Do you wish to continue?

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tiltbillings
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Do you wish to continue?

Post by tiltbillings »

>> Do you see a man wise [enlightened/ariya] in his own eyes? There is more hope for a fool than for him.<< -- Proverbs 26:12

This being is bound to samsara, kamma is his means for going beyond. -- SN I, 38.

“Of course it is happening inside your head, Harry, but why on earth should that mean that it is not real?” HPatDH p.723
dhamma_newb
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Re: Do you wish to continue?

Post by dhamma_newb »

Tier three sucks. I do not wish to continue.
The watched mind brings happiness.
Dhp 36

I am larger and better than I thought. I did not know I held so much goodness.
Walt Whitman
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James the Giant
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Re: Do you wish to continue?

Post by James the Giant »

Ooh chilling.
It reminds me of an Ian Banks novel where the Culture goes to war to stop various civilizations from running virtual, simulated hells, where good or bad deeds are punished or rewarded by the torment of digitized personalities after death.
And in a virtual world, there's nothing to stop someone being tortured to death, again and again and again.
Then,
saturated with joy,
you will put an end to suffering and stress.
SN 9.11
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Rui Sousa
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Re: Do you wish to continue?

Post by Rui Sousa »

Great satyre. But the question is very meaninguful. Do I wish to continue experiencing life? The honest answer is yes :(

Not proud of it anymore, but I really want to be alive and have a body and mind just as this one. And so I do.
With Metta
daverupa
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Re: Do you wish to continue?

Post by daverupa »

Is it possible to meditate while remaining on the menu screen? :stirthepot:
  • "And how is it, bhikkhus, that by protecting oneself one protects others? By the pursuit, development, and cultivation of the four establishments of mindfulness. It is in such a way that by protecting oneself one protects others.

    "And how is it, bhikkhus, that by protecting others one protects oneself? By patience, harmlessness, goodwill, and sympathy. It is in such a way that by protecting others one protects oneself.

- Sedaka Sutta [SN 47.19]
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Kim OHara
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Re: Do you wish to continue?

Post by Kim OHara »

James the Giant wrote:Ooh chilling.
It reminds me of an Ian Banks novel where the Culture goes to war to stop various civilizations from running virtual, simulated hells, where good or bad deeds are punished or rewarded by the torment of digitized personalities after death.
And in a virtual world, there's nothing to stop someone being tortured to death, again and again and again.
There are other SF treatments, too. One you may have missed (especially since it was a debut novel) is The Quantum Thief by Hannu Rajaniemi. It opens in a prison in which the lead character is forced to endlessly play the Prisoner's Dilemma game (co-operate or defect?) against multiple copies of himself, or other beings, and dies painfully when he loses, only to be brought back to life. (It does get better, but also weirder.)
Greg Egan has also written some great stories about what might happen if we go silicon.

To answer the OP: Yes, of course. It may be crooked but (so far as I know) it's the only game in town. :tongue:

:namaste:
Kim
suttametta
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Re: Do you wish to continue?

Post by suttametta »

There are many other worlds than this one. No need to cling to life here under such conditions. I, for one, am not afraid to die.
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Alex123
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Re: Do you wish to continue?

Post by Alex123 »

Why exist? Just let me die already! Life has difficulties as it is, so why continue and pay for it?
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manas
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Re: Do you wish to continue?

Post by manas »

Rui Sousa wrote:Great satyre. But the question is very meaninguful. Do I wish to continue experiencing life? The honest answer is yes :(

Not proud of it anymore, but I really want to be alive and have a body and mind just as this one. And so I do.
I feel that way also. But remember that one can enter the stream that leads to Nibbana, and although bhava-tanha is not fully abandoned at that stage, at least we would have shut the door on reappearance in the animal, ghostly or hell realms, permanently. 8-) Let's enter the stream that leads inexorably to Nibbana... :meditate:

:anjali:
To the Buddha-refuge i go; to the Dhamma-refuge i go; to the Sangha-refuge i go.
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Sam Vara
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Re: Do you wish to continue?

Post by Sam Vara »

If I pay a big enough supplement, can they get me stream entry?
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Ben
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Re: Do you wish to continue?

Post by Ben »

well that was interesting, thanks Tilt!
“No lists of things to be done. The day providential to itself. The hour. There is no later. This is later. All things of grace and beauty such that one holds them to one's heart have a common provenance in pain. Their birth in grief and ashes.”
- Cormac McCarthy, The Road

Learn this from the waters:
in mountain clefts and chasms,
loud gush the streamlets,
but great rivers flow silently.
- Sutta Nipata 3.725

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Reductor
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Re: Do you wish to continue?

Post by Reductor »

Surely such a service would be opt-in, right? Or opt-out at least.

Then it would be easier to make that decision when one is sure they'll live forever, thus avoiding such a miserable proposition when the inevitable happens. :tongue:
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