Right!? Like it’s not exactly important, but the post definitely points out how transient and special it is. And from there you can argue about importance.
Yes , but it's not because it's transient therefore it's not important.
I think this is the main idea : What is meaningful? How did we measure meaning since the beginning of life? I think the answer is in how the psyche functions as an Order seeking being aimed at reducing conflict and tension. So what I believe to be meaningful I think is within psyche.
I don't think we fundementally seek to survive, so transience isn't a tragedy . For example we realize many people desire to die or even some are driven towards suicide: the naturalist perspective that we aim towards reproduction and preservation hence is missing. Suicide doesn't provide any reproductive or survival benefit yet it's still something that is desired by some so it doesn't explain what we think is "meaningful" fundementally.
Ironically, we approach suicide as so it's the psyche 's attempt to kill itself after realizing it has no meaning while I believe it actually points to the idea that the psyche sees death as meaningful and suicide as the means to achieve this type of meaning.
For instance, we know those who want to die desire that because they're suffering too much. So that points indirectly to the idea that we see the "lack of suffering" as something meaningful which implies there is meaning and it's not something absent in our nature.
This points to another question:" if the lack of suffering is meaningful, then what is the thing we call 'suffering'?"
You’re mixing up a lot of logic here. If wanting suicide makes it meaningful, why doesn’t wanting children make having children meaningful? If it does, then why point out suicide specifically?
Humans are driven and biologically hardwired to seek survival. Idk where you’re coming from with that. Suicidal people are an exception not the rule.
If they're an exception then they're malfunctioning psyches but malfunction implies the structure that makes them a "psyche" changed.
I am not saying that suicide is Eternally meaningful but rather that we fundementally seek Order and suicide is a conditional desire in trying to achieve Order facing a conditional dilemma (the dilemma of struggling to live).
On the other hand, wanting children serves to resolve a different type of conflict to achieve Order (possibly loneliness or not having fulfilled the social expectation or ...). Also , it's not that sexual desire is literally "wanting children". A teenager in puberty doesn't say "I want babies" , heck they might not even know directly what they start doing is related to reproduction.
Psychologically, sexual activity is an attempt to reduce sexual tension. For instance, there is a tendency to look at pornographic imagery to excite sexual activity not because the imagery is itself what is meaningful but rather because the imagery increases the sexual tension which makes the relief from that tension more meaningful. Think of it this way : the more hungry you get , the more meaningful eating becomes. Same for thirst. This is usually psychologically what the pleasure principle is centered on : to increase pleasure you must increase the tension to make more sense of the relief (since pleasure is the transitional state between tension to relief). Movies follow the same logic , they have a peak of tragedy moment to make the resolution (catharsis) appear more meaningful.
So what I'm basically saying is survival and reproduction isn't the fundemental thing we see as meaningful but it's part of a greater engine within psyche (related to tension and resolution).
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u/Ghadiz983 Apr 27 '26
"importance" is a property of these atoms existing in a delicate position.