The verb "to be".

[china]

One of the strangest things in life is that we are conditioned by the verb 'to be'. For in that there is the past, the present and the future. All religious conditioning is based on the verb 'to be'; on it are based all heaven and hell, all the beliefs, all the saviours, all the excesses. Can a human being live without that verb—which means to live and to have no past, no future?

 

[Tonington]

Exist is essentially the same thing. We can cease to be, we can cease to exist.

 

[s_lone]

I don't see how we are conditioned by the verb 'to be'?

It seems to me that it is one of the verbs that permits the most freedom and creativity. I can choose what I want to be, how I want to be, where I want to be...

Can a human being live without the verb? I don't know. But I would ask WHY we would want to live without the verb. It's at the core of our thought system. 'To be' means something so essential and undeniable that I wouldn't see the purpose in ''living without the verb''.

 

[karrie]

Very nicely put s_lone.

 

[darkbeaver]

I don't see how we are conditioned by the verb 'to be'?

It seems to me that it is one of the verbs that permits the most freedom and creativity. I can choose what I want to be, how I want to be, where I want to be...

Can a human being live without the verb? I don't know. But I would ask WHY we would want to live without the verb. It's at the core of our thought system. 'To be' means something so essential and undeniable that I wouldn't see the purpose in ''living without the verb''.

Hey S-lone, this is just for fun OK. Try to be freely creative and try to be a bunny and try to be ten storys tall and try to be on mars. Really you can't be what you want to be, you can't be how you want to be and you can't be where you want to be at least all at the same time if you could you'd be perfect and you wouldn't bother with anything else and that's the end.:lol:

 

[china]

karrie

Very nicely put s_lone.

Very nicely put karrie .......very nicely indeed .

 

[china]

s_lone

I don't see how we are conditioned by the verb 'to be'?

- the verb 'to be' implies time ,you and all the rest of us are somewhat conditioned to time .

I don't know. But I would ask WHY we would want to live without the verb

the 'verb' is not the actual ...

 

[s_lone]

Hey S-lone, this is just for fun OK. Try to be freely creative and try to be a bunny and try to be ten storys tall and try to be on mars. Really you can't be what you want to be, you can't be how you want to be and you can't be where you want to be at least all at the same time if you could you'd be perfect and you wouldn't bother with anything else and that's the end.:lol:

Of course, I can't be all that I want to be or could want to be. Some things I cannot be. And it that sense, China is right that we are conditioned by what we are. But that's a kind of circular statement.

All I was saying is that there's many creative possibilities with the verb 'to be'. I believe in free will.

 

[s_lone]

s_lone

- the verb 'to be' implies time ,you and all the rest of us are somewhat conditioned to time .

the 'verb' is not the actual ...

You are right, we are conditioned to time. But I don't think we are prisoners of time. A good part of free will implies being able to project ourselves into the future to guess what would be the typical outcome of a given situation. We usually base our judgement on our past experience. When we make decisions, we need to rely on the past AND project ourselves in the future.

That's not to say there's no beauty in living the moment here and now because in the end, the NOW is all that truly exists, at least as far as I know.

But don't you think we need to live in the future at least a little bit? For example, taking care of the environment is a positive way to prepare the future.

 

[darkbeaver]

I don't know about the rest of you but I am a prisoner of time, past present and future, I cannot escape it's boundarys, even in my mind when it gets quiet I can still hear my biological clock, ticktockticktocktickcoughtockticktock, it's winding down now and I'v lost the key, the spring is softening, the sands of time have phucked-up the gears. to be or not:lol:

 

[s_lone]

I don't know about the rest of you but I am a prisoner of time, past present and future, I cannot escape it's boundarys, even in my mind when it gets quiet I can still hear my biological clock, ticktockticktocktickcoughtockticktock, it's winding down now and I'v lost the key, the spring is softening, the sands of time have phucked-up the gears. to be or not:lol:

I'm taking my time...
I'm wasting my time...

These expressions wouldn't exist if we didn't have some form of control over time.

Of course we are prisonners of time, in the sense that we can't escape its boundaries. But a prisonner is free to do whatever he wants in his prison. You just have to use what you have, even if it is very little.

Do you believe in free will Dark Beaver?

 

[MikeyDB]

The companion to this thread is the thread China contributed that talked about death.

"To be" implies or infers "not-death". As somone's pointed out the only way we internalize the concept of "being" is through our objective and subjective interrelationship with the artifacts of existence. Our senses supply the grist of "I think therefore I am" and the absence or speculation involved around the loss of this "being" gives rise to fear. But the fear isn't what non-death is or may be "like", it is a longing to continue to "be". It is the necessity of pleasure, the triumph of reward, the satisfaction we can obtain through these very same senses that permit our existence. Our "fear" is that the pleasure cruise comes to an end, that the rewards we can secure will become beyond our reach. We live because we are active participants in "living" and once that activity is over, without the "promise" of an after-life where pleasure and reward are continued....we're adversly disposed to imagining the end of our experiences of pleasure and reward. It's what we all live for anyway.....

 

[darkbeaver]

I'm taking my time...
I'm wasting my time...

These expressions wouldn't exist if we didn't have some form of control over time.

Of course we are prisonners of time, in the sense that we can't escape its boundaries. But a prisonner is free to do whatever he wants in his prison. You just have to use what you have, even if it is very little.

Do you believe in free will Dark Beaver?

Very good question lone, a little backyard deconstruction is in order. What is the will free of? It is not free from it's past, it is not free from it's present, it is not free to form it's future. There is only one form of free that satisfys all conditions and that's called dead. In reality we are free of nothing and nothing is free. So no I don't believe in free will, if you're free you're dead. Free is relative to where, what, when, how, who and how much beer you have. Just playing with the term lone. I know what the term free will means but it dosen't mean what it says, just another half truth from an idiot long gone who in death found his elusive freedom. Your will is always always a slave to awareness, you can exercise the will but that will or intent is a construct of awareness and the work of every gene in your chain back to the first little spark, you are connected to the environment for eternity.IMHO:lol:

 

[MikeyDB]

Well at least until our environment freezes into a solid block of ice as predicted by Walter.. Then all us meat sticks will be popsicles. Would make an interesting find for an intelligence visiting this little corner of the universe though....

 

[darkbeaver]

Well at least until our environment freezes into a solid block of ice as predicted by Walter.. Then all us meat sticks will be popsicles. Would make an interesting find for an intelligence visiting this little corner of the universe though....

And I suppose they'll "be free" to come to some conclusions about those meat sticks eh. Free will is an oxcymoronic original. :lol:

 

[MikeyDB]

Beve

How does this thing this "free-will" come about? It doesn't belong in an environment where if you don't eat you die....it doesn't come from an alternate physics where you don't fall when you walk off the edge of a cliff....it doesn't come in any from from the reality of our existence. It (the concept the idea) comes from "believers". It's a manipulation of fantasy that allows the "creator god" a get-out-of-jail-for-free" card for the behavior of his creations...

It wasn't Adam who sinned...it was the exercise of "free will" it isn't the imperfect and far less than "divine" stamp on the lives of priests that's responsible for them sodomizing little alter boys....there has to be a convenient "out" for the believer crowd. That's where this notion of "free will" comes from.

 

[s_lone]

Very good question lone, a little backyard deconstruction is in order. What is the will free of? It is not free from it's past, it is not free from it's present, it is not free to form it's future. There is only one form of free that satisfys all conditions and that's called dead. In reality we are free of nothing and nothing is free. So no I don't believe in free will, if you're free you're dead. Free is relative to where, what, when, how, who and how much beer you have. Just playing with the term lone. I know what the term free will means but it dosen't mean what it says, just another half truth from an idiot long gone who in death found his elusive freedom. Your will is always always a slave to awareness, you can exercise the will but that will or intent is a construct of awareness and the work of every gene in your chain back to the first little spark, you are connected to the environment for eternity.IMHO:lol:

I might be wrong, but what I get from your post is some sort of materialistic nihilism.

I CHOOSE to view myself as a living, creative, purposeful and dynamic entity, not a meaningless lump of matter and of random encounters.

I don't see the usefulness in denying the freedom of the will. All I can see in that is despair.

 

[darkbeaver]

For sure Mickey it's the junk and rubbish of the free market, packaged buzz terms jammed into sound bytes and skin packed for the shelves of the Walmart philosophy section. If you think about it "and I know we don't" who in a right frame of mind wants to be free? Oh wait I know, it's that rugged indivdual on the frontiers taming the savage environment, civilizing nature, the well spring of every chicken and it's pot, why do I have to suffer fools when will I be free?hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahhahahahahah free at last coughcough:lol:

 

[s_lone]

I guess you can see freedom as a terrible burden to carry.

Condemned to be free... how cruel...

 

[MikeyDB]

Sorry Beve the ratio between fools and non-fools is a matter of free will.

Because I believe in my "potential" "free-will" has meaning.....just like my belief in my existence lends purpose and meaning to my life.... S_Lone....