Is there a term for those who hate existing?

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(a)This is a very vague claim. On what scale does the brain operate? Do quantum effects matter in how neurons work? Is our universe an accident? The fact is that no matter the scale determinism as such does not always hold which should be alarming since determinism itself relies on the hypothetically possible knowledge. The implications of QM are actually quite striking. There is plenty written about this.
(b) Unfortunately I do not care about philosophy so much to explore all the implications. I tell you this - QM is not about the lack of knowledge. This is why it was so revolutionary and naturally extremely opposed. There are very good counter-arguments for almost everything you might think of.
(c) So you say.

This is false. See Uncertainty Principle, Schrodinger's Cat etc. I do not want to get into all these details, but I would like to assure you that all these questions are standart and answered much better than I ever could. I am not sure about whether relativity of simultaneity was actually observed, though. It was something done on Quantum entanglement.

As for Buddhism - working *hard* and living according principles is not supposed to be hard, just liberating. The ultimate goal is pure happiness, meditation is to set you free from all the suffering that human desires cause, etc. This is difficult, but as any progress is. It is for the greatest good - the end of everyone's suffering. It is pleasant not in the primitive way. It is setting you soul free. One just have to realize that all the pain is not real. Well, something along these lines, I suppose. The existence one is getting towards is the one of God, it is eternal extasy. It is pure happiness.

Well, I mean whatever, in today's sense it's just being smarter and being able to control and understand otherwise irrational or ill feelings. That one has to earn the right to be called human, not just merely exist. Which is probably the hardest thing to do. Afterlife is another matter, I personally do not bother myself with that. And all of it is of course only my interpretation, I think that it is just such beautiful a theory.


I think that language is just merely a tool which might be not so perfect, of course. Art unfortunately also "invites error". The common context is necessary which is usually scientific-cultural. Following my fashion I would like to say that when one is using visual imagery to describe feelings, or something like that, it is just the lack of knowledge. It is just like *feeling out* an idea (well, I do that often.. which leaves me with no results, obv). I would think that most people do not even really have solid, thorough ideas - more like feelings which are irrational representations of what happened to them or some sort of instincts. Those ideas might seem solid and clear to you but they really might not be the case. It is obv very complex so these are only my speculations *that it might be like that*, it would be nearly to impossible to convince someone that this is the case anyway (which I am not saying that it is). In that sense I do not think that human experiences are unique, which they are in some other sense. It is just that *most* of ideas which could be thought in principle are classified in our rich philosophy and psychology, I believe. I am sure that once one recognizes in which philosophical doctrines they fall to then it is much easier to find those who will relate. But feelings are another matter, I am afraid. I am speaking from my own experience here. I had a very rough time explaining myself and now I get along just fine with some theoretical background and sarcasm. Well, maybe not that fine as you can see. Sorry if that's an irrelevant rant, though.


I think that is just great. But I think that you just should question your judgement more and try to figure out from where all these ideas you have came from, be open to truth and to truth only. What are your fundamental beliefs and what science says about them, etc. What I mean is that some people, esp aspies (I guess), have this tendency for details, patterns, generalizing and it easily becomes very complicated.. Then it is a must to get the facts right: to understand what your current beliefs are, which I believe belong to one category or another(more or less they are not unique) and what feelings one has towards them. To separate one from another. To find reasons for those feelings. Anyway, fundamental science is the closest to truth one can get to.

Uh, okay - that's only my thoughts anyway. I think I can empathize with something that you say, again - if I got that right, that is, and working out my maze of thoughts took many years of studying science, philosophy and stuff. And I still pretty much suck at it, but it is all much more logical to me now. It is very nice to find theories which resonate with what I've held to be truth and to discard false beliefs as well. Now what I wrote here might not apply to you, so please do not get into details if I wrote something irrelevant, seemingly offensive, trivial or inaccurate. I just try to be as elaborate as I can, fwiw. The main points are quite simlple, I am just advocating for science and claiming that it can also answer most philosophical/moral/whatever questions and that humans are not as unique as they might want to think. (And I am not to debate that last sentence here)

I Wiki'd both, that might be a bad idea - if either description is in error let me know. The problem I have - the uncercainty principle seems to be about our abilities to measure, as for Scrodinger's Cat - I might just not be intelligent enough to follow it but, unless they're really dumbing the article down it sounds like one part solopsism to two parts misunderstanding of what probability is. Its kind of like that proverbial kid who was wildly into astromy and spoke on his expertise years ago with a psychologist but at the same time admitted that he couldn't understand how we discovered the names of the stars. Similarly both of these 'feel' mismeasured or misconstrued in what they actually are.

If there's an artical out there that gives these more concrete to a layman like myself - if what I read is really just a superficial misunderstanding, let me know where I can find it.

In a sense it seems like almost everything is imaginary, not in a solopsistic sense but our needs and priorities as human beings are overblown for a system where eating, drinking, breathing, f---ing, and dying are really all there is to anything in a concrete sense and all else we make up as we go. Most of those things even are negotiations for the basic things we instinctually want and, in that sense its no shock at all that so many people treat conformity like the supreme law of all laws or have the approach that top 40 is the only music worth listening to in that there's nothing more to anything than genetically displaying enough excess energy and potential to stay fashionable and know what's currently fashionable to the moment.


Strangely I'm more open to the idea of afterlife than I am the idea of a God or a sentient universe. It could be possible that some energy residue is associated with 'us' but I would be more inclined to think that - if it exists at all - it evolved with us and because of us, by the same fluke that we came to exist.


I guess what I'm still looking for is, if scientific/physicological determinism has been disproved by quantum theory and that my understandings of probability and what it means are wrong or that Schrodinger's Cat both is alive and not alive until someone opens the box: I need some type of explanation that works logically not solopsistically. Admittedly though I have to believe - if a tree fell in the forest and no one was there to hear it it 'did' make a sound and that the people who want to debate otherwise either want to redefine 'sound' as something that occurs in the human ear or brain rather than a sound wave or even worse, claim that the push of air and soundwaves occurred only because there was a person there to witness it (if that was the case sample-based/digital musician that would be troubling as nothing would ever transfer reliably). An even bigger challenge to the tree in the woods question - how do we get oxygen and the processing of carbon by plants if no one is there to physically watch - at the most optimistic - 3/4 of the plants in the world metabolizing? Does that prove that there's a God watching while we're not?

Don't get me wrong, if its not solopsism let me know where I can find it contrasted or where the physics of why its this way and not that is clearly explained. Otherwise Many Worlds, solopsism, the theory that all planets in the solar system are the earth at different ages, or a theory I made up one day just for some fecetious fun - that there's only one sould threading through every living thing and that the more advanced/wise the being the later in the souls life that that life was lived: all of these things are great for a bunch of kids at UC Berkley smoking dope together who just like theories that sound 'far out' for the sake of the sounding 'far out' and it stops right there; in a room full of reiki books, power crystals, stoned Californians, and enough patchouli to choke most veteran hippies out the door.

None, other than I relate to your post completely. I'm not suicidal at all, but I sometimes wonder why it is that I'm alive. Every day seems to be a day where I subsist. I'm in no immediate danger of starving or anything (thank goodness), but I have circumstances that seem to be getting worse for me.
My problem is that my life never seems to get better. As a child, I was miserable, and lots of adults told me that things get better. They never seem to, at least for long. I can never seem to make positive experiences "work." I still remember a family trip to France a few years ago, where I had to hide my depression because my family so wanted me to be happy. I didn't want to ruin this trip for them.
I find I am happiest when I can contribute to something outside of myself. I prefer a job, or multiple jobs, where I can work long hours and be extremely productive. Those days when I'm exhausted from work are some of the happiest of my life. I prefer being married to my job because nothing else seems to want me.

It is by no means a solipsism. This is a solid science. Sorry but I think that you should question your judgement more.

Many people apparently had this problem. But it actually has nothing to do with our abilities to measure, there is a alot of material which deals specifically with this question. It is indeed a property of the matter itself. But in day-to-day life these effects are neglible. Same as we do not observe relativistic time stretches. Sorry I cannot provide with links but I am sure that google will do. I can only recommend some books which might be hard to get and are lenghty.
Very relevant: http://www.scientificamerican.com/artic ... entific-pr

I am afraid that you might want to check if you really understand statistics. Yet to fully understand QM it takes a lot of commitment and a lot of college maths as well. Otherwise you will have to believe what is written by the great authorities of the science world and it will be very counter-intuitive. *By the way, just to say, this is not a purely theoretical science (as, for instance, string theory), but expermental as well. And applied*. I would suggest the same short book on "physics and philosophy" by Heizenberg. He writes about this historical change in a popular way, but gives only facts obv. Other than that can watch something on youtube, for instance, from Feynman. More concrete would be any introductory college textbook and some heavy maths. I do not know what your scientific-mathematical background is. If you are still in school then you still have a lot to learn unless you do well in maths. If you are not, then you still have to be good at maths. Unfortunately there is no easy access to a quick understanding. This was ground-breaking after all.

Well if I am correct and you are referring to the Cat, I doubt that QM could be applied to our scale in such way. Everything is based on probability, and probability of such *whatever* event occuring is next to zero if at all. I am not good with these kind of extreme-philosophical applications and paradoxes, I am more of a science person. Its better to look at small-scale implications at first without any radical speculation, imo. My imagination must be poor. But I am sure that animals are watching and, after all, they have to be seen only once. This is irrelevant.

Well that might have been a wrong example for me to link to. It is only a paradox and needs some basic knowledge of various quantum interpretations. It is just that it is very popular and vivid. But all these large-scale analogies are very misleading.

Also interesting example is Quantum tunnelling. Or google something like quantum vs classical mechanics. Normally there is no way for us to observe any of these effects (also can compare with relativity). Classical physics is just a good approximation. This amazing and weird behaviour of matter can be observed only in extreme conditions compared to what eyes can naturally see, but not so rare in general. Small scale, high speed, high energy etc.

I tell you what - you just might have to take a leap of faith here. Because, as Feynman said, "No one understands Quantum Mechanics". I think this article would be relevant: http://physicsandphysicists.blogspot.co ... anics.html.

Or have a go at this:
http://farside.ph.utexas.edu/teaching/qmech/qmech.pdf ... or do I need lmgtfy.

Uh, the joe90 syndrome?

That article seems to point out that there's no 'magic' of the electron changing behavior as if its conscious of you looking at it, so much as that turning up the light on it bombards it with photons and hence corrupts the experiment because the particle you're trying to observe is itself small enough to be noticeably effected by their presence. The paragraph toying with the notion that if we can't measure the placement of electrons or subatomic particles without bombarding and effecting their path then free will likely exists - that still bothered me. Unless they 'think' they're saving the reader from mental burnout but really it looks like a horribly tenuous conclusion.



I am afraid that you might want to check if you really understand statistics. Yet to fully understand QM it takes a lot of commitment and a lot of college maths as well. Otherwise you will have to believe what is written by the great authorities of the science world and it will be very counter-intuitive. *By the way, just to say, this is not a purely theoretical science (as, for instance, string theory), but expermental as well. And applied*. I would suggest the same short book on "physics and philosophy" by Heizenberg. He writes about this historical change in a popular way, but gives only facts obv. Other than that can watch something on youtube, for instance, from Feynman. More concrete would be any introductory college textbook and some heavy maths. I do not know what your scientific-mathematical background is. If you are still in school then you still have a lot to learn unless you do well in maths. If you are not, then you still have to be good at maths. Unfortunately there is no easy access to a quick understanding. This was ground-breaking after all.[/quote]
I really might have to pick this up as a hobby and attempt the math and reading because, what I'm hearing here doesn't add up right - not so much in terms of strange behavior of subatomic particles but free will appearing from QM or probabilities all of a sudden taking a 'real' component rather than being pure theory or our best guesses at *seemingly* chaotic outcomes.


No, I was speaking in regard to the 'tree falls in a forest' argument people put forward and, if they don't believe that the tree makes a sound if no one is there to here it, why should trees process carbon dioxide to oxygen if a human being isn't there to watch them. It wasn't your argument, just a logic pattern in society that really depresses me in that its completely baseless. The 'God watching' thing was just my making fun of it.


Reading your first article I'd agree - the causal mechanisms are completely different and nowhere to be found in the cat in the box analogy.


The first article gives me a page error, for the second I did download the PDF. I'll have to leave for martial arts class in about half an hour but I'll try giving it a read over the weekend.

TBH If there's stuff out there to read on this I won't be intellectually lazy on it, I will read. As of right now, determinism via space/time relationship seems as ironclad as any number x 1 = itself. Its not that I'm gauging it emotionally, there's just nowhere I've been able to find - in my examination of it - to pull free will from. That said I was a theist, I blew that away some years ago; searching across many of the larger world religions and even some of the esoterics. In other words - I do test my own suppositions and will here as well. It takes a long time for me to reach a strong opinion on something though and when I do its the result of a LOT of research and questioning. Be that the case I'll give this its proper due diligence to see what I can glean from it.

Well sure this is SA. Sorry but I do not read these kind of articles much. I just meant to show some valid quote so that I would sound more convincing or something.
As I said - this will and should seem very counter-intuitive.
Sorry I am not familiar with such arguments because I usually deliberately skip them so I do not know what they mean when I prolly should.
As I wrote before to fully appreciate this paradox more advanced knowledge is required, imo.
Try to ommit the dot at the end of it, shouldn't be there. But is not important, it is just if you want some opinion of that "no one understands quantum physics" quote on which I am sure you might find something more decent.

Well I am glad you sound enthusiastic with this.
There is a lot written about quantum laws. One reason I cannot give you anything decent is that there is just too much to choose from and I do not know your background. Also there is a huge gap between doing maths and then interpretating it philosophically. It does require a profound understanding in both.

I am still insisting on heisenberg physics and philosophy
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_will (there is a lot of reference to QM)
googling "quantum free will" gives some interesting stuff
Fitzpatrick gives a list of standart quantum textbooks usually taught in first, more likely second college year. (the pdf I linked to) If you have problems digging any of the pdf's up I would be glad to provide links.

Hope this will be useful to you, it certainly was for me. It is a lot of hard but rewarding work.

This one bothered me, as in the first couple articles I found were dominated by two things: a) authors who can't stop expressing their hate of playing philosophy off of science or science off of philosophical hypotheis (great - so lets call philosophy religion and delusion and put it to an arbitrary definitional death ), they'll say that QM offers no means for an uncaused cause but - once they, by their own definition, stop being utterly irresponsible by comingling philosophy and science and start talking about free will in the grounds that they're talking about science phantasy or Harry Potter characters - sure, it sounds quaint, lovely, and a lie like that can move people toward better behavior ( ). The cynicism's so thick you can barely cut through it with a knife and it seems like, even more than agreeing with me, they're even expressing an utter contempt for philosophy which - I'm baffled by, I've seen people express it before and unless they've found a way to react chemical X against an 'I' and receive objective results I have no clue how they've gone so far down such a hammer-headed road. If philosophy's so inbred, hillbilly, and Abrahamic they should laugh anyone out of the room who proposes a hypothesis.

Wow so much here to read, probably too much for me because it's late.

I did want to respond though, so sorry if this has been mentioned

Even though I have read much about religion, philosophy, psychology, have had all kinds of therapy for depression, PTSD, anxiety, OCD etc etc etc I learned something new in a psych class last year that changed a lot

People who do not get depressed LIE TO THEMSELVES much more than those that have more problems such as hating their own existence.

Self serving bias makes the (rest of) the world go round.

Hating life and the mess that the world and people are is not new though, just so you know, those feelings and beliefs have been around forever and is what prompted people to create organized religions, many of the

sciences, philosophy, simple dialogue. In my experience, happiness is a state of mind we create within ourselves (within reason), evidenced by the fact there are some people in truly dreadful situations (for instance young people with progressive diseases that are in wheelchairs by the time they are 20 and know it will only get worse) that can have a better outlook than people who "have it all" (health, family, money, security, love). I could go on, but got to get to bed.
Care enough about yourself to give yourself (and the world) the benefit of the doubt, tell yourself alittle lie if you have to in order to get through a rough patch, (the lying to yourself gets easier), and you too may find a little more happiness.

I gather such encounters of science and philosophy are inevitable, although, in some cases extremely hilarious. It’s just people with a mouth full of attitude and no knowledge of the either. A good philosophy is difficult to achieve since nowadays what people do is just give their own useless opinion. Thus the only way to acquire some solid knowledge is reading endless volumes of widely renowned people.

I don’t think that many can interpret science without being a decent expert in it and many still do. The theory is immensely difficult.

In other words: books>>internet. But it’s a good place to have a laugh and some examples of fallacious thinking. Anyway.

My opinion is summarized in this short-elementary video I’ve found by famous string-theorist Kaku. Searching for free-will gives some other opinions of other field’s specialists. The difference is apparent.
http://bigthink.com/ideas/37862
He is nice so there is something more if you tolerate this type of documentaries:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=InoMBWnTXpg

Also there’s such thing as neuroscience which explores free will experimentally ;) So in a way we might get rid of *some kind of* philosophy some day all together. It depends if one insists on thinking science being *a philosophy*. I do not know how to put it in words since I have a poor background. I know I should read more but all this *ancient* philosophy is so odd and irrelevant it hurts to read. And all the modern philosophy is referring to the old one. But I definitely dig Wittgenstein when I have a chance. Basically I think that the best philosophy is maths.

You might find this very interesting, but it is too vivid for my liking, it kind of proves free-will .There is a link in it to a very nice scientific paper “The Free Will Theorem”.
http://www.scottaaronson.com/democritus/lec18.html

This is why, when I do try to take my allowances to have an illusion or two I get stomped. I got the impression that, for some reason, especially as a kid and young adult, most people literally did not want to like me and any illusion I had made me vulnerable and gave them ammunition. To this day it still feels like its both incredibly unsafe and would lead me to making choices that could wreck my future. The other problem - pretty lies have always made me a bit bipolar, ie. the rollercoaster seems to swing up hard and swing down even harder, obviously things need to gain traction from people around you and what I'd get back was always "Erm, no, its not in your head - we *do* think you're inferior and about the only way you'll change that is with a bullet".

So no, no white-lies for me. Its a privilege of the genetic elite.

I guess one of MY lies to myself is that I AM one of the genetic elite, rather than just one of the sheep in the herd.

There seems to be much about theories and research posted. While in cognitive therapy a few years back, I started to wonder about some of the concepts I believed in, mostly my firm belief regarding personal accountability and realized it all went back to a book I read in my early twenties (I thought it was another pop psychology book). That book changed the way I look at group mentality, individual accountability, etc. I also wondered what might have been different if I had not read that book, so I won't mention the title.
Perhaps I might have been someone who looked at the world as a popularity contest, like many do, or had valued social connections more. I don't regret any of it, we have different paths to take in this life, there is orderly chaos, there is much I will never understand, and there will always be aspects of human interaction that I find appalling. These are parts of my path, which I believe IS positive, rather than negative, that there are reasons, and that it is completely up to me to find the good, however much of a challenge that may be in some circumstances. There will always be the dark and the light, to dwell on the negative, even horrific things that occur, is choosing to live in the dark. To speak up in small and large ways is my responsibility. We will all experience situations that we know would be better had one person simply spoken up.

I also believe all the focus on experiments regarding human behavior can be a waste of time. Trying to reduce such complicated issues to manageable equations is simply another inaccurate way of dealing with the anxiety that everyone experiences. Life is a fast ride in which split second decisions can make all the difference, not some mystery to unlock.
This, for me, includes not dwelling on the times I "got stomped", rather just accepting the fact life is not fair, we get knocked on our asses (some much more than others), that getting back up is inevitable, so, for me, the best thing is to get on with the getting up part. Of course, I didn't always see things this way, but am glad that I now do, and even forgive myself for the times I forget these things and fall into a little self pity.

I like your guy a lot and yes, I had the chance to watch the whole documentary as well as scan some of his other 'think big' captions. Whether its him Ray Kurzweil, etc. talking on these matters, the notion of unpredictability or randomness meaning free will exists still inherently bothers me a lot. I'm trying to figure out where they break the line from 'It *feels*, to us, that this should indicate there is free will' to 'there is free will' rather than it just being an even more complex determinism than earlier thought. If these motions, actions, etc. are fixed in time - they're there. If the bubble of the universe is one bubble or whether flows down a hall of mirrors and replicates images of different outcomes every time 'something' happens; you're still in one bubble or another. It seems like it just attempts to obfuscate determinism rather than being able to say anything against its core.

Same thing, randomness = free will. Not being a quantum physicist or a man from the 4th or 5th millenium I can't know how wrong they may even be right now, but I don't know how regress along these lines or dark energy, or particles being able to be everywhere and anywhere, effects the rollout of time and motion. People keep saying that randomness = free will. I don't know how to 'just trust' that unless they can explain it a bit deeper.

I am not sure what u mean here.It is very likely that determinism is no longer valid. And it was the main argument against free will. Now proving something is another matter and is probably a subject of neuroscience rather than philosophy. As for the latter I am sure that there are loads of arguments how randomness is free will and how it is not. Anyway I guess I am just not too bothered by that. There is no other solid argument against free will, imho, and there are loads for it. Until I will be albe to understand it better than I do now that will have to do.

As far as full determinacy.... Well, if the mechanisms by which complete determinism work cannot be detected, possibly due to the Rules of Reality [1], possibly due to other reasons... Doesn't conviction/scepticism in determinism/freedom of choice become a subjective matter rather than an objective matter?

[1] Whatever the heck those are...

(And just to be a pain... For a word for existence-hatred...

existentiantagonihilsm? )

Depends on which philosophy one advocates for...It might be but it might be not. To me that implies that it is not. How could it be subjective? Please elaborate.