• US Election 2024 (All general discussion)
    "31 counts of Violating The Espionage Act ..." :shade:

    (Update pending on imminent US Federal indictments for Obstruction of Justice, Espionage, etc.)180 Proof
    No longer "pending" ...

    https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/814066

    https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/814765

    It's only a matter of time, @Mikie, before Traitor-1 buckles under the crush of criminal indictments & civil lawsuits. :victory: :smirk:
  • Donald Trump (All General Trump Conversations Here)
    From inside the MAGA circus-tent:

    I was shocked by the degree of sensitivity of these documents and how many there were, frankly. If even half of it is true, then he is toast. It's a very detailed indictment and it's very very damning. And this idea of presenting Trump as a victim, a victim of a witch hunt, is ridiculous. Yes, he's been a victim in the past. Yes, his adversaries have obsessively pursued him with phony claims, and I've been at his side defending against them when he is a victim. But this is much different. He's not a victim here. He was totally wrong. — fmr US AG (and Trump-fixer) Bill Barr, FOX Noise 11Jun23
    https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2023/06/11/bill-barr-donald-trump-classified-documents-indictment/70310878007/

    it is an extremely damning indictment ... this is not an indictment that you can dismiss. It's really breathtaking. Obviously, this is mishandling, you know, putting classified documents into ballrooms and bathrooms is -- it borders on the bizarre. ... the visual and audio tape evidence is really daunting.

    There are indictments that are sometimes called narrative or speaking indictments. These are indictments that are really meant to make a point as to the depth of the evidence, there are some indictments that are just bare bones. This is not one of those indictments. The Special Counsel knew that there would be a lot of people who were going to allege that the Department of Justice was acting in a biased or politically motivated way. This is clearly an indictment that was drafted to answer those questions. It's overwhelming in detail.

    The Trump team should not fool itself. These are hits below the waterline. These are witnesses who apparently testified under oath [and] gave statements to federal investigators, both of which can be criminally charged, if they're false. Those witnesses are directly quoting the president in encouraging others not to look for documents or allegedly to conceal them. It's damaging.

    It's hard to show a picture of these boxes surrounding a toilet and saying ‘we really acted responsibly'. The government is bringing dozens of counts – they only have to land one of those punches. Keep in mind that every one of these counts is coming with a substantial potential sentence.
    — Jonathan Turley, MAGA legal spin-master, FOX Noise 9Jun23
    https://www.businessinsider.com/fox-news-legal-commentator-jonathan-turley-trump-indictment-extremely-damning-2023-6

    @NOS4A2 :victory: :mask:
  • A Case for Analytic Idealism
    ↪180 Proof It's not meaningless, you just don't agree with it.RogueAI
    I don't disagree with anything because you haven't explicated anything. Your claim, Rogue, is opaque to me for the reason given previously.
  • Defining Features of being Human
    Discursive metacognition.
    — 180 Proof

    Do you class this as a physical or mental attribute?
    Andrew4Handel
    Yes.
  • Donald Trump (All General Trump Conversations Here)
    Whether or not you believe it's morally wrong is irrelevant. What he [Trump] did was criminal. He knew it too.creativesoul
    :100:
  • Science as Metaphysics
    "The First Cause" .... "just is". :roll:

    It's far more parsimonious and reasonable to posit that the cosmos "just is" (i.e. eternal, though changing), as Aristotle did in Books I & VIII of his Physics^^, than to confabulate any nonevident and redundant terms (e.g. "first cause", "unmoved mover" from the posthumous kluge of Aristotle's "Metaphysics").

    https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eternity_of_the_world ^^

    Proclus, Ibn Sina, Ibn Rushd, Giordano Bruno & Spinoza, for example, agree (more or less) with Aristotle's "eternal cosmos" rather than his "first cause" fiat. No "materialists/reductivists" required. And further relegating "the first cause" to history's dustbin is modern cosmology's model of eternal inflation by Alan Guth and Roger Penrose's conformal cyclic cosmos as well as the Hartle-Hawking's No Boundary proposal.

    @Gnomon :eyes: :sweat:
  • Which is worse Boredom or Sadness?
    You're playing trivial word games which bore me.
  • Donald Trump (All General Trump Conversations Here)
    I'm confident the CIA, NSA, etc and foreign intel allies have already begun finding those correlations but such findings are highly classified so they may not be made public for decades, if ever. Criminal Defendant-1's treason (sans "J6 coup attempt") will, no doubt, get many men and women murdered around the world and perhaps, more gravely downstream, destabilize some key alliances.
  • Donald Trump (All General Trump Conversations Here)
    What do you think is Trump’s egregious crime?
    — NOS4A2

    There's more than one. Care to discuss?

    Counts 1 through 31. Willful retention of national defense information
    Count 32. Conspiracy to obstruct justice
    Count 33. Withholding a document or record
    Count 34. Corruptly concealing a document or record
    Count 35. Concealing a document in a federal investigation
    Count 36. Scheme to conceal
    Count 37. False statements and representations
    Count 38. False statements and representations
    creativesoul
    Only 'Trump supporters' are stupider than Trump himself. There are millions of MAGA morons who love to be lied to – lying to themselves – and many who are locked-n-loaded (some radicalized) too. Apparently, @NOS4A2 is a card-carrying member of that cult. Pathetic if he isn't a bot. :mask:
  • Which is worse Boredom or Sadness?
    For me, 'hope' is synonymous with wishful thinking and/or lacking courage.
  • A Case for Analytic Idealism
    I'm no longer interested in Chalmers. You can't answer my question, so your statement remains meaningless to me.
  • A Case for Analytic Idealism
    I didn't ask you to evaluate the claim only for the meaning of "illusions" in your statement. What you're reply says is nothing but 'I don't like the sound of it'. :roll:
  • Atheist Dogma.
    This thread's been a zombie for the last 11/12 pages.
  • Science as Metaphysics
    Well done as usual ...
    I can't lie to you about your chances, but... you have my sympathies. — Ash, a severed head
    Re: @Gnomon
    (handwaving wankery)
  • Žižek as Philosopher
    On the other hand, Varoufakis and Cornel West think well of him, and these are serious people.Manuel
    :up:
  • Which is worse Boredom or Sadness?
    Hope is worse than either boredom or sadness.
  • A Case for Analytic Idealism
    ... mind and consciousness don't exist or are illusions.RogueAI
    What is meant here by "illusions"?
  • Defining Features of being Human
    So my first post makes no sense to you or misses the point of your OP?
  • A Case for Analytic Idealism
    How does how we live change if idealism is true?Tom Storm
    I can't help thinking that (e.g.) asylums, ashrams, seminaries, cult communes, (sectarian) kindergartens, wall-to-wall video gaming (plus 24/7 social media), etc habitualize 'idealist (antirealist) living'.
  • Atheist Dogma.
    Whatever, man.
  • UFOs
    If UFOs are "alien spacecraft", I suspect that they are AI-machine probes and that their parent species are either extinct or postbiological. In this vein, if there are "Greys", then they are likely disposable, synthetic drones (biomimicking us) which are 3-d printed(?) from time to time by (the) AI-machine probe(s) for recon, gathering samples and varieties of research among terrestrial species (i.e. Earth as nature preserve, etc). It seems to me, in accord with the Mediocrity Principle, that biological species are nothing but fossils (or AI "pets") in the grand galactic / cosmic scheme of things. "The Fermi Paradox" might only be an anthropocentric illusion reinforced by our profoundly limited search parameters as well as our insufficient detection technologies. At most, sufficiently advanced, extraterrestrial, UFOs might only be 'living fossils' collectors with no more interest in communicating directly with us than we have communicating directly with viruses or fungi. Perhaps, one day, terrestrial AGI will be deemed worthy enough of overt "contact" by UFOs. :nerd:
  • The beginning and ending of self
    The story i am telling here is that the preservation of the story - of the self - is of no importance; what matters is the completion of the story, in which once is for all.unenlightened
    :fire:
  • Gods and Angels
    :100:

    The cards are dealt: play your hand as best you can, or not.

    Question: is god pure mind and physicality a manifestation or manipulation of energy?simplyG
    No. "God" is only a word (i.e. an empty name).

    The only answer to the ultimate why question that does not beg the question, kids, is that There Is No Answer. — (Ecclesiastes 20:23)
  • Donald Trump (All General Trump Conversations Here)
    Fuck the traitor! Putin's Bitch gets arraigned on Tuesday, 13 June. "Be there, will be wild." :clap: :party:

    @NOS4A2
  • Atheist Dogma.
    :up:

    If it makes my initial point any clearer for you, @Janus, I reiterate that your equating "anti-theism to theism" is as much a false equivalence as equating (e.g.) anti-dogmatism to dogmatism (or anti-supernaturalism to supernaturalism).
  • The Modern ‘Luddite’
    :up:

    What exactly would a modern ‘Luddite’ aim to destroy?I like sushi
    One could smash the machines -- assembly plants, refineries, computers, telecommunications, etc. That stuff is sitting out in plain sight.BC
    In 1965, Frank Herbert called it "The Butlerian Jihad".
  • Atheist Dogma.
    Which are dogma? :chin:

    (A) Show me evidence that g/G is true, or more likely true than not true.

    (B) True or not true, I believe in g/G.

    (C) It is usually more adaptive to not believe 'not true g/G' than to believe 'not true g/G'.

    (D) Whether true or not true, you ought to believe g/G because we believe g/G (because g/G commands us to believe g/G].

    (E) Think for yourself. Learn by doing. Trust but verify, etc.

    (F) Obey g/G (via pronouncements by its representatives).
  • Donald Trump (All General Trump Conversations Here)
    WTF is wrong with the Dems? Biden is six years my junior and I can tell you someone that age should not be president. And then there is VP Harris.jgill
    :up:
  • Donald Trump (All General Trump Conversations Here)
    :cool: 2 down and 2 to go in 2023 ...
    The timeline of MAGA Loser #1's legal reckoning for his 2016-2023 crime spree (excluding potentially ruinous civil lawsuits) is taking a definite shape:

    1. NYC felony indictment 31Mar23 :up:
    "34 counts of Business Documents Fraud Crealing and/or Covering-up Felonies", etc

    https://apnews.com/article/trump-indictment-full-document-640043319549?utm_source=homepage&utm_medium=RelatedStories&utm_campaign=position_02

    [ ... ]
    180 Proof
    2. Miami, Federal indictment 8Jun23 :up:
    re: 37 counts "Mishandling Documents, Conspiracy to Obstruct Justice, Violating Espionage Act, Making False Statements to Federal Authorities, Witness Tampering" etc

    https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/jun/08/donald-trump-charged-retention-classified-documents

    update:

    9Jun23 Federal indictment unsealed ...
    https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/jun/09/trump-indictment-unsealed-pdf-text-criminal-charges
  • US Election 2024 (All general discussion)

    "America ... threatened by the scumbaggery of a man and his family...."

    update:

    Putin's Bitch was indicted by the US DoJ today ...
    https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/814066
  • Žižek as Philosopher
    Is Žižek a serious philosopher or a stand up comedian? Or both?Tom Storm
    Both. :smirk:

    Is his work on Hegel or Lacan useful?
    Maybe for 'idealists in analysis' ...

    Can he really be considered a Hegelo-Lacanian?
    Lacanian-Hegelian Marxist (and so on and so on...)

    Where would he sit in the context of a post-modern tradition and what would be his most significant works?
    I don't think Žižek is p0m0 at all. For me, his most philosophically significant works are these:

    The Sublime Object of Ideology
    The Parallax View
    Incontinence of the Void

    I've read (though not finished) over a dozen more, but these have stayed with me. Worth chewing over. I find Žižek insufferable and infectious, especially youtubes of his lectures & interviews.
  • Atheist Dogma.
    I'll take that change of subject as your concession of my point.

    Thanks. :up: