Thieved from metaquotes

[denimskater]

I edited this a bit because I didn't approve of some of the imprecise word usage (it's still not perfect), and some of the religious bits, but overall I thought it was something that would be fun to have an argument about. (Mind you, to me an argument is generally a fun, spirited discussion.)

And as I was talking to S, she brought up a very good

Comments

[girlvanized]

"Who's to tell someone with a trial different from their own that they just need to be stronger, and they could have made it, and been happy?"

Exactly.

The fact that I'm still alive is solely because to date I've been too stubborn to quit.

Not being facetious at all.

[chainkill]

I have always said that words like "Can't", "Need" and "Necessary" imply some sort of premise. I recently (within the past two years) realized that there are things that I literally cannot do, no matter how hard I set my mind to them, no matter what the extended deadline. This was the revelation to me.

For instance, I cannot lift my house. No matter how hard I try, no matter how long I take to accomplish it, it is impossible. The strongest people on Earth have devoted their lives to being strong. Even they could not lift my entire house. I have no reason to believe that I ever could.

[denimskater]

I think the discussion is primarily of mental limitations, more specifically limitations of endurance. Many physical things do fall under this discussion, though, thinking you can't do something often makes it so.

[damarie]

In this case, the limit is upon your goal. You CAN lift a house with the proper equipment, like a crane.

[chainkill]

Ahh, thank you for pointing out a premise I hadn't even noticed I included in the "can't" which I stated.

[couplingchaos]

I have thoughts to share on this; remind me when I'm done with this stupid paper!

[denimskater]

So have you finished the paper? :-)

I just quoted it before, but I do have some opinions of my own (I have lots of those, beware!) It seems like the sort of thing one should discuss over drinks rather than on LJ, though.

The word I changed from the original that bugged me was "boundaries" - everywhere this copy says "limitations" the original said "boundaries", but that was clearly not what they meant.