I am apathetic toward religious people though. It doesnt bother me in the slightest that people have beliefs – odd as they may be to me. The only time I get negative, is when people in power, like our dear Senator Akin, prey on the fears of religious superstition to advance their heinous agendas (like attacking women’s rights). Guys like this would have us all drinking strychnine and dancing with rattle snakes. I am American, and expect freedom of (and from) religion.

Mitch, your answer is “interesting” but it totally misses the target. Think the issue over more carefully and try again later.

Bolithio, “who cares?”???! Why so negative and apathetic? suzy feels sorry for anyone who has no interest in classical music, and for whom the meaning of life is, “getting through the day”. This is a totally awesome world we share, including a history of great achievements in the arts, (in cases like Beethoven we call it great genius. But what does it mean? If one opens up to it, a marvelous universe appears before you.

1) they rise to the level of consciousness, meaning that a particular subset of a particular brain’s systems — the one’s responsible for giving us a sense of being in charge of our body and personality — reflects their existence and the person who considers those brain systems to be their “self” is aware of them; or,

2) they do not rise to the level of consciousness, but affect the behavior of the body in which they occur in ways of which the person who considers the body “theirs” is not consciously aware, but in ways that can be inferred by that person or others.

If neither of the preceding is true, they are meaningless and, quite possibly, nonexistent. Secret sorrows that “you” don’t know about and that don’t affect “your” unconscious behavior are meaningless and, quite possibly, do not exist in any sensible meaning of the word “exist.”

-but do secret sorrows, pent-up rage, dreams of melancholy oppression, nocturnal visions, bursts of enthusiasm, and essential novelty and individuality have meaning?