I know. But life without problems is boring, and we do not get to choose our problems. Or do we??

Rich

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Its strange how death ends up being a life problem. I guess its becuase all death is created by life. It wouldnt exist without its oposite

Yes. One wouldn't be fun without the other. You can't play hide-and-seek if no one is hiding.

Rich

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What I find mildly amusing is the fact that existential conversations can almost never exist without the mention of this story, and I feel almost doomed to repeat reading its premise again and again.

I suppose I could refuse to read the text, but I choose to find meaning.

In my experience, most theories can be debunked. All is takes is crafty wording, statements with interpretational flexability and charm of some description.

Does ultimate truth exist?

I am a true fence sitter. I find it difficult to commit to any mentality.
I have given up even pretending to.

Depends of how bored you are =)

That sounds like an existential crisis... as I see it, the only solution is to drink more of the beer of reality =)

Living is kind of like being an alcohol addict. You have to stay in a state of self-delusion (drunkness) or face the meaningless of existance and get depressed.

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"Living is kind of like being an alcohol addict. You have to stay in a state of self-delusion (drunkness) or face the meaningless of existance and get depressed."............manored

dont you mean and? that sounds like life to me...both of the above.

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Can you be drunk and depressed at once? I have never been drunk, so I dont know =)

But I dont get depressed about life while deluding myself about it, since it seens the whole point of deluding about it is not get depressed about it. If you see it in a broader view though, as in, whole life, then I think we can put an "and" there =)

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If anything goes wrong, you can always retreat into your own mind.

oh yes. very much so.

Cry tears into your beer =).

Hello Rich, it depends on what those problems are, wouldn't you agree? IMO, to make a blanket statement such as this can be misconstrued. I think it is that assumption that has always existed in which we concude a balance is needed in that to enjoy life we must know what suffering is. As for as a universal paradigm, I will agree it "had to be that way for us to realize suffering is not "universal" and we can solve our problems or at least greatly minimize them. To assume they are equal constructs in which we have no control over is an extremely defeatist attitude and one that could lead to catastrophic results. I love benign problem solving such as crossword puzzles and the like, just as much as the next person, but in a much broader scale to the more serious problems that face us (see list) we can't just assume those are just "natural" and "that's life" and we will never get that rock to the top of the hill. How depressing.

I know you were being light hearted, but we have got some very serious problems we can solve, but we have become so accustom to them, we become innured and cold. Sure it would be nice if crosswords and hide and seek were the worse problems we encounter, but I afraid that is just not the case and I am sure you will agree.

Just a clarification, knowing I am taking out of the context in which you meant it. As far as boring, some of the problems people face and their helplessness in understanding their nature, leads to a boredom we call clinical depression, IMO.

William

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It is not so important to prove our immortality, but it is imperative to believe as though we are.