To Invest or Not to Invest?

Due to the recent collapse of the economy, millions of people have lost millions of dollars as a result of plummeting stocks. A lot of people have lost their confidence in the stock market, and they have a lot of questions regarding it? When will it be safe, if ever, to invest again? Do the benefits of investing outweigh the risks (costs)? If I do decide to invest in the future, how do I protect myself and my finances from having to recover from this downfall again?
The truth is no one has the definite answer to any of these questions, but coinincidently nothing about the stock market is definite. New "experts" come out every week predicting when the stock market will turn around but none of them really know. For some investors, the benefits of investing will outweigh the costs, but for others it wont. In the stock market, there is really no guarantee of anything, and this was true long before the recession. In spite of this fact, the fact still remains that our economy cannot truly thrive unless we do invest. With that in mind, we cannot truly financially thrive without investing. This recession has actually created a window of opportunity to make a substantial profit (http://money.cnn.com/2009/02/13/pf/light_lesson_crash.moneymag/index.htm?postversion=2009021706). For the first time in American history, this recession has managed to make the prices of stock cheap. Now is the perfect time to purchase cheap but promising stock and wait for a great return!