Director Roger Nygard traveled the world asking theologians, scientists, skeptics, and everyday people 85 tough questions to try to understand The Nature of Existence! Now that he’s asked the experts, it’s YOUR TURN! To offer your own insights on today’s question, “Why is there suffering?“, Leave a Reply below!
It seems to me that there is suffering because humans do not possess the god-like powers required to always detect, understand, and eliminate all conditions which serve to bring to us the experience and awareness of suffering. I think that suffering is the general description of a continuum of normal human experiences which, as civilization grows and matures, is continually brought to light.
I also agree with the Buddha: existence is suffering. As to whether or not that condition is permanent, I think is unknown.
Because we live in a deformed world.
Because our current form of evolution requires death but also survival skills in order for an organisms genetic material to be replicated. Those survival skills include feeling or responding to pain in some way and in most cases to feed on some other life-form.
Also, the universe is a place that doesn’t care about us, so violent things such as tsunamis, earthquakes, meteor strikes, ice ages and so on just happens.
All the more reason to be in touch with reality and not running around thinking you can pray any of all that away.
If there is an all powerful being capable of relieving suffering with a wish at any time. and we find ourselves suffering, then it is clearly the whim of said being.
If there is no such being, we suffer because of our own failings to ourselves and to each other.
Suffering is born out of ignorance for the most part. Not all suffering is bad. We have learned a lot about ourselves and the world through suffering. However, most suffering is unnecessary.
Suffering exists because without it, humans would not exist. If every lifeform never experience suffering, we would all be blobs of self replicating proteins never wanting for anything. All of the organisms that existed before us, extinct or not, have given rise to human beings, are a part of the natural pressures that forced our evolution into homo sapiens. Without suffering there would be no evolution, without evolution, there would be no humans to contemplate why suffering exists.
This means that suffering is inherent in the existence of evolved lifeforms, and really, do we want it any other way? The existence of suffering is what gets us out of bed in the morning. Its why we try, why we raise our children to the best of our abilities, to prepare our children to cope with the natural suffering that occurs as a result of environmental pressures, and so hope our children evolve better prepared to face the world of tomorrow.
The big question is what role should humans play in creating suffering. We have to realize that when we create suffering, we are affecting our own evolution. If we create suffering to punish intelligent and rational people for not following dogma, be it religious, nationalist or tribalist, we will force ourselves to evolve into less intelligent beings. If we push suffering too far, the satisfaction of human life might be so low that we as a species may not care whether we wipe ourselves out and our evolutionary branch may come to an abrupt end (some people call it the Rapture, the final relief from generations of human imposed suffering).
We cannot end suffering, but we can manage it to a certain extent to increase our odds of survival or ensure our evolution to a more enlightened species. We are unique among earth species in that we have an opportunity to craft our own evolution or create our own extinction through free will. Our tribalistic behaviors did not have such a profound negative effect on survivability until the advent of technology, so our challenge will be to outhink and outact our destructive tendencies.
When we talk about suffering, the worst kind is the suffering that is caused by other humans. We can all understand accidents, or acts of nature that cause suffering, but when our fellow humans deliberately cause suffering, be it for selfish gain or pure sadistic pleasure, that kind of suffering is the most painful and difficult to cope with, yet it should be the easiest type of suffering to manage, if we have the will to manage it.
There is a lot to be said of the Golden Rule as a means to manage preventable suffering, but sadly, those who preach the Golden Rule most often seem to follow it least often. The Golden Rule should not be preached as much as it should be practiced because practicing the Golden Rule will do far more to influence and inspire others into practicing the Golden Rule than an infinite amount of evangelizing, or pointing an accusing finger, or casting of stones. So, the next time you attend a religious service, ask yourself whether you are you practicing the Golden Rule or preaching the Golden Rule, are you alleviating suffering, or causing suffering by rebuking others not in your reference group. Ask yourself, is your group sharing fruit or inflicting thorns?
Suffering and happiness go hand in hand. You can’t have one without the other. The same can be said of good and evil. Happiness is possible only because suffering is also possible. If there were no possibility of suffering how would we experience happiness? Suffering must be endured and the end of suffering will bring happiness. Happiness is to be enjoyed, but will end when inevitable suffering occurs. I am not saying it is one way or the other, just a pendulum swinging between two extremes – its always relative.
The earth is cursed, so they most be suffering. In the world, suffering always go with happiness, is sometimes up & down, so we need to get used to it.
Because biological life is a conditional thing. Suffering is the orderly universes’ way of building in a feature to tell you what not to do.
from “Princess Bride”
“Life is pain, and anyone who says different is selling something.”
anyone who speaks against that truism…….. LOL… may have already sold themselves a bill of useless goods.
We suffer because we expect reality or God to care for, or even about us.
cause people are just too cool to care about other people. plus the world hates me