...listen to one style of music for the rest of your life, what would it be? — Buxtebuddha

Classical.

"the rest of your life" is god-awful long in my case. Otherwise I would have chosen another genre.

Bonus: If you could only listen to one artist, composer, or band from your choice of music style, who would it be? — Buxtebuddha

Beethoven.

We need to get back to colonialism. It would create a better world with fewer conflicts and less poverty.

I agree with the sentiments here. I would add that only (heterosexual) married people with children are allowed to vote. It would fix most problems the USA world has nowadays.

The case could be made that human procreation is essential to human flourishing (in an objective sense).

What are the reasons birds want to fly, fish want to swim, dogs want lick their own balls, my mouse nibbling on my shoes and humans want to procreate? The biological answer is not going to satisfy you. You are looking for a spiritual answer -- or basically a philosophical answer. You don't want an explanation, you want a justification. A philosophical normative case to procreate.

But I do not foresee a fruitful discussion based on the premises you have provided. All "Reasons" can be taken down as mere rationalisations. For example, even if you accept my first sentence, you could still reject the notion of human flourishing, by questioning the idea as to why we would want humans to flourish in a non-selfish way beyond any subjective rhetoric. As long as the context of the debate remains in the restrictions of subjectivity, the result of the discussion will be inevitable, namely nihilism.

Anyway, the more I read what others people have to say about UBI, the more I become sceptical -- I was very much in favour.

But great economists like Friedman and Hayek -- who both proposed this unoriginal idea, but in different forms -- to me seem too naive. They forget about the political and ideological aspect of the debate. Even if we can create a macrosocio-economic system that contains UBI as envisioned by these two gentlemen -- and I think we can, don't get me wrong -- it will be inevitable that the political pressure from the left side will lead to an unsustainable high UBI, as the mere socialist rhetoric of social rights (read entitlements) will dominate the elections. Right of have food, right to housing, right to have clothes, right to have an smart phone, right to a car, right to all have a tesla car of $100k, etcetera.

It is a tug-of-war where the feel-good emotional "arguments" will prevail and the wise informed economic arguments will land like a dry fart. A war left wingers will win, easily -- because while facts > feelings, in politics feelings > facts.

Deeply amusing that -- in a pseudo-economic analysis -- you forgot to mention the dangers inflation.

Yes, it all depends on how you define supervenience -- no one holds dominion over its meaning. But if you define supervenience without the concepts of reductionism and determinism, one may ask whether the purpose of the term is not lost, and how it contrasts with emergentism.

Sorry, I am a bit late, forgot to reply.

Proving that the conceptual understanding of the whole can't be sensibly reduced to its (underlying) parts without fundamentally shifting our conceptual understanding (or approach). Reductionism in other words: the whole is simply the sum of its parts -- nothing more. If you prove that the whole is more than just the sum of its parts, then you basically proved, emergentism (a form of non-reductionism).

The Mereological fallacy surrounding neuroscience is a great example.

Now-- this is by no means a rebuttal of supervenience. It is an ongoing philosophical debate, with a high level of abstractions that goes beyond the purpose of this thread.

Note that I am merely providing some insights and giving some examples -- by no means do I intend to argue either side.


edit: also see mereological nihilism.

The purpose of education is to increase human capital.

Surprisingly good replies here, I almost agree with all of you to a certain extend. Maw, this is a good post and a very good question.

It is true that you can be conservative and far left leaning economically, as that was the case in the UK. The conservatives wanted to socialise economically, whereas the liberals wanted to privatise it.

Conservative "intellectuals" (although those people dislike that word) that are alive today, and decently influential, are Roger Scruton and Thomas Sowell. Peter Hitchens could probably also be added to that list.

My personal pick would be Angela Merkel. She is probably not an intellectual in the sense of the word you intended, but nevertheless a conservative in the classical interpretation -- namely none-ideological none-dogmatic pragmatist.

Capitalism (and Socialism) is (are) amoral. This thread is a strawman at best.

Anyway, the biggest moral argument made in favour of capitalism over socialism is freedom -- hence the colloquial phrase for capitalism is free market.

Also why liberalism (in the classical and philosophical sense) is in favour of capitalism.

Al right.

All I did was replace "laws of nature" with "our scientific understanding of the world". — Agustino

... and all you did was ignore what I quoted... The fact that you did that replacement showed that.

"our scientific understanding of the world" a.k.a. "laws of nature" could be wrong... Namely our subjective understanding of the objective world could be wrong.

edit: so I was a bit shoddy -- cold hands and lack of engagement -- with my phrasing.

Laws of nature is basically how the world works (objectively), and our understanding of it is through scientific endeavour.

Literally that piece I took a screen shot of, just for you darling.

No -- I am not going to indulge you in this, sorry mate.

I will tell you why. It is the same reason why I dislike the new Atheist-movement. Take Sam Harris for example, he debated (and wrote a book about) moral philosophy with zero interest to address the arguments for or against by major moral philosophers in history. No way I am going to debate people like Harris with that kind of laziness. I don't even care whether I agree with the conclusions. It is so intellectually lazy and dishonest, it is not a debate worth having.

Debates like these are old. There are many arguments in favour and many arguments against. The least one should do is explore the basic (or most famous) arguments, and respond to them.

This is basic in philosophy class. You're interested in topic X? Read some basics on topic X that many great philosophers have already addressed.If you still disagree, then address those weaknesses. Write an elaboration with your own arguments to support your conclusion. Ta-da!

Okay Agustino, you know I like you neff, but this is the last time I respond to something you could and should have read yourself... read Hume (read the thing I linked, it is only 4 pages mate, almost the size of this entire thread...)




seriously though, read Hume, lol.

edit: okay I am done with this discussion, there is no fruitful debate here. Just me teaching you some basic philosophy.

None of you actually studied philosophy, am I to presume?

Our scientific understanding of the world.

Like I said you need to learn to read -- I mean it...

where you go wrong -- for the life of me, I do not now why you keep doing it, there is no emotional attachment to this discussion as far as I am concerned, we are not debating your dick size -- you mix your own incoherent definition, namely:

then the laws of nature are the volition of that diety — Mr Phil O'Sophy

Hume defines miracle as either "violation" or "transgression" of the laws of nature. You then continue to ignore Hume's definition, make up your own definition that goes straight against Hume's definitions, then go back to Hume and claim his definition is poor.

This comic illustrates you:

If you assume there islam a diety, then the laws of nature are the volition of that diety. so a transgression of a law of nature by a particular voilition of a diety becomes -the transgression of a volition of the diety by the particular volition of a diety. — Mr Phil O'Sophy

Where you go wrong is add your own (strange at best, trying to be charitable) definition in the mix -- equivocate -- then fall over and blame me ( or Hume).

Again, to you as well, read some Hume kiddo.

I’ve read the document on Hume quite intensely already. I did an exam on that very paper last year, and seemed to have a decent understanding of it considering I got a 1st. — Mr Phil O'Sophy

I doubt that, for your own sake, lmao.

A miracle is very difficult to define - alas, I am not much interested in definitions. — Agustino

It is not, read Hume.

The problem with Hume's definitions is that "laws of nature" do not really mean anything. Whatsoever we call a law of nature is just a regularity we have observed. For all intents and purposes, those regularities can change over time. There are no laws of nature above and beyond the regularities themselves. So if the regularities change, that would, according to Hume, be a miracle. Quite a strange definition I think. — Agustino

Christ almighty for the love of God, read some Hume. This discussion is older than your dead granny.

Hume's take down on miracle still stands today. If you somehow find it incoherent, please share with us why.

Learn some new things about Hume: http://documents.routledge-interactive.s3.amazonaws.com/9781138793934/A2/Hume/HumeMiracles.pdf

Not a kid, — Mr Phil O'Sophy

Are you sure?

...

Learn to read kid.

(lazy copy paste): Hume defines a miracle as ‘a violation of the laws of nature’, or more fully, ‘a transgression of a law of nature by a particular volition of the Deity’ (p. 173)

For example, this definition includes things like me telling you I will flip this coin and get tails 20 times in a row, and I get it, and you and others are not capable to reproduce the event within a reasonable timeframe using the same coin. — Agustino

That is not the definition of miracle, nor coherent with your first sentence.

Your definitions are shoddy, there are already well-defined terms by others that most of us would accept.

Anyway, I voted no.

I can't think of a philosophical way to disprove this, and creating an experimental conditions whereby we could even tell if mental states change without brain states relevantly changing seems mind-buggeringly hard. — bert1

Make a distinction between the philosophically way (abstraction) and scientific way (empirical or practical).

OP asks the former.

Is there a way to disprove this though? — LibnizMakesMeThrowMyBookAway

Yes. Supervenience assumes (or logically relies) on two assertions, (1) Reductionism and (2) determinism. Disprove either and the concept of supervenience falls.

Laurence Krauss — andrewk

Someone posted it here before, but it is a perfect illustration of Scientism:


Scientism --> (i) negation of a priori knowledge + (ii) being completely oblivious of (i).

Didn't that Stanford kid get a few months for rape? US Justice system at its finest. :ok:

This is Scientism:

Spare your effort, mate. Right wing conspiracy is as worse as left wing conspiracy, see Alex Jones and Noam Chomsky.

You, me, and a billion other people. Welcome to this club too. — Bitter Crank

Rubbish, 1 in 7 people do not suffer from major depression. It is only a very few.

Is this a common philosophical approach to life? In your experience, have people achieved long-term contentment or freedom from despair looking at life in this way? Are there any readings you would recommend on the subject of cultivating a relatively stable peace of mind? — CasKev

Try Christianity. The only cure for nihilistic emo's.

whether or not positive and negative feelings such as pain and pleasure are essential in our conception of morality. — Purple Pond

Bold is mine editing.

Depends. Not for moral realists for example. Moral anti-realists, perhaps.

I think that the entire debate of ethics depends on the ontological status of moral features, hence this discussion is rather metaethical.

Ideally, we would have a anarcho-capitalist utopia, conservative hegemony or Christian theocracy, etc...

How does my happiness interfere with yours? — T Clark

We do not wish to make paedophiles "happy". Some people become happy via murdering, slaughter, abusing, exploitation, raping, kidnapping etcetera.

Happiness is not a right.

I say this, because I have seen moderate politicians stutter and stammer when confronted with its populist counterparts -- I literally scream at my telly, it is not hard to rebuke those remarks. Some extreme populists (whether left wing or right wing) think that popular vote should trump individual rights.

Agree, but do not romanticise democracy, or conflate it with plebiscitary systems -- though you mentioned "liberal democracies" -- since its weaknesses are apparent with Weimar Republic, 1933. Populism is a unique phenomenon (= instability) with liberal-democracy.

My first reaction is that it is the life motto of libertarians. A deep rejection of paternalism. Like many libertarian economists say: 'no one spends his money as wisely as their own'. People have an incentive to take care of themselves and their own property. Others disagree like many conservatives. Roger Scruton, for example, says that education is a way of society to make people free -- and approaches this issue from paternalism. Progressives often agree with Scruton on this point, they highly value the use of media, expectations and education to change people to their ideals, another paternalistic approach.

It is ultimately the battle between paternalism and rebelism.