Friday, April 10, 2009

What The Hell Are You Doing and Why?

There are so many stupid questions with flawed premises and therefore stupid conclusions masquerading around as 'deep' nowadays. One is especially poignant in my mind today. I was in a class this morning that was discussing Dante's Purgatorio and it is said, "O human race! If you knew everything, no need for Mary to have borne a son." Hmmm.... It might be a natural human inclination to react immediately and emotionally to any theologically charged statement. So you can imagine the kind of discussion that would have ensued. It should seem obvious that before reacting to this kind of statement we need to ask what the premises of this statement are. So... why did Mary have to bear a son? Only after an answer is proferred for such a question we can analyze the validity of the statement.

All right so that aside, here's the related stupid question: Are you saved? It's so ridiculous that there's no way to respond. It's like walking up to a stranger on the street and asking "Is he guilty as charged?" Who? What are we talking about? And most importantly, why should I give a damn?

It seems as though many people try to separate religion from all else in their mind, beliefs, behavior, and so on thereby creating two personalities and constant cognitive disonnance. Someone may say consciously or unconsciously, "I believe in the scientific method Monday through Saturday but on Sunday I believe I'm drinking the blood of a 2000 year old god who is now everywhere and nowhere." Ever wonder why you feel weighed down and stressed? You suffer from the burden of inconsistency. You have made two mutually incompatible assumptions about reality and your mind can't resolve it: it is your mind verses reality and reality is winning. Reality always wins.

Stop fighting yourself. There is no truth that is inconsistent with any other truth. Truth is real. Anything that is real, must be real. By definition. There is nothing more real than what you can experientially know for yourself to be real. Do not ever assume that any hearsay is more real than your experiences. If saved means happy then yes I want to be happy. If saved means strumming a harp and doing nothing forever with your jackass of a God who does that then no, I surely do not ever under any circumstances want to be saved. What you call hell I venture to guess will be a more happy place. I know it'll be more interesting. Check your premises.

Wednesday, April 8, 2009

Power of Choice

Within the framework we have established there is a fundamental governing principle: causality. By controlling our actions we control the effects that will be brought about. The effects of some actions are individual happiness. The effects of other actions are individual misery. A basic tenet of eternalism is that of consequence. By our actions we fully merit and deserve the associated consequences. The eternalist believes in the freedom of and accountability for individual choice.

By saying that the doer of an action fully merits the consequences of that action we imply that the doer has full freedom to choose his action. This is true. The eternalist is a doer, an active participant and controller of the events around him. The eternalist is an optimizer, ever working to optimize his circumstances by his choices to adhere to the laws of well-being and provident living. All of these principles are completely contrary to victimhood. The eternalist is never a victim of any kind. Unfortunate or tragic things will befall him but he is not a victim because of how he chooses to respond to such opposition. The eternalist values his power of choice more than any other. Eternalists may even thrive best in states of constant opposition because such an environment is most conducive to the constant re-evaluation of beliefs and behaviors that the eternalist craves. The environment of opposition continually reinforces the truthfulness of the principles valued by the eternalist. He will always be right and happy because when he discovers himself to be wrong or unhappy he immediately busies himself with discovering the cause and needed change and expeditiously executes the required change of belief and behavior.

Choice is the source of all power for all rational beings. Because rational beings have the freedom to choose and moreover the freedom to learn and make continually better or more informed choices, the rational being naturally merits what he gets, happiness or misery. The justice of the optimizer living at peace with himself and the perpetual misery of the victim is a natural law of reality predicated on the power and accountability of choice of the individual. A rational being will increase in knowledge and power as he chooses to do so. The same rational being will forfeit power and freedom as he chooses to do that. The state of any rational being is a result of the use of that being's power of choice. Choice is the great governing power of intelligence. Intelligence is intelligence because it possesses the power of choice.

Tuesday, April 7, 2009

Redefining Faith

Too many false religions, false beliefs, and inconsistent philosophies owe their existence to a ridiculous and incorrect concept of faith. Irrational faith, unsupported faith, hysterical faith, screaming faith, and fanatical faith has caused the suffering and unhappiness of billions. Faith requiring unshakable, unswerving, unquestioned, and complete dedication to unfounded, unreasonable, un-evidenced, and mystic falsehoods has given us the crusades, the jihad, the holocaust, not to mention years of self inflicted suffering and unhappiness in slavery to imposters of the truth. What's worse, the very fact that a belief is unsubstantiated often is used as evidence of faith's supposed greatness. This is absolute idiocy.

So what is faith, if not the belief in the unbelievable? Faith is an action of the rational and logical mind. Faith is anticipating an increase in truth from a source of already received truth. When we have faith, it is true we believe something we do not yet know, but there must be a consistent reason for that belief. Faith is not blind, it is not given freely, and it should never be unquestioned. Faith is an evolving, seeking, reaching thing by which we intuitively search for truths.

Furthermore, once we hold faith in a particular idea, that is not enough. Faith is not the goal, it is a tool. We attain faith and then must continue to strive for complete knowledge. Finding knowledge will be a sequential, step by step process of having faith in an apparently reasonable idea, testing and applying the idea, reevaluating our faith to adjust, reject, or confirm it and always moving forward in the search for knowledge. When we view faith as the ever-changing tool to true knowledge. Faith is useful, thought evoking, and most importantly, will contribute to our personal happiness. Finally, faith is too often associated only with religion. The principle of faith should be applied in all fields. Obviously this is only possible if faith is a consistent and useful principle, not the cow dung found in popular religion. Faith to the Eternalist is simply a continuously examined belief in logical conclusions based upon established truths. What else would be reasonable?

God the Optimizer

The God that most people believe in nowadays is a total douchebag. A complete bastard. God is supposedly the jackass that smiles at all the emaciated orphans, the Holocaust, new plagues every few years and so on. Apparently he's just doing this for his own amusement and to make you afraid. He craves your fear. He keeps you in the dark. He grants you no vision. He condemns you to be stoned for picking your nose on the ninth day of the third month; starves your family with famine because he can. It earns your fear. God paving the road of hell with skulls of unbaptized children. God condemning all people born before an apparently temporally significant saving event occurs. If this is your God then your God is a jackass whose worship will make you miserable. Have fun.

Place your definitions in proper order. Choose to make your focus your happiness. We have thus far discussed how all our frameworks for understanding and dealing with our environment must come from our fundamental assumptions about reality itself. We have explored and presented definitions for a consistent God of Happiness. The characteristics and attributes of God are contingent upon the nature of reality. These attributes have begun to be explored. The God of Happiness is a master of reality. He has all knowledge of all natural laws and uses that knowledge to live in complete harmony with what is. Complete knowledge of reality has given him power to live fully in harmony with reality (yielding a fullness of happiness) and the ability to control effects by controlling causes. This is the nature of his power. This is consistent.

All rational beings are capable of choosing to progress toward greater knowledge of and commitment to live in harmony with reality. Thus all rational beings are capable of choosing to make these attributes of God attributes of themselves. In an infinite unfolding of time these beings, through consistent choice, will be gain a fullness of joy themselves and therefore be Gods themselves (as we have defined God).

The Consistent God, the God of Happiness is God the Optimizer. Optimization in any context is the process of reevaluating methods and algorithms to accomplish specified goals faster (time optimization) or with fewer resources (resource optimization). Gods and Beings of Happiness (rational beings in the process of choosing to gain knowledge and committing to live in greater harmony with reality) thus continually optimize the process for gaining joy. A God can increase his dominion. God the Optimizer can optimize the increase of his dominion by placing rational beings (who may choose to progress) in the optimal circumstances for their progress. This is progress on an infinite timeline. Death is irrelevant. Only happiness of the individual matters. Within this context happiness naturally becomes a choice independent of externally imposed circumstance. The Being of Happiness is never a victim of any kind. The Being of Happiness will choose to act, to do those things which will bring happiness. Work, learn, understand. Above all, worship truth. The Being of Happiness chooses to be an optimizer.

Optimizers cannot be victims and victims cannot be optimizers. The optimzer will take whatever he has and through the course of living by the natural laws of hard work and rational choice will reap the natural rewards. The optimizer will always come out on top. To choose to be an optimizer is to choose to be successful. To be successful is to be in a state of happiness without reservation.

Monday, April 6, 2009

Independence.

Progression is a personal thing. There is no shortcut, no easy way around, no secrets, no possibility of progressing on someone else's merit. That is just not how it works. We are responsible for who we are every step of the way. It has become widely believed that all people have so called "rights"; rights to houses, cars, jobs, protection, health care, and all matter of things. This is completely and totally false. These things are never rights, they are privileges. The privileges of work. The only right any of us has is to progress ourselves and to strive for happiness. Anything beyond that is inconsistent and impossible.

Debt is a terrible thing in any form. It enslaves a man to his wants or supposed needs. Debt results from attempting to have what we have not achieved. To be who we are not and to claim what we do not own. It restricts happiness, retards progression, and destroys confidence. Debt should be avoided as the plague if none currently exists and fled as if from a burning building when one is in it. Still a repaid debt is far better than living at an other's expense.

To live off handouts, food stamps, taxpayer money, charity, begging, or any other form of living that comes at an other's expense when we are capable of supporting ourselves to any degree is among the most degraded thing a man can do. It is choosing to be a rock when offered the choice of progressing towards perfection. It is giving up, it is becoming worthless, and is worthy of nothing but contempt and disregard. It can never be the responsibility of another to pull someone along who doesn't have the self respect to do it themselves. Life is not valuable or sacred simply because it is life, life is valuable in direct relation to how it is used. The life of the thief, the murderer, the idle, the lazy, the willing slave, the apathetic, and the willfully useless is not equal to the life of the worker, the consistent, the truthful, the seeker, the contributor, and the independent. It is a grave mistake to think these lives are the same.

The Eternalist is strong enough and self respecting enough to never live at an other's expense. The Eternalist contributes, strives for perfection, takes personal responsibility, and expects the same of others. The Eternalist is proud of accomplishment and strives to increase it. Eternalism understands the honor of work.

Guilt And Entitlement

I will not apologize for my talents. I will not apologize for being happy. I will not apologize for things I have worked hard for. If you don't value hard work or self-sufficiency then I don't give a damn about your feelings. You are not entitled to the fruits of my labor. You will not get a cent or a tear from me if your life sucks.

Guilt is an evil vice that turns otherwise good people into slaves. If you live consistent with a consistent philosophy then there is never any reason for feeling guilt. You will still make mistakes because your knowledge is incomplete. But you acted exactly how you should have according to what you knew and you should be proud of that even if you were ultimately wrong. Guilt is a waste of time. It neither helps me nor you. What's done is done and can't be undone. Since I live a consistent eternalist philosophy I will learn from my mistakes whether or not I feel guilty. Feeling guilty will merely make me miserable. I choose to be happy. I will not feel guilty.

My success does not make me your slave. Screw you. My success must surely come as a result of adherence to natural law. Everyone who exalts the honor of work of body and mind will reap the natural rewards. I have no moral or social obligation to share my duly earned rewards with anyone else. If you want to be happy then do those things which must surely lead to happiness. If you don't want to do all those things then you are welcome to have a miserable existence until you die in disgusting squalor. I will surely not obstruct your right to be miserable. And you will surely not obstruct my right to be happy. What I do with my duly earned resources is my choice. You may choose to ask for material or philosophical help. I may choose to help you because I know helping you will increase my happiness. But you cannot demand my help. And if you feel entitled to something I have earned you can fornicate yourself with an iron stick.

I will not apologize for choosing to be right. Feel free to exercise your right to be right and happy or stubbornly wrong and miserable.

Sunday, April 5, 2009

Just Death, Nothing More

Death. One of the most illogical and inconsistent views persistently held by the majority of humanity is that death is a fearsome and innately evil thing. Incredibly, in so believing, people relegate themselves to unavoidable misery and failure. Everybody dies. In order to be happy, it is entirely necessary to have a proper and realistic understanding of death.

Two possibilities exist, either death is an end to our being or merely a step in our progression. The first option certainly doesn't give any reason to fear death, no existence is neither better or worse than existence, it is simply nothing and, therefore, nothing to fear. However, I believe the second possibility is the consistent option of the two.

As has been discussed previously, man is meant to progress and God acts to aid man's progression. Death, therefore, cannot be a bad thing, as God the optimizer continuously allows it to occur. Death can only be a necessary step in man's progression, certainly not a bad thing. In fact, I believe in many cases, death can be an honorable and great thing. When a man gives his life protecting his beliefs, a woman sacrifices (in the redefined sense) her life for her children, or anyone dies having understood and lived consistent and true principles, these are good deaths; deaths of honor and integrity that should be celebrated. In many cases, death is a great success.

Therefore, the media's use of death to evoke pity and concern and outrage is terribly inconsistent. Everybody dies. The portrayal of death as the ultimate evil to be avoided and feared is illogical and self-defeating. Death is a natural progression that comes at its own time, not something to fear. I am not advocating that we seek death or that things like murder are not wrong. We avoid death in order to take advantage of life and we cherish life for its goods. Still, death is not a thing to fear, it is not an evil. Eternalism necessitates this.

Redefining Sacrifice

Sacrifice. I can think of no word that is more misused and more often evokes the wrong response than the word "sacrifice". Currently, when people speak of sacrifice, they are apparently trying to point out that something has been given up, forsaken or rejected in a way detrimental to themselves but beneficial to someone else. The word is used as if something good has been given up for something not so good. The greater forsaken for the lesser. The word is used as if a sacrifice has been made and the sacrificer should therefore be admired. This is wrong.

First of all, anyone who would trade the greater for the lesser should certainly not be admired; they should be ridiculed as a fool. If at any time, someone is actively seeking to "sacrifice" their time or their money with nothing in return, that person is an idiot and a destructive force in the universe. They are untrustworthy, inconsistent, and most of all, a liar. Sacrifice is not giving something for nothing, it never is. True sacrifice is forsaking the lesser in favor of the greater.

To sacrifice time, talents, or money is to use these things in such a way as to maximize happiness. People dont sacrifice their money or time for nothing, they do it if to eliminate guilt, feed ego, assuage conscience, demonstrate "goodness", or if they are consistent trustworthy people they do it simply to increase their own happiness. If we must persist in the use of the word sacrifice, then let us change it to an honorable meaning. Let sacrifice be when a person is logical and consistent enough to make a trade in which they give something up in order to be a happier and more complete being. That is how sacrifice should be viewed and only in that sense could a sacrificer be praised. I will not praise a chosen failure, an inconsistent trade, or an idiotic lie. Let us praise sacrifice for what it is, the wisdom to give up the lesser in order to obtain the greater. This is eternalism.

The Attributes of God

We have successfully established that the modern popular "gods" are nothing even resembling a believable, consistent God, and in fact are closer to a Santa Claus, Easter Bunny, magical and mythical thing. Furthermore, we have examined the postulates of atheist and agnostic viewpoints and found them to be equally inconsistent and often lazy rejections of the desire to know. Therefore, it is only logical to conclude that there is indeed a God, a perfectly consistent, fully logical, and believable God. Now it is time to examine the attributes of such a figure.

First and foremost, as has been repeatedly mentioned, God is fully consistent with reality. It follows that God is the happiest of all beings. This could be termed "blessed" but I prefer happiest because of the mystic mumbo-jumbo currently associated with "blessed". In order for God to be the happiest of all beings he must exist in absolute harmony with reality. Therefore, God must have a complete knowledge of reality. This is the first attribute of God; a full and complete knowledge of reality. God's knowledge must include an understanding of all physical governing laws, all events, all causes, etc...

In every instance, true knowledge converts to power. The more we understand the better we are able to mold and shape reality as we desire. The old adage that knowledge is power is true by definition. Every form of knowledge is power in some sort or other. God, a being with perfect knowledge, must therefore be a being of power. God, through knowledge, can accomplish anything that does not violate true laws. This does not mean God can do anything, only that God can do anything it is possible to do. Therefore, God is a being of power.

Currently, the definition of God we have arrived at does not limit the number of God beings in existence. There is no logical reason there cannot be a multitude of beings with perfect knowledge and power. However, in the former argument for God's existence, the point was made that God is the first cause of our current existence. A first cause cannot be a multitude of causes but is limited to singularity. (Explanation of this point is beyond the scope of my current topic but suffice it to say that if we suppose two or more beings concurrently acting as the first cause both equal in perfection of knowledge and power and singular in purpose and causation then they are not two beings but one, being similar in all things.) Therefore, though more than one God being may exist, the God with which we have to do is singular. Therefore, our God, is one God of perfect knowledge and power.

Finally, we will briefly consider what God has to do with us. God as a perfect being, cannot increase in knowledge or power. Thus, it is reasonable to ask, what does God purpose or desire. Firstly, it is obvious that God in order to be God must have progressed to that point of knowledge and power. However, having arrived at perfect knowledge and the limits of power, what more could God do to progress and increase in happiness? Not in knowledge, not in power, but in dominion. God can progress in happiness as beings created by God progress and increase thereby adding to God's happiness. Therefore, as we are happy because of increased knowledge, increased understanding of reality, and a consistent applicable philosophy, God is happier also. Therefore, God is intimately concerned with mankind's progression and desires our happiness as if God's own. Obviously then, within the bounds of natural law, God works to maximize and optimize our opportunity for lasting and true happiness.

This is a God worth believing in, a consistent, knowing, powerful, being who desires nothing but our everlasting happiness. The only God that could possibly be God.