-- Posted by Lohrbas at 6:22 pm on Jan. 7, 2009 Assuming life were an infinitely differentiable function, it's meaning/value would ultimately be zero after enough iterations of differentiation. If that isn't enough proof that life is pointless, social exchange theory (SET) suggests that friendships only exist while their marginal benefits exceed their marginal costs. In other words, friendships and relationships are governed by pessimistic economic theories. While any economics class will teach you that marginal benefit should always equal marginal cost in an ideal situation, we are faced with the reality that life is not an ideal situation by my premise. In other words, while many people will lack the ability to maintain any significant friendships due to the deadweight loss created by life's unfairness, the best any average person can hope for are friendships which amount to nothing (Marginal Benefit - Marginal Cost). -- Posted by ocho cinco at 6:22 pm on Jan. 7, 2009 oh youre so deep and interesting and smart -- Posted by sexaypants at 6:23 pm on Jan. 7, 2009 nice -- Posted by HideOrSeek at 6:23 pm on Jan. 7, 2009 Comparing life to a simple derivative. that's clever. -- Posted by Craziie at 6:24 pm on Jan. 7, 2009 Wow.. -- Posted by 4irate at 6:24 pm on Jan. 7, 2009 Conformist *flips emo hair* -- Posted by Chernobyl at 6:26 pm on Jan. 7, 2009 Quote: from Lohrbas at 6:22 pm on Jan. 7, 2009 social exchange theory (SET) suggests that friendships only exist while their marginal benefits exceed their marginal costs. Not true, I bought an MP3 player for a freind out of the goodness of my heart, yet I rarely ever see or talk with him, let alone receive any material profit from our freindship. I am usually kinder to others than they are to me, meaning maximum input cost with minimal profits. Does this add purpose to life? Or does it take away from the already pointless pursuit of purpose to life? Does that make me insane? -- Posted by matto at 6:27 pm on Jan. 7, 2009 i do, regretfully, agree that your economic analysis of human interaction has merit. i hope that i'm an exception, but i kind of doubt it. the fact that a measure of the marginal costs and benefits of a friendship even exist is kind of depressing. -- Posted by Lohrbas at 6:28 pm on Jan. 7, 2009 Quote: from HideOrSeek at 8:23 pm on Jan. 7, 2009 Comparing life to a simple derivative.   that's clever. Honestly, the goal was that someone would point out the obvious flaw that life has kinks/bumps/etc which would mean that it isn't differentiable at all. -- Posted by Lohrbas at 6:30 pm on Jan. 7, 2009 Quote: from matto at 8:27 pm on Jan. 7, 2009 i do, regretfully, agree that your economic analysis of human interaction has merit.  i hope that i'm an exception, but i kind of doubt it.  the fact that a measure of the marginal costs and benefits of a friendship even exist is kind of depressing. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_exchange_theory It made me despise my economics class =( Especially when we covered the Nash equilibrium. No one ever wins >.< -- Posted by matto at 6:31 pm on Jan. 7, 2009 Quote: from Lohrbas at 6:30 pm on Jan. 7, 2009 Quote: from matto at 8:27 pm on Jan. 7, 2009 i do, regretfully, agree that your economic analysis of human interaction has merit. i hope that i'm an exception, but i kind of doubt it. the fact that a measure of the marginal costs and benefits of a friendship even exist is kind of depressing. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_exchange_theory It made me despise my economics class =( Especially when we covered the Nash equilibrium. No one ever wins >.< i think i'll remain ignorantly blissful and stick to my mathematical set theory instead :( -- Posted by telomere13 at 6:33 pm on Jan. 7, 2009 Quote: from Lohrbas at 9:28 pm on Jan. 7, 2009 Honestly, the goal was that someone would point out the obvious flaw that life has kinks/bumps/etc which would mean that it isn't differentiable at all. But that's completely baseless, and, furthermore, if one assumes that life (happiness over time?) is a differentiable function, nothing particularly noteworthy is implied by taking its derivative down to zero. Also, not all differentiable functions can be differentiated down to zero, anyway (e.g. sine), so that doesn't make much sense either. Your economic ramblings are even more incoherent. (edit)I cannot spell. -- Posted by lovelyshadows19 at 6:38 pm on Jan. 7, 2009 If life went exactly the way you wanted it to go, then it would become boring, yes. The flaws and the potential for things to change is what makes life worth living. Change, for better or worse, is what enables us to keep changing in certain aspects as well. -- Posted by Lohrbas at 6:40 pm on Jan. 7, 2009 Quote: from telomere13 at 8:33 pm on Jan. 7, 2009 Quote: from Lohrbas at 9:28 pm on Jan. 7, 2009 Honestly, the goal was that someone would point out the obvious flaw that life has kinks/bumps/etc which would mean that it isn't differentiable at all. But that's completely baseless, and, furthermore, if one assumes that life (happiness over time?) is a differentiable function, nothing particularly noteworthy is implied by taking its derivative down to zero. Also, not all differentiable functions can be differentiated down to zero, anyway (e.g. sine), so that doesn't make much sense either. Your economic ramblings are even more incoherent. (edit)I cannot spell. My statement wasn't baseless.  The correct answer was that life has kinks and isn't differentiable. Life clearly wouldn't be any trig curve because that would mean that it is ordered and not chaotic. Perhaps you don't remember, but any time MB != MC, a DWL is created.  By my fictitious premise, MB would never equal MC. SET suggests that MB and MC would be equal for a friendship to exist.  Thus, it's overall net friendship profit would be zero. Thanks for playing though =) -- Posted by telomere13 at 6:47 pm on Jan. 7, 2009 Quote: from Lohrbas at 9:40 pm on Jan. 7, 2009 My statement wasn't baseless. The correct answer was that life has kinks and isn't differentiable. Which is... still baseless?  I mean, presumably, "life" is not continuous if you accept the Planck time as the smallest meaningful unit of time, but that would be just silly in this context. Life clearly wouldn't be any trig curve because that would mean that it is ordered and not chaotic. And yet not every stochastic function that is differentiable can be differentiated down to zero, obviously. Perhaps you don't remember, but any time MB != MC, a DWL is created. By my fictitious premise, MB would never equal MC. SET suggests that MB and MC would be equal for a friendship to exist. Thus, it's overall net friendship profit would be zero. Thanks for playing though =) It looks like you took an economics class in high school but don't know how to apply it properly to philosophical issues. -- Posted by Lohrbas at 6:54 pm on Jan. 7, 2009 Quote: from telomere13 at 8:47 pm on Jan. 7, 2009 Quote: from Lohrbas at 9:40 pm on Jan. 7, 2009 My statement wasn't baseless.  The correct answer was that life has kinks and isn't differentiable. Which is... still baseless? I mean, presumably, "life" is not continuous if you accept the Planck time as the smallest meaningful unit of time, but that would be just silly in this context. Life clearly wouldn't be any trig curve because that would mean that it is ordered and not chaotic. And yet not every stochastic function that is differentiable can be differentiated down to zero, obviously. Perhaps you don't remember, but any time MB != MC, a DWL is created.  By my fictitious premise, MB would never equal MC.    SET suggests that MB and MC would be equal for a friendship to exist.  Thus, it's overall net friendship profit would be zero.    Thanks for playing though =) It looks like you took an economics class in high school but don't know how to apply it properly to philosophical issues. OK, you win. And I took micro in college, tyvm. Now GTFO =(