out of arguments and back at ad hominems I see, how novel. It's obvious for anyone who can read using the common sense meaning of words in the English language. — Benkei

How in the world is what I wrote an ad hominem? I described the reasons why it's impossible to discuss with someone who requires their own interpretation to be accepted before they can accept any counter-arguments from their interlocutor. That's not an ad hominem, that's pointing at the problem of your reasoning, and your answer to that is to shout "ad hominem".

...and then the irony of you trying to prove why your interpretation is correct by prompting that those non-native English speakers you argue with would "clearly understand" in the way you do if they had only understood the English language better. Almost kind of racist in a way of an Ad Hominem now is it?

Can some other mod please enlighten me on why Benkei is still a mod on this forum? It's like a judge who's breaking the law and when being called out doing so he just continues with even more of it and the justice system just keeps him protected within the system.

I already mentioned to Christoffer that in the context of that small speech it's quite clear what he means. — Benkei

It's not quite clear at all. It could be actions to put much harsher pressure on Russia, it could mean actions to rally military defense lines at the borders, it could mean actions to, as I said, initiate a no-fly zone and be more active in the defense of Ukraine rather than just sending weapons. It could merely mean that the world needs to take more action to prevent Russia from continuously killing civilians.

The way you handle discussions like these, pointing out that something is "obvious" when it clearly isn't obvious, other than supporting your own argument, makes it impossible to have a discussion with you. You demand that your interpretation is the valid one and then everyone around you should comply based on that interpretation because then you can win that argument... wake me up when you're a more honest interlocutor.

And how would they decide what missiles count as rouge or not? There is very little margin of error here.

If the margin were as big as you imply, such actions would have already been considered and probably implemented, given how long the war has been going on. — Manuel

If a no-fly zone were initiated, or a "soft" one, that would basically mean Nato shoots down the missiles shot into Ukraine. If that happened without the context of this event, it would be considered a direct oppositional act by Nato against Russia, but if it's within a context of diplomatic pressure against Russia that "this is the only way Nato can assure Russia that they will not escalate into war but instead protect themselves from Russian misfires". It's an escalation, sure, but not a direct war and it would set a specific context around why it's initiated as a direct pressure point toward Russia to stop sending in missiles.

A Russian misfire is a serious blow to Russia, not anyone else. There's little diplomatic ammunition that Russia can gain out of this situation as Nato has always been clear about its focus on defense. Russia's claims that Nato is trying to be on the offense against Russia has no merits and is proven by Nato not involving itself in battles, but if Russia misfires into a Nato nation they could argue that they need to defend themselves against such events and Russia has little to argue against that.

But what should be clear to him, is that getting direct NATO involvement would signify the end of Ukraine and of Europe. This is not secret information. — Manuel

Direct Nato involvement is not a single event. It can also mean other structures of pressure on Russia than some final nuclear war. It's this type of black-and-white assessment of the situation, disregarding any kind of more serious diplomacy against Russia as an outcome.

The most likely outcome, out of this specific situation, that Nato can deal against Russia would be to pressure them that they will initiate a no-fly zone to block possible rogue missiles going into Nato nations. That would be a kind of soft no-fly zone that doesn't become a full confrontal war and it would have legitimacy within the context of what has happened here. Within that diplomacy, they would have the foundational reasoning against Russia for such a no-fly zone that isn't a full-blown Article 5 movement.

But people seem to argue about both Russia and Nato as being just people with their finger over the red button. That's the depth some of these discussions seems to have.

"Action is needed" — Benkei

And you, of course, interpret that as "initiate Article 5 and bomb Russia to hell".

In no way is what he said directly pushing for a direct world war with Russia. Why wouldn't "action is needed" also mean a no-fly zone that he has been asking for since the beginning of the war? Or more serious pressure from Nato towards Russia than just sending weapons.

How is my interpretation and speculation in any shape or form less true than what you suggest?

That's not what Zelensky and people in his cabinet said at the time these missiles hit Polish territory. — Manuel

If you were in his situation, asking for a no-fly zone and more help to defend his people and push back the Russians, what would you have done? Especially since right-wing nationalists around the world keep hinting of leaving Ukraine in the dust by stopping aid.

Are you saying that Zelensky should put the world on his shoulders and be the perfect leader for everyone around the world while backward politicians around the world keep hinting of turning their backs on him. I wouldn't, I would probably do whatever I could to try and defend Ukraine and push for the aid that is required.

It's insane what people demand of him in the situation he's in from behind the safety of our own nations.

What I wrote was a speculation on the outcome if it was Russian. Zelensky wants a no-fly zone over Ukraine, he knows a full-blown Article 5 intervention would be too much for the world to handle and that no one wants to initiate that. But if he could push Nato, out of the situation that Russia misfires into Nato nations, then a no-fly zone could become a reality based on that fact and Nato could deal with the diplomacy towards Russia in a way where they initiate a no-fly zone without concluding it all to be a direct war with Russia, but instead in order to defend against irrational misfires. It would be diplomatic ammunition to pressure Russia in ways they couldn't have done before.

What Zelensky did yesterday was insane! Does he not understand that such reckless acts will harm Ukraine much more than the current war?

A nuclear war would destroy every single Ukranian, European and likely the majority of the world's population. — Manuel

How does a Russian misfire into Poland lead to nuclear war? It's engaging Article 4, not 5 and would most likely lead to higher political pressure on Russia because such an event would clearly give Nato political ammunition they didn't have before and a clear reason for higher-ups in Russia to de-escalate. Zelensky knows this and might have tried to take advantage of the situation.

They all know the MAD consequence, that's not an outcome of a misfire. If Russia deliberately fired into a Nato nation, that would be another thing, but that's not what happened even if Russia was responsible for this.

But of course you have to immediately spin it to some pro-Ukrainian stance — Isaac

I'm not spinning anything. I'm describing what the scenario would be if it was Russian. But you can't even accept speculation based on a possible conclusion out of the investigation. Or even what it would have been if it had been Russian.

Your constant straw-manning and intentional misinterpretation of other's posts in order to spin it in your direction in this thread makes you a dishonest interlocutor, I'm not engaging with your dishonest posts and inability to understand what the fuck others are writing. Spin away into a corner somewhere.

Let's assume that's true. On the basis of belief but not evidence, because that's difficult to get by according to you, he thinks it's perfectly fine to follow a political line aimed at escalation? I still think that's cynical, possibly more so because then facts aren't relevant to his position and we should worry that Zelensky will go to significant lengths to ecalate the conflict. — Benkei

The fact is that the US and Poland have both said conflicting things within their own nations so there's nothing conclusive at all about this. However, if it was Russia's, then Zelensky knows that it won't lead to an Article 5 consequence, because it's most likely a misfire, but still serious, which would result in an Article 4 event.

Such an outcome would drastically put pressure on Russia and could very well be a pressure point that leads to actual progress with Russia scaling down and retreating. Russia's answer to anyone who tells them to scale back and retreat has so far been a blunt "no" and there's nothing the world can do about it, but if they were responsible for an attack on a Nato nation, Nato could pressure Russia but "play the good guy" and say they won't escalate this if they don't need to, as long as Russia starts complying.

Such a thing could actually lead to real constructive peace talks since so far the problem with anyone suggesting peace talks, to this date, has been that they ignore the fact that Russia's "demands" in such peace talks have been "a total surrender of Ukraine".

It's irrational to think that this is a black-and-white scenario and that if some Russian just took a piss on the wrong side of the Polish border it would lead to Article 5. Maybe the ones thinking Nato is a movie villain warmongering organization believe this but it's not how things are.

shit hitting the fan? — neomac

Shit tried to hit the fan and missed. Gonna be interesting to see if Nato will use this to pressure Russia based on article 5.

Hi, really enjoying your posts in this thread. Not my particular stance but you are explaining the arguments rather succinctly. It is "easy to digest" I suppose you could say while still being very meaty in points to discuss. I have not read every one of your posts in this thread with focus and perhaps am somewhat engaging in "drive-by philosophy" more so than commonplace economic model discussion but, if I may.. — Outlander

I must say that it's rare to see someone with objections in an argument be so humble and respectful as you are here. Such things gives me hope for humanity actually able to argue for progression of knowledge and solutions rather than how discussions are usually perceived. I salute to such things and wish far more people having such qualities.

As you go about your motions of existence, knowing they will profoundly affect nobody nowhere, including one's self, you may stop to think... is this life? Surely I must be fortunate. Are there unfortunate people out there who still live in the hellish pre-automated world of labor from dawn 'til dusk? — Outlander

Problem with this division in a future world society is that you also said:

We now joke about "staving people" the way someone would joke about someone having polio or some other long-vanquished ailment of time's past. — Outlander

...if so, then there wouldn't be people in a less fortunate position.

But, you may want to read what I wrote just above this post, which is engaging with the actual nightmare outcome of automation.

of course everything we do is supposed to "do something", we don't "do things" because it has no purpose. "Status and monetary gain" cannot be used as a blanket simplification to gloss over or detract from the intrinsic properties they bestow (or deny) to people: "who you are and what you can do". One doesn't become a "master craftsman" just so he has something to say after his name in introductions. One doesn't work to gain wealth simply because they're "supposed to". These are all done to advance a goal or desire, goals or desires that would exist regardless of the economic model or level of automation. Sure, if you're in possession of little resources, you will likely end up working a job out of necessity vs. pursuit of desire. This would also be the case if you were born or later experienced a handicap or just otherwise aren't that talented. These are also independent of economic models or social systems. — Outlander

What I mean by "Baudrillardian eldritch horror" is that we are unable to comprehend the exact nature of how capitalism affects our psychology in the world today. We have replaced actual reality with a capitalist point of view that fundamentally drives our core values in life. I'm not merely speaking of accumulating wealth but of how we categorize value around us, how we shape our day to day thoughts under a capitalist rule-set. Many proclaim their notion of doing something for a value that is individually fulfilling to them in contrast to monetary value, but very few people can separate that individually fulfilling value with a journey to gain status through that fulfillment.

In essence, why do people want to do something personally fulfilling? This is a generalization of statistical importance, since it's already quite clear that a very small percentage of the world population actually pierce through the system on an intellectual level, most people do not have the ability, through never learning it, channel it or being open to it, to break down their inner driving forces and they do not see the tentacles of capitalist industry shaping their desires and sense of purpose in life.

Here I can draw on my own actual work in marketing. I've studied and worked with manipulation of people's desires and ideas of themselves through marketing. This is a main source of knowledge in psychology driving my argument. And the scary truth of the matter is that the industry, the capitalist industry on a global stage has essentially shaped people's core psychology of meaning to the point that they are unable to distinguish between what is a true introspective purpose in life and what is a manufactured one by the capitalist culture and industry of the world.

That is why I call it "Baudrillardian eldritch horror"; "Baudrillard" as in how we are unable to distinguish the simulated life of what the capitalist culture tells us (through marketing) and a life outside of those puppet pulls, while the "eldritch horror" is the capitalistic system itself that is so ingrained into culture that it is impossible to fully comprehend by the sheer complexity of its Kafkaesque nature.

The conclusion being that our capitalist culture has effectively hijacked our sense of subjective ability to find meaning and replaced it with a manufactured one that is easily controlled on the market.

Needs and wants are still needs and wants unchanged regardless of how you facilitate their fulfillment or accrual — Outlander

How can you distinguish between needs/wants that are universal and ones that are invented by how society and culture program you as an individual? How do you know that your needs and wants are actually pure and honest when your identity is a product of the culture you were nurtured into?

Without growth you have decay. Nothing is truly stagnant. You expect to have children or at least that other people will, correct? The more people who sit down for a pie, the less pie is available. Therefore, you need growth. Be it tangible wealth in your pocket or larger (thus more expensive and labor intensive) operations in whatever the field may be. — Outlander

If all people collectively moved through history with this mindset, we wouldn't have poverty and inequality. However, neoliberal capitalism has pushed the world globally to individual monetary gain and a mindset thereafter. We do not think of growth as sharing a pie, we view growth as individual growth. A person in neoliberal capitalism controlling automation will be able to direct their growth into accumulated wealth for themselves but have no incentive to grow the pie for the many and even individuals outside of such wealth wouldn't view things in such a collective way until capitalism essentially collapses and our psychology is shaped through a new type of model.

And before pointing out that plenty want something good for others, society as it is shaped today, produces far more people playing that individualistic capitalist game than genuinely caring for the world as a collective and shared space for all. Even people who proclaim to care may very well, even unbeknownst to themselves, be slaves to a status of caring, shaping themselves an identity within the system. A manufactured identity of being someone who cares, but essentially follows a value increase in status by being that capitalist archetype.

Maybe that is an obvious reality for us, but how many people in the world spend hundreds of thousands of words dedicated to thinking about these complexities that shape society?

We are more controlled by the system in place, i.e neoliberal capitalism, than we fully comprehend. Our psychology is more programmed by this through an entire life nurturing these systems than we realize. Even notions of breaking free of the system may very well just be part of the system itself.

Just like how in marketing, we create a desirable identity of rebellion against the system, and then earn money selling products based on such a rebellion to people proclaiming to be anticapitalists.

Please read through first as my initial points may seem more antagonistic than they really are. You see the same dangers I've pointed out, but you need to drive them to their conclusions first.

Not so much forget as discount. — Vera Mont

Why do you discount the major factor for my argument? Without it the whole notion of non-work becomes just nonsense since nothing in the world would produce necessary resources for any of us to exist. My argument focus on the singularity event of advanced automation, when almost any task can be turned over to software and hardware rather than a person.

I wished this was just a flimsy thought experiment, but just as uncontrolled exponential climate change and nuclear war is a thought experiment scenario, they are also possible futures that needs to be seriously considered. So is this. And you base your counter argument on ignoring this very fact.

As much as people want to do. — Vera Mont

How do you combine this with an industry and government using automation for any practical task? What work, other than renovating your own house, writing a book, painting, other arts, cooking a fine meal and so on, are you referring to these people doing?

You need to specify based on a task that is by its core and value impossible to replace with software and hardware.

For whom? To what end? What motivates AI to do that? — Vera Mont

I recommend studying how AI functions. Most people who discuss automation does not have good insight into this field of science. The most common mistake is to think about AI as basically just general purpose AI, or rather, sentient AI.

To try and be short, sentient AI is useless. It's basically unprogrammable and would only have the function of being a sentient alternative perspective to humans in philosophy, but it has no inherent function, it basically becomes just another sentient individual.

The AI that actually will be used, and is already being used to a great degree, is advanced algorithmic AI, synthetic intelligence, neural network intelligence. This is simply an AI that is specifically tailored to a specific function.

Automation will be programmed to adress certain tasks. Like, in this example, optimize planning of changes to an environment in order to improve it for inhabitants and the ecology. It will be performing fast administrative changes to mechanical workers to streamline environmental work for that specific end goal. There are no administrative personnel, no human workers, the only input is the intention placed on the algorithmic AI to perform towards this end goal.

Which either leads to a paper clip scenario as its worst outcome, or it functions well. Maybe it functions even so well that the input doesn't have to be by a human, but rather a top level algorithmic AI which functions as a broader planner where environmental issues is a lower branch.

You see, the question you ask is too simplistic to cover how AIs actually work and how it will probably be utilized in the future.

For the sheer joy and satisfaction of doing it! — Vera Mont

Of course, and who has the privilege of doing this job? Because no one will pay for it when there's an almost infinitely cheap labor force through robotics.

So you can't build an industry out of it when it requires that people work for free. And of course there's that little problem in which among the billions of people who live on this planet, most of them do work that is a necessity for income rather than doing what they love.

Who will provide the resources to work for free, doing what you love, without having demands from the employer to perform in competition with companies who utilize automation?

But you are right, people will work with what gives them joy. The problem you won't seem to include in your assessment is how you can grant everyone to be able to do what they love. Both in resources, but also in value.

Here's scenario you have to consider.

Imagine that the lack of work makes millions, maybe even a billion people to pursue work in areas that robotics and software can't replace (which becomes just a handful of occupations). For example, a billion people choose painting. Yes, AI's can paint, but art isn't just scrambling inspirations together with paint and produce a painting, it's also about intention in combination with a viewer experiencing that intention, art requires the artist and the receiver.

This leads to an oversaturation of artworks. Billions of paintings ending up in artistic noise in which artistic meaning gets lost. There are not enough museums to show the paintings, online resources becomes more saturated than millions of posts of TikTok. The experience of painting loses all meaning when so many people collectively only works with it and the feedback becomes based on shorter than glances interpretations than never dwell any deeper than a few seconds.

You need to follow your questions to their logical conclusions, this is philosophy we're doing here.

And then add the fact that not all, far from all people actually has any interest in creative work or work that fulfill them. Plenty of people have no such ambitions, what will they do?

People like the feeling of satisfaction when they have completed a task they set for themselves; the elation of overcoming a challenge, solving a problem. People enjoy exerting their physical capabilities, in sports, but it's more meaningful to do so in the creation of something concrete. People also enjoy sharing work that serves their sense of community, like a pot-luck supper or barn-raising. Have you ever seen men happier - in the sense of abiding contentment, rather than momentary joy - than when a group of them is huddled over a malfunctioning engine or a recalcitrant tree stump? I can't prove it, but I have a feeling most sick people and little children would prefer to be cared for by a loving adult than an efficient robot. — Vera Mont

...have you followed everything to their logical conclusions? How can you reconcile all of this on the scale of billions of people? Stop and think for a minute. The problem is not what people want, feel is meaningful or value etc. The problem is that we are stuck in a system of thinking that is based upon a capitalist foundation that automation breaks at its core.

Your arguments are based on how automation works today, not the implications of future automation. You are stuck in the desert of the real basically.

The fact that something can be done, doesn't mean that it must be done. — Vera Mont

Stop and look at the world today. Look at the forces driving everything, driving progression etc. Then, ask yourself what's stopping advanced automation from happening in the future? It's not really a question of "must be done", but rather it's a question of "something that will just be".

Here's the kicker: you need to dismantle capitalist culture at its core and replace it with something else before automation happens, in order for it not to happen. But since, as I've explained, capitalist culture is a Baudrillardian system, people cannot invent something other that isn't part of the core system already in place as the resources and tools to invent something new needs to come out of the system already in place both in practice and in psychology.

Besides, given that fact that most automation (that's not military) is controlled by commercial interests, as it keeps eroding its paid work-force, it incidentally erodes its customer base and the government's tax base; it has to reach a point of diminishing returns where no money is changing hands at all. UBI is a temporary stop-gap, as it also depends on redistribution of money.
Once there's no more profit to be made, who directs the robots? This, to me, is the central question about automation. (Based on the very large assumption that the whole house of credit cards doesn't collapse before that vanishing point, and all the billionaires head for the mountain strongholds. — Vera Mont

Here you actually start to get to the point I'm talking about: the actual collapse of capitalist culture.

A) UBIs start to increase as taxes on the income placed on the companies who manufacture also increase. At some point there is either a balance that works, or companies gets taxed into no ability to produce, even with cheap labor by robots and the economy collapses entirely as a system, throwing the world into a total capitalist collapse and soon follows, as a natural outcome of that chaos... war.

B) The capitalist system follows to the very end point, in which transactions stop as all the wealth of the world has reached the accumulated highest point, the small group of people who owns the world industry run by automation. This is the scenario you point at. As all money has accumulated it loses all value, but the rich already has the resource wealth and no incentive to keep producing towards the people who are not in monetary and resource control. This also leads to a chaos and... war. However, the risk here is even greater as war might be towards the people in control of resources and that is essentially a losing battle, giving total power of a few over the rest of the world as they control robotics as a means of controlling the rest of the world population.

Scenario B essentially manifest the very extreme version of a company owning "your data", they end up literally owning you as you have no possible way of organizing a revolution against such accumulated resource power. Have you seen "Mad Max Fury Road"? What you see being portraid as society in the beginning, with Immortan Joe controlling water, gasoline, genetic bloodlines and ammunition as resources form a high tower bunker, is basically this scenarios end point, but without the ability to strike back as an army of militarized AI robots would stop any rebellion in an instance.

Very much the opposite is in motion in America. Introducing moral philosophy, depends on a sensible school board operating under a sensible government with a generous budget. In Finland, you may be able to do it; in the USA, not under the current political trend. — Vera Mont

I already consider USA as a ticking time bomb of uneducated people collapsing the system because no one cared to actually educate people into sensible, empathic and thoughtful people. It will be the end of USA at some point. Nations with a good strategy of education will become the future superpowers, but since most of them are really small nations, there's a risk of them being snuffed out by wrestler presidents and delusional self-proclaimed emperors just because of their threat to educated people in their nations (much like Putin's fear of western culture "invading" Russia and threatening his power).

So, as an end point. You seem to see the very dangers that I'm pointing towards, but you may need to drive them to their logical conclusions. Automation is much more world changing than I think people realize.

Non-work is not the same as non-job. As mentioned earlier, people can work for their families their communities, the environment, the future, the protection, welfare and enrichment of their fellow humans, the welfare and rehabilitation of other species, their own betterment. There is plenty of work to do that's far more rewarding than the pittance bosses dole out. — Vera Mont

I think you forget about the reality I describe. With advanced automation how much "work" do you think will be done? If an AI can plan with more precision towards something like a better environment in the future, what work will you do if that AI does all the work organizing society towards that improvement? If proven to be more precise and better than a human worker to do that assignment, why would anyone assign or accept that work to be done by a human?

This is what I mean when I talk about the "Baudrillardian eldritch horror"; people cannot fathom a society without work because it's so ingrained in our psychology that we cannot detach ourselves from that reality, we cannot think through other concepts than it.

The work we can adress to humans as an existential value are work that focus on creativity, expression, art and philosophy. The only thing that robots cannot replace is the human perspective, the collective or the individual point of view that informs the individual or collective creative output. But almost all other jobs can, with enough algorithmic AI development, be turned over to robots.

Most work you are referring to, while being spiritually healthy for people to do, is still related to a grind that gets replaced by advanced automation. Without that grind, what is left of that "work"? The intention? The exposure?

That is exactly what a liberal public education would promote, and that is exactly why all demagogues hobble and cripple public education wherever they can. — Vera Mont

It's not, because we do not fully have a logical moral system, if we had, moral philosophy would have been fully solved. But what I'm talking about is actually teaching moral philosophy as a core part of the curriculum, that is not in motion today. We may have a good educational system (well, Finland has the best from what I know), but it's not fully at the level I'm talking about.

If people start thinking, they may stop fighting one another for the crumbs off the rich man's table. They might put down the placards and talk to one another. They might even stop supporting power-mad leaders. — Vera Mont

Exactly, but even in nations of Scandinavia, which has a good public education of the highest level, it's still not at the level that I'm talking about, because it's not preparing anyone for anything else but living under this Baudrillardian eldritch system.

The world is not prepared for full advanced automation.

Especially in the beginning of industrialism humans were treated very badly but it lead to wealth and that wealth is essential to progress, education, hospitals, and public utilities. When something like printing makes art and books cheap, low-income people can afford them and that makes their lives better. I worry about how many liberals understand the importance of good jobs and big industry that provides those jobs and those affordable products and wealth? Exactly how do we establish an economic and social system that works for everyone? — Athena

The problem with deciphering capitalism is that it doesn't have a constant value. In a poor nation, capitalism can very rapidly improve the quality of life for the people and increase wealth. But as soon as capitalism enters a stage where the majority of the people already have accumulated wealth it starts to tap into just being about cash flow, earnings, and gains. It stops being a system of change and instead becomes a "Baudrillardian eldritch horror" in which people become a slave to it, regardless of whether they want to or not. It starts to corrupt the people and divide them into rich and poor and over time increases that gap until the rich becomes so powerful that they essentially take over power from the government.

This is the state where people start to work themselves to death. Because they're not part of a society that is gaining wealth as a collective but rather has become a new type of slave society. In this new type, people live in an illusion of existential value that they cannot distinguish from any other reality. People lose track of basic existential questions like love and death and replace them with a monetary valuation of status. People start to think they are in love with someone when they're basically just together with them because of the status it produces, they get children because that's a family status, and they have a certain job which is a further acquired status. In the age of the internet, this has also been intensified as people project these statuses out to people surrounding them, further blinding them into this system.

This is the Baudrillardian horror, modern western capitalism has evolved into an unseen monster that people think is "quality life". It's so ingrained into our psychology that we're never even questioning how this life works. Everything we do is part of this capitalist mentality, everything is about some kind of status or monetary gain and loss, and the most obvious sign of this is how much more popular "quick fix" existential treatments have become. The desperate search for "meaning in all the chaos", without people understanding what that chaos really is.

And so, some, like Marx, developed political philosophies that examined the inner workings of capitalism and alternatives to it. But Marx is also outdated since it focuses entirely on the industrial age of development, which had entirely different inner mechanics, especially lacking the Baudrillard perspective.

With so many people in the world today, with such a technological explosion that the last 150 years have produced, it is impossible to maintain a society based on Marx's ideas and it's also impossible to maintain a society of modern capitalism. Because essentially any political philosophy regards the citizen as a cog in a machine, without essential value other than its function.

If these cogs are changed into automation, into robots and we dislocate humans from the traditional machine, then that becomes an existence that has never been available on a large scale before. We are so ingrained in the idea of "work" that people don't know how to manage their time outside of it. It has, throughout history, either been about survival or monetary gain at its core and occasionally, for a few, been a place of meaning. But on a large scale, how can everyone find meaning?

That is the core problem that philosophy and people need to solve when advanced automation starts to reshape society.

The original purpose of free public education in the US was to teach good citizenship and thereby prevent social problems. There are two ways to have social order, culture, or authority over the people. To have liberty there must be a culture that makes that possible we replaced that past education with education for a technological society with unknown values. Some good things came out of this and it appears some bad things are also coming out of leaving moral education to the church and not transmitting the culture we once had. — Athena

The lack of moral philosophy in school, not just in higher education, but as a core part of the curriculum, is part of why people are left to figure out our peaceful, good values on their own without guidance. Parents don't have time to educate their children about this because they need two jobs to pay the bills and in the end that only teaches their children that monetary gain and the appearance of wealth are all that morally matter.

We need moral philosophy in schools, teaching how hard it is to handle morality and letting kids think about these things as they mature. Moral philosophy, with all its examples and theories, can enlighten people to think in a more complex manner towards the next person and have the ability to guide them into figuring out values on their own. If a whole generation had the same basic understanding of these things, then the existential discussions they tackle as adults, all the political polarisation etc. would be much easier to resolve. The core problem I see with polarisation and tribalism today has to do with people acting like they understand moral complexity without any training in it whatsoever.

And in a society free from religion, it's key to find empathic values and theories that act as the foundation for everything.

If you can't have "decided principles" through religion, then the principles need to have a rational, logical, and empathic core that automatically makes people gravitate toward that logical good as doing otherwise would lead to misery. A truly liberal society free from religion requires the people to understand morality as a system that is logical and not decided upon them.

"Not having a job" is the least of issues regarding science and technology in this age. — Outlander

Except when that ends up being the norm for a majority of people, then we need a society tailored around a non-work existence.

But my general point is that every choice we make is done in a situation of infinite possibilities and without anyway to know we have done the best or correct thing.

It is something that can lead to an existential crisis. — Andrew4Handel

Welcome to a world without religion in which this crisis leads people to extreme behaviors since society, schools, and work never cared to tackle true existential questions. This is essentially Nietzsche's nightmare future that he predicted and we're seeing it in things like people's desperate attachment to conspiracy theories like Qanon and the increase in depression worldwide.

The solution would be for parents and schools to prepare children for the bleak existence that is life. In doing so teach them to find a purpose that revolves around a positive moral value system: "it's ok to fail, but strive for caring for all life", to simplify what is required.

The problem is that we replaced religion with neoliberal capitalism. Our church is our cash flow and materialistic life. Such a life can be very easily proven pointless and if we don't have anything else than that cash flow to inform us of a good life, then of course people fall into nihilism and despair.

I'd say the best solution to this nihilism is to be curious and creative. Seek knowledge and create things. The more knowledge, the easier it is to understand the dread, the more creativity, the easier it is to find meaning in the meaningless. Anyone who puts all their existential fruit in the neoliberal capitalist market will in the end die screaming (which they usually do) because it's essentially just irrelevant noise that blinds them from finding purpose in a universally meaningless existence.

I'm thinking, the first salvo of war # 28 or 29 by this weekend... But that won't be about automation.
The only question we need to decide what's the ethical response to any technology :
Is man made for the factory or is the factory made for man?
(And once that's settled, the logical questions of any new inventions: Does this machine do humans and the world they live in enough good that justify and offset the harm it does? Do we know how to nullify or mitigate the harm? Will there be lasting fallout? Is there a less harmful alternative?) — Vera Mont

The biggest risks in terms of war will not be tyrannical leaders' delusional dreams of bigger empires, because the rest of the world is pretty much fed up with those kinds of people. The biggest problems we face will be the result of climate change. We might have billions of people being forced to relocate to areas of the world that are habitable and the consequences of that are just ignored worldwide. Even if it seemingly happens smoothly, the following years will have a dramatic shift in culture clashes and democratic shifts due to the number of people affecting other nations' elections through sheer numbers of new voters from entirely different cultures. If we thought that the immigration crisis of 2014 produced a problematic situation right now, just imagine what billions of people might do. This might lead to an actual world war 3 starting as civil wars in regions of the world heavily affected by an influx of a large population.

Automation might even be a solution to this since a nation's economy wouldn't take a hit by millions of people not speaking the language and not having a job in that nation. With automation and UBI, that economy might even thrive. Of course, that is a heavy simplification of the consequences, but comparing an automation/UBI economy with the traditional neoliberal capitalism we have today, the latter would collapse under such massive immigration due to climate change.

And to answer the other questions. Man made factories, so the man isn't made for the factory. And studying the destructive effects that a neoliberal capitalist system has on humans, there's no question that automation is a good progression. However, humans need to do something with their time and not all can manage a sense of purpose without work. Some will work with what they like, some will probably revive extreme religion in search of purpose and some might go insane. For this there need to be a new philosophical movement that focuses on existential questions from the perspective of a life without work.

For this, I'd turn to Star Trek, seriously. In that story/lore, money doesn't really exist anymore. The reason why they are up there in the universe is our need to explore and answer big questions. If we would reach such a society, I'd be really happy, because it's basically putting people into the ideal place where we use our intellect to solve problems and focus our purpose on expanding knowledge. Capitalism is essentially putting us in a system of irrelevancy, where people aren't really relevant anymore, only the cashflow that upholds the stability of living.

We are essentially robots in a system. Why would it be bad to replace us with real robots and be free of that system?

is it ethical for technological automation top be stunted, in order to preserve jobs (or a healthy job marketplace)? — Bret Bernhoft

No, because a better question would be: "is it ethical to keep people working themselves to death in a system that doesn't care for them?

Define if capitalism is healthy or an illusion of healthy. The way the world works today consolidates wealth to a very few on the backs of workers working themselves to death.

Automation would cut out the "working to death" part and present a conundrum for the wealthy in that there won't be people having money to purchase the goods they produce with automation. So in order to keep the economy running, some kind of universal basic income is required so that the loop is kept intact. The less people work, the larger that UBI needs to be, leading to more freedom for the people to do what they want instead of "working to death".

Essentially, automation is a capitalist's dream of cheap labor and high income, but it would kill the market if no one has the money to buy products or services these capitalists provide. So essentially, it's the end of capitalism by maximizing capitalism.

The more advanced automation gets, the less we will be able to keep capitalism as it exists today and in the end, we would require a new system to replace the old.

If we do not figure out a working system, this will lead to future wars and conflicts.

Exactly. People have not "disregarded" domino effects, they just disagree with you about what they are, how likely they are, and how to measure them. — Isaac

How do you disregard the fact of Russia's war crimes? The fact of China's interest in Taiwan? The fact of North Korea's recent aggressions? The fact of how Russia treats its own people? The fact of people being killed when opposing Putin?

These are facts and a solid foundation for any speculation that revolves around the possible consequences of just letting Russia get what they want. Disregarding these facts is just ignorant and not a valid foundation for any counter-argument. These consequences are things seriously considered in every place where serious discussion about the war is happening, but in this thread, such dismissal is somehow approved to be a valid disagreement regardless of how weak any premisses is in support of such disagreements are.

This is why this thread is shit.

The irony... — Isaac

The irony is that you are blind to these simplifications because I've yet to hear any actual consequence analysis of such a simplified position. I'm waiting to hear it...

Just trying to frame disagreements over subjective speculation as the naivety of whichever party disagrees with your subjective judgment is disingenuous. — Isaac

I'm not doing that, that is you framing things in that way, as you always do with your strawmen and why you have dragged this thread down to your level. What I call naive is the black-and-white point of view where everything is only about a life-and-death dichotomy because that is, objectively, an extremely simplified way of looking at this conflict, disregarding any domino effect of short-term decisions just to save lives in the here and now. That you interpret that as me "calling people naive for disagreeing with me" is intentionally strawmanning and changing the very context of what I wrote. This is why your arguments are constantly low quality and why this thread is mostly bullshit today and why I rarely come back here. Mods should rename this thread to "Strawman discussion about the Ukraine war", because that's basically what this thread is.

Do Ukrainians deserve to be protected against Russian aggression, answer: yes. At any cost? No. — Benkei

How would you define "at any cost"? However you turn things, there's gonna be suffering. The problem is when the evaluation of the best solution becomes a black-and-white dichotomy of life and death without ever evaluating if a life becomes worth living or if deaths further down the line are at a greater number than in the short term. When someone argues that it's good that Ukrainians are fighting back against Russian and reclaiming their land and people from the horrors of Russian war crimes, they get criticized for somehow not caring for the ones dying because of the fight or other consequences of the war ongoing. But then what about the people they have freed, the ones who survived the war crimes, who cry in the arms of the Ukrainian soldier who freed them, or the unseen consequences of pushing back Russia showing other nations with similar warmongering leaders that it's not worth it, like China and North Korea? Just putting down arms and sacrificing Ukraine to Russia just to end the war might show China and North Korea that they have the same power and that the rest of the world is powerless to do anything meaningful about it. So what suffering might that lead to if we don't stand up against the tyranny that Russia has shown the world?

The main question is, how do you evaluate "at any cost" when there's no answer that is objectively good? Do you just hold onto a strict "no-death" ideal or might that be too naive for the complexity of this conflict and beyond? Instead of branding interlocutors with being "for" or "against" "at any cost". What "cost" is worth it when the consequence of giving in to Russia's demands may be much more severe than people seem to realize?

if you all would like to give your opinion on the internal affairs of our nation, learn to read our language — Gus Lamarch

your politicians are destroying your economies, principles, values and liberties exactly as the left has tried to do here. — Gus Lamarch

:brow:

Yeah, not actually.

We already saw this didn't happen in the case of the Soviet Union collapsing. Or with the sad case of the Iraqi scientists building Saddam's bomb.

Those people will be on the kill list of many intelligence services.

And that's why knowledge of nuclear technology, which is now basically ancient tech, hasn't proliferated: if anyone is so stupid to try to sell services to terrorists, that's a guarantee you will get on the CIA/Mossad hit list. And actually, those people (with the tech knowledge) know this. — ssu

The key difference is that the number of nukes and people behind them is much higher by the collapse of Russia than anyone else. It's by a large magnitude different. And a collapse of modern Russia would be different from the Soviet collapse seen as Russia would be fractured into more states than before and each state would set its own agendas rather than deal with a larger main state as was the case after the Soviet collapse.

My point is that it only takes one scientist and one nuke to get into the hands of terrorists and seeing as how much of the Russian army is infected by right-wing extremists and downright nazis, what would happen if neo nazi terrorists get hold of a nuke? Most people think of Islamic terrorism when mentioning terrorists, but that's probably not what the outcome would be with nukes from Russia. Neo nazis and right-wing extremists are a much more probable group to weaponize themselves with nukes. And seen how the governments of the world slowly move towards such extremism, like in Italy, it's a major threat to the world if that would happen.

The authors conclude that nuclear weapons are most likely out of reach for terrorists. — neomac

The thing to remember is that if a state fails and collapses, most of the people with technical knowledge of nuclear weapons would also be subjects for terrorists to recruit into their organizations. If successful, they won't need state support.

In this case the next foreseeable concern for US/NATO would be - as it was for Ukraine after the collapse of the Soviet Union - the Russian nuclear arsenal (and even nuclear plants) remaining in the hands of ex-Russian sub-states (with all their unresolved border issues) and the Chinese hegemonic ambitions in est/central Asia. Likely even Turkish and Iranian, at least in central Asia. — neomac

Yes, it would be a mess. But it can also be leveraged. The west could initiate trade agreements and transactions with such states as long as they give up their nukes. It might sound like a loss for them, but since their nation will likely be much smaller, their existence is much more fragile and the west would probably block them even more if they keep holding onto their nukes. So for them, their quality of life gets a massive bump if they give up nukes and that might be preferable. (Using "the west" as a broad term for nations opposing Russia in this conflict).

Of course, with tensions around their borders, they might lock into a Russian-based cold war for decades, slowly suffocating themselves with their finger on the button to eradicate their neighboring nation. It all depends on how stuck up their own ass they are.

The problem isn't really that there will be new nations with nukes, that can be resolved with diplomacy. The biggest problems are broken arrow scenarios in which nukes go missing in the turmoil after Russia collapses. Terrorist organizations could end up with tactical nukes or with knowledge make suitcase bombs out of old bombs. This could become one of the most dangerous terrorist situations in history.

It's actually viable for the UN to go into the new fractured Russia and seize control of the nukes before that gets out of hand. Nato and the UN would need to hastily initiate a plan to acquire all nukes, maybe even by force, in order to have the situation under control.

Russia's destruction of civilian infrastructure deepens the motivation to keep the structure of sanctions after any kind of cease fire. — Paine

Even if we see peace or cease-fire at some point, most of the west will probably not do business with Russia. The lesson has been learned: "never trust them, they will use a deal as hostile leverage".

Russia will be blocked until it has changed into a proper democratic state with low corruption. So basically, since that won't happen overnight, Russia will probably collapse in the long run and fracture into smaller nations that want to get out of the national bullshit while healing their relations with the west.

Most of modern society in developed nations as well as third world nations soon to be considered developed has been built around a globalized infrastructure of goods and tech. Cut off from that it's basically setting a nation back 50 years. So the choice for any nation is to either work peacefully with each other or risk ruining themselves and their people's ability to be on par with the rest of the world. That might work to some degree and in some nations better than others, but at a certain point, people won't accept it. Generally speaking, most people want to reach some basic liberal and human rights and if a nation blocks the people from that too much it will break the back of that government, either over time of political degradation or by the hands of the people.

Just look at Iran, if the people keep on pushing against that totalitarian bullshit, it will, at some point break into a takeover of power and could change Iran into a nation completely different from today (closer to how it was before the 1979 revolution). All it takes is a single event that makes people organize opposition.

What that would be like in Russia is unknown, maybe the police shoot someone who flees drafting, who knows, but I would not be surprised if there are oppositional groups in Russia figuring out how to stand up against Putin's regime and waiting for the perfect time to do so. It might be that they're waiting for Putin to be removed from power and in the following political turmoil they will push for change and take over. And what would happen if draftees were to organize not just to lay down arms but to turn around their weapons towards their own leaders? We've already seen things like soldiers killing their officers or groups of draftees organizing a laydown of arms as a massive group. If all the elite fighting forces are in Ukraine, then how many forces can be used to defend Putin and Kremlin if the people take up arms?

When I spoke about this in the earlier days of the war, I was heavily criticized for being naive, "to think that Russia would fall" was a preposterous idea. At this time I don't think anyone would argue against it being a possibility. People who didn't have insight into how bad the state of the military was in Russia before the war thought that Russia was an unstoppable freight train if they dared to wage war against someone, but they weren't, they were rather pathetic. And with the decline in almost everything that makes up modern Russian society, I don't see how the trajectory for Russia right now is anything but utter state collapse. I mean, Putin is also getting older, if he dies of anything in five years, that's not enough to rebuild the economy and what's been domestically destroyed by this war. So eventually, Putin will disappear and if Russia is in the same bad shape as it is now, that would definitely collapse the region, especially if someone takes over trying to "be Putin", people might just snap and initiate a revolution to remove the corruption at the top.

All of this is of course speculation, but not so much as it was a couple of months ago.

I see your point, and think you are wrong. — Manuel

That's usually how it goes. But the conclusion you put forward usually only have cherry picked details from all over the place in history. I'm drawing sources from experts on Putin and Russia here, https://sceeus.se/en/
While many in this thread just reference their own non-scientific conclusions on the matter. There's a common thread among the Nato blamers to always refer back to their homeboy Chomsky, but it's beginning to become an circlejerk of appeal to authority arguments and little to no actual proper research. I'm drawing conclusions from gathered knowledge from many experts, who's day job is to actually study these things and who's been doing it for decades. Chomsky on the other hand, is a philosopher of technology, psychology, linguistics, but isn't an expert in this field of political research, he's been doing opinion pieces but is painfully simple-minded in his approach. But he's the main "expert" source for everyone who argue for the Nato angle in this matter. The argument that Nato is a threat to Russia has no ground whatsoever, for anyone with an insight into Nato and Russian affairs. Nato is a piece on the chessboard, but not a player. Russia uses the Nato chess piece as a way to legitimize their actions, but it has no real foundation as truth.

Post-Soviet nations are all extremely scared to be snuffed out by Russias delusional dreams of being a grand empire again and they seek security against that, which Russia, especially under Putin's rule, views as a ticking clock against realizing that dream. Therefor Russia has built up the narrative that Nato is threatening Russias very existence in order to keep post-Soviet nations from joining and blocking Russias expansion back into its old form.

That's not based on my own research, it's based on the collective research of the institute above and shared among many researching Russian foreign affairs. But in here, the counter argument just boils down to people "thinking this is wrong" because Chomsky, or some cherry picked quotes from a wide range of people in modern history kind of hints at something that might be a Nato angle. This is why this thread has a trash status on this forum.

You talk with them, because they are the one you are dealing with. Iraq had to talk to the US after the invasion did it not? That war was pretty ugly but nobody in the West ever said it was a bad idea for Iraq to talk with the US, as they should and did.

That's the world we live in. You don't like it, I don't like it, but we deal with what we have not what we want. That's politics. — Manuel

Most nations involved in wars and conflicts have psychologically balanced leaders who, regardless of the horrors of war, conduct diplomacy for the good of everyone. However, some leaders aren't balanced and psychologically stable and then diplomacy doesn't work anymore because one of the leaders are fundamentally untrustworthy. I'd say the same for someone like Trump. There are no deals, no peace treaties or agreements to be made with someone who breaks the entire rulebook. Putin is a type of dictator who doesn't play along except under military threat. That's his whole play.

To think that diplomacy will always work is a naive point of view that's grown out of our modern period of history where people grew up believing everyone to be rational and wanting peace. The people living today haven't been forced to deal with someone like Hitler on the world stage but here we are and anyone who would suggest diplomacy with Hitler would be laughed at.

This is the world we live in, not the always diplomatically rational bad world you describe. Sometimes threats of war or actual war becomes the only way forward when someone like Putin threatens the very existence of Ukraine or further. And this chess play also has the effect that there's a possibility of Putin being removed from power by the Russians themselves. People in this thread laughed at that when I mentioned it in the early days of the war, but they're not laughing as much today as this might actually be an outcome of the pressures put on him and Russia.

And when confronting the argument about stopping the war, regardless of cost, I'm just reminded of the tears of joy on the faces of the civillian people who're at the moment being liberated from Russian occupation by Ukrainian offensive movements. Would you tell them to their face that they're expendable for the sake of just ending the war?

The world is complex and any ideal of "no war" is a naive and potentially dangerous absolutist position that disregards the consequences of not standing up against tyranny.

What makes you think he will move again? — Manuel

What makes you think he won't? Your foundation for him being trustworthy is by blaming Nato and make him look desperate in defense of Russia, but that's the false narrative his regime has been spreading for years. If it's rather the opposite, supported by actual research on the matter, that he wants to join post-Soviet nations back into Russia, then what do you think he will do when failure in Ukraine is a fact? He'll most likely invade another post-Soviet nation while waiting for a new opening to invade Ukraine, or rather, he will play it differently by target assassinations and puppet mastering people into the Ukrainian government trying to initiate a sham election on a higher level. Or he will take time to build up a massive army to just win by force on a whole other scale than we've seen so far. If Russia becomes a North Korea-type state, then he would just force people into the military, brain wash them to the point of submission.

But you go ahead and negotiate, what was it you said before? Some Disney empire stuff? Simplified movie version of how tings would go? I can see other movies where heroes through diplomacy save the world from war. It's even more of a Hollywood naive outcome than what I've described. You can't talk Putin out of this, if you think that you're buying into his whole strategy. Do you think his KGB methods are just in his past?

And will continue dying, unless this war stops short. — Manuel

Your absolutist ideal of stopping death disregards what many Ukrainians deem a life worth living. They don't want to live under a tyrant, period.

I believe sensible people should understand that giving up pieces of illegally, criminally obtained land (and this is what the borders of ALL nation states are, regardless of the state) would prefer to give a bit of land, for thousands of lives. — Manuel

Would you give up a large part of the land you live in and then live under an authoritarian regime? Are you seriously proposing crushing the dreams and lives of the people living there just to reduce deaths when Russia is already conducting genocide? What the hell do you think will happen to people living there if they all of a sudden are forced to live under Russias authoritarian leadership?

And you still haven't understood the consequences of such an act. What it communicates to the worlds authoritarian leaders. It shows them that it is possible to gain land by force. It's naive absolutism. There are no lives to be saved by giving in to authoritarian leaders. You think your idea would have saved people's lives if the same was done with Hitler? This is the whole foundation for police forces not giving into the demands of hostage takers, because if they did, how do you think others would act? If you witness someone getting away with taking a hostage and gain both money, freedom or whatever you want, then there will be an epidemic of hostage takers. It's because of not giving into demands that there's been a decline of such acts, it's not worth it for the hostage takers. But you suggest we do just that, so what would happen in other nations around the world? Those leaders are looking very closely to the outcome of this war.

Will this be good news for those in the annexed territories? Of course not. How can you satisfy all the people in a country that large? It's impossible. So you try to find the least worst option, and make a case for it. — Manuel

Your measurement of "least worst" is only based on a life/death dichotomy, disregarding a life worth living, which is the reason Ukrainians are fighting for survival in the first place. And what about Taiwan? What happens if China sees Russia succeeding gaining land in Ukraine? Would you "save" Taiwan in the same way when the floodgates are open for authoritarian leaders of the world to invade other nations?

When does your "solution" end?

You are seriously misinformed and confuse the symptom with the cause. And stop with the hypocritical holier than thou attitude. — Manuel

Would you mind sending the Center for Eastern European studies the same message please? I'd love to hear them respond to you when you call them misinformed.

Plenty of criminals in the US and Europe, many of them far worse than Putin (Bush, Blair, Sarkozy, etc.). But if you can't see that because of some strange notion that we are better because we have more freedoms, then yes, we do well to stop here. — Manuel

Earlier, you wrote:

It is indeed strange that we must pick sides, because otherwise we support Putin, as such views appear to exclude each other. — Manuel

So, you speak to me about not being able to see the bad people in western society because you essentially position me to have "picked a side" against Putin and therefore I must support the bad people in western society. Talk about being hypocritical.

And if you think they are worse, let me remind you that Putin is very much involved with orders directly down to the military on the ground in Ukraine, the same military who put hundreds and thousands of people and children in mass graves. I've yet to see such a directly ordered systemic genocide by the people you mention, but yet you think Putin is less worse than them? Are you for real? Are you so blinded by your own reasoning that you become morally corrupt to who Putin really is? While so hypocritical that you criticize that we're "forced to pick a side" while putting interlocutors into a specific side anyway. Once again I'm reminded of the low quality in this thread which made me leave it in the first place. Philosophical garbage.

Arguing for a stop to the war is not the same as standing or supporting Putin - it does not follow at all, logically speaking. — Manuel

Of course not, but the arguments in here rarely follows that and instead boils down to defensive stances for Putin to give him something he wants to end the war without ever even thinking about the consequences of such an action. It's essentially giving a murderer who killed for money, all that money and be set free to maybe in the future murder again. And what about China, if they see that it's ok to invade and murder to gain some land and that the rest of the world will just have to accept it.

This single minded idea of ending a war by giving a criminal what he wants just to save lives is philosophically shallow and doesn't follow the actual analysis of consequences of such acts to its end point. How do you actually talk to a criminal like Putin who over and over breaks deals, lie and does whatever he wants. There is no peace talk that works with such people so thinking the war can end by giving a criminal what he wants thinking that's the end of it is naive to the extreme.

The resistance, the sanctions and opposition towards Putin seems by all measurements to actually work, regardless of what many have said in this thread. If this leads to getting rid of Putin, then it was all worth it. Would you agree that all the deaths in World War II to stop Hitler was worth it? Or should we just have given Hitler what he wanted in order to save those lives? What do you think the consequence would have been if that fascism spread and infested society on a deeper level over decades after it?

I would also like to know what is meant by "the West". Does South America count? Africa? Clearly not China because NATO members don't like it. If by the West you mean those countries here that sanction Russia, then I think it's a very nebulous notion: — Manuel

Fair point, "the west", in my definition, are nations with democratic elections, freedom and at least some social security for its citizens. I would barely say US is a truly western society, in terms of such definitions, but they still (hopefully) have a working legal system that protects democracy and still gives people the right to speak their opinions and minds without being put in prison. If democracy, low corruption, freedom of speech, freedom to choose your own life and have protected human rights is a definition of western society, then you can use that against the nations you want to evaluate. There are definitely nations in Africa that is western by those definitions. China isn't a western nations, not because of Nato, but because they don't have human rights in place, they don't have proper elections and they have a power structure and society that limits people to the extreme. Even though on a surface level they look like a free nation.

Putin doesn't like the west and that post-soviet nations want to be western societies because that would mean his form of power gets destroyed. He is afraid that this spreads into Russia, regardless of what the people want, because then he can't be the czar he wants to be.

The less bad "side" is to avoid another World War, because apparently two of them were not enough for us to get the message. — Manuel

There's no guarantee that giving Putin what he wants would safeguard any of that and doing that would probably giving China a reason to invade Taiwan. Too many think that avoiding a World War needs to be avoided at any cost and this gives Putin a big tool to do whatever he wants. He can just threaten with nuclear weapons and everyone will dance to his music.

Taking a stance and opposing back can also stop a World War. It's the whole foundation for the cold war and it worked in its twisted way. And that would also show China that it's not worth invading Taiwan. Which could block another potential opening to a World War. These nations lives in a past era that the rest of the world essentially moved away from and if they could evolve into more modern times, primarily by the old people in power dying off, that could help creating an actual world peace on a level never seen before. Keeping a stalemate until then is also effective.

Putin wants the west to be weak, it's how he gains power. If we give him that power, how can you guarantee he will just be ok with what we gave him and not just attack another post-soviet nation?

You can be outraged at the war crimes and want them to stop, while at the same time seeking to reduce the number of Ukrainians killed. Or you can create a Disney film in which the Empire is defeated. — Manuel

Those kinds of arguments were posted early in this thread when I described potential acts by Putin that we have specifically seen later in this war. The "Movie villain" counter argument rings hollow when Putin actually acts like it and is just a way to dismiss arguments by strawman.

How would you reduce the number of Ukrainians being killed when they seek to defend themselves against those killings? We should, by your argument, give Putin some land where Ukrainians grew up and lives on after they conducted genocide. And what happens when he makes a move again? Give more land? Give up the whole of Ukraine? What about the respect for the Ukrainian people and what they want? Do you think they fight in this war just for the sake of it? You think they don't know they're dying on the battlefield? You think they are involved in a war where they don't know why? They do know why, they want to survive and be their own nation and you suggest that we should give Putin what he wants because we would then save Ukrainian lives? You think Ukrainians would be fine with all these deaths so far just to give up?

It's not me that has a simplified point of view here, it's you who suggest that ending the war at any cost is worth it, without even thinking about further consequences and what Ukrainians feel is worth fighting for. It's a naive point of view.

You may say my last sentence is a defense of Putin, when it is a description of fact, going all the way back to the dissolution of the USSR, stated clearly by people who actually know about this conflict, like the US' last ambassador to the USSR Joh Matlock and others. But if you can't make a distinction between these two, then we are stuck. — Manuel

No, I'd say it's a naive point of view to disregard the actions of Putin and the world view he put forward. And all actions taken in this war that made it worse has been from Putin and Nato has never been an existential threat to Russia. Putin doesn't own the other post-soviet nations and your point of view requires them to be a legitimate part of Russia, just like Putin want it to be, which they aren't. The expansion of Nato has been because of nations fearing what Putin might do and seeking security in an alliance that blocks such aggressions. I know, I live in a nation who wants this security. Any notion that Nato is an existential threat to Russia is a delusional idea promoted by Russian propaganda in order to give justification for Russias actions. And at the end of the day, Putin is responsible for all of this and any delusional idea that Nato forced him to do so is just buying into his narrative.

I left this thread to get away from these kinds of arguments because I'm tired of the level they ended up on. Read between the lines of what I write, I won't repeat myself.

People have to grow above the excitement and entertainment of the freak show. — universeness

They never do. Voters are rarely intellectually involved and politicians desperately seek voters attention, everything in current democracy is always boiling down to demagogues and populism.

Democracy needs to evolve to a higher form, what that is, is up to political philosophers to figure out.

People should be voting for people not political parties. — universeness

Could devolve into becoming just like presidential elections and wrestling fights between individuals and media covering who wore the best clothes and so on.

Such a system needs moderator personel who will steer the ship away from such downfalls and focus on the actual politics and strategies being pit against each other.

You are kinda describing Tony Blairs New Labour Party or perhaps even Keir Starmer's current labour party, who are indeed having tremendous success in the (non-Scottish) polls. That's why the tories keep stealing a lot of their policies, because they are soft tory policies.
Current labour and the liberal party should just merge as there is very little between them. :angry: — universeness

I'm not that well read-up on British politics so I didn't know that they did that.

In all essence I think a lot of western nations of the world needs new political movements that aren't fascist conservative super-capitalist racists. I'm kind of stunned that there aren't enough people who want a more non-extreme leftish movement, but maybe such voters are so content in their middle class life that they're too fat and obsessed with TikTok and social media to ever care about politics until it's too late. Just look at all the Millennials and Gen Zs in Russia who were just ignoring everything up until now and then being all surprised about everything.

It is indeed strange that we must pick sides, because otherwise we support Putin, as such views appear to exclude each other. — Manuel

The only ones supporting Putin are those who argue in defense of Putin. The side-picking is obvious in people's rhetoric. Personally I side with the west, not because it is an innocent perfect utopia, but because it allows progress, personal freedom and security far better than any other form of government or society so far. Siding with the least worse does not mean supporting the bad sides of it, but it damn straight stands up against the tyranny of someone like Putin.

The problem is that when people who generally argue against western ideals, i.e, and specifically, unhinged neoliberal capitalism and the consumer existence, they, in lack of actual rational thought, are unable to intellectually and emotionally handle a discussion surrounding the war in Ukraine. They're so deeply entrenched in their dislike of western society that when a person like Putin essentially wage war against western ideals and any post-soviet nation who wants to rebuild into such ideals, they get confused into somehow defending Putin or validating his perspective just because it somewhat aligns with how they dislike western ideals.

But anyone with the least sense of rationality, empathic ability and philosophical scrutiny would clearly see how tyrannical Putin really is, why he does what he does and how morally corrupt people under him are after all the war crimes and bodies of civillians and children that gets dug up from mass graves right now. It's massive, spread out and systemic, not singular events of isolated morally corrupt soldiers and leaders. From top down to individual soldiers conducting it.

The "good" vs" "bad" is in all aspects extremely obvious in this war and "picking" the side of the west does not validate previous war crimes and morally corrupt actions that infest western society, it just means that we pick the side that is the least worse, the side that can actually progress past the bad and that has a potential future where all people can live a good life with a sense of fulfillment. Putin stands for a totalitarian society where people are meat bags that can be thrown at whatever he feels he wants and progressing that society is an impossibility in its current state. If people cannot distinguish between the sides of this war, it basically means they are morally corrupt or unable to understand further than their superficial dislike of western society. Like people defending Hitler during the start of World War II. When society moved past that war, it was clear that those holding on to judging Hitler throughout his political movement and wartime were the ones who were right and the ones defending him were wrong. There was no grey area in that matter.

Some wars and conflicts aren't as complex as people like to think they are. The complexity can exist on individual scales and domino effects of foreign policies pushing details of a conflict in different directions, but picking a side against Putin, the people under him and their war does not mean we side with a neoliberal capitalist machine of destruction that the west is infected by, but the basic liberal core values that stands against the tyranny and brutality of people like Putin and the people supporting him.

But this thread has for a long time been infected by that kind side-picking. One side of empathic people who get outraged by the brutality of Putin and one side who can't align their criticism of the west with standing against Putin so they disregard any judgement of him or try to justify his reasons because of some weird emotional inability to both criticize the west and see Putin and his war machine for what it really is.

There's a naughty chubby lad with messy hair and even messier morals waiting in the wings and ready for a return to action! Hi, ho, silver! — Baden

So the only people they have available as replacements is the last dude who failed. What does this say about Tories?

And why doesn't the more rational and balanced Tories just leave and start their own new party and leave the incompetent and stupid parts to drive Tories into the ground? I think they would have tremendous success if they did that at this time.

I'm not sure what you're having trouble with here. One can over water one's houseplants. One can under water one's houseplants. — Isaac

And you position yourself as being the one deciding what level of imagination people are on in their writing and then putting yourself into the balanced rational position and everyone you don't agree with into either having too little or too much imagination, whatever fits your way of dismissing someone else's argument without engaging with them honestly.

We can't be responsible for your lack of imagination. — Isaac

I can't account for your overactive imagination. — Isaac

What's the balance here? You both ask for imagination and condemn it throughout this thread. Is it only when it fits your narrative that imagination is needed and when others use it you call it overactive and wrong? I guess consistency isn't your strong suit.

“our scale” and which physical processes? — Deus

Our scale = us, human-sized things observing our surroundings.
Physical processes = physics at our human scale, i.e Einsteins theories etc.

Randomness produced at the quantum level = randomness and classically defined phenomena on the macro level. And vice versa — Deus

Not sure what you meant by this? It's an increasing probability certainty of cause and effect the larger in scale you go from the smallest to the largest.

A good way to wrap heads around the concept of quantum physics is that things at the smallest Planck measurement to the largest objects in the universe tend to be a scale of probability. Going from total randomness at the smallest scale and sequentially becoming less and less random. At the scale we exist, the probabilities that go against deterministic cause and effect, are so infinitely small that they basically never happen.

So... our scale in the universe cannot be randomized in physical processes, even if we can witness randomness and strange probabilities at quantum scales.

No man-made change is inevitable — 180 Proof

Of course, a world disaster could end humanity and it will not, but if no such things happen, it is inevitable because it is a natural progression of how we manufacture tools. Humans have never stopped improving on the tools that we have and advanced automation is a pretty effective tool over previous tools. So, in conclusion, it is inevitable if nothing else happens.

especially to the degree it adversely affects so many people as the prospect of total automation of production and services would. — 180 Proof

Has anything ever changed the course of maximization of production just because some people get run over by it? And even so, it's not all just doom and gloom, advanced automation can also free people from working to death. Like, stopping cheap child labor because robots are cheaper is a positive outcome, regardless of whether the company has any intention of helping the children or not by that decision.

Has the world been helped by the industrial revolution? Did our living standards and life quality increase because of how the world shifted from before the industrial revolution? Of course.

Examples: global Lenin-Stalinism / Maoism, global laissez-faire capitalism, nuclear war, etc. — 180 Proof

All of those ideologies, ideas, and inventions are the result of value-driven, human factors. Progress, on the other hand, happens regardless. You could destroy the world and remove all books and information about everything and the surviving humans will build up a new society and they will continue the progression of tools from what they had.

The progression of tools, inventions, and machines does not have anything to do with how we value them or think of them. A better hammer will be a better hammer, always. So a better robot will be a better robot, always.

Therefore, if humanity isn't totally destroyed, we will eventually reach a point of total automation. So the question is, what would that economy be like? What would that world look like?