Existential thoughts about suffering and existence.

[Circles]

Have you ever wondered why we exist? Of course most humans have. But have ever wondered more about why things are exactly the way they are? That you have to just somehow go through an experience we call life that we didn't ask to be born into and yet we are faced with an uncontrollable situation we all find ourselves in. I often ask to myself why is it that I am me, of all the possibilities I'm in this body typing this out in this time and space, part of a certain species, culture, etc, that we're all on a random ball we call earth that is hurdling through the void with no reason to explain as to why we are here let alone why suffering has to exist.

I often think about suicide in history. Most people who have ever killed themselves throughout history their own names, memories and struggles are lost forever in the midst of time. Most if not all suicides are forgotten and something about that just feels indescribably wrong and unsettling. To know all those peoples suffering and death can be swept under a rug as if it none of our pain existed. And it goes for non suicidal people as well. All our suffering ultimately means nothing and despite that complete utter indifference the universe shows our pain means everything to us. How would you feel if the universe told you that all your suffering is pointless and senseless and there was no need for any of it?

All existential questions all basically boils down to 'Welp that just how the universe is' as if that's good enough. And even if there was an explanation as to why suffering exists it probably wouldn't be a satisfactory answer. Cause to those reading this feeling some sort of pain surely can understand. Out of everything that bothers me most about life is that feeling that your pain and suffering is ultimately for nothing despite it being everything to us. Something about this just feels overwhelmingly indescribably sickening.

To this end suicide is a conundrum. Thinking about how a complete nobody who never asked to exist has to face the reality of suicide just to end the senseless suffering in an inexplicable nightmare that is life just to want to return to an even more unexplainable nothingness if it's even that at all.

 

[excinephile]

Absolutely what I'm thinking about all the time. You don't realise the existential, cosmic profundity about suffering until you are deeply and irreversibly intertwined with it. To think that *the universe* has conspired to destroy me in such an unbeliebably painful and humiliating way is sickening. To think that other people go through similar hells is even more. All of this just doesn't add up. There's something wrong with this world.

 

[justamirror]

What if it is for something?? I have a hard time accepting the whole pointless nothing matters we all die argument. I feel like people let their ideas get stuck into a box where there are no other possibilities. We are in this reality on this planet in this space. Like WTF? Everything we see is just signals interpreted by our brains inside our heads what we see is inside our heads... And what we interpret is severely limited to what is going on. These bodies to me clearly were built to survive, continue to change (like everything around us is doing), and reproduce. Our brains were built to serve that function! Did you know you can cut someone's brain in half and each hemisphere processes information independently.

Have you heard of the double slit experiment (from 1800s btw) where we see that photons act as a wave naturally - we get a obvious wave interference pattern when passed through two slits and onto a background. But when we go to observe this in action with machines made to enhance and upgrade our senses that pattern disappears and we only get the particle form of the photon appearing and passing through the slit - like the universe doesn't want to be found. There is a mold called slime mold a brainless goo that has been used to map the cosmic web.

Did you know there is a field called the higgs boson that is being explained as this thing that is everywhere and its what gives particles mass (expect photon and one other) and we think at any time randomly this field will become unstable and we all will just disappear. WTF is up with the super massive blackholes at the center of every galaxy wat da fuq. When we look out we see the past the photons that have reached us at the moment not the present. How did life emerge from the lifeless - one of the biggest questions of this world imo.

We have such a limited possibility of understanding what this place is. Your a result of billions of years. change after change after change. We all are apart of this thing that is changing. We are it ... and to just sum it up to well its all pointless is so bizarre to me. There are some 30 trillion cells that make you up. Some 60 trillion micro-organisms. If you stretched your DNA out it would stretch to Venus and back I think 40 times. Oh and what about the understanding that venus and earth are siblings, created at the same time with the same stuff yet one is an apocalyptic nightmare. There is clearly SO FKIN MUCH we don't understand and are built to not understand.

I feel like its saying a drop of water in an ocean is nothing. Well when you zoom out maybe you can clearly see that but the drop is the ocean still. It came from some beginning. It was a part of that process in a way. It never was meaningless... it contributed and is still contributing. That same drop. I know this sounds like an incomplete answer an incomplete box with an opening in it... that's the point for me at least.

I know it might sound like im not addressing the individual suffering we experience. But I feel like it does. I feel like suffering and thoughts of "existence" (to me this is a human thing its just a word) are so very human not the reality of what things are - I mean they are words we have passed on and words have always been the interpretation of something going on around us and in us and they have always been incomplete and pretty much not true and just the fastest way of trying to explain something that is unexplainable. Its a human problem not a fact about reality. A society problem. A culture problem.

RAMBLING ENDED

 

[gayayi4811]

I think after contemplating things in this way, the only possible conclusion is that we are the only "real" thing. Everything outside of us is just an amalgam of images, sounds, feelings, thoughts... These things have some sort of coherence and direction. They are directed by some sort of god. We are the only real thing, so we are that God. Creating all this universe for out entertainment. Today the theme could be pain. Tomorrow could be the same or something else. Part of the experience is making ourselves, as god, forget that we are god.

 

[divinemistress36]

Spiritually one could say we are here to learn and experience which is mostly suffering. Biologically speaking cause our parents fucked without a condom

 

[excinephile]

That guy might have solved the problem of life after death. Just putting this here

Reddit - Dive into anything

www.reddit.com

 

[Forever Sleep]

I suppose I feel like all the stories we tell ourselves, the religions etc. is some desperate hope to justify that all the suffering will end up being worth it. I'm just not sure.

Maybe the enormous human ego we've developed has been fundamental in making us the dominant species here. Kind of impressive- we've been able to convince ourselves that we're so all mighty that we won't even actually die! That our consciousness/ spirit/ soul or whatever you want to call it can live on without the body. That we aren't in fact our bodies. I mean- maybe that's true.

But, equally likely I feel is that consciousness isn't some mystical ethereal thing. Why can't it just be a symptom of how the brain and body function in this world? I think it's because we don't understand it that it tends to take on this epic mythical status. But- why can't it be just another ability like sight or smell or hearing? Simply our brains processing the world we live in to try and keep us alive and preferably, reproduce before we die?

It's actually pretty masterful when you think about it- when it's working 'properly' that is. Not only are 'normies' instinctively afraid of death. Now, they feel so unique and self important that they feel the need to protect themselves and everyone else even more.

The majority of us have eyes and ears and noses. Does that mean we see, hear or smell in exactly the same way? No- probably not. Our genes and development and health likely affect how we do those things. Consciousness is the same- surely? If you'd been raised by different parents in a different environment- either a much nicer environment or, a much more abusive one- would you be the same person? Surely not. It would have impacted your sense of self. Sure, you'd still be aware you were alive. The same way you'd still be able to see if you still had functioning eyes in whatever life circumstances. But, we don't feel as mystified by sight or hearing.

I'm not a total cynic though. There are certainly some weird things about consciousness that make me question whether it could be something bigger. Like people who are blind from birth having visual dreams. When people seem to have psychic connections- like knowing a loved one is ill or in danger. Plus, common dreams we share- like flying etc. That all makes me puzzled as to whether there isn't some way of sharing consciousness. Connecting to something fundamental or something. It's just bizarre really.

I suppose I feel like our brains are telling us that we're alive (obviously) and- shit- how did this even happen? Why am 'I' the one witnessing this life? But then, I wonder if it is just another trick to make us feel important.

I think most people recognise that certain traits are produced via evolution. Whatever made a species more likely to survive and reproduce before it died would be passed on. What if this recognition of being alive was no different to developing an opposing thumb? A creature that actually recogised it was alive and maybe even importantly- that it could die could well have a superior edge over others that simply existed off of instinct. Maybe it's no more mystical than an evolutionary advantage.

Except now, we've bypassed natural selection and it's beginning to work against us- maybe. With things like depression, ideation, body dysmorphia etc. We've kind of become too complicated for our own good I think sometimes.

 

[doneforlife]

I suppose I feel like all the stories we tell ourselves, the religions etc. is some desperate hope to justify that all the suffering will end up being worth it. I'm just not sure.

Maybe the enormous human ego we've developed has been fundamental in making us the dominant species here. Kind of impressive- we've been able to convince ourselves that we're so all mighty that we won't even actually die! That our consciousness/ spirit/ soul or whatever you want to call it can live on without the body. That we aren't in fact our bodies. I mean- maybe that's true.

But, equally likely I feel is that consciousness isn't some mystical ethereal thing. Why can't it just be a symptom of how the brain and body function in this world? I think it's because we don't understand it that it tends to take on this epic mythical status. But- why can't it be just another ability like sight or smell or hearing? Simply our brains processing the world we live in to try and keep us alive and preferably, reproduce before we die?

It's actually pretty masterful when you think about it- when it's working 'properly' that is. Not only are 'normies' instinctively afraid of death. Now, they feel so unique and self important that they feel the need to protect themselves and everyone else even more.

The majority of us have eyes and ears and noses. Does that mean we see, hear or smell in exactly the same way? No- probably not. Our genes and development and health likely affect how we do those things. Consciousness is the same- surely? If you'd been raised by different parents in a different environment- either a much nicer environment or, a much more abusive one- would you be the same person? Surely not. It would have impacted your sense of self. Sure, you'd still be aware you were alive. The same way you'd still be able to see if you still had functioning eyes in whatever life circumstances. But, we don't feel as mystified by sight or hearing.

I'm not a total cynic though. There are certainly some weird things about consciousness that make me question whether it could be something bigger. Like people who are blind from birth having visual dreams. When people seem to have psychic connections- like knowing a loved one is ill or in danger. Plus, common dreams we share- like flying etc. That all makes me puzzled as to whether there isn't some way of sharing consciousness. Connecting to something fundamental or something. It's just bizarre really.

I suppose I feel like our brains are telling us that we're alive (obviously) and- shit- how did this even happen? Why am 'I' the one witnessing this life? But then, I wonder if it is just another trick to make us feel important.

I think most people recognise that certain traits are produced via evolution. Whatever made a species more likely to survive and reproduce before it died would be passed on. What if this recognition of being alive was no different to developing an opposing thumb? A creature that actually recogised it was alive and maybe even importantly- that it could die could well have a superior edge over others that simply existed off of instinct. Maybe it's no more mystical than an evolutionary advantage.

Except now, we've bypassed natural selection and it's beginning to work against us- maybe. With things like depression, ideation, body dysmorphia etc. We've kind of become too complicated for our own good I think sometimes.

If , one day , AI develops consciousness, may be it will stop being mystical. Till then, we have no answers. And when you have no answers...it's attributed to God. But why only consciousness? Take gravity for example. It's a force of attraction every "body" exerts on another body. But why is this force in place ? Why did the body acquire this property? Why does it have to attract ? Certain amino acids bond in a specific way with other amino acids to drive every single feature we acquire during birth . Why does only those specific amino acids do the job ? Who assigned them this "feature" to carry data? Every single "property " of every single particle can be questioned. But we leave it at that . We don't question further. So ..may be .. consciousness is just a property of brain to keep an individual alive.

 

[catmanandrobin]

The universe is how it is whether we like it or not.

 

[Darkover]

the universe there seems to be no logical reason for it to happen or be done, the universe wasn't made for anything, but instead resulted from a series of chaotic episodes, including the Big Bang and the formation of galaxies, solar systems, and planets, for this reason it's completely unpredictable who will get to live a good life or who will get to live a bad life

 

[KuriGohan&Kamehameha]

Nature and biology/life as a whole, at least in my opinion, is not intelligently designed by any stretch of the imagination. A more apt description would be a sophisticated machine, yet even machines can be prone to error, and make calculations or decisions that end up being counterintuitive if there are inherent limitations in its design and programming.

When it comes to living organisms, there is a high degree of conserved functions and homology between species. I'm sure many of you have heard the pop-science bit about humans sharing many genes with bananas, and it's actually true. A lot of the basic cellular functions required to sustain life are conserved throughout organisms. However, a lot of other traits that emerged in humans and shaped us as a distinct species from neanderthals and whatnot, either emerged randomly or were selected for by evolutionary pressures.

What may have been a useful survival instinct for a neanderthal or other mammalian species can become a bane for humans in the modern world and may actually inhibit survival and reproduction rather than enabling it. And therein lies the issue with the machine. Evolutionary processes are not sentient/born from conscious thought but operate on a more rudimentary level. You could have a very stable, thriving population of animals in a certain type of biome, only to find that they've been wiped out by a natural disaster the next day and gone extinct.

A trait may have been selected for that was beneficial yesterday, but a hindrance the next. Resources may become scarce, and then abundant. Some animals can adapt extremely quickly, others do not. This is one the cruelest aspects of nature to me. Every organism is fighting for survival and biological systems are wired towards continued existence even in the absolute worst conditions and situations.

It has been shown that the brain processes harmless spiders in a similar fashion as scorpions and fatal poisonous species, despite us being aware that the common garden spider and whatnot poses no threat. Even with the development of highly sophisticated, powerful cortical structures, those basal instincts are stubborn in the face of rational thought. They are so deeply ingrained.

Even when we as humans have the foresight and brain power to recognize something our biology is doing as harmful and determinental, the most frustrating thing is that many times we are powerless to stop it or manipulate the machine, despite the advanced of modern medicine. Even highly rated mathematical models cannot often predict for example, how a protein will be structured in a complex 3D space, or how evolution has occured within a population and how we can predict it in the future, many of these processes are still deeply mystifying.

Of course, we play god in other ways. As a species, we have basically stopped the flow of natural selection. Someone whose entire reproductive system is non-functional can now have an embryo created with their DNA using IVF. People too ill to carry a fetus to term themselves can have an embryo made and inserted into another mother to carry. Almost anyone can reproduce now and so no traits are really being filtered out from the population unless they are lethal/prevent a new life from reaching reproductive age to pass them on, or a person makes a conscious decision not to reproduce and remove themselves from the gene pool.

The environment which we occupy has changed so rapidly compared to our own biology, and despite our ability to adapt a bit epigenetically, I think the brain often cannot keep up with it, so consciousness and the ability to ruminate and reflect inadvertently becomes a burden. Consider the theory that humans often lived in tribes prior to modern civilization and cooperation was essential for survival. We evolved to be social creatures. The modern world is anything but social or cooperative for many people, and this juxtaposition is at odds with neural structures designed to seek out companionship. Consciousness likely exists to make us aware of the stipulations required for continued survival. We know the needs exist, having unmet needs is painful, and so our biology reminds of us that the pain is there, whilst giving us no outlet to resolve it.

Long ago, pain was primarily a danger signal, and a way for cells to indicate a level of toxic distress to the body that are impeding physiological systems from functioning as intended. Now, we have millions of people living with some sort of chronic pain and distress whether that be physical or mental. Clearly, this function is not working as intended, because living systems do not have the fine-tune level of control required in many cases to shut down things hijacking normal functions, DNA replicates and cells divide at such a rapid rate and eventually some mistakes cannot be repaired by cellular machinery.

Being a sciencey sort of person and not really a spiritual one has made me conceptualise suffering as a random, grotesque process that it is hard to break free from because biological machinery is poorly designed and life wants to persist in spite of it. It's why we can't really ever eradicate infections either. The human brain evolved to be so large that throughout history many women would inevitably die in childbirth because our anatomy is not conductive to birthing such huge infants without damage. If that doesn't illustrate how much of a shit-show biology is, I don't know what does.

I don't think there is a reason behind suffering, I think the capacity to feel such deep pain arose from random cellular events and has unfortunately persisted over time.

 

[LaVieEnRose]

Nature and biology/life as a whole, at least in my opinion, is not intelligently designed by any stretch of the imagination. A more apt description would be a sophisticated machine, yet even machines can be prone to error, and make calculations or decisions that end up being counterintuitive if there are inherent limitations in its design and programming.

When it comes to living organisms, there is a high degree of conserved functions and homology between species. I'm sure many of you have heard the pop-science bit about humans sharing many genes with bananas, and it's actually true. A lot of the basic cellular functions required to sustain life are conserved throughout organisms. However, a lot of other traits that emerged in humans and shaped us as a distinct species from neanderthals and whatnot, either emerged randomly or were selected for by evolutionary pressures.

What may have been a useful survival instinct for a neanderthal or other mammalian species can become a bane for humans in the modern world and may actually inhibit survival and reproduction rather than enabling it. And therein lies the issue with the machine. Evolutionary processes are not sentient/born from conscious thought but operate on a more rudimentary level. You could have a very stable, thriving population of animals in a certain type of biome, only to find that they've been wiped out by a natural disaster the next day and gone extinct.

A trait may have been selected for that was beneficial yesterday, but a hindrance the next. Resources may become scarce, and then abundant. Some animals can adapt extremely quickly, others do not. This is one the cruelest aspects of nature to me. Every organism is fighting for survival and biological systems are wired towards continued existence even in the absolute worst conditions and situations.

It has been shown that the brain processes harmless spiders in a similar fashion as scorpions and fatal poisonous species, despite us being aware that the common garden spider and whatnot poses no threat. Even with the development of highly sophisticated, powerful cortical structures, those basal instincts are stubborn in the face of rational thought. They are so deeply ingrained.

Even when we as humans have the foresight and brain power to recognize something our biology is doing as harmful and determinental, the most frustrating thing is that many times we are powerless to stop it or manipulate the machine, despite the advanced of modern medicine. Even highly rated mathematical models cannot often predict for example, how a protein will be structured in a complex 3D space, or how evolution has occured within a population and how we can predict it in the future, many of these processes are still deeply mystifying.

Of course, we play god in other ways. As a species, we have basically stopped the flow of natural selection. Someone whose entire reproductive system is non-functional can now have an embryo created with their DNA using IVF. People too ill to carry a fetus to term themselves can have an embryo made and inserted into another mother to carry. Almost anyone can reproduce now and so no traits are really being filtered out from the population unless they are lethal/prevent a new life from reaching reproductive age to pass them on, or a person makes a conscious decision not to reproduce and remove themselves from the gene pool.

The environment which we occupy has changed so rapidly compared to our own biology, and despite our ability to adapt a bit epigenetically, I think the brain often cannot keep up with it, so consciousness and the ability to ruminate and reflect inadvertently becomes a burden. Consider the theory that humans often lived in tribes prior to modern civilization and cooperation was essential for survival. We evolved to be social creatures. The modern world is anything but social or cooperative for many people, and this juxtaposition is at odds with neural structures designed to seek out companionship. Consciousness likely exists to make us aware of the stipulations required for continued survival. We know the needs exist, having unmet needs is painful, and so our biology reminds of us that the pain is there, whilst giving us no outlet to resolve it.

Long ago, pain was primarily a danger signal, and a way for cells to indicate a level of toxic distress to the body that are impeding physiological systems from functioning as intended. Now, we have millions of people living with some sort of chronic pain and distress whether that be physical or mental. Clearly, this function is not working as intended, because living systems do not have the fine-tune level of control required in many cases to shut down things hijacking normal functions, DNA replicates and cells divide at such a rapid rate and eventually some mistakes cannot be repaired by cellular machinery.

Being a sciencey sort of person and not really a spiritual one has made me conceptualise suffering as a random, grotesque process that it is hard to break free from because biological machinery is poorly designed and life wants to persist in spite of it. It's why we can't really ever eradicate infections either. The human brain evolved to be so large that throughout history many women would inevitably die in childbirth because our anatomy is not conductive to birthing such huge infants without damage. If that doesn't illustrate how much of a shit-show biology is, I don't know what does.

I don't think there is a reason behind suffering, I think the capacity to feel such deep pain arose from random cellular events and has unfortunately persisted over time.

I think the sheer statistics of it all just fucks us all over. Large, complex, long-lived animals such as we are are not supposed to exist in the numbers we exist in. 8 billion? That runs completely contrary to natural principle. The population of species is supposed to decrease as you move up the trophic chain. We have over 8 billion distinct bodies and lives existing in an inherently chaotic world. That means that strange and devastating things are likely to befall some of us just because of the math.

 

[BobSmoked]

In my years I've long resonated with the idea or concept of the point of living is to suffer yet after my journey I'm not so sure anymore yet I long advocated that it was only through suffering that we truly experience life i was raised strict Church Of Scotland so no doubt a contributingfactor, I'm not sure where I'm going with this thought train one of the downsides to having an overactive brain thank you OP and all who have given they're own thoughts hopefully this makes some sense.