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. — Possibility

Well, I was really struggling to conceive of life without suffering, so this all sounds good to me.

So the only way to eliminate experiences of pain, loss and humility is to cease living — Possibility

I think I am on board when it comes to eliminating pain. But to compromise with Leo's position a little, I am comfortable with suggesting significant reductions in suffering is possible. I think your next paragraph indicates you might be ok with that too? (although determining EXACTLY how much we can reduce suffering is probably very debatable)

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. — Possibility

I agree with this, I might even add that we can potentially learn to control MOST of our thoughts, feelings, actions, but complete control is unlikely even for the zen master. I also question the need for control; but it is more questioning why my own mind can understand it cannot control everything, but still desire to control everything. Stupid brain :smile:

That doesn’t mean we do, however, but it’s a start to recognise where our individual capacity for control starts and finishes. — Possibility

I guess I didn't need to add my last few lines, you were already there :smile:

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. — Possibility

I feel like I understand this part, but also not. Based on your final paragraph (I will add a short response) I think I am understanding you, but I also feel there may be some specific aspect that you are trying to get across that I may not be picking up. In reading my responses, I think you will know how much I am understanding. Definitely let me know if I am missing anything as the parts I am getting seem good, haha.

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. — Possibility

For me, this paragraph describes our emotional suffering well (it includes how we could reduce suffering and why our desires cause suffering). But we have not addressed direct physical suffering as much. Would you count someone born into extreme poverty or hereditary slavery as suffering in the exact same way? Can we apply the same model to ease their suffering?

Thanks for your response - it’s reassuring to hear that someone follows the way I see this issue. I have done a lot of thinking on this subject, so I’m trying to keep my posts relatively short, otherwise they’ll just get ignored. But there’s a lot of ground to cover, so bear with me.

I will try to clarify one point for you:

I think I am on board when it comes to eliminating pain. But to compromise with Leo's position a little, I am comfortable with suggesting significant reductions in suffering is possible. I think your next paragraph indicates you might be ok with that too? (although determining EXACTLY how much we can reduce suffering is probably very debatable) — ZhouBoTong

I’m not saying we shouldn’t try to reduce suffering - only that our current perception of suffering is that it is inherently bad. But we don’t understand it enough yet to make that judgement. I think that understanding how we cause others to experience suffering by ignoring/denying relationships could go a long way to reduce suffering in the world, as a start.

Once we recognise that everything we do depends on our awareness of relationships with the universe, we can apply this approach to other people and to our own bodily systems, as well as to the environment. The more aware we become of these relationships, the more connected we become with the universe. But we need to be careful to continually balance our awareness of the universe with our awareness of our own bodily systems. Too much focus on relationships with the universe and those around us, and we suffer by misjudging our body’s capacity to cope, its need for rest, nutrition, etc. Too much focus on the relationships with our own physical or emotional systems, and we suffer by misjudging the state of our relationships with those around us, which also increases the suffering of others by thoughts, words and actions.

When we recognise the suffering of those born into extreme poverty, for instance, we need to try and understand why we’re responding the way we do. There is a difference between compassion and pity, and many religious groups don’t acknowledge the difference.

Pity is when we respond to poverty because we imagine what it would be like to experience lack or loss to such an extent, and this conflicts with our firm belief that no-one should experience such lack. So we give what we can spare to ‘the poor’ in order to ease our own suffering, not theirs. We effectively give until we are aware of our loss, and then we stop - because we believe that no-one should have to experience loss. This is the system upon which most charities operate. It is effective because it doesn’t require us to be aware of any relationship with a poor person, and enables us to avoid suffering ourselves.

Compassion, on the other hand, means ‘to suffer with’. When we respond with genuine compassion, person to person, we acknowledge that we are not more entitled or deserving than they are to a life without loss or lack - which I already suggested is not even possible (without ceasing to live). Genuine compassion seeks to level the experience: to endure more loss ourselves - not so they experience less, but so they experience no more loss than we do, even if only for the time that we interact with them. Compassion is sharing a meal (instead of tossing them scraps), giving the coat off our back (instead of donating our cast-offs), etc.

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. — Possibility

But there can be pain, loss, humility and change without suffering, so surely they cannot be the root causes of suffering.

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. — Possibility

Indeed we encounter these experiences, but they are not necessarily associated with suffering. And it is possible to prevent many of them (such as the example where we don't put our hand in a fire to prevent ourselves from suffering). We can't control everything so total elimination sounds more like something we might asymptotically reach rather than a goal, but I still believe that our current models fail in helping many people who suffer, and that we could do better.

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. — Possibility

Yes we can't control everything. However some control over nature has brought technology, and some control over suffering has helped people live better. Do we have to stop there, or can we do better? Do we have to let the people who don't feel helped by current methods to keep suffering and kill themselves? Again I'm not saying that we can control everything, I'm saying we can do better. Just because we don't fall into the extreme of needing to control everything doesn't mean we have to fall into the opposite extreme of attempting to control nothing. I think if we attempted to control nothing we would quickly die as a species.

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. — Possibility

Giving up control can sometimes be liberating. It's rather, desiring control and believing in the impossibility of such control is suffering. Desiring drinking water soon and believing in the impossibility of finding water soon is suffering.

If what we believe should happen doesn't happen, that's not necessarily suffering. If I believe I'm gonna get hurt, and I don't, I can experience joy rather than suffering.

Again, I feel that the most inclusive view of suffering (given the examples in this thread) is that we experience suffering when we desire something and we believe we can't have it. Can you find any counterexample to this?

(I will eventually reply to all the posts in this thread, there are just some posts I can quickly reply to and others where I feel I need to spend more time pondering them to address them meaningfully)

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. — Metaphysician Undercover

Laws of physics are models of things that many of us experience. There are things that many of us experience (desires, beliefs, suffering) that laws of physics do not take into account, but that doesn't mean we can't build models of how desires, beliefs, suffering and other experiences interact with one another. I don't see a fundamental difference between the two.

We take a ball to be an objective thing because we synthesize various reports of that ball from various living beings from various points of view. If you and I experience a ball moving, we're not experiencing the same thing, we're not seeing the ball from the same point of view, you're not seeing what I see and I'm not seeing what you see. Same goes for your desires and beliefs, I'm not experiencing them, but you can tell me what you experience, and we can synthesize various reports and build a general model that applies to various individuals.

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? — Metaphysician Undercover

We had Newton's laws, and then we had General relativity. We had a new model that allowed to make more accurate predictions, to have more control. Some fundamental assumptions underlying Newton's laws were replaced by others in General relativity. Why would it be impossible to come up with a model of suffering with different assumptions than the ones we use now but that works better? We're always applying a model to a particular instance, but we can still have a model that is more effective when applied to a particular instance.

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. — Metaphysician Undercover

Yes we can't control everything. But there are things that can be done to reduce your suffering. If you experience pain and you suffer because of it, there are things we can do to make you experience less pain.

Again my aim is not to eliminate all possible suffering forever, but to come up with methods that can more effectively deal with suffering. Current methods deal quite well with physical pain and the resulting suffering, but there is a lot of other suffering that current methods deal poorly with. And effective methods are derived from accurate models.

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. — Metaphysician Undercover

Yes I agree that attempting to avoid all possible suffering can lead to suffering in itself. But again, it doesn't hurt to not put your hand in a fire. It doesn't hurt to not walk into incoming traffic. It doesn't hurt to not undertake endeavors that will most likely lead to suffering.

People live their lives according to what they desire and believe, but their desires and beliefs are partly shaped by their understanding of the world, of existence. I see a good model of suffering as one tool that people can use to live the life they want. They don't have to use it, but when they need it it's nice to have. And better have a tool that works well than one that doesn't.

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. — Metaphysician Undercover

Would you agree with the idea that the person who experiences physical pain suffers because he doesn't want to experience the sensation of physical pain, and that the young man who is having trouble finding a woman suffers because he wants to find a woman and he can't do it?

In both cases, there is a conflict between what is desired and what is experienced. I suggest that this is what suffering is.

But the way things are now, the suffering young man might consult a mental health doctor, and upon mentioning how he suffers he will be diagnosed with some mental illness and prescribed drugs that don't deal effectively with his suffering, because they're not addressing the root cause. As opposed to the person who suffers because he experiences physical pain and is prescribed drugs that effectively reduce or eliminate his sensation of physical pain, thereby dealing effectively with his suffering.

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. — Metaphysician Undercover

Indeed this is one way to relieve suffering. But then let's say you find yourself in a state where you don't enjoy anymore the things you used to enjoy, or that you focus on other desires to relieve your suffering but that they too lead you to suffer. Then the method to focus on what we want doesn't always work. It works sometimes, but there are cases where it doesn't work, and in those cases we need other solutions.

Indeed this is one way to relieve suffering. But then let's say you find yourself in a state where you don't enjoy anymore the things you used to enjoy, or that you focus on other desires to relieve your suffering but that they too lead you to suffer. Then the method to focus on what we want doesn't always work. It works sometimes, but there are cases where it doesn't work, and in those cases we need other solutions. — leo

The problem of human suffering is yet another intractable problem. The phenomenology of suffering can be very hard to put into words. Let us say you have had a very happy day- you do all the activities you wanted, you are with all the people you wanted (or by yourself if that's what you prefer), it's that weird transition into the next day.. that feeling that all those good experiences don't even matter right NOW, that is the root of the problem. There is some kind of phenomenon I call "instrumentality" in the human experience of good/pleasure. It's that feeling of dissatisfaction that underlies even the goods of life. That there is something unsustainable with even feeling good. This then leads to the idea of, "why even try to pursue good then if it is just this repeating cycle?". It is hard to pinpoint it, maybe some sort of angst, or realization that all is for nothing really. It is that dip in mood after a good time, that low, that seeing through things for what they are, which is simply the inability to be. We manufacture experiences of happiness to evade the instrumental, repetitive, nothing-feeling one gets if one is not engaged, or right after a peak of engagement. That weird melancholy feeling that it doesn't matter what we do.

Let us say you have had a very happy day- you do all the activities you wanted, you are with all the people you wanted (or by yourself if that's what you prefer), it's that weird transition into the next day.. that feeling that all those good experiences don't even matter right NOW, that is the root of the problem. — schopenhauer1

If my memory serves me well, then Schopenhauer would have advocated not thinking about the now comparatively with the past. You seem to have missed the non-permanence instilled in Schopenhauer's philosophy or his interpretation of the Upanishads. Anyway, without mentioning the overgeneralization that is going about here in the phenomenology of human suffering, I tend to agree with the fact that suffering sucks; but, contrary to you or Schopenhauer it is not intrinsic to the human condition. If that is, you believe that suffering is non-permanent along with focusing on reducing suffering instead of increasing happiness.

There is some kind of phenomenon I call "instrumentality" in the human experience of good/pleasure. It's that feeling of dissatisfaction that underlies even the goods of life. That there is something unsustainable with even feeling good. — schopenhauer1

No, this isn't philosophical pessimism, this is plain depression speaking. We've argued before about the two and how much overlap there is between the two. I haven't read enough Schopenhauer; but, I don't think he would advocate feeling good as unsustainable as long as suffering is reduced instead of masked or covered by the happy things in life.

But there can be pain, loss, humility and change without suffering, so surely they cannot be the root causes of suffering. — leo

There can also be grapes without merlot, but can there be merlot without grapes? I’m not saying that pain, loss and humiliation are the ‘root causes’ of suffering, but in a model of suffering, is there an example of suffering without an experience of pain, loss or humiliation?

I feel that the most inclusive view of suffering (given the examples in this thread) is that we experience suffering when we desire something and we believe we can't have it. Can you find any counterexample to this? — leo

I should point out that I agree with your suggestion that conflict, desire, belief and perception are key ingredients in the experience of suffering. But I think there’s more to the experience of suffering than desiring something and believing we can’t have it.

Would you agree with the idea that the person who experiences physical pain suffers because he doesn't want to experience the sensation of physical pain, and that the young man who is having trouble finding a woman suffers because he wants to find a woman and he can't do it?

In both cases, there is a conflict between what is desired and what is experienced. I suggest that this is what suffering is. — leo

Firstly, it’s not only masochists who experience physical pain without suffering. People who exercise, lift weights or compete in individual sports such as marathons or rock climbing, often willingly endure physical pain, not because they want to experience the sensation of physical pain, but because they want the results of stronger muscles or a sense of achievement. We might say that they ‘suffer’, but that’s only because we don’t understand why someone would choose to endure physical pain, which we believe should never be endured by choice.

So the person who experiences physical pain suffers not because he doesn’t want to experience the sensation of physical pain, but because he believes he deserves a life without pain, and the young man who wants to find a woman is not suffering because he can’t find a woman, but because he believes that every young man is supposed to find a woman.

Perhaps suffering is when there is a conflict between the desire for what is believed and the perception of what is experienced. When we believe that life should be without pain, and we desire that to be true, then we perceive an experience of pain as suffering, as something that is inherently bad or harmful. But we’ve already agreed that pain can be experienced without suffering, so this perception is false - as is the belief in a life without pain. There is a cognitive dissonance here. I think that better understanding our relationship to experiences of pain, loss and humiliation is essential to eliminating this conflict in our minds that we call suffering.

I’m not saying that pain, loss and humiliation are the ‘root causes’ of suffering, but in a model of suffering, is there an example of suffering without an experience of pain, loss or humiliation? — Possibility

Experiences of pain, loss and humiliation can involve suffering, so indeed they are useful to consider in building a model of suffering. But there are examples of suffering without physical pain, loss or humiliation.

Let's say you want some specific thing you have never had, but you can't seem to get it and you suffer as a result. There is no physical pain nor loss involved. There is not necessarily humiliation involved. But there is suffering.

But I think there’s more to the experience of suffering than desiring something and believing we can’t have it. — Possibility

But do you have an example where there is suffering without a conflict between what is desired and what is experienced/believed?

Firstly, it’s not only masochists who experience physical pain without suffering. People who exercise, lift weights or compete in individual sports such as marathons or rock climbing, often willingly endure physical pain, not because they want to experience the sensation of physical pain, but because they want the results of stronger muscles or a sense of achievement. — Possibility

Yes, and this shows that there can be physical pain without suffering. They might not desire the sensation of physical pain, but they have a stronger desire for what they want to achieve by enduring this physical pain. They want something, and they believe they can get it by enduring this physical pain.

It shows that it is not a sensation or an experience in isolation that brings suffering, an experience of pain or loss or humiliation does not bring suffering in itself, there needs to be a desire for there to be suffering. But there can be desire without suffering, so suffering results at least from some interplay between what is desired and what is experienced, the two are necessary ingredients, but each in isolation is not a sufficient ingredient.

So the person who experiences physical pain suffers not because he doesn’t want to experience the sensation of physical pain, but because he believes he deserves a life without pain — Possibility

I don't think that follows. I can believe I deserve something and not suffer if I don't have it. I can believe I deserve something, but if I don't care whether I have it or not then I don't suffer if I don't have it. I will care if I want that thing and I don't have it though, desire has to be involved.

and the young man who wants to find a woman is not suffering because he can’t find a woman, but because he believes that every young man is supposed to find a woman. — Possibility

Again, if he believes that every young man is supposed to find a woman, but he personally doesn't want a woman, then he doesn't care if he can't find one, he doesn't want one. He will care if finding a woman is what he wants, and he will suffer if he can't find one.

However if he believes that if he doesn't find a woman he will be ostracized by his peers, but he doesn't want to be ostracized, then the belief that he will be ostracized is what would make him suffer (conflict between what he wants and what he experiences/believes).


We can address this directly: can we find an instance where there is suffering, but where there is not a conflict between what is desired and what is perceived/believed?

If we can't find such an instance, then we can see suffering as a conflict between desire and perception/belief. And then finding why one suffers is a matter of finding what perceptions/beliefs are in conflict with their desires.

Let us say you have had a very happy day- you do all the activities you wanted, you are with all the people you wanted (or by yourself if that's what you prefer), it's that weird transition into the next day.. that feeling that all those good experiences don't even matter right NOW, that is the root of the problem. — schopenhauer1

Let's assume for a moment that suffering is a conflict between desire and perception/belief.

Then I would ask you, what it is that you want? When the next day you find yourself suffering, what it is that you want that you don't have or that you believe you can't have?

You may say that in these moments you don't want anything, but I won't believe it. If you didn't want anything then you would remain still as a rock, you wouldn't do anything, you wouldn't be struggling with yourself. Rather there is a thing or things that you want, but you have become so convinced that you can't have them that you pretend to yourself that you don't want them. But the suffering is there to remind you that you are lying to yourself.

So I would ask you, what it is that you want deep down?

It's that feeling of dissatisfaction that underlies even the goods of life. That there is something unsustainable with even feeling good. This then leads to the idea of, "why even try to pursue good then if it is just this repeating cycle?". It is hard to pinpoint it, maybe some sort of angst, or realization that all is for nothing really. It is that dip in mood after a good time, that low, that seeing through things for what they are, which is simply the inability to be. We manufacture experiences of happiness to evade the instrumental, repetitive, nothing-feeling one gets if one is not engaged, or right after a peak of engagement. That weird melancholy feeling that it doesn't matter what we do. — schopenhauer1

From this I can gather that what you want is for what you do to matter. You want what you do to serve a purpose. And you have the perception or belief that what you do doesn't matter, so you suffer.

So then the next question is, what makes you believe that what you do doesn't matter?

Laws of physics are models of things that many of us experience. There are things that many of us experience (desires, beliefs, suffering) that laws of physics do not take into account, but that doesn't mean we can't build models of how desires, beliefs, suffering and other experiences interact with one another. I don't see a fundamental difference between the two.

We take a ball to be an objective thing because we synthesize various reports of that ball from various living beings from various points of view. If you and I experience a ball moving, we're not experiencing the same thing, we're not seeing the ball from the same point of view, you're not seeing what I see and I'm not seeing what you see. Same goes for your desires and beliefs, I'm not experiencing them, but you can tell me what you experience, and we can synthesize various reports and build a general model that applies to various individuals. — leo

I can't understand the point you are trying to make here. Do you not see the difference between modeling the movement of an inanimate object, and describing the activities of living beings? You can make an accurate predictive model of the inanimate movement, but you cannot do that with a living being, because you will never know all the variables, and never know how the variables might influence the being's movement. Sure you can make some extremely simple models like Pavlov, but that's very basic. You can make a model to predict how the ball will move when thrown, but you cannot make an accurate model to predict how the dog will move when you let the dog out the door.

Yes we can't control everything. But there are things that can be done to reduce your suffering. If you experience pain and you suffer because of it, there are things we can do to make you experience less pain.

Again my aim is not to eliminate all possible suffering forever, but to come up with methods that can more effectively deal with suffering. Current methods deal quite well with physical pain and the resulting suffering, but there is a lot of other suffering that current methods deal poorly with. And effective methods are derived from accurate models. — leo

You are clearly making a separation here between pain and the suffering which you might say, it "causes". I don't see any principles for such a separation. When I feel pain, and suffer, the pain and the suffering are one and the same. I know that you've already said that people can have pain without suffering, and I accept this, but that just means that not all pain is suffering. So pain is the wider category in this way of using the terms, not all pain qualifies as suffering, but all suffering might qualify as pain. Therefore you do not have the principles to say that the suffering is something different from the pain, as something caused by the pain, or the result of the pain. Some pain is simply apprehended as suffering, and therefore classified as suffering, and some pain is not.

The reason why some pain would qualify as suffering and some would not needs to be investigated, perhaps it has to do with the intensity, the longevity, or something else. But now I think it is you who is playing on a semantic distinction between "pain" and "suffering", in an attempt to say that these words refer to a different aspect of the same thing, one being a cause, the other an effect, when really it's just two different ways of referring to one and the same thing. When I feel pain, and I suffer, the pain and the suffering are one and the same thing. When I feel pain and I do not suffer, it is simply the case that I have not judged the pain to be sufficient to qualify as "suffering", which is a special way of "feeling pain". That this is the case is evident from the many instances when I feel pain, but I don't know whether I am suffering or not. It cannot be the case that the pain is neither causing suffering nor not causing suffering, because one or the other must be the case if there were a causal relation. What is really the case is that I am incapable of judging whether the pain qualifies as suffering or not, and this is probably due to not having knowledge of the criteria required to class the pain as suffering.

Yes I agree that attempting to avoid all possible suffering can lead to suffering in itself. But again, it doesn't hurt to not put your hand in a fire. It doesn't hurt to not walk into incoming traffic. It doesn't hurt to not undertake endeavors that will most likely lead to suffering.

People live their lives according to what they desire and believe, but their desires and beliefs are partly shaped by their understanding of the world, of existence. I see a good model of suffering as one tool that people can use to live the life they want. They don't have to use it, but when they need it it's nice to have. And better have a tool that works well than one that doesn't. — leo

This is all irrelevant. If you know that doing a particular thing will cause suffering, you will not do it. That's clear. But as I explained above, real instances of suffering are derived from accidents, the unknown. So a model which tells one to avoid activities with a high probability of causing suffering is really useless.

Let's continue to consider why some pain would qualify as suffering and some would not. We carry out many activities knowing that there is a high probability of some pain, but we do them anyway, assuming that the pain will not be suffering. So there is a saying "no pain no gain", in cases like athletics, where training and conditioning requires some pain. We submit to pain for the long term goal, and that pain is not suffering. Why is it not suffering? Because of the attitude, that pain is necessary for some good. But such individuals may live on the borderline of suffering. What if it starts to appear like they are not making progress toward their goals, or that they are incapable of obtaining such goals? Then the pain might begin to appear as suffering.

Do you agree that what distinguishes "suffering" from "pain" is one's attitude, one's mental approach to the pain? When the pain is approached with a defeatist's attitude, it is apprehended as suffering, something which cannot be overcome. But when it is approached with the attitude that it must be overcome, and I must continue to get on with my activities, then it is not suffering, it is just pain.

Would you agree with the idea that the person who experiences physical pain suffers because he doesn't want to experience the sensation of physical pain, and that the young man who is having trouble finding a woman suffers because he wants to find a woman and he can't do it?

In both cases, there is a conflict between what is desired and what is experienced. I suggest that this is what suffering is. — leo

I don't think that this description is quite accurate. Very few people could be described as wanting to feel pain, so we can't describe suffering as when the pain is unwanted, it is almost always unwanted. So the pain is never really consistent with the desire. What seems to be at issue is whether the pain is acceptable or not.

This is why I proposed the categorical separation between pleasure (or what is desired as good), and pain. We cannot really oppose the pain to what is desired, and we ought not make a direct comparison or relationship between the thing being desired, and the pain which may or may not occur in the process of attempting to obtain it. The principal reason for this is that we must not allow that failure in the efforts to obtain the goal is itself painful, because failure is quite common and this could lead to suffering. The whole process, the activities of working to obtain goals is set aside from the pain which might be involved, as the pain is accidental to that process, though some pain might be necessary. This allows that the pain does not interfere with the process, altering one's perspective on the process, developing a defeatist's attitude.

So there is always a conflict between what is desired, and what is experienced, because achieving our goals takes work, effort, and there is pain (which is not desired) that is involved with this. The pain is unwanted, so it really conflicts with what is desired, but it is not suffering. We accept the pain despite the fact that it is not desired, for the sake of achieving our goals. It is when the pain is apprehended as unacceptable that it is called suffering. This might occur if the goal begins to appear unobtainable, the pain would become unacceptable.

You can make an accurate predictive model of the inanimate movement, but you cannot do that with a living being, because you will never know all the variables, and never know how the variables might influence the being's movement. Sure you can make some extremely simple models like Pavlov, but that's very basic. You can make a model to predict how the ball will move when thrown, but you cannot make an accurate model to predict how the dog will move when you let the dog out the door. — Metaphysician Undercover

But in building a model of suffering we are not attempting to predict how people are going to move!

We aren't even attempting to predict whether people are going to suffer at location X and time T, that's not the variables we are interested in.

When you model the motion of a ball you attempt to find the variables that act on the motion of the ball and how they act on it.

When you model suffering you attempt to find the variables that act on suffering and how they act on it. If the variables are say desire, perception and belief, then you're not predicting when someone is going to desire, perceive or believe such or such thing, but if you know what the person desires/perceives/believes and the model is any good then you can tell whether the person is suffering.

Basically, building a model of suffering is finding the variables X1, X2, ..., Xn that act on suffering then expressing suffering as a function of these variables. Here the variables are not numbers, so we won't use the usual mathematical operators on them and the function of the model won't look like a usual mathematical equation, as in a differential equation expressing a ball's motion where the variables are location and time and their values are numbers.

I think the above is important to point out and I don't want to make this comment too big, so I'm going to address your other points in a separate comment.

Let's say you want some specific thing you have never had, but you can't seem to get it and you suffer as a result. There is no physical pain nor loss involved. There is not necessarily humiliation involved. But there is suffering. — leo

This is an experience of lack, which I did mention in my original post in tandem with loss. Lack is a more accurate and inclusive description of the experience, but loss seems to make more sense to people when we talk about suffering. This is also the case with humility, which is an inclusive description of the experience for which humiliation is more often considered suffering.

I can believe I deserve something and not suffer if I don't have it. I can believe I deserve something, but if I don't care whether I have it or not then I don't suffer if I don't have it. I will care if I want that thing and I don't have it though, desire has to be involved. — leo

I have not argued against the significance of desire in a model of suffering, nor have I argued against the significance of belief. But to say that suffering is simply a conflict between desire and perception/belief is to reduce a multi-dimensional experience to only two dimensions of awareness. If you want to make a more accurate model of suffering than what we currently have, it won’t help you to disregard or dispute the significance of the other dimensions to the experience, despite how much easier it then becomes to illustrate.

Suffering is a conflict between desire, belief/perception, and direct experience. It occurs when the way we want to move in the world, the way we think about and understand the world (including but not confined to our beliefs), and the information we receive through our senses, are in conflict.

So when you want some specific thing you have never had, but you can’t seem to get it, it is not just a conflict between desire and perception/belief that leads to suffering. You might reword this experience to say that there is a conflict between desire for that specific thing and the belief that you can’t get it, but it’s more complicated than that. For suffering to occur, there must be a conflict between desire for that specific thing, the belief/knowledge/perception that you can or should be able to get it (that getting it is a normal or expected part of life’s experiences), and the direct experience of not getting it. This is where lack becomes suffering.

If you desire something, believe you should get, and experience getting it instead of not getting it, there is no suffering.

If you desire something, experience not getting it, but don’t believe you should get it, there is no suffering (eg. a gold medal).

If you don’t get something that you believe is a normal part of life’s experiences, yet you don’t want it, there is no suffering (eg romantic love).

In my view, it is how we think about and interact with pain, loss/lack and humility/humiliation in the world that should be explored if we want to reduce suffering. Also, we should take a close look at some of the concepts that contribute to suffering, to see if the way we think about and interact with them are part of the problem.

Why do we believe that romantic love, for instance, is something everyone should experience? What is it about the concept of romantic love that makes it desirable? What is it about the concept or the way we understand it that makes it only available to some people? Given that we cannot control what we desire, and we cannot control what we experience, can we adjust the way we think about and understand the what - the relationship between what we desire and what we experience - so as to reduce the conflict between desire, belief and direct experience, and thereby reduce suffering?

When I feel pain, and suffer, the pain and the suffering are one and the same. I know that you've already said that people can have pain without suffering, and I accept this, but that just means that not all pain is suffering. So pain is the wider category in this way of using the terms, not all pain qualifies as suffering, but all suffering might qualify as pain. Therefore you do not have the principles to say that the suffering is something different from the pain, as something caused by the pain, or the result of the pain. — Metaphysician Undercover

There can be pain without suffering, and there can be suffering without pain, so the two are not the same thing, nor is suffering a subset of pain, nor is pain a subset of suffering.

You say that all suffering might qualify as pain but I don't agree. By pain we usually refer to the sensation of physical pain. When you suffer from the death of a loved one, that suffering is very different from the sensation of physical pain. It might however be somewhat similar to the suffering you may experience while you endure a strong physical pain, as in it is an experience you want to stop but you don't know how to stop.

So I don't see how we could see the sensation of physical pain and suffering as the same thing. They are distinct. Even though sometimes we do feel physical pain and suffering at the same time.

Now I agree that we can't say with absolute certainty that when we feel physical pain and suffering at the same time, that the suffering is a consequence of the pain. At that point it depends on the model of suffering we build.

However if we tentatively consider the model that suffering is a conflict between what is desired and what is perceived/believed, I find that it fits nicely to view physical pain as a perception and the desire to not perceive it as what gives rise to suffering from physical pain. It's a principle that can't be proven, but if it is a principle that allows to build a simple model that works then it can be useful to tentatively consider it and explore its consequences. Like the principles at the basis of physical theories can't be proven, but if they allow to build a simple and coherent model then they are useful.

Let's continue to consider why some pain would qualify as suffering and some would not. We carry out many activities knowing that there is a high probability of some pain, but we do them anyway, assuming that the pain will not be suffering. So there is a saying "no pain no gain", in cases like athletics, where training and conditioning requires some pain. We submit to pain for the long term goal, and that pain is not suffering. Why is it not suffering? Because of the attitude, that pain is necessary for some good. But such individuals may live on the borderline of suffering. What if it starts to appear like they are not making progress toward their goals, or that they are incapable of obtaining such goals? Then the pain might begin to appear as suffering.

Do you agree that what distinguishes "suffering" from "pain" is one's attitude, one's mental approach to the pain? When the pain is approached with a defeatist's attitude, it is apprehended as suffering, something which cannot be overcome. But when it is approached with the attitude that it must be overcome, and I must continue to get on with my activities, then it is not suffering, it is just pain. — Metaphysician Undercover

Indeed, the experience of physical pain is not always suffering. These individuals do experience a sensation of physical pain, but meanwhile they are not suffering, showing that pain and suffering are not the same thing.

I agree that pain alone doesn't lead to suffering, other ingredients are required.

What is it that is different between the individual who apprehends pain as something which cannot be overcome, and the individual who apprehends pain as something which can be overcome? Belief. What you refer to as one's attitude or mental approach is in this example one's belief. Depending on what is believed, a given perception may give rise to suffering or not.

What is it that is different between the individual who apprehends pain as something serving no purpose, and the individual who apprehends pain as something leading to something better? Desire. If there is a desire to endure the pain in order to get a stronger body, that pain is not suffering. If there is no such desire then the focus is on the desire to not experience the pain, and that pain is then suffering.

Again, desire and belief are involved in whether a perception of pain is suffering or not. Which still fits in the model that suffering results from an interplay between desire, perception and belief.

So there is always a conflict between what is desired, and what is experienced, because achieving our goals takes work, effort, and there is pain (which is not desired) that is involved with this. The pain is unwanted, so it really conflicts with what is desired, but it is not suffering. We accept the pain despite the fact that it is not desired, for the sake of achieving our goals. It is when the pain is apprehended as unacceptable that it is called suffering. This might occur if the goal begins to appear unobtainable, the pain would become unacceptable. — Metaphysician Undercover

I don't agree that there is always a conflict between what is desired and what is experienced.

If you desire something but you don't have it, and you focus on the fact you don't have it, you focus on the conflict and you suffer.

However, if you desire something and you believe you can get it, you don't focus on the fact you don't have it. The belief changes the experience, the experience is not the same because the focus is not the same. You focus on the goal you desire, you visualize it, and this desire is stronger than the desire to avoid the perceived pain. There is a difference between what is desired and what is experienced, but it is not a conflict. A difference is not always a conflict.

But I agree it should be possible to come up with a better formulation than "suffering is a conflict between what is desired and what is experienced/believed", that is more precise and less prone to misinterpretations.

But in building a model of suffering we are not attempting to predict how people are going to move! — leo

You seem to be moving toward associating suffering with thought. Thought is mental activity. Mental activity is a movement. So really, I think that trying to model suffering is trying to model how people move. Don't get me wrong, I am not saying that it is completely impossible to produce any such model, but I am saying that any such model will inevitably be very simple and basic, most general. I think there has been some success in modeling the way that people move, in the field of morals and ethics.

There can be pain without suffering, and there can be suffering without pain, so the two are not the same thing, nor is suffering a subset of pain, nor is pain a subset of suffering.

You say that all suffering might qualify as pain but I don't agree. By pain we usually refer to the sensation of physical pain. When you suffer from the death of a loved one, that suffering is very different from the sensation of physical pain. It might however be somewhat similar to the suffering you may experience while you endure a strong physical pain, as in it is an experience you want to stop but you don't know how to stop. — leo

I don't see how there can be suffering without pain. All you are doing here is dividing pain into subsets, and trying to claim that the type of pain which one feels at the death of a loved one is not pain, because it's not a "physical pain". Not all pains are physical. So I don't see that this sort of division and exclusion is useful. Since suffering may coincide with either physical pain or emotional pain, it makes no sense to exclude emotional pain, from the category of pain, claiming that it is not a sort of pain.

Do you agree that we can experience all sorts of pain, physical emotional, or whatever, without suffering, and also that suffering can come along with any sort of pain and is always associated with pain? If so, then it doesn't make sense to separate suffering from pain. And if you insist on such a separation, then the onus is on you to demonstrate what sort of suffering there could be which does not involve pain. Surely when one suffers as the result of losing a loved one to death, there is pain involved. If there were no pain, then how could you call it suffering?

Now I agree that we can't say with absolute certainty that when we feel physical pain and suffering at the same time, that the suffering is a consequence of the pain. At that point it depends on the model of suffering we build. — leo

Isn't the goal to build the correct model though, not just any model? If so, we ought to determine whether the suffering is separable from the pain, as a result or effect of it (as you implied), or whether it inheres within the pain. We do have pain without suffering, we agree on that, so suffering does not inhere within all sorts of pain, but there may be some types of pain which do not occur without suffering. So for example, if we distinguish physical pain from emotional pain, it may be the case that emotional pain is always suffering, as suffering may be inherent within it. If that were the case, then whenever there is emotional pain, there is suffering. If this is the case, then whenever there is suffering which occurs with physical pain, it may be that the suffering is an emotional pain which is coincidental, or even caused by, the physical pain.

What is it that is different between the individual who apprehends pain as something which cannot be overcome, and the individual who apprehends pain as something which can be overcome? Belief. What you refer to as one's attitude or mental approach is in this example one's belief. Depending on what is believed, a given perception may give rise to suffering or not. — leo

Here, you are saying that suffering is the result of a particular belief. This may be the case, but if it is true, then the suffering is caused by the belief, not by the pain. The problem though is that you have reduced "attitude" to "belief", and I don't think that this is acceptable. A person's attitude is one's disposition toward thinking, and one's beliefs are the thoughts which have been formed by such thinking. So an attitude is prior to, and necessary for, the formation of beliefs, as a sort of cause of different types of beliefs according to different attitudes.

Now the suffering may be associated with particular beliefs, as coincidental with them, but it cannot be attributed to the beliefs if it is derived from the attitude, which is the way of thinking, the way that one forms beliefs. If this is the case, then the suffering would be a painful way of thinking, and not necessarily associated with any particular belief. I think it is important to bear this in mind because belief requires judgement. A person thinks, in the effort to resolve problems etc., and when it appears that the problem is solved, this judgement is made, then one no longer needs to consider the problem, as a belief concerning the resolution of that problem has been formed. In some cases suffering may be associated with the inability to make the judgement, the individual is held in suspense. Therefore we ought to associate the suffering with the way of thinking (attitude) rather than with the belief (which is the result of the way of thinking.

What is it that is different between the individual who apprehends pain as something serving no purpose, and the individual who apprehends pain as something leading to something better? Desire. If there is a desire to endure the pain in order to get a stronger body, that pain is not suffering. If there is no such desire then the focus is on the desire to not experience the pain, and that pain is then suffering. — leo

The point which I was trying to make, and I ought to stress, is that the pain is completely separate from the desire. The pain itself is neither desired nor not desired. What is desired is the stronger body. The pain is something which just happens to coincide with achieving that goal. A specific activity is required to achieve the desired end, and some pain happens to be associated with that activity. We do not "desire to endure the pain", nor does pain serve a purpose. We desire the stronger body, and therefore the activities required for that, and the pain happens to come along with those activities, so it is endured. The activities serve the purpose and the pain is a by-product, the pain does not serve the purpose. We now have a perspective of pain which is completely disassociated with desire. Pain is neither something which is desired, nor is it something which we desire to avoid, it is just something which happens to be there.

I don't agree that there is always a conflict between what is desired and what is experienced.

If you desire something but you don't have it, and you focus on the fact you don't have it, you focus on the conflict and you suffer.

However, if you desire something and you believe you can get it, you don't focus on the fact you don't have it. The belief changes the experience, the experience is not the same because the focus is not the same. You focus on the goal you desire, you visualize it, and this desire is stronger than the desire to avoid the perceived pain. There is a difference between what is desired and what is experienced, but it is not a conflict. A difference is not always a conflict.

But I agree it should be possible to come up with a better formulation than "suffering is a conflict between what is desired and what is experienced/believed", that is more precise and less prone to misinterpretations. — leo

You describe suffering here as a mental anguish. Notice how what you describe are ways of thinking, attitudes. One way of thinking is to focus on the goal, what is desired, and act to obtain that goal. The other way is to focus on the fact that you do not have what you want. The latter, you say, is associated with suffering. This may be one example of a way of thinking (attitude) which is associated with suffering, but I belief there are many others, perhaps you could identify some others. .

This is an experience of lack, which I did mention in my original post in tandem with loss. Lack is a more accurate and inclusive description of the experience, but loss seems to make more sense to people when we talk about suffering. This is also the case with humility, which is an inclusive description of the experience for which humiliation is more often considered suffering. — Possibility

But the experience of lack of suffering is also an experience of lack, yet it is not suffering. And the experience of the lack of something unwanted is usually not suffering.

Meanwhile the experience of presence of suffering is suffering, and the experience of the presence of something unwanted can be suffering.

We could say that experiences of lack can lead to suffering, and experiences of presence can lead to suffering, but any experience can be formulated as lacking something or as having something, so we can't say that a lack or presence indicate in themselves suffering over anything else.

Basically, lack or presence in themselves are not variables that act on suffering. It is the lack or the presence of something that can act on suffering, and what we are looking for are the something.


The presence of an experience of humility can be suffering (when it is unwanted), and the lack of an experience of humility can be suffering (when it is wanted). So it is not the presence or lack of an experience of humility in itself that acts on suffering, it is the interplay between the experience and whether it is desired or not. But this is the case with any experience and not just that of humility, so in my view there is no reason to single out humility or loss or any other as acting on suffering, it seems to me there always needs to be an interaction between an experience and a desire. And that to me is the kind of something we are looking for, that can give rise to suffering when it is present but not when it is absent.


I am running out of time here, I'm going to be away for one week, I will continue replying when I get back. Thank you for the conversations. Cheers.

But the experience of lack of suffering is also an experience of lack, yet it is not suffering. And the experience of the lack of something unwanted is usually not suffering.

Meanwhile the experience of presence of suffering is suffering, and the experience of the presence of something unwanted can be suffering.

We could say that experiences of lack can lead to suffering, and experiences of presence can lead to suffering, but any experience can be formulated as lacking something or as having something, so we can't say that a lack or presence indicate in themselves suffering over anything else.

Basically, lack or presence in themselves are not variables that act on suffering. It is the lack or the presence of something that can act on suffering, and what we are looking for are the something. — leo

This is why I initially use the experience of ‘loss’ in relation to suffering - because people feel compelled by reason to attribute an experience of lack TO something that is missing. But lack here refers to an experience of incompleteness, rather than the lack of a specific thing. The attribution of lack to a missing thing or experience is simply a justification for the experience of lack itself.

Like experiences of pain, experiences of lack and loss are essential to the process of life. From a single-celled creature to a human being, each living organism must continually part with elements of itself (loss), and is also continually compelled to incorporate elements of the environment into itself (lack). Without this process, there is no life. We are dissipative structures, maintaining a status of non-equilibrium that motivates us to increase entropy: to consume our environment and dispel waste.

When we experience lack, we don’t tend to accept the experience as a normal part of living. We feel hungry because the body must continually process nutrition and energy in order to live. But we don’t believe anyone should have to suffer from a lack of nutrition or energy, and so we tend to over-eat and consume high energy foods to avoid an experience of lack. We see food that we desire, and even though we’ve had enough to eat, we ‘reason’ that because the body expresses desire for that food item, the general feeling of lack we experience as living beings could be satiated by incorporating this particular element of the environment into ourselves.

We don’t like to think of ourselves as incomplete, as lacking anything - and yet that is what it means to live.

I think it’s important to understand that pain, loss/lack and humility/humiliation are the experiences where suffering occurs, and that these experiences themselves are an essential part of living. But they are not the same as suffering, even though it sometimes feels that way. I think we are all agreed that these experiences can and do occur without suffering, but that where there is suffering, at least one of these experiences is also occurring.

But can we also agree that there is a situation in the mind where an experience of pain, loss/lack and/or humility/humiliation is perceived as unacceptable for whatever reason - and it is beyond this indistinct point that suffering occurs?

Where that point is for us depends on our awareness of, beliefs about, and subsequent perception or evaluation of, the complex relationships at play within the multi-dimensional experience in question. It is then different not only for each person, but also each experience, and is subject to change as our relationships with everything in the world change.

Desire is an important factor, but it is our relationship with this desire that leads us to evaluate whether the experience is unacceptable, and therefore suffering. One may desire to be rid of financial stress and also rid of chronic back pain, but instead continue to experience both. In most cases, they would ‘suffer’ more from the second than the first.

One reason for this may be that they can more readily share their experience of financial stress with others, but not their back pain. This relates not just to the fact that bank statements cannot be questioned as much as internal pain, but also to the common experience of financial stress at varying levels, and the capacity for others to ease one’s financial stress to some extent.

Chronic back pain, on the other hand, can be ignored, dismissed or forgotten by those around us, who then refuse or reject our attempts to share our experience with them. We don’t want to hear about someone’s back pain when we can do nothing to relieve it. They tend to ‘suffer’ because the pain is theirs to bear alone - it isolates them.

I think it’s important to understand that pain, loss/lack and humility/humiliation are the experiences where suffering occurs

where there is suffering, at least one of these experiences is also occurring. — Possibility

But do you agree that there cannot be an experience of lack or loss without a desire for what is perceived to be lacked or lost? This makes desire a more fundamental factor in suffering.

Also one problem is that where there is suffering there can always be said to be an experience of lack: the lack of the absence of suffering. So 'lack' in itself doesn't tell us anything as to why people suffer, by construction any experience of suffering can be reframed as a lack (by definition suffering is an unwanted experience, and in an unwanted experience there is the lack of the cessation of that experience).

(I'll be back next week)

But do you agree that there cannot be an experience of lack or loss without a desire for what is perceived to be lacked or lost? This makes desire a more fundamental factor in suffering. — leo

No. You can experience lack without a desire for what is perceived to be lacking. I experience a lack of height every time I walk around in public, but I have no desire for more height. If you’re saying that you cannot suffer from lack without a desire for what is perceived to be lacking, then I agree - but this does not make desire a more fundamental factor in suffering.

Something to think about for next week: one problem is that where there is suffering there can always be said to be desire: a desire for the absence of suffering. So ‘desire’ in itself doesn’t tell us anything as to why people suffer, by construction any experience of suffering can be reframed as desire (by definition suffering is an unwanted experience, and in an unwanted experience there is a desire for the cessation of that experience).

If we agree to define suffering as "an experience that we want to stop", desire is part of the definition so it doesn't tell us why people suffer, if we know that someone desires something we have no idea whether that person suffers or not.

However, by definition suffering depends on what we want (desire) and what we experience. The fact that someone desires something doesn't tell us why they suffer, however what they desire is a factor. There is a fundamental distinction.

The presence of desire doesn't tell us anything, however what is desired does. The presence of lack doesn't tell us anything, however what is lacked might. But we don't care about the things we lack that we don't want, we care about the ones we desire, so again we're led back to what is desired.

By definition what is desired and what is experienced are fundamental factors in suffering. Then it's a matter of finding how experiences that we want to stop come about, and how to make them stop.

Let's take again the example of the young man who wants to find a woman. He suffers when he experiences the thought that he can't find one. How to make that experience stop? Either help him find a woman, or help him believe that he is going to find a woman, or help him stop wanting to find a woman. Isn't that what would address the root factors in his suffering? Isn't that more useful than drugging him because he's depressed because he can't find a woman?

Now if the reason he can't find a woman is because he's too stressed around them, and we give him a drug that helps him stop being stressed, then we're indirectly helping him to find a woman, and fundamentally that's what helps him stop suffering, not the drug in itself. The drug was a tool in this particular case, but coaching him could have worked too.

Notice how different that approach is compared to the psychiatric dogma that in principle any suffering can be reduced or stopped with the right drug, with all the research spent on studying the effects of drugs on the brain, it all seems like such an inefficient venture primarily aimed at enriching the pharmaceutical industry. And notice the terrible conflict of interest: the more people suffer, and the longer they suffer, the more money the industry makes, so they have the strong incentive to provide illusions of solutions and let people continue suffering. Providing real solutions would mean treating less people for smaller periods of time, so much less revenue.

And of course mental health professionals want to help people, but to become professionals they had to be trained to accept and apply the dogmas of the profession, which have been influenced by the research grants provided by the pharmaceutical industry, so they're doing their best within these dogmas, but these perpetuate suffering and help little. I see this as one of the biggest scandals of our time.

Mental health professionals think about this topic far more than we do (assuming the majority of people in this thread are, like me, 'enthusiastic amateurs'.) One might define suffering as 'insult, injury, or psychological harm forced on an individual against their will', so it is recommended (as a first step in combating suffering) to avoid causing even more.

When someone is in a state where they suffer (or are at risk of suffering), it is up to them ultimately to find peace of mind if they can. The best anyone else can do is to try to create structure that helps them achieve this. That is precisely what mental health professionals are trained to do, and I worry that 'enthusiastic amateurs' would most likely cause far more harm than good (as evidenced by the current opioid crisis in the U.S..) This is not to say that certifiably concerned third parties (family, friends, loved ones, etc.) cannot provide a commensurate level of psychological support.

I (choose to) believe that something good can come from this discussion.

leo, it sounds to me that your concern stems from the same root as that which likely motivated mental health workers to enter their discipline. We should be grateful that people who chose to specialize in a mental health related profession have honed their interests over many years. An 'enthusiastic amateur' might develop moments of strong empathy for people who suffer from mental illness, but usually those moments are unpredictable and unreliable. Often, enthusiastic amateurs do more harm than good (this should be self-evident) unless there is sufficiently good reason to believe they can sustain their empathy long enough to help. The reason enthusiastic amateurs often fail is that many people instinctively seek reciprocation or compensation for help that they give, whether or not it was requested. It takes many years for Christians to cultivate a spirit of selfless generosity (the coin from a beggar is (in time) worth more than riches from a King. Also, to follow Jesus is to risk exposing profound injustices, which often involves a large amount of suffering. It's unfortunate when these injustices exist, but exposure is the first step toward eventually resolving and fixing them.)

I (choose to) believe that something good can come from this discussion. — Couchyam

Me too, otherwise I wouldn't bother.

We should be grateful that people who chose to specialize in a mental health related profession have honed their interests over many years. An 'enthusiastic amateur' might develop moments of strong empathy for people who suffer from mental illness, but usually those moments are unpredictable and unreliable. Often, enthusiastic amateurs do more harm than good (this should be self-evident) unless there is sufficiently good reason to believe they can sustain their empathy long enough to help. The reason enthusiastic amateurs often fail is that many people instinctively seek reciprocation or compensation for help that they give, whether or not it was requested. — Couchyam

If you consider that enthusiastic amateurs often fail because they often seek compensation for help that they give, consider that mental health professionals always expect compensation for help that they give.

There is the widespread tendency to see scientific authorities as priests spreading gospel that we have to blindly believe in, as if they were endowed with divine abilities that made their ideas and reasonings inscrutable to the common man. I grew out of that a long time ago. When you look deep into the reasonings and assumptions, you can see the flaws. Blind belief is not warranted.

There are plenty of historical examples where scientific authorities were eventually shown to be wrong, by individuals whose ideas were rejected by these authorities and their community of followers, yet it is still taboo to dare question the ideas and practices of scientific authorities.

Mental health professionals, amateurs, philosophers, individuals who suffer, are all human beings. They are not right or wrong by virtue of who they are or their title, they are right or wrong by virtue of what they say and do, and it should not be taboo to critically analyse the ideas and practices of some individuals, as if we couldn't possibly understand what it is they do and why they do it. Blind belief in the authority does a lot more harm than good.

I agree with your indictment of the pharmaceutical industry, and the educational, financial and even patient pressure on mental health professionals to treat drugs as a ‘solution’ to suffering, when at best it masks the symptoms of a much deeper issue.

But your definition of suffering as simply ‘an experience we want to stop’ is, in my view, insufficient as a starting point to reducing instances of suffering.

I understand that you’re argument is not to just treat the symptoms of suffering (with drugs), but to look deeper and help the person understand why they are suffering and then help them to ‘correct’ or ‘stop’ the experience itself. I agree with the deeper shift in focus - it IS more useful and despite the pressure it IS being practiced by some professionals, but it’s still only an intermediate measure. I’m saying we need to look even deeper again, and help the person to understand what contributes not to the situation, but to their unique subjective experience that they want to stop.

This is more than helping someone stop the unwanted situation of ‘not getting what I want’. In your example of a young man who wants to ‘find a woman’, there is the objective situation of the young man not being in a relationship or not ‘finding a woman’, and there is his subjective experience of not ‘finding a woman’ informed by the perception of ‘finding a woman’ as a) desired, b) deserved and c) necessary: which amounts to his experience of suffering.

What contributes to the situation of not being in a relationship would include the stress he may feel around women. We could give him a drug or coaching that stops him feeling stressed, which may help increase his confidence interacting with women - but if he continues to ‘strike out’ or subsequent relationships go south, then it’s likely his suffering would be intensified rather than reduced. We haven’t solved the problem - we’ve only masked the symptoms at a deeper level. The lengthy process and unreliable effectiveness of these intermediate measures, and the distress this causes their patients (not to mention waning confidence in such treatment) only encourages professionals to fall back on pharmaceuticals to help their patients ‘get on with life’ in the short term - like painkillers to cover up chronic pain that doctors don’t know how to fix.

By prescribing a drug or even coaching as the indirect ‘solution’ to his suffering, we actually validate the young man’s belief that ‘finding a woman’ is desired, deserved and necessary, and that the objective situation of his not being in a relationship is the cause of his suffering.

But this is not the case. The cause of his suffering is not the situation itself, but rather the way that he personally (with his worldview, values and belief systems) experiences or relates to the situation of not ‘finding a woman’. Because it is possible (and even normal or healthy) to experience not being in a relationship without suffering.

The situation of not being in a relationship is one we will probably all experience at some stage for various reasons, whether we want to or not. Despite our best efforts we cannot guarantee avoiding it, and if it happens to us, then we have no choice but to experience it in that moment. We don’t necessarily have to suffer as a result, though.

Reducing the experience of suffering involves understanding our relationship with and between what we desire, what we deserve and what we deem necessary in life, and questioning the assumptions, values and beliefs that govern them.

We can reduce suffering by helping to question the assumption that ‘finding a woman’ is a necessary situation for any ‘normal’ young man - by a certain age, for instance. The expectations placed on young men from society, media, from family and friends, etc. can be critically examined and seen as unnecessary pressure that contributes to suffering.

We can also question the assumption that being in a relationship is a right that is earned by behaviour, words or even by thoughts. One doesn’t deserve to find a woman simply because he displays the right attitude, because he says the right things or even because he treats women a certain way. Applying the concept of ‘reward for effort’ to the experience of ‘finding a woman’ sets up incongruent expectations which contribute to suffering.

But we can even question the assumption that being in a relationship is actually what is desired. What does it mean to this young man to ‘find a woman’? Is it an initial sexual experience, a regular sexual partner, romance, marriage, family, someone who looks at him a certain way, someone to take care of him; or is it the experience of feeling like a ‘normal’ male, of having his parents stop fussing, of having someone to come home to...? Equating what is individually and honestly desired with the perceived experience of ‘finding a woman’ can also contribute to suffering.

‘Not finding a woman’ is a situation we cannot hope to eliminate from human experience. The suffering that is associated with this experience, however, I believe we can reduce: by increasing awareness and understanding of what we desire, what we deserve and what is necessary in life.

Interesting comments, thanks.

I agree that defining suffering as "an experience we want to stop" is very general, but isn't it precisely what suffering is? A feeling that we want to not feel.

We can agree that not all young men want to find a woman, and that not all young men who don't find a woman suffer. This shows again that it is not a situation in itself ("not finding a woman") that causes suffering, it is an interaction between the person and the situation.

And I agree that what we think we want is not always what we really want. Say the young man is not attracted to women, but he is pressured by his social environment to find a woman. He may come to think that he needs to find a woman, to say that he wants to find a woman, but what he really wants is to fit in his social environment, to be accepted by his family and peers. Now when he finally finds a woman his suffering related to not being accepted may cease, but if he is attracted to men he may suffer from not being with a man.

So indeed, sometimes we may have conflicting desires, we have plenty of desires, life is not so simple as having one desire at a time. But if we acknowledge that suffering results from an interaction between what we desire and what we experience, then we have a framework that can guide us to find the source of a person's suffering and help relieve it: What does the person really want, that is in conflict with what they experience, and how can we best untie their knot to make their experience of life closer to the life they want?

On the example of the young man again, if he wants to find a woman and that's what he really wants deep down (he wants the whole thing, the intimacy, the romance, the life partner, the family), and he suffers because he can't find one, succeeding in helping him find one would relieve this particular suffering. Then if the relationship doesn't work out, and he finds another woman and things go south again, and again, and again, then the source of his suffering is not that he can't find a woman but that he can't keep a relationship with one. And then we would have to look deeper as to what happens that prevents him from maintaining a durable relationship, by looking at what makes a relationship work and what doesn't work in his case.

And indeed drugs can sometimes be a tool in some situations, but that's how they should be looked at, one tool out of many to use in a philosophical framework with solid foundations to help relieve suffering, not the postulated be-all and end-all solution pushed by the pharmaceutical industry with the belief that it's just a matter of finding the right drug.

But if we acknowledge that suffering results from an interaction between what we desire and what we experience, then we have a framework that can guide us to find the source of a person's suffering and help relieve it: What does the person really want, that is in conflict with what they experience, and how can we best untie their knot to make their experience of life closer to the life they want? — leo

You’re still assuming that ‘the life they want’ is also what they deserve and what is necessary. If the young man wants ‘the whole thing, the intimacy, the romance, the life partner, the family’, then helping him ‘find a woman’ only to have the relationship (and subsequent relationships) fall apart is as effective as giving him drugs to treat his depression. To then say that his suffering has a new and different source that requires a new diagnosis and remedy is to commit the same error as the professionals who support the pharmaceutical industry by pushing their ‘be-all and end-all solution’ - only at a deeper level.

You’re still creating a dependency on external ‘help’ (ie. drugs, coaching) to attain superficial experiences (ie. finding a woman or keeping a relationship) which appear to relieve his suffering, but only temporarily take his mind off what he really wants (‘the whole thing’). Plus, you’re perpetuating the assumption that what he desires is both necessary and what he deserves: that it’s what he should have. Relieving his suffering is then seen as just a matter of finding the right way to make his experience of life mould to his desire, rather than critically examining the relationships with both his experiences of life and his desires.

I get that you want to make it simpler, but relieving suffering is never going to be simple. Suffering may seem to be ‘a feeling that we want to not feel’, but that’s only a surface explanation of a much more complicated web of interconnection. If you really want to untie their knot, you have to understand why what they want is in conflict with what they experience without assuming the life they want should be the objective.

We disagree in appearance on the semantics but fundamentally I don't think we disagree.

As I said if suffering stems from a conflict between what is desired and what is experienced, then one way to relieve this conflict is to help the individual get what they want, but another way is to help them stop wanting that thing, and this latter way seems to address the issue you raise.

What is seen as "deserved" or "necessary" is a subjective interpretation made by the individual. If they want something, but they think they don't "deserve" it, then they are ok with not pursuing that undeserved desire. If they want something, but they think it is not "necessary", then they are ok with not pursuing that unnecessary desire. In both cases, they give up on their desire, or they push it into the background, and this relieves the conflict.

On the example of a young man, who wants a woman to love and to love him back and to start a family with, and who suffers because he can't find one, then helping him find one is the more obvious remedy, rather than making him think that he is such a shitty human being he doesn't deserve one, or that he doesn't really need love or a family. Now in the process of helping him find a woman, the reasons why he couldn't find one would be explored and addressed, and if the root issues are addressed then a priori there is no reason that he would form relationships that keep falling apart, and if that turns out to be the case then that means the therapy was poor and something important was missed, the root issues weren't addressed, for instance maybe the young man was coached to fake a persona to make women attracted to him, but once in a relationship he couldn't keep it up.

A therapy that is any good would not focus narrowly on the immediate desire but would explore its consequences. Helping someone experience temporary relief only to then face a worse suffering that is harder to escape is not helping. And helping someone does not mean making them dependent on external help in the future, if they internalize whatever worked for them then they could have the tools to help themselves in the future.

On the example of a young man, who wants a woman to love and to love him back and to start a family with, and who suffers because he can't find one, then helping him find one is the more obvious remedy, rather than making him think that he is such a shitty human being he doesn't deserve one, or that he doesn't really need love or a family. — leo

This is where I think we differ, because when I talk about questioning the assumption that he deserves to have a woman who loves him and wants to start a family with him, I’m not suggesting we convince him that he is such a shitty human being he doesn’t deserve one. What I’m suggesting is the whole assumption that ANYONE even deserves a romantic relationship and should therefore expect to get one is false. The belief that IF ONLY he could become more confident around women, more attractive, more generous, accommodating, genuine, etc then he would be able to find love and start a family actually contributes to, more than it relieves, suffering.

The Collins online definition of ‘deserve’ states “if you say that a person or thing deserves something, you mean that they should have it or receive it because of their actions or qualities”.

It seems to me you believe all non-shitty young men deserve to find love and to start a family, and I don’t think you’re alone in this belief at all. But should they then fully expect to have this experience (say, by a certain age) or else assume some sort of deficiency? And does this mean that all those shitty men who have a woman who loves them and a family have somehow managed to get what they don’t deserve? Have they duped these women, thereby denying the ‘more deserving’ young men of their ‘rightful’ experience? I think this kind of thinking contributes not only to undue suffering by young men, but also to ‘incel’ groups and violence against women.

I disagree with the assumption that a young man SHOULD expect to have or find a romantic life partner BECAUSE of his actions or qualities. I don’t mean to say that they DON’T deserve this experience. Nor do I disagree that certain actions or qualities may endear him to women statistically speaking. But there is no magic combination of actions and qualities in a young man that would ENTAIL this experience - and for a therapy or professional to claim to have ‘the answer’ contributes significantly to suffering.

Now in the process of helping him find a woman, the reasons why he couldn't find one would be explored and addressed, and if the root issues are addressed then a priori there is no reason that he would form relationships that keep falling apart, and if that turns out to be the case then that means the therapy was poor and something important was missed, the root issues weren't addressed, for instance maybe the young man was coached to fake a persona to make women attracted to him, but once in a relationship he couldn't keep it up. — leo

I get the impression you see relieving suffering as a matter of gaining control over the situation. In my view it’s important to come to terms with the reality that the situation can never be fully controlled, even with help from professionals. It is only how I personally understand and interact with the situation that I can hope to control - not the situation itself, not other people’s decisions or how they respond to the situation.

It is theoretically possible for a man to have zero faults and still experience ‘not finding a woman’. This is not a travesty - it’s life.

I think if we’re going to relieve suffering then we need to learn to accept and function within situations we cannot control - to control ourselves in an uncontrollable situation. When people seek help to relieve their suffering, we should be helping them to understand the situation and control their response to it, not helping them try to control the situation, or trying to control it for them. I believe this is as true for lonely young men as it is for starving families in Africa.

To me, "deserve" and "should" are not part of the equation, they do not enter my thinking on this subject. There is not some absolute standard that allows us to say what someone deserves or should have in an absolute sense. If you say someone deserves something, or should have something, you fundamentally say that you want them to have that thing, but how do you decide who gets to have it and who gets not to? In thinking about what you believe one deserves, you're putting your subjective moral judgement first, and the well-being of the individual you're trying to help second. But if the goal at stake is to help someone suffer less, then surely our own subjective moral judgements on what the person deserves or not have no place at all?

I have no opinion on whether a given person deserves something or not, here I am just focused on helping the person suffer less. If the path to happiness for that person is to find a woman to love him and start a family with, who am I to judge whether I think he deserves that or not?

And in my view most young men do not want a woman to love them and to start a family with because society expects them to, but because that's what they want deep down, because of the same drive that keeps life itself going and that has kept life going for millions of years.

And I believe that in principle any young man could find a woman to love him. It may be much harder for some than for others, it may require much more effort for some than for others, but there is a lot that can be done to help. Not all could necessarily be helped to be with the woman of their dreams, as there is competition, but there are a lot of women out there looking for a young man to love them and start a family with. It doesn't take a perfect match to have a relationship that works, there mostly needs to be some common ground and attraction and good will on both sides.

If the man happens to have expectations that makes it nearly impossible to find a good fit, then the help could be focused on changing these expectations.

If the man believes that he has "zero faults", then maybe that's one of the reasons he has trouble finding a woman, because that likely means he is unwilling to change in any way and expects women to adapt completely to him, while it is much easier for a relationship to work out if both sides give some leeway.


As to "gaining control", if we help someone to get what they want then obviously we have helped them to gain control over their life. If we help them to change their expectations or their reaction to a situation then we're still helping them to gain control over their life. It is precisely control over ourselves and our surroundings that keeps us alive. Both gaining control over a situation and over ourselves (our desires, expectations, reactions, beliefs) can help relieve suffering.

I have no opinion on whether a given person deserves something or not, here I am just focused on helping the person suffer less. If the path to happiness for that person is to find a woman to love him and start a family with, who am I to judge whether I think he deserves that or not? — leo

You misunderstand me. It isn’t for me to judge - it’s for him to question. If your focus is only on helping the person suffer less, regardless of whether what he wants is ultimately beneficial for him, for society or for the people around him, then you might succeed in relieving HIS suffering, but what if doing so causes someone else to suffer? I’m not suggesting you have an opinion, but you’re certainly not getting to the root of suffering with such a narrow focus.

If you’re aiming to relieve suffering one person at a time, then I guess you’ll always have a job this way. I was under the impression you wanted to relieve suffering in general, but I’m starting to see that I was mistaken.

As to "gaining control", if we help someone to get what they want then obviously we have helped them to gain control over their life. If we help them to change their expectations or their reaction to a situation then we're still helping them to gain control over their life. It is precisely control over ourselves and our surroundings that keeps us alive. Both gaining control over a situation and over ourselves (our desires, expectations, reactions, beliefs) can help relieve suffering. — leo

No. We’ve only helped them to experience an illusion of control over elements of their life. It is not control over ourselves and our surroundings that keeps us alive - it’s the relationships we develop and nurture that achieve this.