Monday, October 19, 2009
Introduction to Absurdism
Absurdism is a philosophy that states that the efforts of humanity to find meaning in the universe ultimately fail (and thus is absurd), because no such meaning exists, at least in relation to the individual. The word "absurd" in this context does not mean "logically impossible," but rather "humanly impossible." Absurdism as a whole is related to existentialism and nihilism and has its roots in the 19th century Danish philosopher, Søren Kierkegaard. Absurdism as a belief system was born of the existentialist movement, when the French Algerian philosopher and writer Albert Camus broke from that philosophical line of thought and published his manuscript The Myth of Sisyphus. “The absurd is born out of this confrontation between the human need and the unreasonable silence of the world” - Albert Camus. In absurdist philosophy, the Absurd arises out of the fundamental disharmony between man's search for meaning and the apparent meaninglessness of the universe. As beings looking for meaning in a meaningless world, humans have three ways of resolving the dilemma. Kierkegaard and Camus describe the solutions in their works, The Sickness Unto Death (1849) and The Myth of Sisyphus (1942). These three choices are one, suicide or escaping existence. The first solution to the dilemma is simply to end one's life. Two is accepting a type of religious belief in a transcendent world. Such a belief would provide the existence of a realm that is beyond the Absurd, and, as such, has meaning. Finally three is the acceptance of the absurd: The absurdist solution is to accept and even embrace the absurdity of life and to continue living in spite of it. My belief in the absurd is the third solution in that I accept the absurdity of life yet at the same time I am optimistic even in a world where there is no meaning, no objective standard by which to measure ones actions as right and wrong, no way in obtaining objective truth, no reassurance what so ever, hence my name as “The Happy Absurdist”. By the way basically all of this information is from wikipedia so dont post a comment telling me this.
Monday, October 12, 2009
The Transparent Veil of Time
Time is one of the dimensions we breathe in, see in, and all around live in. Yet how much do we about time or think we know about it. Does time even exists in the “real” world or is it that it is an subjective projections of our minds that we mistake for reality. Let us take an introspective look at what time really is. Time being defined as “A nonspatial continuum in which events occur in apparently irreversible succession from the past through the present to the future”. So basically time is a linear progression from one event to the other. But in relations to space-time in general relativity its not linear like how we perceive it to be. According to relativity an observer cam see a particular object in motion move at different speeds and possibly in different directions depending on his location. For instance this famous example of people playing ping pong on a train;
“Two people riding on a train from New York to San Francisco play a game of ping-pong in the sport compartment of the train. Lets say, the train moves at 100 km per hour (= 27.8 m/s) and the two players hit the ball at a speed of two meters per second. In the reference frame of the players, the ball moves back and forth at this particular speed. For a stationary observer standing beside the railroad, however, things look quite different. In his reference frame the ball moves at 29.8 m/s when it is played forward in the direction where the train is heading, while it moves at 25.8 m/s in the same direction when it is played backwards. Thus he doesn't see the ball moving backward at all, but always moving towards San Francisco. For an observer in outer space, things look again totally different because of the Earth's rotation, which is opposite to the train's movement; therefore the outer space observer always sees the ball moving East”. So you see in based on this example, time is not absolute but relative to the observer.
But let’s examine time in a bit more detail. We use time all the time in our daily affairs and activities. We use it to measure the years, mouths, days and hourly succession of are lives from one minute to the next. Time is so important in organizing our lives and society that with out it we wouldn’t have the orderly modern day society we have today. We use it so much that ironically we take it for grated and never take a closer look at what it really is. So far we know we use time to organize our days and lives but we use it also in the conduct of advanced experiments and use it in mathematical equations. It is imperative that time be considered as one of the variables as it lends it self to the progression from one event to the next.
One of the problems of time is trying to definitively define it, we already know the definition of what it says it is in the dictionary but with this definition it still seems too intangible and abstract for my taste.
I mean what if this time is nothing but a construct of our minds. Douglas Adams once said, “Time is an illusion. Lunchtime doubly so”. I’m not the first to say this or even think this. Physicists and philosophers have long struggled to understand what time really is. In fact, they are not even sure it exists at all.
To go farther some researchers increasingly suspect that time is not a fundamental feature of nature, but rather an artifact of our perception. One group has recently found a way to do quantum physics without invoking time, which could help pave a path to a time-free "theory of everything". If correct, the approach suggests that time really is an illusion, and that we may need to rethink how the universe at large works. Even for Einstein, time is a useful measure of things, but nothing special. But in quantum mechanics time plays a key role, keeping track of the ever-changing probabilities that define the microworld, which are encoded in the "wave function" of a quantum system. The clock by which the wave function evolves records not just the time in one particular frame of reference, but the absolute time that Einstein worked so hard to topple. So while relativity treats space and time as a whole, quantum mechanics splits the universe into two parts: the quantum system being observed and the classical world outside. In this fractured universe, a clock always remains outside the quantum system All the same, physicists are loath to throw out quantum theory, as it has proven capable of extraordinarily accurate predictions. What they need is a way to do quantum mechanics in the absence of time.
Carlo Rovelli, a physicist at the University of Marseille in France, has found just that. In the past year, he and his colleagues have worked out a method to compress multiple quantum events in time into a single event that can be described without reference to time The idea is this: suppose we have an electron characterized by its spin, a quantum property that is either "up" or "down" along whatever direction you measure it. Say we want to make two consecutive measurements of its spin, one in the x direction and one in the y direction. The probabilities of the possible outcomes will depend on the order in which we perform the measurements. That's because a measurement "collapses" the indeterminate state of the wave function, forcing it to commit to a given state; the first measurement will change the particle's state, which affects the second measurement. Say we already know the electron's spin is up in the x direction. If we now measure the spin in the x direction followed by the y direction, we will find the x spin up - no change there - and then there is a 50:50 chance of finding the y spin up or down. But if we begin by measuring the y spin, that disturbs the spin in the x direction, creating a 50-50 probability for both measurements.
If reordering the measurements in time changes the probabilities, how can we calculate the probabilities of sequences of events without reference to time? The trick, says Rovelli, is to adjust the boundary between the quantum system under observation and the classical outside world where measuring devices are considered to reside. By shifting the boundary, we can include the measuring device as part of the quantum system. In that case we no longer ask, "What is the probability of the electron having spin up and then spin down?" Instead we ask, "What is the probability of finding the measuring devices in a particular state?" The measuring device no longer collapses the wave function; rather, the electron and the measuring device together are described by a single wave function, and a single measurement of the entire set-up causes the collapse.
You see even with time being such a useful instrument it can be replaced and theories might even possibly function without it. My take on time is that it is an illusion created by our minds and projected onto reality. Why this is, is because we are aware of our selves and our environment at all times. This self-awareness is so constant that it gives the illusion of time and events happening from one moment to the next. For example imagine a video camera, it captures moments of our lives and allows us to revisit these moments at a latter time. But you see the video camera is not capturing time or the actual event happening, but capturing one moment at a time in a single picture. It takes so many of these pictures in such a fast succession that it appears that the moment is actually happening when it really is not. Our minds work this way also in that it takes in all this information from the external world at such a constant pace that are minds fool us into thinking that time really exists. I mean when you sleep time seems to fly by, that’s because you our not fully aware of your environment when you are sleeping and so it feels like five minutes and not 5 hours. Basically How I view it is that there is only this moment. To put it in more detail there is a constant state of motion in which matter and energy and the reactions of such by the laws of cause and effect happen is in such a linear fashion that time appears to be present but is not in the slightest notion really needed. Don’t get me wrong time is a really useful tool in the measurement of things, but that’s all it is, a tool.
I mean its not like time is actually needed for thing to react and happen. Like for instance when you light a piece of paper on fire it doesn’t ask it’s self-the question “oh it must be the time to start chemically reacting with each other”. That would be absurd just like with radioactive decay. It does decay in a predictable fashion, as it will take the same amount of time no matter if we designate time as fundamental or an illusion. Each atom decays randomly and yet as a conglomerate of nuclei, they all somehow "know" the decay rate. But this doesn’t mean that they have collective "knowledge" or awareness of time. The observed decay rate of a lump of the material is therefore an averaging effect that we are seeing.
One question you might ask is what exactly is an illusion to begin with. Well the definition in the dictionary is that it is "an apparent state of reality, the perception of which is generated by our senses operating in what would conventionally be regarded as normal" or “ An erroneous perception of reality” So when I say that time is illusion I saying that time is a erroneous perception of reality. What is “reality”? Well it’s defined as “something that is neither derivative nor dependent but exists necessarily” So something that objectively exists separate from our perception of it. But how can we know what is objective and what is subjective? Well I’m not getting to that in this article, to say the least we can never really know what is and what isn’t real. So one could ask “but if time is an illusion couldn’t everything be an illusion?” My answer is yes, everything could be an illusion, I personally don’t think everything is an illusion but it possibly could be. The reason I think this is, is that we as conscious beings are made up of our genetics/ tools that we perceive with and interpret with and our environment. If everything we perceived were subjective and created by our minds then at birth we wouldn’t need to learn things when were babies as these things would be preprogrammed into us. But it turns out that we do need external stimuli/ information to develop our concepts of the world before we can create our own interpretations of the concepts that we have previously developed. We do though contain in our minds from birth preprogrammed ways of interpreting stimuli like for instance depth perception and motion perception. So yes in a way from birth we already view the world in a way that in essence is distorted and formed by our mind in such a way as to be practically useful for survival but not objectively useful in finding truth if there is any to begin with. This all boils down to all information being received is filtered in a way as to make all knowledge subjective but the strong probability that there is a objective reality outside our mind.
When it comes down to it, taking time out of our equations and out of our minds have profound effects. It for one squashes the paradoxes that might accompany time like for instance time travel or to be more specific the grandfather paradox. The paradox is this: suppose a man traveled back in time and killed his biological grandfather before the latter met the traveler's grandmother. As a result, one of the traveler's parents (and by extension the traveler himself) would never have been conceived. This would imply that he could not have traveled back in time after all, which in turn implies the grandfather would still be alive, and the traveler would have been conceived allowing him to travel back in time and kill his grandfather. Thus each possibility seems to imply its own negation, a type of logical paradox. But you see when time is taken away from the equation such a paradox disappears. If time does not exist then creating a machine to take you back in it would be impossible.
I know it might be hard to imagine a world without time or maybe you can. But though I might be wrong I think it is necessary for everyone to be open-minded and to be skeptical of the things that we take for granted. In the end that’s all I can really ask of anyone.
“Two people riding on a train from New York to San Francisco play a game of ping-pong in the sport compartment of the train. Lets say, the train moves at 100 km per hour (= 27.8 m/s) and the two players hit the ball at a speed of two meters per second. In the reference frame of the players, the ball moves back and forth at this particular speed. For a stationary observer standing beside the railroad, however, things look quite different. In his reference frame the ball moves at 29.8 m/s when it is played forward in the direction where the train is heading, while it moves at 25.8 m/s in the same direction when it is played backwards. Thus he doesn't see the ball moving backward at all, but always moving towards San Francisco. For an observer in outer space, things look again totally different because of the Earth's rotation, which is opposite to the train's movement; therefore the outer space observer always sees the ball moving East”. So you see in based on this example, time is not absolute but relative to the observer.
But let’s examine time in a bit more detail. We use time all the time in our daily affairs and activities. We use it to measure the years, mouths, days and hourly succession of are lives from one minute to the next. Time is so important in organizing our lives and society that with out it we wouldn’t have the orderly modern day society we have today. We use it so much that ironically we take it for grated and never take a closer look at what it really is. So far we know we use time to organize our days and lives but we use it also in the conduct of advanced experiments and use it in mathematical equations. It is imperative that time be considered as one of the variables as it lends it self to the progression from one event to the next.
One of the problems of time is trying to definitively define it, we already know the definition of what it says it is in the dictionary but with this definition it still seems too intangible and abstract for my taste.
I mean what if this time is nothing but a construct of our minds. Douglas Adams once said, “Time is an illusion. Lunchtime doubly so”. I’m not the first to say this or even think this. Physicists and philosophers have long struggled to understand what time really is. In fact, they are not even sure it exists at all.
To go farther some researchers increasingly suspect that time is not a fundamental feature of nature, but rather an artifact of our perception. One group has recently found a way to do quantum physics without invoking time, which could help pave a path to a time-free "theory of everything". If correct, the approach suggests that time really is an illusion, and that we may need to rethink how the universe at large works. Even for Einstein, time is a useful measure of things, but nothing special. But in quantum mechanics time plays a key role, keeping track of the ever-changing probabilities that define the microworld, which are encoded in the "wave function" of a quantum system. The clock by which the wave function evolves records not just the time in one particular frame of reference, but the absolute time that Einstein worked so hard to topple. So while relativity treats space and time as a whole, quantum mechanics splits the universe into two parts: the quantum system being observed and the classical world outside. In this fractured universe, a clock always remains outside the quantum system All the same, physicists are loath to throw out quantum theory, as it has proven capable of extraordinarily accurate predictions. What they need is a way to do quantum mechanics in the absence of time.
Carlo Rovelli, a physicist at the University of Marseille in France, has found just that. In the past year, he and his colleagues have worked out a method to compress multiple quantum events in time into a single event that can be described without reference to time The idea is this: suppose we have an electron characterized by its spin, a quantum property that is either "up" or "down" along whatever direction you measure it. Say we want to make two consecutive measurements of its spin, one in the x direction and one in the y direction. The probabilities of the possible outcomes will depend on the order in which we perform the measurements. That's because a measurement "collapses" the indeterminate state of the wave function, forcing it to commit to a given state; the first measurement will change the particle's state, which affects the second measurement. Say we already know the electron's spin is up in the x direction. If we now measure the spin in the x direction followed by the y direction, we will find the x spin up - no change there - and then there is a 50:50 chance of finding the y spin up or down. But if we begin by measuring the y spin, that disturbs the spin in the x direction, creating a 50-50 probability for both measurements.
If reordering the measurements in time changes the probabilities, how can we calculate the probabilities of sequences of events without reference to time? The trick, says Rovelli, is to adjust the boundary between the quantum system under observation and the classical outside world where measuring devices are considered to reside. By shifting the boundary, we can include the measuring device as part of the quantum system. In that case we no longer ask, "What is the probability of the electron having spin up and then spin down?" Instead we ask, "What is the probability of finding the measuring devices in a particular state?" The measuring device no longer collapses the wave function; rather, the electron and the measuring device together are described by a single wave function, and a single measurement of the entire set-up causes the collapse.
You see even with time being such a useful instrument it can be replaced and theories might even possibly function without it. My take on time is that it is an illusion created by our minds and projected onto reality. Why this is, is because we are aware of our selves and our environment at all times. This self-awareness is so constant that it gives the illusion of time and events happening from one moment to the next. For example imagine a video camera, it captures moments of our lives and allows us to revisit these moments at a latter time. But you see the video camera is not capturing time or the actual event happening, but capturing one moment at a time in a single picture. It takes so many of these pictures in such a fast succession that it appears that the moment is actually happening when it really is not. Our minds work this way also in that it takes in all this information from the external world at such a constant pace that are minds fool us into thinking that time really exists. I mean when you sleep time seems to fly by, that’s because you our not fully aware of your environment when you are sleeping and so it feels like five minutes and not 5 hours. Basically How I view it is that there is only this moment. To put it in more detail there is a constant state of motion in which matter and energy and the reactions of such by the laws of cause and effect happen is in such a linear fashion that time appears to be present but is not in the slightest notion really needed. Don’t get me wrong time is a really useful tool in the measurement of things, but that’s all it is, a tool.
I mean its not like time is actually needed for thing to react and happen. Like for instance when you light a piece of paper on fire it doesn’t ask it’s self-the question “oh it must be the time to start chemically reacting with each other”. That would be absurd just like with radioactive decay. It does decay in a predictable fashion, as it will take the same amount of time no matter if we designate time as fundamental or an illusion. Each atom decays randomly and yet as a conglomerate of nuclei, they all somehow "know" the decay rate. But this doesn’t mean that they have collective "knowledge" or awareness of time. The observed decay rate of a lump of the material is therefore an averaging effect that we are seeing.
One question you might ask is what exactly is an illusion to begin with. Well the definition in the dictionary is that it is "an apparent state of reality, the perception of which is generated by our senses operating in what would conventionally be regarded as normal" or “ An erroneous perception of reality” So when I say that time is illusion I saying that time is a erroneous perception of reality. What is “reality”? Well it’s defined as “something that is neither derivative nor dependent but exists necessarily” So something that objectively exists separate from our perception of it. But how can we know what is objective and what is subjective? Well I’m not getting to that in this article, to say the least we can never really know what is and what isn’t real. So one could ask “but if time is an illusion couldn’t everything be an illusion?” My answer is yes, everything could be an illusion, I personally don’t think everything is an illusion but it possibly could be. The reason I think this is, is that we as conscious beings are made up of our genetics/ tools that we perceive with and interpret with and our environment. If everything we perceived were subjective and created by our minds then at birth we wouldn’t need to learn things when were babies as these things would be preprogrammed into us. But it turns out that we do need external stimuli/ information to develop our concepts of the world before we can create our own interpretations of the concepts that we have previously developed. We do though contain in our minds from birth preprogrammed ways of interpreting stimuli like for instance depth perception and motion perception. So yes in a way from birth we already view the world in a way that in essence is distorted and formed by our mind in such a way as to be practically useful for survival but not objectively useful in finding truth if there is any to begin with. This all boils down to all information being received is filtered in a way as to make all knowledge subjective but the strong probability that there is a objective reality outside our mind.
When it comes down to it, taking time out of our equations and out of our minds have profound effects. It for one squashes the paradoxes that might accompany time like for instance time travel or to be more specific the grandfather paradox. The paradox is this: suppose a man traveled back in time and killed his biological grandfather before the latter met the traveler's grandmother. As a result, one of the traveler's parents (and by extension the traveler himself) would never have been conceived. This would imply that he could not have traveled back in time after all, which in turn implies the grandfather would still be alive, and the traveler would have been conceived allowing him to travel back in time and kill his grandfather. Thus each possibility seems to imply its own negation, a type of logical paradox. But you see when time is taken away from the equation such a paradox disappears. If time does not exist then creating a machine to take you back in it would be impossible.
I know it might be hard to imagine a world without time or maybe you can. But though I might be wrong I think it is necessary for everyone to be open-minded and to be skeptical of the things that we take for granted. In the end that’s all I can really ask of anyone.
The Map Is Not The Territory
The father of general semantics, Alford Korzybski stated, "A map is not the territory it represents, but if correct, it has a similar structure to the territory, which accounts for its usefulness". What this means is that our perception of reality is not reality itself but our own version of it, or our "map". No two people can have exactly the same map. While we all have similar neurological structure, it functions differently in all of us. This is the basis for our problems in communication when we try to impose our map upon another person. Our maps are created through gathering data through the five senses. Our senses bring certain aspects of the world to our attention, which go through neurological processes or filters, forming our values and beliefs. These are often expressed consciously, yet most of the time they operate outside of our awareness. For example when we pour water through a filter not everything passes through. So like water our mind filters out information it feels does not relate to pre-existing reality maps in our mind. To go further there is the essential impossibility of knowing what the territory is, as any understanding of it is based on some representation, for instance when we say the map is different from the territory. You have to say but what is the territory? so when somebody goes out with a measuring stick to measure a rock for instance and take measurements he then puts these measurements on paper. What is on the paper is a map or representation of the rock. But this representation of the rock is a self reflection of the person processing it and filtering out what his mind finds does not match his pre-existing notions of a rock, so really the piece of paper with the representation of a rock is a reality map of a map on a multi dimensional world of maps and as you push the question back, what you find is an infinite regress, an infinite series of maps. The territory never gets in at all. Always, the process of representation will filter it out so that the mental world is only maps of maps, ad infinitum. The problem does not only relate to finding a map that truly relates to reality but to the problem of finding true and objective knowledge. This all meaning that knowledge is all truly subjective and that we don’t have a means of perceiving and processing knowledge objectively. From this we can conclude that since we perceive knowledge subjectively our realty maps prevent us from ever communicating our true feelings and thoughts to others directly as language is an inefficient and inaccurate means of communication. I do believe that one can develop concepts in their head that are distinct from the concepts in another’s head. But can match their concepts to a word in our common language, and then speak the word. They can then match the word to a concept in their mind. So our concepts in effect form a private language which we translate into our common language and so share. As to other ways of communicating like body language, texting, writing, art, ect… all of these mediums of communicating all have the fallibility of the perceiver translating it in his own subjective way based on his own reality map of the world, Things like body language which to a certain degree is universal can be interpreted in slightly different ways as we all have subtle distinctions in the way we make connections in our mind. Art is a perfect instance in that we perceive meaning subjectively. This all add up to the fact that all current ways of communicating are unable to directly communicate ideas and concepts to other people. This all meaning that we can not ever truly connect to others and are ultimately isolated and alone.
The Anamorphic Eye; My Battle with Schizophrenia
Schizophrenia is a chronic, severe, and disabling brain disorder that affects about 1.1 percent of the U.S. population age 18 and older in a given year. Schizophrenia is a psychiatric diagnosis that describes a mental disorder characterized by abnormalities in the perception or expression of reality. Distortions in perception may affect all five senses, including sight, hearing, taste, smell and touch, but most commonly manifest as auditory hallucinations, paranoid, bizarre delusions, or disorganized speech and thinking with significant social or occupational dysfunction. Onset of symptoms typically occurs in young adulthood with approximately 0.4–0.6% of the population affected. Diagnosis is based on the patient's self-reported experiences and observed behavior. No laboratory test for schizophrenia currently exists.
To start off with I like to say that for the record I don’t exactly have schizophrenia but to put it into the words of my psychiatrist I have “depression with psychotic features”. This perhaps conveniently puts my diagnoses into a box and I for one am not sure if it should even be in this box to begin with. This is because as far has I know the symptoms have stopped for the most part about more than close to a year ago in the fall of 2008. This could be mostly due to the medication I am on or the fact that time acted like a healer for my psyche. As far as cases go with a disease like schizophrenia my case is pretty remarkable since I have few of the symptoms still remaining which compared to other cases could go on there whole lives and sometimes end in suicide. This is not to say that these symptoms could not re-serge in the future but I’m crossing my fingers and hoping it won’t. This piece that I am writing on has experiences and contains information I haven’t even told any of my family member until now.
I think the farthest I can see back to when I first notice symptoms was when I was 16 years old and still in high school. It was my sophomore year of high school and all I could remember was the feeling like my life was meant for something greater. I couldn’t explain it, I felt like for some out of this world reason I was destined to do something amazing. I don’t feel that way now but at the time I did. This feeling of mine had been with me my whole life but became prevalent when I became 16. I can’t tell you how or why I had come to that conclusion but this perception of mine eventually shown light on what later would become full-blown paranoia. At this time I had also became really interested in philosophy. I was asking questions concerning matters such as existence, knowledge, truth, law, justice, validity, how the mind operates, language, religion, and finally on morals and issues concerning good and evil. This questioning of existence had always been a part of me but came full circle now and it became something like an obsession of mine.
During this time I became fixed on how and why we as human beings existed and for what purpose. It in a way became my Holy Grail and I spent many sleepless nights on the Internet looking up literature and reading books on all kinds of philosophical problems and issues. I eventually became dishearten with the search and concluded that life had no meaning and things like good and evil were all just subjective figments of our own imagination. This questioning ironically also led to a compulsion to find meaning and connections in everything I saw and perceived. And this habit led to what might remind people of the “Matrix” or “The Truman Show” I began questioning everything and everyone around me, and their intentions towards me. I asked question like what if this world I lived in was all in my mind or was I in god’s mind? Was I on a TV show where everyone was watching my every action or was I in some kind of computer program where all my actions were pre determined? I became so suspicious of everyone’s actions I even questioned my own family and friends. Were they in on it? How could they lie to me! Every time I saw a van outside of my house I thought it was someone they’re spying on me making sure I didn’t escape or suddenly fine out I was all in some kind of game. I mean it wasn’t like I didn’t try to be objective and say that my suspicious are not grounded and based upon facts. I even at the time was looking up things like Schizophrenia on the Internet and see if my symptoms matched what I read online.
This suspicion of mine became my secret and I didn’t want any one to know, of fear that they might think badly of me or think I’m insane. This secret of mine slowly festered like tumor slowly growing deep within my psyche until it was ready to explode. It exploded years later when I was 19 and tried to commit suicide by stabbing myself with a knife. Here is what happened on that faithful night. It was the night of my dad’s celebration, he was celebrating his band and their creation of their new album and the parties acted like a farewell of sorts. I was dressed all in black wearing work clothes I had from the time I was working at the Cliff House a restaurant located in the Manitou Springs area in Colorado. I was working at the party as a server with my cousin Kyle and his girlfriend who were there also working as servers too.
During the party all I could think about was the deed to be done and what I thought was expected of me. That night I was searching for the strength to go on with at the time, what I thought had to be done. I asked my brother David if I should do it or not, but I told him in an encrypted way as to not allow him to know what was going on. As at the time he didn’t know of the issues that I was fighting with. He did his best to answer my question to the best of his ability and current knowledge of the situation. I don’t remember what exactly he said but I think I put my own spin on it and believe that it reassured me of what was to be done. A few hours in, my father said that we weren’t needed any more and were allowed to go about our business. I headed to my room and decided to go on the Internet and search of ways to kill myself. As I was searching I look for the most effective way to kill myself but instead made my choice based on what was the most easily assessable way to kill myself. After the party I waited for every one to leave and headed down stairs to the kitchen and found a Chef's knives. I went back up stairs and made emotional preparation for what was to come next. I went to the bathroom and gazed into the mirror. I open up my bottomed shirt and saw the alpine white glow of my pasty white skin. I watched my self in the mirror as I held the knife up to my chest and tried to gather the strength to plugged 8 inches of steel into my chest.
Holding the knife I forced the blade into my flesh and experienced the most extremely sharp pain I have ever felt. I fell to the flour and leaned against the wall with my feet out. I watched as crimson blood flowed out from my lower chest and dripped across my belly from side to side. I was too scared and feared the pain of another attempt with the knife to finish me off so I decided to head into the shower to see if the water could keep myself bleeding long enough to die of blood loss and to stop the blood from coagulating. Their lying on the bottom of the shower as water poured over me. The fear of dying really hit me and I was to weak to try another attempting with the knife again so I gave up and decide to go too bed, knife wound and all. The next morning I woke up and headed down stairs were I told my father I had a problem with my heart and needed to go to the hospital. He agreed and we took his car and started a drive towards the hospital. During the car ride their I told him the truth and that I attempt suicide with a knife.
When we arrived at the hospital we went to the emergency ward and signed in. I don’t remember what happened next but I remember going to a room were they laid me down at this bed and was cleaning the wound with disinfectants and stitching it up with suchers. All I know is that my dad had called my mom and she made her way to the hospital. After they patched me all up and did an ultra sound they sent me to a place to get an MRI scan to see if any vital organs were hurt. Thankfully I thought this didn’t kill me at the time because I found out later during the stay at the hospital that the knife only went in my chest 2 inches, just penetrating the fat area and just missing my heart. After that they sent me up to a room with a view that was to great to even express in words. There my dad and mom comfort me, but what I remember most was when my mom had her arm around while I slept at night. From there on out I stayed there for two whole days before they sent me to Cedar Springs Behavioral Health place (Which is a mental hospital of sorts in which they rehabilitate people with different emotional problems.).
When I arrive there I felt like my whole life had collapsed and was pretty much vacant of my body. I mean words can explain the way I felt, I believe I had failed god and his intended purpose for me. To what that all was I will get too later in the story. There at the Cedar Springs they worked to rehabilitate me and the others who were there, with daily regiments of medication and group meetings. The type of people that were there ranged from soldiers who had traumatic experiences from war to abused women who had bad relationships. This one guy who was there because he was a cutter and wore this long glove that wore like a sleeve to hid his cuts from being seen. This other kid was there because he too had tried to commit suicide a series of times before. During the time I was there which lasted a couple of weeks I remember what exited me the most was when my mom, dad, brother and step-mother all came to visit me and brought gifts to make me feel better. Beside that my days spent there were pretty boring and uneventful. Though I had fail to commit suicide the thought of it still remained with me and I even considered trying to drown my self in the bathroom. But the fear of death kept me at bay and for the rest of my time there I kept to myself and went along with what I was instructed to do.
You see at the time of the incident I wasn’t trying to kill myself for the typical reasons. I wasn’t depressed, I didn’t lose a love one or suffer some kind of tragedy or even hated the world I lived in. To tell the truth I was scarred and didn’t really want to die, but at the time I felt I was called upon to serve a higher purpose. What higher purpose was I serving you may ask and what does killing my self have anything to due with a higher purpose? Well you have to take a look into my mental process at the time and for that we have to go back a few mouths. See approximately 3 months back I began hearing knocking sounds coming from different objects and furniture. I didn’t mind it at first but it became more and more prevalent as time went on. I wasn’t sure what was the sound was and even though this might not seem significant to other people it just stood out to me. It happened so much and so frequently that it was hard not to pay attention. During this time I had also started hearing voices in my head. These voices were a low sort of whispering and commented on everything I did and commented on me as a person. The voices were very negative and hurtful and said things about me that struck the core of my being. They relentlessly picked me apart and picked any detail of my personality to scrutinize. This lasted for months, day in and day out they talked about me as if I were their whipping post. I wasn’t sure If what was talking to me were spirits, demons, angles, my own thoughts, whatever but they just would not stop. It was an on going conversation with these creatures that went on and on. I wasn’t sure of the reason why I could here them, I thought maybe I was psychic and possessed some unique ability to hear thoughts. I even at time thought I could here my own mom’s thoughts and feelings.
To say the least, it was a truly mind blowing experience. To think I posses some kind of psychic ability was cool beyond belief. I even at times tried to tune my abilities into other areas of psychic phenomenon. Like for instance I tried to use telekinesis to make objects like pens move. It as you might expected did not work out as planned but I still did not give up.. I maybe spent at least a half an hour every day in attempting to make certain objects move. I tried objects that were progressively lighter and lighter but to no avail. I eventual did give up but my belief in telepathy was slowly growing. What ever it was talking to me, Be it some kind of outside influence or just my own thoughts I thought I need to get to the bottom of this and I had to ask the Cliché question “How far down the rabbit hole do you want to go?”
After a while of hearing these voices speak to me they began calling me a name for which I will never forget. They started to call me by the name “Michael”. I at the time didn’t know what Michael was or who he is. I did have the thought that Michael was the archangel in the bible. You know the angel who is supposed to led the army of god in the time of Armageddon, that Michael. Well the reason I thought this was the same Michael was I thought had something to do with things that had a religious undertone like angels and demons because they were I thought speaking to me. Besides I didn’t know of any other Michael that had to do with the bible. Anyway as I was listening to these things talk about me, they said that I needed to give up my life. For what reason I asked they said because they needed Michael soul to be used during the end time. The reason I couldn’t stay alive was that my body or vessel was keeping his soul from going into heaven. You see it wasn’t that I was Michael per-se but it was that I possessed Michael’s soul. They needed the soul so that god could start Armageddon and Michael would led the army of god against the forces of evil and Satan.
As the days went by and the conversation went on with these creatures I learned or thought I learned that these creatures who were talking to me were doing it on the grounds of a order from god or was what they wanted me to think. To put it into perspective, ironically I was an agnostic. To hear that god was asking for my life was just plain crazy. I mean even all of the religious undertones of what was happening at the time was something that shook the foundation of my being. I mean god the big man himself was calling me to do his work here on earth. I mean maybe not me personally but Michael’s soul was in my body and with out me his soul could not be released. What you might ask is well if god wanted Michael soul to return to heaven why do I have to kill myself? Why can’t he find a way to kill me himself? Well that was something I struggle with to grasp, I thought in the end it had to boil down to the whole free will thing and that he was respecting my choice as a human being. Another question you may ask is why was Michael’s soul in my body to begin with? I think it boils down to god allowing angels to live the lives of human beings and experience what the creatures they so often serve experience.
The after math of what happened to me was that I returned to my “normal” life. I was put on medication that treated the psychotic symptoms of my disease. Manly the medication I was on and still on included Fluoxetine (Prozac) an anti-depressant and I have been switching meds on and off with Geodon and Zyprexa which are both anti-psychotics. The only remaining symptoms I have experienced to this day is a deficiency in my mental process which I don’t know is to be contributed to my disease or the medication I’m on and the general weight gain that accompanies people who take drugs like Zyprexa. I am today going to college and studying a degree in electrical engineering. My life at this point is pretty normal considering and plus I have a optimist outlook as to what the future holds. That’s pretty much my story, thank you for reading I hope you have in a way experienced what I have gone through. See ya.
To start off with I like to say that for the record I don’t exactly have schizophrenia but to put it into the words of my psychiatrist I have “depression with psychotic features”. This perhaps conveniently puts my diagnoses into a box and I for one am not sure if it should even be in this box to begin with. This is because as far has I know the symptoms have stopped for the most part about more than close to a year ago in the fall of 2008. This could be mostly due to the medication I am on or the fact that time acted like a healer for my psyche. As far as cases go with a disease like schizophrenia my case is pretty remarkable since I have few of the symptoms still remaining which compared to other cases could go on there whole lives and sometimes end in suicide. This is not to say that these symptoms could not re-serge in the future but I’m crossing my fingers and hoping it won’t. This piece that I am writing on has experiences and contains information I haven’t even told any of my family member until now.
I think the farthest I can see back to when I first notice symptoms was when I was 16 years old and still in high school. It was my sophomore year of high school and all I could remember was the feeling like my life was meant for something greater. I couldn’t explain it, I felt like for some out of this world reason I was destined to do something amazing. I don’t feel that way now but at the time I did. This feeling of mine had been with me my whole life but became prevalent when I became 16. I can’t tell you how or why I had come to that conclusion but this perception of mine eventually shown light on what later would become full-blown paranoia. At this time I had also became really interested in philosophy. I was asking questions concerning matters such as existence, knowledge, truth, law, justice, validity, how the mind operates, language, religion, and finally on morals and issues concerning good and evil. This questioning of existence had always been a part of me but came full circle now and it became something like an obsession of mine.
During this time I became fixed on how and why we as human beings existed and for what purpose. It in a way became my Holy Grail and I spent many sleepless nights on the Internet looking up literature and reading books on all kinds of philosophical problems and issues. I eventually became dishearten with the search and concluded that life had no meaning and things like good and evil were all just subjective figments of our own imagination. This questioning ironically also led to a compulsion to find meaning and connections in everything I saw and perceived. And this habit led to what might remind people of the “Matrix” or “The Truman Show” I began questioning everything and everyone around me, and their intentions towards me. I asked question like what if this world I lived in was all in my mind or was I in god’s mind? Was I on a TV show where everyone was watching my every action or was I in some kind of computer program where all my actions were pre determined? I became so suspicious of everyone’s actions I even questioned my own family and friends. Were they in on it? How could they lie to me! Every time I saw a van outside of my house I thought it was someone they’re spying on me making sure I didn’t escape or suddenly fine out I was all in some kind of game. I mean it wasn’t like I didn’t try to be objective and say that my suspicious are not grounded and based upon facts. I even at the time was looking up things like Schizophrenia on the Internet and see if my symptoms matched what I read online.
This suspicion of mine became my secret and I didn’t want any one to know, of fear that they might think badly of me or think I’m insane. This secret of mine slowly festered like tumor slowly growing deep within my psyche until it was ready to explode. It exploded years later when I was 19 and tried to commit suicide by stabbing myself with a knife. Here is what happened on that faithful night. It was the night of my dad’s celebration, he was celebrating his band and their creation of their new album and the parties acted like a farewell of sorts. I was dressed all in black wearing work clothes I had from the time I was working at the Cliff House a restaurant located in the Manitou Springs area in Colorado. I was working at the party as a server with my cousin Kyle and his girlfriend who were there also working as servers too.
During the party all I could think about was the deed to be done and what I thought was expected of me. That night I was searching for the strength to go on with at the time, what I thought had to be done. I asked my brother David if I should do it or not, but I told him in an encrypted way as to not allow him to know what was going on. As at the time he didn’t know of the issues that I was fighting with. He did his best to answer my question to the best of his ability and current knowledge of the situation. I don’t remember what exactly he said but I think I put my own spin on it and believe that it reassured me of what was to be done. A few hours in, my father said that we weren’t needed any more and were allowed to go about our business. I headed to my room and decided to go on the Internet and search of ways to kill myself. As I was searching I look for the most effective way to kill myself but instead made my choice based on what was the most easily assessable way to kill myself. After the party I waited for every one to leave and headed down stairs to the kitchen and found a Chef's knives. I went back up stairs and made emotional preparation for what was to come next. I went to the bathroom and gazed into the mirror. I open up my bottomed shirt and saw the alpine white glow of my pasty white skin. I watched my self in the mirror as I held the knife up to my chest and tried to gather the strength to plugged 8 inches of steel into my chest.
Holding the knife I forced the blade into my flesh and experienced the most extremely sharp pain I have ever felt. I fell to the flour and leaned against the wall with my feet out. I watched as crimson blood flowed out from my lower chest and dripped across my belly from side to side. I was too scared and feared the pain of another attempt with the knife to finish me off so I decided to head into the shower to see if the water could keep myself bleeding long enough to die of blood loss and to stop the blood from coagulating. Their lying on the bottom of the shower as water poured over me. The fear of dying really hit me and I was to weak to try another attempting with the knife again so I gave up and decide to go too bed, knife wound and all. The next morning I woke up and headed down stairs were I told my father I had a problem with my heart and needed to go to the hospital. He agreed and we took his car and started a drive towards the hospital. During the car ride their I told him the truth and that I attempt suicide with a knife.
When we arrived at the hospital we went to the emergency ward and signed in. I don’t remember what happened next but I remember going to a room were they laid me down at this bed and was cleaning the wound with disinfectants and stitching it up with suchers. All I know is that my dad had called my mom and she made her way to the hospital. After they patched me all up and did an ultra sound they sent me to a place to get an MRI scan to see if any vital organs were hurt. Thankfully I thought this didn’t kill me at the time because I found out later during the stay at the hospital that the knife only went in my chest 2 inches, just penetrating the fat area and just missing my heart. After that they sent me up to a room with a view that was to great to even express in words. There my dad and mom comfort me, but what I remember most was when my mom had her arm around while I slept at night. From there on out I stayed there for two whole days before they sent me to Cedar Springs Behavioral Health place (Which is a mental hospital of sorts in which they rehabilitate people with different emotional problems.).
When I arrive there I felt like my whole life had collapsed and was pretty much vacant of my body. I mean words can explain the way I felt, I believe I had failed god and his intended purpose for me. To what that all was I will get too later in the story. There at the Cedar Springs they worked to rehabilitate me and the others who were there, with daily regiments of medication and group meetings. The type of people that were there ranged from soldiers who had traumatic experiences from war to abused women who had bad relationships. This one guy who was there because he was a cutter and wore this long glove that wore like a sleeve to hid his cuts from being seen. This other kid was there because he too had tried to commit suicide a series of times before. During the time I was there which lasted a couple of weeks I remember what exited me the most was when my mom, dad, brother and step-mother all came to visit me and brought gifts to make me feel better. Beside that my days spent there were pretty boring and uneventful. Though I had fail to commit suicide the thought of it still remained with me and I even considered trying to drown my self in the bathroom. But the fear of death kept me at bay and for the rest of my time there I kept to myself and went along with what I was instructed to do.
You see at the time of the incident I wasn’t trying to kill myself for the typical reasons. I wasn’t depressed, I didn’t lose a love one or suffer some kind of tragedy or even hated the world I lived in. To tell the truth I was scarred and didn’t really want to die, but at the time I felt I was called upon to serve a higher purpose. What higher purpose was I serving you may ask and what does killing my self have anything to due with a higher purpose? Well you have to take a look into my mental process at the time and for that we have to go back a few mouths. See approximately 3 months back I began hearing knocking sounds coming from different objects and furniture. I didn’t mind it at first but it became more and more prevalent as time went on. I wasn’t sure what was the sound was and even though this might not seem significant to other people it just stood out to me. It happened so much and so frequently that it was hard not to pay attention. During this time I had also started hearing voices in my head. These voices were a low sort of whispering and commented on everything I did and commented on me as a person. The voices were very negative and hurtful and said things about me that struck the core of my being. They relentlessly picked me apart and picked any detail of my personality to scrutinize. This lasted for months, day in and day out they talked about me as if I were their whipping post. I wasn’t sure If what was talking to me were spirits, demons, angles, my own thoughts, whatever but they just would not stop. It was an on going conversation with these creatures that went on and on. I wasn’t sure of the reason why I could here them, I thought maybe I was psychic and possessed some unique ability to hear thoughts. I even at time thought I could here my own mom’s thoughts and feelings.
To say the least, it was a truly mind blowing experience. To think I posses some kind of psychic ability was cool beyond belief. I even at times tried to tune my abilities into other areas of psychic phenomenon. Like for instance I tried to use telekinesis to make objects like pens move. It as you might expected did not work out as planned but I still did not give up.. I maybe spent at least a half an hour every day in attempting to make certain objects move. I tried objects that were progressively lighter and lighter but to no avail. I eventual did give up but my belief in telepathy was slowly growing. What ever it was talking to me, Be it some kind of outside influence or just my own thoughts I thought I need to get to the bottom of this and I had to ask the Cliché question “How far down the rabbit hole do you want to go?”
After a while of hearing these voices speak to me they began calling me a name for which I will never forget. They started to call me by the name “Michael”. I at the time didn’t know what Michael was or who he is. I did have the thought that Michael was the archangel in the bible. You know the angel who is supposed to led the army of god in the time of Armageddon, that Michael. Well the reason I thought this was the same Michael was I thought had something to do with things that had a religious undertone like angels and demons because they were I thought speaking to me. Besides I didn’t know of any other Michael that had to do with the bible. Anyway as I was listening to these things talk about me, they said that I needed to give up my life. For what reason I asked they said because they needed Michael soul to be used during the end time. The reason I couldn’t stay alive was that my body or vessel was keeping his soul from going into heaven. You see it wasn’t that I was Michael per-se but it was that I possessed Michael’s soul. They needed the soul so that god could start Armageddon and Michael would led the army of god against the forces of evil and Satan.
As the days went by and the conversation went on with these creatures I learned or thought I learned that these creatures who were talking to me were doing it on the grounds of a order from god or was what they wanted me to think. To put it into perspective, ironically I was an agnostic. To hear that god was asking for my life was just plain crazy. I mean even all of the religious undertones of what was happening at the time was something that shook the foundation of my being. I mean god the big man himself was calling me to do his work here on earth. I mean maybe not me personally but Michael’s soul was in my body and with out me his soul could not be released. What you might ask is well if god wanted Michael soul to return to heaven why do I have to kill myself? Why can’t he find a way to kill me himself? Well that was something I struggle with to grasp, I thought in the end it had to boil down to the whole free will thing and that he was respecting my choice as a human being. Another question you may ask is why was Michael’s soul in my body to begin with? I think it boils down to god allowing angels to live the lives of human beings and experience what the creatures they so often serve experience.
The after math of what happened to me was that I returned to my “normal” life. I was put on medication that treated the psychotic symptoms of my disease. Manly the medication I was on and still on included Fluoxetine (Prozac) an anti-depressant and I have been switching meds on and off with Geodon and Zyprexa which are both anti-psychotics. The only remaining symptoms I have experienced to this day is a deficiency in my mental process which I don’t know is to be contributed to my disease or the medication I’m on and the general weight gain that accompanies people who take drugs like Zyprexa. I am today going to college and studying a degree in electrical engineering. My life at this point is pretty normal considering and plus I have a optimist outlook as to what the future holds. That’s pretty much my story, thank you for reading I hope you have in a way experienced what I have gone through. See ya.
My Core Beliefs and Philosophy
Well where to start, I am a lot of things and I hold a lot of beliefs that are sometimes complex and woven together. But here is the general picture of what my philosophy is in life. To start off with I'm a agnostic and have been for most of my life. Personally I am up in the air as to if I believe there is a god or not, this is mostly because we cant prove it one way or the other as to if god really exists. Unless of course he all of a sudden shows himself, or shows some sign of his power and influence that is definitive in nature. But if I had to choose a side Id be leaning towards atheism. In a political setting I am an independent. I pretty center in my view like for instance I am liberal in issues like abortion, education, environment, religion, same-sex marriage, war in Iraq and the patriot act. I am conservative for instance in issues like affirmative action, gun control, social security, taxes, welfare, and Immigration. Issues I am moderate or unsure about issues that deal with the death penalty, the economy, and health care.
Other words that describe my beliefs are that I am a nihilistic, absurdist, existentialist. I know that different aspects of these philosophies have semi-contradicting views but I named them all because I am a combination of all of them. Premises of these philosophies that I abide by are that for one existence precedes essence. Existence precedes essence basically means that we exist before any concept can define us. To put it in more detail the opposite is essence before existence, like when you create a sculpture you have an idea of what it would look like, which is the essence of it and the finished product which is the existence of it. Since we are indefinable, we first appear as nothing or as a blank tablet. Our essence does not exist before we are born and so we don’t have pre-programmed beliefs. Second premise is that life is absurd, what I mean by that is that the efforts of humanity to find meaning in the universe ultimately fails. To put it in more detail its not that it’s logically impossible but that it is humanly impossible and therefore absurd. We can create our own meaning and superimpose it onto existence but it cant be objective in nature and is only subjectively useful. Third premise is that there is no eternal, absolute, unchangeable truth. Absolute by its definition is “free from imperfection; complete; perfect:” Which to me means that it is a meaningless word and concept, as what exactly is perfect? Its just in the end a subjectively made up fantasy. I do have to add that even though I believe that there are no absolute truths. I am not even absolutely sure about that because to claim that there is no truth is a self-defeating statement as it attempts to express a truth.
At this point before I go on with asserting my premises is that I view life deterministically both in a universal way and as in a personal way and so hold the premise or belief that freedom of choice or freewill is an illusion. If you were to take in account all of the variables or information that make you who you are i.e. our genes and are environment you would see that freewill does not exist and is like I said an illusion. (By the way if you think about it freewill is also a meaningless word). Plus if one was to know all of these variables that made up the universe one could predict the future of both events and actions. But only if you don’t take in account things like chaos theory, which I interpret the term chaos (not the theory) to mean our own ignorance. On a moral level I would consider myself as a moral relativist, part utilitarian and part Non-cognitivist. To put it in more detail when I view ethics or the problems of good and evil, I am a moral relativist which basically means that I hold that no universal standard exists by which to assess an ethical proposition's truth. To me there is no absolute, concrete right and wrong and all moral evaluations are subjective and relative in nature. I am also a Non-cognitivism whcih means is that ethical sentences do not express propositions and thus cannot be true or false. A noncognitivist denies the cognitivist claim that "moral judgments are capable of being objectively true, because they describe some feature of the world”. If moral statements cannot be true, and if one cannot know something that is not true, noncognitivism implies that moral knowledge is impossible.
So I’m a moral relativist and Non-cognitivist when it comes to considering moral values in a objective standing but in a practical setting I use my beliefs in utilitarianism as my basis for judging moral standards. Utilitarianism means that moral worth of an action is determined solely by its contribution to overall utility: that is, its contribution to happiness or pleasure. It is thus a form of consequentialism, meaning that the moral worth of an action is determined by its outcome. Or to put it another way the ends justify the means. In just in a normal setting I am a pragmatist and optimist and view problems and solutions on the basis of practical usefulness and view the world in a positive way. That basically sums up the general core of my beliefs I think A good book to read if your interested is "The Myth of Sisyphus" by albert camus which explains my endeavor and my point of view in life to some degree.
Other words that describe my beliefs are that I am a nihilistic, absurdist, existentialist. I know that different aspects of these philosophies have semi-contradicting views but I named them all because I am a combination of all of them. Premises of these philosophies that I abide by are that for one existence precedes essence. Existence precedes essence basically means that we exist before any concept can define us. To put it in more detail the opposite is essence before existence, like when you create a sculpture you have an idea of what it would look like, which is the essence of it and the finished product which is the existence of it. Since we are indefinable, we first appear as nothing or as a blank tablet. Our essence does not exist before we are born and so we don’t have pre-programmed beliefs. Second premise is that life is absurd, what I mean by that is that the efforts of humanity to find meaning in the universe ultimately fails. To put it in more detail its not that it’s logically impossible but that it is humanly impossible and therefore absurd. We can create our own meaning and superimpose it onto existence but it cant be objective in nature and is only subjectively useful. Third premise is that there is no eternal, absolute, unchangeable truth. Absolute by its definition is “free from imperfection; complete; perfect:” Which to me means that it is a meaningless word and concept, as what exactly is perfect? Its just in the end a subjectively made up fantasy. I do have to add that even though I believe that there are no absolute truths. I am not even absolutely sure about that because to claim that there is no truth is a self-defeating statement as it attempts to express a truth.
At this point before I go on with asserting my premises is that I view life deterministically both in a universal way and as in a personal way and so hold the premise or belief that freedom of choice or freewill is an illusion. If you were to take in account all of the variables or information that make you who you are i.e. our genes and are environment you would see that freewill does not exist and is like I said an illusion. (By the way if you think about it freewill is also a meaningless word). Plus if one was to know all of these variables that made up the universe one could predict the future of both events and actions. But only if you don’t take in account things like chaos theory, which I interpret the term chaos (not the theory) to mean our own ignorance. On a moral level I would consider myself as a moral relativist, part utilitarian and part Non-cognitivist. To put it in more detail when I view ethics or the problems of good and evil, I am a moral relativist which basically means that I hold that no universal standard exists by which to assess an ethical proposition's truth. To me there is no absolute, concrete right and wrong and all moral evaluations are subjective and relative in nature. I am also a Non-cognitivism whcih means is that ethical sentences do not express propositions and thus cannot be true or false. A noncognitivist denies the cognitivist claim that "moral judgments are capable of being objectively true, because they describe some feature of the world”. If moral statements cannot be true, and if one cannot know something that is not true, noncognitivism implies that moral knowledge is impossible.
So I’m a moral relativist and Non-cognitivist when it comes to considering moral values in a objective standing but in a practical setting I use my beliefs in utilitarianism as my basis for judging moral standards. Utilitarianism means that moral worth of an action is determined solely by its contribution to overall utility: that is, its contribution to happiness or pleasure. It is thus a form of consequentialism, meaning that the moral worth of an action is determined by its outcome. Or to put it another way the ends justify the means. In just in a normal setting I am a pragmatist and optimist and view problems and solutions on the basis of practical usefulness and view the world in a positive way. That basically sums up the general core of my beliefs I think A good book to read if your interested is "The Myth of Sisyphus" by albert camus which explains my endeavor and my point of view in life to some degree.
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