Poll: The Universe vs. Your Offspring

Some people see the universe as a stark, unfeeling "is"-ness.
Some people feel that there is some divine plan (regardless of specific spiritual framework).
Some people want to have kids.
Some people don't.

Choose your winning combination...

so "fuck you kids" basically is the result so far.

I did choose the first combination. I am not sure, if it really reflects my own beliefs, though. I think, there is a Creator (although not necessarily a 'being' or a conscious entity like a 'god'). I don’t think there is a 'plan'. I am not sure, if there is a goal. But there is a purpose …

And part of that purpose, when you break it down to every single entity in the universe, is having offspring, to love it, to care for it ... so that it grows, becomes part of a new whole ... and carries on. This offspring is not necessarily biological offspring; our ideas are 'offspring' too. Maybe there will even come a time, when biological and intellectual offspring will mix even more than is already the case with human kids. In Greg Bears 'Eon' and 'Eternity' for example, two people living in the virtual world, can have common offspring ('kids') without biological reproduction.

And yes, I wanted kids, and I was gifted with ... one.

I must apologize if I wasn't clear enough -- to me, a "purpose" and a "goal" are equivalent (ie. there is some "meaning" to events). But no worries, and best wishes for you and your family.

So, just to make it clear for future voters:

By "divine", I mean "some eventual purpose or goal for reality".

Which one do I choose if I'm FIC^H^H^Hundecided?

--Jack Lambert

i want some....some day...eventualy

But then again when i see those uncontrolable pesky kids at the super marcket i'm always thinking 'thank you god that i don't have any'

I was really on the fence about having kids because I think we live in a stark world. My husband wanted kids, though, and we decided (before we got married) that we would have at least a couple kids because we would be in a financial and emotional position to raise them in a fairly stable and productive way.

Honestly, some days I wish I had no kids, but that's mainly because of the work and worry kids entail. Some days I do sit around and wonder what the world will be like in 20 years and have I made a big mistake bringing a couple of kids onto this bizarre planet. I also have pretty much lost any faith in organized religion and I can't bring myself to reinforce those beliefs in my kids whatsoever. A common set of questions I get from my two kids now is "Who is God? [If there is no god] then who made us?" I try to be open with kids and say I don't know if there is a God, and nobody really knows for sure if there is a God; I also tell them that they are free to believe whatever they want and tell them about other religions and their practices and beliefs (Judaism, Hinduism, Shintoism, Paganism, Islam, Shamanism, etc.). (It's amazing and somewhat frightening to me how much Christian beliefs and philosophies are woven into the basic life/school/social experience of most middle-class kids in the U.S., by the way.)

I happen to be of the opinion that, though our biological makeup seems to encourage it, people shouldn't have children when they are really young. I'd recommend (from personal experience) that most people look at starting a family when they are at least in their late 20's or early 30's. There is so much that you just don't have the time or energy for once you have kids, and it's I think it's better to experience those things when you're young and unfettered.

Oh, and I have two kids, one who is four and one who is almost six years old.

Geez I hate it when my choice isn't there.

Divine Universe; been there done that

I am a passive atheist. I distinguish this from active atheists in that active atheists go out of their way to shove atheism in the face of everyone, while I simply don't care whether you believe in God, Santa, or the Tooth Fairy.
I do not believe in God, but I have the decency to be polite around those who do instead of ridiculing their beliefs.
And yeah, I want kids! LOTS OF KIDS!
Heck, my dream job would be stay-at-home-dad, but sadly, modern society requires us to waste our lives on abstract, unnatural jobs, in order to extract this fictional notion of money that we use to buy food.
Just because I don't believe the world is run by some magical entity supposedly made out of "love" does not mean I can't be a loving father and a dedicated husband.
What the hell kinda question was that?
Gene's next poll:

Second Life vs. Bananas

[] Love SL, hate bananas
[] Love SL, love bananas
[] Hate SL, hate bananas
[] Hate SL, love bananas

I want kids! I want maybe three.

And I'm with Eggy here, how did you come up with those combinations and what the heck do they have to do with each other?

I believe there is a God or a Creator, or something, or maybe a committee, or perhaps a divine bureaucracy (hell, that would explain a lot of stuff). I believe that the world is full of delights as it is, so I chose the first thingy. However, I don't see how this is related to whether I want kids or not.

-- as a sidenote, hehe, I thought that this poll would possibly be about The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, or some weird reference to the environment.

In which case, yes, it's the universe against your kids, or at least the world.

No kids for me. I like kids- in fact I used to work with them as both a preschool and elementary teacher in the mid 90s. I've just never wanted one of my own.

As for the universe- who knows?

May have to do with Genes own beliefs ... Don't know. If you read my reply, you can see that there is a relationship between these two aspects for 'some' people; even a strong relationship.

Know the feeling. Orson Scott Card wrote once (or something like): 'Once you have kids you are forever a hostage of the universe'. Worries never stop. And its quite different if you worry about yourself or your partner - or your kid. But I would not miss those worries - and my son - for the world.

Yep. Even though ... sometimes I ask myself, how I would have coped with this exhausting bundle of pure energy 15 years ago.

Personally, I think that the realization that life has no real purpose other than to spread itself just makes the act all that important. Every living creature breeds, and a good many of them even DIE immediately after breeding, because there isn't really any more to their lives than that.
We, on the other hand, are complex little critters in a world that is getting far too complex, so we need to be around for a while longer, to guide our children and their children.