Redafro wrote:I'm already late for work, so I'll go ahead and say this too... Guns are a tool, mainly a tool of self defense and hunting that gets misused. These are there purpose and why people need/want them. Cops can't always be where you want them to be before someone gets hurt, and we have killed the predators of many large animals, so for instance, my city pays qualified hunters to do city hunting once a year to curb the deer population.
Guns have there purpose, they just need more respect and control, and we need to take better care of the mentally struggling.
Basically what should be done, although I don't really think non-hunting civilians have legitimate reasons to have guns.
No ultimate purpose. If we are as Carl Sagan says, a way for the cosmos to know itself, then it only knows itself for a brief flash of time, and much of that is pain. What is the ultimate point of that? I agree, we can say it is simply to live, but how can you determine a valuable way to live if there is no ultimate meaning to that life? Just pleasure for the moment? As much pleasure as you can get while making sure others have as much pleasure as they can get? Those are noble, but still seems so doomed to me. Perhaps I just can't help but look to the far flung future is all. When we have a 60 degree day in winter in my region and everyone is going "wow, this is so warm!" I can't help but think, "Yeah, but do you know how crazy hot it is going to be in the summer because it is so warm now??? Thank you global warming for making my already miserably un-air conditioned fabrication shop even hotter!" Again, that isn't to say I don't enjoy the warm weather, but I can't help but think how I'm going to be miserable later. And if there simply is no later for anyone, I can't help but think there is no purpose to life now.
There are two ways to address this. I'll deal with the first (boring) one: nothing owes us a purpose and I don't really think we have a purpose outside of helping each other survive. I mean, what could it even be?
Second way to address this is to point out that an afterlife is what would really make this life pointless. This is the brief period of torture before bliss? Isn't what makes life precious that it is fleeting, ever-perishing.
