Classics is a diverse and multidisciplinary degree – you’ll be covering the languages, literatures, history, and philosophy of ancient Greece and Rome. Graduates have a reputation for being intelligent, analytical, and articulate. ...[snip]...

What you could study

Latin language
Greek language
Greek drama: tragedy and comedy
The ancient novel
Metamorphosis
Iliad
Aeneid
Sculpture
Ancient Greek philosophy: the pre-Socratic to Aristotle, and beyond
Greek and Roman mythology

https://www.ucas.com/explore/subjects/classics

Just sayin'...

Wake up calls are alarmist!

The importance of living in the 'here and now' is one emphasised by many authors. — Jack Cummins

It is surely only an act* of imagination to suppose one is ever any-when-or-where else.

*act as in 'performance'.

Here and now is where/when we dream of a future as a replay of the past - only better, with hindsight.

*Every performance is live; even the replay of a recording is live, only it is unresponsive to the audience

My favourite science reporter, here explains to me what the f is a 'time crystal' and opens some interesting prospects for future tech.

I suppose the question then is, given this realization, how do we make the dog obey? Is a fascist the equivalent of a feral dog which has no other solution but to put it out of its misery? — Moliere

They are not the dogs, we are, in their eyes. It is a symmetrical understanding of each that the other is the dog.

The reason for this is economic. During the 20th Century, wealth was produced by mass production and sustained by mass consumption. This required a mass of 'wage slaves' that also functioned as consumers. But the advent of robots and 3d printing eliminates the need for mass production and consumption as everything can be made 'bespoke'. The masses are surplus to requirements, and are therefore being turned against each other. It becomes a dog eat dog world.

Neither ballot nor bullet will save us because we are the dogs of war fighting amongst ourselves. "Oh ye of little faith!"

The population will crash to the point where everyone becomes glad to see another human, of any kind, that is not a corpse. Love triumphs in the long run.

For me to understand violence is a means of understanding how to negotiate towards non-violence. — Moliere

That stops working when you are dealing with people who are violently opposed to violence.

You and I, you have to understand, are the violent extremist left wing conspiracy that is directly promoting and funding this wave of violence sweeping the country; there is no talking to us, we have to be stopped by any means necessary. When you talk about non-violence you sound exactly like Putin.

To put it another way, there is a loss of faith, and we can only negotiate in good faith. We cannot negotiate as or with the faithless; there is no basis for communication, let alone negotiation. One does not try and negotiate with a dog, one is satisfied with obedience.

This is quite long. There's a bit of detail and nuance. It mainly focusses on the UK, but lessons can be drawn for other places. (Trump trigger warning.)

Meanwhile, in another part of the forest at about the same time: 3 kids wounded including the shooter who died, in just another High School shooting. Nothing to talk about here, not newsworthy at all - none of them had 1m followers or a history of ranting, so none of us cares a damn.

https://abcnews.go.com/US/shooting-reported-colorado-high-school-2-kids-transported/story?id=125452526

It's.. just a song, man. Just because I paint a picture of a war or scene with people deceased doesn't mean I want to go out and kill somebody. — Outlander

I don't think you did, Bob. And nor would I.

Then said Jesus unto him, Put up again thy sword into his place: for all they that take the sword shall perish with the sword. — Matthew 26:52

Typical Jesus hyperbole. But when it is exemplified for once it seems an appropriate lament.

But I prefer this sentiment, from the American Jesus, addressed to the Masters of the 2nd amendment:

And I hope that you die
And your death’ll come soon
I will follow your casket
In the pale afternoon
And I’ll watch while you’re lowered
Down to your deathbed
And I’ll stand o’er your grave
’Til I’m sure that you’re dead — Bob Dylan, Masters of War

But the last word must surely go to the great admiral, Nelson.

This would suggest that "happening" references conscious perception of the thing as opposed to anything to do with the thing. — Hanover

Yes, time is a limitation of (our human) consciousness, whereas for God, "Before Abraham was, I am."

Or I sometimes like to say, "Being is, whereas Nothing happens." — Time implies 'not yet'.

But that doesn’t make suffering reducible to “just a judgment.” — Truth Seeker

No, I certainly didn't intend that reduction, especially the 'just'. Pain is real, and judgements are real, and suffering is real. The point I want to emphasise though is that the idea that suffering is not bad is contradictory, and thus that the reduction of suffering gives a necessary and real foundation of morality.

And compare this to my earlier suggestion, in relation to communication:

Consider the proposition, "Falsehood is better than truth."
If it were true, then it would be better to believe that truth is better than falsehood.
If it were false, then it would be better to believe that truth is better than falsehood.
'Therefore, 'truth is better than falsehood' is the only tenable moral position on truth. — unenlightened

To be alive as a human, is to make judgements of oneself and of the world, between edible and poisonous, true and false, friend and foe, and so on. And though one can be mistaken, one cannot actually prefer foes to friends, falsehood to truth, poison to food, or suffering to comfort.

Hey, that's some welcome good news. Except not for Americans who think vaccines are a conspiracy.

OK, this is rather interesting to any philosopher of science, but it is mainly a cautionary tale about the social nature of science and the importance of socio-political factors in the progress of science. It is anyway well worth your time to watch, and you might even learn something about plate tectonics and/or US Navy secrecy habits.

But that sprained ankle, not like a color (as such) at all. The very salient feature of its pain is the very essence of the category! This empirical science cannot deal with this, and analytic philosophy simply runs away, because to admit this is ,like admitting an actual absolute. Like admitting divine existence in their eyes.
But are they wrong? After all, this IS the essence of religion: an absolute in the metaethical analysis.
— Constance

That’s very well put. I think you’re right that suffering is not like the color red, which only becomes “red” in relation to our perceptual and linguistic frameworks. The sting of pain is not dependent on cultural categories - it is what it is in a way that forces itself upon us prior to analysis. — Truth Seeker

@Constance @Truth Seeker Pain is not the same as suffering. One might say that pain is the alarm system of the body's damage control function. Sometimes the alarm can go off because there is a fault in the system.

Suffering is a response; an attitude one takes to pain or to other experience; a judgement. One can suffer from guilt, from ennui, from despair, as well as from pain.

So the essence of suffering is the negative judgement of the sufferer. Thus the endurance athlete has to learn to withhold that negative judgement and thus overcome the 'pain barrier' that would otherwise limit their performance.

But this means that suffering is totally in the experience of the sufferer, and it makes no sense to say, therefore, that suffering is good, because suffering is constituted by the judgement that it is bad.

I can still say, though, that your suffering is good for me, if I find it amusing or consoling, or gratifying in some way, but it is not the suffering that you feel, but the idea thatI have (of you suffering) that I am gratified by.

3) Talk therapy for managing pain.
Psychotherapy includes different methods to help you understand and change unhealthy feelings. It also helps you to understand unhealthy thoughts and actions. It can help you manage or change how you feel the pain.

https://nursesgroup.co.uk/pain-management-in-nursing

It stops everything happening at once.

Imagine a movie, but every frame projected simultaneously ... the divine white light of god-consciousness. Even the darkest soul, from the view of eternity, is nothing but a flash of white light.

The 'physical brain' as an object is only disclosed to us through our awareness or consciousness of it, And in order to begin to understand it through neuroscience, we inevitiably rely on the mental operations fundamental to rational inference, We can't put them to one side or step outside them to see what the brain might be apart from those connected concepts and hyopotheses. In that context, rational inference is epistemologically[/i[ basic to anything we surmise about the brain, — Wayfarer

I can understand your intentionality from the outside as a physical process, as long asI do not try to understand my own. But when I intend to understand my own intentionality, I enter an infinite fractal labyrinth. The feedback of intending to understand the intention to understand produces a scream or a howl of terror, or a maze with no exit.

Unless one can understand without any intention.

I think you're reading too much into it lol. — flannel jesus

I wouldn't be doing that if I hadn't existed - so think yourself lucky. :wink:

I'd prefer to not have existed. — flannel jesus

That seems not to be quite right to me. It seems reasonable to say "I do prefer not to have existed.", but to claim that in case one had not existed one would have preferred it, is a step too far. That my existence is unhappy, does not entail that my non-existence is happy.

But as @T Clark points out, one's own happiness and preference is unimportant; it's other people's happiness that makes a wonderful life.

Without me, you would all be fucked.

Oh, wait, you're probably all fucked anyway.

Which means I've gone to all this trouble for nothing.

Well damn you all then!

Calling an action good doesn't settle the matte as to what it is for something to be good. — Constance

No, but it is the necessary first step. One cannot even ask the question as to what it is for something to be good, until someone has called something good.

"What is it for something to be doog?" We have no theory; it is not discussed; there is no controversy. If a few people started calling stuff 'doog', we might start to wonder, whether they were talking about something real, like some of us wondered for a short while a long time ago if there was something real or objective about 'groovy'.

Before, not in the temporal sense, but in the logical presuppositional sense: — Constance

Perhaps I misunderstood. 'Prior' is the usual jargon. Then prior to what? My claim is that the analysis of X cannot be prior to X, where X is something in the world as experienced, in this case, a reflection in thought on actions and a judgement thereon, aka 'ethics'.

Consider the proposition, "Falsehood is better than truth."
If it were true, then it would be better to believe that truth is better than falsehood.
If it were false, then it would be better to believe that truth is better than falsehood.
'Therefore, 'truth is better than falsehood' is the only tenable moral position on truth.

This is the sort of analysis one might attempt in reflecting on the ethics of communication, like what we is doin' on this 'ere thread. But only after the first falsehood. Getting it wrong is what gives one pause...

But prior to this, there is the discussion of what ethics IS. — Constance

How can there be? How can ethics be discussed before there are ethics? First the fall into knowledge, and the birth of shame, then the questioning and discussion. It's always the same with philosophy, it wants to start at the beginning but cannot, it always starts in the middle and in a muddle.

Ethics are grounded in the questioning of life, in the second guessing of behaviour, in the thought that things might have been different, and might have been better.

A path is made by walking on it; ethics are made by questioning our actions.

So the foundation of most moral systems seems to be preventing harm and promoting wellbeing.
— Tom Storm

Which begs the question: is this foundation discovered in the mere thinking, or is there something timeless and absolute in the presuppositions of an ethical problem? — Constance

Do good and avoid evil. Wellbeing and harm are, I think, the same thing in other words. I suggest that humans are those that can question their inclinations, motives and actions in this way and it is the ability to ask and consider if something is right action or wrong action is that foundation. This very discussion is the foundation, and the discussion develops with our abilities to act, and knowledge of consequences. If we don't know that burning fossil fuels destabilises the climate, then we think it a great good to warm and power the human world that way. But as we learn about the long term consequences, we come to know better.

The other question that impacts this is "whose harm, and whose wellbeing?" Me, my family, my tribe, my nation, my ethnicity, my species, my planet? The flourishing of the whole of life is a comparatively recent consideration in these debates, and even consideration of the whole of humanity on an equal level is rather recent, to the extent that our traditions and institutions have not fully made the adjustment. And of course the local harm and wellbeing is more apparent, and tends to seem more vital than distant ones in time or space. I cannot see the starving in Africa, or my unborn great great grandchildren so any harm I might be doing them seems less important, and somewhat hypothetical.

Deer overpopulation in Scotland isn’t a natural problem — it’s a human-made one. Humans killed their natural predators (wolves, lynxes and bears), cleared forests, and now even manage land to keep deer numbers high for hunting. Shooting them isn’t “kindness,” it’s perpetuating the harm. Real solutions are restoring ecosystems, rewilding predators, or using non-lethal population control like fertility management. — Truth Seeker

Indeed, but does it reduce suffering? My local population of wild goats is controlled by fertility management. But all the goats still die eventually of old age. Is it preferable to be killed by a bear or a human? But what I want you to see is how we agree about the moral foundations while we dispute the practicalities. Nobody thinks that falsehood is preferable to truth in principle; nobody thinks that suffering ought to be inflicted for its own sake; there are some who think that life itself is not good because it always involves suffering - they would say that we ought not to reproduce at all. But again the argument proceeds from the same roots - that suffering is bad.

Deer overpopulation in Scotland isn’t a natural problem — it’s a human-made one. — Truth Seeker

Of course it is human made, humans are an invasive species and there are no natural controls on the population. That is why we need the 'unnatural' control of morality; one might call it 'self restraint'.

And this is as old as the bible. Humanity has eaten of the tree of knowledge, and fallen out of the Natural world into a world of right and wrong. The natural world does whatever comes naturally, but humans make moral choices. Rewilding is a moral choice to withdraw somewhat. One I agree we should do more of. But that is something we would have to convince our fellow men of on the basis that morality is real, and the world as a whole would really be better. One cannot do it on the basis that it is all just opinion or invention, and anyone can have any opinion and none can be right or wrong.

Veganism prevents harm and promotes the well-being of trillions of sentient organisms. Yet, more than 99% of the humans currently alive (8.24 billion) are not yet vegan. Non-vegans kill 80 billion land organisms and 1 to 3 trillion aquatic organisms per year. Why isn't veganism legally mandatory in all countries? — Truth Seeker

This is not entirely true, Truth Seeker. All life must consume something, and all life must at its end be consumed. If it were not so, life would choke itself. The most organic of gardeners rely on this; my own garden has a pond to encourage frogs that eat the slugs that would otherwise eat my vegetables. Vegans also kill, and 'natural controls of pests are by no means devoid of suffering, commonly involving being eaten from within by nematode worms or the larvae of some insect. Not to mention the mice and squirrels and rabbits that have to be kept from the harvest by some means or other.

The deer in Scotland have no natural predators, and left to themselves would breed until their numbers exceed the capacity of the land to feed them and having destroyed their own environment, would die en mass of starvation. It is a kindness for humans to control the population by acting as the top predator and keeping their numbers limited. there is less suffering in being shot than starving to death.

This is not to defend current livestock practices, or the overconsumption of meat. And particularly at the moment, I agree that one ought not to eat meat in general, given the choice. But certainly one cannot condemn those obligate carnivores, because they do a necessary job. And the scavengers also do another job of tidying up the creatures that die, and we all die, vegans and carnivores alike.

But what I see is our agreement as to the terms of the moral argument. We agree that truth is better than falsehood, that suffering is bad, and so on. And this is the same moral foundation that motivates the punishment of heresy. If one believes one has the truth of how to live, one ought to defend it from being lost, and ignored. The whole reason for human law, and especially punishment, is to persuade people who are inclined to do wrong not to do it, by making it disadvantageous. And again, it seems that we agree that this is what the law should do. But life is complicated and it is not so easy to tease out the consequences of our actions, including our law-making.

There are regions of the world that cannot produce enough non animal food for the human population. Perhaps we should leave such places wild. But perhaps we can find a place there as herders of reindeer, or buffalo, or goats, and form a sustainable way of life. If there is more life, there must be more death and more suffering, but life is good.

You don't think it will ever do philosophy on par with Nagels or Rawls or Chalmers? — RogueAI

Not even on a par with Ayn Rand, or Walt Disney.

Unfortunately, it's almost inevitable now that Al will become in the near future THE general authority. So, thinking will no longer be a practical necessity. — Baden

Wrong. AI does not know that water is wet. It does not know what wet is, and it does not know what water is. All it knows is what words usually go together.
And that is why it cannot do philosophy, which is the attempt to disentangle the muddles that words create using the world as template. Water is wet because — feel it — this is wetness. There is no logic to this; it is a demonstration. Here, you might need a towel. Oh, sorry, you seem to have blown a fuse and fried your circuits.

How would we work out whose priority matters? — Truth Seeker

Fight!

A truth seeker who begins their search with a quote from fiction might be already on the wrong path.

We may disagree about what makes a good meal, but we can know edible from poisonous fairly reliably.

Some people may think that torture is justifiable under some circumstances, and others think it is never justified. But anyone who complained that there was not enough torture going on in society, as if torture were itself a good thing, would be a lunatic.

There are no falsehood seekers, only truth seekers.

Our disagreements over good and bad tend to be matters of priority - Is it better to let the robber take your stuff or kill them? We agree that best is to not have your stuff taken and not kill anyone, but...

At times, I side with theists and at times with atheists and some agnostics. I find that the idea of 'God' and what it means for such a being to exist to be one of the most extremely perplexing philosophy problems. — Jack Cummins

Who or what is your god? It is not a question much asked now, as we have become obsessed with mere existence. But it used to be psychologically informative. A worshipper of Zeus puts power at the centre of their life. A worshipper of Athene or Sophia puts wisdom at centre. Eirene - peace, Hephaestus - crafts.

So in this sense, to say one has no god is to say one has no purpose or function at the centre; one lives for nothing, stands for nothing and will die for nothing.

But modern atheists are of course not saying this, they give the word 'god' some other meaning, and then deny its reality. There is probably something they stand for, and something they will stand against, but the word 'god' has become an obstacle they cannot pass by. They stand, in fact, against religion, but do not see that as a religious stance.

So if I perhaps say that I stand for nature, for wisdom, and for love, then people will find that acceptable, as long as I do not use capital letters.

Here is a song, that I like that expresses the unimportance of my life to me in relation to the world. What I know, what I do, my life and death are of no significance in themselves, but become significant in relation to everything else. Alas, many will be deceived by the silly clothes and the extravagant setting. They cannot see past that to an expression of the unknown, the unknowable, a vastness that gives meaning to even this feeble, handwaving post. At this level it is not mere factual truth, but the very idea that god died for me - that an unknowable love is what life is about, that gives meaning to all this human nonsense and horror.

I think professional sports of all sorts are prostitution; why single out sex?
— unenlightened
I don't think this reply received the attention it deserves. — Banno

If people can't stomach something, it seems mean to try and ram it down their throats. :nerd:

Sorry, not sorry.

Oh, them smart people trying to make us passive with their theories. I have strong feelings about feelings; respect my feelings!

Alas, you do not seem to recognise your own arguments played back at you. I genuinely do not feel that you are genuine, therefore you are fake.

Your go to response to something you disagree with is personal insult.
— unenlightened

It's not meant as a personal insult. It's genuinely how I feel about the position you're laying out. — Tzeentch

Oh, your sacred feelings! How very woke! How very feminine! How very irrational!

https://www.unh.edu/sharpp/prevention/rape-culture

I suspect you harbor resentment towards the natural structure of society and men/masculinity in general, and that this is just some exercise in projection and the justification of your own prejudices. — Tzeentch

I suspect you are the one projecting onto me here. Your go to response to something you disagree with is personal insult. Rather weak.

Has it ever occurred to you to wonder why we are so obsessed with sex? You know food is as important to survival, but we don't seem to worry too much about what everyone else is eating or not eating.

Why would someone pretend to be trans to commit a rape when in America rapists are treated better?
— Mijin — unenlightened

in America rapists are treated better than trans
— unenlightened

You have a lot of statistical data or anecdotal evidence - or are you just trying to launch a political campaign? — Fire Ologist

I was paraphrasing @Mijin

"Why would someone pretend to be trans to commit a rape when in America rapists are treated better?"
— Mijin

But here is a gentle introduction to the notion of 'rape culture' in the UK. I only specified the US because it was in the quote I was responding to, but I imagine you can easily find the corresponding statistics for the US if you are interested.

Always happy to help.

So why, do you suppose, in America rapists are treated better than trans?

Why would someone pretend to be trans to commit a rape when in America rapists are treated better? — Mijin

That's what we woke loonies call 'rape culture'. Specifically, rape and fear of rape is part of the mechanism of control of female sexuality by the patriarchy. That is the horror of trans - that one might find oneself accidentally raping a man! It's rather like finding a serf in a suit of armour - dangerous, and against the natural order.

A human went searching, of course,
For the truth and its absolute source.
He found it, but then,
Instead of zazen,
He shouted until he was hoarse.

Lies, damned lies and...

Abstract. Recent record-hot years have caused a discussion whether global
warming has accelerated, but previous analysis found that acceleration has
not yet reached a 95% confidence level given the natural temperature
variability. Here we account for the influence of three main natural variability
factors: El Niño, volcanism, and solar variation. The resulting adjusted data
show that after 2015, global temperature rose significantly faster than in any
previous 10-year period since 1945.

https://assets-eu.researchsquare.com/files/rs-6079807/v1_covered_209e5182-d9a5-4305-a4e0-70204151d2b3.pdf

And here is a nice man to explain it all to you in a slightly condescending sing song voice — at least it's not an AI voice.



I don't fully understand the complexities of the statistical analyses, but the principles are straightforward enough; to find the overall trend in data subject to disruptions by "events", estimate the influence of the various events and subtract them from the data.

_____________________________________________

Meanwhile, in another part of the catastrophe, humans are busy poisoning themselves and the biosphere with bits of plastic, pesticides, endocrine whatnots, etc.



https://www.stockholmresilience.org/research/planetary-boundaries.html

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/aug/06/chemical-pollution-threat-comparable-climate-change-scientists-warn-novel-entities.

So that's the good news.