As a rule of thumb I am generally against any kind of institutional organisation.

Authorship seems pretty important for a sense of self.

Google Kantian intuitions. That might help you explore a little.

Define ‘sure’. There is no absolute certainty anymore than there is ‘absolute’ other than in the same sense that noumenon is ‘negatively’ ‘known’.

Words are words. The issue is deciding when we are just using words or the words are using us.

Pretty sure we all have moments like this :D Such is life. Some days rainbows and unicorns, others gloom and doom or emptiness.

The meaning of meaning is what I mean it to be once I decide what meaning means in any given moment. Most if the time now I do not bother with such temporally inconsistent rhythms and just laugh, smile or mock reality and its absurdism.

We all die and that is strangely satisfying for me :)

The terms ‘Good’ and ‘Evil’ are relative. Some could argue that they do not exist so your question is irrelevant.

In a broader sense of the terms used it is clear to me that we are all capable of ‘good and evil’. Some are inevitably more likely to fall into one more than the other because life is like that - due luck/circumstance/experience/opportunity or whatever you wish to frame it as.

Nature vs Nurture is a simplistic means of categorising two different perspectives of human life. They really just the same thing but useful as abstractions to investigate our existence further and open new avenues of investigation. Much like someone claiming to be conservative or liberal, no one is truly a pure form of one or the other because they are organs within the same body of thought.

Good and evil are landmarks on a vast landscape that allows us to navigate better. That is all.

Decades ahead of his time. Still the best imo

Scrivener is a useful tool for writing.

Question is: If these experiences are representations of things in the outside world, why would I expect such a representation to be reducible to the brain activity that supports it? The information in a photograph doesn't contain any direct information about the physical medium it is being represented on, and neither should it if it is caused by information from the outside world. — Apustimelogist

This is precisely the point of phenomenal consciousness not necessarily telling us anything about a physical world but rather representing it.

The argument does not refute physicalism outright it just presents a problem of irreducibility within materialist views. Phenomenology makes no assumptions about some proposed ‘existing world’ and works purely with experience as the core of our worldly knowledge. It is hard to refute that we all act as if the world is a physical certainty though.

The way I see it is that we necessarily operate ‘as if’ things exist and said things exist due to our ability to question them NOT because we have apodictic/irrefutable knowledge of them.

Has the economic anarchy of capitalism produced the current status quo of 2/3rds of the world living below the poverty line? — an-salad

Is this true?

Answer: No.

Yes, you can. Thinking need not be worded thought.

Well, I have issue with saying that laws can be only based on consequences because no one knows the full consequences of their actions.

So it seems like I have to assume there is some hypothetical law that can be seen as unquestionably ‘the best’ law. If so then why would anyone question it. Point being rules are questioned and the kind of ‘laws’ I believe you have in mind are not ever brought into examination they are just accepted.

For comparisons sake, we do not question whether or not a ball will drop if released, we bring this inot question only when experience shows otherwise (ie. in outer space). Obviously we are talking about ethics here so there is far more to question here when it comes to human biases and subjective opinions soak with human emotions.

I have looked again and do not really understand the argument sadly.

I get the impression the premises are based on some proposed ideal of a consequentialist (whatever that may be).

Do we have to assume it holds or are we meant to pick at it?

Everyone had an agenda and perspective. This is a problem if viewed as a problem.

Generally you best of picking who you converse with carefully whilst listening to everyone you can as passively as possible, then with personal intent. By this I mean sketch out your map, find the boarders, and do not let anything outside in BUT view it passively and adjust borders as needed.

That is it really.

‘Philosophy’ is another umbrella term ;)

That could just be down to quality. Maybe popularity is a thing. People are stupid so it happens.

The younger people are the more they want to be heard and the more attention they seek.

If people are attracted to threads due to number over responses that is a sad sad sad situation. Makes no sense at all to me. I look at threads based on topic not popularity and assume literally everyone else does too … why wouldn’t they?

You need one or the other in general. A ‘focused’ dialogue can quickly become one that that misses the forest for the trees whilst one with more participants becomes little more than a free for all.

To go into a bit more depth … if someone insists that something someone is saying has nothing to do with the topic it could just be that they are missing the chance to take an alternative approach. What can seem like far off the beaten track can be key to the fundamental question at hand.

With ‘Participants’ too many lines of inquiry can cause confusion and what was once a dynamic discussion between 3-4 people turns into a muddled mess following several different themes/lines.

With 3-4 people involved less guarding of focus breathes life and exploration into the discussion. With more and more people the focus needs to be rigid to avoid confusion … but imo this will result in a severe lack of exploration.

I disagree with Focus and Participation.

I can tell by your attitude you are not at all interested in discussion so bye bye

I do question the ‘survey’ that states that over 50% are living pay check to pay check btw. Sounds a little obscure how they acquired this data.

I was suggesting that the government should award automatic investments for low income. Given the inbuilt aversion to social care in the US I imagine things won’t change anytime soon. The battle for social care in the UK is pretty scary too … but at least there is a semblance of it there still.

Yes, I am ignorant about US. If the majority of people in the US are literally living to pay check to pay check I imagine the US economy will collapse soon enough. I do know that the richest nations have the largest degree of poverty compared to its counterparts. That is the nature of economic growth.

Read exactly what I said and consider the context it was written in and how I repeated what I meant.

Do you think some kind of scheme should be put into place to help minimum wage workers in later life? I do. Maybe open up a pension/saving scheme to set up like I said? Good idea or bad idea?

Minimum wage is your starting point, that is the issue. Also, why just 30 yrs if you are assuming minimum wage? On minimum wage from 20 yrs old I would go for 50 yrs (which would be about $300,000+).

I understand that people do not appreciate what compound interest can do if left alone over decades. All that said, it would be good if minimum salaries came with some kind of automatic pension investment rather than just having those with a greater disposable income to benefit more easily longterm. How would this be implemented though … tough question. I do not see skimming off the top as being a optimal way forward.

My point was that it is not that hard to get to a million NOT that difficult to do for most people. Of course if someone lacks ability to get a job above minimum wage their entire life then that sucks. Some people are not capable but MOST are.

It is always the case that the richest countries have the poorest people sadly. It was the same for the British Empire. Now the minimum in UK is far better than US I imagine.

What are you talking about? You think putting 5% of your income into funds is only possible for people with a “small fortune”?

All you seem to be doing here is proving my point that people are not educated about how to manage their money. Start in your early twenties and you will be fine. Just takes a little discipline and forward thinking. Very, very few people today are completely unable to put aside something on a monthly basis.

Money is accumulated by working. You just have to set aside a little and put it into savings. That is how people become millionaires. It is not really that difficult if you start young.

The ‘enraged’ people are usually those that want more (envy the super rich) rather than feel pity for those that have less in my experience.

A large issue is simply lack of education. The opportunities are their but so many just had no idea they were available then feel annoyed by those that took advantage of a opportunity they were not aware of. Better to learn, take it on the chin and soldier on and do the best you can rather than scream ‘not fair!’ at billionaires.

If you cannot beat them join them. You just need to start early and be disciplined. If you start too let then teach your kids how to manage money.

Simples.

Noumenon is only in the negative sense NOT the positive sense.

In simple terms there is no referent. That is basically the thrust of the point Kant was making in COPR.

To reveal delusions.

ALL definitions need to be - and are - incomplete. The useful ones are consistent.

If you wish to define ‘reality’ as this or that it is fine by me as long you make it clear and distinct from what you regard other views of ‘reality’ being. Otherwise you will get accused of shifting goalposts to suit any point you are trying to express.

Ethics is just a way to say something is ‘just’ or ‘unjust’ with the facade of conviction.

You can live and act and there will be consequences. You can ignore the consequences but that will not matter to reality only your perception of your intentions and actions.

Choose how to deal with the data presented. That is what you have. Fin

I do find that many are too quick to pigeonhole someone as like x or y, or too ready to argue about what some philosopher said or meant … that is a scholarly side of philosophy.

I much prefer when people use their own words as often as possible rather than relying on philosophers as a crutch.

Bias is not always bad.

A woman talking about women’s experiences is certainly biased … but that is what we need to move towards an actual understanding. A man talking about women’s experiences is biased too. They are potentially both just as bias as each other here depending upon the context of the discussion of women’s experiences.

Needless to say I think women can offer more about the experiences of women than men ;)

Point being … why would anyone seek to eliminate bias? If possible this would make the item useless/unintelligible I feel.

Kant refers to ‘time and space’ in way as to express our faculties as needing them to paint a picture of the world on.

We cannot think of anything without time or space.

The most useful part of his text (for me) was how he discerned noumenon and phenomenon. It is so obvious that many misconstrue what he meant here - to the point that philosophers still argue about it today for some reason! ..l maybe I a wrong though :D

Note: Keep in mind that Kant argues for numerous opposing positions in Critique and you will often find people using quotes to back up one argument of their own that Kant himself refuted elsewhere in this particular text.

Our sense of the passage of time is also illusionary most of the time ;)

A rainbow is an illusion. Prior to our understanding of refracted light we would make up some other explanation. Regardless of what a rainbow is or how one is formed it is an illusion in the sense that something appears to be there but is not there. And the obvious stick in water illusion too.

All experience is not an illusion.

Experience happens. Illusions and delusions are part of experience. Once we recognise a delusion it becomes an illusion. That is all.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Man_Without_Words

Yeah. I get the ‘terminology’ just think it is dumb and historically such demarcations turn out to be mostly due to the need to fund research or push a certain theory. Needless to say there are uses in diagnosing some cases but there are also hazards when the distinctions are somewhat arbitrary in part.

The strong version posits that language determines thought entirely and that we can only perceive and understand things that we have words for in our language. In other words, without specific words or linguistic structures for certain concepts, those concepts cannot be fully grasped or expressed by speakers of that language. — Wayfarer

That sounds ridiculous to the extreme. There are instances of people without language that are able to form thoughts, plan ahead and act out. Animals also exhibit this behaviour.

Feral children, if too far gone, are unable to grasp some aspects of language simply because they have not developed in a world like ours and so struggle to understand things like tables and chairs because they are creatures of forests, mountains and hills. If switched around we would fail to appreciate a number of their subtle behaviours in the wild because we are not wild animals.

A set world view (cosmological view) dictates the items we communicate and to suggest that it can or could be the other way around appears utterly preposterous to me given what I know about humans. I do understand that some people struggle to think in anything but words. Some people even state they cannot conjure up mental images.

To be generous here I guess it is possible for some people that struggle to conjure up mental pictures to fall further towards the belief that language is needed to create concepts. Also, it depends a lot on how ‘language’ is being defined. Such definitions used by some can leave gaps in their explanations. Wittgenstein’s use of language was one such instance where premise is the conclusion … that is not to say that his exploration is not fascinating though!

Everyone is on the spectrum, hence ‘spectrum’.

I think Janus summed it up pretty well. The phenomenological perspective is NOT concerned with existence it is concerned with ‘experience’ only.

If we are talking about mapping out the world, with language or vice versa, then doing away with the ‘world’ (bracketing it out) allows us to examine the mechanisms/items/aspects/‘moments’ (for want of a better term) of conscious experience.