View Full Version : Is the answer to Life 50/50
phlanx
Oct 11, 2009, 11:04 AM
Hello
Poser - Is chance a man made philosophy or is a force of nature that we live with
We all recognise that everything has an opposite and equal reaction
Nature shows us in every aspect it is survival of the best
Or is that true
When a plant grows and seeds the next generation, the new plants will grow and both compliment and anger its neighbours
To the point where some species will thrive and some will be extinct
So is it really survival of the fitist or merely chance that a species will grow where another cannot
Every decision man makes on himself, has a 50/50 consequence, which in turns has a 50/50 on the people around him - causal effect
It is this causal effect of chance that keeps life moving forward, and as such the answer to life is 50/50?
Thoughts please - make sense or am I losing it :rolleyes:
firmbeliever
Oct 11, 2009, 11:50 PM
50/50 chance exists in choices where there are only two options, like try to shoot yourself, you live or die, try to shoot someone else you either hit the target or miss the target.
Lets just say there was another person there near the intended target, you shoot that person by mistake. Or shooting oneself, we don't die, but cause injury that is worse than being alive because that would mean spending money,causing more work for everyone else because of being incapacitated.
Now what does that make, surely not the 50/50 chance we envisioned, because we did not consider the other factors in the scenario.
I read your other post in the philosophy section about overweight and underweight kids, for some it does not matter whether they eat sweets or not, they put on weight, because of their genetics or because they have something different with their metabolism.Some do not put on weight no matter how much sweets they eat.
We can say something is good or bad, right or wrong, but we have to only look at people to realise that the very simple criteria of right and wrong has so many levels on it, there are very few people who will agree whether something is right or wrong in any given situation.
Only programmed machines can make that 50/50 chance.Like the computer it is either 1 or 0
When we consider humans we have to consider so many factors that make us human and that there are other humans like us to make it even more complicated.
In a spiritual sense not every right results in a right or every wrong in a wrong because I believe destiny/ fate does not work that way in this world.
A tree that grows, the seeds may be healthy or not healthy, it may grow the same as the parent tree or even bigger or smaller but the factors depending on that is the environment,sunlight,soil,air,water.
When we stop to consider all of those things, it seems like 50/50 chance is not the right calculation.Because there are in between levels of being half right or half wrong, most options are not black and white.
Yes there are 50/50 options of basic right or wrong,good or bad,but the outcomes are not 50/50.Different levels of loss or gain makes each choice different.
What each person considers as a gain or loss is different.
Natural events like birth or death are not choices we make, but it effects us and causes a change in and around us. In these situations 50/50 option is not relevant.
.
phlanx
Oct 13, 2009, 05:12 AM
50/50 offers three choices :
Yes - No - Don't know
One person making a decision will make it based on their own interpretation of what is good or bad
A group of people will still make the decision individually based on the same criteria
It is only a majority voting system that makes the judgment sway one way or the other
The sweet thing was obviously very simplified, but let me expand it
When a choice is presented to someone they make a decision of what is available to them
To eat a sweet or not to eat a sweet
When someone sees that peron eating a sweet, they have three available judgments to them
Is that a good thing, is it a bad thing or is it I just don't care
Or
I like the look of that sweet, don't like the look of the sweet, not bothered eitherway of what the sweet looks like
One persons decision effects the next person, and a choice can be made available to them as a by product of the former decision
As you state birth and death
Birth is based on a decision your parents made - To have sex or not (or have IVF! Or not)
The sex of the unborn will be decided by the chromosomes, Boy/Girl/Mix
Death can be seen in the same way mounting from a multitide of choices but still on the same principle
To smoke or not to, to quit or not to. To drink, eat meat etc etc
All these choices we make will either extend or decrease lifespans
When a choice is made of our control, if a virus is contracted, it is still a choice being made
To infect or not to infect
How we preceive a choice has nothing to do with the options available to us, which will always be 50/50
TUT317
Oct 15, 2009, 02:53 PM
Hello Phlanx,
Your ideas sound a little like determinism and free will as found in some Eastern philosophies.
A type of moral cause and effect. My actions good or bad will always impinge on other people. Good choices are those actions which promote good consequences for others and eventually I will benefit from the choices I have made.
phlanx
Oct 15, 2009, 03:17 PM
EVening Tut,
I like the way that eastern philosophy was able to be encouraged for the large part, so it gives us a glimpse that man still hasn't changed much, it is just his environment
Mmm, swaying a little away here, whereas I can appreciate good karma generally is a good idea, the idea of good choice promotes good consequences slaps the Zen riddles in the face :)
There is no way we can determine whether an outcome to a good choice is good or bad, as the end can never been seen
Our choices effects each other just as each others effects ours
A choice was made way back when to determine our future as a human race, where as we would not be solitary animals but live in packs/herds or families
Therefore our choices effected the members of the family, which has now grown into 6bn worldwide
Just as a decision for me on a Sunday is shall I eat bacon, or not, a decision of 300m people voting in a particular leader will have influence on the decisions of my government which then has an influence of me
Therefore some choices are made by previous choices out of our control
However the choice is always the same, 50/50, a perfect game of chance for life to be always moving forward
Turning a little political here, a good government was thought of as having opposing forces, called checks and balances, - first thought of in Roman Times, this way of thinking is still apparent today with most Democratic Countries having two main parties fighting it out
Again, the basic rule here is 50/50, republican or democrate, Conservative or Labour etc
Again, man doesn't change but the suits do :)
Maggie 3
Oct 22, 2009, 04:29 PM
You get out of life , what you put in it. We reap what we sow. Our thoughts are seeds,
So think good, positive thoughts. We all want a good harvest.
GOOD PLANTING,
Maggie 3
aravind indian
Dec 8, 2009, 06:23 AM
Hey... thatz a good question u have.. there are no question or answers,there is no bad nor good... theses thing exist only,bescause we believed it strongly that it is.. so by this ,after all we are human our knowledge will not be 100% , this is were those 50/50 things goes on to mind.
ChicagosUgliest
Jan 8, 2010, 11:29 PM
Hello
Poser - Is chance a man made philosophy or is a force of nature that we live with
Predetermination is an ugly, ugly beast. There's a whole section of research dedicated to chaos theory (and in particular, quantum chaos). Even highly-structured, deterministic systems can have random variance at the subatomic level, so I'd say that randomness is inherent to the universe.
We all recognise that everything has an opposite and equal reaction
Nature shows us in every aspect it is survival of the best
Or is that true
"Best" is a subjective term. "Most fit" is a better term, as certain traits might work well in one ecology, but might be problematic in another. At the same time, an environmental crisis that rapidly changes the clime or staple food source can immediately cause a population bottleneck, and survival is completely random. Look up genetic drift, population bottleneck, and founder effect for more info.
Every decision man makes on himself, has a 50/50 consequence, which in turns has a 50/50 on the people around him - causal effect
It is this causal effect of chance that keeps life moving forward, and as such the answer to life is 50/50?
Thoughts please - make sense or am I losing it :rolleyes:
Nothing is ever so simple as if to say life is binary or consequences of choice are mutually exclusive. Especially when you get into issues of moral relativism, there are hundreds of shades of grey that apply to each situation. I'd be slightly wary of trying to reduce everything down to a series of on-off switches, as this tends to oversimplify your decision-making process and really screws up your moral and ethical identity.