OT: What is true victory

[Colonel]

I wrote this.


Throughout human existence and indeed all life's existence, there has been an attempt to be the best, to be the victor, but what is true victory. A Roman General two thousand years ago thought conquering the far off wildness was true victory, but a Roman General would never have thought he could conquer what we today know of as the world; it was simplely unattainable to him. Today the US looks out and sees itself as the Victor of this new age, but are we, have we conquered everything, is there a bigger conquest. What about space could there be a bigger unattainable conquest for us out there? Can there ever be a true victory or are we to endlessly travel in search of new conquests, new discoveries, and new unattainable glories?
In this era of freedom, have we conquered all there is or is this just another step to the unattainable Victory. To seek true victory, one must attempt to understand all, to know all; to seek all there is in existence, to be omnipotent. But to be omnipotent one must be never ending, never beginning, infinity and nothing all at once. Victory is only achieved through the impossible.
What do we know as existence, what of omnipotence, what of life, do we know anything or are we just pawns in a much grander scale of existence. Do we even see what is existence, do we exist, or are we just the dreams of another, the unorganized thoughts of a being beyond are understanding and indeed our perception. Being the thoughts of another in slumber, should we search for the answers or should impatiently wait for this infinite slumber to end.
Should victory be achieved at all costs, should we recklessly aim for the unattainable goal? Reaching for the stars barely grasping at a glimpse of our existence, understanding very little of an infinite understanding. Man shall wander the universe grasping for every bit of understanding until the end of time. There souls shall wander the next plain of existence seeking any understanding to there ultimate victory.

Thoughts on this

[narf poit chez BOOM]

If you don't know and want too, and it's a good idea, find out.

[Randallw]

I'll let that great leader Gul Dukat answer this one,

To paraphrase a bit,

"True victory is when your enemies know they were wrong to oppose you in the first place"

Conan on the other hand would say along the lines of

"Victory is to stand over the ashes of your enemy and hear the lamentations of his women"

Edit: I'm in a better mood now so I'll go into greater detail.

Already mankind is master of his world. His only true enemy is himself. We have two choices. Either learn to temper our worst excesses and fix the damage we have inflicted so we may continue to dwell on the planet, or rise to such a level that we no longer feel or require any attachment to Earth. For the time being we do not have the technology to leave this system, so it is in our best interests to pursue avenues that will facilitate our remaining time here. What the human race is best at is growth, our fecundity means that unless we impose artificial measures or pursue a zero growth policy we will outgrow our home planet. I feel this is inevitable and to take the long term view even with our best efforts the age shall arise when our system is no longer inhabitable. Our attachment to our home shall, in part, be extended by our terraforming Mars, but there shall come the time when even Mars shall be uninhabitable, as our Sun expands. As inevitable as the Suns death is the fact that if we are to survive we must expand. There shall come the day when we shall farewell our home and colonise other systems.

Let me interject at this point to point out that this all assumes interstellar travel is viable. If it is not we shall have no choice but to stay where we are and with no ability to expand we shall stagnate. Whether we create a society that will be involuntarily stuck at a certain stage, or we all transcend physical limitations and perhaps place our consciousness in an artificial environment (which itself supplies an avenue for our expansion) it is a fact that someday all shall be destroyed.

Assuming that we do develop interstellar ability, either the ability to survive the time it may take to cross space or a faster way to travel, we must expand. I feel it is our duty to do such, otherwise we would simply be turning our backs on the most important aspect of humanity, which is our natural instict to survive by any means. Our history of technological development has been to pursue a single purpose, to increase our ability to survive. As we expand there shall be two possible paths. Either we are alone, as some people hypothesise, in which case the Universe is ours and Human domination of all that exists is but a matter of time, or we shall meet other forms of life which depsite being alien can be assumed to have a drive for self preservation the same as ours.

We are all fond of "playing" empires which interact with each other. Creating our people and guiding them, while making friends with othert races. I must depart from a discussion of the facts and from this point on deal with what I personally believe must happen. We shall not make friends, or if we do we should always remember that we are dealing with aliens. These are not fellow humans with which we can develop a bond as we do amongst ourselves despite our diversity. The most important facet of our expansion shall be the advancement of our own people. We shall not be moving from our home in an attempt to find and make friends. Our sole purpose in expansion is the survival of our own species. Other races, of whatever form they take are competition, they may breath a different atmosphere or be a form of life unrelated in any way to ours, but their mere presence as intelligent creatures (if intelligent they are, and non-sentients are no threat that must all the same be removed) opens the opportunity that at some time our goals and theirs, which despite an inability to understand the motivation of "Aliens", shall be contadictory. We should not endeavour to exterminate every race in the instance we find them . As Sun-Tzu says "War is the ultimate risk. It puts the state at risk of defeat, and should not be entered into lightly". Our relations with other races though should always be carried out with the simple truth that we are, as we must assume they are to themselves, infinitely more important than them. To acquiesce to the desires of others would be the greatest treason and result only in our decline in relation to them. If we advance our selves we would reach the stage at which they possess not threat to us, for the time being, at that point we should exterminate them so that they shall never be a threat again. For the purpose of illustration I refer to a novel I once read. I can not recall its title but the plot was that the human race, but for the survivers hiding in asteroids, is destroyed by previously unknown aliens. After eluding the aliens attempts at total genocide some of the survivers contact the aliens. When asked why they destroyed mankind when we did not even know of them they repsond by showing an image of Star Trek. A scene of humans fighting Romulans. "It was only a tv program!. Fiction" declare the humans. The Aliens defence is that it indicates humans are a threat. The very fact that we can imagine conflict between aliens, shows it is a posibility. To protect their own people the aliens destroyed man. We must assume the same that drives us may, however remote, be part of an alien psychy. When the survival of our people is ever at stake we must put aside emotions of use only among ourselves, compassion, friendship, and empathy and strive for their destruction. With a multitude of races all naturally compelled to think only of themselves there can never be any "team win". If it suits us we may work with others to destroy a greater threat, but we must never forget that our "allies", if allowed to exist, pose as much a threat as any other race. Each time we exterminate another race it shall be a small victory. If we are lucky and do not lose sight of our purpose, the day may dawn in the infinite future when whatever man evolves to while still being man inhabits every part of the multiverse. On that day, when every other race that has ever existed is dead, humans shall have the ultimate Victory.

[Cyclop]

I too like Conan's Version of victory:

"Conan, what is best in life?"
Conan: "To crush your enemies, see them driven before you, and to hear the lamentation of the women!"

With deductive reasoning based off the initial post, Conan must have been an American (that might also explain why he is called a barbarian), since that is what they seem to be seeking (not in my opinion but based of initial opinion). So I can deduce even deeper saying that I am American since I like Conan's quote.

Just my barbaric thoughts on the idea of victory since that's what my ambitions have been since birth ... victory of the planet and beyond (hmmm or maybe I've been brainwashed that from birth like all the other Americans). Must think out of the box now, thanks Colonel for the victory view of a few billion people, something I was unaware of. [img]/threads/images/Graemlins/Cold.gif[/img]

[Randallw]

Just my barbaric thoughts on the idea of victory since that's what my ambitions have been since birth ... victory of the planet and beyond (hmmm or maybe I've been brainwashed that from birth like all the other Americans). Must think out of the box now, thanks Colonel for the victory view of a few billion people, something I was unaware of. [img]/threads/images/Graemlins/Cold.gif[/img]

Yours may be barbaric thoughts,but while you were writing them I was busy putting down my thoughts. I come across as a paranoid, xenophobic (but only towards other forms of life), human supremacist.

[Gandalf Parker]

Even though this is an old song (catchy tune, lots of fun) it has lately come into my mind often when the subject of US policies comes up. Polictical Science (also known as "lets drop the big one now")
http://www.ocap.ca/songs/polsci.html

[tesco samoa]

This will cause some duck and cover.... but truefully

USA needs to get over itself.

[Cheeze]

We just need more of those tasty Canadian beers.

mmmmmmmm...beer

[Cyclop]

The phrase "get over itself" always seems to confuse me. As if no one else or nothing else seems to matter but "itself". Which IMO is an ignorant statement.

[AMF]

I think that was the point, no?

Cyclop said:
The phrase "get over itself" always seems to confuse me. As if no one else or nothing else seems to matter but "itself". Which IMO is an ignorant statement.