[lit-ideas] Re: Shadows, Fog, and Money

  • From: Paul Stone <pas@xxxxxxxx>
  • To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
  • Date: Mon, 13 Jun 2005 10:02:22 -0400

>A.A. Frustration that such a question as stated above would even enter
>someone's mind.  Instead, it was a serious question.  This is following on
>the heels of learning that people equate atheism with nihilism.  Truly, it
>was self delusion on my part to think people are as intelligent as I gave
>them credit for.

I never thought you gave me any credit at all. Any way, I was not EQUATING 
atheism to nihilism. I just don't "understand" what would drive someone who 
truly, actually believes that there is NOTHING after you die to live any 
sort of righteous life -- or indeed life at all. I can see people [who say 
they are atheists] doing it everyday, but I don't understand it. What's the 
REASON behind it? Like my 'belief in god' questions, this is a serious 
question and one I fear [know] I won't get an answer to.

>A.A. Religious people are anybody who asks why someone would want to live
>without a tooth fairy, or some variation thereon, by their side.

My questions comes not because I believe in a tooth-fairy. And... I'm not 
religious, if you mean that I adhere to any religion. I am only guided by 
the steadfast refusal to accept that when I die, that will be the end of 
me. I have no imagination of what it might be, but I simply cannot imagine 
not being. If I could, then I might as well get off the ride. What would be 
the point of caring about anything. What possible motivation could I have 
to do anything good or bad or judge things thereby. If you say 'for the 
good of society' or 'to stabilise the society you live in so that you do 
good and help others' I say "why?" "what is the point?"

> > done so in the past...)
>
>A.A. See above.  My definition of religious person is someone who can't
>imagine life without a tooth fairy to guide them along, tell them right
>from wrong, give them a reason to live.  Please, I'm making myself sick
>thinking about this.  I'm going to bed.

I hope you had a good sleep. I don't hope that because I'm religious and 
"religion" does not guide my sense of 'right' or 'wrong'. I just have these 
faint memories of what a 'good sleep' is and even though it is an 
impossibility for me, I would wish it on others. That's a combination of a 
cultural milieu in which I happened to have lived my life and a healthy 
dose of selfishness which basically says "please treat me the way I will 
treat you -- with indifference, within a healthy distance, without invading 
your space with smells or excess noise, without physically injuring you 
without a good reason". That is simple self-preservation. I want to live 
this life that I have
to the absolute fullest because it's fun, interesting and enjoyable -- when 
it's not wretched.

While I'm here, I'm here for me only. I will treat others without harm, 
without malice and without anger (unless they deserve it). I do that ONLY 
as a sort of quid pro quo for maintaining the relatively peaceful existence 
of my society.  But the ONLY thing that drives me is a firm belief that "I" 
am immortal. If I didn't believe that there was a reason to live, then I'd 
have to say that life was pointless -- that's a circular argument, but true 
nonetheless. As a moral person, I would have to then kill myself OR as an 
immoral person, I would have to turn into a truly iconoclastic, sociopathic 
sybarite without a care in the world.

Whether or not anyone agrees with me is really inconsequential. I must 
thank you though because now I think I understand why people ARE religious. 
To turn this 'argument' back to the subject to which it refers, maybe 
people NEED to believe in "global warming" because, well, without that to 
work on, there's nothing to live [i.e. change our lifestyles for the 
betterment of our children etc.] for.

paul





##########
Paul Stone
pas@xxxxxxxx
Kingsville, ON, Canada 

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