Maieutics is not a mental exercise. — Fooloso4

Amounts to the same thing. It’s supposed to lead to something or not. Plato for example took to constructing an answer. If it leads nowhere I don’t see how it’s not mental floss. Stupefying someone with a bunch of questions to show we should question our assumptions is a beginning…

I have not addressed the extent to which they differ from other philosophers. — Fooloso4

Ok, so what are you pointing out? I see a bird..Isn't it lovely? And...

If by mental floss you mean maieutics, then it is an essential part of what Socratic philosophy is. — Fooloso4

Maieutics is not about mental exercises. It is about critical examination of beliefs, assumptions, opinions, and claims. Questioning takes priority over answers. — Fooloso4

Right, but my argument still stands, and just replace it with Maieutics, if that helps.

It's quite obvious some people entered this discussion to defend Israeli atrocities. We can talk about those or pick other events less heated to see how these principles should be applied. — Benkei

Fair enough.. I felt this was just a more theoretical arm of the Israel thread.. one which I am more apt to want to participate in rather than emotional outbursting that seems to happen in the other one..

But we can simply keep it to WW2.. And we can extrapolate from there on our own how it relates to current conflicts.. If we do that, I still don't really see my points about Nazi Germany and Japan addressed.. And specifically this:

First off, what are we admitting to, when we say that (at least some) wars can be legitimate? I keep pressing the matter, because I keep seeing this denial of what war in reality looks like. We all agree it's not Rambo.. It is not just a bulging muscled crew of special forces in remote jungle environments perfectly being able to identify and target the bad guys...

So if we all agree it is not that, what can war look like? Presumably war isn't a gentleman's game of backgammon or chess.. a fun little trist whereby you send a missile here, I send a missile there.. wait a few months, etc.. If it is a war like let's say the Nazis taking over territory, or a terrorist governing body raping, brutally executing, and chopping up your countrymen, this certainly doesn't call for dilatant affairs of swords display.. Of course not.. But then, again, what is war? What is war when it means having to make Nazi Germany totally surrender? What is war in making Japan totally surrender? Japan only killed 2,403 people in Pearl Harbor, but it resulted in millions of Japanese deaths.. for example. Though an unprovoked sneak attack (similar to Hamas), it actually was not directed towards regular civilians either (though a few regular civilians died being nearby)...

I am not advocating "Just because you started a war, this means millions of people have to die. Don't misconstrue me for your straw man.. Rather, what is the result when fighting in certain extremely difficult environments to get rid of a governing body willing to do what it takes to constantly harm your civilians whilst not taking any regards themselves for their own civilians? We agree, what it takes is not Rambo and dilettante exercises.. because the enemy doesn't work like that. The enemy wants you dead, says it, shows it, films it...

Let's say there are two broad approaches:
A1) Just ground troops
A2) Aerial bombardment and ground troops.

A1)Let us say, if the first approach was the one taken, 10x the casualties on one's own side would take place, and the war would become bogged down to indefinite, hellish levels for one's own troops because it would become essentially an unending maze or trap…essentially this is how the enemy would like you to play..keep you indefinitjry stuck for maximum length and lethality. Make it a complete street fight, booby traps etc

A2) The second broad approach allows your troops enough room to maneuver and eventually go in and fight more aggressively, saving lives for your own troops, and ending the war more quickly.

So, I am fine discussing international law.. But it will simply get bogged down to various instances whereby "Did this fighter, by ducking into a building, make that building a legitimate target in the eyes of international law".. Having civilians as "human shields" doesn't make the enemy use it as a "get out of jail free" during a war. As we both agreed, (even if we detest war and violence), war is a "legitimate" thing countries can wage.

Western analysis generally rests on the supposition that there is no empathy for the suffering of brown people, be it working as slaves in a mine or then shot for sport, but this is of course only generally true in the West; there are plenty of brown people who empathize with other brown people, and it is this emotion and its consequence that I would put money on we will see, however unforeseeable it may be in its eventual particular manifestation. — boethius

This to me is wildly inaccurate to the goings-on in Israel.. especially since over half the population are Middle Eastern Jews.. But also, if that were the case, countries like Saudi Arabia wouldn't be tolerated for their treatment of people and human rights abuses.. It's more about strategic interest and historical affinity, not this Leftist oppressor narrative.

Take it for what it's worth, but while I was there I did not hear a single Palestinian express they believed violence was the solution. — Tzeentch

Anecdotally, I am sure that is true. The history doesn't bare that out. You can try to dictate that the story goes..

"Israel wants the West Bank and thus they closed opportunities for peaceful resolutions"..

Or you can look at various things that happened during the "Second Intifada" (mainly bombings and violence.. which caused a whole bunch of things, including building a wall and allowing harderline politicians that had the double agenda of the radicals settlers that went with it..

I don't know what is implied by "JUST". Dialectical thinking takes as its starting point substantial positions. I do not know and have not claimed that Socrates was a mystic. Plato's Socrates does make extensive use of mythology and images of transcedence, but he distinguishes between mythos and logos. At the limits of logos he often turns to mythos, but I think he does so because myths are salutary, not because they reveal the truth of the matter. — Fooloso4

Presumably you are making a point about Socrates and Wittgenstein contra other philosophers, but I am not sure what it is.. There is mental floss and there is philosophy. Mental floss can be part of philosophy, but in the way that doing math exercises helps strengthen your math abilities.. You aren't really a mathematician unless you use some of those skills for constructing proofs, etc.

Israel simply needs to go back to the table and offer a solution and stop supporting right-wing agendas in the name of security. At the same time, Hamas is doing what it set out to do since the 90s, which is to cause Israel so much violence and chaos, it would make them unwilling to work with Palestinian moderates..

However, I get the sense if you talk to Israelis, even liberal/moderate ones, they would ask you what a moderate Palestinian might be, as they haven't seen one? I think that is giving too short a shrift to Abbas, but I might not know enough about why he is sidelined other than convenience.. I know the PA do have the paying of suicide bomber families on their books, but if that's the only game in town.. you have to work with him to build a state, I would suppose. I can think of interesting outliers that are anti-violence, but doubtful they would be seen as acceptable to Palestinians, as they would think they were just plants for Israel and not representing them..

You can look at it a different way too.. Germany did not get certain regions that it thought was rightfully there's after WW2 because they were completely defeated in a total surrender.. Israel thinks after 67, Palestine has less negotiations to work with.. them and the Arab nations lost that war.. Unlike the Germans who willingly admitted defeat and thus could rebuild from there, this is not the case here.

As Benny Gantz and Gallant have critiques Netanyahu for, you need a political end game.

We don't know exactly what Socrates positions are, because we cannot easily split Plato from Socrates.

How do we know that Socrates was JUST a dialectic mystic, and didn't have substantial positions on the questions?

But he is also forcing you through the wringer because (for some) it must be like an epiphany to see that although we, obviously, can not know (be certain) about another, we do not, because of that fact, fall back onto opinion, or other well-worn lessor ideas of knowledge, like: belief, or emotion, or “subjectivity”, or, with respect Joshs, theoretical interpersonal gymnastics (perhaps including “knowing subjects” with “intentions”). We cannot know other minds because our relation to others is not knowledge, but how we treat them, our “attitude” in relation to them, in its sense of: position “towards”. I treat you as if you have a soul. His claim is that is how our relation to others works; that is the categorical transcendental mechanics of it.

Now that’s saying more than something; it’s a revolution in terms, perspective, and frameworks, going back to Plato. And of course he could be wrong. But the disagreement is between two (or more) totally different ways of picturing philosophy and the human condition. Someone just “saying” (stating, telling) something of that nature is going to sound incomprehensible to the other. So, if you want to fight from your own turf, you will feel like he isn’t playing fair. But with any philosopher (worth their salt), if you don’t try to understand them on their terms, your “disagreement” will just be a dismissal without hitting the actual target (thus perhaps the feeling of frustration). — Antony Nickles

Well, we have a disagreement then on legitimate forms of discourse. If I give you a premise with little reasoning or evidence to back it up, you can rightfully accuse me of a poorly constructed, or bad argument.

However, if I provid numerous details for a premise I do not make, that is not so much a bad argument, as a bad faith argument. For the adherent to demand then, that you really don't "know" what he's doing, it's "radically different" and "playing on a different turf", then we are already not playing the game.. Ironic, because Wittgenstein's very point in PI is that we must understand the language of the game in order to understand how to use language.. Yet here we are abusing language to let Wittgenstein have a free pass to not play the game.. because he's playing with different rules and it is somehow UP TO US, to understand his rules. Why? And if that's the case, why can't I make the rules, and you go to me? Does merely fandom qualify as making someone worth paying attention to in some kids-glove special way, where only THEY cannot play by the rules?

That's already established if you stop pretending I disagree with everything. I'm very clear about what I disagree with with respect to the article you cited. All non-combatants are equally innocent and therefore ALL of them need to be taken into consideration without weighing them because of their presumed affiliation when deciding on a military course of action, irrespective what side of the border they're on. Then it becomes abundantly clear plenty of historic and current violence is entirely disproportionate. — Benkei

So my point was to establish several things here...

First off, what are we admitting to, when we say that (at least some) wars can be legitimate? I keep pressing the matter, because I keep seeing this denial of what war in reality looks like. We all agree it's not Rambo.. It is not just a bulging muscled crew of special forces in remote jungle environments perfectly being able to identify and target the bad guys...

So if we all agree it is not that, what can war look like? Presumably war isn't a gentleman's game of backgammon or chess.. a fun little trist whereby you send a missile here, I send a missile there.. wait a few months, etc.. If it is a war like let's say the Nazis taking over territory, or a terrorist governing body raping, brutally executing, and chopping up your countrymen, this certainly doesn't call for dilatant affairs of swords display.. Of course not.. But then, again, what is war? What is war when it means having to make Nazi Germany totally surrender? What is war in making Japan totally surrender? Japan only killed 2,403 people in Pearl Harbor, but it resulted in millions of Japanese deaths.. for example. Though an unprovoked sneak attack (similar to Hamas), it actually was not directed towards regular civilians either (though a few regular civilians died being nearby)...

I am not advocating "Just because you started a war, this means millions of people have to die. Don't misconstrue me for your straw man.. Rather, what is the result when fighting in certain extremely difficult environments to get rid of a governing body willing to do what it takes to constantly harm your civilians whilst not taking any regards themselves for their own civilians? We agree, what it takes is not Rambo and dilettante exercises.. because the enemy doesn't work like that. The enemy wants you dead, says it, shows it, films it...

Let's say there are two broad approaches:
A1) Just ground troops
A2) Aerial bombardment and ground troops.

A1)Let us say, if the first approach was the one taken, 10x the casualties on one's own side would take place, and the war would become bogged down to indefinite, hellish levels for one's own troops because it would become essentially an unending maze or trap…essentially this is how the enemy would like you to play..keep you indefinitjry stuck for maximum length and lethality. Make it a complete street fight, booby traps etc

A2) The second broad approach allows your troops enough room to maneuver and eventually go in and fight more aggressively, saving lives for your own troops, and ending the war more quickly.

So, I am fine discussing international law.. But it will simply get bogged down to various instances whereby "Did this fighter, by ducking into a building, make that building a legitimate target in the eyes of international law".. Having civilians as "human shields" doesn't make the enemy use it as a "get out of jail free" during a war. As we both agreed, (even if we detest war and violence), war is a "legitimate" thing countries can wage. — schopenhauer1

:up: Indeed Lincoln was prescient in more than one ways..
A statesman is supposed to put country above politics...
A mere politician puts himself or a party above country, usually to gain or stay in power...

Don't get confused though, a statesman can be a deft political actor, but knowing how to play the game for the greater good, and knowing how to play the game to stay in power are two different things.

How Lincoln maneuvered to get the Republican nomination, how he played his cards to keep the border states from succeeding, slowly evolving strategy to make about a greater ideology (only after decisive wins).. How he was able to cobble the coalition to pass the 13th amendment is a great political actor done by a statesman.

I meant by that, in a sort of Kantian way, you are completely undermining what it means to be a close relation with someone, if you treat them JUST as any person, and not someone who has special significance in your life. It would be crazy for a father to not feed his family, or his invalid mother, because an anonymous person is starving in Ethiopia... Or to make it more stark.. IF one must decide to protect one's family or another's family, one from a side that has a government causing the damage, that he is thus equally obligated to protecting both in the same due caution.

And this brings us back to Rambo...
You agreed:

Nobody argues against a right to self defence so if anybody is raising a straw man, then this is it. — Benkei

But self-defense doesn't look like Rambo, taking place in isolated areas against clear enemy targets...

So what are we admitting where we say countries have a right to a self-defensive "war"? And if you say, "Not this that or the other tragedy".. noted, and no one wants that.. but then, what are we "admitting" of it, other than we both agree it is not this idealized Rambo kind of situation.. as that is not reality..

And this ties in with my conversation with @ssu about WW1 and WW2 and the differences in how those ended, and the goals of a "defensive war" (certainly a case can be made for this in WW2)...

We can go over each speech, but this one gives a good gist of Lincoln's general position (this is really against the Kansas-Nebraska Act of 1854, but touches on the broader issues):

I think, and shall try to show, that it is wrong; wrong in its direct effect, letting slavery into Kansas and Nebraska and wrong in its prospective principle, allowing it to spread to every other part of the wide world where men can be found inclined to take it.

This declared indifference, but, as I must think, covert real zeal for the spread of slavery, I cannot but hate. I hate it because of the monstrous injustice of slavery itself. I hate it because it deprives our republican example of its just influence in the world; enables the enemies of free institutions, with plausibility, to taunt us as hypocrites; causes the real friends of freedom to doubt our sincerity, and especially because it forces so many really good men amongst ourselves into an open war with the very fundamental principles of civil liberty - criticizing the Declaration of Independence, and insisting that there is no right principle of action but self-interest.

Before proceeding, let me say I think I have no prejudice against the Southern people. They are just what we would be in their situation. If slavery did not now exist among them, they would not introduce it. If it did now exist among us, we should not instantly give it up. This I believe of the masses North and South. Doubtless there are individuals on both sides who would not hold slaves under any circumstances; and others who would gladly introduce slavery anew, if it were out of existence. We know that some Southern men do free their slaves, go North,

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and become tip-top Abolitionists; while some Northern ones go South, and become most cruel slavemasters.
When Southern people tell us they are no more responsible for the origin of slavery than we, I acknowledge the fact. When it is said that the institution exists, and that it is very difficult to get rid of it in any satisfactory way, I can understand and appreciate the saying. I surely will not blame them for not doing what I should not know how to do myself. If all earthly power were given me, I should not know what to do as to the existing institution. My first impulse would be to free all the slaves, and send them to Liberia - to their own native land. But a moment's reflection would convince me that whatever of high hope (as I think there is) there may be in this in the long run, its sudden execution is impossible. If they were all landed there in a day, they would all perish in the next ten days; and there are not surplus shipping and surplus money enough in the world to carry them there in many times ten days. What then? Free them all, and keep them among us as underlings? Is it quite certain that this betters their condition? I think I would not hold one in slavery at any rate; yet the point is not clear enough to me to denounce people upon. What next? Free them, and make them politically and socially our equals? My own feelings will not admit of this; and if mine would, we well know that those of the great mass of white people will not. Whether this feeling accords with justice and sound judgment is not the sole question,

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if indeed, it is any part of it. A universal feeling, whether well or ill-founded, cannot be safely disregarded. We cannot make them equals. It does seem to me that systems of gradual emancipation might be adopted; but for their tardiness in this, I will not undertake to judge our brethren of the South.
When they remind us of their constitutional rights, I acknowledge them, not grudgingly, but fully and fairly; and I would give them any legislation for the reclaiming of their fugitives, which should not, in its stringency, be more likely to carry a free man into slavery, than our ordinary criminal laws are to hang an innocent one.

But all this, to my judgment, furnishes no more excuse for permitting slavery to go info our own free territory, than it would for reviving the African slave trade by law. The law which forbids the bringing of slaves from Africa, and that which has so long forbidden the taking of them to Nebraska, can hardly be distinguished on any moral principle; and the repeal of the former could find quite as plausible excuses as that of the latter.

I have reason to know that Judge Douglas knows that I said this. I think he has the answer here to one of the questions he put to me. I do not mean to allow him to catechize me unless he pays back for it in kind. I will not answer questions one after another, unless he reciprocates; but as he has made this inquiry, and I have answered it before, he has got it without

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my getting anything in return. He has got my answer on the fugitive-slave law.
Now, gentlemen, I don't want to read at any great length, but this is the true complexion of all I have ever said in regard to the institution of slavery and the black race. This is the whole of it, and anything that argues me into his idea of perfect social and political equality with the negro is but a specious and fantastic arrangement of words, by which a man can prove a horse-chestnut to be a chestnut horse. I will say here, while upon this subject, that I have no purpose, either directly or indirectly, to interfere with the institution of slavery in the States where it exists. I believe I have no lawful right to do so, and I have no inclination to do so. I have no purpose to introduce political and social equality between the white and the black races. There is a physical difference between the two, which, in my judgment, will probably forever forbid their living together upon the footing of perfect equality; and inasmuch as it becomes a necessity that there must be a difference, I, as well as Judge Douglas, am in favor of the race to which I belong having the superior position. I have never said anything to the contrary, but I hold that, notwithstanding all this, there is no reason in the world why the negro is not entitled to all the natural rights enumerated in

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the Declaration of Independence-the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. I hold that he is as much entitled to these as the white man. I agree with Judge Douglas he is not my equal in many respects-certainly not in color, perhaps not in moral or intellectual endowment. But in the right to eat the bread, without the leave of anybody else, which his own hand earns, he is my equal and the equal of Judge Douglas, and the equal of every living man.
Now I pass on to consider one or two more of these little follies. The judge is woefully at fault about his early friend Lincoln being a "grocery-keeper." I don't know that it would be a great sin if I had been; but he is mistaken. Lincoln never kept a grocery anywhere in the world. It is true that Lincoln did work the latter part of one winter in a little still-house up at the head of a hollow. And so I think my friend, the judge, is equally at fault when he charges me at the time when I was in Congress of having opposed our soldiers who were fighting in the Mexican War. The judge did not make his charge very distinctly, but I tell you what he can prove, by referring to the record. You remember I was an Old Whig, and whenever the Democratic party tried to get me to vote that the war had been righteously begun by the President,

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I would not do it. But whenever they asked for any money, or land-warrants, or anything to pay the soldiers there, during all that time, I gave the same vote that Judge Douglas did. You can think as you please as to whether that was consistent. Such is the truth; and the judge has the right to make all he can out of it. But when he, by a general charge, conveys the idea that I withheld supplies from the soldiers who were fighting in the Mexican War, or did anything else to hinder the soldiers, he is, to say the least, grossly and altogether mistaken, as a consultation of the records will prove to him.
As I have not used up so much of my time as I had supposed, I will dwell a little longer upon one or two of these minor topics upon which the judge has spoken. He has read from my speech in Springfield in which I say that "a house divided against itself cannot stand." Does the judge say it can stand? I don't know whether he does or not. The judge does not seem to be attending to me just now, but I would like to know if it is his opinion that a house divided against itself can stand. If he does, then there is a question of veracity, not between him and me, but between the judge and an authority of a somewhat higher character.

Now, my friends, I ask your attention to this matter for the purpose of saying something seriously.

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I know that the judge may readily enough agree with me that the maxim which was put forth by the Saviour is true, but he may allege that I misapply it; and the judge has a right to urge that in my application I do misapply it, and then I have a right to show that I do not misapply it. When he undertakes to say that because I think this nation, so far as the question of slavery is concerned, will all become one thing or all the other, I am in favor of bringing about a dead uniformity in the various States in all their institutions, he argues erroneously. The great variety of the local institutions in the States, springing from differences in the soil, differences in the face of the country, and in the climate, are bonds of union. They do not make "a house divided against itself," but they make a house united. If they produce in one section of the country what is called for by the wants of another section, and this other section can supply the wants of the first, they are not matters of discord but bonds of union, true bonds of union. But can this question of slavery be considered as among these varieties in the institutions of the country? I leave it to you to say whether, in the history of our government, this institution of slavery has not always failed to be a bond of union, and, on the contrary, been an apple of discord and an element of division in the house.
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I ask you to consider whether, so long as the moral constitution of men's minds shall continue to be the same, after this generation and assemblage shall sink into the grave, and another race shall arise with the same moral and intellectual development we have -- whether, if that institution is standing in the same irritating position in which it now is, it will not continue an element of division? If so, then I have a right to say that, in regard to this question, the Union is a house divided against itself; and when the judge reminds me that I have often said to him that the institution of slavery has existed for eighty years in some States, and yet it does not exist in some others, I agree to the fact, and I account for it by looking at the position in which our fathers originally placed it -- restricting it from the new Territories where it had not gone, and legislating to cut off its source by the abrogation of the slave-trade, thus putting the seal of legislation against its spread. The public mind did rest in the belief that it was in the course of ultimate extinction. But lately, I think -- and in this I charge nothing on the judge's motives -- lately, I think, that he, and those acting with him, have placed that institution on a new basis, which looks to the perpetuity and nationalization of slavery. And while it is placed upon this new basis, I say,
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and I have, that believe we shall not have peace upon the question until the opponents of slavery arrest the further spread of it, and place it where the public mind shall rest in the belief that it is in the course of ultimate extinction; or, on the other hand, that its advocates will push it forward until it shall become alike lawful in all the States, old as well as new, North as well as South. Now I believe if we could arrest the spread, and place it where Washington and Jefferson and Madison placed it, it would be in the course of ultimate extinction, and the public mind would, as for eighty years past, believe that it was in the course of ultimate extinction. The crisis would be past, and the institution might be let alone for a hundred years -- if it should live so long -- in the States where it exists, yet it would be going out of existence in the way best for both the black and the white races. (A voice: "Then do you repudiate popular sovereignty?") Well, then, let us talk about popular sovereignty! What is popular sovereignty? Is it the right of the people to have slavery or not have it, as they see fit, in the Territories? I will state -- and I have an able man to watch me -- my understanding is that popular sovereignty, as now applied to the question of slavery, does allow the people of a Territory to have slavery if they want to, but does not allow them not to have it if they
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do not want it. I do not mean that if this vast concourse of people were in a Territory of the United States, any one of them would be obliged to have a slave if he did not want one; but I do say that, as I understand the Dred Scott decision if any one man wants slaves, all the rest have no way of keeping that one man from holding them.
When I made my speech at Springfield, of which the judge complains, and from which he quotes, I really was not thinking of the things which he ascribes to me at all. I had no thought in the world that I was doing anything to bring about a war between the free and slave States. I had no thought in the world that I was doing anything to bring about a political and social equality of the black and white races. It never occurred to me that I was doing anything or favoring anything to reduce to a dead uniformity all the local institutions of the various States. But I must say, in all fairness to him, if he thinks I am doing something which leads to these bad results, it is none the better that I did not mean it. It is just as fatal to the country, if I have any influence in producing it, whether I intend it or not. But can it be true, that placing this institution upon the original basis -- the basis upon which our fathers placed it -- can have any tendency to set the Northern and the Southern

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States at war with one another, or that it can have any tendency to make the people of Vermont raise sugar-cane because they raise it in Louisiana, or that it can compel the people of Illinois to cut pine logs on the Grand Prairie, where they will not grow, because they cut pine logs in Maine, where they do grow? The judge says this is a new principle started in regard to this question. Does the judge claim that he is working on the plan of the founders of the government? I think he says in some of his speeches -- indeed, I have one here now -- that he saw evidence of a policy to allow slavery to be south of a certain line, while north of it should be excluded, and he saw an indisposition on the part of the country to stand upon that policy, and therefore he set about studying the subject upon original principles, and upon original principles he got up the Nebraska bill! I am fighting it upon these "original principles" -- fighting it in the Jeffersonian, Washingtonian, and Madisonian fashion.
Now, my friends, I wish you to attend for a little while to one or two other things in that Springfield speech. My main object was to show, so far as my humble ability was capable of showing to the people of this country, what I believed was the truth -- that there was a tendency, if not a conspiracy, among those who

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have engineered this slavery question for the last four or five years, to make slavery perpetual and universal in this nation. Having made that speech principally for that object, after arranging the evidences that I thought tended to prove my proposition, I concluded with this bit of comment:
We cannot absolutely know that these exact adaptations are the result of pre-concert, but when we see a lot of framed timbers, different portions of which we know have been gotten out at different times and places, and by different workmen -- Stephen, Franklin, Roger, and James, for instance; and when we see these timbers joined together, and see they exactly make the frame of a house or a mill, all the tenons and mortises exactly fitting, and all the lengths and proportions of the different pieces exactly adapted to their respective places, and not a piece too many or too few, -- not omitting even the scaffolding, -- or if a single piece be lacking, we see the place in the frame exactly fitted and prepared to yet bring such piece in -- in such a case we feel it impossible not to believe that Stephen and Franklin, and Roger and James, all understood one another from the beginning and all worked upon a common plan or draft drawn before the first blow was struck. — Abraham Lincoln - August 21, 1858

From it I can see that as you point out, Lincoln was trying to show that he did not believe in outright abolition but he thought the westward expansion of slavery and the Dread Scott decision were wrong (as far as I can interpret it). That is to say, he stood as a moderate Free Soiler of his day, but it was clear, being that Douglas was in favor of Kansas-Nebraska, and the overthrowing of the idea of the original Missouri Compromise that Slavery should not end up north of the 36th parallel (aka Mason-Dixon line), that Lincoln had already made himself an enemy to staunch pro-slavery advocates.

But the biggest thing that would absolutely turn pro-slavery people against him is in the very beginning of the speech itself:

This declared indifference, but, as I must think, covert real zeal for the spread of slavery, I cannot but hate. I hate it because of the monstrous injustice of slavery itself. I hate it because it deprives our republican example of its just influence in the world; enables the enemies of free institutions, with plausibility, to taunt us as hypocrites; causes the real friends of freedom to doubt our sincerity, and especially because it forces so many really good men amongst ourselves into an open war with the very fundamental principles of civil liberty - criticizing the Declaration of Independence, and insisting that there is no right principle of action but self-interest.

So I agree, and in this you can see Lincoln, at least at this point was bigoted (or at least played so for the audience), as was the majority of his time, but also forward looking in terms of the gradual abolition of the South whilst preventing the spread of it in the new territories. I find it interesting he mentions the popular view at the time of Liberia.. The view being that Slave owners can be compensated and that the ex-slaves would not live a happy life with their former masters and could be shipped to Liberia to start anew.. He thought this untenable and basically advocated for equality of rights. This too would have infuriated many pro-slave advocates.

It was quite logical that the Allies didn't want to make the same mistake again. And total defeat lead both Germany and Japan to change their policies totally. A total defeat makes an obvious reason for totally changing everything. — ssu

Ok then, I agree with this logic. In which cases can that be applied to, especially your analogy with WW1 and WW2?

It's also problematic because through incorporation in the state you should not be able to create more rights than people would otherwise individually have. Because that would obviously put the door open for all sorts of abuse. — Benkei

But being at a state of war means what to you? Again, shall I post that fantasy Rambo ideal of war being in some remote jungle whereby an elite team/individual just goes in blows up the perfectly out-in-the-open combatants? If only it was open fields, and people wearing Blue and Grey...

How is that a straw man? As if close family members cannot be assholes or immoral people? Or is there an implied point that your close family members are saints? The point is, it is hubris to claim you can weigh one person's life against another when you don't know them. And in armed conflict, we don't know. — Benkei

No, I meant by that, in a sort of Kantian way, you are completely undermining what it means to be a close relation with someone, if you treat them JUST as any person, and not someone who has special significance in your life. It would be crazy for a father to not feed his family, or his invalid mother, because an anonymous person is starving in Ethiopia... Or to make it more stark.. IF one must decide to protect one's family or another's family, one from a side that has a government causing the damage, that he is thus equally obligated to protecting both in the same due caution.

I say "It's irrelevant what others think to decide what is moral". Obviously I meant that with respect to that moral case and you start about the right of self-defence, which is not at all in question. — Benkei

No you misinterpreted what I meant then.. Let's replace Hamas with Nazis if that helps you be more unbiased about it.. If Nazis don't think that a freely run Netherlands should exist independent of their domination, or of France, or of Eastern Europe, and freely decide that bombing Britain is best, and that America should be defeated using their ally, Japan... What should the defender do in response to that? And hence I said this in another post:

Why didn't the allies just send in some really stealthy people to take down the Nazis and leave the German citizens alone? Ditto with Japan? (Edit: I mean, the Germans especially didn't vote in the Nazis with a majority, and by 1939, anyone who spoke out against the Nazis would be imprisoned or killed. Shouldn't the air raids over Britain, and the total conquest of France, Netherlands, and Poland NOT BE a good excuse to completely demand total surrender from Germany? Again.. to be read with heaping dose of sarcasm here.. but you get the point).

Why couldn't the Allies simply negotiate a peace rather than demand total surrender? Are you telling me there was something inherently expansionist and threatening about Nazi and Imperial Japanese actions and intentions? (Sarcasm implied of course).

And thus my point is, war is almost never the case of stealthy Rambos going in, involving no one but the combatants, and ending the war quickly. And hence I posted the ridiculous Rambo video as a fantasy position that people naively claim war should look like. Should I post it again?

What does a just war look like if any civilian dies in it? If Germans die fighting Nazis, is the war against the Nazis wrong? Let's say there were individual soldiers, leaders, or strategies that were wrong, indeed, they should be punished.. But war itself entails some amount of destruction and death on the people involved. Hell, the US and the Soviets had a policy of MAD.. The strategy was literally both sides getting annihilated in a nuclear holocaust in one wrong move. Why was that even a thing? Well both sides wanted to keep their sphere of influence "safe" from the other, along with their own territories. Let's say the US did NOT have nuclear weapons, and the Soviets did, does that mean they had a right to wield them to take over the world because any conventional war could possibly mean that that other side would be annihilated. No, nuclear war is terrible, but it was better that the US had them then didn't IF the Soviets had them.. Because, simply "non-violence" towards aggressive actors by itself seems pretty wrong.. No defense against violent actors means might makes right, even if that means LESS violence to fight against the aggressors.

For the worse, actually.

It's telling that the ICC court now found both the Israeli leadership and the leadership of Hamas guilty of warcrimes. And both sides just don't give a fuck. Likely Israel trying to get the judge himself to be canceled. There's another thread for that war, so not meaning to go into detail with and only mentioning to give an example of why in our times war has become more barbaric, actually.

Of course people can find multiple examples extremely brutal wars in history and in general civil wars are far more brutal than two conventional armies fighting it out. Yet still, many things have become worse, especially when you compare to the fighting in the 19th Century. — ssu

Yes wars can be brutal, and civil wars especially. But I'm interested in your response to the rest of my last post:

Why didn't the allies just send in some really stealthy people to take down the Nazis and leave the German citizens alone? Ditto with Japan? (Edit: I mean, the Germans especially didn't vote in the Nazis with a majority, and by 1939, anyone who spoke out against the Nazis would be imprisoned or killed. Shouldn't the air raids over Britain, and the total conquest of France, Netherlands, and Poland NOT BE a good excuse to completely demand total surrender from Germany? Again.. to be read with heaping dose of sarcasm here.. but you get the point).

Why couldn't the Allies simply negotiate a peace rather than demand total surrender? Are you telling me there was something inherently expansionist and threatening about Nazi and Imperial Japanese actions and intentions? (Sarcasm implied of course).

Now you might say, that wasn't a civil war, or an insurrectionist war, but a war of aggression.. But of course, Germany might frame that differently.. And the allies might frame the differently..

The immoral thing is not to demand the total surrender of a neighbor but that one doesn't have a plan for what to do with it afterwards to prevent a second war.. WWI is an example of not doing this right, for example, but post WW2 is in terms of how to defeat an enemy who is implacably aggressive until they get everything they WANT.

The Dread Scott case in 1857, whereby ironically, the states rights of the North were infringed if their laws recognized the slaves as free citizens...Also upset the Free Soil movement regarding citizenship and free federal territories, Probably the most racist decision in US history..

Kansas Nebraska Act, whereby now territories had to fight it out with population to see if state was admitted as a free or slave state.. This kicked off Bleeding Kansas whereby free soilers and slaveholders both fought for control.. These "mini civil wars" created the atmosphere for insurrectionists like John Brown to cobble together a militia to march on Harper's Ferry in Virginia and try to start a rebellion there in 1859. This in turn made slaveholders in the South scared that the North was plotting insurrections and they weren't safe to keep slaves

The Republican Party, ironically a party dedicated to the issue of anti-slavery, and with the figure of Lincoln who was known for his debates against Stephen Douglas which firmly denounced slavery. This election was the thing that pretty much tipped the scale in favor of war as the Southern states completely disengaged from any of the candidates of the North (Lincoln or Douglas), in favor of Breckenridge or Bell.. It was by that time as if they were acting as if there were two different elections..

By the time of the February, 1861, South Carolina, and other Southern states were sending their own delegates to Montgomery Alabama to form a new constitution, and the ones that went to Washington were forcefully removed if they did not recognize Lincoln as president.

The debate itself was more about the expansion of slavery in the Louisiana Purchase and recently acquired Mexican War territories when the territories were admitted as states (were they to be slave or free states when admitted?) and also about states rights, but not in the way you may think.. Because of various "Fugitive Slave Acts" and the Dread Scott decision, it was Northern state citizens who were angry that their laws were not recognized in regards to fugitive or freed slaves in their states.

Is this a response to me? — Sam26

No, you can answer if you'd like, but it was quoting @Wayfarer but the way the quoting works, I quoted from a quote he quoted, and so it only referenced the reference of the quote, and not the person quoting the reference of the quote :smile:

The declared aim of the Vienna Circle was to make philosophy either subservient to or somehow akin to the natural sciences. As Ray Monk says in his superb biography Ludwig Wittgenstein: The Duty of Genius (1990), “the anti-metaphysical stance that united them [was] the basis for a kind of manifesto which was published under the title The Scientific View of the World: The Vienna Circle.” Yet as Wittgenstein himself protested again and again in the Tractatus, the propositions of natural science “have nothing to do with philosophy” (6.53); “Philosophy is not one of the natural sciences” (4.111); “It is not problems of natural science which have to be solved” (6.4312); “even if all possible scientific questions be answered, the problems of life have still not been touched at all” (6.52); “There is indeed the inexpressible. This shows itself; it is the mystical” (6.522). None of these sayings could possibly be interpreted as the views of a man who had renounced metaphysics. The Logical Positivists of the Vienna Circle had got Wittgenstein wrong, and in so doing had discredited themselves.

A lot to unpack there.. nice post.. but looking at the quotes there, I see a subtle shift of focus from Wittgenstein's argument which is not about philosophy as the target (it is more the consequence of his target), but about language:

The book deals with the problems of philosophy and shows, as I
believe, that the method of formulating these problems rests on the misunderstanding of the logic of our language. Its whole meaning could be
summed up somewhat as follows: What can be said at all can be said
clearly; and whereof one cannot speak thereof one must be silent.
The book will, therefore, draw a limit to thinking, or rathernot to
thinking, but to the expression of thoughts; for, in order to draw a limit
to thinking we should have to be able to think both sides of this limit
(we should therefore have to be able to think what cannot be thought).
The limit can, therefore, only be drawn in language and what lies on
the other side of the limit will be simply nonsense. — TLP Intro

That is to say, this is admonishing folks like Schopenhauer and others for trying to write what he thinks cannot be written about in any linguistic attempts.. Sensical language only deals with propositions about true states of affairs (which presumably is understood by scientific/empirical means).

So I get that at the end of it, he kind of says.."Look I deem these metaphysicans nonsensical, but you can understand them as poets!".. But this is more critical than at first blush..

It is his, at least seemingly insidious way he uses nonsense, that is not as all-embracing as he sounds at the end.. in TLP, he seems an elitist on what "sense" MUST MEAN.. He drew his line in the sand.. but on what authority?

Ok, I will say, you have been a good sport, and even gracious in this reply, being the title of this thread.... I think you have some valid points.. In effect, it this is not the gatekeeping and curtness I appeared to see in the other thread...

However I do want to examine this crucial last paragraph:

I don't have much patience for people who pretend to know what they don't know. What I mean is this, if you haven't seriously studied a subject, then you shouldn't be dogmatic about your views on the subject. If you are, then that seems to be more about one's ego than getting at the truth. I don't know about the rest of you, but my observation has been that most people in here are more interested in winning their argument, at any cost, than trying to ascertain what's true. — Sam26

Why is it that Wittgenstein can have a pass to riff off his own thoughts, but others cannot in relation to Wittgenstein? Odd. Being how ahistorical Wittgenstein was, I would think even the reading of Wittgenstein would invite more caprice than that of a more systemic philosopher.. But I digress..

As for most people on here just want to win an argument, absolutely agree! That is a lot of how people operate on here. Point scoring. But to turn this around a bit.. Can showing off how much of a devotee you are to the writings of a particular philosopher also turn into a pissing contest?

@Wayfarer Monk says here:

Philosophy, he writes, "is not a theory but an activity." It strives, not after scientific truth, but after conceptual clarity. In the Tractatus, this clarity is achieved through a correct understanding of the logical form of language, which, once achieved, was destined to remain inexpressible, leading Wittgenstein to compare his own philosophical propositions with a ladder, which is thrown away once it has been used to climb up on.

No, this seems just wrong too. This makes Wittgenstein sound like a neutral figure regarding how to use language, but it is clear he favored (in Tractatus) empirical claims to "Facts of the world" over language that he thought could (SHOULD) not be expressed (nonsense).. This just obfuscates his more critical aspects of his philosophy.. that he was criticizing not scientists for scientism per se, but other philosophers. It doesn't matter whether he thought playing the flute or reading a koan was "real" expression, what matters is he thought various metaphysicians as not "really" expressing anything of sense.. they were expressing (in his/early analytic use of the vocabulary) "nonsense".

Hey I just got to this paper you posted, thanks.. But this seems real ironic..as Tractatus baldly has various "technical terms" that he (doesn't clearly explain but starkly defines).. As the author asserts here about Witt:

Scientism takes many forms. In the humanities, it takes the form of pretending that philosophy, literature, history, music and art can be studied as if they were sciences, with "researchers" compelled to spell out their "methodologies"—a pretence which has led to huge quantities of bad academic writing, characterised by bogus theorising, spurious specialisation and the development of pseudo-technical vocabularies. — Ray Monk

How is Tractatus not composed of "pseudo-technical vocabularies"?? I mean, yeah, maybe not like Russell, but he invented/reused some for his own purposes, no? States of Affairs, propositions, facts, objects and all the rest...And yeah, if those aren't "technical", then we wouldn't still be discussing them...

And yeah, I realize he could be talking about the "Later Wittgenstein.." but it wasn't stated like that there...

And granted, the author might have a point about overbloated academic disciplines filled with drivel... but why is Wittgenstein thus exempt? Again, odd hero-worshipping, sui generis, etc.

:up:

Here is the thread.. Feel free to comment..

https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/15218/wittgenstein-and-how-it-elicits-asshole-tendencies

y purpose in creating this summary is not to necessarily debate with people about this or that interpretation, but to just summarize the main points in the Tractatus. — Sam26

Gotcha, I realized that after, but you also inspired me to write a whole other thread that I think is important in regards to Witt, and I'm sure you've seen by now...

As I said in that thread:

Eh, for some it seems to be solely about the author's perspective. Perhaps this comes from how I approach most philosophy, which is jumping off points for how one's own thinking relates, contends, or aligns with the author. Analysis is necessary and a good didactic exercise, but I see it as the starting point for later doing synthesis, comparison, and ultimately, evaluation. I guess that butts up against other, more static approaches to the primary text (or secondary literature that often is employed with those like Witt, Nietzsche, Derrida, Heidegger, and the like...).

May I ask why the need to simply summarize without commentary? Is it like a SparkNotes by PhilosophyForum thing?

I always imagined that the point of philosophy for many was to dismiss or pillory another's reading and then go on to demonstrate why one's own reading is superior. Is't that inherent in the activity? — Tom Storm

Eh, for some it seems to be solely about the author's perspective. Perhaps this comes from how I approach most philosophy, which is jumping off points for how one's own thinking relates, contends, or aligns with the author. Analysis is necessary and a good didactic exercise, but I see it as the starting point for later doing synthesis, comparison, and ultimately, evaluation. I guess that butts up against other, more static approaches to the primary text (or secondary literature that often is employed with those like Witt, Nietzsche, Derrida, Heidegger, and the like...).

Here specifically with regard to Wittgenstein while others are spared. — Fooloso4

Not quite.. But rather this would be a better formulation of the objectionable argumentation:
https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/905765

While framed as a denunciation, this amounts to an endorsement of the resounding success of a man who said

I should not wish to have spared anyone the trouble of thinking. — Srap Tasmaner

It is precisely this kind of self-referential back-patting that I am refuting. That his adherents make it frustrating to disagree with doesn't to me, make the measure of the philosopher, even if that was something they desired..

However, if you are judging "success" in that people are doing what one would like, (even if what one would like is what is being deemed as questionable), then I guess, good job Witt??

Wittgenstenians have a tendency to impose this premise on others, resulting in a double standard that is a form of unethical discourse. — Leontiskos

Frank Ramsey's reply to Wittgenstein is on point, "What can't be said can't be said, and it can't be whistled either." Wittgenstein is either saying something or else he is not. It can't be had both ways. If he is saying something then he can be contradicted and he can be wrong; if he is not saying anything then he cannot. But obviously he is saying something, and along with Ramsey I'd say it is a farce to claim that he is not. (I have noticed that Wittgenstenians tend to miss the fact that conjectures and indirect locutions are also ways of saying something.) — Leontiskos

The effect is that Wittgenstein gets to say things without saying things. He gets to have his cake and eat it too. Perhaps this is part of the reason why the Wittgenstenian is so awkward when it comes to disagreement. They are imposing their own system and that system cannot even theoretically account for disagreement. — Leontiskos

All great points along the lines I was thinking.. I think it actually informs and is informed by my articulation of the (same) problem you are discussing. See here:

https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/905765

You would enjoy Gellner’s Word and Things, he has very similar points throughout his book. — Richard B

:up:

I invite you to the above comment as well...

https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/905765

One more thing I think is happening sometimes is people take everything Witt writes as if it was a statement, like a claim to knowledge or an argument for the purpose of having a conclusion admitted. But I hear them like conjecture, or even more, like characterizations of remarks, that only lead to asking: “why would we say that?” Or: “look at it in this way”. But the only way to treat a picture like a conclusion is to accept it whole hog, without justification and without means of refuting it, when the picture is just meant to say: “do you see what I see in this (by/for yourself)?” — Antony Nickles

But this is part my frustration with him/reading him perhaps. If he is providing, not definitive claims but a methodology, one can always claim about him, that he really isn't "saying" this or that definitive thing, and thus we must tacitly just accept the implications of his methodology because it's just some innocuous observations of how we think and do philosophy. It is another side-step whereby let's take for the sake of example:

"Kant claims that synthetic a priori truths provide the groundwork for the cognitive conditions that make the possibility of experience possible."

This is literally a claim that one can try to do three things:
1) Refine the statement to be more accurate retelling of the philosopher/thinker.

2a) Say the claim Kant is making (not the interpreter of Kant) is true (to whatever extent), offering one's own insights or a synthesis from what others have said...

2b) Say the claim Kant is making (not the interpreter of Kant) is false (to whatever extent), offering one's own insights or a synthesis from what others have said...

What happens in Wittgenstein's debate seems to be a WHOLE lot of 1 only.. It stays on 1.. big droning, sylloquies of 1, without any room to move to 2a/b.

But to add even more frustration, if it does move to steps 2, it always seems that 2b seems an option that is off the table, because 2a will always refer back to 1, to tacitly refute that 2b is even an option. And this is helped along by way of saying that Wittgenstein is just a methodology and a demonstration, and thus is immune from 2b. This becomes at this point futile to debate anything but more 1 and 2a, otherwise one is ground down or dismissed. This can happen to any thinker, but it seems viciously pernicious in Wittgenstein's case, being the style, the ambiguity of the text, and the demand to believe that this is a sui generis type of philosophical discourse that cannot be dealt with in the same manner as other philosophers...

How many times can one philosopher have the glory of being saved by Appeal to Misunderstanding? Is that academic philosophy now? Is that this debate forums way of handling Witt specifically? Doesn’t seem to be as big a problem from devotees of other philosophers in quite the same way. Holy shit, this guy gets religious levels of obfuscation as a smokescreen.

Which is why I asked, can Witt be wrong, even just in principle? Because the way you describe it, he can’t be wrong, because he’s not making claims..

What happens if it’s just a sugar pill painted red?

See here:
https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/905680

There may well be those who think philosophy is an enquiry dedicated to reasonableness and ongoing discourse. I suspect that much philosophy is faddish tribalism, dedicated to onanism, amongst other things. :grin: — Tom Storm

:lol:

In my view here there is the obvious case of where appliance to laws of war have degraded from the past. Far too easily if one side chooses to disregard the laws of war, the other side opts similar ways. Even if it's an anecdotal and a single event, it's still telling that unarmed Israeli hostages trying to surrender to Israeli forces were gunned downed... because the Israeli soldiers thought "it was a trap", or so at least they justified their actions. Compared to the 19th Century, in many ways warfare has become far more barbaric than before starting with the idea of total war. We don't want to acknowledge it, but I think it's the truth. — ssu

No, I don't think it is less barbaric, but the tactics have changed. My point is, war itself is a sort of absurdity, because it means death and destruction, and yet it has "legitimacy" (for good or bad). Yet, it seems in many arguments, people don't acknowledge that this indeed is what war pretty much entails. It isn't just Rambo going into a building getting the bad guys, saving the good guys and the end.

Why didn't the allies just send in some really stealthy people to take down the Nazis and leave the German citizens alone? Ditto with Japan?

Why couldn't the Allies simply negotiate a peace rather than demand total surrender? Are you telling me there was something inherently expansionist and threatening about Nazi and Imperial Japanese actions and intentions? (Sarcasm implied of course).

Legitimate is a legal term. Any act that conforms with the pertinent law is legitimate. Laws are drafted and legislated by human agencies constituted for the purpose. If a war falls within the currently accepted international definition, it's legitimate. — Vera Mont

Is it legitimate to wage armed conflict though? Is it not silly that conflict has any legitimacy? Should for example, it have been legitimate to make the Nazis totally surrender Germany after they attacked Poland and France, or should the Allied militaries simply have contained the Nazis once their troops had reached the German borders in 1945?

This endlessly fecund, perhaps even Rabbinical reinterpretation of W does suggest that critique almost seems superfluous. — Tom Storm

:lol:

The Talmud of Wittgenstein. Damn, I got the title of my new book deal. But your point oddly "shows" Wittgenstein's point that the usage of the language community (this instance around Wittgenstein himself), creates the meaning... Oh dear...

But to get out of the vicious circle of meaning in context of a community, and the layers of meanings it creates over time through its own usage..

You asked

Might it not be argued that until one has a robust reading of any writer it is not really possible to refute or acclaim them? — Tom Storm

It can become a game of dismissing the critic to not engage the critique...

Complete understanding itself is unfalsifiable in the context of a philosophical work...

It inherently assumes that the philosopher is right if you only knew him better...

It invites tactics like using the author's words as the only basis for accepting a valid argument to refute the author, thus becoming a kind of circular reasoning...

Often outside understanding can inform, even the best of specialists because they offer a different perspective...

Any refutation gets bogged down in hermeneutics, leaving no room for substantive critiques. Instead, it simply engages in endless layers of analysis and context refinement, similar to the Rabbinical idea you mention.

It undermines the principle of academic and philosophical dialogue, which relies on the exchange of ideas and critiques at various levels of understanding.

It can create an environment where philosophical works are revered rather than critically examined, which is contrary to the spirit of philosophical inquiry.

This tactic can prevent the identification of specific errors or weaknesses in an argument, which are valuable for the growth of understanding.

It can be a defensive mechanism to protect one's own interpretations from scrutiny by discrediting critics preemptively.

The argument often establishes a false sense of authority where only a select few are deemed capable of truly understanding the philosopher, which can lead to dogmatism.

This argument fosters echo chambers where only those who already agree with a particular interpretation are allowed to speak, reinforcing biases and preventing growth.

Understanding can evolve over time through critique and discussion. Insisting on complete understanding upfront denies this dynamic process.

It can obscure real flaws in the philosopher’s arguments by shifting the focus to the critic’s knowledge rather than the argument’s content.

Philosophy is about ideas and their implications, not just textual mastery. Reducing it to the latter by requiring exhaustive reading misses the broader purpose.

Some philosophical ideas, while complex, can be critiqued based on their core tenets without delving into every nuance, making the insistence on complete understanding unnecessary.

Valuable critiques often come from interdisciplinary perspectives. Dismissing these on the grounds of incomplete understanding of the philosophical text itself undermines interdisciplinary dialogue.

This tactic deflects from holding the philosopher accountable for the clarity and coherence of their arguments, which should stand up to critique regardless of the critic's breadth of reading.

And a bunch more stuff in the key of elitism and dogmatism..