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<p>I suppose so. I’ve been feeling fairly distant from my “significant” other as of late.</p>
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<p>I’ve never experienced this. the more I learn, the more I want to learn. maybe after reading a textbook, I’ll feel a bit tired and rest for a little, but that’s pretty much it. so I’ll say that you can’t be “full” from loving. </p>
<p>I’ll use another metaphor. imagine you are in an amusement park (if you don’t like theme parks, just pretend to for the sake of this example). you may go on the large roller coaster and get tired of it. so then you go onto other rides. the number of rides are infinite. I think the different kinds and intensities of love are infinite too.</p>
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<p>I think you are talking about being pleasantly satiated.</p>
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<p>If you want to talk about flaws, turn to MLK. For the below reasons, I refuse to call him Dr. MLK. I also make sure to tell everyone about his misdeeds each MLK day. MLK: </p>
<p>1) Cheated on his wife multiple times.
2) Hired three prostitutes the night before he died.
3) Abused prostitutes. Hey - prostitutes are people. Therefore, prostitutes should not be physically demeaned.
4) Plagiarized 1/3 of his his doctorate thesis.
5) Borrowed portions of other works in his speeches (this is more acceptable than plagiarizing a doctorate thesis). </p>
<p><a href=“http://www.straightdope.com/columns/read/2449/was-martin-luther-king-jr-a-plagiarist[/url]”>http://www.straightdope.com/columns/read/2449/was-martin-luther-king-jr-a-plagiarist</a></p>
<p>@IceQube</p>
<p>This is a situation where I can say that it does NOT matter. Dr. King did so much more good than any of us will ever do.</p>
<p>From your link:<br>
“As every reasonable observer has commented, neither King’s sexual wanderings nor his scholarly misdeeds detract from his core achievement. By continually publicizing black grievances while putting a palatable, nonviolent face on resistance to jim crow, King paved the way for the landmark civil rights legislation of the 1960s and a major turnaround in public attitudes about race. But there’s no getting around the fact that he was a complex and deeply flawed man. Was he a great American? No argument here. Was he a fraud and a hypocrite? He was that, too.”</p>
<p>The part you should be paying more attention to is this: “As every reasonable observer has commented, neither King’s sexual wanderings nor his scholarly misdeeds detract from his core achievement”</p>
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<p>I suppose one could take that viewpoint, but referring to him as Dr. King is ridiculous.</p>
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<p>On an unrelated note: how often are you guys invited by friends to birthday parties, shopping sprees, etc.? I have never been invited once by a friend to a birthday party or anything. The times I have, the events were arranged by my parents. Am I unusually alienated or something?</p>
<p>bump!!!</p>
<p>No what is ridiculous is having a national holiday celebrating him where all schools close. He did a lot and I can understand why they didn’t posthumously take away his doctorate but for academic institutions to openly celebrate him when his educational credentials were completely fraudulent is kind of ridiculous.</p>
<p>@IceQube i’ve actually never had an event arranged by my parents, but it has been a while since i’ve been to a party/the mall, aside from the occasional study party. Generally my friends and I are pretty busy though, in activities that don’t involve each other, so it’s whatever.</p>
<p>in re MLK, I think generally the best leaders are the worst people, and if you dig deep enough you’ll find dirt on anyone, and then we wouldn’t have any holidays, ever. There’s no need to be the allegorical ‘muckraker’</p>
<p>Because I have zero shot at being valedictorian in my HS, should I aim to be valedictorian in college? Or is this pointless, because once I leave college, I’ll likely have a job, given that I just major in something sensible and maintain a reasonable GPA?</p>
<p>My philosophical question: should I aim to be the best at something, given that I’m pretty much worthless in all other respects, just to satisfy my desire to be good at something? Or should I just not waste the time and try to enjoy college as much as I can vs. spending late nights with books?</p>
<p>@IceQube I don’t really see that as a philosophical question. It just seems to concern personal happiness which the individual can feel for his or herself</p>
<p>I haven’t been invited to anything since high school started. I just don’t get people at my school that well, even though it is huge. everything just seems a bit… shallow. although I can’t put my finger on why</p>
<p>@IceQube Is being valedictorian at a college that easy? haha</p>
<p>Oh and I also find it really, really hard to believe that you’re “pretty much worthless in all respects.” Just reading your posts on here leads me to believe that you’re an advanced writer/thinker. </p>
<p>To answer your question: do what you want/do what feels right. If being the best would make you happier and more content with your life, DO IT. But just being the best for the sake of being the best…I feel like those victories can feel a bit empty. You’ve also said you need to improve socially; college may be a good time to do that.</p>
<p>same here…i only have less than 5 friends that i talk to every day…i feel like everyone is always so preoccupied with who’s dating who and who’s wearing what when they should worry more about their future and just more meaningful things.</p>
<p>I love life. Love is infinite.</p>
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<p>I expected this, and the answer is it’s not going to be easy at all … and the chances of me even being valedictorian are very very slim considering that there are people out there with IQs several standard deviations above mine and with much better work ethics. </p>
<p>Perhaps this will bring focus to the question I posted earlier:</p>
<p>*It is better to be a human being dissatisfied than a pig satisfied; better to be Socrates dissatisfied than a fool satisfied. *</p>
<p>Do you agree with JS Mill’s statement? Is it better to be a learned person than a lowly beast?</p>
<p>You guys are so deep! The discussions here are so scintillating that I’m starting to see the world in a new light. It reminded me to observe and not just live by :)</p>
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<p>No, I don’t agree. I think one of the several qualities human beings look for in life is happiness - and by extension, satisfaction. It is not better to be a dissatisfied learned person than it is to be a satisfied fool simply because “wisdom” or “knowledge” does not have a relevant analogue to happiness.
We could even bring in the fact that since the learned person is wiser, he would have a more informed opinion on what “satisfaction” is. Indeed, he may even have reached the conclusion, after being exposed to a wider variety of things than the fool, that it is impossible to be satisfied due to the sheer breadth of the world. Thus, the wise person can never be satisfied, can never reach that pinnacle of human emotional calm. The fool, however, is presumably less informed about the world, and is thus happier in the circumstances he’s in, simply because he doesn’t know how much better things could be.
I think it’s completely unfair to compare humans to pigs, so I won’t comment with much else than “At least the pig has reached a level of satisfaction a human being could never reach.” The argument would likely be similar to the one made above anyway, with more complexities thrown into the mixture.</p>
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<p>The statement reflects some wisdom, however it has its flaws. Now, IceQube, the idea behind this piece of wisdom is not that one should always remain put and never endeavor for a better life, but that one should be satisfied with whatever circumstances he or she is given, regardless of whether the goal was achieved or not. Put simply, you can have ambition and set out to achieve several goals as you wish, however, you should always be satisfied regardless of the outcome. Otherwise, you will live the most miserable of lives, and no matter what goal or honor you eventually attain, you will surely be dissatisfied and discontent. A very subtle change of attitude can have a major impact.</p>
<p>This isn’t that philosophical, so sorry that it’s out of place.</p>
<p>I don’t think romantic love exists. Platonic love and sexual attraction do exist, and from the blending of those comes infatuation, which is really just falling in love with the mind’s projection of a person. In our society people go into relationships with unrealistically high expectations that they are bound to go downhill past the infatuation stage. We want to get to know our significant others, yet we don’t want to find out that they aren’t perfect.</p>
<p>I love the feeling of infatuation though, that high I get when I flirt and learn about someone new and attractive and interesting, although I know the feeling won’t last and I’ll get bored eventually… I wonder if I’m just going through a phase or if I’ll never fall in love like society has made me feel that I should.</p>
<p>CORVIDS, I disagree.
Romantic love exists, but it’s difficult to reach that stage in a relationship. You have to first surpass the initial infatuation, and only if you can somehow go against anatomical tendencies, which dictate that one gets bored with someone else within 6 months or so, you’ll reach the romantic attraction stage. Here, I think, attraction is based mostly on the person and who he/she is and less on sexual attraction. It’s only after really getting to know the person during the next several months can you be “romantically attracted” to this other being.
You’re right though, that people go into relationships with unrealistic expectations… which is why getting past that infatuation stage is so difficult. If you learn to accept the weaknesses you come to learn about - I find that in the infatuation stage, you are more likely to ignore what someone else has done in his/her past, anyway - you can make it!
OF COURSE YOU LOVE THAT FEELING OF INFATUATION:
You’re biologically designed to. Biologically speaking, you don’t even have to get to know a person in order to have sex with them. If anything, relationships like that are a social construct humans have developed… for the better, in my opinion.</p>
<p>^ I agree with classicgirll. Romantic love exists, but is rare, as most relationships seem to be infatuation or platonic love for a friend that turns into some form of infatuation. I’ve definitely seen true love before though; you can just see it in the way couples act and are towards each other.</p>
<p>I also believe in altruism; you guys are such cynics! Haha, I guess I’m a dreamer and optimist, but I really do believe that people do things unselfishly. For example, what about a mother who sacrifices herself for her daughter? There’s nothing for her to gain; she simply loves her child very much.</p>