Isn't the opposite of materialism - death worship?

reply to post by NotAnAspie

Originally posted by NotAnAspie
Could you please try to answer the question because at this point, I just want to know that the topic has a foundation.

who are these anti-materialists that you are referring to that you think might be worshipping death.

Just answer that one question.

You say "who" - I was not talking about people but ideas. I said that if a true opposite of materialism existed, it would be "following death (in other words death worship)". I also explained why that is so, in the original post.

Originally posted by arpgme
reply to post by NotAnAspie

 

Originally posted by NotAnAspie
Could you please try to answer the question because at this point, I just want to know that the topic has a foundation.

who are these anti-materialists that you are referring to that you think might be worshipping death.

Just answer that one question.

You say "who" - I was not talking about people but ideas. I said that if a true opposite of materialism existed, it would be "following death (in other words death worship)". I also explained why that is so, in the original post.

edit on 30-9-2012 by arpgme because: (no reason given)

Well then the answer could be anything you want it to be because it is your idea.

Why would you ask us to tell you what your idea was?

That's kinda strange.

maybe you forgot what inspired you to make this thread but I'm sure it has to be something. You had a go at this for a reason. maybe if you just think back a bit it'll come back to you.

Who is wanting to do this? Did you read it in a book, did a friend say something about it, did someone on here talk about it? Did you read it on another site? Was this an earlier practice of your own to try to let go of all things?

You're asking the question in order to understand something that is more than an idea inside your lone skull else you would not need to ask anyone else and since it is a manmade concept, then someone else is your culprit.

Who is the subject of your discussion?

reply to post by NotAnAspie

Originally posted by NotAnAspie
Well then the answer could be anything you want it to be because it is your idea.

Why would you ask us to tell you what your idea was?

That's kinda strange.

Again, there is no "who", this is the discussion about materialism and what a true opposite of materialism would mean...


I think there is a misunderstanding. Let me try to rephrase it.

I am talking about the ideas of "materialism", and "the opposite of materialism". Materialism is believing only in the physicality. I was talking about how energy is a part of physicality - so spirits, light, thought, emotion, intention are all still a part of "physicality" and the true opposite of materialism would not be "idealism" because that is just saying that all things are ideas from a mind - and even ideas are a part of physicality. An idea of a ruler is still pointing to a physicality ( a ruler), so the true opposite would be death - no spirits, no light, no body, no physical world, no emotions, no intention...

Then I was asking for feed back on this.

reply to post by arpgme


we arnt perfect so as to be protected by sH#t in life and never will be. If we are humble enough to accept that we can start living. Death is gonna happen so theres no point worshiping it or hoping it will come faster. Dont worhsip death and dont fear it, just respect it and live life.

I didnt mean to sound preachy. Life is here and one day it wont be.

reply to post by AthlonSavage


Yes, but if materialism is evil and leads to suffering, why try to hang on to life at all, and shouldn't death be a celebration?

I'm not asking you this because you don't seem to hate materialism, it seems like you are saying just don't be attached and enjoy life. Most people think that way.

I'm trying to address the ones that demonize material reality but still want a "material" heaven with "things" in it...

reply to post by arpgme

Yes, but if materialism is evil and leads to suffering, why try to hang on to life at all, and shouldn't death be a celebration?

Celerbrate your life, your existance and its connectivity with everything that has a purpose in its own right. Accept what fills your heart and reject the rest. Materialism doesnt need to lead to suffering, and its not evil its just the props on the stage of life we are acting in. Death is a final curtain call, the celebration was life as the curtain came down not the curtain coming down.

Ok my rant has made me hungry im going out soon and getting myself a burger and chips a little celebration for life.

Originally posted by arpgme
reply to post by AthlonSavage

 

Yes, but if materialism is evil and leads to suffering, why try to hang on to life at all, and shouldn't death be a celebration?

I'm not asking you this because you don't seem to hate materialism, it seems like you are saying just don't be attached and enjoy life. Most people think that way.

I'm trying to address the ones that demonize material reality but still want a "material" heaven with "things" in it...

and even ideas are a part of physicality... this is a good point against idealism being an argument to materialism in the textbook sense.

However, we are still not referring to textbook materialism are we?

I couldn't get you to answer me but you go right ahead and vaguely answer someone else. I knew it's in there somewhere.

Who are these people demonizing materialism in the *complete* sense, not just the shopping too much sense?

People on the internet? People who are thinking about suicide? Who? Obviously by your own admission you are referring to *someone*... and I am just trying to learn more about that so I can give you my reflection on what I think is making that person/people tick.

If you ask us what we think about this, you must expect us to either already relate to this, know somebody who does or can at least imagine relating to this.

I am having an extremely hard time relating to this because it's like telling me to imagine thinking physics are evil. I have absolutely no idea why I would ever think physics were evil but I do think materialism is evil... Greed, hoarding, waste... but there were complaints with my first interpretation of materialism.... so now I am stuck wondering who in the world thinks the physical laws are evil.

Let me put it to you like this. You strike a lot of different ideas with where you're going. I once noted that in carbon, which is our culprit element for traces of life, There are 6 neutrons, six electrons and six protons and yes it was a bible discussion.

Would you consider me guilty?

Maybe it's not the design itself that I suspect, maybe it's the ingredients... and I think problems with life forms are more unfortunate than they are evil.

My point in that discussion is what if the beast is referring to our carnal nature and this should serve as a warning to rise above it and explore new understandings of what we think reality is.... whereas God as in "Dunamis" is referred to as pure energy... not just an elemental prone to other organism consumption.... but like you even say, that's still energy and still not downplaying the entire scope of physical laws.

I could go on and on about that but I am explaining multiple different ideas here that could paint close to what you are referring to since you are looking for opinions on what this could entail but it's really not easy to relate to.

Are you referring to people who want to commit suicide?

To not want to feel at all is the closest thing I can think of and it is still related to the Buddhist relation to suffering. Stillness is what comes up as answer to suffering.

I think when people push off ideas like this, they are either suffering and want it to end or they are unhappy and this is their way of complaining. I'm not saying that is wrong but I don't think it is a "worship" I have never in my life met anyone who would say "I think the physical reality is totally evil and I think that there should be nothing.... ever"

that's not to say I haven't heard people talk that way but they were just really depressed and trying to express it.

Sometimes you get caught in the wheel thinking about the strife between dark/light good/bad and it all seems the same.... and always attached... it does appear firmly attached and this dread of a lack of progression in reality and an evil endless vortex is a depressive mode of thought. It is a bad frequency.

I really wish you could refer to who it is that is "training themselves" as you did definitely put it to let go of everything and have no emotions or anything because where this is going, I have some serious thoughts about. You're not giving an angle and you might really be selling yourself short.

If you know someone that talks like this and you're chalking it up to "dearth worship"... like they chose to feel this way, I think you really need to take a closer look. You might be missing something really important.

Originally posted by AthlonSavage
reply to post by arpgme

 

Yes, but if materialism is evil and leads to suffering, why try to hang on to life at all, and shouldn't death be a celebration?

Celerbrate your life, your existance and its connectivity with everything that has a purpose in its own right. Accept what fills your heart and reject the rest. Materialism doesnt need to lead to suffering, and its not evil its just the props on the stage of life we are acting in. Death is a final curtain call, the celebration was life as the curtain came down not the curtain coming down.

Ok my rant has made me hungry im going out soon and getting myself a burger and chips a little celebration for life.

edit on 30-9-2012 by AthlonSavage because: (no reason given)

You see, you are even trying to talk to this person as if someone somewhere this person knows is embracing the concept of trying to escape suffering by ceasing to exist.

You can't argue this viewpoint away because it's not really a viewpoint.

It's an idea that gets pushed off in response to suffering. It's a practice, not a worship. It's a response to suffering. You can't eliminate that response... just like when the body has had too much, it dies. There's a limit and both death itself and wanting to die is a response to suffering and it always will be.

You have to eliminate the suffering because you cannot eliminate the idea that death is a solution to suffering because death is the result of suffering. It's how it resolves itself. It is suffering, that is what this is.

I don't know how or who but whatever the origin or what started it for who ever, it is a manifestation that should probably be examined, not thought of as a mere idea. As a belief you can't even expect to control something like that entirely... what if you just keep reincarnating? the only thing you can do is practice minimalism to slow down your karmic repercussions of the wheel of pain around and in organisms you effect and even committing suicide creates more negativity... Stillness is a practice, Buddhism doesn't preach suicide. It's an attempt at answering suffering.

But that still solves nothing and it won't until this has really been personally addressed.

Do you know that vibrations can make you feel this way?

I do not worship death and I do not think the physical world is evil but I have absolutely felt what it is like to want to die and some would call that a mental disease but I call it something that has come upon me in a matter of minutes and lasted for a particular window of time and then abated just as soon as it came.

Do some research on schizophrenia and listen to some schizophrenics talks and know that some would would categorize nihilist like this talk as such. I don't even know if I believe in schizophrenia so don't think I'm calling names here... I'm telling you what to expect from most people from a concept like this.. I'd really like to know where this is coming from. I believe everything has a source and everything has a projection.

I feel like you read a lot of really bad literature that causes you to come here and share your disturbed unbalanced thinking with others.

I'll tell you what I think:

You think in ridiculous terms.

But, I will concede that those who see this world as 'loving life' generally view the other world - the locale of the Godhead, as constituting mans 'true' good. Therefore, in this Monism-Dualism duality, the side of 'life' and 'being' is a consequence of consciousness, which is a knowledge of knowing that "I am"; the reverse is death, of non being, and in the absence of a self conscious being who knows himself i.e. a subject-object dichotomy, as existing.

This is what Islam actually preaches. Many Muslim clerics enjoy telling westerners that in a war between us and them, that we would lose because "we love death like you love life"; and this attitude is fostered by Shi'ite theology (just look at the Ashoura festival, which sees self flagellation and skull cutting as expressions of rapture) as well Sunni Sufism.

In any case, it's a false dichotomy because it works from false premises.

You assume that we can only think in 'it's either non-existence' or 'existence', which means, Nirvana, or endless rounds of reincarnation - pewy.

That's a purely eastern way of thinking, and even if they think that way, there are necessary safeguards against letting that perception devolve into thoughts of mass suicide.

In Judaism, for instance, there's a wonderful teleological awareness that this world exists for a reason; Abraham Joshua Heschel aptly described this unique vantage point as seeing the meaning behind the mystery; while you are fascinated by the mystery of 'non-being', of being extinguished by the Godhead, Judaism, in particular, teaches that man's raison d'etre is to search and find the meaning in life, in nature, and in all ones personal experiences.

Meaning is superior to the loss of self in Nirvana.

If you want to exit the world, feel free. This world is wonderful.

Nietzsche, despite all his problems, had a wondrous way of wording things.

He said that the Jews were willing to Be at ANY COST! He found it amazing, that this people more than any other people which cherishes life - unlike his Aryan ideal of pure will - were willing to live under any circumstances. And it's indeed a very apposite insight. Judaism at it's very core is about life

L'Chaim!

reply to post by arpgme

Homer started it Plato gave it form and Thomas Aquinas introduced it into Western thought...
...but there is no dichotomy between material and spiritual...
...that is the modern/post-modern illusion...
...and death only exists in the absence of Spirit so it is the material that is death...
...so it is really materialism that is the death cult.

reply to post by troubleshooter

Originally posted by troubleshooter
...and death only exists in the absence of Spirit so it is the material that is death...
...so it is really materialism that is the death cult.

This doesn't make sense. If it were true, we should ALL be spirit and then when our spirit "dies" we become "material" without any life - but that is not the way it works.

There are these living spirits in these animate bodies and when the body dies the spirit leave, so even material is a part of life and so is spirit. Death is absence of all things material
(whether it is energy/spirit or matter/body)

Originally posted by arpgme
reply to post by troubleshooter

 

Originally posted by troubleshooter
...and death only exists in the absence of Spirit so it is the material that is death...
...so it is really materialism that is the death cult.

This doesn't make sense. If it were true, we should ALL be spirit and then when our spirit "dies" we become "material" without any life - but that is not the way it works.

There are these living spirits in these animate bodies and when the body dies the spirit leave, so even material is a part of life and so is spirit. Death is absence of all things material
(whether it is energy/spirit or matter/body)

and that system is tied to suffering and therefore the need to escape suffering.

Is death the solution as it may only be a new beginning or is eliminating suffering when death is not necessary the solution?.... because in extreme cases it IS necessary.

My point is that in an unaffected mind, it's not normal to want it unless there is suffering.

I don't think it is is fault of thinking nor do I consider it a core belief.

Like I have said, I have experienced bouts of feeling so attracted to death that the mere thought of the yin and yang symbol would bring me to tears as a reminder of the inescapable truth of suffering in life.

but I'm trying to tell you, this is not a normal mode for me and I think is a result of something else.

That's why I'm trying to get you to be more clear about where this idea is coming from because as a concept, it's going to get argued into oblivion.

Take a person who is angry and then goes and says something driven by anger. Of course it's not right but what's the solution? tell them they are not allowed to speak while angry or find out what their problem really is and what's causing their anger.

reply to post by arpgme


The essence of our lives is the simplicity of touch. There is no greater power born in the material world than originates when a man and woman touch hands, hold hands. Thats not death. Death has nothing to do with that force, it didnt create it and its not its essence. Death participates in life as an observer until the time it reaches over and taps the person. Love is taking a loved ones hand and declaring love against death knowing that the love will go beyond material death. Love is the heart that dared it all in front of the pain of losing it all.

Think about that. Your not schizo or anything like that. Your alright and doing fine. How do i know that? Because, because....now thats something for you to think about.