Is a world without suffering necessarily the best possible world? There are values such as some forms of love (alms for the poor, care for the ill…) which CANNOT express themselves otherwise than in a context of suffering.
There are great feats which CANNOT be achieved if there is not some background of problems.
And how can there be justice if there is no moral evil?
How can there be such a thing as a feeling of relief if there was not previously some bad feeling?
How can we appreciate the value of drinking if we are never thirsty?
You wouldn’t need justice. If no suffering can occur then no justice is needed.
relief would not exist now would it? So you would never realize it.
If we are never thirsty then we will never drink.
If a world without suffering can occur then it is the best world because people will never have problems now will they? Also all diseases, disorders, villians, etc… will not exist. There for while they will be blissfully happy and be very uniform it gives the greatest chace of equality throughout all of life.
a world without suffering is not necessarily the most advantageous world.
as creatures who have known suffering all our lives, in some form or another, if we would ever find ourselves in a ‘perfect’ world without suffering, our immediate reaction would be to evaluate it thoroughly to prove beyond the shadow of doubt that suffering does not in fact exist there. when six billion individual perceptions of absolute bliss fail to align, suffering would be generated.
one person would suffer because they cannot build their house as large as they want because there are trees blocking the way. another would suffer if the trees were torn down to accomodate the construction.
one would want to have all the money. millions would starve.
one would want to openly worship their god, which would offend others who think him insane for even believing in a god.
some young girl would get accidentally knocked up and not be able to support a child and seek abortion–but it wouldn’t be available to her because the fetus would be denied suffering. which in turn would make the young girl suffer.
and all our suffering immediately returns to contaminate our newfound paradise.
the idea of no suffering for the human race is, in my humble opinion, conceptually impossible.
if i never ran the risk of experiencing hunger, thirst, poverty or lonliness then what would be my incentive of leaving my house. or of building a house. or of expanding my mind to contemplate the mysteries of the universe. for surely, with our complex minds, we would suffer to have an unsolvable mystery. no one would ever die, because it would be suffering for the being experiencing death and also for the ones that would experience the pangs of loss. we would all have to be immortal. many people would not be happy without children. we would multiply to the point that we could not all inhabit this planet for the thread of exhausting all natural resources.
and we would all suffer.
a life without suffering, therefore, would have to be completely inert.
Who says suffering exists in the first place? Suffering is a subjective viewpoint. If we change how we view suffering, then suffering won’t really exist. Then we can mold the concept so that it is no longer so contradictory in its nature. What is suffering to a person who does not hold suffering in his vocabulary?
I think we can replace “suffering” with a more creative solution. I think all problems in the world can be solved if we create a World Lolipop Day, so that everyone can enjoy the candy-tastic taste of a darn good lolipop.
as long as mankind experiences desire, he will suffer.
i desire to live, so i breathe, i eat, i drink, i seek shelter. . .
i desire happiness, so i seek companionship, discussion, creature comforts. . .
one can minimize suffering by greatly reducing desire, but suffering can never be eliminated.
almost every action you take creates suffering for something, in some way, because you are altering your reality.
i go to mcDonalds and get a chicken sandwich.
that chicken suffered for me to continue living.
a tree was cut down to make the paper wrapper around the sandwich–a tree which was probably home to many insects, maybe a squirrel or two(squirrells!!! YAAAAAAAYYYYY!!!).
god only knows how many natural resources were synthesized in ungodly ways to produce the hormones to inject into the chicken. . .
anyway, my point is, in interacting with and altering your reality, some form of ‘suffering’ is being generated somewhere.
in minimizing your desire, you can reduce(or alter to a more harmless state) your impact on the world around you, but it can never be eliminated.
to live is to know suffering.
i think its funny how, in the western christian tradition, eternal life seems so cool, while in eastern traditions, such as hinduism, the eternal cycle of death and rebirth is something to be escaped.
Of course we must suffer now. But when you put a pencil into a glass of water it seems from some angles to be bent. However the pencil is in fact straight.
In other words do not let appearances, and the material world fool you into thinking suffering is compulsary. What may seem crooked, is in fact straight. One day we shall all be free.
