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If a universe bubbled into existence, stars exploded and cooled and a bag of atoms were to self-organise and develop the capacity to experience its own relative
by jddj 8y ago
If a universe bubbled into existence, stars exploded and cooled and a bag of atoms were to self-organise and develop the capacity to experience its own relative concepts of pleasure and suffering over millennia, I don't think it would be irrational or illogical for that bag of atoms to seek to selfishly maximise (long-term) the former and minimise the latter, and that scales out pretty comfortably to persuing philosophy, politics, raising a family etc., even in a universe where everything else is also just a differently shaped bag of atoms.
There's nothing inherently more meaningful about the supernatural than the natural.
This particular bag of atoms, for instance, derives much more pleasure from acknowledging itself as such, than from deciding that it is instead some platonically ideal "being" who was created by an ideal God who always was and whose mere existence eliminates every trace of the incomprehensible, random and emergent beauty that exists in this brutally materialistic framework in one fell swoop.
- tivert 8y ago> If a universe bubbled into existence, stars exploded and cooled and a bag of atoms were to self-organise and develop the capacity to experience its own relative concepts of pleasure and suffering over millennia, I don't think it would be irrational or illogical for that bag of atoms to seek to selfishly maximise (long-term) the former and minimise the latter, and that scales out pretty comfortably to persuing philosophy, politics, raising a family etc... ...and slavery.
- jddj 8y agoHa, yeah, all of the awful shit is better this way as well.
- tivert 8y ago> Ha, yeah, all of the awful shit is better this way as well. Honestly, that just sounds like the peace of mind of a psychopath.
- jddj 8y agoPsychopath? That I would rather that all the terrible things in the world emerged randomly rather than being a part of some grand plan, or some supernatural game of Good Vs Evil? I think you might be reaching for a label when you could have simply said we disagree.