Aaron

Desire pushes us to face fear.

__________________
"The pump don't work cause' the vandals took the handle" - Bob Dylan

lauraclay

I think that's a personal thing. Not everyone wants control, and now everyone wants to get rid of the what ifs. Some people want them, hence, that desire for what if. Also, I was referring to the desire for the unknown. The grass is always greener on the other side.

__________________

The purpose of a fish trap is to catch fish,
and when the fish are caught, the trap is forgotten.

The purpose of a rabbit snare is to catch rabbits.
When the rabbits are caught, the snare is forgotten.

The purpose of words is to convey ideas.
When the ideas are grasped, the words are forgotten.

Where can I find a man who has forgotten words?
He is the one I would like to talk to.

The An-Jel

Not everyone wants control? EVERYONE wants control! They want to be able to eat, sleep, drink, and be merry and in the conditions that suit them. I haven't met a person yet that doesn't want these types of things. That is control. Controlling ones environment whether it means controlling other people to do it or just the things and creatures other than people. This is what I mean about control.

I really hope thats true about the unknown stuff cause I don't see a lot of people wanting that kind of thing and more inclined to control what they can and what they are born into.

__________________
"And let there be Light!" said the Blind man.

Life is simple, people make it complicated - Basilisk

Nulli Expugnabilis Hosti - Royal Gibraltar Regiment

lauraclay

I wasn't referring to control regarding the necessities, more like the wants. Some people are more than willing to give up happiness for a better cause, and some people just want to start over. Some people's lives are scheduled so much that one day they break and decide they want no control.

Have faith, I know a lot of people who just want to leave what they know and delve into the unknown. Then again, I'm a senior, and the majority of my friends are just starting their lives. There's not much that isn't the unknown.

__________________

The purpose of a fish trap is to catch fish,
and when the fish are caught, the trap is forgotten.

The purpose of a rabbit snare is to catch rabbits.
When the rabbits are caught, the snare is forgotten.

The purpose of words is to convey ideas.
When the ideas are grasped, the words are forgotten.

Where can I find a man who has forgotten words?
He is the one I would like to talk to.

Armel P

Sometimes I like being tied up by a pretty little Japanese 20-something in a school girl outfit and having her beat the hell out of me.

__________________
Aspiring Memetic Engineer

lauraclay

Case in point.
I guess.

__________________

The purpose of a fish trap is to catch fish,
and when the fish are caught, the trap is forgotten.

The purpose of a rabbit snare is to catch rabbits.
When the rabbits are caught, the snare is forgotten.

The purpose of words is to convey ideas.
When the ideas are grasped, the words are forgotten.

Where can I find a man who has forgotten words?
He is the one I would like to talk to.

Piglet

An Jel

No. I would be quite happy to be totally alone and control nothing.
The idea of controling others is sickening to me.
People in general make me feel ill. But humanity, i love.
The potential of children, i love. Reality i love.

The desire to control others, is a sickness. A sickness fundamental to our
history. Stalin, Mao, Hitler, changed the world. [by killing]
Yet those that REALLY changed the world, Socrates, descartes, einstein,
yeats, beethoven, archimedies, galileo, copernicus, Jefferson, the wright brothers, Jesus. And a thousand more
They changed the world with words and personal deeds.
They changed the world by NOT BELIEVING what they were told is
'thats the way it is'

True, i dont want to have a meteor fall on my head, so control of such
would be nice. But if not, so what, i die, i'm going to die sometime soon
anyway. If reality says my day has come.. so be it. Reality gave me my life to start with so i owe it everything anyway. The 'structure' piglet. Is a thing built and owned by reality. I own nothing but my private thoughts.

Im not so christian to whine and grovel for an imagined eternal existance.
To get more of what i did not earn to start with.
Most people i know would have no idea what to do with a 1000 years of
life, let alone eternity. [watch big brother on fox cable?]

Piglet however has 10 thousand years worth of ideas to explore.
thats just a single tick of the cosmic clock.

Piglet

__________________
Vir prudens non contra ventum mingit

Piglet

Laura

As do i. I am also a 'senior'
Yet our social 'system' puts the fear of something into us all.
That something is hard to define.
Our world is now a tightening web of safety nets and supports.
Hundreds of them. Conditioned from birth, we are strangled with our own hands in any attempt to leave.
Each of us has a file on a hard drive of several computers location not known.
But guaranteed on the petabyte drives at NoSuchAgency.
Thats fine. As long as we are harmless, we are harmless.

To escape this, one needs to detach completely.
Go to where no humans are. And live there
We as individuals have grown 'soft' compared to our great great forefathers
and foremothers.
Few wish to give up electricity and vehicles and technology.

But we evolved over 500 thousand years with none of those things.

Piglet

__________________
Vir prudens non contra ventum mingit

lauraclay

Is the social system a separate entity? Does it live, breathe, think, influence? Or do humans individually set up this fear? Are we born with the drive to succeed, and all that has changed over thousands of years is the definition of success? Is it so horrible that our world is built of safety nets? Now, we don't have to worry about dying of small pox, we can focus on something new. We never know what will come next, but reverting to the past will only deny us the opportunities a little longer.

Why must we go to where no humans are? We have grown soft? Or just differently? Few wish to give up the comforts of technology, and thousands survived without it, but we survived to build this. To deny technology completely is to deny the products of evolution. Why not use technology and evolve further? Use the tools given, and take everything a step further. I agree, if we gave up technology we would learn a lot. But wouldn't we be learning lessons already learned? It is infinitely valuable to learn these lessons on our own, but I don't think we should confine our live to learning them. The revolutionaries you cite are famous because they didn't believe what they were told, true. They pushed further and learned something never before learned. To make a difference, we must do the same.

__________________

The purpose of a fish trap is to catch fish,
and when the fish are caught, the trap is forgotten.

The purpose of a rabbit snare is to catch rabbits.
When the rabbits are caught, the snare is forgotten.

The purpose of words is to convey ideas.
When the ideas are grasped, the words are forgotten.

Where can I find a man who has forgotten words?
He is the one I would like to talk to.

Piglet

Laura

I can find little to argue with in your post.
But for one thing. Our society DOES not promote dissention.
And all those great free thinkers and doers. did not have to deal with the 'now' the huge power of conformity.
In a world where none are blind.
But 'visually challenged'.
Who can see a path?
[not an excuse, but it sound cool no...lol, maybe i should write poetry]

Piglet is just another human in the mass.
I set myself a path, a path that will have no conclusion, for death will
end it a thousand years before it can even gain momentum.
That path is to undertand all i can from existing, and in so doing, maybe just once
aiding our species on it's path.
If i can do just one little thing, maybe change one pivotal person to a path that will result in
wisdom. [for piglet is not pivotal, merely an influence]
Then i have done something of benefit for my race.
I can ask no more.

I understand fully the significance of my existance in it's uniqueness and the
insignificance of it in it's profusity here on earth.

Yet i rejoice, in the love and happiness that cannot be controlled by any saftey net.
In the love of man an women, of same/sex partners.
In the love of children and their infinite potential.
Of the weilding of reason and logic, To undersatand and solve problems.

I am but a speck of nothing. But a nothing that cannot easily be refuted.
[in arguement, act and existance]

Piglet

__________________
Vir prudens non contra ventum mingit