Why is there so much pain and suffering in the world?

[nec209]

I'm wondering why there is so much pain and suffering in the world and how do you define it as one person may experience pain and suffering but the other person not even with out people looking at animals there is pain and suffering there.

 

[Sensei]

"Life feeds on life"..

You are eating a great meal, but someone died to become your meal..

Edited November 30, 2023 by Sensei

[iNow]

Suffering is everywhere all the time. You’re not special. We see what we look for. 

[mistermack]

Pain is there to notify you that you are being damaged. Without it, you wouldn't notice when a thorn jabs into your flesh, or you are standing on a burning ember. 

Suffering is inevitable, because most animals produce many offspring, to cover for natural hazards. They can't all survive. If every individual frog spawn lived to old age, there would be a plague of frogs, and there would be no food to feed them. A human couple can have ten kids. Some have to die, to prevent overpopulation. In the natural world, most will die before they get to sexual maturity. 

[nec209]

47 minutes ago, iNow said:

Suffering is everywhere all the time. You’re not special. We see what we look for. 

I assume you talking about animals killing other animals or people killing animals.

[iNow]

Why do you assume that? 

 

[Peterkin]

3 hours ago, nec209 said:

I'm wondering why there is so much pain and suffering in the world

Because evolution finds an ecological niche for every possible kind of life-form. That includes predators, parasites and pathogens. A huge amount of scope for eating other life-forms, and for developing aggression, greed and ways to satisfy both.

 

[mistermack]

Or maybe god is a sadist. 

[Sensei]

Meat or plants are a source of food, i.e. a source of stored energy created by autotrophs.

Humans can become autotrophs through genetic manipulation of DNA or technology (CO₂+H₂O+N₂+little others-> organic matter) and stop killing other animals and plants to survive. Overpopulation will force such solutions sooner or later..

 

 

Edited November 30, 2023 by Sensei

[Phi for All]

14 hours ago, nec209 said:

I'm wondering why there is so much pain and suffering in the world and how do you define it as one person may experience pain and suffering but the other person not even with out people looking at animals there is pain and suffering there.

I think it comes down to selfishness. We've had the ability to take care of every single human on the planet for some time now. War for resources is obsolete. We have enough for everyone, so to deny anyone shelter, food, and water just boils down to selfishness, and feeling that some humans aren't as deserving as others.

[nec209]

13 hours ago, Peterkin said:

Because evolution finds an ecological niche for every possible kind of life-form. That includes predators, parasites and pathogens. A huge amount of scope for eating other life-forms, and for developing aggression, greed and ways to satisfy both.

 

The world seems to be set up as you are born and get eaten by some thing than die and you only alive for short time.

Well going back to what you are saying a virus or bacteria killing a human being or big animal or if they are just lucky get really sick.

But then a poisonous plants could kill human being, your dog or any large animal. 

So the world is in state of being born and dying. And than many fruits and vegetables are only alive for short time the same with plants 

[Peterkin]

6 hours ago, nec209 said:

So the world is in state of being born and dying. And than many fruits and vegetables are only alive for short time the same with plants 

A-yup! The evolutionary prize is to survive long enough to make offspring to carry your DNA and raise enough of them to reproductive age. Individual specimens don't count; only species do. 

[mistermack]

20 minutes ago, Peterkin said:

A-yup! The evolutionary prize is to survive long enough to make offspring to carry your DNA and raise enough of them to reproductive age. Individual specimens don't count; only species do. 

I would rather go by what Dawkins said. It's genes that count. (selfish genes)

[Peterkin]

1 hour ago, mistermack said:

I would rather go by what Dawkins said. It's genes that count. (selfish genes)

Fine. But genes can't get themselves replicated without reproductive agents. One has to wonder whether they even have an independent existence. 

[mistermack]

38 minutes ago, Peterkin said:

Fine. But genes can't get themselves replicated without reproductive agents. One has to wonder whether they even have an independent existence. 

You could say the same about a virus. They act in a selfish way, even though they are mindless, and don't have an independent existence. 

The term "selfish" is more of a marketing ploy. Genes have no intentions, but they act in a way that a selfish one would act. Like the way the eye looks designed, but isn't. 

[Peterkin]

1 hour ago, mistermack said:

You could say the same about a virus. They act in a selfish way, even though they are mindless, and don't have an independent existence. 

Viruses are interesting in that way. Genes are not: they make no effort, have no perceptible influence on anything except as they manifest in stand-alone organisms, such as viruses. They're components, rather than entities. 

 

1 hour ago, mistermack said:

Genes have no intentions, but they act in a way that a selfish one would act.

They don't act at all. They just sit there, like mail, being carried from one organism to another.

Dawkins is a bit too fond of metaphors.

[martillo]

On 11/29/2023 at 9:16 PM, nec209 said:

I'm wondering why there is so much pain and suffering in the world and how do you define it as one person may experience pain and suffering but the other person not even with out people looking at animals there is pain and suffering there.

 

Too much diseases, calamities, catastrophes and tragedies. Seems the Universe is not well "tunned" for an ideal kind of life. We live as we can...

[mistermack]

10 hours ago, Peterkin said:

They don't act at all. They just sit there, like mail, being carried from one organism to another.

They certainly do act. If your egg had had no genes, it would have been flushed years ago. 

If you take the example of Neanderthals, the species is extinct, but the genes live on in modern humans. They don't necessarily benefit our species, in fact some modern genetic problems are blamed on Neanderthal genes. But they live on. I read somewhere that you could assemble the entire Neanderthal Genome, from the current human population. I don't know if it's true, but billions of people carry the genes.

[Sensei]

22 hours ago, Phi for All said:

We've had the ability to take care of every single human on the planet for some time now.

...sometimes highly educated and rich people lose touch with the reality that is the reality of most of the rest 8 billions..

22 hours ago, Phi for All said:

War for resources is obsolete.

..soon (with growing population and side effects of global warming) you can have a completely new level of "war for resources" e.g. for a fresh clean water..

22 hours ago, Phi for All said:

We have enough for everyone..

..only those who will pay.. This is how capitalism works..

"We"? Who is "we"? Rich Westerners? 70% of Americans who have $1000 or less savings?

22 hours ago, Phi for All said:

so to deny anyone shelter, food, and water just boils down to selfishness, and feeling that some humans aren't as deserving as others.

1) construction industry is significant industry in the world. The less developed the country, the higher the percentage of GDP.

2) agricultural industry is significant industry in the world. The less developed the country, the higher the percentage of GDP.

3) The whole reason they have problems with shelter, food and water is because they have no money to buy them.. This is how capitalism works..

 

 

[Peterkin]

1 hour ago, mistermack said:

people carry the genes.

As do animals, plants and protozoa. Carry them, like little packets of mail. If being carried is acting, then they are and do.

[iNow]

1 hour ago, Sensei said:

soon (with growing population and side effects of global warming) you can have a completely new level of "war for resources" e.g. for a fresh clean water..

In addition to wars for water, that same drought problem will lead to crop failures at the base of the food chain. Hard to grow corn and wheat and soy etc. when it's not raining, so that further amplifies the valid probabilities you cite. 

1 hour ago, Sensei said:

.only those who will pay.. This is how capitalism works..

Phi's point is completely correct, though. The problem isn't the availability of the resources but the methods currently being used to control and drive access and distribution. 

[Bufofrog]

2 hours ago, martillo said:

Seems the Universe is not well "tunned" for an ideal kind of life.

No kidding, the universe is incredibly hostile to life.  The only place possible for life as we know it is a thin shell around a single planet. 

[iNow]

1 minute ago, Bufofrog said:

No kidding, the universe is incredibly hostile to life.  The only place possible for life as we know it is a thin shell around a single planet. 

And even THERE it's mostly not possible for most "organisms" who try. 

[martillo]

58 minutes ago, Bufofrog said:

No kidding, the universe is incredibly hostile to life.  The only place possible for life as we know it is a thin shell around a single planet. 

Yes, lot of coincidences allow life in this planet and still with lot of problems. The reality is hard, nothing easy.

59 minutes ago, iNow said:

And even THERE it's mostly not possible for most "organisms" who try. 

Sure and many species got extinct. Even our own future is not very certain after all. 

[iNow]

8 minutes ago, martillo said:

Even our own future is not very certain after all. 

Our future is pretty certain, actually. We too will eventually go extinct and fall into the dustbin of geologic history, or at least evolve into something completely different and unrecognizable.