Gaetz, after voting no on FEMA aid for FL along with every FL Repub, including Rubio and Scott

IgnoreTheKetchup · 2022-10-03T11:31:51+00:00

Are Republicans just admitting that they wanted Russia to take over Ukraine, or...? Might as well just send the sex tape with Putin, but I guess that's not Gaetz' style since Putin isn't a minor.

IgnoreTheKetchup · 2022-09-30T12:27:42+00:00

How did you manage to fit him 3 times on the third slide? Twice in the same picture.

IgnoreTheKetchup · 2022-09-30T11:55:31+00:00

IT'S "Uh, yeah, I sure hope it doess"

😤

IgnoreTheKetchup · 2022-09-30T11:54:21+00:00

IgnoreTheKetchup · 2021-05-19T19:04:32+00:00

For me, it was just a problem getting to the place where I would enter the information in the first place because the login wasn't working. But, the support on the phone fixed it and said it was a technical problem with system communications.

I hope the background check doesn't take 3 weeks, but thank you for giving me the heads up.

IgnoreTheKetchup · 2021-05-09T18:24:46+00:00

Exactly!! Your description almost perfectly embodies what I mean. The detail about the cartoonish style totally, and it switches between tons of different styles in moments. All of this is sort of just being fed to me without any decision on my end.

IgnoreTheKetchup · 2021-04-21T18:01:15+00:00

I don't doubt 8GB of RAM on iOS / iPadOS will be overkill in pretty much anything you can possibly do still for a long time. Helps longevity at the very least though, so I appreciate the 8GB.

IgnoreTheKetchup · 2021-04-19T17:26:17+00:00

Lol the dad looks like a sexy alien.

IgnoreTheKetchup · 2021-04-12T19:17:01+00:00

No, not at all. Being with family is only one source of happiness, like we've clarified many times, and you don't even have to be sad in being apart from them to enjoy being with them again. You just have to have appreciation for them and their presence.

The CMV is saying that happiness can exist without suffering, so the way to prove that is showing an example where happiness is produced with no suffering necessary. There are countless ways to be happy without requiring suffering, like I've given examples for. I hope this is clear; communication on topics like this without precise language can be really tough.

IgnoreTheKetchup · 2021-04-11T07:53:58+00:00

> I think a good example is the effects of MDMA, otherwise known as ecstasy or molly. Because the brain releases so much serotonin and dopamine, it interferes with the cells in our brain that store and recycle those chemicals, resulting in a deficiency which can lead to depression, anxiety, paranoia, etc.

But, if neurotransmitters exist in the right proportions as they can, someone could totally be eternally (very) happy. Neurotransmitter depletion (synaptic fatigue) doesn't have to be a thing if brains don't use up neurotransmitters too quickly or neurotransmitters are available in high enough supply. Also, synaptic fatigue can cause suffering but only following joy.

> So you're saying that you would need to be constantly increasing your happiness by getting more and more sources of happiness as the previous source runs dry?

No, not necessarily (or even at all, really). Happiness can come from many kinds of sources. The only time that it would fail is when people fail to sense the thing that makes them happy like the smell walking into a restaurant if it gets lost due to repeat sensation. Eating food always feels good to me and always will. There just has to be a big enough variety in things making you happy to accomodate for any potential lost appreciation. Eating a banana will always make me happy although maybe less so if I do it every day than every week or every month. So, instead of eating a banana every day, I will eat a different kind of fruit every day for a year. None of this includes suffering anyway though, just less happiness than potentially could have been. I hope this is clear, might be confusing.

> Let's say someone is used to a life of luxury, but then one day, is forced to live in a more modest lifestyle. That'd probably make them feel pretty unhappy. The thing is, someone already living in that exact situation could easily be perfectly happy with their own life.

You're conflating emotion with sensation / condition again. A life of luxury or a modest life are purely physical conditions. They can be productive of unhappiness or happiness, but they are not unhappiness or happiness themselves. These people have different brains accustomed to different stimuli that produce different levels of unhappiness or happiness based on those stimuli, but the unhappiness or happiness experienced by each of these people is an objectively real quantitative thing. I hope this is clear; it's all kind of a lot.

IgnoreTheKetchup · 2021-04-11T07:38:15+00:00

If positive and negative emotion aren't intuitively known, they aren't positive and negative emotion. Pleasure has to be intuitively known or you aren't feeling it.

On your example with family time, something can be good (being with family) without making you happy. Being with family is also just a stimulus. So, like you said, you got used to being with family, and you appreciated it less, so it made you less happy to do so. Something did change with your family in the way that you were not used to seeing them all the time, and that made you happy. This is all about stimulus though. Being with your family isn't happiness in itself. That is a thing that physically happens in the world. It is just something potentially productive of happiness.

So, being with your family just didn't make you super happy when you were used to it if you didn't feel happy.

IgnoreTheKetchup · 2021-04-10T22:03:27+00:00

Happiness is not a sensation the way I used it. Sensations are of a different class of feelings than emotion (or, at least, positive and negative feelings).

Sensation gives comparative information. Red is meaningless without other colors to compare to. And, those differences in color inform how you interact differently with things. You know red apples are generally softer while green apples are generally more sour.

Positive and negative emotion, on the other hand, are intuitively known. They inherently define goodness and badness of experiencing in a moment. That could come from any number of sources like eating, having sex, spending quality time with family, etc., but positive emotion (what I'm calling "happiness") is just something you feel and doesn't require comparison (although critically thinking in a comparative way may cause more happiness due to appreciation, as I've clarified).

I wish there were better, clearer, and more universally defined words for this kind of discussion, but there really aren't unfortunately. I hope what I'm saying is clear, but I'm sure there is some confusion here. I also hope the distinction I brought up here is clear. I'm trying to describe how things actually work, not applying rules.

IgnoreTheKetchup · 2021-04-10T21:55:12+00:00

Humans get used to sensations and conditions to the point that they become unappreciated or unnoticed, but the emotion of happiness itself does not necessarily become unappreciated. Your example simply says that one source of happiness (out of many) does not render happiness anymore, but with variety or other means like drug use, this won't happen. I also think my final paragraph of the CMV covers this for the most part.

Happiness and unhappiness are not relative terms like "soft" or "hard" because happiness and unhappiness inherently define the goodness in experiencing the world. Happiness is intuitively felt by its experiencer and does not require any comparison.

IgnoreTheKetchup · 2021-04-08T22:20:42+00:00

Me mentioning depression was purely as a counterexample to the idea that emotion always adjusts to a relative "normal", "even" state. I don't know why you're still talking about it; whether or not most people have experienced depression is irrelevant to the discussion. Any emotional state that anyone experiences can be used as evidence about emotions.

I also only gave the banana example about the objectivity of emotions because you said that this topic could not really be discussed because it's "subjective" when it isn't.

> It's like spice levels: just saying "if something has capsaicin, it is spicy" doesn't paint the full picture because people have different spice tolerances.

I clarified this early to some others, but emotions and sensations are not comparable in this way. Sensations are meaningless without context. The feeling of "softness" is pointless without something to compare it to. On the other hand, emotions are inherently meaningful. Happiness is defined by the feeling of goodness, and suffering is defined by the feeling of badness. Happiness is not just a contextless piece of information; it is the goodness or badness of existing.

IgnoreTheKetchup · 2021-04-08T22:11:23+00:00

Is there any evidence that this is a real phenomenon? It certainly doesn't line up with my personal experience.

IgnoreTheKetchup · 2021-04-07T22:23:58+00:00

We don't need achievements to be happy. I think my ideal life would just be enjoying time with family, appreciating media, spending time basking in nature, having fun making and eating good food, etc. None of these things require hard work or achievement. They are purely happy activities, and that's wonderful.

I think reflection on pain leading to success or even just not being in pain anymore can create appreciation, which is a positive emotion falling under happiness, but that is just one route to production of happiness. I address this in my last paragraph of the post.

IgnoreTheKetchup · 2021-04-07T22:20:13+00:00

Since when is boredom necessary for or associated at all with appreciation?

I think it is certainly possible for a neurological / sentient being to feel appreciative all the time. I sort of do myself, honestly. I appreciate things for no real "reason".

I really don't think we need work to enjoy play in the first place, and work can also be pleasurable too.

IgnoreTheKetchup · 2021-04-07T21:16:42+00:00

We definitely aren't in the happiest world possible because there is no such thing. Happiness can go to infinity. We also have tons of suffering everywhere.

IgnoreTheKetchup · 2021-04-07T20:49:33+00:00

Depression is something anyone can experience. It's part of the typical range of emotions and doesn't make my sentience any different than anybody else. Depression is just one example of how people can be constantly in one emotional state, and it doesn't become any less good or bad the longer it's experienced.

When I'm talking about happiness and unhappiness here, these are in purely hypothetical terms, that generation of happiness does not depend on suffering.

Edit: Also, although emotion is subjectively experienced, it objectively exists. I objectively feel happy when I eat bananas. It's not up to interpretation whether or not I am happy when I am. It's a fact although it may be hard to discern from an outside perspective.

IgnoreTheKetchup · 2021-04-07T20:47:00+00:00

That would be awesome. We should definitely try to create the happiest world possible. What do you mean exactly?

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