Man is just a lump of MEAT?

reply to post by Illusionsaregrander

And further, I did not get at all that "Romeo and Juliet" was about true love being ever lasting and eternal. I got from it that love makes you do stupid things, for no good reason. Who knows which one of us is closer to Shakespeare's intent?

Rather than continue to refute your arguments point by point, which has become a complete waste of time, it is easier to just simply quote your last remark, and let that stand as evidence to your level of comprehension. Who knows which of us is closer to Shakespeare's intent? Those who have diligently read Romeo and Juliet, and considered what was written can know.

But, don't take my word for it, consider what others have to say on the matter:

"This play is the largest and most persuasive celebration of romantic love in Western literature."

~Harold Bloom~

Under his handling, it has become a glorious song of praise on that inexpressible feeling which ennobles the soul and gives to it its highest sublimity, and which elevates even the senses into soul, while at the same time it is a melancholy elegy on its inherent and imparted frailty; it is at once the apotheosis and the obsequies of love.

www.theatrehistory.com...

But rather than waste my time with further appeals to authority, for surely one can find criticism of Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet to contradict these praises offered, perhaps it is best to simply rely on Shakespeare's words from the play. And since my contention is that Shakespeare has set out to argue that true love is everlasting even in death, consider these lines from Romeo upon discovering Juliet, of whom he believes to be dead:

"O my love, my wife! Death, that hath suck'd the honey of thy breath Hath had no power yet upon thy beauty."

~William Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet, 5.3~

But even before this desperate exclamation, in an earlier scene between the two, consider these words that Shakespeare wrote:

Romeo:
look, love, what envious streaks.
Do lace the severing clouds in yonder east:
Night's candles are burnt out, and jocund day
Stands tiptoe on the misty mountain tops.
I must be gone and live, or stay and die.

And Juliet's response:

Juliet:
Yon light is not daylight, I know it,
It is some meteor that the sun exhales,
To be to thee this night a torch-bearer,
And light thee on thy way to Mantua:
Therefore stay yet; thou need’st not to be gone.

Ever the consummate poet, Shakespeare foreshadows their deaths, while speaking to the anxiety of separation, and the dilemma of staying with Juliet to meet certain death, or leaving that of which he loves in order to live. It is Juliet who sends him on his way so he may live, and in that decision underscores her true love for him.

Of course, you can claim that you have a different take on what these words mean, and we have both well established that people are capable of deriving at different interpretations, but to insist that "love makes you do stupid things, for no good reason", not only ignores much of the language of Romeo and Juliet, not to mention ignores the fact that it is ultimately the love between Romeo and Juliet, and their tragic deaths that finally bring a peace between the Montague's and Capulet's, your argument also ignores that Shakespeare wrote 154 Sonnets, the vast majority of them being about love, in praise of love.

While we as humans can and do come away with different interpretations on works of art, this does not mean that we can not know what the work of art is saying, or that because there are different interpretations of Romeo and Juliet that there can be no central unifying theme to that play, or any of Shakespeare's plays for that matter.

It is interesting to note that Hamlet has produced a wide array of interpretations, and there have been many who have made a somewhat similar argument that I make in terms of premise, where I argue that Hamlet's premise is that a failure to act swiftly and with assurance can lead to tragedy, I have read an astonishing number of analysis on Hamlet that claim it was Hamlet's failure to act that led to tragedy.

The difference between my assertion and these others may seem slight and quibbling, but there is a huge difference between them. Where I briefly speak to Hamlet's failure to act swiftly and with assurance, I speak to his failure to kill the king, Claudius. This reticence to do what we understand from Act I that Hamlet wants to do, causes all sorts of tragic ends for practically every major character in the play, but Hamlet had not failed to act, and from the beginning acts in many ways in order to finally make a decision on whether or not he will kill Claudius.

I have actually read a scholarly analysis that argued that Hamlet was incapable of acting, which is astonishing because clearly the author had read the play, but some how misses the fact that Hamlet swears his friend to secrecy after meeting with the ghost of his father, he then begins pretending to be insane in order to gain access to areas where he might become more privy to knowledge that would help him make a decision, and in his pretense of insanity, he spurns his lover Ophelia, later killing her father Polonious, and ultimately battling Laertes in a duel, where after being fatally stabbed by a poisoned sword by Laerte's, and upon is dying admission Laertes informs Hamlet he too is dying from this poison, does Hamlet finally kill Claudius. That is quite a bit of action to be arguing Hamlet was incapable of acting, and yet the argument gets made.

Having different interpretations is a good thing, even if ones interpretation can be way off the mark, but when way off the mark, it is not such a good thing for others to question their own interpretations simply because someone has interpreted it differently and is way off the mark. Shakespeare carefully constructed his plays, as many playwrights have throughout the centuries.

I was reading an interview with a playwright Arthur Kopit years ago who wrote a play called Indians and another play called Oh Dad Poor Dad Momma's Hung You In the Closet and Feeling So Sad, both of which were made into films. The interviewer asked Kopit what he thought of those plays, and his answer was that with Oh Dad Poor Dad they didn't change a word from his script and missed the point of the play entirely, but with Indians they maybe used 16 lines he had written in the play, and didn't even use the same title but completely captured his point entirely. And, of course, Quentin Tarantino was so pissed off at Oliver Stone for his job on Natural Born Killers that Tarantino demanded they remove his name from the credits, later explaining in an interview that it just wasn't what he wrote.

Interpretations can be, and sometimes are, way off the mark. This is why some stagings of Shakespeare's will work, and others won't. When a director is off the mark, regardless of how good the acting may be, the audience knows this and the production fails. Which brings me to the point of this thread, and your arguments that we are nothing more than animals with no beingness outside of our own biology. It makes sense to me that someone who would argue that we are nothing more than a meat box would dismiss love as something that makes us do stupid things, and while I am in agreement that love often can, and does make us to incredibly stupid things, love is far more than that.

I found it interesting that so many people were willing to reveal their own schadenfreude after Tom Cruises silliness on Oprah's couch. How much of it was just schadenfreude and how much was simply a dismissal of love I am not sure, but that Tom Cruise acted foolishly that day on Oprah's couch most can agree on. What I found sad about it was not that Tom Cruise acted foolishly, but that so many took pleasure in deriding him for doing so.
So what if love makes us do foolish things? I can think of no better reason to act foolish than for love, and of course, when we speak of love in this fashion we are not speaking really of love, but of infatuation and the exhilaration that comes with that, for love is something all together different. Love is unconditional.

This unconditional love is not limited to humans, and anyone who has ever had a dog knows of the unconditional love that can exist in that bond between human and dog...even cats, and I have seen the love of one bird for its mate be remarkably stirring. So, where I tend to agree with you on your assertion that we are no more special than any other species, I only do so because I tend to believe that other species are more than just their biology as well. When our bodies die, there is a loss of energy, and energy never dies, it may dissipate, but it doesn't die. Where this energy that was once a part of biology goes, I do not know, but that it leaves the body and goes somewhere is fairly certain.

Is that energy our soul? Is our soul the same as our consciousness? These are the questions that compel me to join threads like this, and when the answers become that consciousness is something different than biology these are answers that I all ready knew, not from learning, simply from knowing. I have heard it argued that consciousness is nothing more than emergent behavior, but from an engineering standpoint, emergent behavior is almost always bad news. Is consciousness bad news? Some would argue yes, I would argue quite the contrary, and would argue that consciousness is not at all emergent behavior, it is that energy that existed before the body, and after, and that thoughts are things, and they live with or without bodies.

reply to post by pause4thought


The beautiful thing about a meaningless universe is that we get to choose what is meaningful to each of us. If that's science, meditation or shoes, who am I to disagree - it's your existence not mine.

We may just be meat, but I am enjoying my time immensely!

Man is a kinetic, [we hope] neurological dynamic event cascade, both contained & driven.

Meat is our term for a cadaverous chunk of animal muscle tissue.

To so simplistically equate one with the other is either a real shortcoming [lack of] of your intellect or a rationale designed to mask your desires.

The term 'meat' is a grossly simplified term for all the intricate structures, chemistry of even cadaverous muscle tissue.

On second thought maybe some of us are essentially little more than 'meat'.
You might find something akin to that if you look closely around in the vicinity of your residence.

[edit on 28-6-2010 by slank]

Understandably we hail from bacterial material trapped in meteors which bombarded and broke open like seed pods... upon the earth.

This gives rise to the water, plants and animals and all forms of organic life upon the earth.

Then after we were quite well along developmentally, .....something else happened to us.

I always thought we were "organic" with a touch of something that is inorganic added. Call it soul. It is not called heart because animals, our closest relatives have THAT in abundance - humans can claim no exclusivity on heart.
What about soul? I have no idea but I know there is some addition we cannot quite explain. This addition is the difference between us and all other life on the planet.
A few odd chromosomes. Is it possible these modifications are not organic - not from earthy? At least not lately?

We are closely related to the trees and yet we are more like computers, computer outposts or thought modules than we are lumps of meat.

reply to post by slank

To so simplistically equate one with the other is either a real shortcoming [lack of] of your intellect or a rationale designed to mask your desires.

Ad hominem attacks will get you nowhere (-not least because a key element of one of my degrees was neurology).

And, in case you're overly concerned, I'm not a cannibal.

Back when I have a little more time...

I think we can learn alot from nature, and get many ideas

like a dog nose is used by the police because they cannot develop something with such a sensitive sense of smell

and with the way they live, e.g. tigers hunt alone and feed children before themselves things like this are what we can learn from and be inspired by

reply to post by pause4thought


Of all the replies I read, Jean Paul has pointed to the truth of the matter most eloquently, I especially enjoyed his references to the intelligence of plants. A benefit that plants have over humans is that their awareness is not limited by diverse cultures, language differences, systems of education and religious doctrines that obscure the truth. Thus, plants behave as we can only dream of presently, with complete awareness. As for humanity, a large proportion still refuse to recognize truth, and it is staring them in the face with some urgency right now. You are not a lump of meat, you and I and everyone else on the planet are one constantly evolving whole in the non-local sense and individual ripples of energy constantly dying and being reborn in the local sense. Awareness experiences thought, thought does not experience awareness. We are minute pinpoints of the universe experiencing and becoming aware of itself. The physical reality you perceive in this moment with your senses is nothing but a collapsed wave form, which will be replaced by another of your own creation in the next and so on. The difference between your reality and mine is choice, nothing more, nothing less. Many blessings

I found this interesting article. Now, is it true? I haven't a clue but it's a interesting article and something to think about.

No trolling please, I'm just sharing something I came across.

Keep in mind, the way humans look at cows, sheep, pigs and chickens.

Now, if and I say if there are beings from ? and they look upon humanity like we look upon rats, chimps, cows, sheep, pigs, chickens and all the rest of the animals we humans abuse and use, well, as my doctor says, "bigger, smarter beings, use and eat littlier, dumber beings - it's probably just not the law of our planet but a universal law.

Are we food for more than one alien race?

There’s a good chance that is the case. The Grays have been accompanied on several abduction forays by Reptoid and insectoid type aliens. The Grays could be acting as meat brokers for the Reptoids and others. There have been reports that the Reptoids have had sexual relations with abducted human females. This does not seem to be what they are really after. Lonely sheepherders on Earth use sheep for sex too.

Why do the Grays refer to us as containers?

Because our bodies contain the products they are interested in, meat and blood (all in a convenient portable container).

Ever see a meat chart showing where different cuts of meat come from on a cow?

The aliens look at us in the same way. Welcome to the food chain.

Can abductees capture aliens on return visits?

It’s not very likely. They have viewing devices that can see through the walls of houses like superman’s x-ray vision, detect the electrical impulses of nervous systems, and detect any electronic devices like video cameras, weapons, etc. They do have the technology to pass through solid walls.

Did you think they couldn’t see through that same wall first?

Abductees have tried to videotape the aliens, but the aliens either came through a wall and shut off the cameras, or waited until a time when the unit was not in operation. They can tell.

They can read the abductee’s thoughts, so how do you keep secrets from them?

They’ve even gotten the abductees to shut off the camcorders themselves.

Why do the Grays tell abductees that we belong to them?

They consider us their property, just as cattle ranchers consider cows their property. They have genetically altered us over many thousands of years for their own purposes. We too breed and crossbreed cattle strains for increased meat and milk yield.

What’s the purpose of the implants that aliens put into abductee’s bodies?

According to what the aliens have told abductees, they are multifunction devices. They are used to track the abductee, monitor physical condition, record physiological changes, allow communication, alert if there is a serious health or safety condition, and monitor patterns of movement, all at a great distance. It’s a very high tech cowbell. The main purpose is to prevent premature loss of their property.

From a variety of sources, I have come to a conclusion that our own government has duplicated and mastered the implant monitoring system they found on a captured or recovered alien craft. There have been many times when black helicopters showed up at the homes of implanted people (who are multiple abduction subjects) a few hours before they are abducted by the aliens. I think the aliens send a signal to the implants in the abductees they are coming to pick up, to turn on their homing beacons so they can be easily found.

Our boys pick up the implant signal beacon and fly out in their black helicopters to monitor the situation, probably to make sure it is not the start of the big roundup. There have been a few reported cases of the black helos shape shifting back to a saucer shape and then departing. Other reports state black helicopters accelerated rapidly out of sight, just like the UFOs. Those made no sound. It is interesting to know that the aliens have the technology to play tricks with holograms to change the appearance of their ships in broad daylight. We may have acquired that equipment from them.


What happened to the Ten Lost Tribes of Israel?

According to the Bible, word had filtered back eighty years after they left, that they were transported to a place where they could eat no meat, and must sacrifice their first born children to the “gods.”

If you write your congressman what should you ask?

Ask for open congressional hearings on the matter of UFOs, aliens, and their plans for humanity. Tell them they need to have the top people in military intelligence, NASA, etc., testify under immunity so they can’t be convicted for revealing “secret” information.

Source: www.bibliotecapleyades.net... 24:

Scary to think we may not be the smartest beings at the top of the food chain.

Now, link this to the conspiracy of it seems we're being "fattened up".

Just a passing thought, and no I'm not dead set on this idea being fact, as stated before, just another thought thrown out there for polite and respectful discussion.

Any trolling or smart arse remarks will be reported to the mods. I'm tired of immature smart alec comments.

If you don't have anything constructive or additonal information to contribute to this thread please go play somewhere else.

If you don't believe this is a possiblity than go to another thread that you do believe in and add your wisdom to that.

Our bodies are our vehicles, it is the attachment to them that causes our suffering. If our awareness and our senses were more independent of our physical vehicles, then life and death, eating and being eaten, would just be another process in this reality.