[Philosophy] Twilight movie quote....

Bella Swan: "Childhood is not from birth to a certain age. And at a certain age, the child is grown and puts away childish things. Childhood is the kingdom where nobody dies."

There are a few different perspectives from which this can be approached : one is like you said, Jestor, the age at which a child realises s/he is a mortal being whose life will one day end (around seven years or so ...)- as alluded to also by the carefree behaviours of many "youth" (20's-ish) who are well beyond that innocent age. Before this age, the deaths of people are usually felt merely as privation - they don't get to interact with that person (the one who has died) any more. The 20-somethings that Khaos was talking about, they are still a little stuck in that age by several factors - they aren't usually parents themselves yet, there are few, and no major, rites of passage in our industrialised cultures, post-modern consumerism (which creates a societal value out of remaining young forever and making "death" an indecent subject-matter) and also that we are living much longer life-spans than we were just a very short century ago, many of the things which used to do us in having been brought under some measure of control.

As it were, with the taboos set on real death, many of us older people are not altogether aware of it either, no matter how many friends, relatives or others close to us we have bid adieu to. Intellectually, we can know that it is imminent, that it will indeed put an end to us one day, but nowadays it is so remote from our everyday lives that the mere idea of it puts us running to the refrigerator, the telly, the pub, the shopping mall, the bedroom with some willing partner - or just a hand - or to church (of which most don't do the job they are supposed to any more - that of letting us be okay with it). Whereas none of us likes the idea of the dying part, which could involve various degrees of pain first, that really isn't the part that gets us freaked. It is in the non-being ; the end of all the experience, memory, feelings, sensations and identity that the phenomenal "persons" we are cling to. It is the end of possibility. Yet, it is also totality ... Children do not yet have this charge of identity - the ego - which keeps them stuck to living. To Life itself, however, that is yet another matter. It is a little easier explaining this in French, because I can draw upon a distinction between "l'être humain" and "un étant humain" ~ in English it is all just "human being", essentially the expansive continuity of the experience of being a human individual which death brings to its totality -- death being the ultimate act of a complete Life.

But there is another important concern, one that I touched on above briefly, which is "they usually aren't parents yet". This is the most naturally occurring "rite of passage" that we have - it is innate to our biology. Regardless of ethical considerations - for now, let's just stick to biological/psychological ones - it is a very short time between when a child becomes aware of her/his own mortality and when s/he is physically capable of having a child. It is nature itself that brings a young girl to womanhood with her first menstrual cycle. Boys are a little different, for when they come of reproductive age, they have to be ushered into manhood by acts (symbolic though they may be, issued from pre-sapiens dominance struggles) by other "men" -- the "father" confrontation, although particular relationships vary. As it were, for both the girls and the boys, when they become women and men, childhood is at this time over ... and it is not at a particular age, but when the natural instincts for creating new Life emerge. Every new life is destined toward death. Thus, in a kingdom of children - those not moved (by nature) to the creation of new Life - no one ever dies for no one is ever born.

Innocence then, is quite sterile ...

Does that help ?

I don't belive childhood ends by a child seeing or becoming aware of death no..
Not necessarly at least, in my experience some children has to grow up fast in order to take care of their sibblings when the parents are not present or when the parents are in some way incapable of taking care of them, thereby the child is forced to become an adult.

I have not personally experienced this but i know of several people around me who has been in this situation, and their childhood has ended quickly thanks to that.
One of my closer friends did basically everything at home, make food, clean and take care of his sibblings while his mom was almost never home, and his father was not with his mother any more, and according to him that made him the adult man in the house
And all this makes them enter adulthood or atleast take the role of parent.

I think she meant an adult bring her childhood into her life . But she bring her behavior has a complete child as an adult . It's very dangerous what she say's in that quote . It is like she what to project her full childhood to do life at her fullest , kind a of kingdom . It is like she can do anything she want as an adult we all known that child can and will take on almost anything into her mouth :ohmy: . But about an adult , normally people learn to do thing right for a good healthy balance but what if .

For my part I think the context of Twilight is the extent of the carnivore . Difficult for the normal men to think about these scenarios , is death is eminent I do not known the real truth lies in each of us . But during these past few year I became aware there is many way to live very long. But out of these studies here at the temple .

Still is I read the system of living in to the bible .

Khaos wrote: As one gets older, we are not so willing to add to age, haha.

I am 45... For years I have been saying I am 45... I will be 45, until I am 48, then I will say 50...

I round, lol... My wife, while I was 43, would say, "you arent 45", Id say, "Im closer to 45, than I am 40"...

Im goofy that way...

For some of us, with extremely active lifestyles, we can feel the difference.

I am 35, and in BJJ, when sparring 20 somethings, there is a definite difference in sheer athleticism, recovery times, injuries etc.

When I was younger, I said the same things they say to me now, and with the same ignorance.

I see them ignoring injury, taking huge risks with there body, and being unwilling to tap, etc.

I dont know, one of my first mentors told me when he was 65, that you do not become a man until 50, as you simply havent lived and experienced enough.

I think this is true of many ages...

The 15 year old thinks the toddler is a baby..
20 thinks the 15 is a child...
30 thinks the 20 is a kid....
Same for every group, or generation...

But, it is amusing, that's for sure...

And, an argument I make on occasion, and get accused of "ageism"... lol....

I for one, am more and more filled with a sense of...appreciation, for being lucky enough to experience life at all.

Me too....

"the kingdom where nobody dies" sounds me like a metaphor for living in a state of fantasy - the bliss of ignorance, so to speak, where we make up the rules of life from our own imaginations and desires, and are allowed to live as if those rules really apply

i agree with those who have pointed out the themes of mortality and responsibility - integral to adulthood

the closest things to rites of passage that i can think of are maybe personal accomplishments and experiences

getting ones first job or car, losing of virginity, going to college, moving out of the parents home

nothing as ritualistic, dramatic, or definitive as the bullet ant initiation

we usually focus on the painful or frightening part of these sorts of ceremonies, but iirc these rituals are also the moment where children are taught the rules and responsibilities of the society, and are enlightened as to where they themselves can fit in

what we have in the west is the "freedom" to define the terms of our own lives, which is awesome,but happens to a great extent at the expense of a reliable map (tradition and custom)

having ones place already determined means no one is confused about whats expected of them or what it means to be "good" and there is no need to battle over who does what, when

to my mind, adulthood is, more than anything else, taking ones place in society as one who is responsible

one who helps build and further or sustain ones civilization, as opposed to simply being supported by it

Also perhaps different measures exist for different parts of the self in this regard; mind, body, spirit etc.

A kid could have to take on duties of an adult and so they might grow up fast in their mind and spirit, but the body is still a child and this will have relevance since they are connected IMO. Going the other way, some people seem to reach their 30's and still have the mindset of a child
:ohmy:
But given they are also quite different its interesting to consider how we might retain to some extent the capacity to have the mind or spirit of the child after becoming an adult. Obviously not the body though!!

Given those things, perhaps the measure of becoming an adult is leaving childhood in each of those and being self sufficient in that modality of self sufficiency within society - but then to what extent must it be divorced from the experience and manner of ones childhood.... enough to understand the impact of ones childhood, half of all self, entirely!?

I'd be tempted to say entirely but that might just be a crude way to understand the impact and conditions of ones childhood by one manner. Realization might occur without being divorced from it, so perhaps the mind maturity is not contingent on time or behaviour but realization, and the body on time (physical maturation). I dunno about spirit, that capacity might fluctuate based on the relationship of body and mind and expression might be a mix of the intention and resolve. Perhaps we keep the same spirit we always had, its just the conditions around our capacity to be spirited change... and often weight it down instead of lifting it up.

I saw this written in Reddit today about Peter Pan, but it seems relevant:

Some have surmised that Peter is fascinated by death as he can't die. It also appears that "boyhood" to Barrie meant "not understanding your actions have consequences" and that death was "a great adventure".

That seems more appropriate than childhood being that children do not understand death will happen... Peter knows others can die but not him, so he messes about with others yet doesn't understand the other consequences of that.

Here is an excerpt from Stephen Kings "It", that has always struck me powerfully.

Stephen King speaks often on childhood, and adulthood, and the differences, bridges, and parallels.

He awakens from this dream unable to remember exactly what it was, or much at all beyond the simple fact that he has dreamed about being a child again. He touches his wife’s smooth back as she sleeps her warm sleep and dreams her own dreams; he thinks that it is good to be a child, but it is also good to be grownup and able to consider the mystery of childhood ... its beliefs and desires. I will write about all of this one day, he thinks, and knows it’s just a dawn thought, an after-dreaming thought. But it’s nice to think so for awhile in the morning’s clean silence, to think that childhood has its own sweet secrets and confirms mortality, and that mortality defines all courage and love. To think that what has looked forward must also look back, and that each life makes its own imitation of immortality: a wheel.

Or so Bill Denbrough sometimes thinks on those early mornings after dreaming, when he almost remembers his childhood, and the friends with whom he shared it.

I don't know if she said that because twight is dull ,but it a good quote .but if the question is if as a child you don't believe in death so you wouldn't die?. Ahh...no

No, more, if you watch the movies or read the books, the vampires are immortal and almost indestructible, and act very much like children. They have no real responsibility, no real fear or worries.

The humans, by contrast, are viewed as fragile, breakable, etc.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2_5ayprT6LM