Skip to main content

Philosophizing The Big Question

Life. What is it? That is a philosophical question. It’s probably the oldest question in history. But does it have an answer? Of course it does. It’s been, what, a thousand years of humankind? Of course someone would’ve answered it by now. And people have, they’ve answered and created careers out of it. Entire lives based on that question.

There was Diogenes, a beggar kind of guy who eventually became one of the founding members of a branch in Greek philosophy. This dude existed around the time of Alexander the Great and Plato and Socrates. There’s a story about him;

One day Diogenes is out in the beach just chilling when Alexander the Great approaches him and asks “I have a huge empire, it is the greatest, tell me what you want and I will bring it to you!” Diogenes replies with annoyance on his face “Get out of my sunlight.” Alexander, being a proud dude, says “if I wasn’t Alexander, I’d be Diogenes.” To this, Diogenes replies “if I wasn’t Diogenes, I’d be Diogenes”.

Diogenes was known to be weird. In fact, he was exiled from his birthplace, Sinope, for it. But at least he knew what he was doing, had the guts and the self esteem to do it and justify his actions. He was a social outcast and sometimes, I relate to the guy. This society in general, this big bad world out here, it doesn’t encourage individualism unless you’re rich enough or powerful enough to make a difference. Being rich isn’t an easy thing, else everyone would be rich. Karl Marx had views on how society works between the rich and the poor and he founded communism.

We’re encouraged to think and act collectively, as a herd and anyone with creativity or originality, anyone who may potentially think or stand for themselves are discouraged. I think if civilization is to advance, to progress, this view must change. However, it’d be horribly long and even in the end, may not completely be different. In every era, there are problems, and revolutionaries, and the bringers of a new era. Problems only exist if you have choices and humans, have way too many of those.

The hand that’s been dealt me in life, it’s getting me nowhere. I will lose this hand. In the words of NF (hip hop artist); Time to threw away the deck and got my own cards.


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Internaut's Theory of Workplace Popularity

Brenda got the promotion! She doesn't even work. She just gossips all day with the boss. She just pawns off her work onto us and I've been working overtime and the boss won't even look at me!! We've all been there, either in school, or our workplace. We have seen this happen. Entire movies and TV shows have been made on this situation. Well, in this post, we look at my theory of why this happens and once you know why it happens, you'll know what to do about it.  Reddit user u/ghkuuk said in his post on the subreddit r/Showerthoughts, "Being proactive is rarely rewarded, because if your actions avoid a tragedy, there is no tragedy to prove your actions were warranted."   Employees that are consistent in their work / duties are constantly overlooked. This is so common in workplaces to see. The other place this is common in is places of study like schools and universities among students. Teachers tend to focus on students who do badly in school and never seem...
Post a Comment
Read more

Predicting human behavior

I was reading this book on the extent of the seemingly insignificant nonverbal behaviors influencing the perception of others and I thought it was interesting. I think that subconsciously, people pick up certain behavioral cues, without even knowing about people. This would lead to creating preconceived notions and "I don't know why, but I don't like him/her." Usually it's something small. For example, when you first meet a person and you don't see them smile, you may not think a big deal of it, but later on, the subconscious will hold on to it and you may eventually find yourself thinking of sadness or depression the next time you think of this person. It is said that we cannot be certain of the way that humans behave. I agree in the sense that one may not be able to completely determine the behavior of another in a social setting, but I was wondering if, by being more aware of body language and other nonverbal cues, could we control the cues that we subcon...
Post a Comment
Read more

Evolution of Technology

Technology is not something that is new. It is a process that has been around for as long as human civilization. It is what has led us to modern civilization and is propelling us into the future. 2.5 million years ago, humans started using stone tools. They were crude but proved quite helpful. 5,500 years ago, humans came up with the wheel and it changed the course of history forever. But now? Technology is viewed as screens. According to research by South University students, owning the latest tech products has symbolic value in society. The program director for Information Technology at South University, Columbia, James Anthos stated “ You are definitely not ‘cool’ if you don’t have the latest technology in cell phones, one or more iPads, and an e-book reader,”. High schoolers are known to try hard to be the “cool” kid at school by possessing the latest gadgets. The definition of technology as defined by the Merriam-Webster dictionary is that it is “the practical application of know...
Post a Comment
Read more