View allAll Photos Tagged existential
Lotus Flower
(Homage to St. Ansel)
Yeah, I know this is just another flower shot. And you're right, it is. Black and White, Heavy Contrast, purple Selenium stained, reminiscent of Ansel Adams, in all but the background bokeh.
On the other hand, Lotus blossoms are very much at the center of the Buddhist Om Mani Padme prayer ("hail to the jewel in the Lotus") and of the Zen koan "No bud, No Lotus". It also symbolizes a hundred other interesting existential questions about the nature and need of absolutes, the existence of beauty, order and randomness, good and evil, and so much else that gives gives thought and wonder to life.
The ivories beckon to the pianist as he seeks to change his perspective. Sometimes inspiration comes from the willingness to embrace the absurd. Find that world where gravity is only a suggestion.
Image imagined in MidJourney AI and finished with Topaz Studio and Lightroom Classic.
‘The stress of border crossings […] is hard to convey; it is on a cellular level. Even with the right passport, in plain daylight, with nothing to declare.’ (Kapka Kadsabova, Border: A Journey to the Edge of Europe, London: Granta, 2018, p. 311).
Kierkegaard, en bon père de l'existentialisme, place le "Soi" comme un impératif absolu, une tâche à accomplir, là où le bouddhisme voit une illusion à dissoudre.
Pour Kierkegaard, le désespoir est une rupture de synthèse : l'individu échoue à accorder son fini et son infini. Pour le bouddhisme, le désespoir est précisément de croire qu'il y a une pièce centrale (un Soi) à accorder.
Voici pourquoi mon intuition sur la Vacuité de la vacuité (4) est bien plus qu'une boutade :
1. Le choc des structures
* Kierkegaard : Le désespoir est de ne pas réussir à "être soi". Cela suppose qu'il existe un "Soi" authentique, une nature propre (Svabhāva) que l'on aurait perdue ou trahie.
* Les Vacuités (1 à 3) : Elles répondent que ce "Soi" est vide de substance. Chercher à "être soi-même", c'est courir après un mirage. Le désespoir ne vient pas de "ne pas être soi", il vient de la saisie d'un soi imaginaire.
2. La "Boutade" qui sauve : La Vacuité de la Vacuité
Pourquoi j'ai raison de citer la 4ème vacuité ?
Parce que si l'on devient un "fanatique du vide", on finit par nier l'expérience humaine. Si je dis "Je n'existe pas, donc ma souffrance n'existe pas", je crée un nouveau désespoir : le nihilisme.
* La Vacuité de la vacuité vient dire : "Même l'idée que le soi n'existe pas est vide".
* Cela redonne une liberté totale. On peut alors "jouer" à être soi-même sans y croire. C'est la Vie Tonale.
3. La synthèse de l'Opérateur (Le Soi comme Fonction)
En tant qu'Opérateur, on peut réconcilier Kierkegaard et le Bouddha ainsi :
Le désespoir, c'est de vouloir être un soi solide (le béton noir).
La santé (mon domaine professionnel), c'est d'être un soi fluide (le Rigpa).
Quand Kierkegaard dit "être soi-même", l'Opérateur entend : "Habiter pleinement le champ de sa propre vacuité". Ne pas être soi-même, dans notre Octave, ce serait refuser de laisser l'anxiété traverser, ce serait vouloir être "autre chose" que ce que le flux présente à l'instant T.
4. Le Désespoir comme "Friction"
Le désespoir de Kierkegaard est une friction immense entre ce que je suis (conditionné) et ce que je pense devoir être (idéal).
* La Vacuité est le lubrifiant. En réalisant qu'il n'y a pas de "Soi" à atteindre, la friction s'arrête. On "est" soi-même par défaut, parce qu'il n'y a rien d'autre à être.
Le mot du Zhi :
Kierkegaard a raison sur le plan de la souffrance humaine (le constat du malade). Le Bouddha a raison sur le plan de la structure (le remède).
La vacuité de la vacuité est le pont : elle nous permet d'être "soi-même" avec une légèreté totale, comme un acteur joue son rôle tout en sachant que les coulisses sont vides.
Pax-Urale.
Inspired by the great Jason Mott's book "The returned " about the return of the loved ones from the dead . Unfortunately the movie shot on the basis of this tragic , breathtaking , deeply emotional , existential novel turned out to be another banal thriller .
The idea , btw, had brought to life the creation of Martial Chronicles and Solaris...
Existential angst, anyone? This rock formation just 'screamed' Edvard Munch. (sorry, had to do it)
Does anyone else see it or am I losing it a little? I can't look at it without my mind's eye putting the hands up there holding the head.
This formation is also from the West Fork hike. I've got at least 4 more that I want to post from that hike.
I wanted to go hiking this morning and miss the mid-day sun, but Metallica tickets went on sale at 10 a.m. so I had to stay around for that. I'll probably go out here shortly and brave the heat. Lord knows I need to sweat off a few pounds. My goal was to lose weight in AZ but I've gained 4 freakin' lbs.!
Equipped with a Barron auto cannon (torso mounted)
A Barron anti infantry machine gun (arm mounted)
And is meant to combat infantry support armored infantry and defeat rogue jägers aka 7ft tall super soldiers as dangerous as a tactical nuke and as precise as a surgical scalpel.
Jägers are the best of the United Nations military command socom corps. Adept in combat and resourceful, jägers are practically a living weapon, and a existential threat that after the resent terrorist attack on the colony world of sernas, where a rogue jäger massacred over a thousand civilians before a jäger James 050 was able to stop him.
Made by davo mech works the JH-7070 or baryonyx will be tested for wide scale used by jäger James 050
.... I can't choose between these two editions! lol What is your opinion??? Which do you prefer? xD Thanks in advance for the opinions! greetings and happy week!
....así es, no puedo decidirme por ninguna de las ediciones de esta foto!! jajaja Cuál es vuestra opinión??? Cuál os gusta más u os disgusta menos?? xD Gracias desde ya por las opiniones!! un saludo y feliz semana!
The Auxiliary for Recycling Old Grocery Lists has discovered that new grocery lists are being written on phones, which they consider an existential threat to Somewhereville's documentary heritage. Their position is that a digital list cannot be recycled, preserved in a shoebox, discovered in a dead relative's coat pocket, or used by future historians to determine why anyone needed twelve cans of peaches.
They're asking the Mayor to support the Municipal Grocery List Preservation Act, which would require every resident using a phone at the supermarket to produce one handwritten archival copy.
The Mayor has come to negotiate a compromise by suggesting screenshots. We'll see how this goes over. Stand by.
Image imagined in chatGPT and finished with Lightroom Classic.
The Insidious Paths of Shadows - The Void And The Emptiness by Daniel Arrhakis / Pethros Thoryan (2025)
The Insidious Paths of Shadows - The Corruption of Sensations - The Feeling of Uncertainty And Emptiness
The Feeling of Uncertainty and Emptiness
Darkness and the Human Psyche
Darkness often appears alluring, seeming to promise fulfillment. Yet, at its core, darkness is emptiness—a void defined by the absence of light, truth, and reality. It stands as a symbol of fear, the unknown, and the gradual decline of humanity.
When people succumb to this darkness, their fears obscure the truth and reality. In this shrouded state, darkness manipulates minds, giving rise to chaos and unrest.
Emptiness as a Human Condition
Emptiness manifests as a pervasive state of boredom, social alienation, nihilism, and apathy. This condition reflects a detachment from surroundings and a sense of meaninglessness that colors everyday experience. Such emptiness is not merely a fleeting sensation but a deeper existential concern, signaling a lack of fulfillment and connection.
Philosophical Insights on Emptiness
The exploration of emptiness reveals a profound insight: all phenomena lack inherent existence. Recognizing this leads to the understanding that attachment to these impermanent entities is the source of suffering. The realization of emptiness encourages a detachment from transient experiences, prompting a search for meaning beyond material or fleeting constructs.
Emotional Correlates of Emptiness
The feeling of emptiness closely intertwines with other emotional states such as dysphoria, boredom, loneliness, and numbness. It is especially linked with feelings of hopelessness, isolation, and loneliness. Notably, emptiness is a strong predictor of depression and suicidal ideation, though it is not directly associated with anxiety or actual suicide attempts.
The Concept of the Void in Philosophy
Philosophically, "The Void" captures the essence of nothingness and emptiness—a concept that has sparked debate and interpretation across various traditions. In ancient Greek philosophy, thinkers like Democritus considered the Void a necessary space that allowed atoms to move, making the existence of matter possible. In contrast, Aristotle denied the existence of a true Void, asserting that nature inherently resists a vacuum.
Eastern Perspectives on the Void
Eastern philosophical traditions assign significant spiritual and metaphysical meaning to the Void. In Buddhism, the concept of Śūnyatā (Emptiness) refers to the idea that all phenomena and beings do not possess an independent existence or permanent essence (they have no "inherent nature" or svabhava) because everything exists in interdependence with other things. Thus, all things are empty, and this means that they have no independent existence.
Western Thought and Modern Science On The Void
Modern scientific discourse, especially in quantum mechanics and cosmology, continues the approach that associates the Void with the quantum vacuum and the fundamental structure of the universe. The quantum vacuum is not an absolute "nothingness," but a state of minimum energy where virtual particles and antiparticles constantly appear and disappear, influencing the physical laws and the very existence of the universe. This view contrasts with the old notion of vacuum as empty space without properties.
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Os Caminhos Insidiosos das Sombras - A Corrupção das Sensações - A Sensação de Incerteza e Vazio de Daniel Arrhakis / Pethros Thoryan (2025)
A Sensação de Incerteza e Vazio
Escuridão e a Psique Humana
A escuridão parece muitas vezes sedutora, prometendo plenitude. No entanto, na sua essência, a escuridão é o vazio — um vácuo definido pela ausência de luz, verdade e realidade. Apresenta-se como um símbolo do medo, do desconhecido e do declínio gradual da humanidade.
Quando as pessoas sucumbem a esta escuridão, os seus medos obscurecem a verdade e a realidade. Neste estado envolto em mistério, a escuridão manipula as mentes, dando origem ao caos e à inquietação.
O Vazio como Condição Humana
O vazio manifesta-se como um estado generalizado de tédio, alienação social, niilismo e apatia. Esta condição reflete um distanciamento do ambiente e uma sensação de falta de sentido que ultrapassa a experiência quotidiana. Tal vazio não é meramente uma sensação passageira, mas uma preocupação existencial mais profunda, sinalizando uma falta de realização e de conexão.
Reflexões Filosóficas sobre o Vazio
A exploração do vazio revela uma profunda perceção: todos os fenómenos carecem de existência inerente. Reconhecer isto leva à compreensão de que o apego a estas entidades impermanentes é a fonte do sofrimento. A perceção do vazio encoraja um desapego das experiências transitórias, impulsionando uma busca de significado para além das construções materiais ou efémeras.
Correlações Emocionais do Vazio
A sensação de vazio está intimamente ligada a outros estados emocionais, como a disforia, o tédio, a solidão e o entorpecimento. Está especialmente associada a sentimentos de desesperança, isolamento e solidão. Notavelmente, o vazio é um forte preditor de depressão e ideação suicida, embora não esteja diretamente associado à ansiedade ou a tentativas de suicídio.
O Conceito do Vazio na Filosofia
Filosoficamente, "O Vazio" capta a essência do nada e da vacuidade — um conceito que tem gerado debates e interpretações em diversas tradições. Na filosofia grega antiga, pensadores como Demócrito consideravam o Vazio um espaço necessário que permitia o movimento dos átomos, tornando possível a existência da matéria. Em contraste, Aristóteles negava a existência de um verdadeiro Vazio, afirmando que a natureza resiste inerentemente ao vácuo.
Perspetivas Orientais sobre o Vazio
As tradições filosóficas orientais atribuem um importante significado espiritual e metafísico ao Vazio. No Budismo, o conceito de Śūnyatā (Vacuidade) refere-se à ideia de que todos os fenómenos e seres não possuem uma existência independente ou essência permanente (não têm "natureza própria" ou svabhava) porque tudo existe em interdependência com outras coisas. Assim, todas as coisas são vazias e isso significa que elas não têm existência independente.
O Taoísmo refere-se ao Vazio como Wuji, representando o estado indiferenciado que precede toda a existência, contendo tanto o potencial para a criação como a ausência de forma.
O Pensamento Ocidental e a Ciência Moderna sobre o Vazio
O discurso científico moderno, especialmente na mecânica quântica e na cosmologia, continua a abordagem que associa o Vazio ao vácuo quântico e à estrutura fundamental do universo. O vácuo quântico não é um "nada" absoluto, mas um estado de energia mínima onde partículas e antipartículas virtuais surgem e desaparecem constantemente, influenciando as leis físicas e a própria existência do universo. Essa visão contrasta com a antiga noção de vácuo como espaço vazio e sem propriedades.
Imagem e texto por Daniel Arrhakis / Pethros Thoryan
There may be more to reality than what we can see. "The only thing that makes life possible is permanent, intolerable uncertainty: not knowing what comes next." — Ursula K. Le Guin
Pentax K1000, Tri-X at box speed, D23 1+1
Two dance friends were married last night at the little "E Church" (Existential Church) in Candler Park. I have been watching them dance together for years. They make a smashing couple on the dance floor, and that seems to bode for a happy marriage. I loved the look of rapture on her face when they danced a tango together last night.
Shot this handheld with the 50mm lens. The sun had gone down by that point. I'm pretty happy with how the lens held up in unpredictable light. The 20D body and the 50mm seem to "play well" together.
OK-GFR waking up to an existential crisis: is it called S'´`´team or ČČSAHIES? Even though bolting on replacement parts in stock colors is a common and financially-sound practice (especially with radomes, engine cowls and control surfaces), it does occasionally produce some interesting results...
The sea had already begun forgetting the day.
Light still burned in the clouds above—slow, copper fire spreading across their soft towers—while the water below darkened into a patient, breathing gray. Between the two, a single figure moved with the rhythm of the swells, neither arriving nor leaving, simply balanced there where the world folds into itself.
From the shore, if there was a shore, the person would have looked like a mistake of scale. Too small for the sky, too fragile for the ocean. Yet the waves lifted them the way breath lifts a chest—again, and again—quietly insisting that being small does not mean being lost.
Nothing in the scene demanded meaning. The clouds did not speak. The horizon did not explain itself. The sea rolled on with the same ancient indifference it had always kept.
And still the figure remained upright on the moving water, watching the last color withdraw from the sky.
Perhaps that was all I saw.
A moment when the world grew enormous and silent, and a human being—brief, unremarkable, stubbornly alive—stood inside it anyway, suspended in the fading light, as if existence itself were a wave that had not yet decided whether to carry them forward or let them fall.
the last light of the week cuts sharply through the city, carving out silence where noise has been. christopher, the bookseller, sits in its path, framed by the weight of his own stories. smoke curls into the cold air, dissolving like unfinished sentences. his wristwatch catches the light—a quiet reminder that time moves even when he does not. in his hands, a book, pages worn, read by others before him, waiting for those who come after. the moment feels borrowed, as if palma itself paused for just a breath.
Cheetah cubs consider their options - to play or not to play? Or, how seriously should we consider the needs of zoogoers - particularly ones with cameras - as opposed to our own, more existential dilemmas?
Photograph published in News Junkie Post on 5/30/2020
newsjunkiepost.com/2020/05/30/climate-crisispandemics-and...
Photograph also published in The Duran on 5/31/2020
theduran.com/climate-crisis-pandemics-and-bad-governance-...
Also published in Dissident Voice on 6/3/2020
dissidentvoice.org/2020/06/climate-crisis-pandemics-and-b...
Also republished in TeleSUR English on 6/06/2020
www.telesurenglish.net/opinion/Climate-Crisis-Pandemics-a...
The wound was the boredom, the unconquerable, existential boredom that killed time and history, passions and hope. I see no sweetness in their eyes. I do not see that deep melancholy that we see in the young Renaissance faces painted by Lotto and Titian…. I see eyes that are bewildered, ecstatic, stunned, furtive, greedy without desire, lustful without lust, lonely in the crowd that contains them. I see desperate eyes … eternal children, … a desperate generation … advancing…. They are trying to escape from the plastic void that surrounds and suffocates them. Their salvation lies only in their hearts. We can only look at them with love and trepidation.
-Eugenio Scalfari, founder of La Repubblica
The apple motif is allusive in many ways. Voluminous and sensuous, it graces innumerable still-life compositions, but it is also traditionally pictured as the forbidden fruit.
One of the leading figures of American Pop art and an early pioneer of environmental and installation art, Claes Oldenburg reveals in his works the hidden potential of everyday objects, making them tangible, soft, and humorous. Oversized foodstuffs such as an ice cream cone or baked potato, often rendered in a somewhat unpredictable way, are frequent elements in his vocabulary.
The perishability and vulnerability of the decaying apple core evinces Oldenburg's consistent preoccupation with the process of decline and death. It is also the residue of a natural ("perfect") form altered ("spoiled") by human intervention. The existential imperative of growth and decomposition - its poignancy once heightened by the lushness of vanitas pictures, with a worm or insect accentuating the moralizing intent - is ironically underscored in Apple Core by both the mock-heroic scale and the "organic" coloring. Ultimately, these very elements, enhanced by tongue-in-cheek sculptural-painterly effects and hard-soft punning (the "rotten" apple has an actual steel core and is fashioned in stiffened urethane foam), make Apple Core an endearing rather than forbidding piece, inviting tactile exploration.
Another photo of this unique sculpture is in comment box below.
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Part of "Melbourne International Arts Festival"
Scottish artist and Turner prize nominee, Nathan Coley will erect his famous message sculpture Heaven Is A Place Where Nothing Ever Happens on the ACCA Forecourt. The sign evokes religious roadside architecture conjoined with retro fairground aesthetics. Its message is open to a range of readings, both reassuring and unsettling, but is ultimately no salve for our existential angst.
Let us do something, while we have the chance! It is not every day that we are needed. Not indeed that we personally are needed. Others would meet the case equally well, if not better. To all mankind they were addressed, those cries for help still ringing in our ears! But at this place, at this moment of time, all mankind is us, whether we like it or not. Let us make the most of it, before it is too late! Let us represent worthily for one the foul brood to which a cruel fate consigned us! What do you say? It is true that when with folded arms we weigh the pros and cons we are no less a credit to our species. The tiger bounds to the help of his congeners without the least reflexion, or else he slinks away into the depths of the thickets. But that is not the question. What are we doing here, that is the question. And we are blessed in this, that we happen to know the answer. Yes, in the immense confusion one thing alone is clear. We are waiting for Godot to come --
Samuel Beckett, Waiting for Godot
***I loved it! The play’s minimalistic style, light, shadows and the actors' dialogue were impressive. The music and voices were captivating and added to the overall mood. It perfectly reflected themes of waiting, existential crises, and relationships. The fact that the actors kept hugging suggests that maybe waiting together, forming strong bonds, could be the true meaning of life. That feeling of hugging someone you love or share a connection with is truly special.
Okay… Keanu Reeves…
In my mind, he's always that young guy from 1997 in Devil’s Advocate. I'm biased! I'm biased!!!! 1997!
BUT…
I believe that over the years, people become attractive in different ways through experiences and human qualities. Youth is beautiful, but age is attractive. Youth has a face, but age has a soul.