As a start, here are some instances I see where people suffer:

- Feeling hungry or thirsty but not knowing where to find food or water to stop that feeling
- Wanting to feel loved but feeling rejected, while not knowing how to be loved
- Wanting to feel considered but feeling ignored, while not knowing how to be considered
- Wanting to have biological children but not being able to have biological children
- Wanting some person to be alive while that person is dead
- Wanting to feel free but feeling enslaved, while not knowing how to free oneself
- Wanting to stop experiencing physical pain, while not knowing how to make that pain stop
- Wanting to reach some goal while believing that this goal can't be reached
- Wanting to avoid something while believing it can't be avoided

In all these examples there is something that is wanted, while there is the knowledge or the belief that this thing can't be had. When there is hope one can cling onto the hope and not suffer, but it seems that it is when one loses hope or doesn't have hope that what is wanted can be attained, when one finds oneself helpless to reach what is wanted, that suffering appears.

One thing to take into account is that there are various degrees in what we desire, there are things we want strongly and feel we can't do away with, while there are things we desire but don't mind that much if we don't have them. For instance I want to eat sushi, but even if I believe I can't get sushi I won't suffer much, unless I desire sushi so much that it comes to occupy all my thoughts and I feel like I can't live without it.

The examples above might not represent all the situations in which people suffer, but a temporary conclusion that can be gotten from them is that suffering seems to come about when something is wanted while it is believed that it can't be attained, and that the intensity of the suffering seems to be a function of the intensity of the desire for what is believed to be not attainable.

Two potential solutions to alleviate suffering follow directly from this. One is that suffering can be reduced by managing to desire less something that cannot be had, for instance by finding other objects of desire that can be had to focus on. The other is by managing to change the belief that what is wanted cannot be had: maybe there are possible ways to get what is wanted that weren't thought of, and then focusing on these ways would make hope return and reduce suffering.

I will keep thinking about all this, but meanwhile your thoughts are much welcome, for instance if you have examples or sources of suffering that aren't included in the examples above, or if you have any thought that can contribute to making a working model of suffering.

Maybe the relevant difference is not in the suffering, not the type of suffering, but in how one parses and deals with suffering. If that's the case, what should be pursued is a model, or perhaps a set of interpretive dispositions, techniques, etc.that can enable people to look at suffering differently.

Of course, this isn't a novel suggestion, and maybe there are ways to deal with this already, such as the zen approach to Buddhism.

Maybe the relevant difference is not in the suffering, not the type of suffering, but in how one parses and deals with suffering. — Terrapin Station

Well the point I was going to bring up was, "how much does suffering contribute to joy?" The yin and yang so to speak. Is joy greater if we have experienced the lows of suffering?

I think Terrapin's point is related, but more useful. We need to learn to deal with suffering more than we need to eliminate suffering.

- Feeling hungry or thirsty but not knowing where to find food or water to stop that feeling
- Wanting to feel loved but feeling rejected, while not knowing how to be loved
- Wanting to feel considered but feeling ignored, while not knowing how to be considered
- Wanting to have biological children but not being able to have biological children
- Wanting some person to be alive while that person is dead
- Wanting to feel free but feeling enslaved, while not knowing how to free oneself
- Wanting to stop experiencing physical pain, while not knowing how to make that pain stop
- Wanting to reach some goal while believing that this goal can't be reached
- Wanting to avoid something while believing it can't be avoided — leo

I view the bolded ones as those deserving a plan of elimination (assuming they are actually enslaved not just "feeling"). With the rest just being stuff we have to learn to deal with (I am not saying that is easy).

A couple of points - first, as Terrapin notes, the idea of 'the cause of suffering and its end' is indeed central to Buddhism. Suffering (dukkha) is boiled down to: an inevitable consequence of old age, sickness and death, of not getting what you want, and getting want you don't want. Which, I suppose, is intrinsic to the human predicament.

Another point which I think could be made, is what Jung meant when he refers to 'voluntary suffering' (which the OP touches on.) There is a certain amount of suffering to which human beings are susceptible to just on account of being born. Being able to bear suffering for a cause - like, the suffering women undergo in childbirth, the suffering that those caring for others take on, and so on - is also an essential part of the human condition. (It doesn't mean necessarily choosing to suffer, but more like 'forbearance'.)

I think one problem in contemporary culture, is that there's no real way to make sense of suffering. Western medicine is unbelievably effective at treating and reducing physical suffering, of that there can be no doubt. But there are kinds of suffering or sorrow that it can't begin to treat. Whereas in Buddhism and in other traditional frameworks, there is a sense that suffering does indeed have a cause, and also an end; what is 'beyond suffering' is held to be heaven (in Biblical religions) or Nirvana (in Buddhism.) There's no orienting concept of that kind in modern secular culture - after all that's one of the reasons it's 'secular'. And so that amounts to a kind of 'crisis of meaning' - a sense that life is futile, but also that it, and I, exist for no reason. There's no light at the end of the tunnel. I think that lies behind a lot of the existential angst of modern culture.

And now the aim of this thread is to attempt to make a model of this suffering, how it comes about, what makes it disappear, so we can better prevent it and better help those who suffer get better. — leo

You seem to want to eliminate the single easiest way to end the suffering...allow the individual to commit suicide.

Why?

Suffering happens. If a person wants to end the suffering...allow that to happen. Facilitate it.

This thing we humans call "the universe" has existed for over 13 billion years. If a giant asteroid were to impact the Earth and tear it to pieces so that the planet and everything on it ceased to exist...it would be a nothing burger in the grand scheme of things.

This thread is an attempt at creating a model of suffering, through observation and reason, by looking at all the instances in which people suffer, and attempting to find out how suffering comes about and how it disappears. — leo

We could take the approach of Plato. The Gorgias, and the Protagoras, if memory serves me, provide the best examples. What Plato does, (Socrates in the dialogues) is to separate pleasure from pain such that they are not in dichotomous opposition to each other. Placing pain and pleasure as opposite to each other in the same category, proves to be a problem because then pleasure can only be derived as a relief from pain. Then pain and suffering are required necessarily, as prior to, in order to have the goal of bringing about pleasure. So Socrates wants to put pleasure into a different category, such that we can bring on pleasure without the pain and suffering which would be required as prior to pleasure if the two are opposed.

Does this sound reasonable to you, that pain and suffering are categorically distinct from pleasure? The distinction becomes important when we look at pleasure as that which is desired, the goal or end. When they are dichotomously opposed, then the goal or desire for pleasure is necessarily the desire to end pain and suffering. When they are distinct, then the goal, what is desired, pleasure, is not necessarily to bring an end to pain and suffering.

The question now is why do you have a desire to model suffering. If we can bring about pleasure without ending suffering, then why focus on the suffering? The desire, what is wanted, is always based in some form of pleasure, the good, and this is categorically distinct from suffering. Why bring yourself down by focusing on the suffering, when this is unnecessary for bringing about pleasure and good?

Thank you for the replies.

The point in building a model of suffering is precisely to come up with techniques to have a better control over suffering (such as to prevent or reduce it), in a similar way that building models of the world allows to come up with techniques to have a better control over the world (such as to communicate or travel more quickly across the world).

What you guys refer to as dealing with or making sense of suffering is what I see as examples of techniques to have more control over suffering (to make it more bearable, which essentially amounts to making it less intense, to reduce it).

It is easy to build a model of suffering that doesn't work well, but it's a bit harder to build a model of suffering that works well.

Frank proposes the model that suffering is something that happens to people who are alive, and proposes that the easiest technique to end this suffering is to help people kill themselves. In fact an even easier technique would be to kill them directly. It would be fine if our only goal was to end suffering, but as it turns out people also want to live. Presumably people wouldn't want to kill themselves if they had the tools/techniques to stop suffering while staying alive. People have been talked out of suicide. Most people don't need help to kill themselves, there are many ways, what they lack is tools to help them stop suffering while staying alive.

A model of suffering that works well would allow to have a better control of suffering while staying alive.


There are two main types of suffering I want to distinguish:

- The suffering that is accepted/borne, seen as temporary and as a step towards something that is wanted (masochism, childbirth, experiencing the lows to make the highs greater)
- The suffering that is not accepted/borne, that one is unable to escape and doesn't see as a step towards anything wanted, on the contrary what is wanted is to make this suffering stop.

Plenty of people go through the first type and don't mind, they don't feel like they need help at all (or maybe very temporarily with painkillers). On the other hand those who go through the second type don't have painkillers to help them out of their predicament, they suffer and see no end to it, no help in sight, and when it becomes too unbearable what they see as their only way out is to hurt/kill themselves and/or others.

There are plenty of people who need help to stop this suffering but they find no tools/techniques to help them. Telling them that their suffering is a learning experience or that they need to deal with it won't do, they can't deal with it on their own, they need help. Telling them that the easiest way is to kill themselves is not the answer that they want or need, but it might be what they end up doing if they see it as the only way out.

There exists models of suffering, but I see none of them as doing the job well enough, I think we can do much better. We need a model based on empirical evidence, but without constraining that evidence with beliefs so much that it becomes nearly useless. I feel that the widespread models used are guided more by belief than by evidence, with beliefs shaping more the evidence than the evidence shapes the beliefs.

There is the model that suffering is due to demonic possessions and that the technique to eliminate it is the ritual of exorcism. I haven't looked much into it but I doubt it is very successful.

There is the model that suffering comes from the brain, and that since painkillers are useful to reduce some suffering then presumably all suffering could be solved in this way and it's just a matter of finding the right drug for each suffering. It has helped some people, like exorcism has helped some people, but how many it doesn't help? Many have felt worse after taking their prescribed drug, many have killed themselves after taking their prescribed drug, many have their suffering reduced at the cost of having all their feelings numbed, the long-term effects of these drugs often cause suffering of their own, people who were told they needed to take some drug their whole life managed to get better without the drug. That's a model of suffering that doesn't work well.

There is the Buddhist model, according to which the cause of suffering is attachment to desire, and the technique to end this suffering is a series of practices called the Noble Eightfold Path. It has definitely helped people, but it demands a strong commitment to its practices and beliefs that many people aren't in a position or willing to make. Also I agree that attachment to desire is sometimes a cause of suffering, but I disagree that it is the cause: one can be attached to a desire and not suffer or suffer little, working towards making the desire a reality while being hopeful about succeeding. Many people function fine while being attached to desires, and it demands a strong commitment to give up all attachment. I see this as an instance of a model that provides useful techniques to reduce suffering, while being embedded in some beliefs that are not based on empirical evidence.

It is interesting to note though the similarity between what Buddhism sees as the cause of suffering (attachment to desire), and what I described as a potential cause in the second post of this thread (that suffering seems to come about when something is wanted while it is believed that it can't be attained), they are not equivalent but they partially intersect.

I view the bolded ones as those deserving a plan of elimination (assuming they are actually enslaved not just "feeling"). With the rest just being stuff we have to learn to deal with (I am not saying that is easy). — ZhouBoTong

Actually I see these three bolded ones as a subset of another one I listed: "Wanting to reach some goal while believing that this goal can't be reached".

When we "feel hungry or thirsty but don't know where to find food or water to stop that feeling", we want to reach the goal of satisfying our hunger or quenching our thirst while not believing we can reach it.

When we "want to stop experiencing physical pain, while not knowing how to make that pain stop", we want to reach the goal of not experiencing physical pain, while not believing we can reach it.

When we "want to feel free but feel enslaved, and don't know how to free ourselves", we want to reach the goal of feeling free while not believing we can reach it.

Note that you could be enslaved and not suffer because of it, if you don't feel enslaved or if you don't want to feel free. Suffering is linked to one's desires, beliefs and perception. You can put two people in the same situation and yet they would suffer differently, one suffering and the other not, because they are not going through the same experiences in what appears to be the same situation from our point of view. That's what leads me to think that the desires and beliefs of the individual have to be taken into account when attempting to make an accurate model of suffering, they are linked to suffering.

Ultimately, "dealing with suffering" refers to a technique that helps reduce or eliminate a suffering.

We could take the approach of Plato. The Gorgias, and the Protagoras, if memory serves me, provide the best examples. What Plato does, (Socrates in the dialogues) is to separate pleasure from pain such that they are not in dichotomous opposition to each other. Placing pain and pleasure as opposite to each other in the same category, proves to be a problem because then pleasure can only be derived as a relief from pain. Then pain and suffering are required necessarily, as prior to, in order to have the goal of bringing about pleasure. So Socrates wants to put pleasure into a different category, such that we can bring on pleasure without the pain and suffering which would be required as prior to pleasure if the two are opposed.

Does this sound reasonable to you, that pain and suffering are categorically distinct from pleasure? The distinction becomes important when we look at pleasure as that which is desired, the goal or end. When they are dichotomously opposed, then the goal or desire for pleasure is necessarily the desire to end pain and suffering. When they are distinct, then the goal, what is desired, pleasure, is not necessarily to bring an end to pain and suffering.

The question now is why do you have a desire to model suffering. If we can bring about pleasure without ending suffering, then why focus on the suffering? The desire, what is wanted, is always based in some form of pleasure, the good, and this is categorically distinct from suffering. Why bring yourself down by focusing on the suffering, when this is unnecessary for bringing about pleasure and good? — Metaphysician Undercover

Interesting comment, thanks.

I don't necessarily see the lack of pleasure as suffering or the lack of suffering as pleasure, there are varying degrees of each and there are experiences that could be qualified neither as pleasure nor suffering, and even experiences that could contain both at once. So in that sense I can view suffering and pleasure as categorically distinct.

But in desiring to model suffering, I don't necessarily attempt to bring about pleasure, rather I want to help people suffer less, give them the tools to escape a feeling that they want to escape without dying but don't know how to escape without dying. Someone who has escaped this feeling doesn't necessarily experience a constant state of pleasure, but they don't experience the terrible feeling anymore.

On the other hand, people who focus constantly on pleasure and attempt to experience relentless pleasure can't keep up forever, at some point it usually comes crashing down, and then they find themselves suffering but without the means to escape it, as they find their former means to experience pleasure not working anymore.

So it seems to me that if we focused on bringing about pleasure then many people would still be stuck in unescapable suffering. Today's society is focused on providing pleasure in many ways, and yet many people suffer and kill themselves.

I don't see focusing on the suffering as bringing myself down. It's like suffering is seen by many as this contagious thing that we must avoid talking about to not risk being contaminated by it, as if not thinking about it somehow kept it at a distance and rendered us immune to it. After all we give drugs to people who suffer as we give drugs to people who are sick, as if suffering was a disease. But then by the time we come to face it we don't know how to deal with it.

As a start, here are some instances I see where people suffer:

- Feeling hungry or thirsty but not knowing where to find food or water to stop that feeling
- Wanting to feel loved but feeling rejected, while not knowing how to be loved
- Wanting to feel considered but feeling ignored, while not knowing how to be considered
- Wanting to have biological children but not being able to have biological children
- Wanting some person to be alive while that person is dead
- Wanting to feel free but feeling enslaved, while not knowing how to free oneself
- Wanting to stop experiencing physical pain, while not knowing how to make that pain stop
- Wanting to reach some goal while believing that this goal can't be reached
- Wanting to avoid something while believing it can't be avoided — leo

I’ve been thinking outside the box on this concept of ‘suffering’ from a number of different angles recently, and I’ve noticed a few things.

First of all, if we look at the above examples, many of them have two related situations in common: there is a particular belief/lack of knowledge that prevents someone from coping with a particular feeling/experience they don’t want, or want the opposite of.

This suggests that education and awareness would be a significant part of any potential solution - especially in relation to what these feelings are, why we feel them, and how this amounts to suffering.

Another thing I’ve noticed is that there seems to be three main experiences associated with suffering: Pain, loss/lack and humility/humiliation. Sometimes the suffering consists of a combination of these experiences.

All three appear closely related to consciousness, especially to self-consciousness. Animals that we recognise to be lacking in self-consciousness do not appear to suffer from pain, loss or humiliation.

As humans, we tend to have a complicated relationship with these experiences. That is to say, there are times when we consider experiences of pain, loss or humiliation to be bad, evil or unnecessarily harmful, and other times when they are a clear indication of one’s humanity, a reminder that we’re alive, or the ‘stuff of life’ itself. And there are those who determine that both of these are true, and so they understandably seek to ‘opt out’.

But there are also those who find the significance or the very joy of being alive in experiences where they embrace the risk of pain or death, and the humbling sensation of putting their abilities at the mercy of nature’s power.

Why do we both suffer and feel alive in experiencing pain, loss and humiliation? Is the difference in the value of the experience, or the level of awareness? Is it then our suffering or feeling alive that is a misinterpretation of the experience?

There is the Buddhist model, according to which the cause of suffering is attachment to desire, and the technique to end this suffering is a series of practices called the Noble Eightfold Path. It has definitely helped people, but it demands a strong commitment to its practices and beliefs that many people aren't in a position or willing to make. Also I agree that attachment to desire is sometimes a cause of suffering, but I disagree that it is the cause: one can be attached to a desire and not suffer or suffer little, working towards making the desire a reality while being hopeful about succeeding. Many people function fine while being attached to desires, and it demands a strong commitment to give up all attachment. I see this as an instance of a model that provides useful techniques to reduce suffering, while being embedded in some beliefs that are not based on empirical evidence. — leo

The way I see it, it is how people relate to their desire/attachment - and the experiences of pain, humiliation and loss that come from that relationship - that lead to suffering. According to the Buddhist perspective, all is suffering. So it’s not so much a matter of ending suffering as learning to relate to pain, loss and humiliation in a very different way so that the concept of suffering from these experiences effectively disappears.

Take pain, for instance. We tend to view pain as a signal that something is wrong and needs fixing. We experience pain when there is tissue damage, as a warning to stop, or when a relationship breaks down. But pain is also a signal that our muscles are developing, that we are focusing on the present moment, that progress is happening. If we look at all experiences of pain, it could be understood as an awareness of change that requires the experiencer to adjust in some way. The problem is that, in many cases, we don’t want to make those adjustments, or we don’t believe that we should have to make them. This is where suffering occurs.

In modern science, we understand everything in the universe as process. Change is always happening, and every ‘thing’ comes and goes, undergoing many changes along the way and bringing about changes in interactions with the rest of the universe. We are part of that, not separate from it. When we act, we impact on elements of the universe, which adjust in response, bringing about more changes as these elements interact with other elements, and so on. So why is this awareness of change and the necessity of adjustment a source of ‘pain and suffering’ for those of us who are self-aware? Why do we resist change? Why do we refuse to adjust?

The point in building a model of suffering is precisely to come up with techniques to have a better control over suffering (such as to prevent or reduce it), in a similar way that building models of the world allows to come up with techniques to have a better control over the world (such as to communicate or travel more quickly across the world). — leo

Do you see the presumption in this statement?

Do you see the presumption in this statement? — Wayfarer

That suffering can be modeled? I don't see what you are hinting at. As soon as we attempt to relieve someone of their suffering we are applying an implicit model of suffering (hypotheses/beliefs as to what causes it and what can relieve it).

The point in building a model of suffering is precisely to come up with techniques to have a better control over suffering (such as to prevent or reduce it), in a similar way that building models of the world allows to come up with techniques to have a better control over the world (such as to communicate or travel more quickly across the world).
— leo

Do you see the presumption in this statement? — Wayfarer

That suffering can be modeled? I don't see what you are hinting at. — leo

That suffering can be controlled?

That suffering can be controlled? — Possibility

But that's precisely what psychotherapy, psychiatry, Buddhism and other practices attempt to do, with some limited success. We have plenty of evidence that suffering can be partially controlled, what I have pointed out through this thread is that the models of suffering commonly applied are flawed in several ways. My only presumption there is that it is possible to come up with a model that works better. But in order to find out we have to try, thinking outside the boxes delimited by the beliefs of the other models. It is the presumption that we can't do better that forces us to not look for and thus not find anything better.

(by the way I will reply to your previous posts, I just need some time to ponder on them)

Here is how I sum it up:

Man suffers because he desires.
Having eaten the Fruit of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, man desires good and if he does not acquire it, he is left with evil.
It is like a man running on a treadmill, he must continue running or he will fall off.
The object of man's desire has taken hold of him and his freedom goes away.

Man smells a bad smell and says: "Oh, how foul!"
So with images, sounds and touch that doesn't feel right.
This is because these stand out. They are sharp.
Like a drop of ink on a blank page.

So the problem lies with permanance.
Man assumes the state of permanance, and anything that damages his sense of permanance causes suffering.
For man to hold his state of permanance, as I have said, one must keep going and displace oneself.
It is this constant displacement which tires man out, and this fatigue - which is suffering.
If man should simply observe, all ills would pass him by.

That suffering can be controlled? — Possibility

That’s what I’m getting at. A certain kind of suffering - actually, very many kinds - can be managed through medicine - but I don’t know if that is applicable to what you might describe as existential anxiety.

That’s what I’m getting at. A certain kind of suffering - actually, very many kinds - can be managed through medicine - but I don’t know if that is applicable to what you might describe as existential anxiety. — Wayfarer

And I agree with that. Conventional medicine (in the form of drugs) is little effective to treat many kinds of suffering, such as existential anxiety. It can be more effectively treated by changing one's beliefs about existence (then it's a matter of finding an effective technique to change one's beliefs). There actually exist some drugs that can help with existential anxiety (some psychedelics), but they are not prescribed by mental health professionals, and these past decades it has been mostly taboo to conduct research on them as a healing tool.

A certain kind of suffering - actually, very many kinds - can be managed through medicine - — Wayfarer

Yes, and that's an important useful insight. What I mean is that suffering is to a significant degree a mechanical issue which when true makes the subject far simpler than complex psychological and philosophical theories etc.

1) Suffering is made of thought.

2) Control the volume of thought and we control the volume of suffering too.

3) The volume of thought can be managed through simple exercises patiently applied.

No, this is not a magical cure all for all problems, nor a permanent solution. But if we aren't serious enough to do the simple stuff, there's really not much point (other than casual entertainment) in discussing all the fancy stuff.

But in desiring to model suffering, I don't necessarily attempt to bring about pleasure, rather I want to help people suffer less, give them the tools to escape a feeling that they want to escape without dying but don't know how to escape without dying. Someone who has escaped this feeling doesn't necessarily experience a constant state of pleasure, but they don't experience the terrible feeling anymore. — leo

The issue though, is that fulfilling a desire is equivalent to, or the same thing as pleasure. Pleasure is fulfilling a desire. So if you have a desire to model suffering, then to do this will bring you some sort of pleasure. If you desire to model suffering because this will help people suffer less, then this is what will bring you pleasure. This is not about bringing pleasure to others, it is about pleasuring yourself. You think that it is good to help others with their suffering, so to do so will bring you pleasure.

You say that you want to help people suffer less, but suffering is particular, unique to the individual. How do you think you can model suffering in general, when there are so many different ways that people suffer? Each person who suffers needs care specifically designed for that person. Don't you think that helping a person to suffer less requires attending to that individual on a personal level?

So it seems to me that if we focused on bringing about pleasure then many people would still be stuck in unescapable suffering. Today's society is focused on providing pleasure in many ways, and yet many people suffer and kill themselves. — leo

I think the point is that pleasure is something wanted, desired, so it is always in the future. It is something to look forward to. But suffering is due to past misfortune. So to focus on pleasure is to focus on the good which the future may bring, and doing what we can to bring about that good, while focusing on suffering is to focus on a past which really cannot be changed. I think that suffering cannot be avoided because it is already present, caused. But by looking to the future, things desired, pleasures, we can distract ourselves from the suffering. And wounds heal with time.

I'm going to boil down the issue to a utilitarian ethical schematic. Now, with this line of thought in place you can successfully produce a model to be applied to the issue of human suffering. But, I want to point out that it's near impossible to attain a deterministic model if we incorporate the notion of having a free will. Furthermore, quantifying a qualitative trait such as suffering will produce a loop of subjectivity and objectivity. The solution to this is to assume a pragmatic attitude of what is best for oneself with intersubjectivity in mind.

Good luck.

Note that you could be enslaved and not suffer because of it, if you don't feel enslaved or if you don't want to feel free. — leo

If wage labor is slavery I agree. If 1800s American South slavery is what we are talking, one's mindset may reduce the suffering, but eliminate seems wrong.

Ultimately, "dealing with suffering" refers to a technique that helps reduce or eliminate a suffering. — leo

Notice that "reduce" seems far more realistic than "eliminate". I am not convinced that humans could even understand a universe without suffering (it is such an inherent part of life, can I even start to guess what life without suffering would look like? Notice that eliminating death would be an obvious requirement).

What about happiness? Isn't focussing only on suffering an incomplete view of reality? I guess suffering is a very basic emotion and relatable, through empathy, to a greater extent than happiness. For instance we can understand that animals can feel pain but it becomes difficult to recognize what it is for animals to be happy.

I just read on wikipedia about the World Health Organization (WHO) and how it redfined ''health'' in 1948 as not only the absence of disease (suffering) but also a state of wellbeing in which one could fuflill one's potentials in the world.

An ancient model of suffering I'm familiar with is Buddhism which basically states that ignorance is the cause of suffering: when we don't know the truth of impermanence (nothing lasts forever) we tend to attach our selves to people, objects, etc. and when these fade into nonexistence, naturally, we suffer from the loss. It's a good model I believe. I think philosophy in general subscribes to this model because it is, in essence, an enterprise to gain knowledge i.e. dispel ignorance.

That said one thing that I do want to put across is that knowledge isn't required to make us happy i.e. some truths like disease, evil, etc. are sad to know. I guess sometimes truth or happiness is an exclusive disjunction. Perhaps such dilemmas are a few and far apart and a quasi-universal model of suffering can work in a therapeutic sense.

Given that psychiatry and psychology are the main fields of science in dealing with suffering and its alleviation, then what's the issue with treating the issue as a medical or therapeutic one? Personally, my favorite domain of psychology is Cognitive Behavioral Therapy along with logotherapy, which addresses suffering through the application of reason to irrational tendencies or cognitive distortions, like drug use which is a raving topic on the forum currently. Now, I understand that this is idealistic and non-material in terms of what relationship pain has with suffering; but, there's a tendency to equate suffering with pain, which isn't entirely true. It can be existential angst or anxiety or depression for the matter.

So, concluding my sermon and grandiose belief that suffering can be thought away through the application of reason and mindfulness towards inner struggles, I must say that the task is futile for N>1.

Thank you for the comments.

There is a lot to consider and answer, and it will take some time to think about it all carefully, so I won't reply to everything right away but I will eventually reply to everything.

As a general comment suffering is subjective, so indeed an accurate model of suffering will have to take into account the subjective experience of the individual rather than treating the individual as some objective blob of matter. That's not an impossible task, psychotherapy already applies a model of suffering that makes use of the subjective state of mind of the individual, with some limited success. Interacting with the individual through speech can help reduce/eliminate/prevent some suffering.

Don't you think that helping a person to suffer less requires attending to that individual on a personal level? — Metaphysician Undercover

Indeed it does, an accurate model will have to take into account the individual, and a technique that works well will have to interact with the individual. We can build a model that depends on factors that are particular to the individual. We don't have to see suffering as some objective thing that we can model and control without taking into account the individual.

Another thing I’ve noticed is that there seems to be three main experiences associated with suffering: Pain, loss/lack and humility/humiliation. — Possibility

To the masochist who doesn't want to avoid pain, pain is not suffering.
To the one who doesn't want what he loses/lacks, this loss/lack is not suffering.
To the one who doesn't want to be accepted/respected, humiliation is not suffering.

This suggests to me that what is wanted is a more fundamental factor in suffering. There is a desire involved in suffering. But it's not the act of wanting something that causes suffering.

To the one who wants to avoid pain, there is suffering when there is an experience of pain.
To the one who wants to avoid loss/lack, there is suffering when there is a perception of loss/lack.
To the one who wants to avoid humiliation, there is suffering when there is a perception of humiliation.

So both individual desire and perception are factors in suffering. There seems to be suffering when what is perceived contradicts what is desired.

But in fact, both desire and perception can be partially controlled.

When there is a perception of loss, that perception is not the same whether it is believed that what has been lost can be gained back or not. When there is a perception of lack, that perception is not the same whether it is believed that what is lacked can be obtained or not. The perception of something can be threatening or not depending on what we believe that thing to be and what we believe it to be capable of.

What is believed has an influence on what is perceived.

Hope is the belief that what is wanted can be obtained. When there is hope, there is less suffering than when there is no hope. Belief acts on hope, so belief is a factor in suffering. And beliefs can be partially controlled.

This is a start, but here we have the beginning of a model. There is an interplay between what is desired, what is perceived and what is believed. Suffering seems to occur when what is perceived contradicts what is desired. And we can act on this conflict by acting on desire, perception and belief.

As a general comment suffering is subjective, so indeed an accurate model of suffering will have to take into account the subjective experience of the individual rather than treating the individual as some objective blob of matter. — leo

Then you are not talking about "a model of suffering", you are talking about modeling a particular instance of suffering.

That's not an impossible task, psychotherapy already applies a model of suffering that makes use of the subjective state of mind of the individual, with some limited success. Interacting with the individual through speech can help reduce/eliminate/prevent some suffering. — leo

So how can you call this a model of suffering, if it is a method of dealing with particular instances of suffering? I would say that it is not accurate to say that psychotherapy is applying a model of suffering, rather they have a method for dealing with suffering.

Do you see a difference between reducing/eliminating suffering and preventing suffering? The first is to deal with an existing condition, and the second is to avoid an unwanted condition. The latter, preventing suffering, I think is an unrealistic goal. This is because suffering is unintended, it is accidental, the result of mistake, and other things which are unintended. So as much as we make all the safeguards that we can, to avoid the unintended problems, the very nature of suffering is that it comes about from the things which we are unaware of, the unknown, thus it cannot actually be avoided. Therefore preventing suffering is like preventing mistakes or accidents. We naturally try to avoid these things, but by the time we see the particular instance taking shape, it is already too late to avoid it. We can live prudently and cautiously, but a human being is an active being, and limiting our activities for the sake of avoiding the possibility of mistake, accident, or suffering, may itself be a mistake, and a cause of suffering.

The more realistic approach I think, is to deal with suffering as an existing condition, one which is unwanted. Since it is existing, present, then it must be caused. To understand the condition itself would require understanding what caused it. Each instance of suffering, being particular and unique must have had it's own distinct causes. As explained above, the causes of suffering are unintended, things we were unaware of, and were unknown at the time of causation, and this may remain the case even after the suffering is caused, if one cannot pinpoint the exact time the suffering started. So I believe that the difficult first step of any procedure, or method for dealing with suffering would be to determine the causes.

This is a start, but here we have the beginning of a model. There is an interplay between what is desired, what is perceived and what is believed. Suffering seems to occur when what is perceived contradicts what is desired. And we can act on this conflict by acting on desire, perception and belief. — leo

I think that this is naïve, and not a true representation of what suffering really is. If suffering were the interplay between desire, perception, and belief, and resulted when what is perceived contradicts what is desired, as described, then we could satisfactorily deal with suffering by altering our beliefs. We could prevent ourselves from desiring what contradicts our perceptions, by adjusting our beliefs. So for example, if you had a physical pain, suppose you crushed your finger and you were suffering, then you could deal with your suffering by altering your desire to perceive no pain, when you are actually perceiving pain. You could theoretically desire the pain, tell yourself that the pain is good, and this would produce consistency between perception and desire, releasing you from the suffering.

I think that to describe suffering in terms of conscious acts like "desire", "perception", and "belief", is a mistake. This is because, as described above, suffering is derived from the unintended, the unknown, what we are unaware of, so it is largely unaffected by the conscious activities of desire, perception, and belief. The conscious mind has a very limited amount of influence over the human body, constituting a relatively small part of the human physiology, and suffering is perceived, apprehended by the conscious mind, but as something outside its control. So suffering is more like an unwanted perception.

Then you are not talking about "a model of suffering", you are talking about modeling a particular instance of suffering.

So how can you call this a model of suffering, if it is a method of dealing with particular instances of suffering? I would say that it is not accurate to say that psychotherapy is applying a model of suffering, rather they have a method for dealing with suffering. — Metaphysician Undercover

I think you're playing on semantics here.

When you apply a general model to a particular instance, you're dealing with a particular instance. If you apply the model of Newton's laws to the trajectory of a ball, you have a method for dealing with the trajectory of this ball, that doesn't mean you're not applying a model.

Psychotherapy has hypotheses/beliefs as to causes of suffering and ways to relieve it, there is a general model implicitly being applied to a particular instance when they are dealing with a particular individual.

Do you see a difference between reducing/eliminating suffering and preventing suffering? The first is to deal with an existing condition, and the second is to avoid an unwanted condition. The latter, preventing suffering, I think is an unrealistic goal. — Metaphysician Undercover

If you put your hand in a fire, and your hand burns, and you suffer, you can analyze the situation and infer that you can prevent a particular type of suffering by not putting your hand in a fire. In a similar way, you can try to analyze in the general case how suffering comes about and prevent suffering by not behaving in ways that will lead you to suffer.

I don't see as unrealistic at all to gain the ability to prevent more suffering than we do now. I don't have the goal of building the perfect model that eliminates and prevents all suffering forever, I simply have the idea that it's possible to come up with a model that works better than the ones we have now.

I can agree that having the desire to prevent all suffering can be something that could lead one to suffer more by having this desire than by not having it, but then this is something that would be taken into account in a model of suffering that works well.

So I believe that the difficult first step of any procedure, or method for dealing with suffering would be to determine the causes. — Metaphysician Undercover

I agree, but that's precisely the point in building a model of suffering that works well, to derive from it methods for dealing with suffering that work well.

First step is to list all instances in which people suffer, then find similarities between them to hypothesize underlying causes.

If suffering were the interplay between desire, perception, and belief, and resulted when what is perceived contradicts what is desired, as described, then we could satisfactorily deal with suffering by altering our beliefs. — Metaphysician Undercover

And there is evidence that we can. Many people who suffer from the idea they are going to die find relief in the belief that death is a new beginning, that they keep living after death in a different way. People who suffer from the death of a loved one can find relief in the belief that they will be reunited with them. People who suffer from the belief that no one can love them find relief when someone shows them enough love that it changes their belief. There is plenty of evidence that changing one's beliefs can provide relief from suffering. But it's not always easy to change one's beliefs, especially when they are deep-seated ones we cling to.

So for example, if you had a physical pain, suppose you crushed your finger and you were suffering, then you could deal with your suffering by altering your desire to perceive no pain, when you are actually perceiving pain. You could theoretically desire the pain, tell yourself that the pain is good, and this would produce consistency between perception and desire, releasing you from the suffering. — Metaphysician Undercover

Masochists do get pleasure from pain inflicted on them, not suffering. Most of us are wired to not desire pain, but some people desire it, and they don't suffer from it.

Pain is an intense sensation, and because we usually desire to avoid it we suffer at the same time as we feel the pain, and so we come to see pain and suffering as the same thing, but they are two distinct things.

The desire to perceive no pain presumably won't stop you from perceiving the pain, but sometimes there are ways to not perceive it, by focusing on other things. The more people focus on their pain the more they suffer (when they don't want the pain), but if you can divert their attention by asking them unrelated questions, they can forget about the pain momentarily, they stop perceiving it and stop suffering meanwhile. There is evidence of this.

In my own experience there were several instances where I was so focused on something that I didn't even notice I hurt myself, although I should have perceived a sharp pain if my thoughts weren't absorbed on something else.

It's not always easy to act on what we desire, perceive or believe, but they are involved in the act of suffering. And in that view, drugs can work because they act on perception. Psychedelics can work because they act on perception and beliefs. Psychotherapy can work because it acts on beliefs. Then there are also experiences that can make us change what we desire, and then the suffering associated with the old desire disappears.

Here’s an interesting thing about suffering in terms of pain, loss and humility: there can be no process of life without experiencing all three. There is no interconnectedness without loss, no growth or development without noticing and adjusting to change, and no awareness of anything in the universe without humbly recognising that the universe is bigger and more valuable than my existence.

So the only way to eliminate experiences of pain, loss and humility is to cease living - I think it’s important to recognise this if our aim is to find a way to model and then control, reduce or eliminate suffering while continuing to live.

I question this need to ‘control’ everything. Despite every effort and every elaborate illusion we construct, I can potentially control my thoughts, my words and my actions, and you can potentially control yours. That’s it, at best.

That doesn’t mean we do, however, but it’s a start to recognise where our individual capacity for control starts and finishes. As a human being, as an animal, we can literally do nothing else in isolation. Everything else we achieve requires a relationship: awareness of interconnectedness and potentiality beyond ourselves.

I may assume, for instance, that I ‘control’ the axe I am using to chop wood, but that sense of control is dependent upon my body’s awareness of certain interconnective properties of the molecules that form the axe and its handle and their collective capacity to split wood, the combination of situational properties (position of the wood, angle of impact, force, arc of swing, grip, etc) that will achieve the desired effect on the wood, as well as my body’s capacity to lift and swing the axe in the required manner every time. Even if I don’t have to consciously think about all of this detail to make it happen, my body still has to take all of this into account to appear to ‘control’ the axe. If I have misjudged or incorrectly assumed any one of these relationships (beyond a certain margin for error), I may ‘lose this control of the axe, as what I intend or desire to happen with the axe fails to occur as intended or desired. But there was never any ‘control’ as such - there are a number of interconnected relationships at work as a result of awareness.

I think perhaps this idea of ‘control’ is where we have a misguided view of our relationship with the world. When we don’t feel like we have control, when what we intend or desire fails to occur as desired or intended, we experience suffering. When what we believe should happen doesn’t, when we incorrectly assume the properties of a relationship with our environment, we experience suffering.

If you apply the model of Newton's laws to the trajectory of a ball, you have a method for dealing with the trajectory of this ball, that doesn't mean you're not applying a model. — leo

I agree with this, but laws of physics can't be applied to acts of living beings because living things are self-moving. So it's not semantics that I'm arguing. What type of universal model would be adequate for understanding intentional acts? It's fundamental to a living being that it's motives are unique to itself. Sure you can make generalizations, like if you strike someone with a hammer or similar object you will cause pain, but I really don't think that this sort of generalization is helpful in dealing with the particular nature of the individual instances of suffering which you seem to be interested in.

Psychotherapy has hypotheses/beliefs as to causes of suffering and ways to relieve it, there is a general model implicitly being applied to a particular instance when they are dealing with a particular individual. — leo

I do agree that some general statements can be made about the cause of suffering, such as the hitting with the hammer example, and there are many other straight forward causes of suffering. Also, there are drugs to relieve pain, as well as some forms of suffering, but you seem to be looking for something more than this. If you believe that the tools which the doctors already use are inadequate for dealing with suffering, then what more do you want, other than to throw away these models and deal with the peculiarities of particular instances?

If you put your hand in a fire, and your hand burns, and you suffer, you can analyze the situation and infer that you can prevent a particular type of suffering by not putting your hand in a fire. In a similar way, you can try to analyze in the general case how suffering comes about and prevent suffering by not behaving in ways that will lead you to suffer. — leo

Yes, that's obvious, but most actual cases of suffering are caused accidentally. No matter how well I know that the fire will burn me, this won't prevent me from getting burned when I slip and fall into the fire while stoking it. This is what I meant when I said that suffering is caused by accidents, things we are unaware of, unknowns. I can know that walking down the street is dangerous, a car might hit me, but this doesn't prevent me from doing it, because there are things which I value that require taking this minimal risk. But if a car is hitting me it's already too late to prevent the suffering which will follow.

If you're familiar with Aristotle's ethics you'll know that he talks about a balance, "the mean". Virtue is found in the middle (the mean) between the two extremes, both of which are vises. So courage for example is the mean between being rash and being timid. If we refrain from behaving in ways which could lead to suffering we will fall into that extremity of being timid, and this could increase the possibility of a different sort of suffering.

The key points here are "possibility", and "the unknown". If we avoid any situation where there is the possibility of suffering arising, then we wouldn't do anything. But suffering comes about when you least expect it because there will always be possible causes of suffering which are unknown to you, and therefore not avoided by you. So if you do nothing, because doing anything causes the possibility of suffering, you might find that doing nothing could actually cause suffering itself. This is why we need a healthy balance, the mean between trying to avoid the possibility of suffering arising, which drives us away from doing things, and living an active life.

First step is to list all instances in which people suffer, then find similarities between them to hypothesize underlying causes. — leo

If this is your approach, then I think the first step would be to categorize different types of suffering. I think that you will find that there are a number of different types which are not at all similar. Being not at all similar, they have completely different underlying causes, and need to be classed separately. So for instance the person who accidental put a hand into the lawn mower has one type of suffering, and the young man who is having trouble finding a woman for a date has a completely different type of suffering. I believe that these two are so completely different with respect to causation, that it's difficult to understand why we even call them by the same name, "suffering". The problem I see, is that we will go on and on, determining many different types of suffering, each being a different type according to its mode of causation, until we hit numerous forms of suffering which we cannot say what the cause is. These of course are the most difficult forms of suffering to deal with. At this point we will have identified some difficult forms of suffering to deal with. But since we do not know the causes of them, how does this help us? In other words, the forms of suffering which we can identify the cause of, the doctors already know this, and have ways of treating them. And the forms of suffering which we cannot identify the cause of, we cannot help the sufferer because we cannot identify the cause of the suffering.

The desire to perceive no pain presumably won't stop you from perceiving the pain, but sometimes there are ways to not perceive it, by focusing on other things. The more people focus on their pain the more they suffer (when they don't want the pain), but if you can divert their attention by asking them unrelated questions, they can forget about the pain momentarily, they stop perceiving it and stop suffering meanwhile. There is evidence of this.

In my own experience there were several instances where I was so focused on something that I didn't even notice I hurt myself, although I should have perceived a sharp pain if my thoughts weren't absorbed on something else. — leo

I agree with all this, and that's why I first suggested separating pain from pleasure. I believe that if we can focus on things which we enjoy, and things which we are doing because we want to do them, we can put any suffering which we have, in the background. And, I believe that in most cases suffering is similar to pain, which is caused by an injury, and injuries heal with time. So if we can focus away from the suffering, and occupy ourselves with the things that we enjoy doing, we can give the injury and the suffering time to heal. The problem is to understand the particular source of the suffering, just like understanding the physical injury, because we can very easily reinjure in the same spot and then the wound just festers without healing. Therefore we often must avoid certain activities which we enjoy because these activities are not conducive to healing, but we need to be able to identify which activities are likely to reinjure the weakness which has been created by the injury.