If you could push a button and simply cease to exist, would you press it?

No, there's too much I'm enjoying and looking forward to. Ask me again in 35 years.

Nope. It's a big beautiful world out there. I want to continue to engage with it for as long as possible.

not until i finish final fantasy vii, the wheel of time and another thousand toffee crisps

no, no, no. I'd like to push a button and eradicate the mistakes I have made that have involved emotional and financial and other repercussions to the people around me though.

I can't really imagine not wanting to do this in a heartbeat. You guys are weird.

Nope. Many years ago I concluded that if I could wake up every day and do at least one thing that I enjoyed - might just be eating a tasty breakfast or listening to a song I like - then it was worth getting up, and I'd apply that to existing, too. I'm pretty sure that most days I manage to do way more than just one thing I enjoy, too, even if some days they;re not as enjoyable or the enjoyment gets outweighed by the crapheap of life's vagaries. But I'm lucky in that my head doesn't tend to fixate on the bad stuff.

I have a beautiful house, wife and kids, and when I ask myself "how did I get here", I know.

So, no.

a better question is push a button and some OTHER person ceast to exist etc?

Or, press a button and reset to a given point in time?

(Still no, fwiw)

voting no but if I could have the button stashed away that'd be cool thx

what about push a button and EVERY other person ceased to exist ? That'd be fun for a bit at least.

no. i like existing. dealing with crap that it entails is another thing but really that's the crap's fault not mine.

re. reset,
http://pbfcomics.com/archive_b/PBF111-Reset.jpg

push a button and Charles Manson ceased to exist?

He'd like that...

what about push a button to freeze everything except yourself?

xpost good point.. (re the last cartoon)

what about push a button to freeze everything except yourself?

Man, that solo album would be DONE!!!

if i cd push a button and be an invisible ghost that cd travel anywhere in space forever but only observe i'd think about that one

when I was a kid I wanted to have the power to slow the rest of the world down so I could have mad footy skills.

what about the power to read thoughts?

what about push a button to freeze everything except yourself?

Man, that solo album would be DONE!!!

― Mark G, Friday, 12 October 2012 11:39 (2 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Maintenance! I can't get this recording device to operate!!!

What was the name of that kids' programme in the early 90s about a girl who was half-alien and had special powers that let her stop time and move shit about and her dad communicated to her from a weird glowing box in her room? I loved that shit.

Answer to OGQ: No.

A few key things I'm not happy about on a personal level, but geez, no.

Hell no.

xp.out of this world. i had a bit of a crush.

Now? No way. As much shit as I deal with on a daily basis that makes it tough to be inside my head, I love life and am afraid of not having enough of it not too much. Ask me when I'm old and falling apart and my answer will likely be v different.

that's it, thomasintrouble... i remember being a bit freaked out by one episode where she had to physically battle the alien half of herself in a boxing match. it got a bit deep and psychological. i still get the theme song stuck in my head, although i think it's an old standard anyway.

A "delete all of humanity except me" button would be my idea of hell. That's unpleasantly how life feels too much of the time.

A "delete all of humanity, including me, now" I would probably feel pretty morally obligated to hit, considering what a drain we are on the planet's resources, but that's another thread for another day.

would consider the latter if it included cows as well.

for dog latin : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fjQNoXWBWaM

wld prefer to hit the 'voluntary human extinction' option, to start NOW

delete all humanity def has its merits but I'd be tempted to hang around just to find out which species ended up bossing the game in our absence

they'd just become the new humans, and it'd take as long again for them to invent the toffee crisp, so i don't see the point tbh

i like the sound of these toffee crisp articles.

There have been times in the past when I would have pushed the hell out of such a button (and probably times ahead when I would want to as well, as much as I hate to say it). But now? No way.

I wouldn't eradicate humanity either because I think we'll figure it out eventually and if not, we'll all die anyway and the planet will spin on.

this question seems to be asking if you would make use of a pain-free (to yourself and others) way of committing suicide. i think for most ppl the impulse to stay alive is more than just avoiding pain - it is avoiding death/void/oblivion/nothingness. it is certainly that for me.

yeah it's not so much the death as the not-knowing? I don't mind making big decisions but I like being able to assess them afterwards.

If the It's A Wonderful Life scenario were available, I'd totally want to see what the world would be like without me.

We're not talking about death, we're talking about... not existing. Like actively choosing nothingness.

i sometimes wonder whether it would be in society's best interest to create a way for people to commit suicide in a responsible (to their families + loved ones + themselves) way. presumably people are going to do it anyway, so maybe if we had some kind of "ethically" sanctioned dystopian way to do it (like those drinks in children of men, or the suicide booths in a mind forever voyaging), it might ease some of the pain. this might be a copout tho, since treatment has got to be the better model, right? (kant would certainly never condone suicide, even under the best most responsible conditions)

this is the question i used to ask myself when i was lying in bed all day pretending i wasn't contemplating suicide. the answer was yes of course. can still find myself leaning in that direction in unguarded moments but in general it's a definite no, and for the change i am exceedingly grateful.

THere are definitely days when I would. Of late, most of them. But there are days when I wouldn't. "no emotional or financial or other repercussions to the people around you" weights it heavily towards the "yes" column.

I asked this question. This question is not about suicide. It is about not-existing.

Please can people not use this as a suicide thread, that was not the intention and I'd really rather the discussion did not turn that way.

Nope. I would miss out on stuff and that is the worst.

i think if this question is always on your mind and you think "it's ok this is just an impossible hypothetical and i'm not actually contemplating suicide" you're basically fooling yourself that your mental state is better than it is.

("you" = impersonal, would have used "one" but it reads funny.)

Historically speaking, you've already missed out on pretty much everything, and are going to miss out on everything else.

Existence is sometimes awesome, but on the whole it's pretty shit.

I would be very tempted.

Would it be as though I'd never existed? Would the actual world simply be replaced with the nearest alternative world in which there's no me? It's hard to know what exactly that world would be like... George Bailey taught us.

I don't think anyone in this thread has any right to draw conclusions about the mental state of anyone except themselves. Thanks.

Historically speaking, you've already missed out on pretty much everything, and are going to miss out on everything else.

On the one hand, sure.

On the other hand, the only things that matter are the things I'm around to experience, and prematurely shutting things down by ceasing to exist makes a bunch of stuff I care about no longer matter.

I disagree with the op regarding what this thread is about. Luckily death of the author etc.

i'm drawing the conclusion that the southern hemisphere doesn't have toffee crisps, which has got be having a serious quality of life impact tbh

darraghmac, what's your opinion of Double Deckers?

we did that thread last week, thomas!

srsly speaking tho any question that asks about self-annihilation necessitates a discussion of suicide imho

even if it is super special suicide

Isn't it great that there are people on this thread who can mansplain to me what the thread I started is about! Because I would ~never~ have known what was in my head otherwise.

who cares what you think the thread is about is really the point. i would happily "mansplain" 20th century literary theory to you, but i'll let wiki handle that: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_of_the_Author

if you could push a button and authorial intent would simply cease to exist, would you press it?

^^^ yes

I would only ask:

Do you mean, fade out to nothing, leaving behind no body for someone else to sort out, including yr stuff?

And where to go?

Put it this way, would it be the same as going to some far-flung, ooh, coastal area some place 'west' of here, with enough resources to live on?

?

OK, I've looked at that wiki link, it's beyond my ken...

you lot carry on.

The relevance of suicide depends on how we read the question.

If the effect of the button is that at the moment of pressing I simply vanish, whereas my friends and relatives are magically unafflicted, then it sounds like a peculiarly consequence-free self-killing.

If the effect is to change the world such that I've never existed, then I don't think that suicide is relevant. It's a limit case of the question, "How would you wish for the world to be different?" If the consequence of my wish is that someone isn't born who would otherwise have been born, then I wouldn't regard that as murder.

The act of trying to consider this hypothetical anullment in a hypothetical universe which does not contain the concept of suicide is twisting my poor little brain. I'm out too.

That's not why I'm out, just to clarify.

xp Jim, there's still a active act of self-annihilation involved, for which suicide is still the only relevant analogue.

xp ( sorry Mark, didn't mean to speak for you chap )

a better question is push a button and some OTHER person ceast to exist etc?

― nostormo, Friday, October 12, 2012 7:36 AM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

yeah being a parent makes this whole question more complicated. does my son cease to exist too? would he just suddenly have another guy as his dad? or no dad? because fuck that w/ any of those scenarios. so maybe not so complicated.

hell no

my life isn't even half as great as it could be right now and i still didn't even have to think about this one

You can't cite death of the author in a discussion, you fucking lugnut. This isn't literature, it's communication.

yeah despite being a major stan for death of the author i dont think it applies here at all

xp I don't see why the thread creator should have any special privilege to police the discussion

and some dude otm. even if it would be ethically okay for me to wipe out my own existence, i don't think i can make that decision for the life that is dependent on my own existence to exist.

what about push a button to freeze everything except yourself?

This was a pretty decent novel, fwiw.

If the It's A Wonderful Life scenario were available, I'd totally want to see what the world would be like without me.

― thomasintrouble

Heh, I'm sure I would be miffed to find out everything was EXACTLY THE SAME.

no. i like existing. dealing with crap that it entails is another thing but really that's the crap's fault not mine.

this, but there were times - not necessarily times of great depression (most memorably walking down a moonlit sunken lane in Sussex in my early twenties) - where I longed for such a button and would have pressed it.

Thought experiment. Pretend it would involve no physical pain to yourself, and no emotional or financial or other repercussions to the people around you. Would you hit the Flag Post button?

i'm assuming for the purpose of this question that the button is ideally consequence free. we can argue that in reality our existence has had consequences for everybody we've ever met and many people we haven't, but i don't need to work out the nuts and bolts of how it wd be possible for me to cease to exist without impacting on those people - it's a given of the question, which is reduced to "do i choose to cease to exist or not, given no consequences ensue from my decision?"

my answer is still no, because in the most simplistic Camus-ian sense, i prefer existing to the alternative.

Nah. I mean I don't contribute anything to the well being of my fellow humans or the planet but I'm not bothered by that. There's always a record to listen to, a TV show to watch, a football match to obsess over. That's more than enough for me to want to exist. Being a shallow sort probably helps.

If a thread-starter asks a question which is "do you prefer red or blue?" you don't get to walk into a thread and declare that actually red is yellow for the purposes of this question and claim "ooh, death of the author."

Especially if that means drawing dubious psychological conclusions about what it means for anyone on the thread who chose "yellow" (when they actually chose red.)

i'm sure i've had a lot of times when i'd've pressed it, maybe. i think i'd've been wrong. (inasmuch as i can speak for an i that isn't me, now - complications!)

but to go back to something else i thought upthread, i think i'd be comfortable with a consequence-less removal from the world of other people as long as i cd go on experiencing, including experiencing that world, without belonging to it.

what if the thread-starter asks: 'if you could eliminate yellow or blue, which would you eliminate?' and someone declares that eliminating any one of those colors would also eliminate idk green (if i remember my primary and secondary colors correctly?) and then the thread starter said: "NO. ONLY ELIMINATING THOSE COLORS DON'T TELL ME HOW TO FEEL"

Thought experiment. Pretend any hypothetical situation in which you cause yourself to "simply cease to exist" can be discussed without ever referring to suicide.

maybe it's like that dr who thing where the crack in the wall eats you and then everyone forgets you ever existed.

'if you could eliminate yellow or blue, which would you eliminate?'

blue. man city. obvious.

Mordy, you're a total arsehole and I wish you would cease to exist. Or at least keep your unpleasantness off threads that I start. Can you please just go away and just not do this, for once?

If you can't do that, I'm going to ask for the thread to be locked, because I'm really, really sick of this.

Get over yourself.

I'm becoming completely serious, before you start with your "oh noes, women be being emotional" garbage again. Please just stop this.

always, always include a poll option that states ”YOUR OPTIONS DON'T INCLUDE MY PERSONAL CHOICE YOU THOUGHTFASCIST” is the key rule imo

WCC, any issue I have with you has nothing to do your gender.

fwiw, I don't really have an issue with you except that you love to escalate ILX arguments. I don't even have a problem with that tho! Go with god.

also lol @ *my* women are being emotional garbage. i've never said that. but when did you stop beating your inappropriate work crush?

Seriously tempted right now to push a button so that this discussion could cease to exist.

i'm trying to decide which of mordy's "texts" most warrants a flagging.

MATT DC otm this tiresome crap has to stop.

quite.

i don't think i said anything warranting a flag post itt, but do what you've gotta do xxp

I'm on my phone can someone post a .gif of Michael Jackson eating popcorn, thank you in advance

I love this "I'm not even being a dick to you!" faux-innocent act followed by immediately being a massive dick.

Matt, please can you lock the thread. I'm deeply tired of this.

deeply

Yeah, from my perspective, I answered the question, thanks WCC for clarifying it had nothing to do with that wiki link, and any discussion seems to be hidebound by some bloke almost making a point then being quite nasty in the next breath...

mordy engaged with the thread sincerely and in good faith, and then was told he couldn't use the S-word

literally all the bullshit happened after someone tried to control how people interpreted the question.

i think he was asked not to use it, but it seemed v. important to him to ignore that request

look, Dolphins. aren't they adorable?

http://www.centauri-dreams.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/09/dolphins-poster-l.jpg

and why was that wrong? WCC said/clarified it wasn't about S, and I would have asked for further clarification but then, etc.

xposts render this incomprehensible, but in before lock.

being told not to use the S word, I mean.

stop mansplaining y'all, mordy is a misogynist and the question can only be discussed on the terms defined by the thread starter, *locks ilx*

There are plenty of other threads if people want to talk about suicide. OG asked for people not to do so in this thread, which is about something different. That's fair enough - I have done and will continue to ask people not to derail my own threads if I feel discussion goes AWOL. Maybe reinforcement of thread intention could have been done more diplomatically, but it didn't warrant the reaction that followed.

darragh don't be a dick.

i think mordy was fine here until he referenced an unrelated thread as a snipe. i dunno though, i'm a pretty big fan of letting conversations evolve organically

yes, that was unfair + mean of me to bring in an unrelated thread. i apologize for that. i was just annoyed at being called names w/out having done anything to deserve it. it was childish.

suicide was such a totally inevitable subject itt that it would've been wise to announce that the intention was take that word out of the equation from the beginning. although i still have no idea how that would actually work. any imaginary sci-fi scenario is going to evoke the closest real world analog.

can't believe someone misinterpreted this thread title as being about suicide. it's about *not existing* anymore you guys, *not* suicide, there's a big diff

button's function not well enough specified. so no will not press it.

The Barthes reference struck me as being intensely rude (and also not relevent, as this is, as pointed out, a discussion rather than a static work); unless it was some kind of high-fallutin' meta-joke about the OG being wiped from existence with no consequence. Which I doubt.

actually, that was the joke.

i'm glad someone got it, even if comedy is unnatural and abhorrent.

It was a bloody long punchline!

fwiw the OP is complaining about me by name on their twitter account. i guess i get to join the club.

you should retweet

guilty of being a dick SM, but eh that's what happened. Nobody owns threads, suicide wasn't a huge intangential leap.

done xp

Oh, I had that happen before too! Fun, huh?

I'm presuming there isn't actually going to be any further discussion of the original thread premise...

i'd press the button now, yeah

I'm happy to keep discussing the original thread. But suicide is an unavoidable topic here. I'm not sure why it's been ruled out.

*original thread premise

Anyway

I def think this is a suicide Q, at least in my thought process. Suicide or in this case non-existence has always been quickly ruled out once I think about how much my life has been built around artificial constructs, that my "happiness" (and occasional "sadness") are tied up in small variations of work-eat-exercise-socialize-internet patterns, that if I really was contemplating non-existence I'd first re-format my life and, in order, try out being a gym rat, a yoga teacher, a mechanic, a teacher, a scuba diving instructor, a ski bum, a beach bum, a thief, a drug addict, a mystic, a resident of Florida

How is this now unlocked?

pressed the "cease to be locked" button iirc

Oh.

As a non-mod this is all as magic to me.

I made that up btw, I have no idea what happened. I also am glad I only follow like Ned and two other ppl on Twitter.

Well, judging by the admin log, someone locked it and someone (else?) unlocked it.

the whole reason there are people who consider or attempt suicide but haven't done it is because of concerns of it involving physical pain, and/or emotional or financial or other repercussions to the people around them. that's why this looks like a suicide Q to so many people here.

i still can't see how this button can achieve this because by not existing you would be affecting SOMETHING by definition.

unless this button replaces your existence with another, identical, existence. i.e. it does fuck all?

yeah is the idea that some other spirit would inhabit your body and live your life? or you'd kinda be on autopilot while on some deeper level your true self wouldn've be around for any of it?

i think thought experiments are allowed to have unworkable irl parameters.

it can if the logic can follow it

no way, josé.

i'm impulsive tho, & prone to depressive spells, so catch me on a down path & (o wait I don't exist).

I wouldn't commit suicide, but I have enough days where I feel the 'cease to exist button' impulse that I voted yes. I keep going in the hope that I'll someday stop feeling that impulse. And also because, from a dramatic standpoint, I've lost way too much in my life for me to stop existing at this point without it being a little too pat and convenient. Yes, this is among the thoughts that keep me going.</overshare>

Also, the direction this thread took (writ large) is among the reasons that nonexistence occasionally sounds pretty sweet.

No, I don't think it's eradicating all you've ever done or replacing your existence with someone else; just stopping you existing now. All the things you've done still happened, but you're gone. Suspension of disbelief is needed, but no one misses you, someone else comes in and does your job, you just stop. Vanish.

unless this button replaces your existence with another, identical, existence. i.e. it does fuck all?

That's an interesting variation. Suppose that by pressing the button your consciousness ends, but the world goes on "objectively" just as it would otherwise. Either your body continues to operate like a philosophical zombie, or it retains consciousness and a sense of continuity with its prior life (we can suppose that it blocks out the memory of the button-pushing), but *you*, in an important sense, no longer exist. Nobody would ever have to know. Would it still be a kind of suicide?

if I turn into a zombie by pushing the button I may want to change my answer

zombie you also now has a mustache

and what becomes of the "you" that continues? sure "they" will have some kind of "consciousness" in order to function? i guess it depends whether you regard there being a "spirit" or whether we are but automata

Oh, on the reinhabitation tip, I have thought before that it would be awesome if I could body swap with someone like Stephen Hawking who could put this bag of meat to better use and who would be much more appreciative of being relatively healthy. Healthy once you scoop the brain out, anyways.

it's like that film about that dude who does this magic trick that involves making a copy of him and then drowning the original copy to perform a teleport.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0482571/

xps, you say automata, I say automahta, lets call the whole thing off.

twittercide

no way no way

automata

at present my answer varies from hour to hour - at the moment, no, but get back to me later, it's a pretty appealing idea

no. i don't know why but answering yes to this seems kind of narcissistic somehow

if a guy walked up to you with the button every day going "how bout now?" yeah we'd probably all push it eventually. and then it'd just be the guy with the button running things. which is probably what he wanted all along, the bastard.

reagan

ned ryerson

fwiw the OP is complaining about me by name on their twitter account. i guess i get to join the club.

― Mordy, Friday, 12 October 2012 14:57 (17 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

you should retweet

― some dude, Friday, 12 October 2012 14:59 (16 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

guilty of being a dick SM, but eh that's what happened. Nobody owns threads, suicide wasn't a huge intangential leap.

― Randy Carol (darraghmac), Friday, 12 October 2012 15:00 (15 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

done xp

― Mordy, Friday, 12 October 2012 15:00 (14 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Oh, I had that happen before too! Fun, huh?

― (✿◠‿◠) (ENBB), Friday, 12 October 2012 15:02 (13 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

indeed.

Lol wcc actin like she's the fuckin mayor mccheese of psuedo philosophical faux suicide threads

but get back to me later, it's a pretty appealing idea

It really is! But even more appealing is a "do-over" button. If I could cast my current consciousness back in time into my body -- say, when I was 11 and we moved from CA to MS -- I would do that without even bothering to say goodbye to anybody here first. Well, maybe a couple of people.

oh hell yeah wmc, just lmme grab these lotto numbers first

I don't think I'd do a do-over. There's stuff I'd change, for sure, but I think there's too much stuff in my childhood that I had no real control over that got me to where I am today. I'd still just be dealing with the same underlying shit.

i dunno the "do over" button would involve too much paedophilia.

I've never seriously thought of suicide, but if the button-device were just lying around the house... I dunno, I might eventually press it just out of curiosity, to see whether it was the real-deal, to resolve the tension of the unpressed button, because it's a forbidden button to be pressed.

xp How much is too much?

i would throw it into the ocean (dramatically)

Seal in lead box, solder shut, tie to cinderblock, throw in ocean off cliff at tip of Patagonia where no one goes.

The "do-over" concept is fascinating. Part of me finds it massively appealing, and part of me finds it horrific.

the interesting thing about 'do-over' is that you'd kind of have a leg up on controlling certain things about your life, but at a certain point you'd just start making new mistakes and navigating a life that was just as unpredictable as it was the first time.

great, u just gave bear grylls the ultimate weapon

xp How much is too much?
― Tom Hardy & the Batbreakers (Phil D.), Friday, 12 October 2012 14:49 (3 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

ask Jimmy?

Getting to keep the memories of adulthood is cheating imo.

I would love to write a letter to my 11 year old self with a list of books to read

Don't mention Jimmy or we'll all get arrested.

I would love to write a letter to my 11 year old self with a list of books to read

― flamboyant goon tie included, Friday, October 12, 2012 2:56 PM (7 minutes ago)

i've daydreamed about this fairly often

Getting to keep the memories of adulthood is cheating imo.

― flamboyant goon tie included, Friday, October 12, 2012 9:55 AM (8 minutes ago)

That's the only thing that makes it appealing for me though. I certainly wouldn't go through the decade from 11-20 again without knowing what to avoid and who to warn.

my parents; my brothers

exactly!

to me the part of this that's interesting is the "no consequence to others" - that's magical thinking in a way that the magic button isn't, because the button just doesn't exist but you can imagine how it works. but this added "nobody suffers" benefit could not really exist logically. so it becomes a "would you painlessly kill yourself if it doesn't bum anybody out" question. I think about suicide a lot, but I think the pain it inflicts on people is some bullshit, so I bust ass to keep my head above water at all times on that q. if there were a button that said "nobody even feels bad and the you-who-is-presently-suffering goes away" then yeah there would have been no more me as of, like, last week.

do-overs with or without your added knowledge are fraught with fuckin peril tho. You know some good stuff you might do but unforeseen consequence could take all the sweetness right outta that super-quick.

i was imagining this like a "it's a wonderful life" scenario where you just never existed

well that makes it real different though - rightly or not, I'm proud of some things I've accomplished, plus I'm a dad, if I never exist at all then I deny existence to a swell little guy who likes to play and yell and make funny faces - the original q posits no ill consequences to others

A large part of my current happiness is looking back at what a strange messed-up kid I was and how OK I turned out regardless

yeesh

a large part of my current happiness is my car </mygodiamshallow>

Also, going back to age 11 with all current knowledge means you have to hang out with teenagers for eight fucking years, no thank you.

plus you'd be one of those terrible teenagers who believes they're an 'old soul,' which would be insufferable even if technically correct in that case

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XgEfYGzojcA

Our parents and teachers would recognize our sudden precocity and bump us ahead to college. Then we'd spend the rest of adolescence inexplicably failing to develop any further, plummet into depression, finally request the button-man to undo the do-over.

^ thought that has occurred to me manys the time when musing on the 'back to my teenage body' thing

It's interesting, the liminality that these conversations create, to both exist and not-exist, to be an adult and also a child, to eat an oyster and also a pizza

lj??

I'm afraid of not existing. OP doesn't strike me as narcissistic...seems kind of enviable to be able to think about something so huge as not existing and being of no consequence to others and just hit the button and be gone. Because that's not something you do on the spur of the moment when you've stubbed your toe on the kitchen table for the 20th time. That's a thought you've been staring down for a long time and hitting that button would be pretty, well I dunno if brave is the right word but that's how it seems to me.

Sometimes I wonder if my fear of not existing is a denial of a deep dark wish that I didn't exist. And now I have a headache.

(Also this thread delivered everything I thought it would, and in record time. You guys are getting GOOD at this, lol)

i dont think there's anything brave at all about hitting the button

thinking out loud, is all

Don't care if it's brave, I'm hitting that button. Give it to me.

sometimes existence seems like a useless burden but other times i probably foolishly believe i have something like a "purpose" so voted no

lj??

― Randy Carol (darraghmac), Friday, 12 October 2012 15:43 (13 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

if he meant the oyster to be on the pizza I'm sure he'd have said

Yeah, bravery and cowardice are kinda nonsensical concepts wrt this scenario. Inasmuch as it seems like a decision that's pointedly uninformed by ego (to the extent that we're positing that you'd just be forgotten, or that the cessation of your existence would at least not cause any pain).

FWIW, I'm totally looking forward to the day when this scenario no longer seems at all appealing.

jesus what a depressing thread

Surprise?

The last time I felt like this I was drunk and maudlin and "oh what's the use, what is the fucking point?" I think at one point I said out loud "I wish I was a hovercraft" or something equally ridiculous. It was a very strange thing to feel and say - I don't know why it came over me that point cos I def don't feel this way 99.999% of the time, even if I'm feeling really low and everything's going to pot.

if only the Duchess of York had been around at the time, you could have starred in a delightful children's book by now

haha

"I wish I was a hovercraft" lol

I guess i can't comment on this thread because although I've often contemplated the possibility of erasing my existence without harming anyone else, it was always in the context of suicidal thoughts or just depression or whatever.

also - "Pretend it would involve no physical pain to yourself, and no emotional or financial or other repercussions to the people around you. - these are all things directly related to suicide. the question is basically like "pretend you could commit suicide the repercussions of suicide. however, don't mention suicide."

guess i'm being small-minded about this, sorry.

(i too am in favor of letting threads develop organically. lord knows i've started plenty of threads with absurd questions that were luckily saved by other people bending the conversation in a direction that was more interesting for them)

ugh, as usual i left out important words and i suck. that should have been "pretend you could commit suicide WITHOUT the repercussions of suicide. however, don't mention suicide."

guys, every fucking day is a gift and it's insane to me that any of you think nothing is preferable to EVERYTHING
and now i'm going to take a shower and go to a museum and then go to a cocktail tasting and then see an ilxor and a bunch of other guys perform live music and then go see a woman i'm dating DJ at another museum (not the first museum) and then we're going to go out and have a nice meal and then go home and have sex and sleep and then I'll get up and throw some pottery and then watch the thursday NFL game on tivo that I couldn't watch because I was out at a job interview where i was promised more work and then went to my OTHER pottery class and then went to a big society event food and wine tasting with a gal DJ (not the first gal DJ) and after I'm done with the NFL game while I do some work I'll go to see a maestro of indian tabla and likely have to break up with a woman i love dearly but that i just don't see working out and then I'll go see a series of short films about the Spanish labor movement and then go to the Ukrainian House and eat pickles and watch more music and then i'm going to KEEP FUCKING DOING THIS UNTIL I DIE and rushing that moment is completely beyond my comprehension and although much of life is very sad a great deal more of it is too sweet to even express

i should note that i am also fat and hate myself but hey, can't have everything

and then I'll get up and throw some pottery

is this a euphemism

I'll go see a series of short films about the Spanish labor movement

what films?

good post forks. feel like this concept is particularly appealing to british ppl for some reason?

also forks otm life feels great + the good is way better than any bad, tho i understand not everyone might feel that way

if there was a button the british could push that would instantly undo literally centuries of brutal horrific worldwide bloodsoaked imperialism and colonialism would they push it?

http://www.moma.org/visit/calendar/film_screenings/16463

super cool. plz tell how it is

also: forks throws pottery (and maybe you do too?)

Let's say you have a son or daughter who is five. If you press the button, do they also cease to exist? Or were they born of immaculate conception?

Eventually we all will be forgotten to time, why be hasty about it.

guys, every fucking day is a gift and it's insane to me that any of you think nothing is preferable to EVERYTHING so I'm just going to detail how awesome my life is and completely ignore that my experience of life is nothing like other people's, go me

emil.y otm, congratulations forks on your great life

awesome? sounds like way too much hard work to me.

yup

Not enough napping imo.

Where are the naps!?

I assume it's after the sex

I'm still back on how the person he loves dearly but has to break up with is not the same person he's going to have sex with?

lol

oh, forks, you casanova

A quiz:

"I generally enjoy life and am able to find meaning in things that sustain me and make me want to continue existing" => "Every day is a gift"

"I don't generally enjoy life and I have a hard time finding meaning in anything and just being in my skin is hugely taxing" => ??????

I might be doing dating wrong!

I mean, serious kudos to anyone who legit feels like every day is a gift, but try to understand why other people might not share your outlook.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZY3bcc-cKwo

if you aren't breaking up with your beloved during the maestro of tabla, you might as well button yourself

I thought it was the same girl he was going to have sex with but that he was gonna break up with her the day after the sex.
xp

i grew up on a cow farm in a small rural southern town and then threw my bread on the water and decided to go to a major metropolitan city with one suitcase and $1000 bucks in the bank. I then had a series of deep horrible disappointments and crippling bouts of depression that lasted about six years
so not everything is great or has been easy or gone reasonably and while i'm deeply proud and happy with my life, it's the product of a great deal of hard work and effort and OCD tendencies and constant crushing failures and self-doubt. i dunno if it's "awesome" necessarily but trust me when i tell you that anybody who's privileged enough to have the time/tech/education to be contributing on this thread can find a level of joy in life that improves on "let's press a button and make it all go away" even if it requires medication/therapy/disappointment and sadness to achieve
and yes, the naps are after the sex

is 'throwing bread on water' pottery slang

wow it's so crazy how everyone is giving subjective answers when the question asks your opinion

anyway the more I think about it, the more I think this question was designed to make us all WANT to push the fucking button by the end of this thread.

push it, don't push it, but don't belittle people for sharing their opinion. forks has a madcap life, and he wants to share, he's a positive dude by nature, good on him for feeling that way. because it's HIS bloody life, he can do what he wants. i go to work, I come home, I exercise, I sleep. that doesn't make my feelings about button pushing more or less valid.

we're all snowflakes etc

*unbookmark thread*

"Trust me when I tell you that your experiences are completely irrelevant because I've had some experiences myself"

http://bible.cc/ecclesiastes/11-1.htm

emily, i got no idea why you think i'm preaching any other message than life is beautiful but coolio

I think it's a little more complicated than "my life sux y/n" b/c the act of eliminating oneself suggests a definitive decision that "my life cannot get any better"

Surely I'd press the button if I became seriously and irretrievably disabled, but it does make me sad to read that abled, employed computer-owners would rather terminate their lives consequence-free rather than consider a new life as a bike courier or a champion spaghetti eater or something

Not putting words in anybody's mouth or projecting. I've had serious phases of incredible depression and low-self esteem and it makes me sad to read that ILXors I respect would even consider this as a possibility, like, I will cook for you the rest of your life if you'd stick around. I hope nobody feels belittled in me saying this

Ahh but see I guess I'm missing the point already, this is now about "me" and "my feelings" instead. It really is a "life is pain y/n" Q, isn't it

yo forks i love that post
& i love that the museums & djing girls of life are multiples

ew, soggy bread

This is about "would you push the button?" The answer "yes" appears to lead people to tell you about their sex lives in order to somehow impress upon you that life is amazing. Not really sure how that one works.

Part of the joy of life is the things we learn and the memories we make, and choosing to eliminate yourself from history robs those who know you of every thought or memory about you. That might not be pain, but it still may be a huge deficit.

I don't understand the question

I'm sure this thread is a joy to read for a currently-disabled person.

god i love ilx

if i cd push a button and be an invisible ghost that cd travel anywhere in space forever but only observe i'd think about that one

picking up on bits in the thread n not really following properly cos on phone, but this intrigues me. Can envisage it being a dreadful curse:

Me only cruel immortality
Consumes: I wither slowly in thine arms,

Here at the quiet limit of the world,
A white-haired shadow roaming like a dream

The ever-silent spaces of the East,
Far-folded mists, and gleaming halls of morn.

wait so is WCC part of aphex twin or not

em: weird to me that on the thirty things i'm doing right now, you feel like my sex life is the one i wanna talk about? especially when i just linked to a whole thread about my throwing pottery? sex is part of my life but it's not a more dominant force (or at least i try not to let it be) than that of a dozen other drives. real talk: none of that screed is BRAGGIN, it's simply a moment where i compare what my next three days are to not existing and that's such a shitty equation. it's not meant to be instructive. i'm just talking to myself.
anyways. off.

if i cd push a button and be an invisible ghost that cd travel anywhere in space forever but only observe i'd think about that one

this sortof breaks my imagination im trapped in thinking from here and cant hypothesise myself into the imaginary space of this question, maybe im a massive narcissist. and anyway i don't want to have never tasted sushi fallen asleep on a bus or punched in the face or held hands with someone or you know so many endless things, waking up in warm sunlight etc etc etc

shit yeah omniscience vs experience is a much more interesting and difficult question for me than the original premise here

I can't reconcile forks' description of his life with forks' level of progress in Tokyo Jungle.

Part of the joy of life is the things we learn and the memories we make, and choosing to eliminate yourself from history robs those who know you of every thought or memory about you.

And part of the shit of it is, for example, watching my grandmother, with advanced Alzheimers, lose every single one of those memories, more of them every day. She doesn't know who she is, who anyone else is, where she is, or much of anything else. She doesn't remember the word for "sandwich." She doesn't know how to eat tater tots. She can't remember whether she just went to the bathroom or not, and when she does, she doesn't understand what the toilet is for. What a joy!

lmao xp

Yo plax: at some point you won't know you did those things, and you won't miss them, because you won't have any intentional state at all. Button-pushing, that just speeds up that process. IT IS IMPOSSIBLE TO REGRET PUSHING THE BUTTON. It is very possible to regret not pushing it. ERGO, push that shiz.

regret ain't so bad

itt: between grief and nothing, will you take grief

http://books.google.ca/books?id=HssrAQAAIAAJ&pg=PA300&img=1&pgis=1&dq=between+grief&sig=ACfU3U2jW__lyRi_aKUfBxIozUClbGa9Tg&edge=0
http://books.google.ca/books?id=HssrAQAAIAAJ&pg=PA300&img=1&pgis=1&dq=grief&sig=ACfU3U39Lxxfj6bP_Q8Nd3SdHU28U6w7QQ&edge=0

forks how dare u, don't you know that relating yr experiences/pov is an attack on all others.

I thought that was from Ferris Bueller lol

And part of the shit of it is, for example, watching my grandmother, with advanced Alzheimers, lose every single one of those memories, more of them every day. She doesn't know who she is, who anyone else is, where she is, or much of anything else. She doesn't remember the word for "sandwich." She doesn't know how to eat tater tots. She can't remember whether she just went to the bathroom or not, and when she does, she doesn't understand what the toilet is for. What a joy!

― Tom Hardy & the Batbreakers (Phil D.), Friday, October 12, 2012 1:19 PM (9 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

If/when I get to this point I hope to either have it together enough to take matters into my own hands or have loved ones with whom I've discussed the issue and will do it for me.

Yo plax: at some point you won't know you did those things, and you won't miss them, because you won't have any intentional state at all. Button-pushing, that just speeds up that process. IT IS IMPOSSIBLE TO REGRET PUSHING THE BUTTON. It is very possible to regret not pushing it. ERGO, push that shiz.

― emil.y, Friday, 12 October 2012 17:22 (5 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

this is the thing though its not about regret or missing or longing or yearning. whats interesting about this question is how time is structured. its about undoing the past as future. i wish i had never been born. every tiny fragment of pleasure.

If I cease to exist in this scenario, does my dad still have the orgasm from which I sprung? Wouldn't want to deny the guy that tiny fragment of pleasure.

forks how dare u, don't you know that relating yr experiences/pov is an attack on all others.

― Randy Carol (darraghmac), Friday, October 12, 2012 5:28 PM

implicitly it is tho

i have known ppl who lead lives seemingly even more fulfilling, vital and relevant than forks', who evidently didn't feel as fulfilled, vital or relevant as forks purports to be

yeah this is really about the internal life, not the external facts of how you spend your day, which is the real problem with forks's post (aside from the question of how the hell this presumptuous fucker KNOWS he's getting laid tonight!?). i'm grateful for the good fortune of being born in the time & place i was and the material benefits of that, but more than that i'm grateful for the disposition or brain chemistry or whatever to be able to enjoy it -- many people have had more and been far unhappier.

and it seems pretty cruel to tell people that if every day doesn't feel like a gift they're not just unhappy people but UNGRATEFUL unhappy people

xp dude, i'm not generally fulfilled vital or relevant! i'm scared most of the time! but it's worth it for the momentes when you get close to the moments of fulfillment vitality relevancy and real joy
also lol at me with my exciting life unwilling to stop posting on ilx to go live; how exciting can it be?

xp eh forks also said that he was depressed for 6 years so i don't think that is the correct think to take from that post. to me the post was is more about realizing and taking advantage of opportunities that exist for you to be stoked on things in life, something that ime it is terrifyingly easy to lose grasp of

The issue with forks' posts was never about him relating his experiences. It was about the multiple times he explicitly stated that because of his experiences other people should feel the same way that he does about life.

Forks was making the "it gets better" statement which doesn't work for me but he shouldn't be castigated for thinking it might work

if "becuz of my experiences other people should feel the way i feel about life" = "life is ultimately meaningful and worthwhile and beautiful in some way at the core" than yeah i'll rep for that

am gonna push the button, using the lo-tec equivalent offered by a nail gun, if the collective response to forks' "there are wonderful things in life!" post is people interrogating his ability to assess them & getting at him for appreciating them w/o appropriate deference to others' conditions. the solipsism of "i can't believe you people don't think this" is sometimes a necessary part of the single-minded capacity of being able to appreciate things, imo.

also lolz forever on that tokyo jungle post A+
i mostly play at 4 in the morning

there u are conflating 'life' as in individual phenomenological lived experience and 'life' in some gloopily pantheistic 'the tree of-' sense

The fact that you're asking or reading or answering or entertaining this question says to me that you haven't given yourself over completely to the idea of nonexistence, which indicates at least a glimmer of hopefulness.

guys, every fucking day is a gift and it's insane to me that any of you think nothing is preferable to EVERYTHING

Every day is a gift = rendered as statement of fact, and anyone who diverges is "insane".

trust me when i tell you that anybody who's privileged enough to have the time/tech/education to be contributing on this thread can find a level of joy in life that improves on "let's press a button and make it all go away" even if it requires medication/therapy/disappointment and sadness to achieve

TRUST ME THIS IS TRUE. SO TRUE AND NO OTHER OPINIONS MAY DIVERGE. YOU PRIVILEGED TWAT.

ugh

After all, and I think this argument might be beyond me, but in admitting to others that you would accept a consequence-free elimination-of-self, that could also be interpreted as a negation of another's state of happiness. Logic being that "I do not accept that my happinesses or yours make life worth living" and "I do not accept a human's capacity for life-changes, or that these changes could create a positive effect on their outlook", it's an enormously provocative statement, imo

it's a major underpinning of a lot of ethics that life is sacred/gift/beauty/etc, i don't think forks articulating that idea is so controversial.

every day is a grift

ethics is vacuous

it's p funny to see the habitual ilx flav dismissive/reductive argument in service of "no, life is NOT worth living!"

every daaaaay is a winding roaaa-d!
(...i get a little bit closer!)

but to what?

..."to feeling fine"

*thinks*

I would love to write a letter to my 11 year old self with a list of books to read not read

― flamboyant goon tie included, Friday, October 12, 2012 10:56 AM (2 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

"life is worth living" is a statement with a lot to unpack. Worth what? To who? Living how? How can we be sure?

Furthermore, and this might not be the case everywhere, but isn't the desire toward self-elimination considered a treatable illness?

I'm on a kick the last couple weeks where I'm pretending I'm still in college and that I'm an asshole philosophy student

every day is a gif

Lol as Z S

"life is worth living" is a statement with a lot to unpack. Worth what? To who? Living how? How can we be sure?

― www.toilet-guru.com (silby), Friday, October 12, 2012 1:55 PM (20 seconds ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

pack that shit back up & liveitup, homie

I guess part of the issue is that it sucks to see that ilxors who have provided me with happiness via hilarious/insightful posts don't find joy in their own lives/existence. And that's part of why I think it's sort of important to mention suicide in this thread. ILX has experienced that loss as a community, and many of us have lost friends either to suicide, or the de facto suicide of personal neglect, or a tragic accident, or whatever. It isn't a hypothetical situation, and it doesn't come with a button. So while this thread is an interesting intellectual exercise, it's hard not so see it as a red flag, and while forks may have come off a little braggy, I think what he's really saying is "come have fun with me in New York! Don't press the button!"

in admitting to others that you would accept a consequence-free elimination-of-self, that could also be interpreted as a negation of another's state of happiness. Logic being that "I do not accept that my happinesses or yours make life worth living" and "I do not accept a human's capacity for life-changes, or that these changes could create a positive effect on their outlook", it's an enormously provocative statement, imo

That isn't a logical inference, that's an emotional response. I do not accept that my happinesses or yours makes my life worth living, but I never said shit about whether it makes your own life worth living.

it's a major underpinning of a lot of ethics that life is sacred/gift/beauty/etc, i don't think forks articulating that idea is so controversial.

Most ethics is bunk. And I never said that forks' posts were "controversial". I am saying that they're limiting, and an imposition of his own ideals onto others.

it's impossible to state an opinion without imposing your ideals upon others

Actually, it isn't.

the way you spit things ppl say back at them you would think it was tho

FTR, I wasn't castigating forks at all before. I'm always happy for anyone who's legitimately able to find happiness and meaning in life. But like some dude said, the externalities of one's life sometime have an unfortunate lack of consonance with the shit going on in one's head. And although a lot of people would surely disagree, I feel pretty strongly that the value and beauty of life is a perspective rather than a universal truth.

the way you spit things ppl say back at them you would think it was tho

What, the way I use verbatim evidence to support my claims? Oh shit, sorry man, I didn't realise I was supposed to talk ill-informed bollocks instead.

ethics as first philosophy

emil.y, you may be miserable, but you are also hilarious.

life is grotesque. push the button.

i don't want to push it now, but i'd like to have the option in the future

emil.y, the act of describing an opinion or viewpoint to someone and making them understand it is, by definition, imposing your viewpoint upon someone else. I do not think it is actually possible to communicate an idea or understand other people's points of view without this type of imposition, therefore I do not see it as an exclusively negative process.

WCC pitching "the button" as a new concept to a home electronics firm, using this thread to collect market data. pie chart shows two thirds of consumers open to installing some kind of button, depending on ease of use, cost efficiency, attractive design.

xp em. eh no i mean just acting like some guy making a posi post relating trying to relate his own history of happiness/depression to that of a community he is a part of is an "imposition of his own ideals onto others", seems so needlessly defensive & such a generic & universally applicable accusation that dan's post makes sense itc

emil.y, the act of describing an opinion or viewpoint to someone and making them understand it is, by definition, imposing your viewpoint upon someone else. I do not think it is actually possible to communicate an idea or understand other people's points of view without this type of imposition, therefore I do not see it as an exclusively negative process.

DJP, I think your interpretation of 'imposing' here is misleading. One would imagine that a discussion wherein one proffered an opinion to one's conversational partner would be more accurately described as an 'exchange' or a 'proffering' of ideas, or even a 'negotiation'. An imposition is a much more forceful process.

btw, emily totally otm

got to say that if 'being told how to feel' or similar was a particular bugbear of mine then I would probably have tried to give a thread with a title like this a wide berth

What about a button, or machine, that when you enter it, you play out the rest of our life in a virtual state where everything plays out in the most positive possible way. You wouldn't even realise it wasn't real and you were guaranteed that everything in your life were to pan out in utter bliss. Would you do it?

Sorry about structure of that sentence, typin on the phone

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Experience_machine

, in which dog latin reflects on his extended bluray session of millennial sci-fi flicks

DJP, I think your interpretation of 'imposing' here is misleading. One would imagine that a discussion wherein one proffered an opinion to one's conversational partner would be more accurately described as an 'exchange' or a 'proffering' of ideas, or even a 'negotiation'. An imposition is a much more forceful process

Yes and no. All of the actions you're describing are differing degrees of the same process, governed by both parties' expectations going into the conversation, and those degrees are affected as much by perception as they are intent.

Well it's not supposed to be an original concept, but hey

things are p rad, gonna keep exisiting

xxxp or American Dad episodes: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Vacation_Goo

It's days like this I wish Banaka would show up

Maybe this button should just put have the power to put you on stand-by for just 6 months with no consequences, rather than cease to exist altogether. There's experiences I'd rather have not been round for (such as practically the whole of 1995), but not worth giving up the rest of my life to avoid.

I most definitely would push the button. When, is the question.

the most I'd consent to is activating a process that has a small random chance of pressing the button at any given moment, biased towards several decades from now

You guys should look at more ricky rubio gifs

What if the button were a cat's anus?

some people don't get fulfillment from happiness, but that doesn't mean embracing misery is going to make you more fulfilled

the times in my life where I'd have said "sure!" to this button aren't those where amazingly bad things had happened. when things actually happen, that gives you a bunch of real shit to deal with, and I can understand the impulse to end it all at those points, but not with the disconnect the question would give. In those instances I may feel hopeless, but I want the chance for redeeming the situation. When I felt like a total lump, I'd want to hit rock bottom and tear a hole through it, making everything blow up and leaving a sucking void where I was.

It's the days when I didn't feel much at all, that I was probably either depressed or just disconnected, that I'd rather just walk out without anyone noticing, and I'd push the button.

Is the refutation of my priviliged twattery that life is NOT worth living for some? And that it is presumptuous to tell other people life is precious? What exactly should we bear that in mind as a bulwark against? It's a short text message on a BBS, I can't cover all the exigent circumstances of justifiable despair. I think as a rule, life is a gift, no precious moments, and it's mystifyingly sad that spurs an argument.

Btw sex and pottery exist with equal oomph on the phenomenomenomenomenological and JAHLOVE continuum for me; I am a firm believer that we are what we do/consume/create/share/abuse

And yeah, feel free to come out to the city and not not exist! As any ilxor I've met IRL over the past five years will tell you, I will always put u on the list and buy u the first round. U too em!

didn't the chemical brothers have a song about this?

Forks, YOU CALLED PEOPLE PRIVILEGED. I WAS QUITE CLEARLY USING YOUR VOICE. Jesus Christ, try actually reading something for a change. If you can't be bothered to even do that then fuck it, I'm out.

"fuck it, I'm out"

-- actual label on the button?

I feel like we'd have to be really careful in labeling this button, as such a label would really make me tempted to hit it

I think as a rule, life is a gift, no precious moments, and it's mystifyingly sad that spurs an argument.

I envy your mystification. Hang on to that!

forks, i do like you as an internet friend and all, but yes, it is very presumptuous to tell people that life is precious. almost condescending, in a way. not that i have anything against you specifically having a kick-ass life, but the world is full of utterly miserable people who have just had enough.

Life just *is*, imo. On one hand, I'm not going to join the voluntary extinction movement, but I'm also not a person who is religious about the sanctity of life or whatever else.

I guess I really want to be reincarnated as a rock.

i would like for you to be reincarnated as a rock

Life is the best, I would never not live it

I mean making other ppl smile is kinda the best thing ever

Life's not a song. Life isn't bliss. Life is just this: It's living.

how does the existence of utterly miserable people make saying life is precious presumptuous (not a sarcastic q just interested in what the link bw these two sentences were)? does the existence of miserable people make life less precious?

This button is impossible and should stay so

I mean if it erases everything you are, were and could be

yeah, i'm sort of baffled by all this. i know no one is intending this, but the way it's coming out is like "stating an opinion in anything but the most neutered fashion is forcing your views on others, and presumptious". makes me not want to post anything at all (i'm sure others would be cool with that)

language is violence, bro

language is a virus

if someone says something that isn't exactly what you wanted to be within conversational bounds on a thread you started, it isn't thread hijacking to me, but opinions apparently vary

pretty sure everyone has pushed a snooze button before on their alarm which amounts to about the same thing but only lasts 10 minutes.

OP has taken ball and gone home at this point so that's not even the issue at this point xp

ce n'est pas sur le suicide

- René Magritte

Life is precious in the same way that minerals are precious. An unusual occurrence, cosmologically speaking.

life may be precious for many people and i wouldn't deny that to them, but to speak it as a universal truth just doesn't sit right for me

but who knows, i'll admit holding this opinion may come off as being sanctimonious itself

I am amazed at how perfectly-formed this question is for prodding ILE into 1000 posts in a few hours. btw, my answer is 'no', but you all knew that, I suppose.

"life is precious" "don't say that, you'll upset the utterly miserable" "what harm could it do, they're already miserable to begin with!" "good point! why are we talking about this let's have sex and then throw pottery"

why are you people so violent, throwing pottery all over?

nhex: wouldn't mind hearing u explain further but, if it's just a feeling i understand & can't cop to my own opinions about this to being much more than that

i think a less heavy question that would allow people who want to answer yes to do so could be something like
"if your health plan could get you an operation that would make you never sleep ever with no health consequences, would you opt out?"

"life is precious" "don't say that, you'll upset the utterly miserable" "what harm could it do, they're already miserable to begin with!" "good point! why are we talking about this let's have sex and then throw pottery"

― flopson, Friday, October 12, 2012 3:15 PM (8 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

lol

cancel yes.

wow this thread is pretty intense, my answer is a definitive 'no' fwiw, extreme unrelenting physical pain and/or maybe debilitation is the only thing i can imagine of thatd make me want to magical suicide, tho im sure there are all sorts of unimagined things lurking out there

so you guys answering no, would, given the choice, never sleep?

"There are all sorts of unimagined things lurking out there. Pretty intense!"

-- Bob Marley --

haha

it is very presumptuous to tell people that life is precious

no, no it's not. or at least, it's equally as presumptuous to get on a low horse about it just because you make an opposite contention.

i sympathize w/forks life is beautiful argument even if i do find his version a bit desperately over scheduled, but to me i feel like theres some sense of appreciation thats deeper than beauty which is maybe a lil too overtly binary

I love falling asleep, but what's the point to BEING asleep? You can't remember it/don't experience it, or at least I don't. If it wasn't necessary for basic health it would be a waste of time for sure.

so you guys answering no, would, given the choice, never sleep?

If I could remove my need for sleep without going insane, I would do it in a heartbeat.

sleep is awesome, fuck the haters

my only concern with not sleeping would be that maybe I'd need to increase the dosage on my SSRIs due to spending more hours awake, which come to think of it I have to go take those

i like sleep, and eating, feel like theyre p central to the feeling of being alive, might be kinda effed to give that up

would u replace your sleeping hours with leisure tho? or split it b/w work & leisure? extra eight hours to chill out or read every day would be cool but u might just end up using it like doing chores

i waste so much time as is i doubt id do anything too compelling w/those extra hours

yeah same here

there are people who do polyphasic sleep and sleep like 30 minutes every four hours. they all go crazy

how would you ever reset a bad day, sleep is like a magical button you push when youre not in the zone

xpost

but that's because they only end up sleeping 3 hours a day! ;)

i like the downtime my brain and body get from sleep. i often don't get enough, though, because there's too much to do -- i'd prefer a 28-hour day so that there's more time to sleep if necessary.

I would never not live it

Unless I've missed an ILXor being an immortal, this is not an option. I didn't mean to imply above I'd push it anytime soon, but it would be nice when one were old and fading fast to pick a good day for dying.

would you push a button and make yrself immortal

only if I also stopped aging

As to sleep, I think I shall Viking the fuck out of some this weekend.

guys check this out i'm gonna wish for more wishes

I'd only want to be immortal if I also got to go hang out in some sort of transcendental plane where everything was awesome all the time and there was no heat death of the universe to worry about

http://11.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_kueb3lb5h51qzv9mho1_500.jpg

love to be immortal, always think the downside is philosphically overstated

al this is a scarcity problem you can't just go oh i'd like to live for 100 billion years i think that'd be ideal i'd nap every other millenia

i enjoy sleep but if i were someone who didn't i think it would be nice, it always takes me too long to finish books & if i could just blast thru them overnight without suffering repercussions the next day i would take the opportunity

I don't want to die but I also would be freaked out by living for millions of years

would you push a button and become a god

no one realizes that the average human lifespan was once only 14 hours. people back then, in their final hour, would often think about how crazy it would be live for a month. we ARE living for millions of years right NOW, in a sense, compared to those people, and we're not freaking out. people adapt man

but once you get to explore space and hang out with other civs, it would be cool

with all ur power

I also would be freaked out by living for millions of years

Yeah 'cause you'd end up falling in love with Andie McDowell

I wld live for a million years if each month of each year would pass by as quickly as like, say, a second

nah you'd become a starchild and go to a shittily decorated room

people would come up to me and point and say "there stands the slowest person in the world" but of course it would sound like high pitched unintelligible squeaking to me

I think human quest for immortality will have to keep scaling up slowly; Kurzweilian singularity would just upset everyone

What about a button, or machine, that when you enter it, you play out the rest of our life in a virtual state where everything plays out in the most positive possible way. You wouldn't even realise it wasn't real and you were guaranteed that everything in your life were to pan out in utter bliss. Would you do it?

― where is el airoporto? (dog latin), Friday, October 12, 2012 1:17 PM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

only if the machine also chopped up my body and sprayed bits of me into the faces of everyone who's ever loved me

i mean, let's raise the stakes here

"Music was so much better in the 2070's. Fuckin' hell."

people would come up to me and point and say "there stands the slowest person in the world" but of course it would sound like high pitched unintelligible squeaking to me

this must be what life is like for starfish, which are, in a way, "starchildren of the universe"

sprayed bits of me into the faces of everyone who's ever loved me

There goes my crush on goole...

we used to play a game in the car where we imagined having a button that when we pressed it [something would happen], often what it would do would be to make mcdonald's chicken mcnuggets appear in the car for us to enjoy or for a magical tunnel to open up in front of us and take us straight home

so what I'm saying is there's way cooler shit to accomplish with a magic button

Today it might simply consist of a button to make all my co-workers simply cease to exist...

great thread btw

it appears WCC is through with it now, but it is impossible to wall off this discussion from consideration of suicide. the scenario is about suicide + magic

I would love a button to make my coworkers turn into gin and tonics.

Alfred, I would gay marry you in an instant if you had that button.

You guys I pressed the button ;_;

based on the number of responses in this thread, it seems like this question pushed a lot of people's buttons

I really hope this button makes a fart sound when you press it.

that's every button

if you shaved an hour off sleep, that's like living an extra day or three each month, and an hour is probably manageable without any health problems. But if you don't do it, it's like hitting the suicide button for a day every month. No magic! Just accounting!

well i take it back. accounting is a form of black magic

"that was easy!"

an hour is probably manageable without any health problems

the health problems may just emerge more slowly

why even bother with the caveats of no pain to yourself, or to others?

there are plenty of ways to kill yourself that are painless, that hardly needs a magic get-out. and as long as you don't have any beliefs in the soul that persists no matter your wishes (or if you do, assume that this magic button makes god himself forget, for good measure), the pain it causes to others would be a null issue to you the you who no longer and never existed.

i will say that this exact scenario/thought has definitely occupied my mind in long dark moments of my life. there were times when i would absolutely press it. now i absolutely wouldn't.

how would you ever reset a bad day, sleep is like a magical button you push when youre not in the zone

the worse my day, the less likely that I'll be able to sleep at the end of it

the thing forks's count-your-blessings screed doesn't take into account is "people who have suffered losses which they feel they cannot bear": I have a couple of these; some people don't, may their days be long. My days are filled with joy & I love my life & I'm going to live to an abominably old age like everybody else in my family, but I also carry grief from which I will never be free and that descends on me like a cloud. I'd guess I've spent as much time in therapy as anybody I know & I'm a healthy motherfucker generally speaking but this magic button means an unimaginable kind of relief, so its appeal seems obvious, although since nonexistence is literally incomprehensible imo concepts like "relief" don't really articulate with it

I should say though that the best current reason to push the button when it finally gets invented is that it will troll the hell out of this thread

this is reminding me of a Raymond Smullyan story

... and the realization that i was tempted to end it all, except for the fact that i didn't want to hurt anyone else, was itself realization enough that i didn't really want it to be over.

xp to myself

isn't the M*A*S*H theme song about this thread?

would be a null issue to you the you who no longer and never existed.

Second nail in the coffin of my putative goole crush. Surely you'll grant that living or alive, you mean no harm to your closest? Yes, you won't care one way or another, but you'd die knowing you flaked on your beloveds.

Or what goole said to himself

if you could push a button and you'd cease to exist on ILX, would you do it?

I think the button would be more tantalizing if it was a re-set button that randomly turned you into someone different; age, race, gender, orientation, taste, location, era... "Fancy your chances, eh?"

it'd make a political career a little easier

xp

now singing 'pieces of goole' to the tune of the cure's pictures of you

if you could push a button and you'd cease to exist on ILX, would you do it?

Pity the poor souls for whom that button is merely 'Submit Post'.

if you could push a button and become bob marley, would you?
-bob marley

what about if you could push a button and the button ceased to exist?

"people who have suffered losses which they feel they cannot bear"

this is interesting, because the statement isn't connected to whether the person can or cannot bear the loss, but rather their perception of their ability to bear the loss and how that perception becomes reality

it is particularly interesting in the context of our current round of political theater, where the demeanor of our candidates appears to be more important than the positions they take; you could use both to extrapolate an argument that questions the actual existence of "facts"

An Unfortunate Dualist

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gKbpjw3_EZM

aero very much otm 8 million posts back on this freight train of a thread

what if to the world it looked like you ceased to exist, but to you it looked like the rest of the world ceased and you're in the void, alone with only your own thoughts?

this is interesting, because the statement isn't connected to whether the person can or cannot bear the loss, but rather their perception of their ability to bear the loss and how that perception becomes reality

well - the concept of being able to bear something is entirely subjective. strictly speaking, anybody can bear anything that won't literally kill them. the question is whether the thing in question makes that person's life feel as though it is not worth living.

and you're in the void, alone with only your own thoughts?

This reminds me of Borges' desert 'labyrinth'.

well - the concept of being able to bear something is entirely subjective. strictly speaking, anybody can bear anything that won't literally kill them. the question is whether the thing in question makes that person's life feel as though it is not worth living.

on a daily basis, American society makes me feel like life isn't worth living; however, because I am an egotistical, contrary bastard, this just makes me want to live forever so I can continue to sneer at it

^^^ posts by people who have figured out how to live imo

How many of you would want a button that lets you nap instantly? because you'd just need to put some duct tape over that button...

holy fuck DJP I just noticed your display name and it has literally improved my will to live, thank you

yeah I'm not leaving this world without shitting on a few dozen more people

most of my worldview is a strange mishmash of "Do not go gentle into that good night", "Fight" by The Cure and "Kerosene" by Big Black, with occasional dashes of "I Wanna Fuck You in the Ass" by The Outhere Brothers

no fucking way am I touching that button

because I am an egotistical, contrary bastard, this just makes me want to live forever so I can continue to sneer at it

This is my rearguard answer to the Camus question

djp otm - cf: goole spraying the faces of those he loves

also i misread alfred's comment as 'shitting OUT a few more dozen people' lol

I Want To Spray You In The Face

I'm merely hoping that button consists of an inadvertant OD of morphine when I'm 92 or whatever.

can i ask to have something clarified about the button?

"and no emotional or financial or other repercussions to the people around you." -- how precisely is this magic effected?

is it numbness? all others who have any relation to you at all register your sudden disappearance but find they just don't feel anything one way or another (this seems tyrannical and monstrous to me btw)

is it forgetting? their minds and institutional records are wiped, any debts are written off as an accounting mistake, memories of you come up blank, etc. you become a hole, but one so complete there's no pain to be felt.

is it rewriting history? ie the "it's a wonderful life" option. the clock is rewound. i suppose this is the most attractive option if you want to hit it.

haha i was just trying to fuck with dog latin's un-trolly rosy option, i don't want bits of me anywhere thx

tho i have joked that when i die i want to be cremated and have my ashes sprinkled in the food of people i didn't like.

(the unspoken, disappointed egotistical optimist component of my cynicism is the not-so-hidden hope that some day my sneering will cause society not to suck so much)

i suppose this is the most attractive option if you want to hit it.

and it's off to the out of context thread we go

basically I won't push any button ending my life unless I can push a button that keeps Alicia Keys from singing another note.

everyone you knew is instantly granted religious certainty that you are with God. they all become believers of the hardest core and are glad that you have gone home. several of them become priests

very powerful button, this button

don't hit that button man! do not want!

goole flakes!

would now be a bad time to reveal that I have been mentally replacing the word "button" with "clitoris" as I read this thread

loooooool

aero i already expect my death to send several into a nunnery, you're not telling me anything here

i've been saying "in bed" the whole time too

would now be a bad time to reveal that I have been mentally replacing the word "button" with "clitoris" as I read this thread

no, but it would be a better time to admit that "anus" was also in play HELL YES DO YOU SEE WHAT I DID THERE.

http://catholic-magazine.excerptsofinri.com/images/nuns.jpg

sisters of the blessed goole (rip)

if you could push my nuts and simply caused Alicia Keys to disappear, I will make waffles and mimosas for you the rest of our lives until you push another button and make me disappear

everyone you knew is instantly granted religious certainty that you are with God. they all become believers of the hardest core and are glad that you have gone home. several of them become priests

you know what, as long as we're talking about the magisterium here: what if everyone is granted the righteous satisfaction that you are in hell? (this is what is supposed to happen now afaik)

if you could push a button into my anus I would sing like Morten Harket.

when I'm hungry I eat

thread delivers

thread pushes buttons

thread delivers buttons to your asshole?

thread sprays u face

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/4/49/Three_holes_buttons.jpg/200px-Three_holes_buttons.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/VepYa.jpg

thread feels like a Douglas Adams book.

thread feels like Friday before happy hour

^^^

Suppose that heaven and hell are real and they're as good and bad, respectively, as you can possibly imagine. Every soul gets sent to one or the other forever. You can't be certain where you're going. The religions all have conflicting opinions about what the criteria are. Do you push the button opting for total non-existence instead?

what? hell no, my ass is going to heaven

i kinda vaguely remember an old sim game where you build heaven and hell and sent souls to either one? any ideas what game this was?

xpost but only your ass, djp

i think this might be it:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heaven_and_Hell_(video_game)

I mean, any hypothetical that starts with "assume heaven and hell are real" is going to end with "DJP is going to heaven" regardless of the intervening scenario

xpost but only your ass, djp

I am fine with that

:D

nm, that's not it xxp

woo, this was it: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/6/61/AfterlifeScreenshot.png/220px-AfterlifeScreenshot.png

to answer the original q : no. absolutely not.

and that's despite (or is that in spite of), the evilness of the last 18 months of my life.

I salute you, good sir

^^^

wish I could send you a gin and tonic, mark e

would not push button just based on family responsibilities and stuff. and basketball.

poorly phrased. Due to family responsibilities and stuff, I would not press said button.

but mostly basketball

here, this should push you towards that button:

ABC's developing a comedy starring Michael Bolton

Alicia Keys to co-star?

ABC's developing a comedy starring Michael Bolton

it actually says this on the actual button

haha

wnp. some sad s.o.b.s on this board.

the bolton button would be a better show

I salute you, good sir

firmest co-sign for this.

these lines from Alan Moore's Miracleman popped into my head when considering the original poser

See, I ain't inta gettin' BURNED. HELL no. Am inta burnin'.

not that I do much true burnin' these days, but it's v difficult for me to think that I'd ever *voluntarily* choose to be scrubbed from existence.

would now be a bad time to reveal that I have been mentally replacing the word "button" with "clitoris" as I read this thread

― The Owls of Ja Rule (DJP), Friday, October 12, 2012 3:24 PM (2 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

The vast nothingness of space and time....in my vagina?

it's more likely than you think

he can't he won't he don't stop

i kinda vaguely remember an old sim game where you build heaven and hell and sent souls to either one? any ideas what game this was?

Played the shit out of this game btw. So far from pushing the button that the argument for it is kind of incomprehensible for me.

No offense intended for those that feel that way, I just think that it's prob impossible to have much of a discussion because I imagine that our basic precepts are so far apart tht there's no way to have a meaningful conversation about this.

thread as a whole pretty much bears this out, lol

I feel like there's a part of drunkenness where I feel close to not existing, but it's about a quarter-step from projectile vomiting

push button too hard, vomit comes out

Edgy staples commercial

irl lols

would push bolton

there's two boltons, john and michael -- which do you punch?

yes

Because I am a sap, the do-over would be 24/7 panic as I attempt to reproduce nonsensical / idiotic decisions made by younger me, in order to avoid treading on the nation of butterflies that would prevent me from meeting my lady.

Also confused at the idea that forks wasn't bragging - did you have some wrong-tab confusion and mean to post that into Google Calendar, man?

i prefer using buttons to keep my shirts done up than to cause existential angst

I would be too chicken, although I have wanted to in the past.

I do like the idea of having a dummy-button like this, mounted high on the wall. Like a "break glass in case of emergency" thing, just as a reminder of how fleeting all this is, that we are all blips.....

if you could push your bellybutton and it would simply cease to exist, would you press it?

gasp! no bellybutton? the horror

r.i.p. body shots

boy do i always regret any attempt to ever talk about anything happening in my personal life on this board
*hits the "do not share" button*

you realize this is why we lost tynan, right?

body shots?

U are still yoga flame in my book forks

xp no, that's why we lost momus
go team venture m@tt

hey forks, u get any last night?

you're the worst wing man ever

I have to say, just because of your post & the fact that it's always the image of you I think of, I can't help but imagine forks & rakim reenacting the pottery scene from Ghost

ditto

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YeAW8SCkdP0

i would definitely do this!!! i'm not even that miserable and i sometimes have fun it's just given the choice i would not exist. i also think no one should have kids and the human race should go extinct.

like i am not even sad today but if you don't exist you don't even know about fun or happiness, so why not

long as you wanna get matrixy about this; since you're unplugging entirely and will have no connection to anything, a more reasonable question would be "if you could push a button and make EVERYTHING cease to exist with no repercussions" etc.
also, what if our universe is just a cell in a giant's thumbnail whoa hey man pass that shit

i wouldn't do that

There is an old legend that king Midas for a long time hunted the wise Silenus, the companion of Dionysus, in the forests, without catching him. When Silenus finally fell into the king’s hands, the king asked what was the best thing of all for men, the very finest. The daemon remained silent, motionless and inflexible, until, compelled by the king, he finally broke out into shrill laughter and said these words, “Suffering creature, born for a day, child of accident and toil, why are you forcing me to say what would give you the greatest pleasure not to hear? The very best thing for you is totally unreachable: not to have been born, not to exist, to be nothing. The second best thing for you, however, is this—to die soon.”

― dayo, Tuesday, 14 December 2010 04:46 (11 hours ago)

and silenus grew up to be... barack obama

i hate having obligations. i wish i was a housecat.

it's like not existing but you get petted and you eat food

silenus otm and I'm not even sad today either!

one more vote for being a cat, the one from alice in wonderland is so v chill

Silenus I feel you but I just started season 1 of homeland

how is that? worth netflixing?

I dig it enough to not press an imaginary magical button that erases my existence, plus I love Mandy patinkin

two great tastes that go great together

*me pushes button....but button is on vaporizer*

/me winks

If you could push a button and simply inhale a sick rip, would you press it?

Thought experiment. Pretend it would involve no physical pain to yourself, and no emotional or financial or other repercussions to the people around you. Would you hit the vape button?

would you capture it, or just let it slip?

lol

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=onMQDyWsmX0

http://make-everything-ok.com/

Yes i would push it.

Pretty much the ultimate 'going off the grid'.

Do you get to reincarnate though?

That would kinda defeat the purpose.

the maths of you should push the button because you wouldn't know what you were missing - like you-can't-lose - always seems wrong to me. it was in that derek parfait nyer profile a while ago, the idea that any amount of potential joy has less currency than the avoidance of any potential suffering. those things are on way more of a continuum ime, & are related & transform each other. sometimes i think about when you can't sleep very well, & you spend a whole night staring, your mind racing. some of the times you remember that and some of the times you forget it, it is time that has gone, it was real but it doesn't exist anymore. other times it informs your actions, you remember it, maybe you work out a way to avoid it. i am also not crazy on sharing here but joy can be really contingent on, or enabled by, down periods, too. as a contrast, or relationally. there's something about well you wouldn't know you were missing it that makes this debate too fingers-in-your-ears alternate-reality, to me, like you are literally having to discount all of your lived experience as a human. it sets such a low baseline for satisfaction. for me it feels more like one of the situations that come up when you have to decide whether or not to ask someone out or not, w/the knowledge of how terrible that process is going to be but how much is dependent on it - in any situation there is an option to just neuter the risk & opt for the quiet, but part of the experience of life being okay is wrapped up in it having unfolded, i think.

ps i am listening to phil lynott solo jams while i type this

the maths of you should push the button because you wouldn't know what you were missing - like you-can't-lose - always seems wrong to me. it was in that derek parfait nyer profile a while ago, the idea that any amount of potential joy has less currency than the avoidance of any potential suffering.

yeah it's basically "better to have never loved at all than to have loved and lost"

it's cool if you write some cool plays w/yr pent up emotion

Kinda workin' on that angle in lieu of inventing and pushing the button.

I have an inkling that this desire for self-termination is rooted in a belief that "the future is here" and there's nothing beautiful to look forward to, like, on a technological or political level, and that's kind of interesting

"Everything that can be invented has been invented." -- Charles H. Duell, Commissioner, U.S. Office of Patents, 1899

The thing I don't get is why not just run up like a zillion dollars on a credit card going to hawaii or something and eat expensive pizza everyday before you press the button?

think of the embarrassment of ordering artisanal hawaiian pizza and being put on hold then autotransfered to a suicide prevention hotline, because that's what would happen.

ham + pineapple? you crazy or something? pls hold

if you're paying for an artisinal food order by credit card, it automatically cross-indexes what you've ordered against blowout.xls. diced pineapple is a pre-checkout staple, no way are the retailers getting burned like that again.

If you could push a button and simply cease to exist, what would you do before you pressed it?

Try and seduce a cop, probably

that's what "suicide by cop" means

There's a button which causes anyone who pushes it to cease to exist. You push it and nothing happens. Why is that?

http://www.atariage.com/2600/boxes/b_BrainGames_Color_front.jpg

TOUCH ME

Is it because the button makes it like you never existed & therefore you didn't exist & could not have pressed the button?

It's either that or the doctor was a man

There's a button which causes anyone who pushes it to cease to exist. You push it and nothing happens. Why is that?

because "you" is an illusion, at every moment the "i" ceases to exist and is reformed anew, just like everything else around us, that's called maya in buddhism i think, anyway alan watts told me that

LOL Ive been out all weekend and missed this thread and tbh I'm quite glad. What a shitfit.

Also, ans: hell no. In fact let me live another 100 years (without aging of course). Life's fun and I need time to work more of it out.

Is it because the button makes it like you never existed & therefore you didn't exist & could not have pressed the button?

It's either that or the doctor was a man

Nice, but I didn't mean it as a riddle. I was thinking of the Voight-Kampff questions. No need to overthink it.

yo i found the button, looks like someone has already pressed it.

http://distilleryimage9.instagram.com/2bf769b0161911e29c2d22000a1e9b8d_7.jpg

The vikings defense pressed this button

could never in a bazillion years imagine pressing this button, considering how much my existence has enriched the lives of those around me

another valid perspective!

NO AN INVALID PERSPECTIVE

Pretend it would involve no physical pain to yourself, and no emotional or financial or other repercussions to the people around you. Would you hit the cancel button?

READ THE FUCKING THREAD RULES YOU TWAT

*punches self in face*

also how dare you judge the validity of my perspective darraghmac, you sad little man

TROILUS
What is aught but as 'tis valued?

HECTOR
But value dwells not in particular will;
It holds his estimate and dignity
As well wherein 'tis precious of itself
As in the prizer.

Thsi thread:

http://images3.makefive.com/images/news-business/design/top-5-coolest-animated-gifs/the-shiny-candy-like-button---ren-and-stimpy-7.gif

<3 u for that

ps given that I am alive I'd prefer to be so for as long as possible but if there was a pain- and consequence-free way to get off the ride I just might.

pps you all know there's no prize at the end?

http://i.imgur.com/BcJsQ.png

pps you all know there's no prize at the end?

Counting on it!

i'm not ready to totally write off the possibility that there might be a prize at the end

for people who'd press the button there presumably is

you better hope you find that button before i find you, tlg, you waste, you little man

'cease to exist' isn't setting up a pearly gates epilogue

i meant oblivion is apparently prize enough

yeah sorry i got that from yours dlh, xp to mordy

I don't think I could do this because I'd probably trip while trying to press the button and land on my spine and fall into a crevice and wind up paralyzed and unable to move in a place where nobody can discover me

i'm holding out for a leviathan feast w/ the big guy, G-O-D.

shit good point, where's this fucking button, exactly?

I don't think they'd put it in an easy to access place. Plus I have a bad ankle so I've even tripped even tryin to hop in the shower

yeah, the more i think of it the more wary i get of this mysterious button and its murky origins.

Yeah Like who created it? Can it learn...and FEEL?

as soon as you push it the men in white coats burst out from everywhere and sure you're proper fucked then, try telling THEM it's not some form of assisted suicide scheme good luck!

thank you roberto and trayce :_D

Im amazed no one else beat me to that gif earlier tbph

john K sadly must not be an ilxor.

trayce omg i love u

shut up baby i know it

lol you're all dealwithit.gif

a loaded gun won't set you free (so u ssay) - ian curtis

I was deeply depressed from around age 15 to my mid-twenties and I really wanted to not exist, but I never wished to die; all I wanted is to never have existed. I fantasized of being able to eradicate my existence so that no one would miss me because there was never a me to miss.

I'm doing better now, but still there are times when I find consciousness really burdensome even during good and fun times (the idea of an afterlife is horrifying to me - I want to know that one day my consciousness will stop!). Furthermore, I hate that when I die, chances are that my passing will cause others anguish, so while that not-suicide non-existence button isn't what I crave anymore, it still seems interesting.

if pushing the button removes your existence w/out causing distress to others, and not pushing it means that one day you will die and others will experience distress, does that mean you are obligated to push the button in order to keep others from feeling distress? and if you are not obligated to push the button just to save others the feeling of distress, why not? what is the right you have to exist, despite that existence ultimately leading to others feeling sad?

Well yeh, that's what makes the button interesting.

But I guess you shouldn't press it b/c you wouldn't want to seem ungrateful for each of the hundreds gifts of days and days that every person is given.

i was thinking about ren and stimpy and this thread last night honestly
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ku2wFaaPAzI

The right you have to exist is also the burden you have to offset through your works the misery your passing will cause. Fortunately this isn't that difficult (first step is get off ILX tho)

I don't want to lose my consciousness, I have a vivid imagination!!1!

srlsy, an end to consciousness is the one thing that terrifies me about death

that and a lack of what my equivalent to darraghmac's toffee crisps are

i think it might be cherry ripe but i will need to check

otm

srlsy, an end to consciousness is the one thing that terrifies me about death

― Doping Makes Your Arm Strong (King Boy Pato), Monday, October 15, 2012 7:04 AM (21 minutes ago) Bookmark

how do you feel about sleeping

used to terrify me as a kid tbh

I would not push the button. But I also wouldn't trust myself to even be around that button on the off chance that I pushed it.

I get the same feeling about balconies/ledges. Not afraid of heights, but don't trust myself not to just throw myself off of them.

it's amazing how much i don't trust my own future instincts. like you say, i generally avoid high ledges with no barriers in case i go suddenly and briefly insane and decide to just jump off.

leave me out of this

"high ledges with no barriers" heh

i don't get high anymore and have a few barriers so i think i'm safe.

I couldn't find anything worth buying at Target yesterday. Knowing consumerism had failed me, I figured pushing this button might have been a better alternative to such a boring sunday afternoon

I had 5 rehearsals and a concert in the past 48 hours

the appeal of the button is beginning to reveal itself

also, if you're ever really frustrated by the fact there's nothing good on television, the button sounds nice

i would prefer this to be a thread where we discuss our daily itinerary and debate whether we'd rather be doing what we're doing right now or opt for the void

just had coffee, not pushing the button right now.

I haven't experienced anything in life to make me not want to push the button.

Not pushing the button would be a pretty selfish thing to do. Think of how many resources each of us takes up during the course of our lives.

can I have yr resources after you push the button?

Only if you share.

The button actually just sends you a copy of The Secret.

does it happen as soon as you press the button, or when you release it?

coffee effect disappears, pushes button

i'm more eager to see these poll results than any other ilx poll in a while, i must say

jim furyk, in post ryder cup meltdown despair, decides to hit button, spends eternity missing it from six inches

I get the same feeling about balconies/ledges. Not afraid of heights, but don't trust myself not to just throw myself off of them.

Oh wow! I forgot how I used to constantly think like this as a kid! Not just about suicidey stuff, but about all kinds of outrageous things like if I saw a baby at a store, I'd worry that I'd mutilate it. I didn't have the urge to mutilate the baby, but I was worried that it might happen.

As a teen I also used to worry that I was on hard drugs without knowing it. I would get sweaty and shaky trying to remember every minute of the last week to make sure I hadn't started taking drugs. But of course I didn't remember sleeping, so I was terrified I had nocturnal alcoholism and a smack habit. I'd never done drugs, so I didn't understand that I'd know if I was addicted.

Fucking Nancy Regan and after school specials gave me a ridiculously inaccurate concept of what drugs do.