Latest / Think Twice Show / The Philosophy of Absurdism
Transcript
- 0:03We're often told that everything happens for a reason, So when
- 0:06something goes wrong, we look for meaning in our pain.
- 0:10Some turn to religion and say this is part of God's plan.
- 0:13Others turn to science. But let's be honest, we all need
- 0:17to feel like we're going somewhere, like there's a reason
- 0:21we're here. But what if there isn't?
- 0:25What if the breakup didn't teach you anything?
- 0:27Well, that set back isn't building you into something
- 0:30else. What if something's just
- 0:32happened? That's where Albert Camus comes
- 0:35in. He's a French writer who grew up
- 0:38in poverty in Algeria, lost his father young and lived through a
- 0:41war. He believed that as human nature
- 0:44to look for meaning an answer to the why.
- 0:48But the universe will never give you 1.
- 0:51And that gap between the two where we will live?
- 0:55Camus called the absurd. So what can you do?
- 1:00You can tell yourself a fictional story that gives you
- 1:02meaning. You can decide it's all
- 1:05pointless and completely check out.
- 1:07Or. You can accept the absurd and
- 1:10live fully in spite of it. He called this the revolt.
- 1:15So here's the question If there's no meaning to your life,
- 1:20does that scare you or does that free you?
- 1:36Welcome to Think Twice. My name is Benz.
- 1:39My name is Santa. And today we're discussing the
- 1:42philosophy of Absurdism. Absurdism is a weird one.
- 1:45I hope the intro has basically explained it well for you.
- 1:48But the concept is like, imagine a world where you didn't have
- 1:53religion, you didn't have philosophies that told you how
- 1:56to live. It would be like, what is this
- 1:59like? You've always been told since a
- 2:02young age how to do something, why to do something.
- 2:05You've been told to go to school, to get smarter, to be
- 2:08able to work, for example. What if all of these things were
- 2:10meaningless? What if none of these things
- 2:11actually matter? It actually boggles your brain,
- 2:13right? And that's the space we're going
- 2:15to live in today. So in the first question, is
- 2:18happiness possible without meaning?
- 2:21No, happiness is not possible without meaning.
- 2:24I think if you are happy without meaning, it's just a
- 2:27distraction. It's not true happiness.
- 2:29That's my claim and that's what I'm going to try and argue
- 2:32today. Oh really?
- 2:33OK, what do you think? Yeah, I, I think it is.
- 2:36I think happiness is possible without meaning.
- 2:38I think it's directly tied, though, to individual's ability
- 2:42to deal with the future. OK, Albert Camus in one essay
- 2:45basically said, but what is happiness except the simple
- 2:49harmony between a man and the life he leads?
- 2:53And in my head, that was like a really, really good quote,
- 2:56right? So if you understand the
- 2:57position you're in and you accept all the conditions of
- 3:01your life, you're able. To be happy.
- 3:03OK. And that's probably the place
- 3:04I'm sitting in a little. Bit OK, so so let's actually
- 3:07frame our our positions. This is a good opportunity to to
- 3:10bring it back to what you said in the intro.
- 3:11Are you an absurdist in the sense that you agree with
- 3:14Camus's diagnosis of the meaning of life and the fact that you
- 3:19can't find meaning, but you can find happiness in the life where
- 3:23there's no meaning? Yeah, like he called, he called
- 3:26that. I'm not an absurdist whatsoever,
- 3:28but he called that the thing that you're talking about, the
- 3:30revolt, right? So like the idea that life has
- 3:34no inherent meaning, philosophers have basically
- 3:37given us these ideas that tell us how to live and why it's good
- 3:42to live this way. Or religion is trying to give
- 3:45you that meaning, but it doesn't actually exist.
- 3:47And it all comes from humans trying to get away from
- 3:49suffering. So like, the more and more we
- 3:51try and get away from suffering, the more and more we try and
- 3:54find things that basically make our suffering make sense.
- 3:59And I'm basically arguing that you can accept that none of
- 4:03these things actually matter. When I was younger, I met, I met
- 4:06this this boy once and he told me that he's studying.
- 4:09He was like quack well to do. And he told me he's studying
- 4:12English at university. And back then I was like,
- 4:15brother, that are you studying English?
- 4:16You can't get no job with that. You know, you're told lawyer,
- 4:20engineer, you ain't get no job with that.
- 4:22He's like, university is not about jobs.
- 4:26University is about studying things you enjoy.
- 4:29And that was like a revelation in my mind that like all these
- 4:34things, there's no reason why you have to do that to reach
- 4:37something. You can just live and exist.
- 4:39And that's what can be sort of argued for, that you can just
- 4:42exist within these things. You don't have to try and solve
- 4:45a problem. Like for example, if your
- 4:46girlfriend comes to you, she's crying and she's like, oh man,
- 4:49I've just lost my job. And then you start sitting there
- 4:51thinking about ways to try and fix this and try and find
- 4:54meaning in it. And the whole point is that is
- 4:56to try and reduce her sadness and your sadness and try and
- 5:00control the environment a little bit.
- 5:01But no, you can just sit in it. You can just be in it.
- 5:04Accept that reality, if you know what I mean, and you can find
- 5:06happiness somewhere in that eventually.
- 5:08I agree. I agree you can.
- 5:09You can find happiness in the absurd.
- 5:13I mean, I think I agree with Camus all the way to a point.
- 5:17I agree in his initial diagnosis, which is that the
- 5:20universe is meaningless. And even more specifically than
- 5:25that, what he said was the universe has no meaning that I
- 5:28can ascertain as a human being, right?
- 5:31And that resonates with me because there might be meaning
- 5:34in the universe that there might be meaning in, say, some
- 5:39spirituality, There might be some higher beings that I cannot
- 5:44access. And I do not understand that
- 5:46make this whole world make sense.
- 5:47But us as humans, we don't. We don't know what.
- 5:50That is, we don't know for. Certain, we don't know for sure
- 5:52and because we don't know it, we we cannot derive meaning from
- 5:55the universe. The second thing that Camus says
- 5:57is that cool universe don't make sense, but us as humans, we have
- 6:01a a natural drive to make sense of the universe, right?
- 6:05We have a natural curiosity to try to make sense of the
- 6:07universe. And for him, the absurd comes in
- 6:10the tension between the fact that we will never get that
- 6:12understanding and we will always want that understanding.
- 6:15And you're right, revolting against the absurd is living.
- 6:20Yes, is living is is a way to live.
- 6:22And I guess you can find happiness in that.
- 6:24But I disagree with Camus that you can never find meaning in
- 6:28this life. He's saying you will never find
- 6:30meaning, but just be happy with the fact you will not find
- 6:32meaning. But I think you can find
- 6:33meaning. I'm more of an existentialist,
- 6:35right? Jean Paul Sartre, who's an
- 6:37existentialist, would say, yes, the universe doesn't give you
- 6:40meaning, but you can find meaning in your own life through
- 6:44things that you do right, things that you you choose to take up.
- 6:48And that is what resonates more of me.
- 6:50So I reject Camus's final diagnosis because like his.
- 6:53Argument would be that like you don't even need to find meaning.
- 6:56Like an example of his was if you see a boy German you're
- 6:59feeling or you're you feel a feeling of care to try and save
- 7:03this person. And he argues that the majority
- 7:06of humans feel this. They feel that care.
- 7:09You don't need to police it. You don't need a philosophy
- 7:11around it in order for it to have meaning.
- 7:15You you exist as a biological being.
- 7:20And the way you put constraints on that is you have a line and
- 7:23you don't want to be pushed any further than that line.
- 7:26And you can apply that to other humans too.
- 7:28And that's basically his philosophy.
- 7:31I don't even think he really like the term philosophy because
- 7:33yeah, exactly. But that's that's the absurdism
- 7:36that all living in the absurdism, the absence of
- 7:39inherent meaning that he argues. And I'm like, sure, you can find
- 7:43happiness there. Do you know what I mean?
- 7:44Like you have to be able to. Yeah, I mean, Camus in in the
- 7:48Myth of Sisyphus, the myth Myth of Sisyphus is the book that
- 7:52where he outlines this, this this sort of argument, right.
- 7:55It might not be in a fully fleshed philosophy, but it's
- 7:57it's certainly a compelling argument.
- 7:59And he talks about Sisyphus rolling the boulder up the hill
- 8:02over and over for the boulder to roll back down.
- 8:05And Sisyphus gets up every day and he continues to roll the
- 8:08boulder up the hill. And for him, that's a good
- 8:10analogy of the pointlessness of human existence.
- 8:14But by the end, he says we must imagine Sisyphus happy, right?
- 8:18In that Sisyphus has found that rebellion against the absurd
- 8:22nature of his existence in itself to be a source of
- 8:26happiness. And that is compelling to me.
- 8:28However, I just think we can find meaning.
- 8:31I just go one step further and I'm like, we can find meaning.
- 8:34Also, as I'm reading, I was reading Myth of Sisyphus this
- 8:37week and I was reading it, I was like, Camus, you make some good
- 8:40points. He's making some good points.
- 8:42And then and then I remembered Camus politics and I was like,
- 8:46actually, shut up. I'm saying shut up.
- 8:50What are you talking about? No, because for real.
- 8:53Because imagine you're reading the guy and you're like, I don't
- 8:56read this guy one bit. It's tough to hit, it's tough to
- 8:59hear. It's tough to listen to, you
- 9:00know, because he's putting ideas in my head.
- 9:02I'm like, wait, pause, hold on, wait a minute.
- 9:04I don't respect you, Yeah. Your voice like I don't respect
- 9:07you, but to be fair, he's a great writer and I can't ignore
- 9:13the how compelling it is. What I would do want to come
- 9:15back to though with your argument is if you accept and
- 9:19like Camus says, humans have an inherent drive to find meaning,
- 9:23right? We have an inherent drive to ask
- 9:25the self or ask ourselves who are we?
- 9:28Why am I here? What am I doing with my life?
- 9:30Right? These are questions that
- 9:31everyone asks. If you're self-conscious, how
- 9:33can you be happy if you can never find the answer to that
- 9:36question? Surely those two are in too much
- 9:38tension to be to to call that person happy do.
- 9:42You know what? That that's a really good
- 9:44argument. And it's probably part of the
- 9:45reason why I don't think I'm an absurdist.
- 9:46Sure. OK, Because I think that
- 9:49argument. I'm not ever arguing that I can
- 9:52find happiness without reading. I'm arguing that people can.
- 9:55It's rational to you that someone could.
- 9:56Could. Yeah, exactly.
- 9:57In the plague, Camus, there was a doctor and obviously during
- 10:02the time there was the bubonic plague and he saw a lot of
- 10:05death, a lot of people dying, and he runs out to help.
- 10:08Help, help, help. Can't do shit.
- 10:10Realises that people are dying. I'm kind of fucked here.
- 10:13And essentially he realises that the only thing he can do is help
- 10:19as much as possible and provide solidarity and empathise with
- 10:22these people. We can't fix this problem, and
- 10:24that is the idea behind having a life without inherent meaning.
- 10:30We can't fix this, but what we can do is connect with people,
- 10:34is use our human, our human situation and how we feel about
- 10:38things to guide our decision making and we can find happiness
- 10:42in that. We can't.
- 10:43We can't ever know, we can't ever fix this plague.
- 10:46People will die and people will continue to die, but what we can
- 10:50do is find some level of solidarity within this and some
- 10:55joy within this chaos, basically.
- 10:57Well, in agreement, I would just say that that thing that you
- 11:00find, as long as it's significant enough, as long as
- 11:04it's like bigger than yourself, I think that is we can call that
- 11:08meaning. I'm just going to step further
- 11:11to say it's not impossible to find meaning.
- 11:14It is impossible to find meaning in the universe, right?
- 11:15It's not given to you, but you can find it and you can be
- 11:18significant enough that you can call it the meaning of your
- 11:20Life, OK. OK.
- 11:22You see what I'm saying? It's a slight difference, but
- 11:23like I think because he would. Argue.
- 11:25That's meaning he would just argue, yeah.
- 11:26Yeah, yeah, He would. He would argue he called it a
- 11:28leap of faith. He called it like a leap of
- 11:31faith in that you have suspended your own disbelief.
- 11:34You know that the universe can never give you meaning, and you
- 11:37know that this thing that you're putting your trust in is also
- 11:39not going to give you meaning. But you take a leap of faith and
- 11:42he's called it living, living in bad faith, which is that you're
- 11:45basically lying to yourself. And I would just disagree with
- 11:48that that that last point. On to the next segment.
- 11:54Is the absurd liberating or terrifying?
- 11:58To me, it's liberating. It's liberating.
- 12:02And, and let's think about this truly like living, trying to
- 12:06find meaning. Yeah.
- 12:08Trying to find meaning in a, in a meaningless world, that's kind
- 12:11of terrifying. But the, the the greatest things
- 12:14in life are both terrifying and liberating.
- 12:16To be liberated, you kind of have to be a little bit scared,
- 12:18right? You kind of you're stepping out
- 12:19into the abyss a little bit. I would lean towards liberating,
- 12:22but I think it's both. That shit is motherfucking
- 12:24terrifying. That shit is terrifying.
- 12:28The song called Viktor Frankel. Frankel observed in a
- 12:31concentration camp that people could enjoy extraordinary
- 12:33suffering if they believed had meaning.
- 12:36And if you think about joy, happiness, they're kind of
- 12:40fragile, while suffering can go on for a long time.
- 12:43So like, think about the example I used in the first segment,
- 12:49which was around your girlfriend losing her job.
- 12:52And but now imagine someone close to you died.
- 12:55And that's the absurd now. And people's minds literally
- 13:01break. People have psychosis, they have
- 13:03disassociation. People's minds literally break
- 13:05trying to deal with this problem, right?
- 13:07The way most people deal with this problem is they lived a
- 13:10good life. They give it meaning.
- 13:12They, they lived a healthy life, they lived a long life.
- 13:16They were a great person. They create narratives around
- 13:20these things and give this death, this bit of grief
- 13:24meaning. Oh, I, I'm grieving so hard
- 13:27because I love so hard. Do you understand?
- 13:29And all this meaning allows you to continue.
- 13:32And to me, otherwise it would be terrifying, bro.
- 13:35Like terrifying. But like you couldn't apply that
- 13:38meaning to something that was horrible.
- 13:41Like when shit happens, what we do is apply meaning to it.
- 13:44And if you can't apply meaning to it, Oh no man, like living in
- 13:48that. You, you are right.
- 13:49You are right. I think, I think it does provide
- 13:52a lot of solace. Let me pose this question to
- 13:54you. In those moments of turmoil,
- 13:55right? In those moments of extreme
- 13:59stress or grief where you don't, you can't find answers to
- 14:03something that's happened to you, whether it's loss of a
- 14:06close relative or loss of a job. Isn't the fact that everyone is
- 14:10going through the same thing and everyone has gone through the
- 14:13same thing? Isn't that some solace in in and
- 14:16itself, like the fact that you are living a very human
- 14:19experience, like grief and loss is a human experience that other
- 14:23people will face? Isn't that some solace?
- 14:25I guess it would without meaning, right?
- 14:27It's not. It's not that you have to apply
- 14:29meaning. Yeah.
- 14:29You're. Just understanding that this is
- 14:30a human response to this thing happening.
- 14:32Yeah, or maybe even the fact that other people go through it
- 14:35is in itself some kind of meaning, right?
- 14:38You could, but like I I thought the point you were arguing there
- 14:40was that this is like a human response to it, This is a
- 14:43biological response to it, and once you understand that this is
- 14:45a biological response to it, you can move on.
- 14:48Afterwards, no, no, I'm not saying it's a biological
- 14:50response. I'm saying more that so many
- 14:53other people go through what you're going through and it not
- 14:56necessarily on a biological level, but they are faced with
- 14:59the same circumstances and they survive.
- 15:02Yeah. But I, I would, I would say
- 15:03that's then applying meaning to it as well.
- 15:06Do you get what I mean? That's applying some sort of
- 15:08narrative. I thought you were the
- 15:09biological point would be like separate from that.
- 15:12I guess my overall point is that it's less terrifying than it
- 15:15seems because everyone's going through it with you.
- 15:18You're not like, alone in this terrifying.
- 15:20Thing like a completely unique experience.
- 15:22Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly. Yeah, I, I, I guess that would
- 15:25provide some solace. But as I'm saying.
- 15:27Like where's the meaning coming? From you're still applying
- 15:29meaning. Yeah.
- 15:29Do you know what I mean? You're still.
- 15:30You're still applying meaning to, to this horrible thing
- 15:33that's happened to you, like when people run marathons, for
- 15:35example. Imagine like you, you just
- 15:37wouldn't do it if you couldn't apply meaning to it, like or you
- 15:40wouldn't do your hierarchies or you do you know what I mean?
- 15:42If, if all these tough things that happen in life, you
- 15:45wouldn't do them if you couldn't apply meaning to it.
- 15:48So I I just think if joy is so fragile and happiness is so
- 15:51fragile because it's reliant on external things you can't
- 15:55control, once those things are chipped away at, I'm there
- 15:58backing suffering quickly to your I'm back quick you're.
- 16:01Right. You're right.
- 16:02I think that makes a lot of sense.
- 16:04And I guess what I did was apply meaning, so I took it out of.
- 16:07The absurd, anyway, Yeah. Yeah.
- 16:08So I just, I just did the the the thing again.
- 16:11I did the existentialist thing. Yeah, Yeah.
- 16:14No, that's fair. That's fair.
- 16:15I mean, what what I want to touch on a little bit and maybe
- 16:19in this segment here is take it out of the philosophical for a
- 16:23second and talk about the political right.
- 16:26I want to talk about like people's ability to deal with
- 16:29the absurd, right? Can you obviously condemn, not
- 16:32condemns, but like he looks down on the leap of faith, right?
- 16:38If you are faced with the absurd, you take a leap of faith
- 16:41where you're like, cool, I'm going to trust in some higher
- 16:44deity. I'm going to trust in this
- 16:47ideology, I'm going to trust in this institution.
- 16:50But obviously we don't do this in a vacuum.
- 16:51Do you see what I'm saying? Like we all have our lives.
- 16:53We've got stuff going on. And our ability to take on the
- 16:57absurd and challenge like these deep questions is shaped by our
- 17:02economics, the way we're brought up, like where we live in the
- 17:05world. So one thing I think Myth of
- 17:09Sisyphus leaves like on the table for me is that real life
- 17:14consideration. Like, sure, I can read mythos
- 17:17sis verse. I can do, I can ask myself these
- 17:20questions. We can sit here, we can debate.
- 17:23But there might be someone who's got time to do all of that.
- 17:25Yeah, exactly. You know what I'm saying?
- 17:26Like it's just like. Just tell me what I need to
- 17:29know. Yeah, Tell.
- 17:30Me what I need to do I need to know.
- 17:31Yeah. So I think it's worth saying
- 17:33that as as much as because we're talking about the meaning of
- 17:36life. This is big shit.
- 17:37Yeah, there's privilege in even being able to ask yourself that
- 17:40question. Yeah, exactly.
- 17:41When I was talking about the first question, what I was
- 17:43referring to when I said when I brought up the university story
- 17:47was the fact that he could do that because he was from a rich
- 17:52family. In fact, do you understand that?
- 17:53You could think like, oh, I only get to enjoy this or I don't
- 17:58have to like think about work like I'm doing this because I
- 18:00like this, you know what I mean? And like my mind never ever went
- 18:05there. I always saw it as a means to an
- 18:07end, whilst he probably saw himself as an end in and of
- 18:10itself, which is the difference between people with money and
- 18:15people without. Essential facts, obviously.
- 18:17Resources. We both grew up in similar
- 18:20similar circumstances. My dad was like you're evil
- 18:23doctor or nothing. Gee, don't tell me about nothing
- 18:26else. Take this MCAT, I'm giving you
- 18:28all the books and read it and become a doctor.
- 18:31Do you know what I'm saying? And in your house, it's probably
- 18:33similar, like there's lawyer, there's doctor, engineer,
- 18:37engineer. I didn't.
- 18:38I never heard the word engineer in my house.
- 18:39I'll be real. I never got that one, I hear.
- 18:43It it's like, yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly.
- 18:45But yeah, you're absolutely right.
- 18:46Like we didn't there was no thinking about what's the
- 18:50meaning of life. You go to church and that's it
- 18:51exactly. Sort it out.
- 18:52Just. Everything 4IN next step but and
- 18:56and it's captainism. But we're we're told in this
- 19:02world, we're not ends in and of ourselves.
- 19:04We are a means to an end. And the next thing is the next
- 19:07stage. The next thing is the next stage
- 19:09and you do X to equal Y And the only way you can focus on
- 19:14yourself is if you have the resources.
- 19:16Yeah, first, I mean this kind of, I didn't really actually get
- 19:20to flesh this thought out when I was doing my prep, but it when I
- 19:24was thinking about absurd and the tension between trying to
- 19:26find meaning in the world and not and, and our desire to find
- 19:31that meaning and it not being there, that tension probably you
- 19:33was thinking like this. There's absurdism all over the
- 19:36world, right? If you think about capitalism,
- 19:38you mention capitalism. Capitalism.
- 19:40If you speak to a capitalist, they'll say what capitalism's
- 19:43brought us, brought a billion people out of poverty.
- 19:45Capitalism's responsible for all this growth, all this progress,
- 19:50right? But there's still people in
- 19:52poverty. There's still people on the
- 19:54streets. Do you know what I'm saying?
- 19:55There's this weird absurdism in all of the systems that we're a
- 19:58part of. Think about politics.
- 20:00It's like, Oh yeah, the, the people pick the politicians.
- 20:03Politicians don't give a fuck about us.
- 20:05They literally there's no resonance there because.
- 20:07The absurd is basically the acknowledgement that people are
- 20:12trying to tell you that this is the answer to your problem.
- 20:16This will give your life meaning, this will fix
- 20:19everything. And then realising that it
- 20:22doesn't and then having to be in between that.
- 20:25Facts, basically facts. Just knowing that nothing is
- 20:29nothing's coming to save you, that nothing is coming to save
- 20:31you. No philosophy, no religion, no
- 20:34political theory is coming to save you.
- 20:37And once you acknowledge that, it's a very great area to.
- 20:40To existing facts. And when I was watching Mark
- 20:44Carney's speech at Davos a month ago, like my mind went back to
- 20:47that, that Mark Carney speech because just a quick reminder,
- 20:50he's talking about the international rules based order
- 20:53as the Prime Minister of Canada. And he basically admitted in
- 20:57that speech that the international rules based order
- 20:59works for the West and that Canada has been a beneficiary of
- 21:04that by partnering with the US. And whenever the US and other
- 21:09allies in the West have broken that tree of the international
- 21:13rules based order and exploited it for their gain, Canada's
- 21:17turned a blind eye. And it's like, is absurd that
- 21:22they would enforce these rules on the entire world but break
- 21:26those rules themselves. Do you know what I mean?
- 21:28And then it's even more absurd for someone who's been complicit
- 21:31in that for so long, like Canada, because the US is now an
- 21:35aggressor and it doesn't work for them.
- 21:37It's even more absurd for them to be like, look, guys, let's
- 21:41think about this now. It's been sparked for us.
- 21:45It's not work for. Us No, no, no.
- 21:47So let's, let's, let's do some work.
- 21:49So I, I thought it was weird because I thought that that is
- 21:52another example, I guess in a different way of the absurd
- 21:56dislike. You're told this thing, but the
- 21:59reality is just in conflict with that.
- 22:01And really there's no reprieve for all those countries in in
- 22:04Africa who have been fucked over by that rules based order.
- 22:07That is great area. There's nothing.
- 22:09Then there's no recourse. You can't go back and be like,
- 22:11oh, actually run me back Those natural resources, they're just
- 22:14done. Do you know what I mean?
- 22:16And so I thought I was a quite interesting paralogue.
- 22:18Yeah, 100%. OK, on to the last segment.
- 22:24A new system analysis. Billions of human lives,
- 22:27careers, relationships, achievements, happiness, regret.
- 22:31It can now predict the life path, where you are most likely
- 22:34to look back and feel your life was worthwhile.
- 22:37People who followed their assigned path report higher
- 22:39satisfaction and fewer regrets. But the company makes something
- 22:43clear. The path isn't based on destiny
- 22:45or purpose. It's simply the most
- 22:48statistically effective life for Someone Like You.
- 22:52You receive your result. Would you follow the system?
- 22:55Do you know what I would be super interested to see what the
- 22:58the system don't be like? Do I become a prambula like?
- 23:05But no, I would I would reject what the system said to me
- 23:07because I I do think that you yourself have to face that grey
- 23:11area. You have to face the void and
- 23:13you have to find meaning in your own life.
- 23:15Someone else can't do that for you.
- 23:17But I can't lie. I'll be fucking curious to see
- 23:20what this. Says I'm a little bit of a
- 23:22fatalist in it. Yeah.
- 23:24So if we accept that history has happened and history influences
- 23:28the future, and if that's happened, that means the
- 23:30future's probably predetermined. That's basically the the logic
- 23:35of right thought, right? Even still, then you would
- 23:37think, OK, like, go and do this, right?
- 23:39Like the if you think it's already going to happen.
- 23:41So would would fatalism inform that that choice?
- 23:44Well, it's sort of yeah, because it's kind of like meta, because
- 23:48you would always make the decision you're going to make
- 23:50anyway, right? Yeah.
- 23:52You could never like actually step out of the precise.
- 23:55Yeah, yeah. But the experience of choosing
- 23:58is what's important. I think the experience of
- 24:00choice, the experience of discovering things, still
- 24:03matter. The illusion of choice, yes,
- 24:05yeah, yeah, yeah. OK so so you think it it is
- 24:07genuinely an illusion that so you would feel like you're
- 24:09making a choice, but really it was predetermined.
- 24:11That's a bit mad though. It's.
- 24:13Not that mad like, because do you know what is the great thing
- 24:16about this is we don't know. We'll never know they're.
- 24:21Never really that, man. You can believe this, but like,
- 24:25you don't really know and I know I don't really know.
- 24:29So and you also know that I can't know and correctly.
- 24:32Exactly. So it's not even going down or
- 24:34anything like, so it doesn't really matter.
- 24:36But the experience of discovering things and like
- 24:38choosing things I think is important, at least the illusion
- 24:41of it. So I think if you were to choose
- 24:46that, you're essentially removing that experience and
- 24:50your life is sort of becoming optimised by data.
- 24:53And I just can't see that being a a fulfilling feeling.
- 24:57So would you, would you do it for fulfilment?
- 25:00Would you You reject it? Reject.
- 25:02It I'm rejecting it, yeah. But but if, let's say the
- 25:05system's correct and you would actually be more fulfilled if
- 25:08you did go, would you go for it? Let's say like the machines are
- 25:12actually perfect. Probably not.
- 25:14No, why not? What's what's what's stopping
- 25:16you if you you want to make the choice based on fulfilment?
- 25:20It's probably because I'm, I'm really struggling with the idea
- 25:23that you can be fulfilled and remove choice.
- 25:28I, I think theoretically I probably would say yes to to to
- 25:31your question, but in reality, I just don't know if that actually
- 25:34works like that. You know what?
- 25:35I mean like. Because obviously we're given,
- 25:38this is obviously a made-up dilemma, but the data is that
- 25:41people have felt most fulfilled doing it.
- 25:43Right, but it's not I'm. Assuming those people were happy
- 25:47to give up choice as well because they chose to do right,
- 25:49You get what I mean? But yeah, that's yeah.
- 25:51So I probably wouldn't do it. That's interesting because I
- 25:54thought you were leading me to you would do it.
- 25:57I thought you were going to get you were going to get me there.
- 25:58I. Probably wouldn't, man.
- 26:00I like, you know, I like my autonomy.
- 26:02I hear if there's one thing I like, I.
- 26:03Hear it? Freedoms.
- 26:04Yeah, it's freedoms. If there's one thing I like is
- 26:06freedoms. But on some level, this system
- 26:10that you've described is actually the system we live in.
- 26:14Like it doesn't appear that way, but that's more or less it.
- 26:16Like we have all these influences on our lives that
- 26:19kind of enforce a worldview that the right career is doctor,
- 26:24engineer or lawyer, right? Our parents, our parents have a
- 26:27massive influence on who we've become, right?
- 26:29Then there's another layer of the society.
- 26:31There's everyone at school saying, oh, those, the guys who
- 26:34became lawyers, they have more prestige, right?
- 26:37That is kind of the system. The system is telling you that's
- 26:39the right thing to do. And the system's also giving you
- 26:41this feedback of, oh, the guys who were lawyers, bring them
- 26:44back into the schools. Like, do a talk, like the
- 26:47doctors calm and like, everyone's like, wow, the
- 26:49doctors, you know what I mean? And that's more or less the
- 26:52system we're in. And people unwillingly actually
- 26:55just buy into the system. They don't really know what
- 26:57they're doing. But until you kind of like break
- 27:00out of that spell and, and in some way pick your life for
- 27:04yourself, I can't see fulfilment.
- 27:07I just can't see it. Yeah, because there just will
- 27:09come to a moment later in life where you're like, fuck, it was
- 27:13all a lie. It was all a lie.
- 27:15Like, what did I do this thing? Is this an unexamined life?
- 27:18And I don't know if that that's ever right.
- 27:20And you know how much you change over time as well. 100%.
- 27:24There's there's probably things that you thought were true and
- 27:26believed in that you no longer do, and there'll be things you
- 27:29don't believe in right now that you eventually will as well.
- 27:31So to try and rely on one thing as your North Star is a little
- 27:35bit. It's tough.
- 27:37I mean, I'll bring up a quick example and I'll I'll see what
- 27:41you what you think about it. This idea of like having kids.
- 27:43Yeah, I was watching Love is Blind, the one in Ohio or
- 27:46whatever. And one of the couples went to a
- 27:50parent like visiting the parents and the mum heard that the
- 27:53couple were thinking and I have kids.
- 27:55She and she she goes mad. Obviously generational
- 27:58difference, like personal preference, whatever, whatever.
- 28:00My question to you is, is there any part of life that you think
- 28:04we don't need to over deep? Like, do we examine everything
- 28:08about life or are there things that the generation before gives
- 28:12us that I call fair? Or do we need to examine
- 28:15everything? Just like accepting something
- 28:17from a generation before, essentially.
- 28:18Yeah, or the system or some some narrative that you're told about
- 28:21life or, you know, some source of meaning.
- 28:24Is there something that? That, I think should remain.
- 28:27Yeah. And, and we shouldn't need to.
- 28:29We don't need to examine that because what what we'll find
- 28:31out. People, we've only got so much
- 28:32time. We can't examine everything on
- 28:35some level. When a doctor says, ah, floss,
- 28:38I'm like, cool, a floss dentist said Floss.
- 28:41Yeah. But is there something about
- 28:43life, like life's choices, like living in a city or?
- 28:47Trying to think of something. Bury me two seconds.
- 28:50That's it. Having kids.
- 28:53How deeply have you examined that that that choice?
- 28:55Or do you think it's a biological?
- 28:57This is something that might be a little bit, I think, swearing
- 29:01in front of adults. I think that's something that we
- 29:05received from older generations that I think should remain
- 29:08without examining it. We understand that words have
- 29:11value. We understand that words are
- 29:13important and have impact. And you understand that this
- 29:15word is a derogatory term, so it should not be used in front of
- 29:21people older than you that you're supposed to have some
- 29:23respect for. Fair, fair.
- 29:25That's probably one thing. At what point, though, does it
- 29:29do you like, OK, we need to we need to, we need to think about
- 29:31this. So for example, one of your
- 29:33parents friends come is in the house and you got to prostate.
- 29:37Yeah, like, and he's like, no, no, like all the way, bro.
- 29:42Like at at at what point is it like this is oppressive bro,
- 29:46Like you're violating? The moment you ask you to do it,
- 29:50there's no way I'm ever fucking doing that.
- 29:53There's no way I'm fucking doing that right?
- 29:55OK, so So what if uncle's like prostate are we like?
- 29:59Impossible. Swear we ain't.
- 30:01Fucking about with that. OK.
- 30:03So so that's that's interesting. That's interesting.
- 30:06We ain't fucking about with none of that right.
- 30:07Like our wedding different story.
- 30:09Like it's part of the whole ceremony.
- 30:10All good fun. It's just fun like you're you're
- 30:13participating in the in the fun of it all.
- 30:15But if like come to your yard and it's like me, you and like
- 30:19someone else and you're just like like that.
- 30:21You just don't fuck you. But.
- 30:28That's the meaning that they imbue.
- 30:29Online, Yeah, yeah, that's too much that.
- 30:31That has nothing to do with me. Yeah, yeah, yeah, on on some
- 30:34level I'm a bit like, I feel bad though when I even truck a
- 30:40tradition to to one side, even though it's oppressive to the
- 30:43younger generation. I'm like, if it's means so much
- 30:46to them, it's kind of peak. That's their meaning like that.
- 30:50That's how they establish who they are.
- 30:53Yeah, it's a deeper thing. And I.
- 30:54And I think we can find a balance like I, I That's why I
- 30:57use not swearing for example. Yeah, yeah.
- 30:59And I. Think there is somewhere but for
- 31:00me to lie on my chest? Anyhow, we'll see you soon.
- 31:06Alright then, see you next week. Much love.