Comments on: Can You Delay the Inevitable?

By: Ronald Huereca

Ronald Huereca — Mon, 28 May 2007 09:16:34 +0000

Mubashar Iqbal,

Good point on the avoiding part. Doesn’t make a whole lot of sense. The inevitable is unavoidable.

However, what about sleep? I plan on going to sleep sometime this evening. Is it inevitable that I will fall asleep? By staying awake, am I delaying the inevitable?

Now say that someone comes up behind me and knocks me unconscious. Is that the point of inevitability regarding sleep?

This is a nice headache-inducing topic

By: Mubashar Iqbal

Mubashar Iqbal — Mon, 28 May 2007 02:01:29 +0000

Without some concept of time, inevitability means nothing.

Just because you don’t die today, doesn’t mean you’ve avoided the inevitable. Since you don’t know for sure when death will occur, how can you say you’ve delayed it?

“I will inevitably buy a new car, but the longer I drive my current one only delays the inevitable.” … if you die before your car does, does that mean you’ve avoided the inevitable?

By: cetroyer

cetroyer — Sat, 26 May 2007 07:59:48 +0000

No, if you live longer, it just means that you haven’t reached that inevitable point which is death.

Way to do a Red Herring, though, seeing as the point of being inevitable was our having the argument, not our respective times of death.

You know the only way the debate will end is if you come over to my way of thinking. Mwahahaha.

cetroyer

By: Ronald Huereca

Ronald Huereca — Sat, 26 May 2007 00:30:48 +0000

cetroyer,

So the longer we live, the longer we prolong the inevitable?

Simonne,

That is a good point. I could ride a cab or a bus and never buy another car and shake my fists in the air.

By: Simonne

Simonne — Fri, 25 May 2007 11:25:53 +0000

In your example with the flooded car, I would say that you still can delay the inevitable by using public transportation or cabs for a while. Or you can decide to get yourself a bicycle, thus making the inevitable never happen. Which means it was not so inevitable, after all. So, when do you know something is inevitable? Most of the times, you know it after it occurs. I believe that except for death, there is no real inevitable. It all depends on our actions and on changing our mindset when we foresee an “inevitable” that we don’t like.

By: cetroyer

cetroyer — Fri, 25 May 2007 07:05:52 +0000

Well, when you say “…inevitable that we as humans control…”, that situation is no longer inevitable, by definition (as you noted, and as we have discussed).

I would say it is inevitable that we have the debate until one of us kicks the bucket.

cetroyer

By: Andrew

Andrew — Fri, 25 May 2007 06:08:04 +0000

It would be possible to say that it is inevitable that at 3pm you will be eating peas; however, I think that when we use the word inevitable we don’t really mean it that way.

I think there is usually an implicit understanding in the use of the term that there is some potential for delay; for example, “stop messing about and sort it, you know it is inevitable.”

As a devout atheist I can’t agree with God’s will, but rephrased as an incident of nature or physics I certainly agree with you on that; although, things that now seem inevitable may prove not to be so in future.

By: inspirationbit

inspirationbit — Fri, 25 May 2007 05:48:50 +0000

I think the entire saying “you can only delay the inevitable” overall sounds paradoxical.
Does that mean that we can only delay the inevitable but we cannot delay anything else?
Does that mean that we can only delay the inevitable but we cannot rush it?

But then what kind of things can be categorized as inevitable? Different things… and often those things are relative to smth else.
My baby daughter will inevitably grow up – can I delay that – no, but I can certainly enjoy and get the most out of her childhood, and make her childhood as happy as I can.

Many celebrities though are trying their best to delay the inevitable – aging, and going after some extreme measures to preserve their youth and delay the aging.

So in that respect sometimes people can indeed delay the inevitable.