do all friendships end?

In some sense friendship never ends.

For even when you just know someone, or just part of that person, such as here, in only the things we write, it is inevitable that part of that someone becomes part of you.

Specifically my thoughts have impinged on yours, and whether you like it or not, your thoughts are changed. For even if you rejected what I said, it is changed for the fact that it has interacted with yours.

What more friends, where you are more likely to be less critical in accepting and believing the person.

So the knowledge of another leads to a new creation altogether: two new persons, who otherwise will never be. And although friends may go and grow apart physically, they are eternally embodied in new living spirits.

No I don’ t think all friendships come to a end some peolple are friends with each other for their whole lives. But I do think sometimes a friendship loses it spark.

Yes, I believe that all friendships, if death wasn’t an issue, would eventually end. But, I don’t think that, with our lifespan, it is inevitable that friendships must die. I know many people whom have known and have befriended one another until the day that they died. This, in itself, already disproves the statement that all friendships must end. But, if you take this to a mathematical level, you can see how one might come out with this assumption.

note- J and B are friends.
note- J and B met in the fourth grade.

x: J steals B’s pencil in the fifth grade.
x*: J doesn’t give it back, and B keeps the grudge.
x*: Friendship is over.
x**: J gives it back and apologises.
x**: B forgives J for stealing it. x**: Friendship still alive.
x**: B doesn't forgive him. x**: Friendship is over.

How many successful friendships are there?

1

How many unsuccessful friendships are there?

2

This is just one example, but is a logical one.

Two answer your question:

If you exclude death, no they will not go on forever. If you sit 1,000 chimpanzees at 1,000 typewriters with an unlimited amount of ink for an unlimited amount of time, you will get handed the full works of Shakespeare. If death didn’t occur, there is an infinite amount of time that something could happen to end it, thus, you can’t say that they would go on forever.

As for your example, R doesn’t have to be inevitable for the friendship to end. Over an infinite amount of time, the friendship will end, it isn’t inevitable, as the infinite can not be found, but there is a chance that it will end soon (in one human lifespan), and a guarantee that it will end within an infinite amount of time.

R has a Y/X chance of happening soon.
R has an X-Y/X chance of happening eventually.

In the end, everything is inevitable. R has a Y+X-Y/X (X/X) chance of happening.

~After Death~

And this argument is over. I solved everything, I am God!!! Or not…lol.

~After Death~

postmortem i couldn’t have said it better myself… literally! lol friendship is a relationship between two people. like chemicals, once they ‘interact’, both are changed. friendship has as basis the same as romantic relationships and we can say more comfortably that those always end, because no 2 people can remain constant if all other factors are. if u exclude death, u exclude reality, and by excluding reality, ur excluding existence and ultimately, (emotional) relations.

in my own experiences, friends have come in and out of my life for years. i have always asked myself that question. i have always wondered if it was me or was i picking the wrong friends? i try harder now to be a good friend so that way my friendships don’t “fizzle” away.
but to be honest, with my experiences, friendship does not last forever.
but i also have seen one last a long time but it was with other people, it didn’t involve me.

i guess you could call me pessimistic, but i really don’t think that friendship lasts forever. it never has for me.

For Aristotle, in his Nicomachaean ethics, book 8, you can see an ancient discussion of friendship.

For A., friendship is , to an extent, bound up with love and therefore ‘the good’.

There is an argument, then- if we trust Arisotle (which we might)- that friendship is a cosmic ‘goodness’ - almost identifiable as a pure Platonic form.

Thus, we could view friendship as eternal- not doomed to die!

check out the nicomachean ethics on this one karolina- it may cheer you up! :smiley:

that’s only certain types of friendship, gavtmcc. for instance, aristotle didn’t think it was possible for two ppl to be friends of wide age differences. more specifically, the only friends who were able to have the ‘good’ friendship that you refer to are two, philosophyical individuals. otherwise, the friendship would end quicker than anything else. further, philosophical friends last only because they partake in contempalation. but, this participation is decidedly not like the platonic form of the good, and confusing the two completely ignores aristotle’s causation theory. best to keep the two seperate.

I’m not sure I agree.

Could you be more specific on how you think the Platonic good different to the Aristotelian good between friends?

I have a feeling you’ll have a hard time…

Friendships do end. True friendship is hard to reach. True friendships would stay together because they have a special bond that can’t be broken. “Friends” are known as people who like you and hang out with you, but if there was a true friendship there, the bond would never be broken.

Deep friendships are for example bond when people pull eachother through the great hardship, like war.

In general we can say that people have go through an experience or more with someone, to create such bond. But if real friendships would be common, then social life would take too much time. That’s why they stay rare. But in theorie it could be anyone of the more than six billion people in the world.
Yes, even your neighbor :wink: . But above all, you have to be up to it.

No friendship is meant to last forever. At one time I believed the pie in the ski philsophy that my friends and I would all be close until the day we all died. However, I have come to realize that it is just not possible to maintain certain relationships. When my best friend did not take a strong enough stance against the man who broke my heart, I was very turned off and betrayed by her behavior. I realized that in certain situations I made myself feel awkward just to support her side, even if I did not always agree with her. After that I realized I should have only supported myself :frowning:

Never be quick to go to someone else’s rescue because they will never be quick to go to yours. I am not implying that all people are self centered and think only of numero uno, but the reality is that people are self absorbed and do not realize That they are hurting someone else’s feelings. My friend even told me that she is so busy etc, that she had never intentionally meant to hurt my feelings by not calling etc. However, I came to the conclusion that in the end I want friends who will back me up on key issues, keep in touch with me, and who are truly there for me through the good and the bad.

Not all friendships last because different people have different expectations about what friendship is. The number one thing to keep in mind is that you should never expect anything from anyone. Give it a few years before you decide who your true friends are. For the mean time I would keep everyone else as an acquaintance. Over time you will see who your true friends are and who is just around for the good times. The true friends will be the people who are always there when you don’t expect it. The people who call to check in, even when their own lives are hectic and chaotic. I try to remember that we all have the same 24 hours and we all choose how we will spend this time.

Doesn’t everything come to an end?

Maybe there’s a glorious afterlife where we will meet again!?!?

But could you really stand someone for EVER? which brings into question could you stand yourself forever!?

I feel that friendship is a function of RESPECT essentially. If respect is there from the heart friendship stays, otherwise it disappears gradually. Now I’m not saying that other things are not needed in a friendship, of course they are, but respect towers above all. Respect goes, friendship goes. So, those who have respect for their friends all life long, will keep the friendship otherwise not.

In some ways, friendship does end. But as I see it, there are two different kinds of friendships:

  1. Old friends
  2. Current friends

Pretty simple. There is the friends that you see daily or weekly. The ones that you call up all the time on the phone.

Then there is the kind of friends who you do not see anymore. Your friendship never ended. You either grew apart or moved far away from them.

Either way, I still see both of these things as friendships. So, yes, I do believe friendship is forever, unless you become angry at them.

Am I missing some sort of deep level that complicates the question? Some friendships end, some don’t. It is possible to live a life in which all friendships end. It is possible to have a friend for all your life. There are countless humans who could prove by example that some friendships end. There are countless humans who could prove by example that some friendships last a lifetime.

There are basically 3 basis for friendship: 1)Pleasure, 2)Usefulness and 3)Virtue. Young people often form friendships based upon pleasure, such as in sexual partners, for example. Older people often form friendships based upon usefulness, as in business associates, for example. But what gives us pleasure today may not please us tomorrow. And our needs may change, such that what is useful to us changes. So both pleasure and usefulness are not the basis for life-long friendships. It is the third basis, Virtue, that is forms the basis for life-long friendships. When two people get to know one another intimately and know the state of one another’s character, and when they see common virtues or common vices in one another, then that is when life-long, lasting friendships form. Why? Because states of character tend to repeat those actions by which they were formed. So that men can be relied upon to act in a manner that is consistent with their states of character, whether of virtue or of vice. And birds of a feather flock together.

It’s a shame you are not that active on ILP.

I was going to disagree with this, but then I contemplated what you actually said and noticed it carries a lot of empirical truth.

I saw this play out in my past, my relationship with my ex of nine years was formed on pleasure and only lasted as long as it did because of usefulness… eventually ending because there was no deeper connection (i.e. what you call virtue), we actually disliked each other as people/personalities. Recently, I called a friend of mine who I knew for half that time and who I have only seen or spoken to a handful of times over the past 15 years… our bond was formed on common virtues and I realized that he is one of the few people that I just connect with, our conversation was as if we were still close friends who spoke everyday. On the flip side, my relationship with my siblings is one formed via common vices and once I tried to break away from those vices (i.e. attempting to address our shared dysfunctional upbringing), it strained our relationship to the breaking point. I see this same thing play out over and over again, the majority of people that I form strong bonds with are based on common outlooks on the world and those I form superficial bonds with are based on usefulness and/or pleasure… it’s very noticable as a coach and mentor… I see the types of kids that keep in-touch with me afterwards, it’s without fail those who share a similar outlook on the world. The others move on without a word, once our usefulness to each other ends.

It’s depends on if we treat them as slaves to our own hedonistic desires or if we free them.