The problem isn't that another nation is stronger than Israel. The problem is that the nation expresses genocidal intentions towards Israel and was on the verge of going nuclea — BitconnectCarlos

Israel’s military claimed on Tuesday that it had killed Maj. Gen. Ali Shadmani, describing him as Iran’s most senior military commander, as the most intense military conflict between the two countries entered its fifth day.

Iran did not immediately comment on Israel’s claim. Maj. Gen Shadmani. He was only appointed to the role on Friday, when Israel killed his predecessor in widespread attacks against Iran’s military on the first day of the war.

Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, issued a statement on Friday saying that he had named General Shadmani to command the Khatam al-Anbiya Central Headquarters, the most important economic arm of Iran’s elite Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps. — New York Times

Knowledge is only possible through abstraction. — ChatteringMonkey

The reason you speak in Tweets while pretending to be authoritative is because your father didn’t give you enough attention as a child. And because you’re generally stupid. — Mikie

I’ve heard all civilian areas Israel has bombed were militarized, or were housing terrorists.

Oops I mean Iran. Either way, let’s all be sure to believe them. — Mikie

I don't make rules. — BitconnectCarlos

Once those civilian areas are militarized, they lose that privilege and become legitimate targets. — BitconnectCarlos

Well, it is a war crime to target civilian areas — BitconnectCarlos

Israel’s foreign minister, Gideon Saar, told CNN on Sunday that “The goal is not a regime change. The cabinet had decided on the objectives, it was not one of the objectives. This is for the Iranian people to decide.” — NY Times

Never doubt the neocons. — NOS4A2

Watch, now they’ll want the US to join the Isreali campaign to avoid the cognitive dissonance involved in their narrative. — NOS4A2

Well, I don't think that Iran is economically back in the 1980's yet. — ssu

Likely they just want to bomb it back to the 1980's. They'll surely go for the (oil) infrastructure after they have finished with the nuclear weapons program. — ssu

In a widening of its military campaign against Iran, Israel targeted Iran’s critical energy infrastructure at gas and petrochemical refineries on Saturday, according to a statement from Iran’s oil ministry.

The statement said Israeli drones had targeted a section of the South Pars Gas Field in Bushehr Province. South Pars is one of the world’s largest gas fields and a critical part of Iran’s energy production. The Fajr Jam Gas Refining Company was also targeted, the ministry said — NY Times

Yes it is a tinder box, which is why players shouldn’t play with matches. — Punshhh

I don’t have anything I can point to just now. But at the time there was a lot of discussion about it and subsequently lots of discussion about what they were up to in Iran, long before the Ukraine and Gaza wars. — Punshhh

Yes, but before Trump’s first term in office the Iranians were moving very slowly towards nuclear weapons. This stepped up as soon as Trump tore up the carefully constructed deal when he came into office in 2016. — Punshhh

The International Atomic Energy Agency declared on Thursday that Iran was not complying with its nuclear nonproliferation obligations, the first time the U.N. watchdog has passed a resolution against the country in 20 years — New York Times

It's funny to think just 10 years ago we got a nuclear deal with Iran which Trump foolishly ripped up in his first term, and Biden foolishly didn't get back into during his term. — Mr Bee

These kinds of things have a way of spiraling out of control. 20% of the world's oil goes through the Strait of Hormuz. Suppose Iran chooses to shut that down to inflict economic pain on Israel and her backers. Well, now the U.S. president is looking at a catastrophic rise in oil prices, which will lead to more inflation and higher interest rates, which is usually the death knell for an administration. The president is under tremendous pressure to reopen the Strait, so he attacks Iran's navy, but unlike 1988, Iran doesn't back down. So now what? — RogueAI

Sure I'm up for a laugh — Mr Bee

My guess is it'll probably be a war, but I'm open to hearing how this is all somehow a 4D chess negotiating tactic by Trump from his supporters. — Mr Bee

What I'm saying is that we only have something we call "reference", the thing that we do with referring expressions like names and descriptions, so that we can talk about things with other people. More than that, our individual cognitive capacities are shaped by our interactions with other people, so the sorts of things we want to talk about are already the objects or potential objects of shared cognition. — Srap Tasmaner

Why does any of this matter? Because words are a "just enough" technology that evolved for cooperative use; a word, even a name, is not something that carries its full meaning like a payload. Words are more like hints and nudges and suggestions. They are incomplete by nature.

And so it is with using them to refer. We should expect that to be a partial, incomplete business. — Srap Tasmaner

I doubt that story, but about all I have in the way of argument is that our cognitive habits and capacities are shaped by just this sort of good enough exchange. My suspicion is that we largely think this way as well. And this makes a little more sense if you think of your cognition as overwhelmingly shared, not as the work of an isolated mind that occasionally ventures out to express itself. — Srap Tasmaner

You the entire planet Earth and all living things. It’s basically what you said. — NOS4A2

Where do you come up with this stuff? — NOS4A2

Hierarchical position is a factor along side content. — BC

They’re your friends, why don’t you ask them. — T Clark

I was noting that such inferences cannot result in certainty.

But it's important to note that this doesn't matter.

We don't need to fix the referent of "gavagai" with absolute certainty in order to get the stew, or go hunting rabbits.

So much of the conversation about fixing referents is unnecessary — Banno

By answering both and seeing to which Srap Tasmaner responds? Answering one, and seeing if the response fits that answer?

Generally, by moving the conversation on, and seeing what the result is, and then making an inference about Srap's intent. — Banno

The very content of this intent is something that ought to be negotiated within a broader embodied life/social context, including with oneself, and, because of that, it isn't a private act in Wittgenstein's sense. It can, and often must, be brought out in the public sphere. That doesn't make the speaker's intentions unauthoritative. But it makes them fallible. The stipulated "rules" for using a term, and hence securing its reference, aim at effective triangulation, as Srap suggested. — Pierre-Normand

a singular sense rather than descriptive. When there is an unintended mismatch between the reference of this singular sense and the descriptive sense that the speaker expresses, then the presupposition of identity is mistaken. What it is that the speaker truly intended to have priority (i.e. the demonstrative singular sense or the descriptive one) for the purpose of fixing the true referent of their speech act (or of the thought that this speech act is meant to express) can be a matter of negotiation or further inquiry. — Pierre-Normand

I would look for already-known signs that someone is expressing their understanding to me. — AmadeusD

The question is “why”? Why do Americans have to suffer yet again the destruction of their cities, the people in their roadways, the curfews, the violence and looting, the waving of foreign flags on American streets? — NOS4A2