What was cartoonish, or wrong or mistaken, in Hippyhead's post that you refer to? — tim wood

Cartoonish, pretty much everything. Mainly, the idea that Putin is merely a gangster out for himself, bleeding the people dry so he can build more palaces for himself. It's simplistic and a bit ignorant, I think.

To be fair, I hear it from Russians as well sometimes. I disagree with them too.

I guess the analogy wasn’t clear enough then, because the point of it was that we can (and should) intervene just enough to find out if our help is welcome by the people we think are in need, even without it being explicitly called for. If the apparent victims want us to butt out, we should. We shouldn’t just assume that they want us to, and go headlong into attacking their apparent enemies. — Pfhorrest

Right, fair enough. I thought the analogy was designed just to show that reality is messier than we can know from the outside, and that your own intervention was misjudged, but yes, that makes sense. But crucially, you did intervene, and in the case of humanitarian intervention it may be impossible to draw a line between tentative and full-on intervention (in the analogy, the man attacks you just for butting in where you're not welcome, you defend yourself, etc). And taking your analogy further, the woman may have been too fearful of the man's reprisals to admit that she needed help.

I once saw a man and a woman fighting (physically) in a public place, and out of concern for the woman I stepped in to ask her if she was okay or needed help. They both stopped fighting and explained that it was play fighting and she said she was fine and didn’t need any help, in a believable manner. I’m glad I didn’t just assume she needed my help and wade in punching the guy. — Pfhorrest

The same thing happened to me. I was bitter about the experience.

I hope this analogy is clear — Pfhorrest

Yes, in fact it's a nicely concise way of saying what Marchesk and I subsequently said, about the messy and disastrous realities of intervention.

But obviously I was looking for a clear-cut case: wouldn't you agree that there are cases that are clear-cut enough for pacifism to be morally reprehensible, even without an explicit call for help?

:up:

Great stuff. I'll chew on it.

This also raises issues of why countries like the US or the EU get to intervene. Does that mean China and Russia do as well? — Marchesk

This is an excellent point. In terms of global authority, and even moral authority, the US doesn't have it all its own way, certainly not these days. Among the most powerful countries, each has different interests and priorities, and intervenes in different places supporting different sides. Who has the moral high ground?

One reason I'm more inclined to agree with you, @Pfhorrest, @Daniel, @Coben and others here, against Paul Edwards, is precisely the situation that the question, "who has the moral high ground?" reflects, namely, one in which great powers are competing internationally for influence and authority, and internally for domestic approval. Simply put, I cannot trust the USA to do the right thing, or to attempt to do the right thing carefully. Their meddling overseas has been reckless and destructive, and often makes the world a more dangerous place, even if it is well-meaning. As it happens, I think it is sometimes well-meaning on the part of many of its proponents, and yet also founded on an ignorance about other parts of the world; but just as much, or even more, is it about building up their international stature, spreading their influence, undermining their competing great powers via proxy conflicts, bolstering their public approval back home, and so on. This means that welfare, peace, and justice for ordinary people are not as such the highest priorities. (Much of this can apply to China and Russia too)

By the way, that's part of my answer to my own question above:

A strong man ought to help a frail old lady who is being beaten by someone younger and stronger than she is, even if she is not asking for help. The situation with humanitarian intervention is significantly different from that analogy, but exactly how is it different, and what are the consequences of that difference for the moral rightness or wrongness of intervening? — jamalrob

The situation with humanitarian intervention is significantly different from that analogy, but exactly how is it different, and what are the consequences of that difference for the moral rightness or wrongness of intervening? — jamalrob

Shouldn't the cost of intervening be factored in? A country like the US is often in a position to interfere, but then what are the consequences? You get embroiled in someone else's civil war? Then it turns into another nation building exercise with troops still stationed there a decade later? — Marchesk

Okay, so one answer to my question is that unlike the analogy, the possible costs often outweigh the moral imperative--costs in terms of, say, peace and stability, and in humanitarian terms. Would you want to generalize this to say that US involvement always makes things worse? Or would you say that it's fine under certain conditions? What would those be?

Nothing gives a government or group of people the moral right to intervene in the internal affairs of another country other than a direct attack or a genuine call for help. — Daniel

I’m almost a complete pacifist, and even I’ll say it’s fine to go help someone else under attack if they want it, and they’re in the right in that conflict, and we can afford to stick our necks out for them. — Pfhorrest

But this is difficult to swallow. For both of you, apparently, silent genocide victims ought to be ignored even by countries in a position to help. Aside from the sometime legality of humanitarian intervention under the aegis of the United Nations and international law, moral intuition tells us that innocent victims ought to be helped even if they don't ask for help. A strong man ought to help a frail old lady who is being beaten by someone younger and stronger than she is, even if she is not asking for help. The situation with humanitarian intervention is significantly different from that analogy, but exactly how is it different, and what are the consequences of that difference for the moral rightness or wrongness of intervening?

I am not arguing for @Paul Edwards's position, and I am not saying you are both wrong, but I don't feel that his challenges have been fully met.

@Benkei What's your view?

Yes, good point. In fact, I was just thinking that I'm not quite clear on what the "liberal" in liberal imperialism and liberal intervention actually means.

We should use language which makes the distinction between the two clear. — Hippyhead

It's good that you want to be careful with your language, so I applaud you for that. But the language you use when you're trying to use language carefully, as in this last post of yours, is not much better. You have a cartoonish view of the Russian state.

I honestly think the focus on Russia has largely been played for the domestic audience: It's Russia which 'explains Trump', and not the fact that the democratic party is a hollow waste of space that no one cares for if it wasn't for the even larger unmitigated disaster that is Trump. Also Trump is friendly to Big Bad Russian Tyrant, and Democrats are not, so please vote for us. That's not the whole story of course - Russian support for Iran no doubt plays into it, especially if the neocons are trying to weasel their way into democratic FP decision making. The animosity to Russia makes very little strategic sense for me otherwise. Any clues? — StreetlightX

That's what I was thinking, but I think there's more to it. I think that Biden sincerely believes in doing everything he can to undermine Russian influence and power, partly to enhance American legitimacy and moral authority, but partly because he has delusions that the Russian people want American help. If we look at Biden's track record and that of the Obama/Clinton administration that he was a part of (Ukraine 2013/2014), his currently stated position on Russia is totally consistent with that, in which case he might be seeking to continue and intensify the cold war against Russia.

I just realized I may have to clarify something for suspicious readers: my criticism of liberal imperialism here is not in any way connected with the criticisms of liberalism that have occasionally been heard from the Russian government and leadership over the past few years, and my opposition to American cold warriors should not be seen as support for authoritarian rule.

Hm, I must be paranoid about being seen as a Putin apologist.

As our reward we now get to enjoy some (certainly not all) snooty Europeans lecturing us about what baby killing war mongers we are pretty much any time we try to liberate from bondage any one else in the world. — Hippyhead

I'm not sure who you're referring to here, but note that the authors of the article that prompted the discussion and that I linked to and briefly wrote about in the OP, are American, and they don't mention the killing of babies.

My instinctive position on the matter is probably obvious from the OP, but it's partly just that: instinctive. I'm open to other views. I was looking for some serious analysis from people who know more than me.

Paul Edwards makes the case for aggressive military action to overthrow despots.

In that thread I applaud the clarity of his moral vision, while debating some of his suggested tactics. Personally, that seems a constructive way to proceed on such topics. — Hippyhead

I've read that discussion. To me it's a very unattractive, rather deluded and unhinged vision.

BUSH: Would you like to see Saddam back in power?

OBAMA: Would you like to see Al-Qaeda restored to it's former glory?

TRUMP: Bring back the Islamic State? — Hippyhead

Not for me thanks. Aside from the crucial fact that at least one of these achievements has been won at great cost to the people in the region, and aside from the prior role of the US in maintaining Saddam in power, in the growth of al-Qaeda, and in opening a space for the growth of ISIS by invading Iraq and then allowing the country's disintegration--aside from all of that, the US has done some good things, but it still doesn't follow that US liberal interventionism is, currently, a wise way forward that will make things better on the whole. By "liberal interventionism" I'm referring to efforts ostensibly to spread democracy or help suffering populations by means of interference in sovereign states: meddling in elections, imposing sanctions and other economic punishments, sponsoring opposition groups, regime change by direct military force, and so on. Arguably, destroying al-Qaeda and ISIS on its own doesn't commit you to the full liberal interventionist program.

Good points, especially about Iran, which is where Biden obviously doesn't fit with the neocons. What led me to this stuff in the first place was my narrow focus on Biden's aggressive attitude to Russia.

They wish to wipe the Iranian REGIME off the face of the earth. So do most Iranians best I can tell. — Hippyhead

Even if that's true, it doesn't mean they want the US to do it for them.

1) Have you ever been to America?

I've seen it from the Canadian Falls at Niagara. Does that count?

2) At what point in American history did you become an adult?

The era of R. Reagan and F. Bueller.

Near as I can tell his appeal is to the stupid, the ignorant, the uneducated, the racist, the white man with antebellum southern sensitivities and a sense of entitlement to return to a pre-13th amendment country — tim wood

To add to @Baphomet's posts, which directly confront Tim's comments, I think it's also important to understand the class-based and ideological nature of this kind of prejudice. To that end, it's worth going back to this Jacobin article from 2016:

Burying White Workers

It's worth reading in full.

As an aside, there's one particularly interesting part of the article that goes some way to explain how all this class hatred sits so happily alongside woke identity politics:

Despite off-the-charts wealth inequality, Democratic Party liberals have been concerned not with an egalitarian reckoning to unite the have-nots against the haves but with inclusion: bringing different “interest groups” into the professional class while managing everyone else’s expectations downward.

This kind of “inclusion” politics — the chance at climbing one of a tiny handful of rickety ladders to the top — is the only economic program the Democratic Party mainstream is selling to those not already in the upper tiers. Sure, this politics is better than nothing. But as Ralph Miliband put it, “access to positions of power by members of the subordinate classes does not change the fact of domination: it only changes its personnel.”

Standing outside of this shift, unmoved and — as the Democratic Party sees it — ungrateful, are white workers. Not just those silver-haired remnants from the unionized, manufacturing heyday whose jobs have been offshored or, more likely, de-unionized, but the vast swath who’ve been forced to adjust to the new norm of low-wage, flexible, service-sector hell. Even with the college degree and boatload of debt needed to obtain it.

Part of the explanation is that unlike with white workers, many of the hardships workers of color face fit neatly within an acceptable liberal narrative about what’s wrong with our society: racism. And when racism can be blamed, capitalism can be exonerated.

Liberals can delude themselves into believing that it is nothing more than the accumulation of individual prejudices stashed away in the minds of powerful white people that has destroyed black and brown communities in Detroit, Ferguson, and Chicago’s South Side.

Class stratification, capital flight, and the war against organized labor are thus sidestepped completely. The liberal elite is spared from having to question the fundamental injustices of capitalism.

But as far as I can see as an outsider, most of the American Left choose to ignore this and just throw in their lot with the liberals. Leftists, correct me if I'm wrong.

Great post.

Reflecting that, American anti-Russian sentiment, which Russians are sensitive to, has been getting significantly worse since 2013, according to this Wikipedia article. — jamalrob

Incidentally, I recently went to see the movie Tenet here in Moscow. The audience found Kenneth Branagh’s cartoon Russian villain and the other Russian references hilarious.

But probably not. — StreetlightX

Indeed, I guess nothing except a resounding Trump victory could have made that happen. Even in that case, I actually find it impossible to imagine them confronting it at all.

Is that not a new development since the advent of Trump-Russia collusion? I remember in 2017 thinking it strange that it was the Democrats not the Republicans who were making such a big deal about how Russia Is Bad. — Pfhorrest

That was my understanding too, but I think it’s part of a longer term decline in relations. Reflecting that, American anti-Russian sentiment, which Russians are sensitive to, has been getting significantly worse since 2013, according to this Wikipedia article.

I agree, but go easy on him. He has a pathological condition in which any mention of Russia sends him into a bloodthirsty frenzy.

You seem not to understand Russians at all. — ssu

Lack of understanding has never stopped him before.

Well, it's not up to me. My people will decide.

Busy sorry

In fact, it's not a problem. I presented it like that for fun, just to see how you'd all react.

It's rational. She's Russian and wants the best for her country. The Democrats are the anti-Russia party, and there's the expectation of new sanctions and other economic problems that will likely get worse with Biden in charge.

My wife is pro-Trump. What should I do?

You called?

EDIT: oh I see, no: Hippyhead.

You're forgetting, HH: everything right now is the worst it could ever be and we're at the final crisis point.

As always. :wink:

I am somewhere between Epicurus/Aristotle & Aristippus on the pleasure question, but even the latter taught that the pursuit of physical pleasure should be restrained by moral concerns. — Saphsin

Thanks, I didn't know that Aristippus and his crew were hedonists to the degree that they were. In what way did he think that there should be a moral restraint?

Do you think the observation of the impoverished life being widespread and the lack of opportunities to pursue such pleasure for many people may have been a contributing factor? — Saphsin

I'll interpret this question in two ways.

(1) Philosophers themselves have lacked those opportunities and have become scornful or suspicious of bodily pleasures and the physical world in general because of that, just like the "incels who glorify aceticism" that I mentioned.

(2) Or philosophers, noticing that most people live impoverished lives in which they have little chance of indulging in bodily pleasure; or little chance of indulging in bodily pleasures in an artful, varied, endlessly stimulating way; or without the danger of great suffering; noticing all that, philosophers put forth propaganda to make the people feel better about it. That is, they want to spread a message of self-abnegation to help people cope with their impoverished lives.

I now think that you mean (2), but I originally thought you meant (1). Maybe I hadn't read it properly. I'll look at both anyway.

(1) Nietzsche is interesting here. He's not a hedonist, because he celebrates pain as much as pleasure, but he does attack the "despisers of the body", and even if he just had Christians in mind, maybe we could add some of the philosophers too. For Nietzsche, a life without a variety of bodily pleasures and pains is an impoverished one.

Your question, then: could this very impoverishment lead philosophers to despise the body?

"Body am I, and soul"—so saith the child. And why should one not speak like children?

But the awakened one, the knowing one, saith: "Body am I entirely, and nothing more; and soul is only the name of something in the body."

The body is a big sagacity, a plurality with one sense, a war and a peace, a flock and a shepherd.

An instrument of thy body is also thy little sagacity, my brother, which thou callest "spirit"—a little instrument and plaything of thy big sagacity.

"Ego," sayest thou, and art proud of that word. But the greater thing—in which thou art unwilling to believe—is thy body with its big sagacity; it saith not "ego," but doeth it.

What the sense feeleth, what the spirit discerneth, hath never its end in itself. But sense and spirit would fain persuade thee that they are the end of all things: so vain are they.

Instruments and playthings are sense and spirit: behind them there is still the Self. The Self seeketh with the eyes of the senses, it hearkeneth also with the ears of the spirit.

Ever hearkeneth the Self, and seeketh; it compareth, mastereth, conquereth, and destroyeth. It ruleth, and is also the ego's ruler.

Behind thy thoughts and feelings, my brother, there is a mighty lord, an unknown sage—it is called Self; it dwelleth in thy body, it is thy body.

There is more sagacity in thy body than in thy best wisdom. And who then knoweth why thy body requireth just thy best wisdom?

Thy Self laugheth at thine ego, and its proud prancings. "What are these prancings and flights of thought unto me?" it saith to itself. "A by-way to my purpose. I am the leading-string of the ego, and the prompter of its notions."

The Self saith unto the ego: "Feel pain!" And thereupon it suffereth, and thinketh how it may put an end thereto—and for that very purpose it is meant to think.

The Self saith unto the ego: "Feel pleasure!" Thereupon it rejoiceth, and thinketh how it may ofttimes rejoice—and for that very purpose it is meant to think.

To the despisers of the body will I speak a word. That they despise is caused by their esteem. What is it that created esteeming and despising and worth and will?

The creating Self created for itself esteeming and despising, it created for itself joy and woe. The creating body created for itself spirit, as a hand to its will.

Even in your folly and despising ye each serve your Self, ye despisers of the body. I tell you, your very Self wanteth to die, and turneth away from life.

No longer can your Self do that which it desireth most:—create beyond itself. That is what it desireth most; that is all its fervour.

But it is now too late to do so:—so your Self wisheth to succumb, ye despisers of the body.

To succumb—so wisheth your Self; and therefore have ye become despisers of the body. For ye can no longer create beyond yourselves.

And therefore are ye now angry with life and with the earth. And unconscious envy is in the sidelong look of your contempt.

I go not your way, ye despisers of the body! — Nietzsche, Thus Spoke Zarathustra

So according to Nietzsche, the answer is yes. This is a form of ressentiment.

The idea appeals to me, but I don't know if it's true of philosophers, so much as, say, religious fanatics, puritans, Christian moralists, etc. In any case, in response to the OP, it does suggest that Sex & Drugs & Rock & Roll indeed ought to be "part of the philosopher's quest".

As for the other interpretation of the question...

(2) On one hand, no: it seems to me that philosophers sometimes almost define the common people as those who go through life indulging themselves in eating, drinking, and sexing too much. Their lives are not impoverished enough when it comes to pleasure or self-indulgence. On the other hand, yes: philosophers have offered ways of dealing with worldly suffering, like the Stoics and others who advocate caution at the very least: enjoy yourself occasionally but don't go crazy cos it'll end in tears. So I think it's a good point, but it very much depends on the historical and social context, and the motivations of the philosophers.

This question arose in my thinking about the answers put forward in a thread about the ethics of masturbation. I was astounded by the puritanical thinking ... — Jack Cummins

I was too, when I first joined the original philosophy forum. It's tempting to dismiss it, as if it's just a problem with incels who glorify aceticism and the life of the mind because they can't enjoy the life of the body. But that won't do, because the attitude seems to be shared by many of the great philosophers, not least Plato. The basic dichotomy is between the rational mind (the soul) and the corrupting and deceiving world around us, the world we sense and enjoy and suffer from. So the roots are deeper than Kant and Christianity. Maybe we can pin the blame on the Buddha and Plato.

There were other Greeks who were less sniffy about pleasure, like Aristotle and Epicurus. For Aristotle, pleasure isn't to be denounced or celebrated: it's necessary for a good life, but everything in moderation. Epicurus thought it was fine to enjoy a nice meal but mainly because when you're satisfied after eating it, you cease to want, and this ease and satisfaction is where the best pleasure lies.

I think there is something of Plato's scorn remaining here:

It is not by an unbroken succession of drinking bouts and of revelry, not by sexual lust, nor the enjoyment of fish and other delicacies of a luxurious table, which produce a pleasant life; it is sober reasoning, searching out the grounds of every choice and avoidance, and banishing those beliefs through which the greatest tumults take possession of the soul. — Epicurus, Letter to Menoeceus

Nothing says FUN! like sober reasoning, eh?

It seems doubtful that there can be a philosophy that celebrates physical pleasure, that celebrates an unbroken succession of drinking bouts. After all, philosophy is inherently inclined to favour the life of the mind, because that's what philosophy is. And who would challenge the view that indulging in nothing but drinking and lusting doesn't make for a great life? I'm not sure if any philosophers positively celebrate wild pleasure. The Marquis de Sade, perhaps.

In our somewhat Abrahamic context, we might see Epicurus and Aristotle and especially Plato as moralizers, but this might be an anachronism. It might be better to think of their criticisms of kinds of pleasure as pragmatic, as the criticism of ways of life that impede happiness, or flourishing, or finding the truth. In which case, maybe their similarity to the puritanical people to be found on forums like this is only apparent.

The only other country that deserves as much vitriol directed it's way is China — StreetlightX

Is China then a "shitty country filled with shitty people"?

It doesn't matter how you try to dress up your outburst. That you attempt a justification rather than just concede that it was an outburst is even worse. This is what makes you a bigot rather than just someone who lost it for a moment and said something bigoted.

The fact is, you attacked a people and tried to put yourself above them. You can't justify this with a critique of neoliberalism, any more than you can justify a hatred of Muslims with a critique of Islamism.

In any case America has been a tumor for the last 100 years, it's a shitty country filled with shitty people who have made the world a worse place to be for everyone. — StreetlightX

The good points you often make about American politics are entirely undermined by this vile bigotry. Just stop.

Good day to you sir.

I'm not sure what to say, TMF. I can't get my head around what you're saying at all, and I think I've said all I want to say, so maybe @Gnomon, @aylon or @tim wood could say something.

And for God's sake drop the "pyramid of life", and "game of evolution" phrases. I'm out :razz:

However, you mentioned that there's a microbe with a population of (2.8 to 3.0) × 10^27, a mind-boggling number that make humans look like they're on the verge of extinction. What this means is population, by itself, won't do the job in ensuring that humans retain their position at the top of the pyramid of life. Something's not right. — TheMadFool

This in particular is mind-bogglingly crazy. Seriously, unless someone can point out my own prejudices, this has gotta be one of the craziest thoughts I've ever seen written down on this forum.

It's just weird. Maybe I'm missing the point. You want a metric that reflects the dominance of human beings? Like, a number? Why not use other measures, such as intelligence, or "when a single species multiplies with little to no hindrance from predation and begins to expand their territory into all available ecological niches, sustains it to such a level that other organisms are outcompeted and driven to extinction." I mean, you already defined dominance so as to make humans come out on top, so what more do you need?

Don't you agree that technology, a product of intelligence, has made it possible for humans to expand their reach into different, even extreme habitats from the hot equatorial deserts to the cold arctic, at rates orders of magnitude greater than the much much slower process of evolution? I mean, if we had to depend on evolution to make the arctic landscape our home then it would take millions of years but we've, with technology, accomplished that in a fraction of that time. — TheMadFool

It's about more than just intelligence, but sure, I agree.

Intelligence, in my humble opinion, is an ability that any organism, with sufficient complexity, can acquire. Humans don't have copyright over intelligence and if it has served us well then, what prevents another organism from reaping similar benefits? — TheMadFool

It's weird to say that any organism can acquire intelligence, but otherwise, yes, other animals are intelligent, as I pointed out to you in my first post. Other species do indeed "reap similar benefits", if by that you mean some kind of evolutionary success. Every day I see hooded crows behaving intelligently, and they clearly dominate the bird life in the area I live in.

Allow me to define dominance: it occurs when a single species multiplies with little to no hindrance from predation and begins to expand their territory into all available ecological niches, sustains it to such a level that other organisms are outcompeted and driven to extinction.

Are humans not the dominant species on the planet? — TheMadFool

I'm undecided if this is an interesting or useful definition or question, but I'll answer yes for the sake of argument. What now?

In other words:

Okay, let's say that humans are the dominant species, and yes, we benefited very significantly from intelligence, and yes, other animals can be intelligent. What, then, is your next step?

I'm going to speculate as to why an intelligent person like you might think that the apparent dominance of human beings on Earth is evidence that intelligence is a general advantage in evolution.

I think you have a conception of evolution as a game with a winner, and from your point of view, humans have won the gold medal. Since humans have succeeded owing largely to their intelligence (this is fair), then intelligence must be an advantage in evolution.

But notice that this conclusion simply doesn't follow, just in terms of basic logic. All that follows is that intelligence was an advantage for us. Imagine: some cyanobacteria wipes out human beings (it's possible) and becomes, in your terms, the dominant organism on Earth. In its case, it had nothing to do with intelligence.

In any case, what is dominance, exactly? What makes humans dominant over cyanobacteria?

humans are at the top of the food chain — TheMadFool

They're not: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/where-do-humans-really-rank-on-the-food-chain-180948053/

Please think about it some more, and read at least some of the paper I quoted. And please name a fact that I have denied, as you claim.

What you've pointed out can be explained by saying that for humans, in the environment in which they evolved, intelligence was an advantage and increased at an unprecedented rate. You've made no argument for, and have given no evidence of, a general advantage across the tree of life.

@TheMadFool: Here's some discussion about the evolution of general intelligence that might shine some light on what I'm saying. The context is primates only, but it might give you an idea of how difficult it is to claim that intelligence is a general advantage.

Some species have larger brains than others, which, at least in primates, is associated with higher G [general intelligence]. Why did these species respond to domain-specific selection pressures with an increase in general intelligence, or cope with environmental unpredictability by increasing their brain and intelligence, rather than opting for alternative, domain-specific adaptations?

To answer these questions, it is important to keep in mind that the conditions under which large brains can evolve are to a substantial degree restricted by their costs (Isler & van Schaik 2014). Brains are energy-hungry organs that consume a large proportion of the energy available to an organism, particularly in growing immatures. Thus, natural selection more readily favors an increase in brain size when this leads to an increase in net energy intake, a reduction in its variance, or ideally both. Furthermore, a big brain slows down the organism’s development, which means that a species’ ability to slow down its life history is a fundamental precondition for its opportunity to evolve larger brain size. Accordingly, the life-history filter approach (van Schaik et al. 2012) shows that slowing down life history, and thus evolving a larger brain, is only possible for species that can increase adult survival and are not subject to unavoidable extrinsic mortality, such as high predation pressure. Isler and van Schaik (2014) have shown that such a cost perspective can explain a substantial amount of variation in brain size across primates, and that allomaternal care plays an important role in accommodating the costs associated with bigger brains (in particular, because food subsidies by allomothers help pay for the energetic costs of the growing immatures, and because of life-history consequences; see also Burkart 2017).

Natural selection thus evaluates the net fitness benefit of a bigger brain, which also takes the costs into account. The balance of benefits and costs is critically influenced by how efficiently an individual can translate brain tissue (or general cognitive potential) into survival-increasing innovations – that is, knowledge and skills. — The evolution of general intelligence, BEHAVIORAL AND BRAIN SCIENCES 2017

https://www.eva.mpg.de/documents/Cambridge/Amici_Coexistance_BehBrainSci_2017_2476762.pdf

The paper begins from the common thought in biology that, far from being a general advantage, the presence of intelligence on Earth is a puzzle that needs to be explained.

Here's one (simplistic, semi-metaphorical) way to look at things. In a species with high general intelligence, evolution has offloaded the problem of survival to the individual and social behaviour of that species--it's up to them to solve their own problems using their general intelligence--but in most other species, niche-specific traits have evolved to cope with the environment, as if natural selection has solved the problems itself. Bears don't need to be intelligent enough to make warm clothing.

Thus, general intelligence confers advantages only in some cases.

I have never had a near death experience.

Surely this is the only mark to which people have any authority on the issue — The Opposite

Do you mean that nobody can have expertise in or knowledge of NDEs unless they have had one? That's a bit severe. Imagine applying that standard to psychology and psychiatry in general. It would mean that only schizophrenics could speak with authority on schizophrenia. But in fact, it's often precisely those who are not relying on their personal experience who contribute to our knowledge.

You need to put more on the table than flat assertions. — TheMadFool

This coming from the person who says that intelligence is a general evolutionary advantage, for which there is no evidence, for which there has been no argument (aside from pointing at the development of human civilization), and which doesn't even have any clear meaning in evolutionary biology (what is intelligence?).

Are you saying that if two organisms, one intelligent and the other not, they would both fare about the same in the game of survival? — TheMadFool

Aside from the basic meaninglessness of this question, as I've been saying, it depends. Look around at the species on Earth. The evidence is that intelligence is not required, certainly not always required, for success. On top of that, there are many ways in which intelligence could be a hindrance. My guess is that it would be a hindrance in most environments and for most organisms. I don't see how it could help bacteria or spiders. One problem: big brains are very costly to maintain.

Surely, at least to my knowledge, intelligence at any and all scales of existence is a clear advantage. An intelligent organism will be able to pick the best spots and the right time to do whatever it is they want to do unlike one that isn't intelligent, giving it an edge in the competition. — TheMadFool

This is plain wrong, and you need to think about evolution and biodiversity very differently to correct your misconceptions. I've tried telling you politely.

These days I wouldn't usually link to Quora, which has degenerated horribly over the past 5-10 years, but many of the answers here get across the general gist: Higher intelligence provides a clear evolutionary advantage, so why haven't more animals developed this?

As one of them says, "Evolution doesn't work that way."