Discussion Thread: Idealism vs Pragmatism? Would you kill yourself?

So, lets say we discovered "the fucking truth" (and we are %100 sure its true) and it says that there is no god, that life is worthless, that everything is materialistic and such, and that we should kill ourselves.

An idealistic approach would be to commit suicide in an attempt to follow what you believe is to be the truth.

A pragmatist on the other hand, would cover the truth with lies to benefit the society and prevent them from killing themselves, and adopt a different, ore beneficial, but a false ideology.

So, if you were in charge of the hive mind user, which one would you choose? Would you go along with what you believe is the truth, or would you exchange you ideals for a more beneficial ideology?

(pic kinda related, but red and blue pills are what you want them to be. i am not implying anything.)

Other urls found in this thread:

plato.stanford.edu/entries/idealism/
twitter.com/NSFWRedditVideo

For the stated problem, pragmatism.

can you share your reasoning?

>and that we should kill ourselves
why would a pragmatist disregard this fact?

>and that we should kill ourselves

how could something this stupid be scientifically discovered? didn't you just answer your own retarded question

pragmatism is practically choosing what is beneficial for you. memes aside, killing yourself is not really beneficial. so a pragmatist would not subscribe to such an ideology.

I'd turn men into women and women into men

yes, it is stupid, and purely rhetorical.

Yeah, I'm not seeing how if it's somehow proven that God isn't real, and life is worthless that it means we should just kill ourselves?

If this is all there is then shouldn't we enjoy it while it lasts?

you can always assume. yes it is ridiculous, but what would you do in such a situation?

It wouldn't change anything for me personally. If God exists he certainly doesn't give a fuck about me, so if it's proven he doesn't exist it changes nothing, and if it's proven he does then I hate him and would never worship such an evil entity. I already consider this life to be worthless, and have no hope for humanity or anything. I'm just there to enjoy the simple things about existence that I can still enjoy. Eventually when I'm unable to do that I'll probably end it, but that could be a ways off in the future.

>Current year
>Being an idealist
>Hurr durr how can we see if our eyes aren't real

okay, let me rephrase the question:

we discovered a horrible truth, horrible enough to convince us to end it all.

you are the president or whatever. would you let people know in your commitment to your ideals and truth? or would you cover it up, as you can tell, it wouldn't do society any good. this will effect everyone on the world equally btw, and you are the only person who knows this, and you have irrefutable proof. what would you do?

>Nigger logic detected
>Possible retard alert

You don't know what the word idealism means

See

"practice of pursuing ideals, especially the unrealistic ones."
You can't find a better word than idealism to describe the course of action mentioned on the question. it means you chase your ideals and your "sense of truth" to the ends of the earth. which in this case, is suicide.

That's not what pragmatism is leaf. That's more nihilism than it is pragmatism.

Pragmatism is acting sensibly or logically based upon practical considerations rather than theoretical (emotional) reasoning.

For instance, there is an issue heroin drug use causing disease through sharing needles.

The ideal would be to eliminate heroin use altogether.

The pragmatic solution would be to provide clean needles to heroin addicts, despite being opposed to the behavior.

Materialism is bullshit, atoms are mainly empty and made of vibrating comdensed energy. Everything is energy vibration and frequency

pragmatism is accepting ideas that benefit you in an utilitarian way, and rejecting any ideas that may hamper your progress or harm you. in this case, a pragmatist would reject suicide, even if it seems to be the truth to them.

i am not claiming a pragmatist would ignore the problem, they would just reject the non beneficial ideals.

No it doesn't. That isn't even remotely what it means.
Maybe if you knew what it meant you would be better off
Up to you

Nothing can ever be proven true.

We can only falsify and prove what is not true. The truth is merely what has so far resisted falsification. We can only strive for a greater approximation of the truth. Not what the truth is. At least scientifically speaking

for the sake of the question lets assume it is what it means.
"the practice of forming or pursuing ideals, especially unrealistically."
i googled it and posted the result in quotations, but i will look further into it.

yes, this is just an assumption.
answer this if this is more logical for you:
e discovered a horrible truth, horrible enough to convince us to end it all.

you are the president or whatever. would you let people know in your commitment to your ideals and truth? or would you cover it up, as you can tell, it wouldn't do society any good. this will effect everyone on the world equally btw, and you are the only person who knows this, and you have irrefutable proof. what would you do?

Redpill. I'm going out in fucking style, though.

Idealism:
If you perceive a thing, your perception of the thing is the basis for which it can be said to exist. This is the case for every object in the universe.

This doesn't mean "muh subjective morality", unless you think you are the only conscious person in the universe and the rest of us are literally figments of your imagination (perception)

can you link a dictionary that states that?

To rephrase - someone's perception of the thing is the only cause by which it can be said to be in existence

plato.stanford.edu/entries/idealism/

You mean to assume that Nihilism is the truth?
A pragmatist would understand that there's no reason to mull over the idea that there's no meaning in life. A pragmatist would simply do whatever the fuck they want.

Why does this matter? Nihilism is retarded.

ok, got it. lets say this discovery alters your basis for the universe for the worse then. worse to the point that the only solution for you seems to be suicide. would you betray your ideals?

pretty much, but lets say that you are convinced by the said "horrible truth".

reconsider the question in this form:
we discovered a horrible truth, horrible enough to convince us to end it all.

you are the president or whatever. would you let people know in your commitment to your ideals and truth? or would you cover it up, as you can tell, it wouldn't do society any good. this will effect everyone on the world equally btw, and you are the only person who knows this, and you have irrefutable proof. what would you do?

No, dude. Pragmatism is not solely selfish. Pragmatism applies to all aspects of life internal and external.

Pragmatism doesn't care whether god exists or not. Pragmatism also recognizes that there are cases where suicide is the PRACTICAL solution.

Wanting to stay alive is based upon emotion. Not pragmatism.

yes, but on a societal sense, pragmatism aims to keep the society alive. you can just not share this horrible truth with the people, and let them live their lives.
or you can try to spread what you think is the truth, and cause millions to commit suicide.

and yes, lets say you are the only one on the planet to know this, and you have irrefutable proof.

The question is one of language. The question "does life have meaning?" Can only end up in nihilism if one misunderstands the premise for the question e.g. If one confuses the word "meaning" or the word "truth" for the word "purpose". Most philosophic questions of the modern era are the result of misuse of language. Of course life has meaning because truth corresponds to all the atomic truths which correspond to the relations of objects that exist in logical space.

Well if my perception of the universe altered the universe to such an extent that I made the basis of the universe worse then I would feel guilty for that in some way. But if my perception can effect the very basis of the universe to such an extent, then my perception can probably change the basis of the universe back if I reflect on my own perception, assuming that the basis of the universe changes in response to the moral quality of my perception. but again, I'm not sure how you would change the basis of the universe using perception, this would mean that even more than causing the universe to come into existence from perception, that the type of universe that is made into exist is determined by some additional moral quality of your perception, perception not only creates the universe but also can determine the type of universe that exists based upon the type of perception that it currently is. Can perception change in its type? If perception can change in its type then the basis of the universe can change accordingly, because if your perception is determining the universe then the universe must depend on your perception to exist and therefore will change its properties in accordance with the properties of your perception

Also if my perception is what is determining the universe, then if I die the universe ceases to exist which is probably worse than just it being evil because I have now killed everything that was dependent on my perception to exist, because if your perception was powerful enough to create the entire universe then you would be the only real person and the rest of us are dependent on your perception to exist

not really, the question is, if you were to truly believe that life is meaningless and that you should kill yourself, would you go with it, despite the horrible consequences? or would you betray your ideals and choose to ignore what you believe is the truth in favor of your benefit?

this is all subjective. you cant change the universe itself, but you can alter your perception of it.
cut short, the question is, would you go with your ideals and deal with horrible consequences therefore harming yourself, or would you rather manipulate yourself into a lie to benefit yourself.

There is no concept of subjectivity in idealism. If you believe in a difference between subjectivity and objectivity you are some kind of a materialist. You can't say that the thing exists necessarially upon your perception and then claim that this existence is muh feels

There is no way to believe life is without meaning: meaning is simply the meaning of a word as it used in language. Feeling as though one should commit suicide is a symptom of depression; and this feeling should never be conflated with the logical question of truth. The world contains truths and meanings; although these are of course conventional.

>memes aside, killing yourself is not really beneficial
[citation needed]

i am not claiming that. but you take action from you subjective perception of the world. i never said your subjective belief would be the basis of the universe or whatever. it is simply what you believe and thats it.

yes, i am not claiming this to be the truth. this is just a simple assumption. a rhetorical question on whether one would stay loyal to their ideas and possibly harm themselves (or others), or betray their ideals to benefit (or others) themselves.

kek

Idealism states that your perception of an object is the cause of the object's existence

But it's up to you if your perception can actually make the object worse or better

If that's the case you don't have to kill yourself to change the object. You have to change the moral quality of your perception and because the object depends on your perception, then the object will change in proportion to the change in your perception.

The question of the meaning of life; being to vague and general in terms to have an answer is therefore a meaningless question and one should simply stop asking it; since asking meaningless questions gets in the way of any actual truth seeking and it gets in the way of living life as well

If your ideal is suicide; then you are probably suffering from a pathological state of mind and should be on medication.

its just a mental exercise, you are looking too deep into this. I also would like to learn Sup Forums's stance on this, since there seems to be a lot of conflict on this one.

i am not talking about myself. this is RHETORICAL.

This assumes that we have volition in our perception which is not really true since our perception is largely determined by outside factors and also subconscious or preconscious forces in our own brain.

ignoring off idealism and pragmatism
the question i intended to ask was:

would you rather keep believing in something that you think is the truth, but will harm you? or wold you rather abandon your ideals for something beneficial, but you think is a lie.

Dwarnianian evolution will eventually found to be false. Once scientists start putting two and two together and realize the enormity of protein and gene key space and the mathmatical impossibility of evoltuion being a series of random events darwins theory will die and along with it a considerable chunk of atheists.

I don't know if I believe in idealism but I wanted the OP to know what the term means

But if our perception is determined by outside factors and "conscious forces" you are talking about a very large number of forces of consciousness. Those outside factors are forces of consciousness. Why not just say that those forces of consciousness are what your consciousness is?

I'm saying there is never a philosophical or idealistic basis for suicide and even in the abstract my answer is that no one should not succumb to the despair of their worldview--it would be better to question that world view and change it since it is so life negating.

Yes but if that is what it is then it can't really be called "your" consciousness maybe just "consciousness" in general--which I think is closer to the truth.

thanks for your answer!

man i am considering a revisit to high school after this. my english skills are pretty fucking horrible it turns out. took me this long to get something across.

If those forces of consciousness are your consciousness and they are determined by outside objects then idealism still stands: your future perception is what is the cause of those outside objects existing

Unfortunately Darwins theory holds a sacred space in our cultural narratives and so people are hardly even allowed to ask the questions which would disprove it

i accept your definition of idealism. so, are you an idealist?

Me too but mostly because I am too autistic about language so don't base what you think on how autistically I answer questions senpai

yes, it is unfortunate. and most people don' even understand it completely.

i was just asking for opinions, kind sir.
nice to see that you are a man of culture as well.

I know and yet they will tell you how life is based entirely on that theory which they don't even understand

No, I knew what you meant by idealism I was kind of just fucking with you because I wanted to talk about idealism

I knew what you meant by idealism but actually I still don't know what the question is because it doesn't give enough of an understanding of what you mean by "discover" "lie" and also why suicide would come out of those things & the fundamental assumptions that would motivate these choices - also why only two options? Kind of a leading question

Thanks. it is nice to see a decent thread once in a while.

Why does the existence or lack thereof of a God determine human worth? A real pragmatist would go out, enjoy himself, and stop worrying so much if he could 100% certain there was no higher power.

i can't really explain how it all leads to suicide. i can just merely ask you to accept that it does.
and by discover, i mean you find a new ideology, that you know will spread like a virus, and convince many people to kill themselves.
lets say you genuinely believe this new ideology, but you are also aware of the harms it will bring on humanity and yourself. would you still believe in this harmful idea, or would you willingly deceive yourself out of it (deceive because you really believe this idea and you would have to accept what you consider to be false ideas for replacement) to get yourself out of harm's way?

If I knew the Truth I would know what to do.

I think most of you are forgetting atheism evolved as a cultural weapon. One that started with Marx, and was developed with the sole intent of demoralization and degeneration. OP's suicidal lack of spiritual mooring is exactly the intended effect of its formation

It's going to be hard for me to answer a question without knowing the reasons why it leads to suicide. If I don't have an understanding of this causal, metaphysical mechanism, then I can't really make a metaphysical judgment. I need to know why it leads towards a particular option. If I just make a judgment on a surface understanding of the facts then I don't really have any substantial basis for my judgment.

I find it difficult to believe that any idea that is truthful would be harmful. Necessarily, truth would need to be a good. If you believe in God, then truth is a good because God is the most true. If you are a kind of Darwinian then you think that knowledge of the true is good because it allows you to survive etc

But given the assumption the truth is painful, then it may be better to believe in the ideology if you can stomach it, depending on whether you still believe the true is morally more valuable than the false or necessary for your survival, i.e painful to know that there are child molesters but you need to know this in order to survive. But I find it hard to believe that a true and painful idea can spread like wildfire. Why would people want to believe in something that doesn't make them feel good? Most people get annoyed if you talk with them about child molestation prevalence among clergy etc

But if you believe that this truth is not morally superior to the false or it does not help you survive or hurts your survival then it is not necessary to believe it and it may be morally superior to deceive yourself about it

I need to know why it leads towards the option of suicide, what you mean by "truth", because depending on how this is defined we can have different answers. I.E, if the truth is universal & one truth is morally superior then maybe all truths are morally superior so we can't morally deceive ourselves even if it is painful to not deceive ourselves