesn't matter if we go extinct because I am a human like the rest of you. But if you haven't already read through the post with a logical stand point. I think some of you may find these thoughts rather interesting.

[sonesay 7]

I don't know what else to say but we shouldn't worry about the future too much especially that far into it. We will be dead and our children and theirs long before the earth will die. In relation to the bible I read a bit of the watchtower magazines given to me by some church people and it talked about us living in the last days where God will soon end this system of things. I had a thought since it says its been about 6000 years since the beginning right? What if another 6000 years past and there is no ending would that prove that the bible is not correct since if we are near the end then it should of came before then? Sorry if I'm going off topic I just had that thought and it seems to sort of fit here with world ending and all.

[kobra500 1]

Kobra's stupid new sig image about going green...

lol, I made that because I thought it be funny to insult apple and encourage people to help the environment at a time, okay I wont deny I think the Ipod is great but everything else is well, terrible!

Yes it is true the planet will be destroyed but that wont be our fault but imagine if we create something that will allow us to stop this happening or move to another planet, we need to give science that chance so the longer we hold off on the destruction of earth the better, this is about stopping something that will ruin this planet years and years before it is meant to be destroyed, I see what you mean, but isnt that the point of life, to reproduce, carry on the species... if your not going to do that then you might as well just top yourself now. Of course there are many other points like to have a fun good life. but dont our decendants deserve that?

[galexcd 0]

Of course there are many other points like to have a fun good life. but dont our decendants deserve that?

Of course they do, but standing at a less human more logical standpoint (sort of how summer glau would look at it in the Sarah Conner Chronicles on fox ^.^), the decedents who's lives are on the line don't exist yet. It would be one thing if they were to be born and then suddenly die of our doing, but who exactly are we hurting if they will never exist?

[rvalkass 5]

The planet will soon be destroyed anyway no matter how "green" we go. Even if we limit down our amount of emissions to a tenth of a percent of what they are now, the planet will be destroyed eventually anyway and we will soon need to find another place to live, so instead of "saving" our planet we are just going to try to stall the inevitable destiny of it being uninhabitable until we find an alternative location for us to create a civilization?

"Soon" is fairly relative in this case. The planet certainly wouldn't soon be destroyed naturally relative to your lifetime, but may soon be destroyed through pollution etc. The argument you put forward here is the same as saying "I won't redecorate my house, because the paint will only fade again and I'll have to redecorate." Yes, your action is ultimately undone by the destruction of the planet, but in the meantime it does some good.

 

Now many argue no. They say we are trying to save our planet for our decedents, so they can live in a world as good as ours.

If you believe some predictions, we are saving the planet from our parents for ourselves. Slightly selfish, but look after number one and all that...

 

But why? Why are we bonded so closely to our own kind? Why is any creature? What would be the big tragedy of us all going extinct anyway? I'm sure I'm going to get a lot of annoyed replies for that comment, but think for a moment. We're acting like people who commit suicide to "get back" at the people they don't like, but they don't realize that the'll be gone and it doesn't even matter. So what if a couple trillion people aren't born and have to face life and then die. How is that going to change that much? Nature is the force that decides what lives or dies and we have sure done a number on nature to try to stay alive. Perhaps we have come to a point where we need to back down and let nature take its course, even if that means our kind going extinct.

The problem though is that nature has not been allowed to take its course. There are theories for both sides, but if we assume that global warming and all the current environmental problems are due to human activity then the current state of the planet is due to humans and not nature. If those "couple trillion people" aren't born then it may be due to human activity, not nature, and you are therefore interfering in nature. Trying our best to ensure the next generation will have somewhere habitable to live is the best we can do, and is only reversing human effects, not reversing nature.

 

Of course they do, but standing at a less human more logical standpoint (sort of how summer glau would look at it in the Sarah Conner Chronicles on fox ^.^), the decedents who's lives are on the line don't exist yet. It would be one thing if they were to be born and then suddenly die of our doing, but who exactly are we hurting if they will never exist?

I think you would have great difficulty in stopping the current population, ahem, 'creating more people' We can therefore say with confidence that our descendants will exist, and so therefore their lives are on the line. They will be born, and may well die due to human activity.

[iGuest 3]

an opinion from a child going to live in a world that the generations before me have made a whole mess just in time for me to come in.

Theoretical Question - Life

 

Replying to galexcd

 

The world has been through the greatest tragedies of the universe and by tragedies I am excluding religion because yes there have been a million and one but "mother earth" has survived the Ice Age and probable passes of outer galactical particals and for the noncreational thinkers The BIG BANG. If there was one thing that we could do to save human life from our demise is to find a way to remove ourselves from the ticking timebomb just as the man was suggesting.

 

Poor comment I know.

 

-reply by The future has expired

[Okara KAmi 0]

Ah I see your dilemma Galexcd. But global warming aside, this thought of yours essentially spans into a lot of other conservative movements we ensue. Fact of the matter is that most of the things that we humans do is to set a grounds for justice. Law, government and all other shapes and forms in the hierarchy of truth is made to decree justice. Why? To stabilize the world for our kind. So right about then you ask... why care so much for our kind? Well I've asked myself that many of times while laying on the bed after an unsatisfactory hour of Zelda playing >_> The answer is, we shouldn't care at all. In a world where I had enough power to deem my words the law, I would end all humanity just so that we wouldn't waste so much time for the fight of survival. Now yes that could come out as rather inhumane, but if you think about it...We as humans spend so many of this planet's natural resources to keep ourselves alive. Our demands increase and we indulge in this chaos that we optimistically call life, but in the end, it's just a bunch of insignificant organisms doing insignificant things for an insignificant amount of time... producing an insignificant result. We were never important, we were products of a chain of random mutations (Darwin) and we will only serve to further progress the scientific line of evolution. Life in itself has had no ever lasting impact on the universe, on a macroscopic sale (one which I tend to peer through at times like this) all forms of life are just inhabitants, and nothing else. Every colossal change in our realm, like the big bang, or a supernova, anything of relative importance to an astroscopic (<--made up) view had nothing to do with life.Yet here we are, fighting for animal rights, fighting for civil rights.... but why? Say if in a horribly contorted delineation of this reality, where I am of magnanimous power, I decided to end it all. Wouldn't that make everything simple? If I found a way to end all life on earth, and something similar happened to every other location in the universe where there is life... would there even be a change? No. So here's my conclusion, life? The time space continuum is better off without it. Now you asked before, how would we do this? How would we stop life in our planet? Simple. Genocide. With the nuclear fire power in our arsenal we can destroy the world several times over. Someone's just gotta push the big red button and boom =) Now if only people around the universe would think like me, we could make things so much simpler XD~just my opinion~sry if I sounded like a maniac

[cangor 0]

I've had the same thoughts before, wondering why we really care about the planet and the future and...while it all kinda seems pointless, I know, I think that a good reason we should care is because we as humans have the capacity to care for others...and if we don't provide for the future we're taking away the opportunity for billions of people to have the chance to live...and experience life...I mean no matter how much your life sucks there are always moments in which you're glad to be alive...and if we destroy the planet (ehe...) then we're taking that away from so many people...which isn't right.I guess it depends on how you feel about life...it is a very interesting question though.

[salamangkero 0]

There are, in the world, many people who believe in the certainty of a single end: that, whatever we do, the entire planet will die, whether it be due to global warming or the sun turning into a red giant, the end still remains the same, which is the non-existence of life on Earth. Thus, many companies work on such short-sighted goals, after all, would it really matter how our planet dies if it is ultimately going to die anyway? What use would it have been to "go green" when the demise of our Earth is quite inevitable?

 

It is my belief, however, that what matters is not the end of the world but the events that happen in the time between now and the end. If we are to believe that nothing matters since the end is still the same, then the whole lot of us might as well commit suicide en masse, seeing that we're all gonna die anyway and, whatever we do, we cannot prevent our death, right?

 

Wrong! See, the way I see it is that, yes, we are going to die, however, the longer we live, the greater opportunity we have to potentially affect other people's lives, hopefully for the better.

 

We are not saving the environment for hypothetical children that may or may not exist, no thanks to the miracle of the condom. We are here, minimizing our carbon footprint and going green for humanity, in general. I think that, if we, humans, decided to give up war and worked towards a common goal, we might actually do something significant between now and the end of the Earth.

 

I have yet to watch Wall-E, however, I am thinking that, if we, as a species, ever advance far enough then, perhaps, by the time this planet is swallowed up by the sun, we'd already be enjoying fresh mangoes over in some advanced spacecraft, not quite unlike Battlestar Galactica

 

Alright, that is science fiction, for now, but what I'm saying is that we are preserving the environment so that, in the event that we need to leave the planet, we can take as much of our "home" as we could with us. Let's face it, would you rather leave the planet because the sun was going red giant or because the sun was perfectly healthy but, oh, we have just depleted our resources and turned this blue sphere into a harsh, inhospitable desert? I know I'd be dead by the time humanity finds the need to migrate from Earth, but that is not reason enough for me not to care.

 

Personally, though, I think humanity, as it is right now, is a scourge to the Earth's other life forms and some pruning and trimming down on the human population might be in order

[minimcmonkey 0]

Well first of all, im not going to track you down and try to kill you for the remark about humans becoming extinct, or about people never being born.Because, I really dont think it would matter. If were extinct, theres no-one to know were extinct, we dont think "damn, should'a' seen that'n' comin'," And if a load of people wernt born, they dont sit there saying "damn, those selfish pigs didn't let me live," (well, i dont think so myself anyway).We hear all these speaches about global warming, the industry goes mad and scoops up to oportunity to make people buy their products to make them feel good about themselves or not feel bad. But, im sure someone more knowledgeable in science will tell me my next bit is impossible. But i just wonder, what if nature clears things up?Personally, i dont beleive some all loving, all knowing, all powerful force create the world, or had any part in it. SO i believe we evolved from apes. So, why cant we simply eveolve to handle greater heat, and be able to breath, even with vast amounts of emisions floating around in the air. Obviously, this would take a very very very long time to gradually happen, but global warming is going to destroy the world instantly. So whats to say we cant adapt.And if we cant adapt naturally, this planet is home to many many very very, intelligent people. Whats to say they cant build some miracle wachine which can destroy matter, thus meaning we can just turn pollution into nothingness.And im sure people are aware of the theories about antimatter, whats to say we wont start creating energy, by creating antimatter, and letting it loose on matter, producing photon energy. If we could mass produce photon energy, we wouldn't need another power source (obviously, that would be a lot of photon energy required). Im sure someone will tell me that that also is impossible!but we already have catilic (im not sure how you spell that!) converters on cars, converting the poluting gasses to carbon dioxide and water. Maybe using platinum is nt the way forward, as there is so little of it on the planet. But surely, there is a way of deveolping something which will atleast have a fair effect on global warming.And, ofcourse, you cant rule out, that global warming, simply isnt true!Many Many Many people say that is a myth, just another theory, yet to be disproved.Or that it has been created by the media to generate income.Or that the industry has created this, which cant be ruled out, as it has greatly benfitted thousands of companies, tey just sell things claiming to be "energy efficient" your car may well produce "fewer emisions" people will pay a lot to feel good about them selves, or not feel bad about not trying to save the enviorment. And really, in the big picture, masses of factories polluting 24/7, thousands upon housands of worldwide power-stations, burning fossil fuels and polluting, millions of people driving cars long distances daily. Does you driving a hybrod car, or using your washing machine in "energy efficiency mode" really make that much difference - of course not. Obvoiously, for these things to make a difference, everyine, or atleast a hell of a lot of people are going to have to do these things. But even then, does it really make a difference?And lots of people believe we will find another planet to live on. But consider that so far, there are no plans to move to mars, or anywhere else. And, then, think, what if the mo0olanding WAS faked? I personally believe it was. So, it could well be impossible to leave and go to another planet, because of the rings of radiation surrounding the earth. It was predicted, that the walls of a space craft would have to be atleast six feet think, and made of lead, for the rings of radiation to not be deadly.Now considder, how do you move a vast amount of people, to a planet, that is so far away, we haven't yet discovered it?infact, the only way, would be, to continue living, for many generations, while travelling to another planet (yes, thats what i mean, people would be having babies, while in space)Then, how would civilisation be created? We wouldnt be able to bring cement and bricks with us to another planet. How do we build? Whats to say that the planet is made of rock that is right for building?And then, surely, even if it was possible to move civilisation to another planet, can humans live in space, we cant prove that the absence of gravity, wont kill up gradually, or that something different about the planet wont.And even if we survived that, WE WOULD JUST DESTROY ANOTHER PLANET. And yes, people will say "oh yes, but if it did happed, we would learn from the mistake, and live differently." Personnally, i think not, great amounts of people realy on technology to keep the alive, many more need it to work ect.

Edited August 21, 2008 by minimcmonkey (see edit history)

[musicianly 0]

It seems to me that in taking a step back and looking at what many people are trying to do, including those that have posted on this thread, the answer to this might be simpler than one might think.Many many people are born every day, and this isn't debatable. Many people do, in fact, make decisions that poorly contribute to the overall well-being of humankind and the planet, this too, isn't debatable. There are also many people who do, in fact, strive to make the world a better place, and strengthen the many facets of humankind's ability to contribute, many that we don't know about, this also isn't debatable. What I'm leading up to is this: Many people inhabit the earth. It seems the larger goal in human nature is to make sense of things, and everyone has different methods of doing so pertaining to the magnitude of each person's life. While it would be unfair to say, promote genocide, I understand that many well-to-to people conversely believe it is unfair for another person to, for example, live in such a way that doesn't contribute to the overall meaning of humanity.With each person born on earth, there is an added perspective. Life means different things to different people. Without the intent of being petty, Hitler found meaning in his life through creating a movement that killed many, many people. Gandhi found meaning in his life through offering ideas with which others might add to the meaning in their lives. In the same way, with whatever intent you might have, you must find a way to produce meaning in your life. We're not given as much as we might like to be able to do so, but with what we have, we move forward. Live a life to think about later, or think about a life to live and don't live it at all.Best regards,Musicianly

[ritu 1]

With so many meaningful contributions to the post, I would like to add mine by bumping into the discussion. I feel that human beings are born with their emotional level like any other living beings, but as we grow older, our life goes through internal developments, we start to experience emotions which cause tremendous influence on our lives, we resort to reasoning at times yet end up doing something which is far from reason. In the same way, we feel connected, deeply to our succeeding generations. Anyone who has held his child in his hands can very well understand what I mean. We take efforts to leave the best for them in all spheres, going green with the Earth is one of those measures.Whether the world sees it end, all of our lives are perishable, this realization could actually be the driving force to make the world the best place to live, as we should strive to make the best in this given time (our life span).