Hw #3 : Blog Post # 2

So first I'm going to start this reflection by attempting to answer my own question : "What role does religion play in an existentialist view on human freedom?" The theory of an existentialist is that man was created with no rules on how to live life. "Nobody has an idea about who we are or what were supposed to be like." Now, religion is a culture that lays out the rules of life that was "written" by our creator, God. Its tells you what good things you need to do and what bad things you shouldn't do so then when you die you know you'll have a good place for your soul to rest. These two ides are parallel, so how are there religious existentialists?
It was said in class that religion is like a safety net, just in case there are rules to life. I find this idea quiet interesting because then i branch out to think : "But there are just so many religions, how do you know which one is the right one ? What if you chose to follow the wrong ones?" But then again these are questions we cannot answer because all of these ideas conclude in one thing ; what happens after death ; and no one can die and come back to life to tell us. Its almost as if we live our lifes in fear of dying.

Another topic i want to write about is the idea that who we really are is all mental which leads to our freedom to be individuals. I strongly agree with this idea. We cannot change "the raw materials" that are determined but we have the power to "edit the frames which constitute our experience into the film that is to be our life." This means to me that we cannot change what life brings our way but we have full control of the attitude we are going to use to get through them and the lessons we take away from them. This reminds me of my mother. Since she was a little girl she has made it through some real rough times in her life but she is a hero. she never let the negativity get to her. Every time something came her way she came out even more stronger then before.

These speeches by Banach have given me ideas on how i can view my life and understand others individuality. He brings up valuable points that each one of us can let sink in and begin to use in our everyday life.

HW #2 : Blog Comments 1

Comment on Ariel B's blog :

You have a good idea flowing about how scary the idea of not being able to connect with anyone would make everyone selfish and the world a cold place. I didn't think of it in this way. I looked at absolute individuality as a good thing. Its what separated us from the next. I think that if everyone was able to feel each others pain , at what point would you get to actually develop your own. What i believe Banach is saying is that we can relate to other peoples emotions because we are all human but we will never really actually understand or feel what anyone else does because we are our own persons with our own minds and experience.

I also liked how you related a point in the lecture to your own personal experience.

Comment on Matt B's blog :
I really love how you use the metaphor of a mother and her child to disagree with the idea of absolute individuality. yes you are correct about the relationship between a mother and her child but have you ever felt that you couldn't talk to your mother because she wouldn't understand you. This is the feel i get from his lectures. Banach isn't saying that we don't care about others but that we simply cannot be 100% sure of what another person feels, only how we can relate to their feelings from our own feelings.
In your second paragraph you discuss this idea.

This was a good post , i look forward to reading your other reflections.

HW #1 "The Ethics of Absolute Freedom" by David Banach, Part I

" When you look at the person next to you, do you really see them as they are on the inside or feel what they feel? You see only the images of them that is presented to your mind through your senses. "

This quote reminds me of a person who is always smiling but is actually depressed. We never really know or understand ones emotions or even who they really are. We only go by what we see/ what they want us to see. Is this disability to connect with others emotions a good thing or a bad thing? For example, if your best friend is going trough some tough times so you tell them to vent their feelings. Do you really begin to understand how they feel by the way they explain it or do you just find a time you felt that way and try to relate? Ive been in this position and i find myself relating more then fully fulling my best friends pain. Like banach said, we can only "feel our pains . . immediately."

Im going to take this blog post in a different direction because i dont know what else to say about my first topic. Banach says that our minds are trapped in our bodies "only perceving the images transmitted to us through our bodies and their sences." In other words , our mind intreprets what our sences signal. Can we trust our sences? Im pretty sure everyone has once experinced a time when they thought they heard something but they had actualy heard wrong. Our ears are our only source of hearing whats going on outside of our heads, therfore if we have once experinced hearing soemthing wrong, how do we know that we are always hearing things correctly? Are our sences really that reliable? they can often decive us so how will we every really know whats going on out side of our own heads? I guess we just "hear what we want to hear" becuase at the end of the day, you cant feel or know anything else besides your own emotions and your own thoughts.