I’ve been thinking lately about life and the purpose of one’s life. I’ve also been thinking about the premise we use to live our lives. Reading through works by Thomas Hobbes, Jean Jacque-Rousseau and Karl Marx will do that to a person.
A question that keeps swirling around in my head asks what premise to life is valid? Are we all selfish and corrupt from the start or are we truly innocent. Or are we just some sort of mixture of it all? How does a different view point impact your life? What changes do you make in your life when you believe we are one way or the other? What concessions do we make if we believe we are one or the other? Do they hinder us? Do they make us better?
And no I don’t have the answers to any of these questions. I just like to ponder on them.
If we are truly corrupt how does one become good? Is pure good even possible when you have corruptness? Because doesn’t one drop of black in a jar of white or clear taint the whole bunch?
If we start off innocent what would it take to stay that way? If we were kept separate from society what would be like? Would we have the same amount of knowledge or access to the same amount of knowledge?
In my opinion, I think we are something of a mixture really, because if we were one way or the other we wouldn’t be able to interact with each other the way we do. We wouldn’t be able to have enjoyment or know suffering and realize that sometimes things just aren’t worth pursuing. But there has to be a balance between the two to make some sort of perfection. Because when we titter one way to the other we show weaknesses or gross deformity and then we jump to the conclusion that we are one way or the other and not able to be just as we need to be.