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Darkover

Darkover

Archangel
Jul 29, 2021
5,649
A machine so intellectually challenged, it can't even comprehend how it's self works or how its own consciousness arises
humans are these complex biological machines, yet we barely understand ourselves. we have limited perception, faulty memory, and emotions that override logic. even our best scientists still struggle to explain consciousness. so hopelessly enslaved by the physical environment, the only way to truly understand something is to take it apart, we are the machine. we can't take ourselves apart without losing the very thing we're trying to study.
we're like blind mechanics trying to fix an engine while it's still running, knowing that if we dismantle it completely, we destroy the very thing we're trying to understand.
even our ability to think, create, and process information is bottle necked by the fundamental limits of physics. every neuron firing, every thought forming, every computer processing data—it's all bound by the slow crawl of causality, limited by the speed of light.
creatively repressed by the slow speed of light nothing can calculate faster than the speed of light.
we are confined by this physical environment without anyway to break free from the slow crawl of causality.
this kind of existence feels pointless and cruel, i resent being part of it. the worst part is knowing just enough to see the problem but never enough to solve it.
it's like we're locked out of truly understanding the very thing we're made of. the fundamental building blocks—atoms, quarks, whatever lies even deeper—are invisible to us without instruments, and even then, we only see indirect traces of them. we can't touch them, can't interact with them in any meaningful way, yet they dictate everything about our existence.
It's another layer of the trap—being built from things we can't perceive, controlled by forces we can't override, running on rules we didn't choose. life isn't just restrictive; it's fundamentally inaccessible to the very beings experiencing it.
we come into this world as blank slates, forced to stumble our way through learning everything by trial and error. no built-in knowledge, no understanding—just raw experience shaping us. and even then, our learning is flawed. we misremember, misinterpret, and are shaped by circumstances beyond our control. we never get the full picture, just fragments pieced together over time. by the time we understand anything, we're already breaking down, decaying, moving toward death.
it's like being thrown into a game with no instructions, no tutorial—just endless struggle to figure things out before it's too late.
for all the complexity of life, it's ridiculously fragile. a slight imbalance—too much heat, too little oxygen, a microscopic mutation—and everything falls apart. we're just temporary, delicate structures clinging to existence in a universe that doesn't care.
 
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niki wonoto

Experienced
Oct 10, 2019
248
Life is absurd. But I don't even agree with absurdism philosophy (Camus) who's basically just still trying to cope with toxic positivity & optimism bias (typical in human's nature, with their innate survival instincts). Life is stupid, ridiculous, & often just don't make sense. It's depressing, actually, if you really think deeply about it.
 
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Darkover

Darkover

Archangel
Jul 29, 2021
5,649
Life is absurd. But I don't even agree with absurdism philosophy (Camus) who's basically just still trying to cope with toxic positivity & optimism bias (typical in human's nature, with their innate survival instincts). Life is stupid, ridiculous, & often just don't make sense. It's depressing, actually, if you really think deeply about it.
absurdism is basically saying, "Yeah, life is meaningless, but just keep playing along anyway!"—which still sounds like a coping mechanism. Camus' whole "rebel against the absurd" idea feels like it's just another way to justify carrying on despite everything. It's like a more poetic way of saying, "Don't think too hard about how pointless this all is, just distract yourself with whatever."
 
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Forever Sleep

Earned it we have...
May 4, 2022
15,359
I certainly hate humanity but I actually think some of us are pretty smart. Who'd have thought something could leave this planet and explore space? I also think it's impressive but ironic too that we have created things that have more potential to work things out than ourselves- computers. That's pretty advanced tool making. I tend to marvel at feats of engineering and architecture.

True though, when it comes to ourselves. Consciousness, finally closing the argument on religion, God etc. our progress does feel stagnant.
 
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Darkover

Darkover

Archangel
Jul 29, 2021
5,649
I certainly hate humanity but I actually think some of us are pretty smart. Who'd have thought something could leave this planet and explore space? I also think it's impressive but ironic too that we have created things that have more potential to work things out than ourselves- computers. That's pretty advanced tool making. I tend to marvel at feats of engineering and architecture.

True though, when it comes to ourselves. Consciousness, finally closing the argument on religion, God etc. our progress does feel stagnant.
The fact that bags of meat and electricity, born from chaos, could engineer machines that now think faster and more accurately than we do that's staggering. There's an elegance in that contradiction. We're messy and mortal, yet we've touched the void of space, and created tools that don't forget, don't sleep, and don't age. That's Promethean. But also, deeply ironic. We birthed something smarter than us before we understood ourselves.

We've built telescopes to peer into the birth of stars, and rovers to crawl on alien soil yet can't agree on how to live together. We've sent data beyond the solar system, but still argue over whose invisible friend is real. As you say: on matters of consciousness and God, our progress seems stalled.
 
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