On Truth and Reason
Two questions must be answered: first, does truth actually exist, and second, if truth exists, do we have the ability to discern what is true?
Truth. To live meaningful and happy lives, we must first accept that objective truths exist and can be found through the senses and the practice of reason. Alternatively, we doom ourselves to a life filled with murkiness, indecision, and aimlessness through the inability to know anything.
We perceive reality through sense and reason. Sense is the basis of all knowledge, for we reason using the information we have gathered through exercising the senses. But how do we know that our senses do not deceive us? How can we know that what we see or feel is really there?
To refuse the notion that objective truths can be known induces chaos of mind, will, and spirit.
On Indecision
When presented with any choice, we have three options: the decision to affirm, the decision to deny, or the refusal to make any decision whatsoever. The decision not to decide is usually wrong.
An indecisive person is like a buried seed that refuses to sprout and seek the sun’s light. He is too afraid of life to live.
We make decisions every day but often fail to consider why we make them. Why do we choose the friends we choose? Why spend our time on trivial matters? What is our purpose? Why choose to sin and spit upon the God who created us?
It is so easy to get caught up in earthly success. A life spent on the acquisition of wealth, the improvement of the physical body, or even the progression of one’s virtue with no transcendent purpose in mind is not a life well spent. We must examine our mortality and remind ourselves that purpose must be anchored to something or someone above physical existence.
1 Samuel 16:7. “The Lord does not see as man sees. Man looks on the outward appearance, but the Lord looks at the heart.” God, help me see as you see!
On Time
Like wet soap, always grasped at but never held onto. But not for lack of trying.
It is all too easy to live in dreams of the past but just as easy to be swept away by the future’s tide.
“I don’t have time right now.” But we only have the time to do what truly matters to us.
The only way to truly waste time is to spend it unintentionally.
On Perspective and Wonder
Spend a year, a lifetime, or a thousand lifetimes studying nature. Choose to examine the natural realm at the largest conceivable scale or at the smallest possible level, and you will be overwhelmed with a similarly incalculable amount of information. For example, take the largest star and the smallest dust mite. Both are interminable in complexity and seem to possess infinite details and features. Both are too complex to be fully comprehended, even by the more complex human brain.
Our solar system contains entire planets. Our planet is made of uncharted land and vast, barely-explored oceans that extend for thousands of miles beneath the surface. Trillions of complex organisms exist on the earth, each of which is uniquely created. Humanity has studied its surroundings for thousands of years but has barely scratched the surface of knowledge that can be obtained. There are worlds of complexity within worlds.
Contemplating the smallest atom or tiniest bacterium boggles the mind just as much as trying to mentally take in the expanse of the universe.
How is it possible to feel alone in a room full of people?
So similar. Humans share a common anatomy, a similar ability to grow physically, reason, and a similar capacity to change the world. So different. Humans appear so outwardly different, make radically different decisions, and vary greatly in the scope and virtue of their effect on the world around them.
On Self
Your values determine who you are and who you will become. If you want to change who you are, first change your values. Don’t just change them on paper. A real change in values should have a measurable effect on your life, the lives of those around you, and your environment. I cannot say that I am going to value speaking in a self-controlled manner over the ease of speaking whatever comes to mind, but not change the way that I speak.
Everybody shouldn’t know everything about you.
No business or money is worth risking your life to defend.
Life is already dark with strife and hate. Choose instead to color the world with bright joy and love.
It is all too easy to mistake the absence of vice in oneself or another for the presence of virtue. The two are not the same.
A Conjecture Regarding Creation
Conjecture: Natural matter must have been created by an unnatural, intelligent force. Imagine the natural realm as a cardboard box inside which everything inside the cosmos has been placed. Somebody must have placed it there.
Consider the cardboard box. Only something greater than the system (existing outside it) could have created it. In the same way that an un-assembled box could box could not be put together by a man standing in the middle unless he reached outside of the center, a closed system cannot be created from the inside, but could by a man standing outside of it.
So, any origin or assembler of a closed system must exist outside of it. In the case of nature, this means that the origin must have been supernatural.
Since the origin is supernatural, it could not be understood by humans. It never operated on human terms (i.e. inside the box). If the origin acted in the natural realm, perhaps some muted, incomplete truths regarding its nature could be grasped.
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