It's a rather intriguing dilemma if you ask me.

Either you nationalize the health sector or you privatize it.

If you nationalize the health sector, more people can afford healthcare but quality takes a hit.

If you privatize the healthsector, quality is A1 but fewer people can afford it.

Also, why is (junk) food easy on the pocket but treatment of obesity-related issues expensive? Why is smoking cheaper than treatment for lung cancer? It's as if the state, that's us actually, finds it highly profitable to make us sick first and then treat us for that sickness.

I'll first make you buy the poison dirt cheap and then once you fall ill I'll make you pay through your nose for the antidote. — The State

Reminds me of Fregoli Delusion.

The Fregoli delusion is a rare disorder in which a person holds a delusional belief that different people are in fact a single person who changes appearance or is in disguise. — Wikipedia

No, no, I want to see it from your point of view.
— TheMadFool
Then you'd need to give up anekantavada.

That's why I want to know what your assumptions are.
That anekantavada is a non-viable outlook on life, given that one who practices it will be crushed by other people. — baker

The goal of SPI (Indian Protection Service) was to protect the well-being of natives, and Cândido Rondon created its motto: die if need be, never kill. — Wikipedia

See, you're not practicing anekantavada.
Q.E.D. — baker

No, no, I want to see it from your point of view. That's why I want to know what your assumptions are.

It deserves such attention? "Deserves" by whose standards?

Waiting for others only makes one a victim, and if persisted in, eventually, a martyr. — baker

That's your side of the story.

The peculiar evil of silencing the expression of an opinion is, that it is robbing the human race; posterity as well as the existing generation; those who dissent from the opinion, still more than those who hold it. If the opinion is right, they are deprived of the opportunity of exchanging error for truth: if wrong, they lose, what is almost as great a benefit, the clearer perception and livelier impression of truth, produced by its collision with error. — John Stuart Mill

H-O-W-E-V-E-R (how do I increase the font size?), as Abu Hirawa, in the Misfits (2021), says,

I believe you but there are those who are not interested in the truth [...] — Abu Hirawa (Misfits 2021)

All compound things are subject to decay', but 'There is, monks, an unborn — unbecome — unmade — unfabricated. If there were not that unborn — unbecome — unmade — unfabricated, there would not be the case that escape from the born — become — made — fabricated would be discerned. But precisely because there is an unborn — unbecome — unmade — unfabricated, escape from the born — become — made — fabricated is discerned' ~ source.

What that 'unborn, unbecome' is, however, is never the subject of speculative metaphysics in Buddhist philosophy.

I should say however that Buddhist cosmology is not based on a linear model of history, like the Christian view, but on the (probably more archaic) cyclical view.

Check out this review. — Wayfarer

So, Buddhism did have a finger in that pie though, it seems, they decided, for good reasons no doubt, not to open that can of worms. Good to know. Thanks. :up:

The 'instrumentalisation of reason' that the New Left describes. — Wayfarer

That's a nice way of putting it. I didn't know people were so lax with words though because the correct expression, in my humble opinion, should be "instrumentalization of reason and knowledge."

That said, now that I thought about it a little more, the purpose of knowing stuff is to apply it in our lives and materialistic application seems to be the most obvious way. Nonetheless, there are a lot of ideas out there that are not amenable to physicalization but useful still; given how economics, as I mentioned earlier, is an almost exclusively materialistic enterpise, such ideas might, to our detriment, die out. What kinda ideas, in your view, can't be commercialized in the current economic climate?

The philosophical problem is precisely the elimination of telos, purpose, from ethics. The Universe is deemed to be inherently purpose-less - as Russell said, the 'accidental collocation of atoms', as the Universe goes on its merry way towards the ultimate heat-death.

I'm not pitching for a return to traditionalist ethics. There needs to be of re-envisaging of human goals knowing what we now know about cosmology.

But as I noted already in this thread, the very idea of the 'big bang' lends itself to religious interpretation - that is what the Pope wanted to do, but LeMaitre discouraged him from making pronouncements about it. But the big bang theory was and is resisted by some, because it seems too near to creation from nothing. I mean, when you think about it, it is saying that the entire vast universe burst into existence from a match head, in an instant. Fred Hoyle and many others always resisted the idea. I don't see anything inherently antagonistic between the idea of creation and physical csomology. — Wayfarer

If you ask me, telos and ethics seem almost inseparable because telos justifies ethics. Even secular ethics such as utiliatrianism and deontology are teleological in a nature. Utiliatrianism's telos: maximum happiness for the maximum number of people. Deontology's telos: A fair society (no exceptions). Ethics becomes meaningless sans telos.

It's intriguing to say the least that a pope, no less, wanted to co-opt a scientific fact, the big bang, and give it a religious spin. The similarity between that piece of cosmology and Christian doctrine was just too good an opportunity with respect to how it could be treated as proof of creation for the Vatican to pass up.

And the other point that really struck me about Russell's essay, a Free Man's Worship is that Buddhism, for example, always knew that 'the whole temple of Man's achievement must inevitably be buried beneath the debris of a universe in ruins.' It's not news to them! It's a result of deliberately narrowing the scope of philosophy to the phenomenal realm, the very realm of constant change and decay, and then boo-hooing about it. — Wayfarer

Buddhism is about that which can be observed by any person, anywhere, at any time - change aka impermanence, the birth-death-decay process is central to its philosophy.

However, do you suppose that yes, the Buddhists are right on the money - the hallmark of phenomenal world is change - but, the million dollar question is, is the phenomenal world all there is to reality?

What is also needed is an alternative economic philosophy that doesn't rely on endless growth, consumption and the stimulation of artificial needs. What is needed is a social philosophy that encourages the cultivation of a superior state of being, rather than endless acquisition and consumption. That's the most difficult change to envisage. — Wayfarer

Even I've been thinking along that line. There's something seriously wrong with the economics of this day and age. It's not that there are particular people, states, or forms of government to blame - economics, at the end of the day, is materialism maxxed out.

I maybe wrong about this but I've detected a positive development in economics in that knowledge is held at a premium - to fuel the "endless growth" you talked about, businesses need new ideas, new technologies, new philosophies, etc. However, knowledge is viewed as an adjunct, an auxiliary, playing only a secondary role in the economic machinery; plus the knowledge that's relevant to economics is just a tiny band, centered around technology and science, of the knowledge spectrum.

What we need to do is somehow flip this relationship between material goods and knowledge - people should want and be willing to pay for knowledge, the whole gamut, material goods then become means of acquiring knowledge.

I suppose it all boils down reworking our priorities:

1. Current state of affairs: material goods are needs, knowledge is a means of fulfilling those needs.

2. Proposed change: knowledge becomes a need, material goods help in the acquisition of knowledge.


If ever I start a company, say making mugs, my slogan would be "We sell knowledge. The mugs are complimentary". The mugs could have snippets of information on philosophy, science, religion, etc.

@Pop

Information theory is the scientific study of the quantification, storage, and communication of digital information. The field was fundamentally established by the works of Harry Nyquist and Ralph Hartley, in the 1920s, and Claude Shannon in the 1940s. — Wikipedia

↪Pop Sorry, no. — Mark Nyquist

Harry Nyquist (1889 - 1976) Information Theory

Your namesake was one of the pioneers of information theory.

That went over her head. How quickly the tables had turned. She went off the deep end and her opponent knew this was a cold day in July. :smile:

Thanks :up:

@apokrisis

I'd like your opinion on an idea that I have about the connection between skepticism and information theory. You're well-versed in both these topics so I'll get right down to business.

Skepticism, doubt, is, in the final analysis, about uncertainty - given a proposition p, the skeptic holds that it's uncertain whether p or ~p. To then assert p or to assert ~p is to claim certain knowledge.

Shannon's information theory defines information as any message that reduces uncertainty from a given set of possibilities to ONE.

Information is basically the digital avatar of what in philosophy is termed as knowledge and skepticism is the state of lacking information. In other words skepticism = 0 bits (of information).

Will/should skeptics be offended/pleased that all of them together amount to 0 bits?

It's just your latest non sequitur-fixation, Fool. Like so many so-called "paradoxes", under scrutiny at least one premise doesn't hold up. You're not deranged, just not reflective enough. — 180 Proof

:ok: :up:

:point: Tit for tat

Idioms and our comprehension of ancient languages.

"Hit the nail on the head" doesn't mean there's a nail or that someone hit that nail on its head. It means to be exactly on point.

"Take the cake" doesn't mean that there's a cake or someone took it. It means to be the most remarkable.

"Swallow something hook, line, and sinker" doesn't mean there's hook or line or sinker or that someone swallowed all three. It means to be fooled/deceived completely.

"Bought the farm" doesn't mean there's a farm and someone bought it. It means to die.

Please note, my point hopefully covers all ancient languages, not just the history of the Jews.

Idioms have two layers of meaning:

1. The literal one which isn't the meaning that's intended to be conveyed.

2. The subtext which is the true meaning.

We shouldn't always take ancient texts literally is the takeaway.

I'm not a therapist. :sweat: — 180 Proof

So, you're saying I'm abnormal, cuckoo?

What then of the tit-for-tat strategy? Is it too something only a deranged person would use?

Well, insofar as theism is untrue, they do amount to the same thing. The (origin of the) universe – finite, unbounded immanence – seems a brute fact. There is no answer to "Why" (that does not precipitate an infinite regress, in effect, begging the question). — 180 Proof

I defer to your better judgment!

I have by rejecting the "tit-for-tat strategy" premise as nonsense or, at best, a non sequitur with respect to why humans eat meat. — 180 Proof

It maybe so but here's the deal. Assuming I fall within the category normal human beings, I began with a sense of guilt for eating plants, they are after all living organisms. Then I recalled, thanks to a random magazine thrown carelessly on a table, that there are carnivorous plants. I suddenly felt as if a great weight was lifted off of my shoulder - I stopped feeling as bad as I used to biting down on veggies.

Explain that.

It's all the same perspective at the end of the day. We pretend what we must look like to the mirror. But, there's no real other view to be described regardless of how many qualifications you stack on it. — Cheshire

The thing outside of itself knows the thing in itself. I've always wondered about inanimate objects and what, if they could speak, they would have to say.

Could it be the other way round too - because we're watching, the world pretends to be something it's not? :chin: Hmmmm.

Answer: It was hideously ugly!

Exactly — Cheshire

And...???

I repeat, this is not my logic.
— TheMadFool

Ok. — khaled

And...???

Beauty, for me, is an attractive force. I suppose that's the reason why attractive is synonymous with beauty. I guess we could view/define beauty as a gravity analog operating through our senses and minds. Ugliness then would be a force that counters attraction, repulsive in essence.

Given this, what might I infer from the scientific reports of an expanding universe with each galaxy moving away, faster and faster, from every other galaxy? The universe, it seems, on the whole, is really, really ugly.

A little something to ponder upon:

1. We don't know the answer to "are we alone?"

but,

2. If there are aliens, we know the answer to their question, "are we alone?" No, definitely not!

I propose a new question be formulated: are they (aliens) alone? No!

The thing outside of itself

It is the view a thing in itself has of us. — Cheshire

I already said that tit-for-tat doesn't apply in this situation because humans tend to operate on a higher level of cognition than our vegetative friends (although maybe that's debatable).

What you're describing is akin to taking anger out on an inanimate object. "That curb stubbed my toe so I'm going to destroy it. Tit-for-tat!". More like twit-for-twat. — emancipate

Yes, yes, we see eye to eye, on the same page we are. So, by your logic, tit-for-tat strategy given its due, it's not permissible to eat either plants or animals, right?

Yes it is. Your argument is that since some animals eat us, this justifies us eating all animals. Makes no sense. — khaled

I repeat, this is not my logic.

No. Some animals eat humans. This doesn’t justify eating all animals.

Lions eat us, this doesn’t justify eating cows. — khaled

Yes, groups vs individuals logic which you kindly brought to my attention. Given that you seem to be in the know, how might this affect the morality of our diet?

I gather that in the Middle Ages "proof" meant logical plausibility for further trial by experience. At best, they were admirable agnostics. — Fine Doubter

This actually describes me - I'm a middle-aged person, agnostic and trying my best to formulate a coherent worldview which, I'm told, involves testing theory against experience.

This thread is about how atheism and theism amount to the same thing but, mind you, only in the sense that what's being sought after is an explanation for the existence of the universe. Theists think it's god, atheists think it's chance and as described in the OP, the two were connected in that God(s) worked their magic so to speak as the so-called chance factor.

As for order, there is no outer limit on its level of complexity. There are subatomic scales, the scale we're at, the cosmic scale. We're nowhere near "completing" our understanding of any of those scales. Comets with a too long orbit to calculate (yet) may additionally be influenced by "fields" we've barely begun to sense a glimmer of. As it was only a couple of years ago observations were strengthening Einstein's gravity wave idea, or they started photographing black holes, it's beyond credence when some big people claim everything is an open and shut case. — Fine Doubter

Order, by definition, is simple - there are rules we can get a handle on. Complexity is a function of disorder - it's impossible to grasp chaos. That said, I agree with you that what we don't know dwarfs what we (think) we know.

(On the actually religious side which I want to leave for other threads, often when "god" is mentioned what is really meant is "god pretext" and lots of "god subtexts".) — Fine Doubter

Go on...

Nonsense. We eat meat for the same reason we use petrolium in combustion engines – much higher energy density than plant-matter and wood/coal, respectively. No other reason, Fool. Vegan / vegitarian diet is, however, healthier than carnivorous (or pescatarian) diet and more suitable for us now that we're anatomically on this side of 'the large forebrain explosion' facilitated, maybe even caused, by our h. sapiens ancestors 'adopting' a significant meat-based diet (much more cooked than raw) hundreds of millennia ago. — 180 Proof

I understand where you're coming from 180 Proof but my question is about the tit-for-tat strategy, its moral aspects, our dietary recommendations, and how it all hangs together. Care to take a stab at that, please!

You should at least attempt to figure it out yourself, but if you want me to spell it out for you:

Discriminating against a group for the actions of individuals makes no sense.

"That black guy just shot a man. This justifies shooting all black people"

This is the logic you're employing for animals and plants — khaled

This is not my logic but could you tell me more about groups and indivduals with respect to plants and animals.

they never founded a state or nation by their own — javi2541997

Gypsies never settle for less. :grin:

Tit-for-tat is a strategy in game theory and while non-humans may exhibit that behavior e.g. herbivores eating plants and then plants evolving toxins/thorns/etc., strategies fall in the domain of reason i.e. humans would/have approve/approved it as a legitimate way of dealing with each other and with the world at large.
— TheMadFool

Is photosynthesis also a form of reason? Stretching the definition of reason thin here. Plants do not make a conscious decision about what to eat. Or so it seems. — emancipate

So, you mean to say that if plants could think like humans and they eat animals, we should give the nod of approval to the tit-for-tat strategy and eat them?

That means animals can be eaten because they can reason better than plants and they eat us. Tit for tat!

If you disagree, then for the tit-for-tat tactic to be used, both plants and animals need to have human-like cognition but then that means we can neither eat plants nor animals.

You would (hopefully) tell that person they’re wrong. What would you say to them if they asked you to unpack?

That’s what I would say to you. — khaled

Kindly tend to my original request.

That's not something the plants are doing, humans are to blame.
— TheMadFool

True. But it shows that veganism can be bad for the environment and the animals (and humans) inhabiting it. — Apollodorus

Yes but that doesn't seem to bear on the tit-for-tat strategy and how it relates to the kind of diet we advocate.

How do you make decisions when you don't know (something)?

Say you don't know whether it'll rain tomorrow or not. How will you plan for the morrow? You have to assume either that it'll rain or not, right?

Agree! Somehow it was our fault to make them poor and ignorant. But it is now our duty and responsibility the inclusion of these citizens in jobs and institutions. It sounds so difficult but not impossible :up: — javi2541997

Food for thought. Gypsies, if they're still into wandering about from place to place, the quintessential nomadic lifestyle, and if they aren't subjected to international border regulations, are a reminder to folks who consider themselves natives/original inhabitants/denizens/rightful owners of a given tract of land that their own history is marked by mass migrations of a similar if not identical nature. We're all gypsies.

The fundamental problem with agnosticism seems to be that it can't be used to guide our actions, make decisions, to name a few.

Take prayer for instance. The decision to pray or not is a question of whether you believe God exists or doesn't. Being an agnostic - to hold that one doesn't know if god exists or not - can't in any way help to take a stand on prayer.

It appears that agnostics are in some kind of ontological cum epistemological limbo that precludes any sort of decision-making on other related beliefs/actions.

Thus, necessarily that the agnostic has to pick a side - become an agnostic theist or an agnostic atheist.

It's kinda like not knowing what's inside a cage, recently arrived from Africa. Is there a full-grown, hungry, lion inside it or not. That uncertainty will not allow you to decide how to deal with the cage and its contents. You'll have to assume either that there's a lion or not to inform your approach towards the cage. In other words, being agnostic about what's inside the cage is a dead end insofar as your subsequent actions are concerned. You'll have to be either a lionist or an alionist.

Trust me,
— Art Stoic Spirit

I don't think so. Waffle. — Banno

English: it comes from the word "gyp" which means scam.
German: it comes from the word "zigeuner" which means thief
Spanish: it comes from the word "gitano" which means liar
Hungarian: it comes from the word "szégany" which means poor — javi2541997

Once you're poor, you get some concessions - you can be a thief, a liar, a scammer, even a murderer and people will cut you some slack. Motivation for immoral behavior: NEED!

There's no excuse for rich thieves, liars, and scammers. Motivation for immoral behavior: GREED!

Leave the poor gypsies alone!

suffering — Jack Cummins

Hi Jack. How have you been?

As you seem to have already realized, if we take humanity as a single organism, a person let's say, it wouldn't be wrong to say we, as a whole, are in a torture chamber - horrific atrocities are being committed against humanity. I'm ignoring the part where we're doing it to ourselves which, if given some wiggle room, could be interpreted as the work of a third, as of yet unidentified, party. I guess those individuals who have been/are being/will be tortured are a fractal microcosm of the macrocosm that's humanity's own struggle to free itself from the aforesaid macabre torture chamber!



That man on the cross, being crucified, is humanity!

Jesus Christ is supposed to have died for us. They always forget to mention the torture he had to endure but that's a topic for another thread. The point is Jesus represents humanity - his pain and anguish are meant to mirror humanity's own!

That's one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind. — Neil Armstrong (astronaut)

Why are you such a cunt? — Tom Storm

Why are you such a cunt?
— Tom Storm
My very next question! — 180 Proof

It takes one to know one! :wink:

Venus fly traps don't eat us. The plants we eat never eat us. — khaled

Excellent point! Could you kindly unpack this point further. There's something going on here which I can't quite put a finger on.