Sat here listening to a neighbouring family arguing, screaming and shouting at each other amid the fireworks and celebrations…why is it that the celebrations seem more frivolous and silly than the family argument? Why shouldn’t pain be the frivolous and silly thing? If charity is good then why am I more tempted to spend my money on prostitutes and clothes? And why do I treat my cat better than people?
To answer the latter questions: …because you’re a scum bag. And the former question: …because you’re also a voyeur.
Unfortunately, ILP has this hypocritical rule that they don’t allow you to delete a post, or edit it after 48 hours—even if the post directly violates their own rules, and contributes nothing to philosophy (such that even an idiot and a gossip wouldn’t want to preserve it).
Prostitutes, eh?..
I disagree with the voyeur remark, you’re missing the point, probably to simply attack but that’s alright. Imagine two pictures, one, a starving African boy, the other, a small girl’s lit up face before her birthday cake. They’re opposing extremes of the same thing, technically equal but not. Not equal because one image carries greater weight, ironically, the starving boy is of more impact. One’s emotions are drawn to his position rather than the girl’s happiness.
A scum bag? I can’t tell if you’re being serious but I’ll assume you are. Not very imaginative of you. Are you unable to consider alternative lifestyles without being such a…moral troll? And you’re mistaken if you think I’d want to delete this.
Prostitutes/call-girls/escorts/whatever. Whatever do you fancy? “Life is like a box of chocolates Forest.” Only, you can choose which one you’re gonna get. Maybe you want the stunning blonde, the older woman, the arabian princess. All these possible experiences are there just waiting…abundant possibilities lie around us and we barely grasp a fraction of them…
Not true. There is ample evidence to support the exact opposite, such as when I see people change always change the channel when a certain kind of commercial comes on. Or when you spend your money on prostitutes and clothes, and not charity. Though that evidence is there, I’m inclined to think this all depends on the person.
I called you a scum bag because you said you spend your money on prostitutes and clothes, not charity. And you treat your cat better than a person. What would be so surprising if I was dead serious?
First off, I said “tempted”, and I’d question the sincerity of your remarks based upon this, that I was merely ellucidating temptations, potentials. No surprise though, people have a tasteless tendency to assume the moral high-ground whenever they see chance. Have you earnt the right though? Let he who hath not sinned cast the first stone and all that jazz.
And what are these commercials? People flick channels because they have the concentration of a nano-second…
I think it’s frivolous to build a house on a weak foundation. It’s not that decoration is inherently bad, but you don’t build your foundation out of, say, decorative elements. The true frivolity isn’t the presence of decoration itself, it’s the perverted order of things.
Doing things that knowingly cause suffering to others, in order to effect a bit of bread and circus for yourself, strikes me as frivolous in that sense.
People have different opinions on what it is to suffer. An ascetic could live without most things yet an aesthete would suffer if he were short of anything. What’s an ascetic to make of an aesthete’s suffering? The bread and circus remark seems to trivialise pleasurable goods, is it the moral ground that stands above the pleasure ground? If so, why so?
It’s not so much about morality per se. It’s that depending on external goods to ensure pleasure isn’t a very stable basis for creating happiness. You can’t depend on the continued or repeated presence of those external goods. A good foundation is stable and trustworthy.
So it must be based on something internal? Like what? What do you mean?
I didn’t say “must”. I think some attitudes lead away from happiness.
Sounds a bit too picket fence for my liking. I mean, you’re suggesting that what is happiness is a fixed idea as are the routes/attitudes that get there. In my quagmire of relativism that can’t be true.
Actually, I’d suggest experimenting for yourself. I’ll get back to this thread when I have more time to explain. Maybe Monday.
Traditional family disputes are tradition. 
Best to get it out of the way early then you can overindulge pass out and watch God® through pin sharp crikey! mind vision™® or The Queen™ whomever is your personal Jesus™®. 
Do you disagree that some attitudes lead away from happiness? I think the statement is logical, and even relatively testable. I’d say the narrower your focus with respect to what will make you happy, the higher the chances that you will not achieve this happiness. In some ways I agree with your earlier Forest Gump quote. Why not find pleasure in a broad array of experiences? Why be a puritan? But why not take it even further? Why not learn to appreciate the world as it is, and all? As well, there is another dimension to the problem, which is that we tend to want happiness for ourselves primarily, and others secondarily at best. But if we develop a stronger attitude of wanting others to be happy, even at the expense of our own happiness, we to some extent step outside that extremely narrow world, which (ironically) limits our happiness so severely.