All the shit that happens to you IRL, perhaps?

Or at least, very selective about what you wanted to remember, or chose to think about.

Nobody's debating that. Nobody's saying you can ALWAYS be happy. But I am saying that you can be truly happy, even with free will., which I believe answers your original question.

but you've no way of interpreting your senses if you know nothing. its not like you'll randomly go: "oh shit, i'm getting pricked with a needle by my idiot brother while i lie here in a coma-like state".

and i'm saying that no matter how great your happiness is, it won't last a fraction of a second compared with the happiness of non-existance.

if anyone is starting to pick up which religion i'm being a devil's advocate from, msg me for free cookies.

You wouldn't feel happiness either. Happiness is not the absence of suffering. You can be happy while suffering. In the army, we sweated and bled to get the concertina wire fences up, but we were happy, because we were togetehr and working together.

So - your opinion is that oblivion is preferable to existence and that peace can be found away from the wretched mass of humanity? Well, it is your opinion, and you are entitled to it, but don't expect me to argue it for you.

Personally, I think that's a whole load of shit. Nothing against you, though. I just find the idea of nothingness is happiness stupid.

If there's a religion that advocates these beliefs, I'm surprised it still exists. If they truly believed in the nihilistic worldview, the why they haven't all killed themselves off yet?

Because they believe that you can only achieve Nirvana through being a good person on earth. Hint: They also believe in ressurection and really like cows.

And I'm with Dante: If you don't exist, you don't feel ANYTHING. You can't be in bliss, because you can't be in anything at all, whether it be bliss, pain, or something in between. As he said, the absence of pain is not happiness. He gave an example in which he was perfectly happy while in pain... I on the other hand, can be in no pain whatsoever and still not be happy. I wouldn't call what I am when I'm asleep happy... it's not sad either. It's not anything.

hee hee hee. i gets to be a grammar jerk. no one said oblivion, and no one said wretched masses are the point of suffering.

i said.

-to be truly happy, you have to be isolated from experience

so logically without experience, or the ability to gain more, you're sorta comatose, which was a conclusion i refered to in the "brother needling me" example. if that's true, then being dead is pretty much the same for the body as being comatose. thus if the mind can only be freed from suffering when the body doesn't work/exist, then not existing replicates the blissful experience of knowing nothing.

want to draw a conclusion? since we aren't dead, we feel suffering.

where's that from? its the first noble truth of buddism. and no, buddism isn't gone, its experiencing an upsurge in followers.

EDIT: no one gets a cookie.

hinduism is close, but the concept of atman is the opposite of the buddist anatman (soul vs. nosoul.) in hindiusm, nirvana is joining with ultimate reality, while in buddism the escape from samsara is hitting enlightenment. when you die tho, you stay dead. the buddha is a person who helps others stay dead, if you want to look at it that way.

krylo: Ah, that. Right. They don't talk too much about the nihilism, though.

Now, to address the ORIGINAL question - would I have bliss or free will?

I'm with free will. I'm with free will because I like freedom, and free will is one of the last true freedoms we really have. I'm not saying bliss is bad - on the contrary, I consider myself something of a hedonist.

But I would rather have a choice, even if they're all bad ones, rather than walk a fore-ordained path.

EDIT:

Yes, I made a strawman there without realizing it. My mistake. Sorry.

Although the concept of Nirvana can be roughly equated to oblivion...

Knowing nothing isn't necessarily blissful, for one.

And also, to feel bliss, one would have to be conscious of bliss. Not existing implies that there is no consciousness to feel bliss with.

That is correct. But like I said, presence of suffering is not absence of happiness.

AHHH! Evil Religion Attack! Hssss!

i dunno if anyone read the edit, but there it is. for the original question, i'd go for free will too, but i wouldn't take people out of bliss if they had chosen it. oh man, new question: what happens if someone uses their free will to end their free will? are you allowed to stop them? is it an issue that deals with morality?

EDIT: reading edit concerned with the edit.

exactly why perfect bliss can't be achieved. thumbs up.

you said it the otherway around. the presence of happiness is not the absense of suffering. and i'd dissagree with the quote, but agree with the paraphrase, but we're onto a new question, so i'll leave it be.

Yes, morality. And maybe ethics. Or are they the same?

EDIT: Removed erroneous assumption.

the assumption wasn't that erronous. it depends on how we define morality and ethics. my education said that morality is the intrinsic right/wrong, while ethics is a personal code to determine morality.

good definition? or should we get another?

Morality seems more like a personal thing. You have your morals, while I have mine. Ethics, however, seem more exactly defined...

Also, to get this discussion back on track: Of course your free will inculdes the freedom to take the free will from another. The question is, is it right? Or is it just right sometimes? Is it right to stop someone from killing themselves? How about to stop someone from getting a cheese dog?

Actually, this still isn't on track. Um... add something about bliss here... there we go. All better.