which is a more devastating loss?

[katia]

1. the loss of the future by suicide

2. the loss of the future by being incarcerated for life

3. the loss of the future by refusing to learn or expand horizons in a persons intellect/thought.

elaborate your answer please.

[Sarah Louise]

Death has no meaning for me.  Incarceration in not possible, I can not live through confinement, it would be the same as death.

Sarah L.

[tinkerbell]

Well, suicide is the biggest loss for family members; incarceration is the biggest loss for the self, and refusing to learn is the biggest loss for society.
Bottom line, all three are equally devastating!

tink

[myles]

Well the first 2 would affect myself and my family. While the third one would affect everyone I ever interact with in anyway casualy as well as on a deeper level therefor more devestating in my mind. As it could continue the cycle of ignorance in the world.
Myles

[cindianna_jones]

I view my life as an open classroom.  When I'm not learning, I'm terribly discontent.

If you put me in a cell without the opportunity to learn and improve myself, I would surely die.

I vote for number 3.

Cindi

[King Malachite]

Number 2-There are not many jails or prisions in which you can play video games or watch anime in your own cells and that's horrible!

[Cindy]

Number 3, the other two will not happen to me as they involve choices I will never make. My brain is my life, it is also a conscious decision to keep moving and learning. I make that decision. This week alone I have learned and seen, information from science experiments, that no one else ever has. At the moment I don't understand it, but Malachite, it sure beats the hell out of video gaming 

To be the first to do something or to think something is awesome

[King Malachite]

Number 3, the other two will not happen to me as they involve choices I will never make. My brain is my life, it is also a conscious decision to keep moving and learning. I make that decision. This week alone I have learned and seen, information from science experiments, that no one else ever has. At the moment I don't understand it, but Malachite, it sure beats the hell out of video gaming 

To be the first to do something or to think something is awesome

Lol I need to jump on the bandwagon with those experiments then....unless a video game comes out where I can experiment.   

[Shang]

3. the loss of the future by refusing to learn or expand horizons in a persons intellect/thought.

I am not sympathetic towards people who take their own lives.  I understand a bit of why they do it, but at the same time I don't get using such a permanent solution for a rather temporary problem.  I figure that there are many ways to help you get through what is happening, which there is -- you just have to look.  So, it isn't a loss to me.

I also don't care if someone is incarcerated.  You did something to get there so deal with it.  I do find it silly if they were incarcerated for selling or possessing pot, but it's illegal so I don't feel bad for you and don't view it as a loss.

However, refusing to learn is a terrible loss of a life to me.  If you refuse to learn about a variety of things, then I see you as wasting your life.  Why would you want to sit around and not broaden your horizons or learn about the world around you?

Note:  If you simply can't learn something then that's fine because not everyone can learn the same thing or has the same ability to learn.  It's really only the trying that I care about, but truly trying and not just saying you're trying.

[Cindy Kate]

Thats tough, they are all terrible options. I would have to think that 1 & 3 have got to be a tie for me. Suicide is just depriving yourself all life has to offer and for what is usually something temporary that can be solved, though i would consider diffrent if I was already condemed to die because of a painful terminal illness. Without being able to learn & grow through thoughts and curiosity there would be little point in living you'd pretty much be a vegetable and may as well have commited suicide anyway. The second I guess would have to be the best even though it most likely means a crime has been commited. I would still be capable of thought, yet never able to discover all life has to offer all the while being aware of what is being denied to me. Yet with the other two theres probably a lack of suffering seeing as you can't be aware of missing out on anything if your dead or just incapable of doing so, but I'd still say 1 & 3.

[justmeinoz]

 I will opt for number three.

1.If you kill yourself you cease to exist, so the question also ceases to have any meaning.

2. As an Existentialist I believe that I am ultimately a free person in that I am responsible for my own actions, however circumscribed my limits physically.

3. The belief that one is a " being-thing" or having a fixed existence is a refusal to admit that one is in a constant state of change, and moving towards the future that one lacks here and now.  The future is arriving constantly, so we end up being buffeted back and forth while holding  the belief that we are at the mercy of events.  This is a refusal to accept responsibility for our actions, as even refusing to choose, is in itself a choice.
As such it is a retreat into "bad faith", and a failure to live an authentic life that we ourselves give meaning to.

Karen.