(August 21, 2023 at 9:29 am)Angrboda Wrote: The things the world tells us are not half as scary as the things we tell ourselves.

I have not found that to be true. Often things are worse than was promised.

(August 21, 2023 at 9:30 am)FrustratedFool Wrote:

(August 21, 2023 at 9:29 am)Angrboda Wrote: The things the world tells us are not half as scary as the things we tell ourselves.

I have not found that to be true.  Often things are worse than was promised.

Do you know the tale of the woman and the two Buddhist monks? Forbidden to touch women, the two monks came upon a woman who needed to get across a river. The older monk carried the woman on his shoulders and the two monks carried on. This greatly disturbed the younger monk, but he held his peace. Finally after some hours he just couldn't keep his piece and he asked the older monk how he could bear carrying the woman on his shoulders. To which the older monk replied that he carried her for a few minutes yet the younger had been carrying her all this time. The thoughts we have about something determine our experience, and often our thoughts are an exaggeration of the actual reality.

(August 21, 2023 at 9:36 am)Angrboda Wrote:

(August 21, 2023 at 9:30 am)FrustratedFool Wrote: I have not found that to be true.  Often things are worse than was promised.

Do you know the tale of the woman and the two Buddhist monks? Forbidden to touch women, the two monks came upon a woman who needed to get across a river. The older monk carried the woman on his shoulders and the two monks carried on. This greatly disturbed the younger monk, but he held his peace. Finally after some hours he just couldn't keep his piece and he asked the older monk how he could bear carrying the woman on his shoulders. To which the older monk replied that he carried her for a few minutes yet the younger had been carrying her all this time. The thoughts we have about something determine our experience, and often our thoughts are an exaggeration of the actual reality.

Certainly expectation and perception can affect sensation and experience (though not external reality directly). Of course, since we can't choose how we think it matters little.

(August 21, 2023 at 9:42 am)FrustratedFool Wrote:

(August 21, 2023 at 9:36 am)Angrboda Wrote: Do you know the tale of the woman and the two Buddhist monks?  Forbidden to touch women, the two monks came upon a woman who needed to get across a river.  The older monk carried the woman on his shoulders and the two monks carried on.  This greatly disturbed the younger monk, but he held his peace.  Finally after some hours he just couldn't keep his piece and he asked the older monk how he could bear carrying the woman on his shoulders.  To which the older monk replied that he carried her for a few minutes yet the younger had been carrying her all this time.  The thoughts we have about something determine our experience, and often our thoughts are an exaggeration of the actual reality.

Certainly expectation and perception can affect sensation and experience (though not external reality directly).  Of course, since we can't choose how we think it matters little.

I disagree. We can't choose in each moment what we think, but we can choose to adopt habits that make certain thoughts more or less likely. The end result is pretty much the same.

(August 21, 2023 at 9:47 am)Angrboda Wrote:

(August 21, 2023 at 9:42 am)FrustratedFool Wrote: Certainly expectation and perception can affect sensation and experience (though not external reality directly).  Of course, since we can't choose how we think it matters little.

I disagree. We can't choose in each moment what we think, but we can choose to adopt habits that make certain thoughts more or less likely. The end result is pretty much the same.

I don't believe in freewill. But if we have freewill, then sure.

(August 21, 2023 at 9:48 am)FrustratedFool Wrote:

(August 21, 2023 at 9:47 am)Angrboda Wrote: I disagree.  We can't choose in each moment what we think, but we can choose to adopt habits that make certain thoughts more or less likely.  The end result is pretty much the same.

I don't believe in freewill.  But if we have freewill, then sure.

Free will is irrelevant. We make decisions based upon the information we have. If that information says that we can reduce our suffering then we can decide to reduce our suffering.

If freewill doesn't exist then I can't control what I decide.
I may reduce my suffering by taking note of new information, I may not. Eitherway, its predetermined and not in any way controllable.

Caffeine makes me anxious, but reduces my dysphoria. I read, on a certain website, that caffeine boosts euphoria, and reduces boredom. Just reading that information, made me want to ingest caffeine. So I've been using caffeine for several years. I purchased a caffeinated product at the store, several years ago, and really loved the way it made me feel, so I continued purchasing caffeinated products, up to the present day. I am now addicted to caffeine, and I have no way of knowing if this would have happened if I had not purchased that very first caffeinated product. I'm assuming it would've still happened, but I don't know. Did I have free will when making that decision? I'm actually not sure, but it doesn't matter, the bottom line is that I am now addicted to caffeine, and I just have to live with it, for better or worse. Perhaps being addicted to a substance isn't such a bad thing, if that substance helps you in some aspect of life, such as improving your mood? It's a fair trade off, I think. Free will might not have had anything to do with it. But if this "choice", to become addicted to caffeine, was in fact, pre-determined, I would like to think it only happened for my own good.

(August 21, 2023 at 10:22 am)Ahriman Wrote: Caffeine makes me anxious, but reduces my dysphoria. I read, on a certain website, that caffeine boosts euphoria, and reduces boredom. Just reading that information, made me want to ingest caffeine. So I've been using caffeine for several years. I purchased a caffeinated product at the store, several years ago, and really loved the way it made me feel, so I continued purchasing caffeinated products, up to the present day. I am now addicted to caffeine, and I have no way of knowing if this would have happened if I had not purchased that very first caffeinated product. I'm assuming it would've still happened, but I don't know. Did I have free will when making that decision? I'm actually not sure, but it doesn't matter, the bottom line is that I am now addicted to caffeine, and I just have to live with it, for better or worse. Perhaps being addicted to a substance isn't such a bad thing, if that substance helps you in some aspect of life, such as improving your mood? It's a fair trade off, I think. Free will might not have had anything to do with it. But if this "choice", to become addicted to caffeine, was in fact, pre-determined, I would like to think it only happened for my own good.

There's much worse things to be addicted to. Does it help you? I've never found caffeine to help kill my ennui, or do much else other than make we slightly more awake and go to the toilet more. But it affects people differently, and may also depend upon dosage. How much caffeine were you taking to notice positive effects?

As for freewill, I suspect your addiction was baked into the early stages of the universe and was just the inevitable outworking of natural laws. It was always going to be.

(August 21, 2023 at 10:22 am)Ahriman Wrote: [...] the bottom line is that I am now addicted to caffeine, and I just have to live with it, for better or worse.

Addictions can be broken.

(August 21, 2023 at 10:07 am)FrustratedFool Wrote: Eitherway, its predetermined and not in any way controllable.

This is an unsupported claim.

(August 21, 2023 at 8:32 am)FrustratedFool Wrote: True.  But you will have ceased to be, and that's a subjectively bad thing, is it not?

Who exists to experience this subjective badness you assert?