Can you shed some light on the objection that such a society would have to run secretly? With only a few philosophers knowing of the utilitarian principle behind it? — Jamesk

I don't understand why there would be an "objection that such a society would have to run secretly". What are you referencing in the 'secret' part? It would seem like the utilitarian principle is obvious enough that many people would know of it. No?

Defamatory speech aimed at a particular person, as in me destroying your reputation and causing you to lose your job... — Hanover

Is not @metoo at least sometimes exactly this? Suppose a former employee (10 years ago) makes this accusation: "Hanover required oral sex from me before he would give me a recommendation, and then he told a prospective employer that I give great head." (Well... she did get a good recommendation, after all. Ungrateful woman!)

The lady posts this on twitter, and a day later your boss fires you. "We can't tolerate your appalling and disgusting sexist behavior and your presence here damages our company. Get lost, creep."

You say the lady is a liar and you never did any such thing, and never would, but you are still disgraced and out of a job. So, two people are at fault here: The lying lady whose false tweet cost you your job and reputation, and your employer who fired you on the basis of a completely unsubstantiated claim which was a lie.

I suspect that some of the @metoo claims are at least exaggerated, if not outright false. But the point is, employers are not obligated to act on these claims, whether they are true or not. It isn't so much a problem of free speech, as it is people who are willing to admit what they hear on the street as sworn testimony and convene themselves as the jury to render a verdict and sentence.

Maybe Tom, Dick, or Harry did paw Betsy 10 years ago, but what does that have to do with his job as a faceless functionary at XYZ corporation? So it isn't just Betsy that is playing fast and loose with the truth. It's XYZ Corp. as well.

If you want to know more, much more, about Hare, here is an article at the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.

This is from Texas A & M University. It might help. I didn't get it either.

The basic argument:

1. The universalizability of moral judgments implies preference utilitarianism.

It is a logical feature of natural language that moral judgments (expressed in terms of "ought" claims, or claims about what is "right") are both (1) universalizable and (2) overriding.
By this he means that, in order to sincerely assent to the judgement that "A ought to do X to B and C," one must sincerely assent to the judgements that "B ought to do X to A and C" and "C ought to do X to A and B," were their various roles switched, and one must assent to this irrespective of what one's individual preferences are (that is, whether one is A rather than B or C).
And this means, according to Hare, that Kantian universalizability implies preference utilitarianism. For to sincerely assent to an ought claim is to prefer that the thing in question be done, even if one had to occupy, successively, the positions of each and every one of the persons involved.
Hare's criterion of universalizability thus combines the intuitiveness of the traditional Golden Rule (do unto others what you would have them do unto you -- you imagine yourself in the others' shoes) with the precision of the philosophers' condition of universalizability (when doing so, you are to imagine yourself having the others' preferences rather than your own). So one way to think of Hare's view is as providing a secular defense of the Golden Rule (one based on the logic of moral judgments rather than divine authority) and an argument to the conclusion that the Golden Rule, properly understood, implies preference utilitarianism.

2. However, human beings need both "intuitive level moral principles" and "critical thinking."

Humans' basic preferences are pretty uniform, but
Humans vary in their ability to think critically and to act on what they determine to be correct moral principles, and across time and varying circumstances, the same individual varies in these same ways.

C. This implies that one should embrace a two-level version of utilitarianism:

We use "intuitive level thinking"...
or Prima facie principles governing general types of cases commonly encountered by people...
when there isn't time for critical thinking, or
when one can't trust one's critical thinking.

and we use "Critical level" thinking"...
when prima facie principles conflict, in unusual cases, or
when both (a) it is clear that utility can be maximized a certain way and (b) one can trust one's judgment that this is so.

The discussion concludes with:

Three kinds of intuitive level principles:

Common morality: Insofar as members of a society face similar problems, we would expect agreement to emerge on basic standards which everyone in the society will be expected to live up to. Moreover, given the universal features of the human condition, we would expect there to be many similarities between the common moralities of various cultures at different times and places.

Professional ethics: Insofar as those in certain roles face similar kinds of situations repeatedly, we would expect agreement to emerge on basic standards for the conduct of various professionals and others in special roles.

Personal morality: And insofar as individuals differ in their abilities to reason critically under various circumstances, critical thinking will lead different individuals to train themselves to adhere to different sets of intuitive level rules, including "metaprinciples" for deciding when to engage in critical thinking and when to stick unquestioningly to one's intuitive level priniciples.

Wikipedia isn't always the best source of information.

I am going to train myself to use it. — andrewk

We all might as well.

The 'st' on the end of 'whilst' is called an 'excrescence'. Apparently philologists don't like it. There are several excrescent words:

whilst, amongst, amidst, against, and unbeknownst

betwixt seems to be the most disliked excrescent word. It goes back to Old English, betweox.

Swingeing (pron. swinjing, rhymes with singeing) deserves more usage. It's British;, meaning a sweeping change..

Unbeknownst to me whilst I was living amidst the Gaulois, a plot against Ceasar was being hatched amongst his soldiers.

It isn't clear to me HOW abortion came to be the hot issue it has become. I am familiar with the 20th /21st century history, going back at least a century. I am (I think) aware that abortion was disapproved of in the ancient world, but NOT on account of the fetus--rather it was on account of the parent, or patriarch of the tribe/community. At the same time as there was concern about women denying someone a child, the ancient world was quite willing to get rid of inconvenient live births. Unwanted babies were thrown out with the bath water -- left outside to die.

So, sometime after the demise of the Empire in the west, and before contemporary time, a religious-led objection to abortion and infanticide arose. (I'm guessing the objection to abortion was as present in Islam as Christian teaching and practice.)

Who, what, when, where and why did the drive to fervently foster full-term fetuses develop?

Anyone can uses references [whilst] misrepresenting the findings of studies and selecting a few studies out of thousands. — Andrew4Handel

Ah, ha! Lives in the UK, "whilst" he posts on TPF.

People who "join the army" or "follow certain spiritual paths" are "different" before they even make that choice. Somebody who is tone deaf doesn't decide to become a musician; someone who is hostile towards authority will join neither the army nor the monastery. The path we "choose to take" is often laid out for us (in terms of compatibility, preference, ability, etc.) before we even step out the door.

Don't take the paragraph above as hard-core determinism. We can make some choices; we can adapt to situations we don't especially like (sometimes, anyway). Lots of people have led lives they might rather not live twice; they put up with what was given them, but they would rather have done something else.

how polarised is human nature?" For example, do the dimensions of good/bad, moral/immoral, play a part in human nature — BrianW

Animal behavior -- squirrels', lions', chickens'... and ours can be depicted on a scattergram better than a a linear line with extremes on both ends. Animal behavior generally don't fit into polarized frameworks.

We (humans) just naturally turn to polarized models because they simplify things. Scattergrams may be more accurate representations of how we behave, but they are harder to interpret than "good/bad", "smart/stupid", "angelic/devilish" and so on. Black and white depictions are just so much easier to use -- they get rid of all that annoying detail and subtlety.

Sexual behavior is a good example of the scattergram vs. linear line. It would be much simpler if everyone was either 100% gay or 100% straight; 100% monogamous, or 100% promiscuous. That's not the way we are. All but a small percentage of us are a little gay and mostly straight, or mostly gay and a little straight, with all shades in between represented. If you chart the results of a battery of aptitude and skills testing for even 1 person, the scores will be all over the place. One gets strong patterns only after you've charted the results for maybe 5,000 people.

The same thing is true for just about any animal behavior you might care to measure. "Birds fly south for the winter." Simple. The actual performance of individual birds and individual bird species varies quite a bit. Some have higher rates of death than others; some birds successfully mate in the south, others don't. Some birds lose their mate along the way, others don't. Some birds get lost along the way. Others make it to exactly the right spot. Sometimes birds are blown off course by storms, and end up in backyards where people are very surprised to see them.

We often say things like, "humans are not a monogamous species" — BrianW

I grew up hearing that this or that species of bird were monogamous for life. Usually said bird was held up as an example of virtue to be emulated. Later in life I learned that monogamous birds cheat fairly often IF the opportunity presents itself. Many male and female birds engage in this sort of thing every now and then.

Why should we be more virtuous than birds? Just because some bird is so discrete when playing the field that ornithologists don't notice, I should never have a memorable affair?

We are animals, unequivocally. It doesn't matter how well we reason, how well we do or do not control our emotions -- we are part of the animal kingdom. Our behavior accords with our genetic makeup and the manner in which we are nurtured from conception -- just like other animals are.

While it is true that we can reason, it is true that we can gain self-understanding (not that we always do, but we can to some extent), while it is true that we can control our emotions (sometimes, at least) it is not true that we can be anything we want to be, that we can feel however we wish, that we can reason at any level of complexity we want, and so forth.

As a species we are limited by our genetic inheritance and potential. We experience our genetic inheritance and potential on a very personal level. Individually we are unique (within limits) and we do not have control over how we become who we are (because by the time we can take control of our own development, the concrete is already pretty well set).

Because we are conscious beings, we can be very aware of the wide -- maybe unbridgeable -- gap between what we wish we were, and what we are. This leaves us quite frustrated a good share of the time.

Some of us would like to think that we have no innate 'nature'. They think we are products of our nurture and our ideas. Some people go so far as to think our 'minds' are not even located in our physical bodies. Others of us are banking on our having at least a large measure of genetically directed or influenced behavior. Our behavior is somewhere on the continuum of animal behavior.

All of this gives a human being plenty of wiggle room -- something a sensitive human needs when trying to explain his nature.

Testicles are often seen as a sign of masculinity, strength, and power. Sometimes, testicles are flaunted like peacocks' feathers: the bigger your "balls", the more manly you are. Oftentimes warriors, sports icons and other masculine idols are described in terms of having "balls of steel" or similar phrases. — darthbarracuda

Taking the expression literally, I think a man with steel balls would find them an inconvenience. They'd be much too heavy, make too much noise banging together, and would stretch his scrotum down to his knees. Never mind trying to get through airport security screening. Just picture what would happen in an MRI machine.

There might be a some relationship between larger testicles and some masculine features like a lower voice pitch. However, pictures of naked muscle-builders don't usually show remarkably large testicles. Testicle size doesn't seem correlated with heterosexual he-man stereotypes. The lack of correlation is partly owing to the role that testosterone plays in fetal development. Male fetuses supply the testosterone that masculinizes the brain. AND, of course, male and female brains look pretty similar when you scoop them out of the skull and put them side by side on the lab table, as one does.

To repeat myself, much of the discussion one hears about the differences between, and grievances directed toward men and women are moronic. Some of it is just another trope like the 'kick in the balls' humor you mentioned. A lot of it is stupid, but that doesn't mean that there is no seriousness in saying it.

Both posts served a salutary purpose in this discussion.

Quite a bit of the discussion one hears about the differences between, and grievances directed toward men and women are moronic (but never within this sublime shelter of reason, of course).

We either have free speech, or we don't — Bitter Crank

thats a black and white fallacy right there buddy. — Mr Phil O'Sophy

If the principle of freedom of speech is not protected in its practice, then it will eventually be whittled back to "the principle of convenient, allowable speech" which is not free speech.

Although I am sympathetic to the sentiment you put forward, I think it overlooks circumstances that would clearly need restricting when it comes to overtly aggressive speech that deems to threaten an individual. Such as the elderly, the disabled, children. — Mr Phil O'Sophy

There are limitations on speech: "The Court ruled unanimously that the First Amendment, though it protects freedom of expression, does not protect dangerous speech. In the decision, Oliver Wendell Holmes wrote that no free speech safeguard would cover someone "falsely shouting fire in a theater and causing a panic."

Aggressive speech is not the same as dangerous speech (at least as I understand "aggressive" and "dangerous".) It's quite possible that a Neo-Nazi might yell at some people ""You old Jews should've been made into soap." Or "Hitler knew what to do with cripples!" yelled at someone in a wheel chair. Very offensive and provocative, certainly. But probably protected.

In 1977 The American Civil Liberties Union defended the American National Socialist (Nazi) Party in its bid to hold a march in Skokie, IL, a Jewish suburb of Chicago where many Holocaust survivors lived. It is a celebrated First Amendment case, which the National Socialists won -- in a decision by the Supreme Court.

[caption] Frank Collin, leader of the National Socialist Party of America, holds a rally in Marquette Park at 71st Street and Sacramento Avenue on Aug. 27, 1972, in Chicago. The Tribune reported Collin telling the crowd of 300, “The black revolution has taken over in all of the large cities in this country except Chicago and it’s up to the white, Aryan people of this city to keep white ethnic neighborhoods like this one together!” (Walter Kale / Chicago Tribune)

The Nazis were a very small group. There was also a black-and-white racial issue lurking in the background (the National Socialists said they were protecting white communities from encroaching blacks).

So, should a group of Moslems wish to march through a gay community carrying signs that homosexuals were doomed to hell, you would have that right.

A grown man, calling children the c word, the f word, the t word, etc etc, like the most foulest things you can think of, outside of the school through the fence on public property.

And the police not having the power to do anything. He is only using speech, and we either have free speech or we don't. Therefore we can't arrest him, and because he's on public property we can't do anything at all. We could ask him to move politely, but so long as he was only verbally abusive, he's protected by absolutest free speech laws and there is no crime being committed. — Mr Phil O'Sophy

Your scenario may seem bizarre, wild, extreme... but actually it isn't all that far out. Some people will engage in this sort of behavior--not all that often, but not rarely either. Some of them are deranged, some of them are hateful bastards. Some of them are besides themselves with rage (over god knows what). What can the police do?

The police are usually not without recourse. He could be ordered to lower his voice. He could be told to move. He could be accused of being a public nuisance, disturbing the peace, blocking a public sidewalk, interfering with a government function (education) or some such thing. The police might act on their own, but more likely they would act on the basis of a complaint from the public.

His speech, per se, isn't the problem, here. It's the loud volume at that particular place. The same thing would probably happen to him if he were at the same location, screaming verses from the Koran or the Bible, Tropic of Cancer. or Paradise Lost. Behavior like this seems deranged.

Adults have, on a number of occasions, arrived at schools being integrated to scream epithets at the black children entering the school. They were protesting a change in policy to which they were very opposed. Were the children in those situations totally traumatized by hearing bad things screamed at them? Not too traumatized, because black parents had prepared their children for what would happen at the school. It's one thing to have people screaming at you and you don't know why, and quite another to know exactly why they are screaming at you.

Matters of taste might have existential gravity. It is quite possible that someone might so strongly prefer to speak French rather than German, prefer certain foods very strongly over others, prefer a certain manner of dress, that those preferences define who they are. For instance, I started growing a beard in 1970. Once it was an inch long or so, I realized that "that's me" and I have not cut it off since (Trim, yes -clean shave, no). It's a matter of taste, a matter of appearance which I define as "me".

Come to think of it, there are several matters of taste I consider existentially central, or have in the past.

So, on closer examination owing to your question and prompt, i"ll elevate matters of taste to a higher level of significance than I did earlier.

Oscar Wilde shed aphorisms like golden retrievers shed hair, so there are a lot of them, and many of them have kind of a snarky quality. But apparently Wilde valued matters of taste very highly. For instance, sober types say that it is shallow to judge by appearances. Wilde says that "Only shallow people don't judge by appearances."

I'm a free speech absolutist. I don't agree that any speech can be harmful, at least not in a manner that suggests control of speech. — Terrapin Station

If anyone is unclear on what harmful speech is, it should be obvious that when anyone criticizes a group of people without any other reason than that they are different in ethnicity, gender or culture, it is hate speech. Any criticism against a group of people should be based on solid reasonable arguments that can't be disputed easily. — Christoffer

I am much closer to Terrapin Station's position than Christoffer's.

I'm not in favor of banning hate speech. I am a member of a group which many people dislike, loathe, hate, disparage, ridicule, consider inherently disordered, sinful, etc. -- gay men. Gay men have come in for what Christoffer calls "hate speech" because we prefer to have sex with other men; often display our preference publicly, and sometimes parody women (drag). Some gay men are swishy. Not only do gay men like having sex with other men, we quite often have sex with many other men. We are also (sometimes) well organized.

Don't I want protection from hate speech? No, not particularly. I do not require that people must think homosexuality and homosexual activity equal, desirable, and deserving of respect. What I want is not to be physically attacked by someone who dislikes gays. Say what you want. Words won't hurt me but clubs and rocks are another matter.

Why should I tolerate hate speech? Banning hate speech isn't just a slippery slope on the way to widespread censorship and censorious policing of expression. It makes law out of some version of politeness. The rules of etiquette should not rule speech. Banning is a restriction on appropriate (as well as inappropriate) speech: There are groups who "are different in ethnicity, gender or culture" and who deserve criticism. For instance, gay men can be appropriately criticized for practicing promiscuous unsafe sex. Young black men - and perhaps urban black culture as a whole -- can be appropriately criticized for the amount of black-on-black violence. Very conservative white men can be criticized for their fondness for the Confederate Cause and for engaging in sometimes violent demonstrations. Young, privileged leftist white men and women (and other ethnicities) can also be criticized for sometimes violent demonstrations and for attacking people for having what are often rather innocuous opinions.

I want to be free to criticize people and their cultures whatever their ethnicity or sex. Promiscuous high risk sex among gay men, promiscuous high risk gun use resulting in deaths, beating up blacks and Jews, or shutting down discussion on campuses are all worthy of criticism. I want to be free to publicly criticize rich people, whether they are male or female, black or white, gay or straight, Christian or Muslim, or atheists. A rich black woman is no more above criticism than a rich white man.

We either have free speech, or we don't.

I have always thought "de gustibus non est disputandum" referenced nothing very weighty, but about which much dispute could occur. So, if its a matter of "I say garum from Greece is better than garum from Egypt", one might say, "De gustibus non disputandum est." Or "You know, Heinz catsup is better than Hunts." Rather than argue over it for an hour, just say de gustibus non est disputandum, or there's just no accounting for taste.

One certainly would not say that the justification for impeaching Donald Trump was a matter of mere taste. Law is not taste or vice versa.

there is no law of the Universe — RosettaStoned

And that's the end of it. We don't get any of our laws from the universe. Never mind about conservation of energy, gravity, momentum and all that. I'm talking about Hammurabi-type law, canon law, common law, and so forth.

So, the only law that matters in court is human-made law, and human-made law sort of frowns on killing babies and raping women (officially, at least)--especially when our ox is the one gored, so to speak. Every now and then there is a regrettable outbreak of arson, rape, and bloody murder by the good side (we expect it from the other side) which requires some fairly stern due process.

379
↪Bitter Crank

You said:
I don't care what you say!
— Bitter Crank

So clearly you're not interested in actual discussion. — NKBJ

So, that was your evidence of trolling. What you took to be trolling was hyperbole. Any sort of off-beat humor is difficult in on-line communications because there are no expressions, gestures, voice, etc. which would aid the receiver in interpreting how serious a given sentence was intended. And then there are literalists who take everything at face value.

So by my fault, by my most grievous fault... grovel, grovel, grovel.

We have no more choice about consuming other life forms than any other creature.
— Bitter Crank

That's clearly wrong, since some if us do choose not to.

Also, you already admitted to just being a troll. — NKBJ

Don't troll me, young whippersnapper!

What I said was we have no choice about consuming "other life forms" which includes what fruitarians, vegans, and finally, omnivores eat. Other life forms like spinach, oysters, cows, and termites.

What I said you may not like, but disagreeing with you a troll does not me make.

Maybe then this is not the thread for you and you should stick to commenting on threads you actually care about/have an open mind about. — NKBJ

No. It's perfectly appropriate to reject the validity of a discussion.

Humans are as much a part of the web of life on earth as any other creature. All creatures are engaged in a continual processing of other life forms into their own. We have no more choice about consuming other life forms than any other creature.

There has to be a choice before morality can come into play. We don't have any choice about eating plants directly or indirectly, so it can't be a moral issue--any more than drinking water or breathing can be moral issues. There is no choice there.

In an industrialized world rife with choices which have existential consequences, food choices are just one more moral issue among many. Population, resource consumption (all kinds), and global warming make most of our lifestyle choices unsustainable. Using gasoline in a private car, electricity generated with coal, heating and cooling, irrigating crops, flying, etc. are all choices with significant negative consequences.

Pulling one issue out, say the morality of flying when a bus or train would place a far smaller burden on the environment (or maybe just traveling around at all), would make for a nice heated moral shooting match, but, after all, flying is just one piece among many. Pumping water out of the Colorado River, lifting it over a mountain range, and keeping Phoenix, AZ, Las Vegas, and Los Angeles alive, is a frightful burden on the world environment -- and that's just resource wasting population center among many. It's another moral choice.

What I am saying, is in that in The Big Picture, our individual capacity to make significant moral choices is rapidly becoming limited. Not eating meat is a good moral choice, the benefit of which might very well be negated by other moral choices. A car-driving, large house dwelling, frequent flying vegetarian is accomplishing no more net good than a bus-riding, small house dwelling, never flying carnivore.

I've been struggling for many years with thoughts about suicide, but my case is peculiar in that I desperately want to live. — simmerdown

You apparently are suffering from a chronic condition. You have learned how to live with it -- else you might have committed suicide years ago. I'm glad that you are still with us.

This has created an incredibly difficult life for me, and I regularly fall into depressive episodes (for which I've been seeking help) — simmerdown

Just guessing, but your depression probably came first, and causes your feelings of despair. Stick with therapy. Depression is a bitch, for sure. Try to do the usual self-help stuff that people always suggest: Take care of your physical health; eat regularly, get some exercise, do what you can to get quality sleep; maintain friendships (or at least regular social contacts). Yeah, I know -- when you are depressed, this stuff is hard to do. Try, anyway.

as selfish as it sounds, there would be no "me" to realize the consequences of my actions — simmerdown

True, there would be no "you" afterward, but there is a "you" before it happens, and that "you" is running the show.

Are you taking antidepressants? Do they help? (Don't just stop taking them because they don't seem to be working). Talk therapy? Cognitive Behavioral Therapy? Is it helping?

Is there something about your life that is adding a steady drip of unhappiness? Like a bad job, bad relationship, poverty, disability, alcoholism... stuff like that?

Are you involved in any support groups for depression? (not a cure, you may not like groups; they can be a useful source of info on doctors that are better or worse, and can be sounding board...)

Welcome to The Philosophy Forum.

@Vegans, @Vegetarians, and @Vigilantes Nature is neither moral nor immoral. To the extent that we fulfill our natural functions of thriving (eating, growing, maturing, breeding, nurturing young, extracting necessities from the earth, and in time being returned to the earth) we are neither moral nor immoral. We are simply doing what comes naturally.

Our Edenic Existence has long since passed, of course. Our behavior long since began to range far beyond the borders of the innocently natural world. We developed technics of various kind which extended our reach way beyond our grasp. We became more dangerous to one another; we developed unnatural behaviors like religion in which we sacrificed members of the tribe to appease a god. We played with fire and got burned. We sometimes killed our own kind when they disagreed with us (that is to say, became disagreeable). We discovered we could be really awful, pairing predatory instincts with devious demonic cognition the way we do. We try to overlay our devil selves with higher morality to keep life from becoming too bad. We try. We try.

Just like with technology, morality provides us yet another opportunity to carry things to excess. It's not enough that we actually behave fairly well toward each other. Some of us feel obligated to impose our ideas of higher morality on behavior which is actually pretty natural, normal, and nice. Like sex; like eating meat, like drinking fermented beer and gin; smoking some vegetable matter perchance to dream a little.

I like sex, meat, beer, drugs, all that. You don't? Fine. Go home and have a glass of warm water. Or take a cold shower. Just leave me, my pork chop, and bottle of beer alone.

What animal is there that is not subject to being eaten? Porcupines? Maybe porcupines are exempt. Not sure about that. How would the wolf go about it?

What plant can count on not being consumed by either an animal, an insect, a fungus, or bacteria? None that I can think of.

Will the dietary moralists please clear out of the dining room, and once you are outside, keep walking. I don't care what you say! The next time I get a chance (maybe tonight!) I plan on eating oysters so fresh they will still be alive when I tip them out of their pearly shells. Exquisite!

At the Feast of Life we eat, we grow and we die. Even predatory primates are occasionally privileged to be featured on the menu. Wade in the water and get snatched by an alligator, pulled to the bottom of the swamp; left there to cure for a few days; then the alligator's delectation begins. It's not a crime against nature. It IS nature.

As morally sensitive as I am, I am not outside of nature, and neither are you. Human animals do what we do because we are what we are. You stick with your organic fair traded watercress and cucumber sandwich on gluten free, fat free, sugar free, salt free, artificially leavened wafer and just sit there and glow with vegan virtue. I'll have roast pork, potatoes, broccoli, and beer and glow with pleasure. I'm having dessert, too -- and you can't have any of it. So there!

Chopping up the head of an iceberg lettuce would feel as painful to iceberg lettuce as... — Purple Pond

The head of iceberg lettuce deserves whatever it gets. Awful stuff. At least kill for better results: Romaine, cabbage, spinach...

This depends on what the mind actually is. And what is in your mind where does that come from? — Andrew4Handel

The universe is matter and energy.
The brain is matter and energy.
The brain produces the mind.
The mind produces meaning.
The universe is the source of meaning.
I had nothing to do with it.

Is that the deal we get?

Is your life meaningful? — Purple Pond

It is. I am loved. I love others. I find some meaning in service to others. I find more meaning in gaining understandings of the way the world works. I find life enjoyable and enjoyment provides meaning.

Happiness and unhappiness (all of us have had both) give some meaning to us. No one thing can, should, or does provide us with all the meaning we have or may want. We also create meanings. Creating meaning is one of the great cultural tasks. For example "In the beginning... in Genesis is an example of a narrative that places the world and humankind in context and establishes a meaning for us. There are many creation narratives in various cultures that perform the essential task of meaning making.

Individuals create meaning for themselves, as well as for others.

Do you believe that you are significant? — Purple Pond

I am about as significant as the next fellow.

Given these facts, how can we say that the brief adventure that life has provided for us has any meaning? — Purple Pond

If we had been provided this brief life as an adventure, then adventure would be the meaning o life.

We make meaning. If any adult thinks life is meaningless, then they just aren't trying very hard.

where are you getting the meaning from? — Andrew4Handel

I'm getting it from my fertile mind.

"Making meaning" is the exclusive privilege of human beings.

I must be brief; I have to usher at a funeral in 28 minutes, and I'm still in my bath robe.

The universe doesn't provide us ready-made, objective meaning. It can't. On the other hand, we can, we will, we shall, we must provide meaning. And we do.

Got to go. The corpse is waiting.

If you want to believe otherwise as you now do, figure out how your behavior would change, and then change it. The mind follows the body,\. — Mariner

Your view is all too rare. William James thought that the mind followed the body as well.

I'm not sure it's possible to get rid of beliefs — Jake

I'm not sure either. It can be a very slow process, megatons of processor time for deeply seated beliefs.

So for the 9/11 truther: We could just send you to a political reeducation camp until you decide that it is time for you to straighten out.

Or follow just a couple of simple steps:

a) Stop reading articles related to 9/11 -- no matter what the article says.
b) Stop expressing opinions about 9/11.
c) When you find yourself thinking about 9/11, think about squirrels or Brexit.
d) avoid proximity with people who have opinions about 9/11 similar to those you used to entertain.
e) avoid even looking at people who have strong opinions about 9/11 truthers.
f) eliminate 9/11 from your repertoire: never set your alarm or 9:11; make no appointments for 9/11; never buy $9.11 worth of groceries; never drive 911 miles in a single trip; never swim 9 laps in 11 minutes; never dial 911.
g) become obsessed with the history of the Golden Gate Bridge or something else a long ways from New York City.
h) meditate on the idea that the United States Government is incompetent in all areas at all times and has always been
j) build short, squat buildings with Lego bricks. Avoid structures which are taller than they are wide.
k) If you live in New York City, move to Des Moines, Iowa. Cease thinking about NYC -- ever.
l) Have your name changed, get a new social security number, cancel all your credit cards. Start over.
m) Do not watch the first opening credits of the Sopranos
n) Avoid situations where anyone will mention world, trade, world trade, towers, or you know what.

I have a lot of self doubt. I am also quite critical of other peoples writing. — Andrew4Handel

Of course you have a lot of self doubt -- you and few billion other people. As for being so critical of your own and others writing, it's a dead end. But... when you sit down at the table, keyboard or pen in had, remember: nothing is a stake. You are free to write whatever you please. And you are free to find it pleasing, as well. The thing is, get it written.

Will you be successful? I don't know. Statistically the odds are against every writer that wants to write really good poetry, fiction, drama, screen plays, etc. including me, Baden, and everybody else. Nonfiction is much easier to write. Writing that ends up being classified as "printed matter" is the easiest of all. Terabytes of trash are turned out by truckloads of talentless twats.

Completely honest criticism is what any aspiring writer should want before anything else. — Baden

Honest criticism for an actually aspiring writer is one thing. What you did was nip it in the bud.

I agree with the excellent author, Flannery O'Connor, about criticism:

“There's many a bestseller that could have been prevented by a good teacher.”

Actually, Baden and @Andrew, Flannery O'Connor is worth a look, both for one's pleasure and instruction. I don't especially care for her full length novels (she didn't write many) but her short stories contain some of the best, tightest, most highly polished writing in the language. "A Good Man Is Hard to Find (A Hard Man Is Good to Find is by somebody else.) and The Life You Save May Be Your Own available at the same site.

It's been decades since I read Bulgakov. I loved The Heart of a Dog -- about a stray dog that received the transplanted balls of a soviet bureaucrat or crook? Can't quite remember. The dog became more of a soviet bureaucrat while remaining pretty much a dog.

The Twelve Chairs, By Ilya Ilf and Evgeny Petrov was also good. Mel Brooks made one of the several movies based on the soviet-society-satirizing novel. I thought it was hilarious.

If you're going to engage on the mammoth task of writing any novel, never mind a philosophical one, you should probably begin by at least demonstrating an ability to construct some well-formed paragraphs in your posts here or no-one with any sensitivity to the rhythms of the language as expressed by any decent author will be able to get past the first page of your proposed project. I know I wouldn't if it were written like the above. In other words, in order to write a work of any kind, even of the most modest kind, you have to be able to write. — Baden

See, that's what I mean. Criticism that keeps you from even getting close to the airport, let alone starting down the runway to take off.

Matthew stared at the at the heap of papers on his desk. It suddenly struck him that maybe this was all completely pointless. He tried to repress this thought for the rest of the day." — Andrew4Handel

So there's your opening 3 sentences; a good start for a short story. Something is going to happen later that day. What? Good? Bad? Very very bad? Utterly surprising? We don't know. You don't either, yet. Keep writing, and for god's sake don't show it to bury the baby before it is born Baden.

Alice in Wonderland is great. I need to reread it.

Some science fiction books rise to the level of philosophical novels and they are good stories to boot. I read several sci fi titles by Ursula Le Guin which had some good solid philosophical content.

The main thing is to write and keep writing, and don't throw away stuff that you have written because you think it isn't any good. Just keep writing. Producing a good book takes a lot of sitting still at a desk and working away. Practice, practice, practice...

Also, be a bit shy about showing stuff to random people. No matter what you write, many people will shoot you down and there is nothing helpful about that. Writers need encouragement, not withering criticism. Once you become a famous established writer, then you can open yourself up to withering reviews.

How about cancer or other diseases affecting the genes? If DNA is the primary predictor of individuality wouldn't that person be biologically changed in such a manner that they're not the same anymore (especially if said mutation/condition has large implications on appearance and/or personality)? — Pelle

Were our genes to become very disordered, we would drop dead. Big change, for sure.

On one level we are constantly changing and on another level we are stabile individuals from one year to the next. It is a paradox. Even if all my cells have regenerated 100% I maintain the same identity, cognition and personality characteristics. If I learn something I didn't know before, I might be slightly altered, even though that alteration wasn't the result of new cells. The Lacks cervical cancer cell line has been multiplying rapidly since 1951, yet remains the same; that's why it is a workhorse of cancer research.

I could lose quite a few pounds of corporeal weight and remain the same person. The brain weighs about 3 pounds; an ounce or two of tissue loss there might make me a different person (depending on which ounce disappeared).

POINT IS: I don't want to open the door to an interpretation of mind which isn't solidly anchored in the physical brain. Mind is derived from matter, and experience tells me that despite all the changes going on cell by cell, my self-identity, my perceived identity to others, and my legal identity is quite stable.

Substantial changes in the brain, and an injury or diseased ravaged body may alter me so much that lose my previous identity. But then look at Stephen Hawking: his body was practically gone, but he remained the same insightful thinker long after his body stopped working. (Granted, he required a lot of support to continue functioning so well.)

A philosophical novel needs a good plot, interesting characters, convincing dialogue, and so forth. The plot and the characters should lead in a compelling way to the philosophical content. If characters start philosophizing in an unmotivated way, you can end up with something like Monte Python's cleaning 'ladies' launching into discussions of Kant. By Python, it's very funny. That probably wouldn't be your intent, but if it was -- that would be fine too.

So, writing a philosophical novel is like writing a novel. Give it a whirl. If you turn out something as good as Brothers Karamazov, great. If it's just for yourself, that's good too. The process is probably more important than the finished product.

Right, almost all of the body cells are replaced periodically. The exception is the brain and the muscles of the heart.

It's not quite settled whether the brain adds brain cells; it may add some, but nothing remotely close to replacement numbers. That's why neurodegenerative diseases like Parkinson's disease are so devastating. Once the substantia nigra cells are destroyed, one has advanced Parkinson's disease for the rest of one's life. Injured brain tissue (tumor, fall, impact) doesn't recover. Other parts of the brain may take over a function, but the injured tissue is not repaired the way a broken bone is repaired. When you have a heart attack, the damaged muscle is replaced by scar tissue, not new muscle.

a way that trancends matter, otherwise we wouldn’t be able to even be a ”consistent” person for more than 10 years post-birth. — Pelle

There is something in the body, some specific matter, that provides guidance for the continual replacement of the skin, bone, blood, lung, liver, etc. cells: DNA. All of the tissue you recreate during your lifetime are constructed according to very specific DNA instructions. Sure enough, over time we change: as we age (say... past 60 years) our spinal structure begins to collapse and we will lose height; the eyeball changes shape, and glasses are required. The cartilage in the joints wears away and we become arthritic. Our hair turns gray (if we are lucky) or it falls out altogether. All of these processes are overseen by the genes.

It is true that many species, some of them much-honored megafauna, are being killed off by deliberate human acts of killing. Whales, lions, elephants, rhinos... for examples. Far, far more animals -- most of them not on anyone's list of storybook creatures, are being wiped out by chemicals we use on plants -- chemicals like Round Up™ or neonicatinoids, and others. These chemicals are greatly reducing insect populations, a key part of the food web -- a food web on which we are also quite dependent, whether we are carnivores or vegetarians. Field studies from around the world are showing precipitous declines in insect populations.

Ecology is a real moral issue, as is the social, economic and industrial system we have built. No matter what we eat, the goods required to support soon-to-be-8 billion-people has been, is, and will continue to be highly UN-ecological. It isn't just food, vegans of the world: It's oil, coal, steel, glass, plastics, electricity, clothing, housing, transportation, health care, education, and so on -- all of it requiring much more intensive extraction of resources and food production. If one is really worried about the welfare of the animal kingdom (including spiders, grasshoppers, bed bugs, beetles, wasps, wood ticks, mosquitos, et al one should foreswear having children.

Humans are the first animals known to have what we call morals. Ethical living is of concern to us. — TheMadFool

And is it not the case that moral, ethical living is directed toward the manner in which we treat each other? How central to the moral and ethical codes to which we subscribe is "not eating chickens, cows, fish, and pigs"? We have been eating animals for a very long time -- at the same time we developed morals and ethics.

Health is one issue. So, some people maintain that it is healthier to eat only plants; others think it healthier to eat mostly plants, but allow eggs and milk or cheese. Most people think it is healthier to include at least some meat in their diets.

We don't expect moral or ethical consideration from animals such as chickens and we have not considered it appropriate until recently to extend moral and ethical consideration to animals. (I'm not reckoning Buddhist or Hindu religion here.) Animals are outside moral and ethical consideration. (That doesn't mean that we can't be sentimental about animals. I think squirrels are very cute; I wouldn't deliberately run over one of them. Deer are very attractive, warm fuzzy animals, too. Killing a squirrel or a deer deliberately (like, by shooting it) is neither moral nor immoral. It is only legal and illegal, depending on the laws governing hunting season.

For our good, food animals should be raised under "humane" conditions. Factory farming doesn't qualify as humane, as far as I know. But if a chicken is crowded in its cage, that is a health concern, not a moral concern. (We are concerned about a chicken's, pig's, cow's health because it may affect our health.)