(After reading papers on Spinoza, thinking aloud)
“Free Man, a man who is led by reason and not by the affects…”
One thinks about the experiences the individual is living and evaluating, applying reason, weighing those experiences against each other and the present teaching that has been given you by your present belief systems used as a thinking paradigm; these are the present affects to find the truth in these life experiences and what they reveal: wisdom hopefully.
“Free Man, thinks of nothing less than of death, and his wisdom is a meditation on life, not death. ”
A free person practices reason and not be led by affects… death is the single effect that applies to everyone, born, alive, or dead. Every single body share’s death: death is not on the horizon it is the last horizon. NOT A SINGLE PERSON can stop death. Spinoza says it is simply a waste of your energy to have your death affect your living this life. Death is inevitable, for sure, absolutely will happen to you. All life share a common ending of death. Spinoza points out the importance that your energy is applied to meditation on life resulting in the wisdom that will reward one with peace and joy.
I will comment that those who chose a belief system that provides “a here a after life” heaven remove the fear of death. If you choose to follow the good to arrive in paradise, you are not a free person to gather the wisdom that meditation on life makes available to us.
Most people do develop a practice to remove the fear of death with a belief in heaven practice, then pour energy into whatever the rules are to qualify, and therefore not worry about death. Still, there is an energy cost for qualifying one way into the after-death reward. So one will chose a practice “believable and useful” to substitute rewards of a paradise to remove the fear of death, therefore, they loose living a meaningful life.
“Avoid death by not thinking about it. It will happen, absolutely.”
To spend time-energy thinking about death has no value. The value is living an awakened experience of live is peace and joy. . A god belief connected to some reward after death-specific actions will steal time and energy. Value exists in living and learning from experiences of cooperation, caring, and maintaining your body and Human Community Expereinces.
Remember, the human organism has evolved into its present state. An organism that is carefully balanced into a living mammal that wants to survive, All those living materials and creatures, such as bacteria and cells, have built an immune system to defend their organism, their home, and their planet,
These, such as bacteria and cells, their living were first, to begin the process of evolution and slowly the human organism evolved a thinking process in this human organism. The thinking process of each organism was contained in the brain and senses. In evolving, a thinking process in the organism can go a long way to keep the organism alive a bit longer.
The thinking process sees itself differently than bacteria & cells because the thinking process has developed a person, an I. Then, I need to be set aside, and the more responsible entity needs to see as a co-operator with all the other co-operator parts of the body such as bacteria and cells.
The thinking process realization of existence probably started in the hunting-gathering cooperative experiences.
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