I don't understand what you mean by "about". — Astrophel

I don't understand what you don't understand about how I use "about" in that sentence.

... how do "natural" objects get into knowledge claims when causality, the naturalist's bottom line (just ask Quine) for everything, has nothing epistemic about it?

I don't understand the question or its relevance.

Or, if you prefer, how does any thing "get into" a brain thing such that the what is in the brain is "about" that thing?

I have no idea what you are talking about, Astro.

But what is religion apart from the bad metaphysics?

A community of ritualized reenactments of an epic myth (i.e. folk anti-anxiety placebo-fetish aka "magic show") ... no doubt based on "bad metaphysics". :sparkle: :pray:

And what is NOT a "denial of reality" and that is the true ground of religion?

Uncertainty.

You mention suffering, but what is this?

Useless hope (i.e. attachments) ...

... an infinite series of beings ... — Bob Ross

Like real numbers series (i.e. continuum), like unbounded surfaces, like fractals ...

... lack the power to exist (i.e., are contingent)

"Exist" is not a predicate of any subject but instead is merely a property (indicative) of existence like wet is a property (indicative) of water (such that whatever is in contact with water is also wet). Aristotle's notion of "contingency" (accident) fallaciously reifies predication, or conflates his abstract map(making) with concrete terrains.

By cause, I mean it in the standard Aristotelian sense of that which actualized the potentiality.

Okay, and yet another anachronistic metaphysical generalization abstracted from pseudo-physics – of no bearing on contemporary (philosophical) usage of "causality" ...

https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/causation-metaphysics/

... spatiotemporality implies[affords] divisibility.

Again, conflating (a) map(making) with a terrain further confuses the issue. :roll:

Certainly, the Thomist "Five Proofs" are not sound.
— 180 Proof

Why not? What false premises do they contain, if they are not sound? — Arcane Sandwich

Principally because the Aristotlean
premises used by Aquinas (& other Scholastic apologists) are metaphysical generalizations abstracted from (his) pseudo-physics (e.g. universal telology, absolute non-vacuum, absolute non-motion, etc) which are not factually true of matters of fact (or nature). Consider the following further objections to "the soundness" of Aquinas' Quinque viæ (by clicking on my username below) ...

...from an old thread concerning Thomistic sophistry:

[ ... ]

And [another] excerpt from an old post objecting to the soundness, etc of "the cosmological argument": — 180 Proof

Thus, believing in God does not resolve moral conflicts. — MoK

Plato says as much in his dialogue Euthyphro.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Euthyphro_dilemma

Higher being lies in the future.

The Ground-Of-Determination', G.O.D., underlies all, but it isn't a God Being. — PoeticUniverse

:fire: À la natura naturans ...

That doesn't mean that they're not valid or sound. — Arcane Sandwich

Certainly, the Thomist "Five Proofs" are not sound.

34. The purely simple and actual being is the ultimate cause of all actualization of potentials.

But deism

42. Therefore, God exists."

False. Thomism is inferior philosophy — Gregory

:up: :up:

@Dmytro

Love is Joy, accompanied by the idea of ​​an external cause ... [and] ... All happiness or unhappiness solely depends upon the quality of the object to which we are attached by love. — Benny Spinoza

I fell in and out of love when I was nineteen. I gave my love all I had to give at that age and yet, after several months, it wasn't enough to keep her. Why? Because she needed love from a man and I was – like almost all nineteen year old males – still a boy in a man's body. IME, most women (at all ages) need – desire – men and not boys.

When does 'a boy become a man' in the context of romantic love (eros)?

As a generalization, IMO, at the stage of experiential development (usually mid-twenties to mid-thirties) once a boy learns how to avoid 'falling for' (in order to protect his life from) selfish¹ women of any age; in this regard, absent 'paternal' guidance, a gauntlet of heartbreaks and rejections usually does the trick.

How does you recognize a selfish woman before you fall for her into that 'love trap'? :confused:

While getting acquainted or dating, pay close attention to both how she behaves around others, especially her girlfriends, and, without asking more than once, what she doesn't tell you about herself; being money-fixated, entitled/bossy, never mistaken/wrong, always a victim/blame-shifting, gaping holes/inconsistencies in her upbringing & romantic history, etc are also tells of a selfish¹ woman (ergo maybe a 'lover' :yum: , but evidently a bad risk for romantic love :hearts:)

Anyway, philosophers and psychologists opine about "love" in theory² but practice – "romance" – in a concrete social-cultural context is much more insightful. (Fwiw, my insights (scars) I'd acquired from 'loving' (mostly) middle class women in the Northeast US while in and out of university and bartending, etc during the 1980s.)

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Selfishness [1]
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Love [2]

Love, n. A temporary insanity curable by marriage or by removal of the patient from the influences under which he/she incurred the disorder. — Ambrose Bierce, The Devil's Dictionary

:smirk:


Welcome to TPF!

:up:

:fire:

:up:

Yes, of course. Taiwan is, after all, "a part of China", but the political class in Taipei are just living in denial. Like Cuba (or Canada :sweat:) in relation to America. I think the more germaine question is: Will the US abandon Ukraine (& Eastern Europe) to Russian aggression and thereby give the PRC a green light to invade Taiwan without risking a catastrophic (world) war? :monkey:

Enjoy the tunes! Happy 2025 :sparkle:

:up: :up:

Propositions can never to removed from the existence in which they are discovered in the "first" place. . — Astrophel

Reifiication / misplaced concreteness fallacy is implied in your assumption, Astro. "Propositions" are only truth-bearing ways of talking about aspects or features of "existence" and not the sort of things which can be "removed from" or "discovered in" "existence". Unlike sophists (or essentialists & idealists), most philosophers do not confuse their maps (or mapmaking) with the terrain.

As a metacognitive species we "suffer" from instinctive and/or learned denial of reality (e.g. change (i.e. pain, loss, failure, impermanence), uncertainty (i.e. angst)). As history shows, what greater reality-denial can there be than 'supernatural religion' (i.e. philosophical suicide) – a cure for suffering that frequently worsens suffering?

5. An infinite series of composed beings (viz., of parts which are also, in turn, composed) would not have the power to exist on their own. — Bob Ross

Why not?

6. Therefore, an infinite series of composed beings is impossible.

This statement does not follow (e.g. numbers are infinite and each is an infinite composite). Besides, classical atomists argue otherwise.

7. Therefore, a series of composed beings must have, ultimately, uncomposed parts as its first cause. (6 & 3)

"Cause" here is undefined, which invalidates this premise; but even so, this idea corresponds in conception to atoms in void.

8. An uncomposed being (such as an uncomposed part) is purely simple, since it lacks any parts.

i.e. Democritus' void.

9. Two beings can only exist separately if they are distinguishable in their parts.

Insofar as "two beings" lack identical properties and/or relationships, and if by "exist" what's meant is .. spatiotemporal, then such non-identical "beings" – even if both "lack parts" they do not occupy the same positions simultaneously in space and time – necessarily "exist separately".

10. Two purely simple beings do not have any different parts (since they have none).

This statement does not make sense since there are "two" which implies differentiation by more than just internal composition. "Parts" (i.e. internal compositions) are a necessary but not sufficient condition either for describing or of existing (see my reply to #9 above).

11. Therefore, only one purely simple being can exist.

This statement does not follow (see my reply to #10 above).

42. Therefore, God exists.

Caveat: though I've not bothered to read past premise #11, it is abundantly clear to me, Bob, that the conclusion presented here in #42 does not follow from undefined, incoherent or false premises (e.g.) #5, 6, 10 & 11 above.

:up: :up:

Philosophers chasing after propositional truth (logos) is patently absurd. — Astrophel

Such as the above "propositional truth" you're "chasing" (Gorgias laughs).

:smirk:

To my mind, Mythos (narratives (e.g. religion, art ... placebos-intoxicants)) provides succor to those who are uncertainty-avoidant whereas, by contrast, Logos (inferences (e.g. philosophy, science, history ... medicines-surgery)) provides guidance to those who are uncertainty-tolerant. Logos, however, is never – cannot function / signify – wholly Mythos-free. :fire:

The idea that western [greedy individualism] are superior to eastern [collectivist communality] in no way implies nor entails that the white "race" is superior to any other "race". — Bob Ross

Consider Kipling's 1899 imperialist paean ...
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_White_Man%27s_Burden

and Mark Twain's 1901 response ...
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/To_the_Person_Sitting_in_Darkness

↪180 Proof Bob should know why you went there — ssu

:up:

Also also, does god actively give little kids inoperable brain cancer, or does he just let them get it and then sit back and watch while it slowly kills them? This isn’t rhetorical, I’m actually lookng for an answer. — an-salad

Silly question – if a "God" exists that allegedly "created" a world full of animals devouring each other alive and gratuitously suffering human beings, then "God" is either a sadist (demon) or a fiction, both of which are not worthy of worship (e.g. a moral/spiritual ideal).

True beauty is something that attacks, overpowers, robs, and finally destroys.
— @javi2541997

Can you makes sense of this one for me?

Those quotes sound like Nietzsche. — Tom Storm

This Yukio Mishima quote reminds me of

For beauty is nothing but the beginning of terror
which we are barely able to endure, and it amazes us so,
because it serenely disdains to destroy us.
Every angel is terrible. — Rainer Maria Rilke, Duino Elegies

So you believe Eurocentrism – "Western Supremacy, Nationalism and Imperialism" (re: OP) – is not (euphemistically) synonymous with White Supremacy? How naive of you, Bob (or disingenuous, Captain Renault). :roll:

Why would you not be a Western supremacist? — Bob Ross

Well, I'm a 'cosmopolitan alter-globalist'...

In Support of Western[ White ] Supremacy, Nationalism, and Imperialism

Like "whiteness", "the west" is a myth, and, as a scientifically and historically literate (postcolonial) freethinker, I'm engaged in praxes of support for both the abductive disenchanting of nature and dialectical demythifying of political economies.

Thanks for clarifying. :up:

‘saṃsāra has no beginning but it has an end. Nirvāṇa has a beginning but it has no end.’ — Wayfarer

So duality is not an illusion – 'samsara is nirvana' is ignorance? :chin:

Religion takes its first step ... — Astrophel

... chasing its (fairy)tail.

[W]hen an encounter with an object occurs, it is an event, and must be analyzed as such. What lies "outside" of this event requires a perspective unconditioned[presupposed] by the perceptual act ... — Astrophel

"Object" presupposes (a) subject, or (an) actor of "the perceptual act", that is embodied (i.e. an aspect of nature). Mind is non/pre-mind-dependent (i.e. emergent-constrained by – entangled with – nature aka "non/pre-mind") and not the other way around as idealists (e.g. apophenia-biased¹ and/or egocentric-biased² and/or introspection-biased³ 'believers') et al assume.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apophenia [1]
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Egocentric_bias [2]
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Introspection_illusion [3]

:up: :up:

Does any of this erudite palaver have any bearing on religion and suffering? — Vera Mont

Apparently not.

Yes, in other words The Clown's goal is a White nationalist apartheid dictatorship and the means to succeed – transforming this (failing) neoliberal corporatocracy into a full-blown oligarchic kakistocracy – is on the verge of being installed by the MAGA-GOP majority US Congress & SCOTUS. Even though "We the Sheeple" failed again in the last election, will Democrats in Congress, Democratic State Governors & US military leadership also fall in line behind The Clown or will the fuckers uphold their oaths to defend the US Constitution "against all enemies foreign and domestic"? TBD. :mask:

14Jan25

10Jan25

It's official:

DJT, Convicted Felon-in-Chief

https://www.wsj.com/us-news/law/trump-sentencing-hush-money-new-york-9f9282bc

Sometime in the next ten days the US DoJ, at the very least, should release the partial (or complete) Special Counsel's Report on DJT's January 6 Insurrection Indictment Case. The US AG should also release the Special Counsel's Report on DJT's Stolen National Security Documents and Obstruction of Justice Indictment Case and then receive an unconditional pardon from POTUS. History is watching, Mr Biden. TBD.

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/elections/2025/01/09/trump-special-counsel-report-federal-appeals-smith/77549818007/ — 180 Proof

Mr. Smith: "F-U, Douchebag!"
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/jan/14/donald-trump-2020-election-conviction-special-counsel-report-jack-smith

:up:

:up:

:up: :up:

But this is due to your failure to understand that no event has ever occurred unless witnessed. Ontology and epistemology are analytically bound. — Astrophel

So 'only what is known is real (happens)?' – that's idealist-solipsist / antirealist nonsense (pace G. Berkeley ... pace N. Bohr et al).

In my view the Eden myth referred to in the opening, was designed to express that humanity's desire for meaning is its downfall. — ENOAH

:fire:

I.e. our "fall into time" (Cioran) ... "nostagia, or philosophical suicide" (Camus) ...

[W]hy do you think only good things are meaningful? — Astrophel

Strawman – I never claimed or implied that anything is (inherently) "meaningful".

Granted: anything may be meaningful to somebody to some extent in the context of some kinds of engagement... whatever that means. However, it does not indicate that meaning is in any way inherent in anything ... — Vera Mont

:100:

Meaning, and of course, this is not the dictionary sense of meaning, but the affective sense, referring to the pathos of one's regard for something ... — Astrophel

The victim of a fatal birth defect does not even have an "affective sense" of what's happens to her. Likewise, natural disasters do not happen because of our "pathos" (i.e. we want / don't want them to happen). Again, your equivocating (meaning with feeling) avoids ...

random events ... are instances of 'meaninglessness' — 180 Proof

Explain in what way (e.g.) a fatal birth defect is "meaningful".

Never once has a human being witnessed meaninglessness — Astrophel

This statement doesn't make sense (e.g. birth defects, natural disasters, mass murders, vague utterances, discursive nonsense, random events ... are instances of "meaninglessness").

If life is not a struggle with god[death]... — Astrophel

... then its not "life".

Btw, why do you assume being human "means" anything at all?

Yeah, and decadent cynics bleated like that about Nero too.

Apologies for not reading the entire thread before responding ...

I often wonder, what makes a person interested in philosophy? — Rob J Kennedy

My 'philosophical interest' was/is rooted in everyday encounters with stupidity (i.e. maladaptive, incorrigible behavior) in all of its insidious forms as both an enabler of and constraint on practice (or agency). Though I've always had strong affinities with Zapffean-Camusian absurdism, more than anything else I'm a fallibilistic Epicurean-Spinozist (i.e. committed to a critical form of anti-supernaturalism).

What is it about them that draws them to read, study and discuss philosophy?

In practice, IME philosophy is an infinite game (i.e. fractal-like maze, not 'solvable' labyrinth) one falls into and cannot / doesn't want to escape from (unless you're a fly named "Ludwig" trapped in his own flybottle). :smirk:

Usually they are people who prefer to be alone than constantly around others.

Yes. Solitaire ...

They are people who care about politics and the arts.

... et Solidaire. Yes.

They are writers.

Yes ... sentences cage me.

They are introspective and educated.

Yes ... very bookish.

They want the world changed ...

Yes ... and themselves.

So, ethics, under your view, is a personal habit? — Bob Ross

Insofar as "personal habits" – in the context of my previous post – specifically means virtues, then I think so.

Could you give an example where the "community policy" is not underpinned by "interpersonal conduct" 

Two policies come to mind: retributive justice (i.e. proportional punishment) & distributive justice (i.e. social welfare). Neither policy is based on how individuals ought to treat each other or (non-reciprocally) conduct themselves.

... (so that I can understand where you are coming from)

Again, I refer you to this old post (esp. 2nd para.)...
https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/857773

... the original purpose of Philosophy: to give practical wisdom that every man—even the blindest and poorest—could understand and apply to their lives to better themselves. — Bob Ross

:fire: :up:

Some of my own 'aphorisms' ...

(2023)
https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/851181

(2025)
https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/959723

Addendum to
https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/851181

Bemusings 2 ...

Death merely randomizes memories & awareness.

All that we are and have ever built are, at most (and forever!), sand castles in the surf.

Since existence is the sky, universes are nothing but the weather.

Origin of the universe? = Edge of the Earth?

What question is not begged (is not fallaciously answered) by "a mystery"?

How is anything explained by or justified with "a mystery"?

If 'God is the ultimate mystery', then a godly (i.e. inexplicable and unjustified)
world is indistinguishable from a godless world, no?

You escape from reality via fantasy but we can escape from fantasy via ecstasy.

Pray to the presence ...
meditate on the nonsense ...
or contemplate the absence.

As a life-commitment, you can only love the world (group think) or only love god (that thinks for you) or only love wisdom (learning to think for yourself even against yourself).

Not meeting the burden of proof only means the claim at issue remains unproven and not that it is false. For this reason alone a thinker ought to accept the burden of proving that theism is not true.

There is no god but Death and Sleep is her prophet.

... And therefore we have metaphysics ('order, cosmos') in order not to howl in despair at the real (disorder, chaos).

... Branes to Black Holes to Brains to Brains to Black Holes to Branes ...

There are no antirealists in foxholes.

Usually the beautiful tend to be boring, the flawed on occasion more interesting, and yet the beautifully flawed are always irresistible.

Every professional liar knows that facts are never as persuasive as stories.

Astronauts went where all religions call 'the heavens' and discovered two things which had impressed me as a child: (1) they saw no God, no gods, no angels, no souls and (2) they saw that the Earth is round, not flat. What's impressed me even more ever since is that not one of the world's great religions have ever sent their own astronaut-priests into 'the heavens' to find out the truth for themselves.

As weak as gravity that orders the universe, reason orders minds which dis/order our world.

Sophia says ...
'Your god isn't even a providential being who can do anything for you. He's nothing but that hole in your bucket – nonbeing.'

I'm not religious or a trumper, so I don't discuss American politics any more – I'm too literate historically, culturally and scientifically for that.

(To be continued ...)

10Jan25

It's official:

DJT, Convicted Felon-in-Chief

https://www.wsj.com/us-news/law/trump-sentencing-hush-money-new-york-9f9282bc

Sometime in the next ten days the US DoJ, at the very least, should release the partial (or complete) Special Counsel's Report on DJT's January 6 Insurrection Indictment Case. The US AG should also release the Special Counsel's Report on DJT's Stolen National Security Documents and Obstruction of Justice Indictment Case and then receive an unconditional pardon from POTUS. History is watching, Mr Biden. TBD.

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/elections/2025/01/09/trump-special-counsel-report-federal-appeals-smith/77549818007/

Shameless and insipid non sequiturs. Good job, lil troll. :clap:

Logos alone ... — Jack Cummins

I didn't say anything about "logos alone".

The reason why we need[practice] philosophy is to disentangle the two, because they can get muddled.

Yes, analytically. We also ought to strive to live according to logos over above mythos in order to flourish (according to e.g. Laozi ... Heraclitus, Epicurus, Epictetus ... Spinoza ... Peirce-Dewey, Zapffe, Camus, C. Rosset ...)

6Jan2025 :mask:

"In your ruins I find shelter."
~Samuel Beckett, from letter to Emil Cioran

Do you agree or disagree that we as individuals, communities and as a civilization should outgrow – overcome (as Nietzsche says) – evidence-free stories (mythos) by striving to live according to evidence-based stories (logos)? If you agree then, what you suggest about "the significance of myths" is hyperbolic at best. However, if you disagree, Jack, tell me (us) why philosophy matters.

Isn't this "interpersonal conduct" that you are referring to underpin the "community policy"? — Bob Ross

Not necessarily.

Or are they completely disparate areas of ethics?

Yes. Afaik, personal habits (ethos) are normative and institutional priorities (polis) are applications of norms to public conflicts (or issues) which are not limited to or by those norms.

A cursory search for what the Big Bang is shows that it actually is the beginning of the universe. — Brendan Golledge

"Cursory searches" are more often too simplicistic (lazy) and misleading, especially in modern physical sciences, than deliberate study. Given the extent of current astrophysical evidence, your claim doesn't make any sense scientifically, and therefore metaphysically (as categorical generalizations, or (tentative?) synopsis, of the 'absolute presuppositions' of current physical sciences).

... the transcendent exists in the form of mathematics. Math appears to exist independently of matter and time.

Reification fallacy (à la Platonic forms, Aristotlean essences). "Math" concerns abstract objects structures & patterns and only an infinitesmal fraction of them are computationally possible to instantiate in (human) discursive-cognitive practices.

So I repeat the question:

Please explain why do you assume that a so-called (un-knowable, ubiquitously nonevident) "Deity" can be "the uncaused cause of all other causes-effects" and yet also assume that the (know-able, inescapably evident) universe itself cannot be "the uncaused cause of all other causes-effects". — 180 Proof

@Gnomon :roll: