Provided your evolutionary stage of development has reached that point of awakening.
We cannot know if people did actually reach enlightenment during the heyday of the Buddhist and Hindu religions, when they wrote their teachings down. Or if it represented a goal of their practice. We really don’t know how things were back then. — Punshhh

If I may, i have some questions:

-what kind of evolution are you referring to, the mythical rebirth cycles of buddhism, maybe something easier to grasp that you think is fundamental to enlightenment?

-what do the ancients have to do with any of this? Weren't their canons created because they knew they would die? So how can transcendental-ego practices be off limits?

However it very nicely expands the Cartesian cogito in such a way as to render intuitively satisfying the sense of the meaning of idealism. — Pantagruel

I guess the famous (or infamous) descarte quote is one of the earliest forms of philosophical idealism...as opposed to visionary idealism, which is a totally different thing.

the questions were intended to help clarify what you and Hegel mean with the above proposition...

Thus intelligence is explicitly, and on its own part cognitive: virtually it is the universal, —its product (the thought) is the thing: it is a plain identity of subjective and objective. — Pantagruel

so is Hegel then saying the universe itself is consciousness (or intelligence)? This bit may also indicate that all reality is perception, which of course would be in line with idealism, the way that it's currently defined.

This is in response to your new/edited OP: your gender theory is very much in line with how aristotle may have responded in his time period to more modern and flexible ideas of gender...however, his logic has been criticized on the basis of some of his "is" statements for their lack of acknowledgement that being is not a fixed state. For example, "he is a boy": if that boy gets their penis removed, wears a wig, and talks with a lisp, then many will no longer see them as such...what are they then?

Aristotle would probably agree with you that gender as a personality trait would violate his rigid ideas of...things...but what practical relevance does this have? What justifies totally invalidating transgenderism and homosexuality? It seems that it's not working....

A gravitational gender expression of gender is any expression that a healthy member of that gendersex would gravitate towards (e.g., males gravitating towards being providers and protectors); and a symbolic gender expression of gender is any expression which represents some idea legitimately connected to the gendersex-at-hand (e.g., the mars symbol representing maleness). — Bob Ross

But how can you justify this perception of health? Is health then supposed to be equivalent with "well, they tell me that im a male, so it's unhealthy to wear pink or read cosmo"? The gender stereotypes have changed overtime. That line of reasoning doesn't seem to make any sense, seems to be a symptom of an extremely kantian type of logic.

This is just false: Jamal told me that they were alerted to this from at least two people and the implication obviously was that it was not like they were alerting them because it was such a great, positive post — Bob Ross

Based on what jamal said, they were probably alerting him based on perceived rule violations, even though Jamal clearly decided you didn't. I wish you well in trying to sharpen your discussion/rhetorical skills in getting your points across, even though i might not read your OP again.

I don't have enough time to read this entire discussion to figure out the source of our conflicts. I haven't even read everything in the discussion I created.

With all due respect, you didn’t address the OP in any substantial sense. — Bob Ross

Are you kidding me? What i said wasnt true and i will not acknowledge / you didnt address it enough is awful forum etiquette. You said nobody was addressing the OP, which is a complete lie. It's pretty clear from interactions with you that talking to you isn't worth it. Have fun with "the liberals trying to cancel you", as you seem to be framing it.

In fact, I haven't received a single private message complaining about this discussion. — Jamal

Thanks for revealing rhetorical methods for what they are.

2. No one contended directly with the OP: it is about gender theory—not ethics about sexuality. — Bob Ross

but once again: this just isn't true. I know it's not true because I did directly respond to the OP: in my response, I sympathized with you implying that gender and biological sex are dependent on each other, and I asked you not to use the term "liberal agenda" because it's terminology used for bigotry and fear. If you don't believe, the main people who propagated that term were political pundits appealing to those who don't like liberalism. It doesn't clearly describe anything that's going on in politics: it's vague, it points into a void. The reason why those pundits use the term is to induce fear; they want their listeners to think liberals have this unified ideological agenda, and our discussion showed that you agreed with that POV (point of view).

Me asking you not to use a particular term is not me "canceling you", it's just me wanting you to use clearer and less emotive terminology so I can understand your gender theory. You say that others have been trying to shut down the thread, but I personally have sent Jamal or other moderators no messages like that. I personally don't like to do stuff like that, at least in the context of "someone has an offensive or wrong point of view". If I think someone believes in nonsense, then I try to show them it's nonsense if I talk to them at all. I personally thrive on "offensive", it makes me feel alive, even though I will continue to respect Jamal's specific guidelines because I do think flaming and nazi perspectives tend to make internet discussion more bland and less interesting.

And good luck being am without the incessant intrusion of becoming if you were born into human history. — ENOAH

"Becoming" does directly contradict "I am".

I believe the main attempt of buddhist religion/philosophy is to strip you of everything except the true ego, at at least as you have defined it (pure consciousness)?

Anyways, buddhist meditation made a lot of sense to me in the goal of doing away with anything extraneous or superfluous, but I eventually realized that you cannot change yourself, and therefore, you cannot become enlightened.

The fear of nihilism shall only widen the gaping emptyness inside of us...

The fact of the matter is that no one from the opposition, expect perhaps Jamal, has even tried to contend with the OP — Bob Ross

That's false though: i read it and tried sympathizing with your logic, and i still don't agree with it.

If you don't like being treated like this, then don't try and ban drag shows like you said you wanted to...and don't complain about people trying to cancel you when your thread and arguments stay intact.

It's hard for me to obey the moderation rules on websites in general when there's so much dumb and spammy crap; so you are not alone if you feel misunderstood. People trying to cancel your thread is not the same as people trying to kill you, which is another form of "canceling".

it's not about stopping you from being casual, it's just a guideline. I've made typos and even missed typing entire words on here to my embarrassment, I went back and change it when i noticed. As long your posts on here appear to be coherent, and you fallow the actual forum rules, then nobody is going to punish you for making mistakes like that.

instead, they are trying to cancel me. — Bob Ross

"trying to cancel you" would amount to some sort of moderator action, or people trying to bully you off the website...so far, i haven't seen anyone whatsoever doing that to you. It seems to me that you're having trouble dealing with large volumes of disagreement. The point of philosophy is not for everyone to come to the same conclusion, but to discuss and argue, among making statements about your truth.

Google’s ever-helpful chat-program – presumably reflecting some kind of cyberworld consensus – would like to straighten this out for us:

“Causation involves a physical connection between events, while entailment is a relationship between propositions.” — J

Thus is the incredibly opaque nature of a thought having any bearing on "physical reality".

Thoughts give rise to eachother in terms of their topical content, like with your example of thinking about ann. This reminded you of her upcoming birthday.

However, i would argue this whole process is fully dependent on emotional content. Thoughts that carry less emotion are less likely to have any importance to you, and continue any newtonian chain reaction.

Perhaps the moral system of human society is itself an adaptive tool formed under evolutionary pressures to promote group survival and reproduction. — panwei

I'd argue this as well; you'll notice that standards tend to shift rather than stay permanent, "we killed them and it is justified because..." and various other examples.

"Ought" and "must" aren't the only illusory types words people to use, there's also the use of can/can't beyond possible/impossible, and the dreaded "should".

sorry for not pulling up the churchill quote and explaining it:

Tact is the ability to tell someone to go to hell in such a way that they look forward to the trip.

the quote you gave in describing tact was more about finding the truth, the churchill quote seems more about appearances, revenge, and politics than a renewed shared understanding. The quote you described explicity requests people don't offend each other...

it's interesting how the definition of tact you quote is almost the opposite of what Winston Churchill describes. I guess there is a time for snark (churchill's tact), but i think the need for it often gets overstated by modern people...

I can tell from your disposition as well as the dismissal of his meta-point, you clearly know where you're going to get your next meal from. Not everyone has that luxury. — Outlander

That's an interesting point, yet a somewhat irrelevant one to the discussion. Most (if not all) impoverished people still can see the distinction between a gold chain and a meal. People do at times kill each over trivial possessions, but clearly morality and rights do not often come into the mix when that happens.

However, i don't think there's a whole lot i can do if some folks question whether "transgendered rights" are human rights: seems pretty trivial and basic. Not worth my time, the socratic method isn't a solution, and yes im familiar with his method. Not that it should be recommended: history has it that he was killed by the state as a result.

Lets pull it out of the abstract and look at your own life. Lets say you stumble upon a person in a lone allyway. They mean you no harm but you notice they have a gold chain around their neck. Looking around, you realize you could get away with stealing it, the other person does not suspect you have a knife, and you could quickly end it. Do you need a law to tell you that murdering them for their gold chain is wrong? Or have you thought through it any particular time and concluded "That would be wrong".?

Rights are the algebra of ethics. X + 1 = 2 "Stealing from another innocent person is wrong" is the circumstance, the number, while the abstract is something like "X is the right way to treat a person". X is where we put the rights like "Letting them speak their mind, respecting property, not murdering them". We can of course go about our lives without thinking at all about what or why we do things, but if you've thought about them at all, you've essentially been considering rights.

Rights are therefore a form of morality. There is an idea that we should or should not treat people in fundamental ways. This does not require a law, it only requires a mind. — Philosophim

Wow! What a HORRIBLY irrelevant and convoluted mess! Where do you get the idea I have seen anything like that in my life? "Oh! Gold chain, me stupid, i'll kill person with gold chain in alleyway because we alone and nobody catch me! Me shmeagal, i want ring!"

Also, I'm pretty sure you are making up this "rights as part of morality algebra" stuff as well. It's not even coherent from a logical or historical perspective. You made this comment in your other thread:

Now if a person is trying to avoid bullying or disrespect, they should avoid poor grammar and unclear communication. — Philosophim

I now know that i should not expect to have a clear and coherent conversation with you.

Stealing from another innocent person is wrong — Philosophim

The constitution (which is where all rights are derived under american law...) says absolutely nothing about innocent persons, because the people who wrote the document knew that guilt an innocence were matters of local states/tribunals etc., the rights granted were only supposed to be a guarantee against a tyrannical government, and it really doesn't take a whole lot of thinking to understand that they haven't been very effective.

Not at all. Rights are the framework upon which we should want laws written. Even in a society without some authority figure over your head, rationally we would want to treat each other with the respect that we believe each person should be given for merely being a person. Laws are simply an authorized way to enforce behavior. Rights are a rational conclusion of what behavior we believe is appropriate towards others in the world. — Philosophim

but earlier you said that people don't have to do anything, so fallowing from that logic, how would rights make any sense on a practical day-to-day basis? Are you saying that rights are only higher ideals that we can imperfectly conform to?

Fair question. I posted a link in the OP, and TClark posted a link to generally what the transgender community is asking for in terms of rights. I am not talking about an individual, but the spokespeople who are asking for trans rights as laws that are documented and well known. That is why I put this under the political category and not ethics. Can an individual trans gendered person have a different view on what they want? Absolutely. But this is addressing the people pushing for lawful change who are claiming this is what all trans gender people deserve. — Philosophim

Okay, thanks for telling me about the link. However, it is still just one .com website, it's not some transgendered lobbying group that's asking for specific changes in the current laws. You can go on communicating how you'd like to, yet i would said "this website phrases transgender and transexual rights as such", and then discussing the rights exactly on the websites terms. Being clear and direct makes things easier to read.

Does everyone agree that if that bar is agreed upon, a person should not be administered cruel and unusual punishment? I would say yes — Philosophim

In this context, one would argue that with cruel and unusual punishments, that the cruelty itself sets a poor example and is morally wrong. If people accept that premise, wouldn't it then be easy to argue that any prison sentence whatsoever is cruel punishment? There's no "everyone agrees", yet "cruel punishment" is redundant because punishment is supposed to be cruel instead of rewarding.

In a rights based society, the government ultimately should answer to and serve the people it governs. Thus it is up to the citizens to uphold rights through laws and culture. Does a country and its citizens have to do this? No. People don't have to do anything. — Philosophim

So wouldn't you then agree with me when i say that rights are totally meaningless outside of their usage within a legal framework?

I personally like thinking and breaking things down philosophically, but this has nothing to do with "the purpose of philosophy". Maybe philosophy is part of what it means to be a human, for I don't think you will ever find a single purpose.

If the rights they are asking for fit in and do not contradict human rights, then yes, they are. But in the OP its clear that some of the things being asked as rights conflict with human rights. Therefore these are not human rights. — Philosophim

I'm really sick of this over-use of "they" i am seeing in talks about transgendered people here. It's very similar to how people in the U.S. talking about "the liberal agenda". Conflating a bunch of different things so they seem unified doesn't help clarify a philosophical discussion. Maybe you could use sources: tell me where "the transgendered people" are united in their demands. Give us a more concrete "they" rather than a nebulous one.

The above rights I've examined are within the context of trans gendered individuals claim that the requests they are making are human rights, which are generally based on the context of one individual not trying to violate the rights of another, or the agreed upon standard outcome when certain human rights do conflict. — Philosophim

what if "rights" themselves are not valid? If you're not willing to be more critical of rights, then i don't think you will get very far in this discussion, as the government wants rights to be inviolable, but all the evidence points to this not being the case. Let me give you a very clear example.

Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted.

These are seen as "rights", that the legal system shall not do any of these things in reference to rulings in a criminal trial. However, a lot of people are in disagreement about what constitutes a cruel and unusual punishment. Some say the death penalty is cruel and unusual punishment, yet i think life in prison fits that description more so than an execution (depending on factors). A lot of people have been discussing the cruelty of solitary confinement over the years, and they have plenty of evidence to support their claims.

So if rights only apply in specific circumstances, and state authorities have the liberty to disagree about who has rights to what, how can rights be viewed as valid or meaningful in a philosophical sense? It seems to me they are only a legal mechanism, and nobody whatsoever is guaranteed rights.

i think you are making this one way too complicated: transgendered people are people, so if we are to talk about "human rights", than transgendered rights must also be human rights. "Transgendered person" is merely a sub-category of human.

However, I'm confused how anyone can have "a right", because wouldn't that entail an ability to do something without anyone else's capability to take away that ability? People are always talking about "the right to free speech", but people only have this right on the surface: the supreme court of the united states has decided repeatedly that speech is not an inviolable right, but only grants you a right if it feels appropriate and relevant to some legal case either you or another party brought to court.

Yes, but people like Trump can destabilise the global trade flows we rely for competitive growth at the stroke of a pen. Just in time supply lines have fine tuned production and consumerism. This can collapse like a house of cards. Causing stock market collapse and depression. — Punshhh

I don't think you are giving the stock market credit for the massive size and power it has: the net worth of the stock market is about 68 trillion dollars. Trillion...with a T. That's more than twice the debt of the U.S. government. The stock market itself is a force to be reckoned with.

And sure, a powerful person like Trump could theoretically do all sorts of horrible things, but i'd recommend that until you have a clear line of thought (you can confidently say that a particular executive action will cause a stock market crash because of a clear reason) about a particular thing he is looking to do, that you don't act on these kinds of existential fears.

Trump doesn't have a personal/political reason for crashing the entire stock market: he was causing miniature crashes with his tariff policies, but he must have known that it wouldn't cause any large scale harm to rich people's wealth...as he is one of them, and many of his friends are wealthy people.

Also, there's a lot in your quote that doesn't appear to have a clear meaning to it, I would maybe adjust your arguments so it's possible for us to read them and understand them:

Yes, but people like Trump can destabilise the global trade flows we rely for competitive growth at the stroke of a pen. Just in time supply lines have fine tuned production and consumerism.

i think there are two ways to look at this...

yes) NVIDIA's stock has been the poster child of A.I. stocks, and the hype around artificial intelligence inflated this one then deflated it because investors realized the price of it was obscenely high. For those of you who don't know, NVIDIA was the target of such massive hype because quality GPUs are one of the main components for A.I.

no) the dot-com bubble occurred during a radically different time period. It was pretty recent (if i had to guess, i'd say most of the people on here at least were alive during the dot-com bubble), but technologically speaking, the internet infrastructure was way behind what it is now. Now, we live in an era of constant network connection. This, in a way, has stabilized the stock market by making it much larger with much larger volumes of buyer activity. Much of the buyer/seller activity has also been replaced with artificial intelligence, so immediate, catastrophic events of total "SELL, SELL, SELL!" are harder to come by.

However, i think a bigger question to ask is how long can the stock market last? Will it get wiped out in a heartbeat, or will the destruction be slow over long periods of time? I don't think it can last forever, since scientists agree that the sun will no longer be able to support life on earth in the future, but all estimates exceed 1 billion years as to when this is going to happen.

What do you mean by transgenderism being a legal framework? It’s a ideological view that one can convert to a different gender. — Bob Ross

The examples you gave of playing sports with the opposite sex, going in women's bathrooms, and changing the sex on a drivers license are legal in the sense that these conventions already shape what we're allowed to do and not. It's actually certain feminists (who tend to be overwhelmingly liberal) who reject the idea of transwomen being in their bathrooms, or getting social services as women...these women tend to be insulted as "T.E.R.F"s by trans supporters (trans exclusionary radical feminists). With the sports, its always a case by case basis, and i personally am fine with that and trans women should not always expect to be able to compete with women...it's up to them. The bathroom issue is a liitle more dicey, because kicking them out of women's bathrooms means forcing them to use men's bathrooms, something people shouldnt do to each other. If i really have to take a crap, im running to whatever is there.

I dont get hostility towards putting something different on your drivers license or the drag shows: in the former, it just makes it even easier for the police to identify you (i.e., sally with a beard, or explicit trans labeling), and drag shows are only entertainment, i don't get why people get offended....

i only answered because you seemed to bothered by Old Testament atrocities, but of course, these things can explained any number of ways. In my experience, I've had to conclude it was just people writing it, as I've seen/heard no personal evidence of the God of Abraham.

Liberalism in America tends to want the social and legal acceptance of:

1. Sexually deviant, homosexual, and transgender behaviors and practices;
2. The treatment of people relative to what they want to be as opposed to what they are (e.g., gender affirmation, putting the preferred gender on driver’s licenses, allowing men to enter female bathrooms, allowing men to play in female sports, etc.);
3. No enforceable immigration policies;
4. Murdering of children in the womb;
Etc. — Bob Ross

1. i personally think it has to do with differences in terms of what rights people think they should have have...for example, lots of completely heterosexual liberals want people to freely practice "those deviant behaviors", but are indifferent as to whether or not they do it, it's a matter of what they should be allowed to do, rather than enforcing homosexuality...etc.

2. transgenderism in a legal framework, no unified agreement...not something i hear a lot of liberals advocating besides transexuals and their supporters

3. the "no enforcible immigration policies" is an extreme left-wing or anarchist point of view, it's not the kind of thing advocated by your typical liberal. Biden and Obama both intensely enforced immigration policy, the severe drop in mexican immigration we see now started at the end of the Biden administration...

I personally am against any kind of immigration enforcement, as i think people should be free to move where they need to, but "liberal" tends to mean accepting immigration enforcement but with a softer framing.

4. That's a fairly loaded way to discuss abortion, it's a purely moral framing as opposed to a consequentialist or ecnomic/social way of looking at the problem.

These are all differences in how people think policies should be shaped, none of them are really "agendas" unless you apply the same logic in reverse (i.e., opposition to gay marriage is a "conservative agenda"), it's a basic part of representative democracies for differences in opinion to exist.

I fully agree with the notion that you can't totally separate gender from sex. However, since we are looking for clarity instead of fear/confusion, i recommend avoiding certain popular scare terms:

When conjoined with liberal agendas, it becomes incredibly problematic — Bob Ross

Can you come up with examples of liberal agendas? There are liberals, there are agendas, but "liberal agenda" paints a unified conspiracy when political agendas always have to do with money and power.

Logic and reason is what clears the confusion. — Harry Hindu

That, and overtime applying the logic and reason to understanding politics/power was helpful to me personally, but that also gives you a sense that "we live in confusing times", with the fragmented and separated nature of human activities.

For example: You get falsely accused of some wrongoing at work, you get fired, you are blamed for losing your job, so you're not eligible for unemployment benefits; you don't have the money to pursue the matter legally. How do you get peace of mind in such a situation (without doing something illegal)? — baker

My previous was a little too depressing, as i was only thinking of it in terms of "getting justice". Things similar to what you have described have happened to me before.

While retaliation tends to be off the table, what does tend to help is finding a sympathetic ear, and looking for what can be learned from the situation. The saying "the best revenge is living well" speaks directly to situations where you want revenge but also realize acting on it just makes your life worse...

For example: You get falsely accused of some wrongoing at work, you get fired, you are blamed for losing your job, so you're not eligible for unemployment benefits; you don't have the money to pursue the matter legally. How do you get peace of mind in such a situation (without doing something illegal)? — baker

Well, it seems like in that kind of a situation (being accused of something falsely) means there is no legal recourse without some evidence of the business behaving illegally. The unfortunate reality is that alot of times people do not get punished for harming us...even though dishonest behavior can have long term disadvantages (for example, alienating people who could useful or comforting in the future)

there aren't any gaurantees you won't become jaded, it happens for all sorts of different reasons. I didn't answer your question because i don't understand what you want, i thought you were hinting at wanting to get justice.

Here's the thing: How do you cope with blatant injustice done to you, and you have no recourse for rectifying it? Without becoming cynical and jaded? — baker

You can't really dish out punishment without either committing some crime, or getting some collective approval that someone committed a wrong against you

and for my ethics, i just have to accept transgendered people the way they are, with their gender essentialism, until they fail to respect my preferences. We live in very confusing times.

Hence gender is not a social construct on the scale of society as a whole — Harry Hindu

To me this is correct, even though the political left usually refuses to see things this way as it would unravel their worldview. The midwest is different from more metropolitan areas of the U.S., yet even with those areas, there are still major differences of opinion. It is a large scale construct, but not in interpretation.

For example, when i said "guys like that", i wasn't referring to the masturbation thing, but a trend within my party going social environments to rate people on how much they get layed. Sometimes i would have to talk to people like that through association. The shame over masturbating is only something me and one of my later friends noticed about the internet masculinity preachers, but i coupled them just because the mindsets are very similar...you see "getting layed" as some sort of spiritual status that's a sign of how important you are.

In that respect all good philosophy is ‘self-help’ — Joshs

For me what is most admirable about him is not the ambiguous aspects, but the aspects the philosophers I most admire are in general agreement about, such as the meaning of concepts like eternal return and will to power. I can’t imagine a powerful philosophy which doesn't — Joshs

The part that makes it fun, at least for me, is the ambiguity. Otherwise, i wouldnt read his books themselves, but i would leave it up to some academic interpretation. Kaufman was a pretty good source for that among others, yet there's always room to make your own, even after all this time.

Would this be appealing to you? — Joshs

Of course, the source of my disagreement was praxis trying to argue that my take on Geneaology of morality was false, and that his edited version was correct. They both work IMO, even if criticisms like "Nietzsche was the prototype for nazi and fascist ideology" are mostly false. What i like about him is the ambiguity and multi-faceted dimension of his writing. I don't like the prospect of turning his writing into a self-help authority.