Frank: In the latest issue of Scientific American, they have an article discussing the use of mathematics in drawing up voting districts in such a way that they cannot be rigged. Hopefully, these methods will become the gold standard, because what we are seeing now, and have for a long time, is a concerted effort to deny people their voting rights. I also see the failure of states to apportion their electoral college votes among the voters, as wiping out people's right to vote for president. A republican may as well not vote for president in California, and a Democrat may as well not vote for president in Texas. For a country that supposedly values democracy and the right to vote, we sure as hell don't act like it.


I'm still not sure what's wrong with "colored people." If I use "non-white people," why should that make a difference. It's not as if Trump is just against Hispanics, and likes Blacks, and Indians from India. As far as I can tell, he dislikes all of these people, precisely because they do not have light skin, and are people of color.

The dividing line between the right and left, typically comes down to three major beliefs: 1. Tribalism: The left likes foreigners and minorities, while people on the right, don't. 2. Inequality. People on the right are unconcerned about inequality, while people on the left are greatly concerned about it. 3. Human nature. People on the right view a person's wealth or poverty as being due to their own efforts in life, while people on the left look at institutional causes, outside the person's control.

So, it makes sense for Trump to attack foreigners and make fearful claims about a foreign invasion, if his goal is to motivate his base. However, it will turn off everyone else who does not share that view, so it's not a policy position with broad appeal that all Americans can join in on.

I agree with the First Amendment law in the USA. I can say, perfectly within my legal rights as an American, that Muhammad did not even exist as a real historical person, and that, if he did, since he is allegedly a man who married a six-year-old, fondled her, and then had full sexual intercourse with her at the age of nine, that he would have been a child-rapist had he actually existed and the story about him was true. That's not illegal in any way. I can even state that Muslims worship a child-rapist as an alleged prophet. Still perfectly legal. What I can't do is say, "look, there is a Muslim, let's kick his ass." That statement incites violence, immediately, and falls outside the protections of the First Amendment. But, I could even say, in general, we should kick Muslims because they worship a child-molester, and that's also perfectly legal.

Now, certainly some of these statements may be offensive to many people, but we can't possibly have free speech if any speech that is found offensive is banned. We couldn't even have science, as many scientific statements are found offensive by various people.

That being said, I do think that people trying to make a point without being unduly offensive are better than the people who go out of their way to anger people.

Brian: Well, how would you, in an ideal world, make economics a science of utility? How would you be able to objectively measure utility? Let's say someone goes into a grocery store, and buys some chicken and some wheat bread. Did they maximize their utility as opposed to all the other combinations of items they could have bought for the same amount of money, and how would one know? Or, do you have something else in mind? I'm just curious. I may agree with you upon hearing more from you.

Arkady: I am an American, and disagree that mentioning colored people is in any way insulting. It is rather inclusive of all non-white groups, from Blacks, Hispanics, Chinese, etc. It's certainly much easier to write colored people than to reference all of the various non-white ethnic groups in the USA to make a point. I also don't believe races actually exist biologically, so I don't like using the word race.

Michael: I just read through the article on the first link, skimmed it, and it's from the Daily Beast. I'm not sure how mainstream that is. I'm just not that familiar with it. I did see where it pointed out numerous state election problems with the GOP suppressing the votes, and there was a comment about this being a strategy used to prevent the Democrats from winning elections, but I didn't see a general statement that the GOP is forced to take this position, because the vast majority of Americans reject their policy positions, so the GOP has to be against democracy, because if everyone is allowed to vote, the GOP loses in pretty much any national election, especially for president. Hopefully, people reading the article can connect the dots, but I still haven't seen this specific point I referenced in my post being mentioned. I have seen specific counties in places like Georgia, where the voters are likely to vote Democrat, having their votes suppressed, or in North Dakota, but why is it that the major news media is so reluctant to state that since the GOP is behind, nationally, on virtually every public policy position, then they have to, as a matter of policy, be against democracy itself?

Doesn't the Vatican have a huge display of wealth? If the Vatican were to do everything in its power to help refugees, wouldn't that also include selling off its ornate decorations to assist the refugees? That display of wealth is there so the Vatican can impress people with its power, not to assist the needy.

It's definitely a value judgment, but I'm not sure if that entirely precludes it from also being a factual statement, or at least a statement based on facts, as well. If there are certain objective parameters that are looked at in forming the rankings, then to that extent, it would also be a factual claim as well.

I'm not sure how accurate the forecasts are, but there is a video from Stanford neurobiologist, Robert Sapolsky, where he claims that depression is going to be something like the number one killer. I think it already outranks a number of other diseases. If the projection is based on a linear regression analysis, then the prediction is almost certainly wrong, as the projection into the future is likely going to be curved, not a straight line at all. But, still, it is a very destructive problem.

I'm not sure what causes depression, but would be surprised if there was a single source as opposed to multiple causes. I think it's also fairly well documented that it is associated with a chemical imbalance in the brain, but is the chemical imbalance what causes the emotional depression or is it that the emotional depression causes the chemical imbalance?

ssu: You are missing the entire point I made. When Hitler came to power in Germany, he had no idea how far he could go in persecuting Jews. He certainly didn't start mass murdering them the day after seizing power. Why? He wanted to see what people's reactions would be. Hitler was frankly amazed at how little protests he received, both domestically and internationally, as he started persecuting Jews. Because he got so little resistance, the persecutions increased. Although Trump is not Hitler, the analogy is still instructive. Trump has stated, openly, before the mid-terms, that he is above the US Constitution. If on Tuesday the Republicans win, then he'll take that as approval for his position, and he'll become more extreme. If, the Democrats win on Tuesday, then he'll get the message that Americans are not approving of his authoritarian claims.

As far as Trump wanting people to call him a fascist, how is that true? That's the last thing he and his fellow-travelers want. Right-wing political correctness is in fashion these days --- no matter how much of a racist a person is we should not call them a racist. Why not? If the description is accurate, then it is useful, and in Trump's case, the description of him and his supporters being racists is accurate.

CarlosDiaz: Your last comment is rather comical, since it is self-refuting. So, by me asking a question, I "closed" the debate? Well, if I closed the debate, then how come you've entered into the debate? By doing so, you have confirmed that I have not "closed" the debate. I wouldn't even know how to do that, but certainly, asking a question would not close a debate.

As far as your other point, I'm not sure what your point is? Is it that there are no sciences at all, including physics, because we don't have all the answers? And who said medicine was a science? It's based on science, but it's somewhat like engineering, applying science as opposed to being an independent science itself.

In any event, you indicated that economics is a science, just not a very good one. What is your basis for stating that economics is a science? After all, the stock market just got crushed, and how many economists saw that coming? As far as comparing the predictions in economics to physics, they aren't even remotely comparable, with physics far in the lead. A physicist can calculate how much farther away the moon will be from the Earth a year from now, based on conservation of angular momentum, and be extremely accurate in the prediction. There is nothing comparable to that in all of economics.

Trump's claim that he can with a stroke of his pen overrule the US Constitution is the very definition of authoritarianism. The fact he can publicly announce such an intention, with popular support from his racist, science-denying, conspiracy-theorist base, right before the mid-terms, tells me that unless there is an actual blue wave in two days, that we may not even have a presidential election in 2020. After all, the last free-election the Russians had, they probably didn't think it was going to be their last either. No American should assume at this point that our democratic institutions will survive Trump's onslaught. Especially with a conservative Court that may not stand up for the Constitution, and a Republican party that is now seemingly out in the open about its endorsement of a white-ethno authoritarian state.

Screw Trump, and his fascist followers. I'm standing on the side of liberty.

Wayfarer: I never thought of the Comte angle. Thanks for mentioning it.

thatoneguy: I definitely disagree with your statement that regression analysis can determine the actual shape of a demand curve. It can't. Even the Economist magazine had an article about a year ago on the very topic of economics not being able to empirically verify the existence of demand and supply curves.

Not to mention that when the situation involves investment assets, we definitely do not have downward sloping demand curves. If a person buys gold at $300.00 an ounce, and by the end of the year, the price rises to $400.00 an ounce, will the person now buy less gold? He's likely to buy more, as are other people, who think that gold is a great investment. Hence the formation of asset bubbles, including the infamous tulip bulb bubble. The point being that not only is there no way to confirm the existence of a demand curve, we can easily think of situations where the downward sloping demand curve would definitely not exist, which makes it that much more difficult to empirically verify the existence of a demand curve, as its shape is not necessarily of a specific preconceived shape, so we don't even have that as a guide.

ssu: I never stated that anyone claimed economics was more of a science than a natural science, but they certainly claim it is a science. Milton Friedman constantly referred to economics as a science and himself as a scientist. This is commonly done by economists.

Rank Amateur: The reason for that statement is because the Catholics recognized the same immorality I did. But, since they have received no additional knowledge from when they claimed hell was a real place, they could not possibly have any justification for shifting gears, other than an acknowledgement that their previous claim about hell was immoral. It's also rather odd to claim hell is a state of mind, and engage in this blame the victim strategy. I don't believe in any God, but am not in hell, even by the Vatican's description. So, we have concrete, empirical evidence that this statement is false.

The whole idea of salvation is immoral. The claim is one must accept the very God that will torture them for all eternity if they don't. Now, what do we call this? Bullying people around. That's not moral, that is coerciveness at its finest.

I like both of you, so I am hoping that this is all in good fun.

Wayfarere: It's not reductionist though. Far from it. In fact, in modern biology, if anything, it's about as anti-reductionist as a science can get.

Evolutionary biology most definitely does not promote utilitarianism. As I indicated with the trolley problem. If it did promote utilitarianism, then the same part of the brain would light up in both scenarios, but, since it doesn't, this is biology verifying that we are not utilitarians. In fact, just look at the link regarding disgust and ethics, which is clearly non-utilitarian.

Well, actually, the Jews don't even refer to that opening story, which was written long after many other stories were written as Genesis, and for the Jews, the people who wrote the story, it has absolutely nothing to do with the alleged fall of the human race. It has more to do with issues like the distinction between humans and people when it comes to ethics. That's the problem with classifying the story as Judeo-Christian ----- one typically makes sole reference to the Christian interpretation while ignoring the Jewish one, which is completely different from Christianity. One may as well call the story a Christian-Muslim one, and see how far it gets one where both the Christians and Muslims disagree on what the story means.

Wayfarer: I stopped at this first claim made by you, because I am not sure where you are getting this from, but it's not true. You stated that, "The problem with your account, is that it doesn't come to terms with the fundamentally sisyphean predicament of being human. Like all evolutionary theory, it implicitly assumes that the only aim in life is, ultimately, survival, passing on the genome." Evolution is not concerned with whether any specific individual has children. If it were, then we would have a much different world. In fact, over-production can definitely be a problem, and why would evolution support a species that overproduces? As long as there is sufficient reproduction in the species as a whole, evolution accounts for the birth rates, and thus, evolutionary theories are not in any way wedded to the notion that "the only aim in life is passing on the genome." At least this is true for any given individual's genome.


Moreover, evolutionary biology allows for proximate causes, and is not limited to such a goal being in the head of any individual. We take care of our children, not because we are cold-blooded calculating machines, but because we love them. We have sex, not because we are cold-blooded calculating machines, but because sex is pleasurable. Evolutionary biology has long recognized that proximate causes for behavior is different from the ultimate cause, so biology does not by any means state that there is only one goal in a person's life. Far from it.

Well, then I would defend the accused by first asking that the charges against the accused be amended, because presently the claim that guilt has already been decided against the accused is unduly prejudicial and violates basic due process. I would also ask for a bill of particulars as the charges now raised against the accused are rather vague and again violate basic due process as the accused cannot be sure of what needs to be defended. I would further request a disclosure of the criminal backgrounds of any witnesses against the accused, as this goes to the issue of their credibility, and possible bias, and bias is never a collateral issue.

Empathy most likely would have started out as concern for our children, and we also have mirror neurons in our brains that allow us to basically feel what others feel. So, it's biology.

A key piece of evidence deals with the trolley problems. Most people agree that pulling the lever is okay to avoid killing 5 people, while killing 1 instead. However, most people also reject pushing the fat man onto the tracks, despite the fact the outcome is now different, five people will die instead of just one. However, neuroscience has sown that a different area of the brain lights up in the two situations, as physically pushing the person makes a biological difference in how the information is processed.

If one looks at the field of psychology these days, it's heavily influenced by biology. This includes topics addressing moral psychology.

If you are stating that he has already been found guilty, then what are the witnesses being called for? For a sentencing phase? You can say that there is a pending charge and call witnesses to establish evidence of the alleged charge, but, once there is a conviction entered, the issue of guilt is no longer before the court.

I don't think Pascal is in any way, with this argument, rejecting a person accepting a true belief. His argument deals with something that is unknown, so I don't think it can be used for a situation where the actual state of affairs is known.

Morality is definitely based on evolution. This includes cooperation between people, and there are scientific models laying this out for people, especially if one references evolutionary game theory. If you stop and think about our most basic moral principles, like very few people are surprised that Trump has his children heading up his cooperation --- because we know that parents favor their children. The reason this makes evolutionary sense is because the parent wants to make sure their genes get passed on. We also favor our family members, like brothers, cousins, etc., over strangers. Now, certainly this isn't always the case, but it is true on average. As mentioned above, groups that cooperate and are more altruistic defeat groups that have exclusively selfish members.

We can also see a great deal of human moral behavior in existence in our closest relatives, chimps and bonobos.

If we were reptiles the chances of us having the same morality that we now have as evolved social primates would be zero.

Even Peter Singer accepts a great deal of evolutionary biology as an explanation for human morality. He simply does not think it is reducible to human biology, which is what evolution also tells us. Our main trait is intelligence, compared to other species, and that allows us a greater variety of behavior, and so we can build off of our basic morality and expand on it through moral debate. But, for anyone to claim that morality has nothing to do with biology is a rejection of basic science in the same way that creationists reject evolution. If one believes in evolution, then looking for evolution's impacts on human traits makes logical sense. It really makes no sense to claim we evolved, but, evolution has nothing to do with human traits, including such things as intelligence, compassion, etc. There is not a single human trait that is not impacted by human genetics.

Relativist: It's most definitely not true that corporate tax cuts will have a positive short term impact on the economy. If the tax cuts are going to cause a huge deficit? If the tax cuts are occurring when the economy is already heating up, and they will cause inflation fears and a central bank to raise interest rates? That's just two situations where tax cuts will have a negative impact, even in the short-run.

It was a trade war that crashed the stock market in 1929 and started the great depression that followed. Trump, while the stock market was in a bubble, has started a trade war. That was the dumbest economic strategy he could have followed, and we are seeing the fallout from it, right now. Maybe if he quickly reverses himself we can avoid a major recession, but I doubt Trump is smart enough to figure out he has screwed up the economy, and he was handed a great running economy when he took office. Why anyone supported his economic plan, which was doomed to failure, as has been explained now for centuries of economic theory and evidence, is beyond me. Trumpers may as well not believe in gravity if they are willing t believe that a trade war will strengthen the economy and is a great idea when the stock market is already in a bubble.

Even the claim that we are in competition with China when we trade with China is beyond stupid. That's like saying a customer of Walmart is in competition with Walmart. Wrong. When we trade with China we are in a mutually beneficial exchange, and we are in competition with others who would also like to trade with China. Trump couldn't have gotten things more backwards and distorted.

Praxis: You keep trying to have it both ways. You can't claim that they are saying Trump "encourages political violence" but "makes no claim that Trump directly caused the MAGA bomber...." Encourage? That's causation. Jesse is one of many who have been making this claim, with no scientific support.

Noble Dust: The science has shown we have bias in our political and philosophical views. In fact, it's so well established, it's amazing that it's hardly ever mentioned in philosophy forums and by political pundits. Why is Trump talking about a "caravan"? It's because the right-wing is xenophobic. Why are they xenophobic? Partly because of their genes. Some of our ancestors survived better by not mingling with foreigners, which made their immune systems safer, as one example. For others, they like foreigners. Why? Again it's partly genetic. Some of us had ancestors who gained an advantage by mating with those outside the tribe, as it limited the negative impact of inbreeding too much. People's opinions on immigration are rarely the result of some unbiased opinion regarding philosophical arguments on the topic, but rather, one's built-in predispositions greatly affect the arguments one is willing to accept on the issue. And it should not surprise anyone that Trump is a germophobe, as many top racists, including Hitler, were/are. This also explains why racists commonly use words like "vermin" and "parasite" in describing the Other --- the hatred really is biologically based, in significant part any way.

This is the old problem of evil, which I think does rule out the existence of an all-powerful, all-good and all-knowing God, but I am not sure that eliminates other conceptions of God, like a less than all-powerful being, as an example.

The free market is not democratic, and never has been. In fact, from an historical standpoint, democracy and capitalism were considered to be antagonistic towards each other. After all, a majority of poor people could pass laws to confiscate the wealth of the capitalists. It's only in more modern times where the concept of democratic capitalism has taken hold, as if the two are joined at the hip. People should realize too that capitalism as we know it today only exists as a result of laws that were passed to make capitalism more humane. We had to legally abolish child-labor, unsafe work conditions, long hours, etc.

Rank Amateur: I'm making the point that natural rights do not exist. Never have and never will. People instead first figure out what is morally good, and then make up legal rights to accomplish what is morally good. It's only after people figuring out that freedom of speech is a good thing that it then becomes a legal right. Rights are always governed by a larger moral system. To say something is a natural right doesn't help anyway. Once you make such a claim, you then have to figure out is the right absolute, or qualified. If you claim the right is absolute, you'll end up with absurdities, like saying we can't imprison a murderer because he has the absolute right to freedom. If you say a right is qualified, then how is it in any way a natural right?

Jake: I'm fairly confident Trump's plan is not to have me talk about him, because I despise him. I think he's an idiot, a fascist, a racist, a science-denying POS, a liar, an anti-Semite, a sexist, a imbecilic conspiracy theorist, a disgrace to the office of US president, Putin's little bitch, etc., etc.

Jeremiah: "As an aside and for the record, humans are absolutely more powerful than God." Talk about an absurd claim. What God? Spinoza's God? How are humans more powerful than Spinoza's God? Or, a God that allegedly created the Earth 10,000 years ago and does not even exist since the Earth is closer to 4 billion years old? Or, the God that is supposedly existing as a supernatural being that governs the cosmos? How do we know that such a being does not exist? We can't know. Much less show rationally that humans are more powerful? We can't.

Rank Amateur: You asked the question, "Can I speculate all human beings have a right not to be enslaved ?? How without circular logic would one go about proving that ?" for which I already answered. You don't need to create any fictional rights. You look at the issue from a general moral framework, which is exactly where so-called natural rights come from in the first place. Every right an American has comes from people figuring out that it would be a good thing to establish such rights, and they do have limits. Saying a person has a right to be free does not mean that we cannot imprison those who murder, or that a parent can't send a child to their room as a punishment.

Relativist: You just supported my position. Tax cuts do not automatically stimulate the economy. What will occur due to a tax cut depends on numerous other factors as to what is going on in the economy at any given time. Yet, all I ever hear from right-wing politicians and political pundits is that lowering tax cuts always stimulates growth. Despite an enormous amount of economic data to the contrary.

I'm not so sure any of these prizes are all that meaningful. After all, every year, there are numerous people who could have justifiably won a Nobel prize in physics, butt they didn't win. Now, many people then think that their achievements are lesser than the people who did manage to win. Is that true? Hardly. Only one person or one team of three can win each year, and it's a close judgment call on who wins. In the field of philosophy there is even less ability to judge whose work is better than another's.

I think prizes for the actual solution of a specific problem are the way to go. The winner is the first person to solve the problem, so we have a clear standard on judging the winner, and, by solving the problem, we also have an advancement in knowledge. So, if someone wanted to award a prize to the philosopher who could actually "solve" a specific question in philosophy, that would be fine by me, except I doubt there would be any winners. This is because philosophical problems are by their very nature the types of problems that cannot be answered by looking at empirical evidence, scientific experiments, proofs in logic or mathematics, so I'm not sure what good would really be accomplished by giving philosophers awards for achievements in the field.

Jermiah: That is part of the basic standard proof for there being no greatest natural number, and one can extend it to integers, real numbers as well, but what does that proof have to do with whether one can conceive of a greatest being? Nothing. It only pertains to numbers, and numbers that can be ordered on a number line, and I think that was DingoJones's point. I may consider woman X as the prettiest woman ever, or who ever could exist, and that would not be refuted by someone coming along and saying, we can prove there is no largest integer by adding one to an assumed largest integer. The math proof has nothing to do with assessing non-quantitative issues.

Praxis: Saying that the president has power is not the same thing as establishing that people killed because of things he said. And I note that the person who gunned down 11 Jews last week hated Trump, and so what happened there.

Yes, I can honestly state that it is unreasonable to speculate that just because there are pictures of Trump on a van that the person killed because of Trump's speech. Do you know how many people have similar pictures of Trump on their social media pages? You are basically saying --- I don't like what Trump says, so, therefore, I'm going to blame what he says on the killings. I, on the other hand, am stating, I hate what Trump says, and it is morally offensive, but I have not seen any evidence linking his statements to the killings.

What is this thing called a friend?