u/Mayion

Disclaimer: This topic will discuss topics like sex and the like. If you feel uncomfortable, please leave. If you just want a Tldr, see the last conclusion section. I will lay my thinking process and finalize with the question.

Opener: I am a firm believer in my religion and found it was tailored for the human psyche. Your faith is yours alone and your prayers are a reflection of your deepest desires, after all nobody would still lie when a genie comes out of the bottle. It helps us reorganize our thoughts and priorities, and throughout the journey, it teaches us to be grateful for what we have and what we get. You can only wish for what you do not have to begin with, and that you wish stays the same, and that teaches us humility.

Point 1: As such, my understanding of Islam is, it's God's guidance for the individual and their community. We do not bet to help people not pick up the habit of gambling. Not to drink to be protected from addiction and so forth. All standard ideas.

Question 1: That is where a certain question arises. Things that are forbidden like drinking, eating pork and sleeping around, although are not explicitly stated in their severity on a clear scale, unlike Kufr for instance, I believe they are not all equal. Killing in vain is not the same as knowingly eating pork for example. One harms others and is disruptive to society, which is common sense, while the second we are not clearly told. Could be our favorite excuse of the evil worm in its meat, or could be any other reason. We are not explicitly told why, and we are not told if there are exceptions (outside of necessity).

This raises a certain line of thinking. Why are we not told why certain things are forbidden? I am not asking for some abstract answer like, "God knows best" - we aren't in the 50's anymore, such answers do not convince or hold meaning nowadays. I am looking at the topic from a more philosophical perspective, or a psychological one even. Main reason I am posting this on a progressive sub to begin with.

We can guess the reasons, we can go back to Hadith (Which are not usually credible), but in reality, our framework - the basis of our religion, the Quran, omits the reasons almost as if provocatively, or at least I thought so before. "What will you do about being told not to do something you don't understand? Can't have sex or drink, sure you can guess why, but why not pork? You can't know why and it's to test your faith. Is it because it's unclean? Something you haven't learned about yet? How about other, cleaner pig species? How about lab grown pig meat?" - sort of thing.

Point 2: But lately I have been looking at it from a different perspective. As I said at the start, it's a religion tailored for us, for our way of thinking and for human nature. Fundamentally, how can I hold the belief that the religion is meant to stay the same for thousands of years, that seems faulty right? Times change, and so do people - how come Allah would create a religion that refuses a fundamental aspect of life - change? Not as in picking what I want to follow and disregarding the rest or saying "ok well I'm a good person and Allah will surely not judge me harshly" - not that sort of change I am alluding to.

I am beginning to question if the things that are forbidden are left purposefully open ended so that they can be overridden when appropriate.

As in, it prompts learning first and foremost, like the rest of the religion does. Think about it. The Quran for example is not explained to us so we can read it, understanding it and learn from studying it. Perhaps the idea of certain things being forbidden should also be studied and are left to the person to make the final decision.

You must first learn and seek the knowledge behind why they are forbidden, and depending on your circumstances, decide whether or not it applies to you while still being a full fledged Muslim. While I realize the paradox of what I just said, "how can you deny the very thing you claim to believe in", but my point is, I am not denying Islam's teachings - I am saying our understanding of what haram entails might have been overly aggressive, something that is not foreign to the Islam community and our cultures throughout the hundreds of years. Most of our understandings are born out of uneducated guesses made by people long gone.

Like recently when I studied and looked more into marriage, many of our marriage problems arise from cultural norms and traditions, not what the Quran said. Two adults can just proclaim their marriage and agree on the terms of their marriages, within reason, and tada - they are married. You don't need a Sheikh or anything of the sort - they are all just customs.

Point 3: That raises a supporting argument. Just because it is not explicitly told in the Quran that I can override something that I am forbidden from doing, does not mean doing what the Quran says is always right. Not in an explicit sense of course, but take Mutaha marriage or whatever it is called as an example where they get married for a short time just for sex. Even though it can follow the Quranic rules exactly, is it actually Halal to find a loophole? Assuming they follow all the rules and let "people" (friends, her pimp or whatever) know. Now, I can't claim for certain because God stands in judgement for both cases, not me, but its point is to illustrate that the Quran is left open ended because not only times and people change, but because we can expand on it depending on the situation.

Conclusion: That brings me back to my first point now that I have laid down my logic. Is it possible that we are not explicitly told why some things are forbidden so that we study them, and through studying them we realize their risks and then it is up to us to contain said risks? Allah would not care who we sleep with, or if we drink and eat pork. Those are rules for us, but by understanding them, we can better our judgement.

As in, when as a kid you are told not to eat an entire chocolate cake, that does not mean it's a rule for the rest of your life. It is a rule until you mature [understand the religion and why certain things are forbidden] that you can then override.

And like when your father said 60 years ago, "Don't invest in real estate" - That does not mean he will be raised from the dead when you do and proclaim his disappointment in you. It just means it might not have been a suitable business plan back then or did not seem worth it.

Anyway, would love to hear your thoughts. Challenge them if you wish or agree, but please remember that it is easy to write a comment, but it is never easy to understand years of thinking through a glance, form an opinion and post it in the span of a couple of minutes. Take your time if you wish.

Most answers I found predated the dreaded AI surge so I am hoping for more updated or experienced replies on pricing and deadline.

A medium sized firm wants a team/project management internal tool with their specifications, mainly focused on managers having an overview of everyone's projects, what deadlines are near and so on without all the bells and whistles that come with most projects out there like Jira or Teams.

Long story short, I decided the architecture for the internal tool is using ASP .NET and PostgreSQL locally hosted, this way if they wish to expand their operations, I can easily move it to a VPS so they can use it from their homes.

My question is, how much do you recommend I ask for to create this application in such an AI saturated market, and in how long? Back in the day it might have been 3k USD for 2 months worth of work. Is it still the same, or has pricing decreased because "Just have AI code it for you, here is your 500 bucks" sort of thing?

And the second question, how should I lay out my offer for setup and maintenance? Is it a standard, "I will install it on your machines and offer maintenance for 1 year and be on call in case an emergency occurs", or does that entail extra fees?

The project is locally hosted as I said, the login system will be simple and most of the work will be put in the UI/UX along with user roles etc.

As a C# desktop developer, I have good experience with things like dedicated servers and their architecture like TCP, UDP along with their authentication, packet structures and so on. You can imagine my surprise when I was playing with ASP.NET last year and saw how easy it was to create a login system for example.

Appreciate it.

I remember seeing before chicken broth that was made in a specific way, maybe by simmering it for a very long time, that it turns white and creamy. Is that actually a thing, and can it be made with an instant pot easily?

26 (m), A left temporal AVM that I didn't know I had ruptured last year. After exhausting the options available, I went in for a Gamma Knife operation. Pain comes and goes mostly in the form of seizures that are often in the form of sharp or pulsating pain. I am very prone to dizziness that can last for hours, or seizures that are reminiscing of a stroke where I have little control over my mouth muscles, tongue and lose my ability to speak.

Question is, am I being cowardly by staying away from adulting until hopefully the Gamma Knife takes effect and the AVM closes up? For example, Just focusing on creating my resume is enough to make me seize up or get irrationally irritated (something that happened after the rupture, don't know if it's psychological or not.) The sun makes me dizzy and activity where I move my head a lot almost feels like the AVM area is flaring up where the pain makes it hard to function, and the fear of rebleeding would happen. After all, I bled while going to sleep so I don't see how doing physical activity is playing it safe.

I do realize I have a traumatic fear of my AVM reopening, and that there is a difference between seizure pain and rebleeding. I decided I am not going to work and instead focus on recovery and light software development from home (which is my career). But some of those around me are afraid for my mental health, that the fear is stopping me from living normally.

From my perspective, I do not mind losing two years of my life in the name of recovery. Better than rebleeding or embarrassing myself at a job because I got a seizure mid-day due to stress, or that because someone called me while I am sleeping and uh oh, I now can't speak for the rest of the day, sort of thing.

I mainly want to wait for two years (8 months have already passed since the operation) so that at least I am not walking around fearing a rebleed. Maybe then the seizure pains and inconveniences won't be too stressful.

I thought about therapy but I don't think it's the best thing for me right now. I get energy spurts here and there, but I don't exercise and I do not work. I still clean, do the dishes etc. Not depressed. Do you have advice for me? Am I overreacting to the fear of pain and the possibility of rebleeding?

They would go, "this is good ahhh i can't believe it" - what is that all about