The molecule is more likely to be in a place of higher oxygen density than not (per given volume) but every oxygen molecule has an equal chance of being the particular molecule you're after regardless of location (all things being equal). Say you are looking for a cat and you know there are four cats in your house and one outside somewhere in the neighborhood. You'd look in your house first because it's easier, but no one cat in your house has any greater likelihood of being the cat you want than the one outside.

Flynn will definitely cop it, I reckon, but Trump will hobble on, horribly damaged, but still shouting "Fake news! Fake news!" to a dwindling flock of sycophants and fanboys unless dear Jared goes down and then he'll sink like a punctured liner.

If it gets to Kushner, Trump is toast and Pence's daily diet of shit sandwiches may start to seem sweeter.

Obama had to repair the broken auto. Trump merely stepped in after he got it running. And you're crediting him with what? Not crashing it again in a few months after taking office. OK, well, that's a low bar.

Of course, Wall St is going to benefit from deregulation and promised tax breaks. Note that the benefits are going to the rich. As for the second statistic, Obama had 3% quarters too. So what? You have about an overall 2.1% growth rate under Trump so far. Talk about fake news...

https://www.marketwatch.com/story/trumps-first-9-months-the-economy-and-markets-are-ok-but-not-the-greatest-ever-2017-10-20

Luckily you would never dream of spreading Trump propaganda. When you do it, it's just telling the truth! ;)

Been there. Lovely place. Nice renditions (Y)

Sorry meant to reply to this. No real conscious commentary there but sounds fine to me.

Not sure all these discussions should be in the Question category actually. Need a little time on this one.

Ok. I'll do that anon.

Objection noted.

I put it in the question category while at the same time wanting to emphasize it does not concern a philosophical mystery (at least that's the developing consensus).

(Moved to "Questions" category. This is not Philosophy of Science, it is confusion about science.)

Three then. Abort mission.

How many lightbulb jokes does it take to screw a comedian?

Good point.



My melancholy manifests itself in a kind of restless good cheer these days, rather than anxiety which is the killer, so I am indeed armed with a lamp though what it illuminates is open to question.

That would be my approach but it doesn't come in a bottle at the local supermarket. Telling a melancholic person to just laugh at it all is unlikely to work.

Sandwiches give me nausea. Anyhow, Sartre wasn't a exactly a barrel of laughs. The condolences of existentialism are just that. Condolences are offered to the suffering. On the other hand I doubt many would trade away their intelligence or their melancholy to be Mill's fool, so I'll settle for the sandwiches and the nausea (and an oxygen tent??).

Yes, I always do that. (Y)

Ernest Hemingway — ‘Happiness in intelligent people is the rarest thing I know.’

Philosophers are at a disadvantage from the start.

If your functional disorders need a thorough profiling, it will be a psychologist who does that. If there seems to be something wrong with your brain or CNS, you'll see a neurologist. If it's behavior that is the problem, and it is severe -- then you need a psychiatrist. Or, if you need to have a long, long talk with somebody, psychologists are the best bet. — Bitter Crank

Well put. I think there is definitely an issue of psychiatric overreach, but it's unfair to demonize the entire profession for that. Rapid cycling bipolar disorder, for example, is something that probably requires a psychiatrist; regular depression, probably not, in my view.

(Today's WAPO. Full article behind paywall)

My answer again, political partisanship. Must be incredibly frustrating for them.

So I propose an alternative: lust for growth derives from fear of Them. — Banno

Yes, although there is also the (mostly) post-enlightenment lust for knowledge, which leads (in the realm of technology) to innovation, greater efficiency and savings, surpluses, and therefore growth. Maybe this isn't cleanly separable from the simple lust for material wealth, and military technology is certainly largely based on fear of them, but there's a bit of a knot to untangle.

Sapientia posts posts postily.

That's it.

How many knock knocks does it take a rabbit to cross a lightbulb?
Gavan
Gavan who?
Gavangi

*Returns serve* (You don't get to gerrymander the terms of the debate to immunize yourself against evidence). Tangent over. Hopefully.

Oh yeah the GREAT Scandinavia :-} - Scandinavia is not peaceful at all. Anders Brevik was from there for example. There are also many Neo-Nazi groups in those Nordic countries too.

And to judge the "peacefulness" of Western society based on less than 100 years from what were the 2 most brutal and bloody conflicts in human history is childish. — Agustino

There you go again...Reality = Iceland and Denmark are in the top five most peaceful countries in the world and the top 20 is dominated by western liberal democracies.

https://www.statista.com/statistics/273159/most-peaceful-countries-in-the-global-peace-index/

You can have the last word on the rest.

I know that feeling. (Y)

Oh? Then what are we doing in advertising and marketing if not inflaming already existent and basic human desires, re-directing them, and so on so forth? :s What are we doing in psychotherapy, psychoanalysis, moral philosophy, etc. if not trying to change our structure of desire? — Agustino

You've answered your own criticism, to change the structure of something is not to distill it out. How can one change the structure of something that is no longer there. :s

That is true, but to suppose that human beings are primates in the same sense that chimps are is folly — Agustino

I don't. Note the difference between being "like" (in some respects) and being the "same".

Reason can indeed only work with what it is given, but what is given isn't biological in large majority, but culturally mediated. — Agustino

Sure, biology is culturally mediated as is reason itself, and we are disputing extent.

All religions, but especially Christianity and some forms of Buddhism encourage the abandonment of imitative desire as the solution to the ills of the world. — Agustino

Again, sure. And how does that work out in practice and why?

Your liberal society is not liberal at all, but illiberal. When rivalry is allowed to run amok, nobody can enjoy the object of desire - everyone is busy killing each other off, outplaying each other, competing, etc. - we all become fascinated with the rival, and the rival is more punishing than any law would be. — Agustino

Kind of sounds like we're a bunch of chimps or something. :)

Just because there is choice does not mean that there is freedom. The two shouldn't be confused. — Agustino

Amen.

In one sense, I do understand why society is becoming "liberal" - sacrificial mechanisms no longer work to keep the peace. But this becoming more "liberal" is identical with becoming more violent - violence becomes harder to control. — Agustino

And yet the most liberal societies (e.g.western Europe, particularly Scandinavia) are among the most peaceful that have ever existed. :s

Right, you take the naive view that they are already inflamed, increased and redirected - naturally. Just look at chimps — Agustino

Hmm, but... Nevermind.

Actually, society does need radical reform. I'm with you there. I'm probably not with you in terms of the type of reform or the extent of its effects.

Well, this is it, really. — TimeLine

I grant it may not be useful to have gone off on this tangent with Agu. I didn't intend to distract from the practical side of this issue.

Actually, more than a few...

But you seem to deny that these primary desires can be inflamed, increased and redirected by many factors — Agustino

No.

Yes, but in my view you tend to overestimate their influence and underestimate our natural tendency towards "evil" or "sin", or whatever you want to call it, in the sexual arena. — Baden

Sure, I don't disagree with that or with all of Agu's cultural criticisms. I just see biology as playing a bigger role than he does and am skeptical of the weight he gives to the Hollywood etc influence on sexual misbehavior. — Baden

Which makes much of the rest of your post irrelevant. It's easy to argue against a caricature of someone's position. There are some relevant points of disagreement in there though which I'll dig out anon.

OK, maybe some people did. Yes, let's not go there.

and also stop saying it's acceptable or that women like it really. — unenlightened

Who said that?

@unenlightened
Put it another way, I want harsher punishments and more awareness within the context of a liberal society while recognizing the problem is not going to just go away. Agustino seems to think that a liberal society itself is the problem.

It's not a mitigating factor at all or an excuse. Who says it was? Have I not been obvious enough from the start that I have no sympathy for HW and his ilk? But dominance hierarchies are a fundamental underlying organizing principle for human behavior. Hollywood, not so much.

Sure, I don't disagree with that or with all of Agu's cultural criticisms. I just see biology as playing a bigger role than he does and am skeptical of the weight he gives to the Hollywood etc influence on sexual misbehavior.

That's why we have to attack the root cause, which isn't power and desire, but rather that which puts those desires in our mind in the first place — Agustino

That would be biology. Dominance hierarchies are natural in primates like us (and many other species) and the main reason to be on the top is access to mates (for males at least). If you look at Franz de Waal's work on chimpanzees, for example, you'll see how closely chimp politics resembles our own. You seem to think you can reprogram human behaviour from the top down and somehow distill out desires that have a natural basis. You can't. You can only repress them.

Yes, biology does play a role, but it is only aided by culture that it can produce such desires. Why do you attribute a sufficient role to biology alone to produce such effects of conflict and rivalry, and hence sin and immorality? — Agustino

Because we are primates, and that's the way primates act. Culture can only mould the clay its given. Anyway, I don't know if you've laid out your version of Plato's Republic in another discussion in which case I'll take a look at it (or you could do so in a new discussion) but this discussion probably calls for more practical solutions.

Like, think about yourself. The first memories I have of my sexual desire aren't of some biological kind but rather I remember hearing around, in music, etc. that real grown up men have sex with women, so then I started to desire it. That's how I actually got to having that desire. Then over time I started to see that men who had sex with more women were admired more than those who didn't, so then I started to desire that too, because I thought that's what it takes to be a real man. I didn't learn all that myself now, that's what society taught me. I suppose that if I was left alone with no such messages, I would have had to wait until I actually fell in love or was biologically attracted to a woman and figure things out for myself from there on. But that's not how it happened. I was taught that these women are hot, these women are not hot, etc. — Agustino

I hit puberty and then I wanted to get as much sex as possible. And I don't think its much more complicated for most teenage boys than that (Hollywood or no).

Another positive change would be to get people to stop voting for sexual predators for President. It sends a horrible message when the punishment for sexual harassment, disrespect and degradation is promotion to the highest office in the land. I'd like to think Trump would be the last one but with the levels of polarization in American politics, I wouldn't rule out the mistake being repeated.

Americans are tribal — Baden

I should note there are some honourable exceptions. A few writers on redstate.com (no bastion of liberalism!), for example, have been very critical of Trump's sexual misbehaviour and I presume there are liberal writers that properly hold Clinton to account. It does seem to be more the exception than the rule though, sadly.