an unsolicited phone call from a lending institution(s) for ALOT of money, an unsolicited individual appearing at my doorstep offering me something, an unsolicited employer offering me something, and a few more unsolicited things... . All of which I accepted to my delight. — 3017amen

If spam is now proof of God, then he truly is Satan.

So much to unpack here... IF I felt like going back in circles again... Which I don't.

And should Trump have banned all flights from Europe today, without consulting anyone in Europe? — Punshhh

Too little, too late. Donald "Pandora" Trump

So basically, if you think there's someone else on this forum who's "got it", give them a shout out here, let them and us all know. — Pfhorrest

I've been in agreement or near agreement with you most of the times I've read your posts. And, which is even more important, when I've disagreed with you, I've still thought you pretty reasonable.

I think an issue is that there is a tendency to only then reply to someone when you do disagree. "Like buttons" could give us a more accurate idea of whose ideas are garnering agreement.... Buuuut that would be undesirable for other reasons.

There's only one person I've ever met whom I'm basically 100% in agreement with, and I married that guy. :joke:

Since we're posting videos about it:

https://youtu.be/1LfQlYESTHg

Jimmy Kimmel on the virus.

knowledge is regarded by the fool as ignorance, and — Antidote

Yet another really convenient way to dismiss any and all critics. :brow:

Will you vote for Trump if Biden is the nominee?
My guess is that everyone who supports Medicare-for-All is going to vote Democrat, no matter who is the candidate. — Relativist

Ohhhhh boy. I'm just gonna refer you right back to my original post in which I showed that Biden and Bernie are TIED as to who will vote for them over Trump.

I'm sorry, but it really seems like you just don't want to understand what several people (so, phew, it's not just me!) here have been telling you.

simply engaged to test my own wisdom and to benefit any that might have the eyes to see it. — Antidote

So, you're here to bequeath us all with your superior insight... How kind of you.

That's called proselytizing.

but at the core of that snowball is that there are good reasons to believe Biden is more electable: as a moderate, he is more likely to bring in independents and never-Trumpers. Polling in swing-states consistently showed he had the bigger edge over Trump. By contrast, Bernie strikes fear in moderates and independents - this can drive up opposition voting. — Relativist

Just because they sound like they could be true, doesn't mean they are. As the polling against Trump shows....

Explain the broad appeal you think he has. — Relativist

He's the most popular senator in America.
https://politicalwire.com/2020/01/16/sanders-is-most-popular-senator/

His policies are also the ones that most Americans support. Again, the argument most democrats, moderates, and independents tout against him or his policies is that they don't think the rest of America wants them--leading right back to my Emperor theory--so they think they can't be done as much as they personally are in favor of them.

If Sanders is one of the best speakers around, and that makes a meaningful difference in terms of votes why hasn't Bernie run away with votes in the primaries? — Relativist

One last time: because people think other people are going to vote for him.

The examples cannot come from my experience because I cannot give you that. — Antidote

That makes no sense.

Read the book, honestly even if its just a few pages and see what you think. If you object, listen to your objection, is it valid? What are you objecting to?

The buddist say, "Don't look at the finger pointing to the moon and mistake the finger for the moon". Sit quietly and contemplate this. What does it mean? Why is it so profound?

Why were ancient cultures more interested in listening to the heart, than the mind? What does that mean? Can you feel anything in your body? These things may help. — Antidote

So... he's not clear enough or sensible enough that you could just tell me. Gotcha. Sorry, no, I have a better reading list on my shelf.

In the end, all this is no better than any other religion preaching about needing to accept Jesus or whomever into their souls before you can really "see the light."

Is that what you're here for? To proselytize?

Artemis, read his book, or take a look online for a PDF copy of his works, it might help this make sense. Or don't, it's your choice. — Antidote

If you can't tell me, it can't be all that clear or "understandable."

If you go beyond thought, you gain a greater understanding of yourself and the world you are in. — Antidote

Give me an example.

He most certainly understands this as having almost killed himself, had his eyes opened. — Antidote

Understands WHAT?

Thought creates the confusion when its mistaken for understanding. — Antidote

Understanding WHAT?

Precisely that. Artemis sees thoughts as the "ends" of the process, where it appears as the "beginnings" of the process, — Antidote

Wrong again.
I see thought as the process. Full stop.

But as I was suggesting above (albeit in a tone of amusement, but I'll be serious now): the problem with theories that want to do away with thought in favor of some "other" kind of understanding is that they fail to give any coherent theory. There either never is a whole theory, or it just runs into contradiction after contradiction. It's not surprising, because they inherently desire to exempt themselves from the need to make sense. It's just another form of accepting Jesus as your Savior: you have to believe first and only on the basis of faith and then you'll see the light. Miraculously.

As I follow this, understanding brings something into thought, so is a synthesizing function, not entirely thought, and not merely thought. — Pantagruel

Actually, he says:

All thought, words, etc are just distrubances. — Antidote

Understanding is mixed with thought mainly because of our confusion. — Antidote

A couple of problems here:
If your entire counter argument boils down to "you're confused," then it's not only weirdly presumptive, it's pointless. Confused how, why, and about what exactly?

I'm not surprised, of course, that the person whose argument is that understanding happens without thought is also the person to not have any real arguments--those require thought.

I'm sure it is super convenient though to just wave off criticism by saying it's just a result of confusion. Saves you a lot of.... thinking. :wink:

So, if your arguement held true, those spiritual masters who claim the importance of "no thought" would not attain understanding, because they are without thought - again, not so. — Antidote

I haven't met a "spiritual master" yet who's impressed me much with his or her "understanding." I've read several books by so-called "spiritual masters" that have very much put me in doubt of their level of insight, to be perfectly honest.

Here's a challenge: give me some example, something specific, about which you think a person might gain understanding without thought.

What "kind" of thought do you imagine understanding to be? — Antidote

Thought is mental/brain activity with cognitive content. So is understanding. So is empathy and humility.

To phrase it differently, once you're not just talking "understanding" in the abstract and try to think of specific instances, you immediately get to: what are you are understanding? And badabing, badabum, you've got thought.

Does understanding arise as a result of thought, or in the gaps between thoughts. — Antidote

Since understanding is a kind of thought, this is nonsensical.

A) if the difference falls within the margin of error, then it's not really sensible to build any theories around it.

B) see my previous post.

Another flaw in your theory: why have Democrats (so far) voted for the candidate with dementia rather than the one who has neither dementia nor craziness? — Relativist

It's a whoke The Emperor Has No Clothes thing. The news has been working hard to sell us the theory that Biden is more electible, and that voting for Sanders would mean a Trump win.

Therefore lots of people are voting for Biden in part because they think other people want to vote for Biden. It snowballs from there with each primary.

Why would anyone vote for a guy with dementia when we can instead give the crazy guy 4 more years? — Relativist

"He's so crazy it might just work!"
VS
"I feel bad for the tired, weak old guy who can't remember how he started a sentence by the time he gets to the end of it."

don't see how the perception that he has dementia would affect any votes, since the case can be made for Trump as well. — Relativist

Trump may be insane, but he doesn't have dementia.

Biden has an electibilty problem list as long as my arm.

:rofl:

Dementia, for one.

Back to talking about Sanders:
There's been a lot of general blah di blah in the news about how Biden versus Sanders compares regarding electibility against Trump.

This recent Newsweek article suggests that they're actually pretty much tied in that regard (less than a point difference being well within the margin of error):

https://www-newsweek-com.cdn.ampproject.org/v/s/www.newsweek.com/what-polls-say-about-donald-trump-vs-joe-biden-election-1491230?amp_js_v=a2&amp_gsa=1&amp=1&usqp=mq331AQFKAGwASA%3D#aoh=15839338809752&amp_ct=1583933891072&referrer=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.google.com&amp_tf=From%20%251%24s&ampshare=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.newsweek.com%2Fwhat-polls-say-about-donald-trump-vs-joe-biden-election-1491230

Somehow I'm not surprised.

I'm just not buying it. — tim wood

Well, that's your business then.

I've proved my point. I can't do more than lead the stubborn mule to water.

Since we are using Wikipedia now:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Friedrich_Nietzsche%27s_views_on_women

Some biographical context:
https://amp-theguardian-com.cdn.ampproject.org/v/s/amp.theguardian.com/books/2018/oct/06/exploding-nietzsche-myths-need-dynamiting?amp_js_v=a2&amp_gsa=1&usqp=mq331AQFKAGwASA%3D#aoh=15836245562294&referrer=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.google.com&amp_tf=From%20%251%24s&ampshare=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.theguardian.com%2Fbooks%2F2018%2Foct%2F06%2Fexploding-nietzsche-myths-need-dynamiting

And a paper explaining in depth his very non-simplistic views of women--note that the paper suggests Nietzsche thought there may be differences between the sexes, but not these necessarily meant superiority of one over the other.
https://philarchive.org/archive/HATNOW-2v1

From these it can be inferred that Nietzsche very much thought about women and women's rights and that it is highly unlikely that his use of "Mensch" was either exclusionary of women, or not a purposefully gender-neutral term.

"Mensch" only gets translated as "man" when "man" is erroneously and outdatedly meant to stand for "human." It's as absurd as claiming "human" means "man." Your quoted Wikipedia entry confirms this. :roll:

I'm taking Nietzsche by his literal word. You are not. You're therefore the one who needs to provide evidence that he did not mean the word that he explicitly used. To quote you:

Have you got that? — tim wood

Uber=over, mensch=man. But never as woman. Whether — tim wood

I've explained the proper translation of Mensch. Feel free to Google it if you don't trust the bilingual, native German speaker (that would be me). Nietzsche cannot be held accountable for the mistakes of his translators.

If you continue this, please cite chap. & verse and show I'm wrong. — tim wood

I've been supplying you with specific facts that counter your very vague, hand-wave-y generalization.... Perhaps it is you who needs to provide more in evidence and/or argument?

meaning I get thousands of emails notifying me of people commenting to me. — NOS4A2

You can turn that off, just fyi.

Can we settle this simply by saying that Nietzsche was not a man of XXIst century western culture, experience, and sensitivity? — tim wood

Since that would be inaccurate, not really.

For example, despite having many controversial views on women's potential, he did talk about it. So, no he did not just "accidentally" exclude women because they were some odd afterthought as foreign to his writing as yak milk would be to my breakfast. Note that there were many writers of his time who did just leave out talk of women altogether.

You're accusing me of attributing some 21st C understanding of the world to Nietzsche. But you're attributing some simplistic, stereotyped, and frankly inaccurate 21st C understanding of the people of the 19th C to him.

Meschugenes Ubermenschchen", which means in Enlish, translated loosely, "Loco little Overperson". — god must be atheist

:rofl:

I especially appreciate your translation of Yiddish into Spanglish.

It's not what you want to retro-read into him, or think he should have said, but what he did say and meant. — tim wood

Nietzsche is famous for having strongly mixed opinions on women and their potential. So, based on that and on his particular, and for the time uncommon, choice of the neutral term, I'd say your claim that he meant purposefully to exclude women is as much, if not more, "retro-reading into him."

As a German speaker, let me point out that he did specifically call it the "Übermensch" and not "Übermann." Mensch is human and Mann is man in German. And since German has the same history of human/man usage I described above in English, I think he probably used "Mensch" purposefully.

Well, I’m not a native English speaker and ‘overman’ is what google translate tells me to translate that word to. — Rystiya

Oh, I see. I take back my snark then :wink:

For future reference, "man" means human male. An antiquated use is to use it to refer to all humans (and some really obstinate types still do). But generally people now just say "human" or "person" to refer to, yknow, "humans" and "persons."

You mean my overman looks too perfect to be realistic? — Rystiya

I mean your overman is stuck in antiquated diction.

Sheesh, even Nietsche knew to call it the "über-human."

You asked why the taxpayer would want more money in their pocket. I gave my answer: Freedom. — BitconnectCarlos

You're a moving target. It may feel like that means you're getting somewhere in the conversation, but it just suggests you can't really defend a position.

Since I've shown that the tax-payer does not actually have more freedom, in fact has less freedom, in most circumstances under a purely capitalist system, your argument makes no sense. And all you had to say when I pointed that discrepency out was basically "bummer, but I don't make the rules"....

So do you have an actual argument or not?