Greg is dead

Originally posted by FMF
[b]Casual research on the topic will reveal that life is, indeed, a very perplexing aspect of the human experience.

The ancients held that life and death were two forces of the Great Mother--- the oneness of being, or everything.

Greeks had it as opposite forces, life perceived as feminine and death as masculine with Thanatos personifying the end.

None of this establishes that "death is the most perplexing aspect of human existence known".[/b]

No, it just establishes that man has always wrestled with the concept of death, has always considered it a force to be reckoned with... except for you and your friends, of course, who are more considered with reality.

Originally posted by FMF
If you think claiming that death is "is entirely unnatural" and that it is "the most perplexing aspect of human existence known" makes you "very interesting" then that is more a matter for you than it is for me.

My views on death don't make me interesting.
Not sure why you feel compelled to twist things around in a thinly veiled attempt at insult.
Perhaps that's what makes you interesting.

Originally posted by FreakyKBH
~ ...man has always wrestled with the concept of death, has always considered it a force to be reckoned with... ~

This aspect of the human condition has given rise to countless religions and conjecture about supernatural things.

Originally posted by FreakyKBH
No, it just establishes that man has always wrestled with the concept of death, has always considered it a force to be reckoned with... except for you and your friends, of course, who are more considered with reality.

What I said was that me and most people I have discussed death with do not find death to be "the most perplexing aspect of human existence known". I have never said they have not "wrestled" with the topic.

Originally posted by FreakyKBH
Not sure why you feel compelled to twist things around in a thinly veiled attempt at insult.

You said: "Perhaps you're simply not associating with very interesting or interested people", which clearly is not thinly veiled at all. I was merely responding to this.

Originally posted by FMF
This aspect of the human condition has given rise to countless religions and conjecture about supernatural things.

Now you're just talking in circles.
Death isn't perplexing, yet it is the aspect which has led to countless religions?
Is religion unusual?
Is it a thing?
Or is it just another ho-hum aspect of life?
I'd say religion is a pretty big deal in the scope of things, as it relates to human beings.
If (according to you) death is the impetus for countless religions (countless, really? there's no end to the number?), and religion is an incredibly complex, perplexing and exceedingly interesting aspect of the human condition, wouldn't it stand to reason that whatever 'gave rise to it' must be all the more a spectacle demanding an account?

Originally posted by FreakyKBH
Why would you give something which you do not consider perplexing a second thought?

I would say it is human nature. We are thinking about things all the time. I don't think that everything we devote thought to is "perplexing", do you?

Originally posted by FMF
You said: "Perhaps you're simply not associating with very interesting or interested people", which clearly is not thinly veiled at all. I was merely responding to this.

If you associate with people who don't think or talk about what motivates man, about the things which are part of the human experience, is it out of the realm of decency to label such people 'uninteresting?'

I think not.

Originally posted by FreakyKBH
Now you're just talking in circles.
Death isn't perplexing, yet it is the aspect which has led to countless religions?

Sure it has. Death perplexes many people. Religions are the result. I don't find death perplexing. I am not religious. This isn't circular. It is linear.

Originally posted by FreakyKBH
If you associate with people who don't think or talk about what motivates man, about the things which are part of the human experience, is it out of the realm of decency to label such people 'uninteresting?'

I did not say that they don't "talk about what motivates man, about the things which are part of the human experience" as you know full well. I said that I don't remember many people who say "death is the most perplexing aspect of human existence known".

Originally posted by FMF
I would say it is human nature. We are thinking about things all the time. I don't think that everything we devote thought to is "perplexing", do you?

I would say that human nature is concerned with death.

I am perplexed, however, at how readily man acts as though death doesn't exist.

Originally posted by FMF
Sure it has. Death perplexes many people. Religions are the result. I don't find death perplexing. I am not religious. This isn't circular. It is linear.

So it is your view that religions are primarily directed at the question of death?

Originally posted by FreakyKBH
If (according to you) death is the impetus for countless religions (countless, really? there's no end to the number?), and religion is an incredibly complex, perplexing and exceedingly interesting aspect of the human condition, wouldn't it stand to reason that whatever 'gave rise to it' must be all the more a spectacle demanding an account?

I haven't said at any point that "death" is not an "interesting aspect of the human condition". Of course it is. I simply do not think it is the most perplexing aspect of human existence known.

Originally posted by FreakyKBH
So it is your view that religions are primarily directed at the question of death?

I think most religions are primarily directed at what one can think and do while alive in order to achieve or obtain an "afterlife".

Originally posted by FreakyKBH
I am perplexed, however, at how readily man acts as though death doesn't exist.

I have met a lot of people who know that death is natural and inevitable, the only people I've met who act "as though death doesn't exist", in so far as 'death is not the end' etc., have been religionists who believe in "salvation" and "afterlife' and the like.