The Human Animal (Humans)

by xeno6696 , Sonoran Desert, Wednesday, August 12, 2009, 13:18 (5373 days ago) @ David Turell

Dr. Turell, - > Of course we know that all our experiences are transient, but that doesn't mean that the present is meaningless. I would rather be happy/pain-free/laughing at this moment than miserable/in agony/weeping. Multiply that by a lifetime, and you have a lifetime of meaning. Multiply that by the number of people whose moments you can change from tears to laughter, and you have another collection of meanings. Why does meaning have to depend on eternity, on an unknown outside force, or on a special place?
> > 
> > I think you and I may have found some common ground here!
> 
> Sounds like you may not have read Adler, and I think you should, but that you have read Viktor Frankl. - That little bit of conversation between dhw and I arises from the last 3-4 chapters in Adler's book where he discusses what he sees as the "difference it makes" in whether or not humans are different by degree or kind. Adler argument is pretty much in line with current Catholic views that if man differs by degree than we can't morally condemn Nazism. N's view (and my own) states exactly what you say above, that removing man from his "special place" doesn't change at all how we assign meaning or uphold our laws. Adler may not have been Catholic at that time, but his Thomist bend *definitely* was peeking through the last half of that book. You get the distinct impression that Adler thinks all of western civilization relies on man being different in kind--thus recreating N's second form of nihilism. - There's a punk band I like whose singer immigrated to the US after being kicked out of Ukraine for being a Gypsy. One resonant line: "There were never any good old days, they are today, they are tomorrow..."

--
\"Why is it, Master, that ascetics fight with ascetics?\"

\"It is, brahmin, because of attachment to views, adherence to views, fixation on views, addiction to views, obsession with views, holding firmly to views that ascetics fight with ascetics.\"