Less Than Nothing

Is truth an achievable goal to strive for? We humans often take it for granted that the truth exists somewhere, that if two individuals disagree, one must be 'right' and the other 'wrong', in other words, that one person understands the objective truth, and the other is misguided, or basing their beliefs on flawed logic or incorrect facts. The issue with accepting this view of reality, is that it requires first accepting that absolute facts exist, statements which are incontrovertibly true.  The question stands that if an objective truth exists, why haven't we found it yet? Even after 25,000 years of human  civilization, there is not a single fact that humans can agree on, with hundreds of vastly differing systems of thought on the basic nature of our existence. If absolute truths did exist, facts which could stand up to any scrutiny and could be proved beyond a modicum of doubt, would we not have found them yet? Should there not be a single axiom which cannot be co...

Consciousness is a fundamentally human concept. The charge and mass of an object are measurable properties of matter that can be experimentally verified, however no physical reaction will take the sentience of an agent into account, simply put, to be alive is a  definition assigned only by the alive, and to whom only it is important. That being said, to be aware is clearly an important distinction to us humans, it forms a core aspect of our collective moral philosophy ('beings' deserve a certain level of rights and welfare over the inanimate). Therefore it is important to form a conception of what it means to be conscious, how we see consciousness as an attribute, and what elements of the universe 'count'.  As has been stated, what humans think of as 'being' is an illusion created by our own minds. We see ourselves as single agents, indivisible mental 'atoms'. This of course is a convenient lie, evolutionarily it is more effective to view fellow humans a...

The Future is, essentially an illusion, it is inaccessible and unknowable to a being in the present, while we often presume that we can, at least partially, understand what the future holds, this is necessarily impossible. Simply due to the fact that the future is impossible to reach, no experiments can be conducted, and therefore no meaningful conclusions can be formed. To predict the future, we humans instead must use causality in the present, this however, hinges upon the fact that our conception of cause and effect holds true at any future point, which is, of course, impossible to prove definitively. While this may be true, it does not negate the importance which humanity's perception of time holds for our survival. Evolutionarily speaking, it is necessary for species to have an understanding of the passage of time, in order to take actions in the present which benefit a future instance of the individual, or it's species at large. In many ways, the passage of time is the fu...

  Life is ultimately meaningless.  It is the only conclusion that can be drawn from an objective examination of the Universe. There is no grand end goal, no purpose for which we were placed upon this Earth, because we weren't placed here, a fluke of mathematics created the ideal conditions for our species, and the less than ideal conditions for your coming into consciousness, we were nowhere before we were born, and when we die, we pass into oblivion, becoming less than nothing.  If this is the case, if all objective analysis points to a meaningless reality. Why continue to exist? Suffering is an everpresent part of human existence, why continue to strive, and therefore endure some degree of suffering, in a life that amounts to nothing. There is no satisfactory answer to this question, there is no objective purpose, this however, does not mean that purpose cannot exist, in fact, it must. In a meaningless reality, we must derive meaning from ourselves, this is t...

Philosophy, like Science, pursues the truth, yet without the empiricism which marks the objective nature of the Sciences. It is from this fact which arises the 'personal philosophy', an individual's conception of reality and their place within it. As living organisms, the self-preservation is perhaps the greatest focus of our minds, thus, humanity is often placed at the centre of an individual's perception of existence. It is incredibly difficult for one to separate their conception of reality from the value they place upon their own being. This is perhaps the origin of theology as a near-constant within the human condition, a universe centred around humanity is easier to live with, and does not come with the extensive existential baggage of a reality in which our entire existence is a spontaneity of mathematical chance upon the universe, surrounded by oblivion. However, to create a true understanding of existence, we must rely only on objectivity and logic, though this...

  Artificial Intelligence VS Art: There has been lengthy discussion on the internet, of the societal and economic impacts of the further development of artificial intelligence technology, we have already seen the rapid advancement of these systems, and many are worried about the impact which this technology will have on the current economic landscape. Perhaps one of the most prevalent issues is that of Neural Network based art generation programmes, and particularly their impact on human artists, given that programmes like Dall-E can already generate in minutes, what may take a conventional human artist hours or days, and significant expense, though these programmes are currently still lacking in many regards, it can easily be conceived that a technology will arise that is superior in every regard to humans in the arts, and while these systems are today limited primarily to literary and visual art, an entirely AI dominated internet art space is entirely a ...