Suicide (Yippee!)

[Baniboy 3]

Yippee! This is what you've been waiting for! After posting this thread I'll be the top topic starter in the philosophy forum, (I mean business).

General directions:
1. Should suicide be outlawed? Are there any rational reasons (theoretically) to disallow suicide?
2. Practical problems: should it be controlled by law if it's allowed? how? why?

Pretend you're talking to Socrates, if you say stuff here, back it up. Now, before you move onto replying, I'll say that "would you like if your mom did suicide?" and "my cousin committed suicide last year and I didn't like it a cried blah blah" and using any sort of supernatural being or metaphysics to reason your claim will gain you only minus in my book. I'm mentioning these because *some* people don't know what rational reasoning is.

I'm going to leave the discussion open and not take a position on this matter myself for now, because I'm a nihilist. It would practically mean that when you use values, ethics, morals, evil & good, humanism, naturality and other silly ideologies as the basis of your argument, I'll simply say that those are meaningless and win. However, to have a little fun, I may respond to your arguments using the same silly ideology soup I mentioned earlier. Indeed, it wouldn't be fun otherwise. The world is much more fun when you don't think about the world.

Because in an absurd world there are absolutely no guidelines, any course of action is problematic. Enter nihilism

[anwiii 17]

first of all bani, you can't outlaw suicide. if someone wants kill themselves, they will kill themselves and that's the end of it. i will try to read between the lines though.first let me say that suicide is wrong. before i get in to why it's wrong let me say that i will never promote suicide, but i have no problem with it as long as a person is making a rational decision for him/herself without emotions controlling that decision. i will always be 100% in favor that everyone is in control of their own bodies. just like abortion. i don't promote it or agree with it for the most part, but i feel the woman should have ultimate control of her own body and life. so basically if everything is cut and dry(and it isn't), i am pro choice.problem is.....and it's a big problem, most suicides are based on emotions. emotions have no brains, therefore there is usually no logic behind suicide. in fact, a lot of suicide attempts are a cry for help. it's not that they want to die, it's that they want someone to see them....see their pain. unfortunately a lot of these cries for help end up in real suicide attempts because nobody was paying attention to the signs.why is suicide wrong in general? because i believe in a deeper meaning in life. within that deeper meaning, i can say that everyone is born with a purpose. everyone is born with something specific inside them that makes them stronger in certain areas of life than other people. with that said, everyone has a gift they need to recognize to help people around them and society in general. when a person takes their life, the world is left without that gift that could have influenced many people in a positive way. they aren't only killing themselves, they are killing much more than that and taking away what could have been. it's also wrong because like i said, most suicides happen without logic or rational thinking, but under emotional distress. if suicide was right, and everyone just commited suicide, our population would eventually drop down to zero. i also believe that life and death re both connected. we don't chooseto be born, so why should it be right that we should choose to die? there is a purpose beyond our control in life AND death and when we try to control nature, nature becomes unnatural. this is backed up by my previous statement that our population would drop down to zero. my personal believe is that part of our purpose in life is to learn. we learn in this lifetime. i also believe in reincarnation so i believe we continue to learn the more lifetimes we experience. to kill ones self is to halt the learning experience until on can be reborn. i also believe in a spiritual realm where we are also made to learn until we are ready to be reborn again in the flesh. i believe in this never ending cycle of life and death based on many things including personal personal experiences. when i put all the pieces together from the puzzle i call life, which includes death, it's really as simple as adding 1+1.sometimes suicide is right when it fullfills a purpose. i believe that sometimes people are born just to die. to make people think. to make people open their eyes. to allow people to learn from their mistakes. i believe life is a lot about people and learning from other people. most people look at suicide as a bad thing and don't really open their eyes to see the good that suicide sometimes offers. especially in these times of technology and living in the fast lane where a lot of people are too busy to take notice to the people and things that surround them....even the little things that nature provides. in some ways, suicide provides a wakeup call to many people who are otherwise too preoccupied to notice the signs of someone in distress. we learn from it, we take more notice in the future, and in the end, society as a whole is a better place because of it.most people aren't born to die though. i believe with every problem, there is a solution. even though the solution isn't apparent, doesn't mean there isn't one. what's more important than allowing suicide is allowing people who are under emotional distress to get the help they need. i feel that if a person fails in their suicide attempt, the government or at least society should step in and try to do everything in their power to help that person. people have their own definitions of help though. doctors like that quick fix where they give you medication to make you act like a zombie so your thoughts aren't clear and thinking about suicide. what they fail to realize is that when you put a person in a state of uncaring, they are more likely to reattempt suicide but because they are no in an uncaring state, their chances of succeeding in killing themselves increase. this is why if you do your research, there are now warning labels on certain depression medications of suicidal tendencies. people need meds to so their chemical imbalances can become balanced, yes, but they need much more help than that. and i do believe the government should step in. someone has to or it totally defeats the whole purpose of life.now one my reasons for a purpose of life goes a lot deeper than what i am about to say, but one thing that semi proves that there is a purpose is that people are compelled to live. that's why most people don't kill themselves even though they may be under severe emotional destress. people are fighters for their life in general. i think this is part of an answer you were looking for bani without my personal beliefs. people don't live just to breath. if that was our only purpose then you'd see many more people killing themselves because the world can be awefully cruel to most people in it. the cruelty isn't cruelty at all though as some people would see it. the "cruelty" is actually the learning experiences we have to go through in life to better ourselves. most people understand this concept and a higher purpose in life or more people would just off themselves.aside from all that, i have a a personal experience with suicide because i tried to kill myself once. i wasn't reaching out for help. i didn't write s suicide note. i didn't succeed because i made the mistake of calling someone 1500 miles away. in the meantime, i had taken about 50-100 pills and tons of alcohol to wash them down with. i really don't know what happened after that for the next 24 hours but i was meant to live. there was another time where it really wasn't a suicide attempt, but me trying to prevent someone else from committing an attempt on their life when they were laying a bunch of pills in front of them and ready to start taking them. i took them all inside me myself. the reasoning rather than tossing them is they would still be available to that person. i also wanted to make this person realize who suicide affects others. i wanted this person afraid of what might happen to me so after i took them, i walked out the door and down the street to the park where i hid for a bit. i got tired really fast. but again, it wasn't my time and i hope a lesson was learned. i had a friend who commited suicide. he hung himself from his parents garage door at the age of 14. WAY too young to die, but he did. i've talked with many people about suicide and their thoughts about their suicidal tendencies. you can pretty much say i have experienced it all where suicide is concerned. i understand almost every aspect of it.what i have learned through the years is that suicide isn't about suicide. it's about the the pain people feel. people look at people who commit suicide differently than i do. they see a person kill themselves because they don't feel loves, or they lost their job and can't support their family, or lost all their money in a stock market crash....etc...etc...etc. i don't see it like that because i would be viewing them all differently. but every single on of them has something in common and that is what i like to focus on. the one thing is pain. it doesn't matter how the pain originated. they are all experiencing pain whether it's physical or emotional. the only difference is the degree of pain and the pain tolerance a person has.bani- even though you are unwilling to state an opinion right now, i can already tell your thinking is all wrong and i'll tell you why. you insist people use "rational reasoning" but rational reasoning is all relative. who are you to say that beliefs don't have influence in rational reasoning? look at my facebook wall and notice the little kid playing the gutiar. you think he learned how to be talented? no buddy. nobody learns to be that talented. he was born to know things and just because someone can't prove what they know doesn't mean that knowledge doesn't exist or rational thinking isn't taking place. there is a balance in life of good and bad. i don't believe in the bible as a whole, but i do believe in bits and pieces of it and it holds some truth. the world was never meant to be a perfect place, it was only meant to have a perfect system.now i talk about my beliefs without going in to great detail of why i believe what i do. it's not complicated but it's complicated to explain. it's all my experiences all wrapped up in to one thing. life. i know more about suicide than most. i don't have to prove it that's just the way it is when i have experienced most aspects of it from personal to non personal(actually it's all personal to me when i think about it). i will give you one reason why i believe their is a higher power and a higher purpose most people don't realize even if others have faith in a god or a higher power. there was about 5 instances in my life where i should have died. i am really died. i have starred death defying experiences in the face and survived. the suicidal attempt was just one of them. another biggie was when i rolled my car 75 yards at 70mph without a seatbelt, getting thrown out of the car without a scratch on my except a tiny cut on my forehead. i survive certain experiences which always strengthened what i already knew about myself. if i can believe what i do about myself, then i definately believe the same beliefs in others. those death experiences are just a few pieces to many pieces of the puzzle i have put together. life after death? i am one of the best amature photographers out there and i have taken pictures of things that i have no explanation for. some of the pictures can be seen on my myspace page. people can say i altered them in some way, but i have never altered an original picture in my life unless it was in the darkroom using black and white film. the pictures i have taken in the past just reinforce what i already knew. you say let's not talk about the super natural, but why do you want to illiminate the super natural if the super natural exists? answer me that? it's something i know as fact. i can tell stories of personal experiences and people would think i'm crazy so i don't talk much about them.so bani, although i believe in pro choice and if a person wants or needs to die, it should be allowed, i am against suicide personally because i know people for the most part have a higher purpose in life than killing themselves and there is no doubt that not fullfilling those purposes in life that people are born with is a shame....wether they commit suicide or live to an old age learning nothing about life or themselves. but to end with something more suitable to what you want, men are born with a penis, women are born with a vagina. we are meant to pro create. NOT to pro create only to end our lives in an unnatural way through suicide no matter what age(for the most part). if we can't interfere and help those who are feeling suicidal, i would have to ask what the world has come to and shake my head in disgust.

[mrdee 1]

Certainly an interesting question.

However, if someone does commit suicide while it is illegal, what are they going to do?
Give him the death penalty?

Seriously now, since it is not illegal as such at the moment, what they usually do to someone who had a failed suicide attempt is put him/her in hospital for observation (not talking about treatment for the wounds or illnesses caused by the attempt, talking mentally) and, if deemed necessary, they section the patient.

The reason why they do this is because it is usually assumed that suicide ( or suicide attempts) usually happen during a time of depression, instability, trauma, ie. all situations where the patient finds him/herself in a situation there is no way out.

The reason why they give the patient that treatment is not only to help that patient, but also to protect him/her against him/herself.

So, this is obviously a clear signal they are trying to prevent people from committing suicide.

However, to try and find a rational answer to your first question:

There might be a number of theoretical answers to the question, for example:

There is psychological evidence that someone who commits suicide has that sense of regret at the last second (usually when it is too late), so that seems to point in the direction that someone who commits suicide really does do him/herself harm rather than solving a or a set of problems.

Another thing could be, someone who has young children, and leaves these children behind as orphans, cannot really (and I am being very careful with what I say here, as the circumstances of suicide sometimes shed a whole different light over the matter) really be called a responsible person or a loving parent.
Also, that person causes trouble for a lot of people, people such as social workers, having to organise temporary placement for the children, check with relatives, open a whole complex file on the children etc.

Trouble also for the tax payer, who has to fork out (no matter how little it is) for what is being done for the children.

Trouble for other relatives, who are sometimes (temporarily) put in charge of the children, or, just the opposite, who, because of their love for the children, want to help them and end up with a broken heart when the children are taken away from them by social services because they feel they have a 'more appropriate place' for them.

So, I would say there are certain reasons which night make suicide look illegal.
And, maybe the most appropriate one: the law forbids killing, when you commit suicide, you are killing/trying to kill a person, whether that is yourself is not really relevant here.

First of all: I must say the question is not 100% clear to me, the question goes:

2. Practical problems: should it be controlled by law if it's allowed? how? why?

This question could be interpreted two ways:

a) If suicide is allowed, should it be controlled by law?
Should the law say whether or not suicide is allowed?

I have the impression that the first interpretation of the question does not make a lot of sense, how would the law control how you do it, how many times you attempt it, what to do if you do not succeed?

In case of interpretation #2, this brings us back pretty much to question number 1:

1. Should suicide be outlawed? Are there any rational reasons (theoretically) to disallow suicide?

In which case I would really have to start from the beginning, making it a sort of endless loop.

However, I am sure I have not said the last word about the subject yet, there might me many more things I have to answer in our fellow Knowledgesutraists.

But, try to make your second question a bit clearer if you can.

[Baniboy 3]

Practically speaking, suicide is outlawed. If you attempt to commit suicide (btw, what's up with all these 'special' words for suicide... I can't say do suicide or try suicide, but attempt and commit is ok), you are automatically crazy and/or depressed, after which it is okay to lock you up and force medication. Even if it's not illegal, they sure do a heck of a lot to keep you alive against your will, I have to say.

@anwiii:
you wrote a ton of text. You could've summed it up a little, you know. I know you like to write a lot and explain and ramble () about your own experiences and stuff, but still. You've got something to learn from mrdee's relatively short response. I got demotivated of replying to you because your post is so long
Basically what you said was that because life has a purpose, we shouldn't do things which disallow us to fulfill those purposes. I'll leave the actual purpose out of this for now. BUT, you failed to make a convincing argument for life having a purpose itself. The best argument for it that I saw in your post was reproduction. I don't even know how that is convincing enough for you, and you should know me well enough to know that such claims do not convince me. They crumble before me because life isn't anything special to me. To me having vaginae and penises doesn't prove anything else than that we reproduce with them, no higher purposes. Reproduction is what it is, if you want to draw a higher purpose of it, do it carefully. Btw, suppose someone is born without a shaft, can he kill himself?
About reincarnation, suppose everyone kills themselves and population drops to zero, will 'souls' stop reincarnating?

what i have learned through the years is that suicide isn't about suicide. it's about the the pain people feel.

Really? I'm not trying to make fun of you or anything. Did it take you years to conclude that people don't kill themselves for fun, but because of the pain they feel? REALLY?!
So, because we can't decide if we are born, we shouldn't kill ourselves. I'm not saying we should. We can. To should or to not should contains no information value. Sounds very noble and stuff but does it make any sense? It's just as silly as saying that life is sacred or that it has a purpose. People say things without thinking about them, without backing them up with anything. That is why I'm a nihilist. I tried to search for reasons and found out there aren't any. My own way of thinking doesn't let me manipulate myself back into believing the same things other people do. This is why I haven't taken a stand here. I can't because the core of people's arguments (from human rights to the meaning of life) are meaningless to me. So how do I make my decisions, you could ask. But that is another story.

i think this is part of an answer you were looking for bani without my personal beliefs. people don't live just to breath. if that was our only purpose then you'd see many more people killing themselves because the world can be awefully cruel to most people in it. the cruelty isn't cruelty at all though as some people would see it. the "cruelty" is actually the learning experiences we have to go through in life to better ourselves. most people understand this concept and a higher purpose in life or more people would just off themselves.

The reason everyone isn't committing suicides is because they can't handle the truth. Believing in illusions gives their lives a purpose. I don't know if people still know what I would call the 'truth' but don't want to admit it because I went pass that phase and can't come back to experiment. The truth is that people live by their feelings. That is why they want to live, feelings. Feelings are also the basis of morals and values. What IS interesting is that you can alter ones feelings about something by modifying the cognitive model that has been fed to them earlier. Models often contradict themselves inside one's head, so by pointing them out you can practically modify the person in the direction you want. Another way is to point out their feelings or making them feel things, such as telling a racist to put him/herself in a foreigner's position, empathy will do the rest. However to manipulate the cognitive models you have to be someone that the target already trusts as a source of information. Well, a little offtopic, but anyway.

However I do like your stand where you don't want to control people, but the question is, would you control if you had the power to?

so bani, although i believe in pro choice and if a person wants or needs to die, it should be allowed, i am against suicide personally

@mrdee:

The reason why they do this is because it is usually assumed that suicide ( or suicide attempts) usually happen during a time of depression, instability, trauma, ie. all situations where the patient finds him/herself in a situation there is no way out.

This is what I meant by mentioning "practical problems". Things that relate to committing suicide. And also, by asking if a government should control suicide if it allows it I mean that for example if a 14-year-old wants to kill him/herself, should he/she be forced to take medication? Most of the things you mentioned were like these... practical problems. I first asked to look at suicide without taking these into account.
Another thing that is funny to me is these mental conditions. Thinking a bit more objectively I find that crazy people are just different. That is why we lock them up, to not do their crazy things to us. But then we lock up people who don't want to harm anyone else but themselves and we pretend to be protecting them or other similar thoughts. The most fascinating thing is the circular reasoning for mental conditions and killing oneself:
You are supposed to be crazy because you want to kill yourself and you want to kill yourself because you're crazy. So I conclude that people want to force everyone to live and think like they do. Thinking otherwise will make you a crazy person. The only reason only thinking differently nowadays doesn't get you in jail is because of this human rights and humanism mind set that is used to gain control over people. But that was just about thinking, when you do something, you can be locked up. Using those to gain popularity has then resulted in being forced to live with people like me () who don't buy into such illusions such as the higher meaning of life, spiritual worlds and morals. If you want proof you can research ethical nihilists throughout history.


Anyway, interesting discussion here. I was waiting for more replies, tho. Continue.
Edited February 20, 2011 by Baniboy (see edit history)

[Iniyila 2]

Yes i agree with anwii you can not outlaw suicide because after someone kills him/herself then who do you want to punish ? so there is no way for getting it in the law. By the way as the law was unable to prevent people from suiciding so another way of prevention is just created and it is religion, in most of religions it is a big sin and those who do it will get to hell or will be punished hardly. this shows that as the law was nothing to do with suicide then they have thought to at least try to prevent faithful peoples from suiciding. if you are seeking for why it is bad or why peoples have tried to prevent other ones from suciding, then i can say everyone can tell many reasons for why he/she thinks about suicide be a bad thing. look governments just get advantages when a person kills him/herself because most of these peoples do that after getting depressed and duo to some emotional problems they decide to do such a thing, when a person becomes depressed so much , she/he has no benefit for the government or even for her/his family so when you try to change someones decision about suiciding, you don't think about any loss or benefit and you think about something else.I think first of all, we all get so sorry when see a person trying to kill her/himself because most of us know how beautiful life is and we want others to enjoy this world too so we try to change their decision, another reason is that when a person suicides, he/she kills hope in some people, this thing is really dangerous for any of us who is not in a good condition, so if someone suicide then it will affect the environment where lives in so badly and can cause real dangerous condition for peoples live in that place, for example i know a family that their son's killed himself after that they went to u.s.a but some years later their daughter killed herself, they went to canada after that but just a year later their neighbour from the place they where living in u.s.a killed himself in UK , so i think this is why governments are really serious about such things because they know if the rate of suicide goes up in a country, this means peoples of it are getting more hopeless everyday and this can destroy a whole country so they should prevent from such thing to happen. Should it be controlled by law ? hmm as the law have no way to prevent someone from suciding then i prefer to answer this question : can a government do anything to reduce suciding ? i think the answer is yes, they can. they should provide people with hope and this is a really hard thing to do but it is possible. first of all, job is very important, a jobless man or woman is hopeless so first of all they should try to make sure that there is enough job for everyone to do it, the second thing is trying to educate people about love, really most people do not even know what love should be like and they only think that they love somebody, governments should try to educate people about failing in relationships, there are many peoples around the word suciding for failing in their relationship so governments have to do something about this, they have to show people that being alive is more valuable than loosing their loved one. another thing is that to make sure no one is alone! this is very important and just nearly impossible but this should be done, one of the things i wanna to say is that to force people to encouraging people to live with each other, give huge discounts and many things like this to encouraging people for doing this. Anyway suicide is a fact, no one can delete this word, so we have to accept it, many experiments are going on to find ways for reducing this and some of them are really nice. i have seen some micro chips which can alert doctors when somebody is in dangerous conditions so they can find him/her before anything bad goes on. anyway no one can say why someone takes his life because no one can feel what he had felt in that situation.

[mrdee 1]

This is what I meant by mentioning "practical problems". Things that relate to committing suicide. And also, by asking if a government should control suicide if it allows it I mean that for example if a 14-year-old wants to kill him/herself, should he/she be forced to take medication? Most of the things you mentioned were like these... practical problems. I first asked to look at suicide without taking these into account.Another thing that is funny to me is these mental conditions. Thinking a bit more objectively I find that crazy people are just different. That is why we lock them up, to not do their crazy things to us. But then we lock up people who don't want to harm anyone else but themselves and we pretend to be protecting them or other similar thoughts. The most fascinating thing is the circular reasoning for mental conditions and killing oneself:
You are supposed to be crazy because you want to kill yourself and you want to kill yourself because you're crazy. So I conclude that people want to force everyone to live and think like they do. Thinking otherwise will make you a crazy person. The only reason only thinking differently nowadays doesn't get you in jail is because of this human rights and humanism mind set that is used to gain control over people. But that was just about thinking, when you do something, you can be locked up. Using those to gain popularity has then resulted in being forced to live with people like me () who don't buy into such illusions such as the higher meaning of life, spiritual worlds and morals. If you want proof you can research ethical nihilists throughout history.

Well, I did not exactly say you have to be crazy to attempt suicide.
It is also difficult not to take the practical issues into account, as (as far as I recall anyway) I have never known anyone to commit suicide for no reason (which could be anything from constant bad luck, a lost love, bankruptcy to more underlying mental problems or trauma or depresiion), these things do not necessarily indicate the person in question is crazy.

However, to come back to your example of the 14-year old: should that person be forced to take medication: i can be very clear her: in the beginning, certainly NO, and also, they usually wil not do that initially, they will give the person counselling and guidance, sessions with a psychologist or psychiatrist or both to try and find out what exactly that underlying problem is.
Obviously, with the child being a minor, the parents/guardians will also be invoilved in the whole process, and, should the medical/psychological staff find there are certain conditions which need a drug related therapy, then they will obviously consult with the parents/guardian.

However, not al mental conditions or problems are treatable with drugs.

I will not go into details here (maybe I will later, if the further development of the thread warrants it, but, as a parent, I have faced a similar situation twice and it is really not as black and white as it all seems because there are so many different circumstances and reasons why people think they should take their own lives, and all cases are completely different.

Forgive me for not being clearer in my explanation at this time, but I assume there are many other people who do not really feel like smearing a whole part of their private life all over a forum.

But, believe me, as a parent of two children, now almost 23 and 21, and after the things I have experienced, I think that I, at least to some extent, know what I am talking about.

Anyway, I will see how this discussion evolves, and in case it would merit the discussion, I might explain things much clearer.

[Baniboy 3]

The reason I differentiate between practical problems and the theoretical position where there is something that makes suicide wrong is because I was waiting for replies such as the one from anwiii that states that life has a purpose or similar things. It would be more interesting to debate as well instead of discussing on the 1001 cases of suicide and analyzing them one by one. (I shouldn't have mentioned law in my first post, instead I should've asked why it is wrong/right). There are people who believe suicide is wrong just because suicide is wrong, without thinking about things such as the circumstances where someone wants to kill himself or herself.The core question is are you a sane person if you want to kill yourself? Sane and insane are pretty much normal and abnormal (abnormal in a destructive or non-productive way). That's just the way it is. So normal human nature is that humans don't want to kill themselves. Due to the feelings that it gives us. We enjoy life. So let's take an example that someone doesn't enjoy life and wants to end it. Do others have the right to force him/her to live. Or do others have the right to force him/her to enjoy life again? This is the problem. Even if I'm not crazy in the traditional meaning of it, I am not perceived as mentally balanced if I want to kill myself. And I used myself as an example because it's an easy pronoun to work with. Tired of typing "him/her" or "person" all the time...With my 14-year-old example I wanted to make you think about a situation where attempting suicide would be allowed to happen. Something like how alcohol is legal but is controlled by the government. Also, one thing I would like to talk about is euthanasia or more accurately being able to kill yourself if you can't end the suffering anyway. With euthanasia I have a problem with who has to do it. Suppose euthanasia is allowed? If a judge allows it, that's practically a murder. Pulling the plug when someone is in coma is also practical murder if you value life as something more than a combination of chemical processes. I do not think that others should be able to control if you live or don't. But we are forced to do that anyway. However with mental depression, I know that humans are very adaptable. You can't stay depressed forever (with the exceptions of certain cases). I do believe that time heals (= hides) everything, tho I don't have anything else to prove it than with my own experiences.Regarding euthanasia I would recommend watching a Spanish film called "The Sea Inside". Contains a lot of useless drama but still an interesting, thought-producing watch.As for the reason for me to make this thread is a) web_designer and anwiii asked me to make this after we talked about suicide in the chatroom and b ) I'm trying to a achieve a direction of discussion here that I won't comment on now. We'll have to wait and see where this conversation goes. However I want web_designer to reply post here as well because she wanted me to make this thread. She'll either post here or I'll debate her position without seeing her reply! :DAnwiii probably didn't reply to me because my replies have started to suck recently when it comes to structuring. I really don't know why but lately I haven't been very good in typing posts that make sense. I promise I'll look at my posts later on to check if I make sense. What I was asking you, anwiii, was that prove me life has a purpose to complete your argument. You failed to do that in your first post.

[anwiii 17]

sorry bud, been busy and will be for another week and a half.very quickly though, i can prove life holds purpose just by pointing out that males have a penis and females have a vagina. their bodies produce both a sperm and an egg SPECIFICALLY for producing life. if you are going to try to tell me that life holds no purpose, then it goes against the nature i specifically gave as an example above. but if you are going to continue to say i didn't prove there was a purpose, i would have to ask YOU, where's the proof that there ISN'T a purpose. i will bet you i cann list more things that make sense that suppose a purpose to life than you can to list things that support anything that says that life has no purpose. :)you have to understand bani. it's not just one thing that can prove a purpose to life or a structure to it. it's a whole bunch of things. many smaller things that when you know what they are, combine them as one, you can more easily see the structure and then the purpose in GENERAL. when you want to be specific in death like suicide, we have to be specific to THE PERSON who is going to commit suicide, no? since his or her purpose in life would be different than someone elses. i can more easily explain a person's purpose if you give me someone as an example who has already commited suicide. i can show you life WITH that purpose and life WITHOUT that purpose being fullfilled.i remember when i was in my 20's and i had a driving job, i looked out the window to notice life and the people in it. people on the freeway, a bunch of people constructing new buildings, people walking somewhere, etc..... it was the first time i ever questioned lifes purpose because people in general just looked like a bunch of ants scrabling around going in different places with no real purpose organization. we just WERE. we were just THERE or we are just HERE. that's it. no purpose no nothing. well, i learned a lot since then. i don't know if i can show the proof you are asking,but i will certainly try to argue my point in what i personally know exists. i also understand that believing in something and knowing something are two different things. when i talk though, i sorta mix what i know with what my beliefs are because they work together that way. i also understand that you are asking me to PROVE a purpose without me imaginaing or making up a purpose.i will have more time to talk later....

[Baniboy 3]

i will bet you i cann list more things that make sense that suppose a purpose to life than you can to list things that support anything that says that life has no purpose.

There aren't many things supporting that a pink elephant isn't sitting on my desk either, doesn't mean that I should think it is true. I'm not making a negative claim. At least this time. I'm saying that if you want to claim that life holds a special purpose, show it.

i also understand that you are asking me to PROVE a purpose without me imaginaing or making up a purpose.

Well, could you do that, please? The sperm and egg argument is kind of weak. Show me that life is something more than a bunch of chemical reactions taking place.

we just WERE. we were just THERE or we are just HERE. that's it. no purpose no nothing.

That is exactly my take on this topic.

[anwiii 17]

i know what your take on this subject is. i expected better logic than a "pink elephant" scenario though. it's something bikerman would use to help support his own arguements. i mean, i thought we were talking about a serious subject here bani. if you're going to talk about pink elephants, why should i bother even responding? seems pointless.unfortunately, i cannot prove that life holds a special purpose. it's different for everyone. but if i were going to compare people, it's obvious that people have certain talents in life. for example. if you haven't heard of "Sungha Jung", search this guy on you tube. this kid has a talent that is not from any chemical reaction. he was born a certain way and and not a lot of people has his gift. now most people in this world bani would look at this guy and know his purpose. his purpose being to share his talent and his gift to the world. he's a person you can just look at and wonder how he became to be when other professionals who have been playing and practicing their whole life, can't even do what he does. this suggests that there is even something more to a person than what is made up in their dna. i mean, you don't see his parents on youtube, do you? some people would say that it is some sort of devine intervention that happened before birth. in some ways, i think this is true, but what i believe for the most part is that everyone takes their "soul" or this energy that have inside them from one lifetime to another and they build on who they are from one lifetime to another in the areas of their purpose.now what i have said doesn't have any solid data or evidence to prove people have a purpose, but i gave an explaination that can at least question it when i know you can't come up with anything better yourself to disprove my theory or even give a better explaination of why certain people are born with a talent or a "gift" is what i like to call it.i can talk about myself and say that i should have died several times in this lifetime. when i can get thrown out of a car that is being rolled at 60mph and can walk away without a scratch, and you hear other stories who's bodies defy the laws of physics, then you have to begin to wonder if science will ever explain life. i mean, for a lot of people, science is THEIR "god". science is supposed to explain more about life. but when you start limiting science to dna or chemical reactions or physics, you really will never figure out life as a whole...only some of it in small bits and pieces....and never ALL the pieces.this is why i believe in all religions bani. why limit ones self to only one belief when there is so much more to life or what other people are trying to figure out? this is why there is more to "nature". than what science can disprove or even PROVE for that matterso what about these laws of nature that cannot be proven or even disproven? you are willing to throw them out? why? because it's easier to believe in things that can be proven or disproven? this is shallow thinking.let's talk about natural instincts. humans aren't born with any natural instinct, but other species of animals are. they rely on them for their survival. without them, they would die. this is something you can read in your precies science books as being FACT. where do these natural instincts come from bani? natural instincts are not learned. they are something you are born with.this is sorta off topic to your original post though, but you seemed to have wanted to go in this direction and talk about pink elephants for some reason.you didn't like my anology about the sperm and the egg? what about male and female parts. proof that there is a purpose in life if not just to reproduce is right in front of you. so then the question becomes, why is there a purpose of reproducing. when you start from the beginning with that one purpose and follow the answers to the questions that are asked next, it's like connecting the dots and eventually, you will see a better picture of what life is. the problem because when people don't question things or try to find the answers. they can go through life like a bunch of worker ant or lemmings. they can even say they believe in a religion without really knowing why they believe and this sort of thinking can make any religion less credible when there is some truth to everything. even if we want to talk about witches or these new age religions like wicca. you will hear them talk about things like "magik". the mind is a very powerfull thing. all they are really talking about is a belief in something and the power of prayer or thought which they like to call "rituals". all they are really trying to do is harness an energy they know is there that other religions fail to talk about. you've heard of the saying that the more you believe in something, the more it becomes true? well, this is true. in some ways we create our own life through our own thought processes. to support this arguement, i refer you to the book "the secret". it's even on video.suicide shouldn't be illegal or outlawed because death is a part of life and we have so much to learn about life.....including "death". just like life, "death" has it's own purpose. should taking a life be controlled by a government if it's legal? ofcourse not. the government should never take the laws of nature in their own hands. it is not up for them to decide who lives or dies and by what cause. if we did that, the learning process of life and death would be lost. just like technology has paved a way to limit how people think and survive in this world. technology was never needed were life was concerned. we lived a long time without it and over the years, it made life as a shadow as technology progresses where life in a sense becomes less important than science and technology. instead of science following in the footsteps of life, life is following in the footsteps of science. it's all backwards.it's so hard to just talk about a people's purpose in life before we talk about life it self. and it's so hard to just talk about if suicide should be legal or not or if there should be governement control without talking about other things first. like i said. to connect the dots, you have to start from the beginning, not the middle or the end(the end is what you want to talk about from the start when you are talking about suicide and death). so you have me at a real disadvantage of trying to prove anything when you want to start a conversation at the end of life. you want to skip over all the other major important things about life itself. i know your logic bani and i know your logic as no choice but to agree with me here. it's really some pretty basic philosophy though... "if this, then that".now if i met someone suicidal or someone about to kill themselves, i would try to stop them myself. the keyword is TRY. i can't fight nature or fight what other people have in their own true nature. all i can do is try to learn more about life and death. the fact is, if a person was meant to die, they would already be dead before i even had a chance to talk to them. part of my own purpose in life is to try to guide others who have lost theirs. lost is not even a good word. "hidden" is a better word. it's really easy for one's own purpose to be hidden when there are so many things in life that are a distraction to life itself. when we put a higher importance on those distractions, then it's easier to feel lost and even suicidal and thinking about death when we start believing more and more that "we are just here" with no real purpose. it's unfortate people have to feel that way. so for people like me, we have to guide them back while digging through all the distraction that these people created for themselves to see who this person really is to get a clearer picture of what their own purpose is. this is where the old saying comes from, "you can't judge a book by it's cover" because there is so much more to learn about someone that what people reveal to others based on learned experiences in life and the distractions they created for themselves. for the most part, suicide is NOT the answer to anything. but government control? absolutely not. when we do that, we might as well tell women that they are no longer in control of their own bodies either an that they have to birth any child after they impregnate themselves or were raped or impregnated by other means beyond their control. we might as well let them choose what we do with our lives while we're at it. i mean, if i wanted to paint for a living because it's in my nature, but not a lot of money it and the government steps in saying we have to earn a decent wage because it would be better for the economy, what kind of life would we be living then? the sad part is that we are not too far from that right now as the government and society in general sorta dictates to people what they need to be doing with their lives already. when people feed in to that *BLEEP* and don't fight against the government and society in general to stand up for their own selves, we have a major probelm in this world....and WE DO! how is anyones purpose supposed to be found or followed?if you feel you are just here with no purpose to anything, then it's time for you to forget everything you were taught, and start guiding your own self in life bani. as i told you before, i see something in you. you get upset at me because you don't understand me. but i also know that you do feel something that makes you different than other people. you always wanted me to be specific with you but it's not my place to be specific. i can't step in and tell you what you need to be doing or what your purpose is or i would be no different than the government or society that has a basic life plan for everyone. all i can really tell you is that you aren't like the rest and there are very few people out there like you. i can tell you this though.....out of all the people in this world to be worried about, i will never worry about you. you're still young and have a lot to learn. at the same time, at your age, you are so smart and i wouldn't be too far off base by telling you that part of your purpose is to question life's purpose. it will only make you stronger when you do and whatever you choose to do with your life, you will never be typical as so many other people SEEM to be. part of lifes struggles that make the struggle worth it is finally finding ourselves and our purpose without other people having to step in for us and tell us. there is nothing to learn from that.now i said at the beginning that it is often said that humans do not have any natural insticts for survival. for the most part, the majority of the experts agree with this. the only difference and arguement people have is when we define "natural instict". for the most part i agree with the general definition, except the definition doesn't incorporate anything that can be present, but not proven. if Sungha Jung was born to play, and he could play or was forced to do something else, what do you think would happen? what would be the result? well, there would be something he feels is missing in his life. i am certain of this. so lets say he was pushed to be a doctor or a lawyer so some other profession which doesn't utilize his true gift. you can say that he is already dying inside and eventually, living and breathing would be a pointless act in his every day life. soon he only knows how he was guided to be.....not who he really is and becomes suicidal where life isn't even worth living anymore. in this sense, i feel people are born with a natural intuition and instict about themselves that becomes relevant for survival. i feel everyone is born with it, but life's distractions can make it very difficult to follow the path of what was natural at one time. so when i person leads a life like this, am i ok if the goverment steps in saying it's ok if you make a choice to kill yourself without considering other options? NOPE! i am definately not ok with that because like i said before....part of my purpose is to guide others in the right way. killing yourself is usually never the answer wether there is government regulation or not. we can already determine that part of lifes purpose is to reproduce because we are born with male parts and female parts to do just that. so when we consciously make a choice to kill ourselves, it negates the original purpose of life and why there are two sexes to begin with.anyway, another long winded post. you may not even read the whole thing. i don't blame you

[Harlot 2]

Let me quickly give my opinion on the matter. I am not Socrates, but I will try to use logic as much as possible. Now, I believe that suicide is caused by one of two things. That is depression or insanity. I simply do not believe that as completely normal person wakes up one day and decide to end their life. It has been mentioned that people who are suicidal are stereotyped as either insane or depressed, but its because that is exactly what the majority of them are. People who commit suicide are unhappy with the world, their life, and themselves. It becomes so unbearable that they can not handle it. I also think that suicide is usually emotional more so than logical. I seriously doubt many people commit suicide as a result of an epiphany after deep thought. I doubt that the majority of suicides are caused by new insight or some sort of logical realization that death is good, and life is bad. So in a sense, suicides are a result of mental or emotional instability. Before this is denied, I think its important that reasons for suicide be listed. I think all of those reason can be attributed to an emotional or mental deranged individual. I think an issue that will arise in my argument thus far is the definition of insanity. One definitions that I found labeled insanity as extremely foolish and irrational. However, I do not use the word insanity in that context alone. Perhaps I use insanity for the lack of a better word, but I also use it in the context of someone whose thinking is completely incompatible with the beliefs, values, and morals that hold society together. I know that it has been noted previously that morals, values, and all of those good sounding word should not be used, as they supposedly amount to nothing. I must disagree. What hold society together is morals and values. Of course, human morals and values differ on some levels, however, all humans or at least the powerful institutions that regulate humans, have shared values on a basic level. It is morals and values that keep one man from killing another without a justifiable excuse. Most humans hold that value, and those who do not are incompatible with society and therefore are forced to cooperate through either force and fear, or be put away in order to uphold a society that is bind together. My definition of insanity is what it is because irrational can differ from what society view as right. It may be rational, in your view, to kill someone for stepping on your lawn. I believe that such an action could be rationalized. However, it the action conflicts with the values that are established for a functioning society to exist. So now that we have established that suicide is caused by depression or insanity, if suicide conflicts with the values that hold society together and it can not be put to an end through force, than the person is put away so that society can not be harmed. How can society be harmed by a person's decision to commit suicide? Because that person is a part of society, and as a part of society they are prevented from harming themselves. In addition, others in society who have a personal or emotional connection are temporary protected from the horrors of death.Of course, it makes little sense when closely examined, but it is the reality in my opinion. The world and it's standards do not always make sense to those of us who are not well connected with the values established by society, for those of us who are partially insane. I say it makes little sense because death is inevitable. However, analyzing that truth is dangerous for those who fear death. If death is inevitable, why are murders placed behind bars for speeding up the inevitable. And is the death penalty truly a punish if it was going to happen eventually anyway. Does the punishment amount to beating me down today instead of next week? Either way I will be beat down. So the entire argument is complex, and it all comes down to values and morality more so than logic. Even those who support suicide must hold the value that man is his own decision maker and should determine his own destiny. However, it can be argued that man is a social animal, and society collectively decides his fate. It can be argued that man has no right to individually make the decision of life and death when all of humanity is at stake. If it is the job of humans to reproduce, and reproduction keeps humanity going, as a social creature who is he to decide the fate of society? He is a slave of nature, and is just as much enslaved to life as he is to death. The truth is that there is no truth. When it comes to social questions, rationality and logic is based on values and beliefs shaped by life experiences. Should man fate be decided collectively or individually? There is no equation for the correct answer. Even if we drop the "should" there is still no truth. Is the fate of men decided collectively or individually? Is men fate decided at all? Who decides how a man thinks? Is it the educational system set up by society or the naturally independent thought of men? Does any one really know? My opinion? Rationality and logic is justification of belief systems, which are not always rational. In fact, it is obvious that anyway argument on the issue hangs on right and wrong. It hangs on values and beliefs. Is it right or wrong for someone to commit suicide? Is it right or wrong for someone to be prevented from commit suicide? This is really why I have no issue with religion. Humanity is absurd, so why is the believe in absurdity wrong? Maybe humanity is not absurd, but even if it is not absurd universally, it is absurd because on our knowledge and current capacity. Therefore, why is one level of absurdity unacceptable and living a life with no clear purpose acceptable. How is it any more absurd to live to die than it is to live for the purpose of having life externally? In fact, the first sound more absurd than the latter. So suicide could even be rationalized on a religious level. One side could argue that it is pointless to live because life has no purpose, and therefore suicide is the way for the sane. Another side could argue that life has a purpose, and the purpose is to serve a being in order to live externally in happiness, bliss, and riches (personal gratification). So my opinion on suicide is neutral. I accept it as a reality, but I do not have the logic, knowledge, or patience to compare values in an attempt to come to a conclusion of truth, and I don't really believe that there is a truth anyway - only more values and beliefs. I would have to base my entire opinion on what hold society together, but than I would have to tackle the question of if it is good or bad that society is held together...especially if humanity possibly does not have a purpose.

[Baniboy 3]

Let me quickly give my opinion on the matter.

I don't know about you, but I wouldn't call your entire post a quickly given opinion.
Harlot, I said that norms and habits that are unjustifiable crumble before me for a reason. It's because they are not justifiable. You are using subjective opinions of the general society to make a rational argument? Prove the opinions first. And yes, values are just opinions. Nothing objective about them, never was, never will. Even if they hold societies together.

I seriously doubt many people commit suicide as a result of an epiphany after deep thought. I doubt that the majority of suicides are caused by new insight or some sort of logical realization that death is good, and life is bad.

Suppose someone does, what then? I happen to know many people that think life in itself is pointless. They don't commit suicide, simply because they enjoy living. When somebody no longer enjoys their life enough to be willing to live anymore, why should anybody have any control over them regarding their own life? Because somebody else might feel bad about it? Is the bad feeling of others more important than the person's will and/or suffering?

So the entire argument is complex, and it all comes down to values and morality more so than logic.

I can swear you told me you would try to use logic as much as possible. I know you're not Socrates, but you could at least try

It is morals and values that keep one man from killing another without a justifiable excuse.

So you think empathy and guilt haven't got much part in the soup? Is your value of peacefulness the only thing keeping you from killing someone? what do you think morals are based on? You won't kill someone else because you think it's wrong? Morals are just fraction of the story. Morals are a shortcut, a shell. A a tool to control. Unlike empathy and guilt themselves, morals can be taught, after which they control why we feel empathy and guilt. This is why they are holding societies together. A simple set of rules without justifications makes everyone feel much safer when there is something absolute like right or wrong (or a magical sky daddy) to refer to whenever they come across a problem. Synthetic morals and values are for kids. To date, the only moral theory I've found intelligent and rational enough to be used is consequentialism. And that's because it leaves the thought process to you, doesn't make absolute claims and is based on the simplest thing human beings are craving for; pleasure. Thus, making it very down to earth, practical and often rational. As long as you don't think WHY one action is better than the other without taking subjective experience of pleasure into account, otherwise you're back in the good-bad thing again. Anyway, even this is problematic. That is why I prefer to not use this method either, unless it's a routine decision I have to make.

One side could argue that it is pointless to live because life has no purpose, and therefore suicide is the way for the sane.

Our species has survived because we are constructed to live. Whether or not life has a purpose is irrelevant. We enjoy living, we want to avoid death. If there is some insane person (as you define it) that somehow has different opinions, why is he responsible to take care of your society? After all, they never CHOSE to be born, they were never given the chance to engage in your society or to not do so. It's not their responsibility anymore if they want to leave and do no more good to the society. Why could they be forced into doing something they don't want to?
Anyway, I just read the ending paragraph. I tried to search for key arguments here and there in your post. I couldn't read the whole thing post but you did clear up some of the stuff you said earlier in the end. A year ago I might have sat down and reply to your every argument, but it seems I have a life nowadays. To save you from being patient and comparing the values, I can tell you where using logic ends in... It's "meh, whatever". Truth can't be found. From my point of view it's a matter of preference. But I think one shouldn't be able to control others based on the societies preference when it's about someone controlling their own life without harming others. Even at the expense of someone else feeling bad because of it. Okay, now that sounds contradicting. But there are other things that are done and people get hurt because of them and nobody seems to have a problem with them. Not saying it's right, but this is a matter of preference, as I already said. Nothing comes without a sacrifice. It's like free speech, just a more bloody version.

Now, I wrote this at night so there may be some sentences cut in half without continuation. I apologize if there are any.


Anwiii, I'll reply to you later. It's getting pretty late here.

[anwiii 17]

this is where you are 100% wrong in your thinking bani. this is going to create confusion for you to seek out truth unless you are arguing just for the sake of arguing. please don't turn in to truefusio. i hope i didn't offend him by saying that. all i mean is that although arguements and debates are good, there is a line drawn when balance can become comromised.

why are you wrong? harlot was right in a way. depression is a major cause. but depression isn't the key to is. depression is just the result of why someone feels unfulfilled. if we are constructed to live, then there would be no unnatural deaths yet we face unnatural deaths every day. MY whole basis of arguement relies on the FACT that i know life holds a purpose and people in it hold a unique and specific purpose for their own fulfillment. just because you don't know this fact doesn't make it untrue. even if life held no purpose, that in itself would make it relevant to this conversation.

you ever think that it's not that people want to avoid death, but rather people want to avoid life? most people who commit suicide don't really want to die, they just want to avoid life....THEIR life. their unique situations that lead them to be suicidal.

you can't talk about life and death and LIMIT how we talk about it. that limited thinking will get you nowhere. there are no RULES to life and death except natures ways of controlling it and the purpose we were all born to live through or be unfulfilled.

although in life, it takes years til death where we gain the knowledge we have which we wouldn't otherwise have if we had died sooner, but ever child is born with knowledge bani. morals can be learned, yes. in a way you are right when you say morals or values are just an opinion. but that is on the surface. when we are born, we have knowledge through our spirit and soul. a way of life that is innocence. in some ways, that is the true guide to morals and values. not what is learned. birth is a part of those morals and values we take with us until we are guided differently or guided in a way that supports our natural ways from birth. you say a purpose to me is irrelevant. i say death is irrelevant because death is a part of life and the cycle of life and you can only be reborn through "death" as you call it.

i am not going to play by your rules anymore bani. they are for the weak and the ignorant. people who create limitations on others are people who want other to play by their own rules so they can guide them towards the same limited mindset. i am not really a believer in that but i gave it a shot. from now on, there are no rules to this thread. if there still are, i will be the first to break them

also, since you started this thread, i feel a need to use you and your life as an example to prove my points. you would be a classic example because you feel life holds no purpose, and you also get easily depressed which is an attribute directly related to suicide for most people. let me know if your game. it's one thing to talk in general and get nowhere. it because easier to talk and debate over when we can use a live example under specific circumstances. with that said, don't assume you have all the answers. if you did, you wouldn't have asked your original question. the reason you feel life holds no purpose is directly related with you looking for answers in all the wrong places. i for one believe that for every question, there is a truth....or an answer.

we aren't constructed to live. we are constructed to survive there is a big difference. living however is a choice after we are born when we get old enough to know how to kill ourselves. if we choose to live, it's because we were cinstructed to survive. but i do like how you said we are constructed to live because i know you can't mean physically. you had to mean it towards our mental state.

so knowing we are contrusted mentally a certain way which gives us strength to live, where do you think that comes from? don't tell me it's because people enjoy living. lets really get to the nuts and bolts of it, shall we?

Our species has survived because we are constructed to live. Whether or not life has a purpose is irrelevant. We enjoy living, we want to avoid death.

Edited June 11, 2011 by anwiii (see edit history)

[Baniboy 3]

1. this is where you are 100% wrong in your thinking bani. this is going to create confusion for you to seek out truth unless you are arguing just for the sake of arguing. please don't turn in to truefusio. i hope i didn't offend him by saying that. all i mean is that although arguements and debates are good, there is a line drawn when balance can become comromised.

 

2. if we are constructed to live, then there would be no unnatural deaths yet we face unnatural deaths every day.

 

3. MY whole basis of arguement relies on the FACT that i know life holds a purpose and people in it hold a unique and specific purpose for their own fulfillment. just because you don't know this fact doesn't make it untrue. even if life held no purpose, that in itself would make it relevant to this conversation.

 

4. you ever think that it's not that people want to avoid death, but rather people want to avoid life? most people who commit suicide don't really want to die, they just want to avoid life....THEIR life. their unique situations that lead them to be suicidal.

 

5. you can't talk about life and death and LIMIT how we talk about it. that limited thinking will get you nowhere. there are no RULES to life and death except natures ways of controlling it and the purpose we were all born to live through or be unfulfilled.

 

6. when we are born, we have knowledge through our spirit and soul. a way of life that is innocence. in some ways, that is the true guide to morals and values. not what is learned. birth is a part of those morals and values we take with us until we are guided differently or guided in a way that supports our natural ways from birth.

 

7. i say death is irrelevant because death is a part of life and the cycle of life and you can only be reborn through "death" as you call it.

 

8. i am not going to play by your rules anymore bani. they are for the weak and the ignorant. people who create limitations on others are people who want other to play by their own rules so they can guide them towards the same limited mindset. i am not really a believer in that but i gave it a shot. from now on, there are no rules to this thread. if there still are, i will be the first to break them

 

9. also, since you started this thread, i feel a need to use you and your life as an example to prove my points.

 

10. you would be a classic example because you feel life holds no purpose, and you also get easily depressed which is an attribute directly related to suicide for most people. let me know if your game. it's one thing to talk in general and get nowhere. it because easier to talk and debate over when we can use a live example under specific circumstances.

 

11. we aren't constructed to live. we are constructed to survive there is a big difference. living however is a choice after we are born when we get old enough to know how to kill ourselves. if we choose to live, it's because we were cinstructed to survive. but i do like how you said we are constructed to live because i know you can't mean physically. you had to mean it towards our mental state.

 

12. so knowing we are contrusted mentally a certain way which gives us strength to live, where do you think that comes from? don't tell me it's because people enjoy living. lets really get to the nuts and bolts of it, shall we?

 

1. Ah, thanks for reminding me of truefusion, I'm gonna use his numbering system now. Will make this much easier.

 

2. If by unnatural deaths you mean murders and suicides, I meant the majority of the population, not every single individual.

 

3. You do realize that you need to back up facts with something, don't you?

 

4. I was talking about the non-suicidal people. Of course most the suicidal ones are trying to avoid living. You don't have to be Einstein to figure that out...

 

5. The only limits I required were the ones I mentioned in my opening post. I simply asked the debaters to follow a rational path to argue their points of view.

 

6. Again, could you at least try prove your point? Empirically or rationally, I don't care, just provide something to grasp on when you start.

 

7 & 8. So now you're talking about reincarnation or whatever that is. You can't use this as a rational point in your argument, anwiii. That is what my rule is. Follow a logical path and prove your points. If you don't like my rule, don't expect me to debate you using spirits, souls, and whatever other magical stuff you bring up.

 

9. Be my guest.

10. Hmm... I wouldn't call myself someone who gets depressed easily. I haven't been depressed once as in what it means in medical terms. The only time I recall being close to depressed was 1 year ago. And that was me depressing myself. I've been through things that could've depressed me, but they didn't. I'm interested in where you got this idea from. I do expect more than "I somehow mystically feel you get depressed easily", though. You said you'd use me as an example but you didn't.

 

11. Of course I meant our mental state.

 

12. I don't claim to know the answer. I said that we are constructed to avoid death because that has been the way we have survived as a species. If you don't think that's a reasonable answer, I would like to know why.

Edited June 11, 2011 by Baniboy (see edit history)

[anwiii 17]

5. The only limits I required were the ones I mentioned in my opening post. I simply asked the debaters to follow a rational path to argue their points of view.

bani, i stated in my last post how your limits aren't rational at all. limits create prejudice and subjective thinking. my experiences in life are facts bani yet i will always be unable to prove them to you. you want people to be able to prove things to you except when someone has a closed mind, it's impossible to prove anything to anyone. i can say the sky is blue, but you could still probably hold up a good debate in why you think the sky is pink. it's an endless cycle unless why can use our own experiences. from my own experiences, there is a logical deduction. almost like putting pieces to a puzzle together yet you don't want to use those pieces. why? because you would rather believe in nothing rather than something when you feel life holds no purpose.

i didn't use you in an example because i feel it's appropriate to ask a person first since most people like to keep SOME things private about themselves. as far as me saying you get depressed easily, i am going back to a post you made a while back that didn't give any clues to your depression. most people DO create their own depression bani. that is not a secret in this lifetime. that's why counseling or doing things like writing, walking, excersizing, and other things are able to help people with their depression. if people refuse to help themselves, then they will just stay depressed. some people are unable to do this. but i have given you my reason for the comment. it was based on what you have already said publically. what i was talking about are asking you specific questions to use you as an example to prove my point that you aren't qualified to even give an opinion on this subject, AND that you are wrong in your general opinion. i can prove it using your own words but i would have to ask you to be completely honest and no beating around the bush. what i mean by beating around the bush is that you said you don't get depressed often when in fact, it is natural to get depressed often. some people just choose not to dwell in it more than others. there are a lot of things that depress people every day in life. the people who DON'T get depressed are the ones i actually worry about more because there is something inside them that is blocking the natural ability to care about things in this world to prevent them from getting depressed.

i know exactly what i am asking of you when i asked to use you as an example bani. that's why asking your permission first is appropriate. i want to stress this part because you made it look like i said one thing and done another like a hypocrite or i was ignorant in my thinking when i posted what i did.

i am never ignorant when it comes to subjects like this. at least less ignorant than others as i have experienced a lot more than others in a deep sense of reality that very few people travel in this life. once you say we can use you as an example though, i don't want to be in the middle of things and then have you chicken out so if you do say yes, i want you to know exactly what it will entail. it will entail everything personal about yourself with no restrictions. this is the only way i will able to prove something to you bani. talking general talk like everyone is the same is pointless because everyone is different. this is proven by the fact that we all "choose" different paths in life. the reason for this as i will prove later on, is that we all have a purpose in life and most everyone is born with one. not to just wonder around endlessly not knowing what to do with our lives and NOT just by our learned experiences or guidance from our parents, teachers, or peers.

also, before you answer my questions about yourself, i need you to think of the true answer. i know it will be hard for you at first because you said you don't get depressed easily when i know you do. you are just labeling depression in a different way than i am to say you don't. it doesn't make you wrong, and it certainly doesn't make me wrong either. all we are going to do is base everything on what you tell me and i am sure i will have to clarify a lot of your answers so this may take a while. but since you started this thread and i am assuming you want some true answers, then we can do this by using you as an example. i will start by asking very easy and basic questions. most of which i probably already know the answers to. i need to prime you so you can be more open about more deeper things that you don't think about too much in your own life later on. in the end, you will have come to realizations you didn't know before and parts of the way you think right now will change. that i can promise you. i do have to ask questions though. me just telling you things i can't prove will be a basis of argements which will be unproductive right now. i just want facts or facts that you THINK are facts pertaining to your own life.

so now that you know what my purpose is, are you game? you're not going to chicken out later and able to handle this method? if you are willing, we can start in my next post.

in the meantime, recheck my facebook profile and check those picture i took on a dark night. and answer me one question for now....

if and only if i took those pictures, if and only if, saved those pictures, if and only if i never altered those pictures in any way, if and only if they weren't altred by anyone else, if and only if my camera usually takes clear and crisp pictures without any distortions...the question is....

what would you think about the pictures that you wouldn't have thought before? you know what pictures i am talking about, correct? they are my graveyard pictures i have only recently shared publically. use my conditions i set before you answer even if you feel the conditions didn't exist.

this is a good question to ask first which doesn't really have to do with you directly until i get the ok from you that we can move forward in talking about you directly.