Common question: Half full or half empty?

Question

People commonly ask if the glass is half full or empty, but I think it depends. If your filling the glass up and stops halfway its half full. If it was being emptied out and stops halfway then its half empty. What are your opinions?

Answer 1

If your filling it up and stop you left it half empty and if your drinking it and stop you left it half full.

Answer 2

I disagree with you there if you have a full glass and you are dumping it out and you stop halfway I believe it is still half full. Then again I also believe that if you are filling it and you stop halfway it is still half full. I guess I'm just one of those, "the glass is half full" kind of people.  

Answer 3

I think you got it  wrong. This eternal cliche on optimism  and pessimism  is not about the person who either pouring liquid into or out of the glass.It is about the people , like you and me , who happen to see a galss with some liquid  in it. If someone were to ask you what you see  you might say that you see a glass  half full. I , on the other hand , might say that I see a half empty  glass. It is a diffenece in perception . This has been blown out of proportion.

Answer 4

It is half full as well as it is half empty . If we see life in that view we will never get disappointments .

Answer 5

damet! that's EXACTLY what i was going to say!!!!  wow someone else shares my opinion! you rock!

Answer 6

It's still half full.

Answer 7

Either-or-ness is a limiting concept of the dualistic mind.  Beyond the minds perception of positionality it is obvious that the glass is both half full and empty while simultaneously neither.  Duality and positionality always brings up conflict of the opposite position.  Non-duality is allowing rather than forcing.

Answer 8

This is a question of language and phrasing.  You could just say, "Its holding capacity is at the halfway point" (or rather, its capacity) and avoid the whole judgment thing.  Admittedly, it's not as concise, but sometimes it's necessary to be a bit wordy in order to be clear, or non-committal, or whatever.  

And even if you're filling the glass and stop halfway, it's still both half full and half empty.  

Ha!  You could say it's half emptyfull.   :-)

Answer 9

The glass is full; without liquid there can be no measure.

Answer 10

Its either your a optimist or pessimist. That is all, its called an analogy its not meant to be measured.

Answer 11

The glass is too big.  It can hold a lot more.

Answer 12

It can be both. It depends on how you see it, at any given circumstances. It definitely has the potential to become more full or more empty. But on the other hand, what is "full" and what is "empty"?You lose something and you gain something else. And vice versa.

Answer 13

Half full.

Answer 14

You've just told us how you view life.

Answer 15

Unless you have somehow created a vacuum in the top half of the glass, it is entirely full.  Half is full of water, half is full of air.

Answer 16

It depends on what life deals you. Whether it was half-full or half-empty it would depend more on what it was half-full or half-empty of. Water, Milk, Garbage, Wine, Mud.....

Answer 17

It's both, it takes a more complicated mature mind to see that.