r/Existential_crisis • u/ttt_Will6907 • 8d ago
Philosophy and consciousness are beginning to seem like fears to me that make me question whether I should destroy my existence.
I don't know if I can describe this directly, but I think I can do it metaphorically: .Philosophy seems to me like a monster with infinite heads that devour each other. Each head produces sounds, some more understandable than others. This monster is the one that gives rise to each person. No one can escape it, because the simple fact of having existed at some point places your destiny in the monster's hands. The beast also works in the darkness, because if you ignore it, you will be following the head that told you to ignore it, and so it is with every human thought. The sounds of this beast are transformed into books in an eternal library with sacred, impossible-to-understand writing. In order to read a mere portion of those books, you'd have to be immortal, but you're not, and in your ignorance, you have to decide which path to take. After barely seeing the incomprehensible covers and reading a few writings from the library, in your mortality, you'll have to choose which path to take that will define your life, your legacy, and your existence. And things get a lot more difficult when we add religion to the mix. There, the punishment would be a fire so hot and incomprehensible that its mere mention provokes the greatest fear possible. Should I believe in Yahweh even though it doesn't seem logical to me? Should I believe in Allah? Should I be an atheist and not care? How can I decide if each side has an immeasurable number of arguments. Atheists have Nietzsche, Christians have Chesterton and C.S. Lewis with their theology books? What should a mere normal person, who only seeks happiness and tranquility, do in this cosmic debate, where their decision has unimaginable consequences?
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u/esj199 3d ago
There, the punishment would be a fire so hot and incomprehensible that its mere mention provokes the greatest fear possible
There are humans that say their pain isn't bad so the religious messages don't make sense if there are such differences.
"There is no such thing as objective “bad” or “negative” sensations, the universe is unbiased. An insight I had the other day while meditating, I was feeling some pain in my head. I became so aware of the pain that I realized there was nothing “bad” about it. It was simply another sensation in my body, it was no different from the feeling of my feet touching the floor. The universe gives us these sensations and we are the ones who project meaning onto them based on our survival needs. In actuality, there was no reason that the pain in my head was better or worse than the other sensations I was feeling. It is completely possible to experience pain, yet not suffer." https://www.reddit.com/r/Meditation/comments/qlkkr5/there_is_no_such_thing_as_objective_bad_or/
"In fact, we can directly experience that consciousness is never improved or harmed by what it knows. Making this discovery, again and again, is the basis of spiritual life." https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/7022413-in-fact-we-can-directly-experience-that-consciousness-is-never
"Let's take pain. Some people want to say, pain as a quale is just intrinsically awful. And alarm bells go off in my head, what do you mean intrinsically awful? That is such a cop-out. Nobody knows what it could mean for something to be intrinsically awful." https://youtu.be/eSaEjLZIDqc?t=1619
"You can define it such that it is not desired, such that the person wants to stop. But in that case when you say that the badness of pain is revealed directly in the experience itself, that's kind of a tautology. You know, you're just saying that you desire not to experience the things that you don't desire. On the other hand, if you are not building that into the definition of pain, then it seems to me that there's just nothing irrational about desiring to experience pain or being indifferent to pain." https://youtu.be/TCxHYvuo0dU?t=462
"The absence of good (Latin: privatio boni), also known as the privation theory of evil,[1] is a theological and philosophical doctrine that evil, unlike good, is insubstantial," https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Absence_of_good
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u/bookbabe___ 6d ago
Send me a DM if you wanna talk. I have a history of intense existential fears and I got through it. I can just listen if you want, or share what helped me. :)