what seperates humans from animals

[CoPilot Katie]

Originally Posted by AfroHorse

some say humans have self awareness and animals do not

humans can also think in terms of the past, present and future, and from observing my cats behaviour, id say cats at least can not do this

animals have instinct behaviour, humans can actively seek to learn new behaviour, and not just be conditioned into it


lots of animals have different levels of intelligence, some dogs are dumb as shit, and then theres lassie

"i know cats and dogs that are smarter than corey and trevor"


were not that different from our animal friends though, most creatures on this earth have 2 eyes, a heart, lungs, we all need to eat, have sex, sleep, and all that business, which indicates that if you go far up enough the family tree (evolutionary) we're all family members... unless life started at 2 separate points

but i guess if you apply that theory youd have to say that us and trees are somehow biologically linked (apart from the whole trading oxygen for carbon dioxide cohabitation)

we just ended up with a new part of brain that allows us to think about our new part of brain

humans ARE animals...
animals remember and think in the present, which humans do, they dont often think of the future because humans often are the dictators of their future and we do not communicate naturally with the animals, so they have no idea whats going to happen...

i also think that humans have instincts too and use do not use them enough because our society is one with plenty of distractions from what our natural human needs consist of....

and exactly...there are plenty of stupid humans

[CoPilot Katie]

i also sort of think that maybe human beings arent superior... maybe all of our intelligence and technological advances and intense emotion and social complexity interferes with our basic survival to some extent. by some extend i mean somewhat physically, listening to our natural instincts, and our spirituality. I agree with reverie. Our mental and emotion health, and connection with outer energy forces and our personal energy and soul, etc... are all a huge part of our survival and lives. Everything plays a part. our social lives and material based morals and goals remove us from acknowledging the energy around us and the influences of everything around us, think of the simpler organisms in life... the amoeba which simply does its job... it has nothing to interfere with completing its necessary life functions except having a sufficient environment. Because it does only what it needs to survive at its natural state of being, it does not destroy its environment because it is in balance with the other energy forces around it, assuming the other forces are balanced as well and do not destroy its environment.

[matthewmunari]

bongsmiliebongsmilie bongsmiliekatie....w e are advancing exponentionally..... ....if we make it another 100 years we'll be lucly, cuz we as a species have verry smart people..we are going to kill ourselves with nukes once iran has the bomb.............ahm endenijad is the devil............... ....ITS ALL IN THE BIBLE...........Its crazy how accurate Cayce, Nostradamus, and the like were......Im happy to be living 20,000 miles from the battlegrounnd!!its 6:20, time to smoke

[zoltron]

Originally Posted by matthewmunari

.........ahmendenija d is the devil............... ....ITS ALL IN THE BIBLE...........Its crazy how accurate Cayce, Nostradamus, and the like were......Im happy to be living 20,000 miles from the battlegrounnd!!

I agree with ya, Matt. Nostradamus was amazing. How he predicted things that happened 500 years after his death astound me. He was only 2 letters off when he said a man named 'Hester' would try & conquer the world.
Then he predicted JFK's assassination. Was he the 1 who said the world would end in 2012? Or was that the Mayans or Incas...1 of those civilizations?
I'll bet there's odds in Vegas on when the end-of-the-world will be. I love Las Vegas. Used to go a LOT back in the 70s, when I lived in Denver. I'd think nothing of making that 13-15 hr drive in my 72 Ford Pinto at least once every 2-3 months.

[matthewmunari]

Originally Posted by zoltron

I agree with ya, Matt. Nostradamus was amazing. How he predicted things that happened 500 years after his death astound me. He was only 2 letters off when he said a man named 'Hester' would try & conquer the world.
Then he predicted JFK's assassination. Was he the 1 who said the world would end in 2012? Or was that the Mayans or Incas...1 of those civilizations?
I'll bet there's odds in Vegas on when the end-of-the-world will be. I love Las Vegas. Used to go a LOT back in the 70s, when I lived in Denver. I'd think nothing of making that 13-15 hr drive in my 72 Ford Pinto at least once every 2-3 months.

so true! prolly at the stratosohere tower (they're known for taking crazy off the wall bets!)

[FineazPR]

...I find that the bible is full of BS. It was written by Men backin th late whenevers, and I just find it hard to live MY life according to what it says in that book. Besides, do I really want to even consider going to heaven? Ewww!No not me. thnks.

[matthewmunari]

hahahaha dude, the bible is a group of allegorical tales and statements to help man.......even if it wasnt divinely inspired its still a good way to live a long and happy life...

[Legal lies]

Originally Posted by FineazPR

Besides, do I really want to even consider going to heaven? Ewww!No not me. thnks.

Not believing in Heaven is one thing, but not wanting to go to Heaven if it exists just seems crazy to me. Eternal bliss, I guess, must not be for you.

[matthewmunari]

Originally Posted by Legal lies

Not believing in Heaven is one thing, but not wanting to go to Heaven if it exists just seems crazy to me. Eternal bliss, I guess, must not be for you.

i agree....

[JcP]

^^ I think eternal bliss is the equivalent of hell. A couple millenia of bliss would rock! Imagine existing continually as you for all of eternity. Holy shit. Talk about hell.

Unless eternal bliss is code for "whatever you want," I think it's a wolf in sheep's clothing. If you aren't able to experience anything but one thing for all of eternity, I think around year eight zillion or so, you'd suddenly realize heaven isn't heaven.
Eternal anything has to include the ability to experience "other" or I'm not game.

Maybe it's just the eve in me talking. If you know what I'm getting at. :-)

[matthewmunari]

Originally Posted by JcP

^^ I think eternal bliss is the equivalent of hell. A couple millenia of bliss would rock! Imagine existing continually as you for all of eternity. Holy shit. Talk about hell.

Unless eternal bliss is code for "whatever you want," I think it's a wolf in sheep's clothing. If you aren't able to experience anything but one thing for all of eternity, I think around year eight zillion or so, you'd suddenly realize heaven isn't heaven.
Eternal anything has to include the ability to experience "other" or I'm not game.

Maybe it's just the eve in me talking. If you know what I'm getting at. :-)

(initially) time is a human invention to measure the seasons, and when the crops would grow and prosper.....I believe when you cross over, time takes on a different purpose...it's unecessary once you don't have a physical body, and cant operate in our 3d world...i believe we logically advance to whatever our energies become, cuz you cannot destroy energy...

[JcP]

I agree time is a construct. I've argued that alot on this board.

But MEMORY is not a construct. If one has memory, one has the construct of time. So if one is in ETERNAL BLISS, one is using the construct of time and is aware of being in bliss (has a memory of what isn't bliss), so the construct still exists.

Hope that clears it up.

[matthewmunari]

Originally Posted by JcP

I agree time is a construct. I've argued that alot on this board.

But MEMORY is not a construct. If one has memory, one has the construct of time. So if one is in ETERNAL BLISS, one is using the construct of time and is aware of being in bliss (has a memory of what isn't bliss), so the construct still exists.

Hope that clears it up.

you have to be alive to have memory(so far as i've been aware)....I died (u prolly know the story) anyways, I REMEMBER %90 of it VERY well....we agree energy cannot be destroyed, it can be infused, altered, used, abused, etc. but not destroyed....now is where we get into the grey areas...i remember my hand being repaired to working order beifore I even knew it was paralyzed....explain that....When I woke up out of the coma, i remember 2 people being with me..they told me they'd see me again....now I had a 1st hand experience w/ death..like i said i died 2 times on the way to the e.r....and it seemed like time didn't really matter...(i didnt even know i was comatose for 3 1/2 weeks) it was so real man, I didn't believe them when they told me I almost died.....THATS HOW REAL THE OTHER SIDE WAS.....and an interesting side note, evidence .. the angel (I obviously didn't know she was an angel) she gave me a string-beaded bracelet....I asked my dad where the bracelet came from? He said an Asian woman put it on my wrist while i was comatose.....the funny thing is, when we checked for that nurse, she didn't exist....I was in I.C.U....so they don't let just anyone in, mainly family..I eventually met everyone that helped me survive, and I never saw the lady who gave me the bracelet......

The point I'm trying to make is energy cannot be destroyed.....

[Ziggy Fry]

Eternal bliss to me is whatever I want for eternity.

That's what eternal bliss means to me. Is my heaven different from your heaven?

Even in a paradise, I don't think I could live as/with myself forever.

Edit: Matt.. woah.

Sin.Ziggy.

[Legal lies]

Originally Posted by JcP

^^ I think eternal bliss is the equivalent of hell. A couple millenia of bliss would rock! Imagine existing continually as you for all of eternity. Holy shit. Talk about hell.

Unless eternal bliss is code for "whatever you want," I think it's a wolf in sheep's clothing. If you aren't able to experience anything but one thing for all of eternity, I think around year eight zillion or so, you'd suddenly realize heaven isn't heaven.
Eternal anything has to include the ability to experience "other" or I'm not game.

Maybe it's just the eve in me talking. If you know what I'm getting at. :-)

I think I know exactly what you're getting at, but I think I disagree. You're thinking that you'd be unhappy after a certain point of time because you want variety. Normally, when we don't have variety we become unhappy and we want something to break up our routines. With eternal bliss, however, you are always happy, ipso facto. A lack of variety would not matter if you are really in eternal bliss. And just because you're always happy doesn't mean everything has to stay the same all the time. Heaven can accommodate variety and eternal bliss.

[JcP]

I think there's an issue here but it's hard to put into words...I'll try:

if eternal bliss is always being happy, then you are always the same. If always being something (IE no variety) doesn't make you happy, then eternal bliss is not always being happy, but experiencing variety.

If eternal bliss is variety, then you must have moments wherein you are not happy. If you have moments where you are not happy, then you are not in eternal bliss because at the moment of unhappiness, you are not blissful. Or, in other words, in order to have eternal bliss, you need to not be eternally blissful, which is a bit of a paradox.

The only way I see these two issues coming together peacefully is to have the KNOWLEGE during times of pain that you are actively choosing to have the pain in order to have the variety that makes you blissful.

So heaven, and therefore eternal bliss, is (in a way) merely an understanding of why things are what they are.

So when it comes down to it, I'm not disagreeing with you legal lies. I just think it's more nuanced. I guess heaven is the ability to CONSCIOUSLY choose what you experience. As in "I want a banana" and you have a banana. Or, "I don't want to be able to have a banana" and you don't have the banana (but you know you chose not to have the banana).

hope that makes sense. It's sort of a hybrid of the two.