I've noticed this too. What do you make of that? — csalisbury

Men have harder lives. Women have social safety nets available to them that make them live in a sort of bubble, never really experiencing the worst life has to offer unless they are violently assaulted or something like that. Men on the other hand can often expect to experience how bad life is just in virtue of being regular men. We're disposable, expected to suffer and die. Women always have a second chance, a failsafe, an excuse, etc. The narrative that women have it worse is itself part of this bizarre state of affairs. Part of what makes life hard for men is that it's unacceptable to acknowledge that men have hard lives, unless this is acknowledged in order to service women (patriarchy hurts men 'too,' men are suffering only in the sense that they're complicit in sexist behavior, men need to behave more traditionally feminine in order to be 'saved' from their masculinity, etc.) -- because only the suffering of women is seen to be something 'wrong' by and large. No one cares about men, and no one ever will IMO.

Conrad:

It's queer how out of touch with truth women are. They live in a world of their own, and there has never been anything like it, and never can be. It's too beautiful altogether, and if they were to set it up it would go to pieces before the first sunset. Some confounded fact we men have been living contentedly with ever since the day of creation would start up and knock the whole thing over.

That's not the kind of thing I'm going to say in public, ever (men also can't talk about their suffering, unless in service of women), but I think most of us 'know' this pretty deeply. Men are the 'blue collar' gender, women are the 'white collar' gender. In trying to pass gender boundaries, male-assigned people are more eager to be seen as women than vice-versa, because they are transitioning upward.

My reproach to the antinatalists and pessimists isn't that they're wrong, necessarily, but that denying 'the river' can only be a pose, even if sincerely meant. The river doesn't care etc. People will always have babies. It really fucking sucks to drown, but making sure to disapprove of the river while drowning isn't worth much. — csalisbury

Actually, I have hope -- it turns out that when people settle down and their material circumstances are taken care of, they stop having children, and a stable happy society tends toward a birth rate that's lower than replacement. Antinatalists are only odd in making a practical position everyone seems to hold implicitly, theoretical and explicit.

They are not examples of not seeing something as something. You see an afterimage as an afterimage. a light flashed at you as a light flashed at you, scintillating scotoma as scintillating scotoma and so on. Otherwise how would you be able to identify and differentiate those experiences as such? — John

Not really, no. You don't have to individuate something as 'a flash of light' to experience a flash of light. In fact that would make seeing really fucking hard, you'd never be able to see anything, always having to think about what it was before you could experience anything.

Remember, seeing something indefinite counts as seeing something as something as much as seeing something definite does. Both experiences are always already conceptually articulated. — John

So evidence against your position counts as evidence for it.

Afterimages, having light flash at you, jaundice, shutting your eyes, scintillating scotoma, the ever-elusive and mythical phenomenon of not being sure what you're looking at, you know, crazy philosopher shit.

than it is of seeing a blue sky. I would say the notion of seeing "immediate sensations of quality" is secondary to and derivative of seeing anything as something. — John

This is just wrong, though. You can have visual experiences without seeing anything 'as' anything, but the reverse isn't true. So what sense of secondary can you possibly mean?

I don't get how causality, time, and space are not manifest in world of appearance? It seems real in the sense that it is part of the world of appearances. — schopenhauer1

They're not part of the world of appearances, but their transcendental ground ala Kant. Everything of the world of appearances is in time and space, but time and space are not in that world.

As for your second statement that time isn't real in the Kantian framework, yes I just said that when I said time doesn't exist in any absolute sense for Schopenhauer and that this follows Kantian's transcendental framework. So you seemed to restate what I said as if I did not agree with you. — schopenhauer1

Alright, but your responses don't seem to be fully consistent with the point.

Will needs time/space/causality in order for the world to be Will and Representation. Otherwise, the world is just real. You have a couple problems if you say the world is just Will and representation is not "real". Here are some problems: — schopenhauer1

The will doesn't need time, space, etc. Only presentation does. The will doesn't always objectify itself as presentation.

2) If Will is primary and representation is an illusion or somehow subordinate or secondary, then you have to explain how it is that representation is created by Will. — schopenhauer1

Again, I think this makes the mistake of reifying causality as something applying to the thing in itself. How does the will 'make' representations?

So, in order to counteract this idea, we have to say that representation is not secondary, but is rather the flip side of Will that ensures that there is always an object for the subject. It was there all along. — schopenhauer1

This is just not Schop's position. Presentation is secondary, as one sort of behavior the will participates in (objectifying itself). Nothing needs to 'ensure' that there are objects. Objects only exist for representing creatures.

The odd conclusion is that the first organism has to always be around as it can never be caused. — schopenhauer1

The organism does exist in a kind of timeless present, but that's not the same as it being eternal or having always existed in the past (eternality is not timelessness) -- to think this again seems to reify time inappropriately.

And again, causation doesn't apply to the will as such, only to the forms of representation, when time and space interact. But these are only veils used to objectify the will.

Although, csal, many pessimists and anti-natalists and so on are not pretty boys by any stretch of the imagination. I've met quite a few before, mostly online, but some in person, and they are mostly male, downtrodden, socially inept, possibly unemployed, maybe even impoverished, have physical deformities and mental illnesses, and so on. A lot of pessimists just have no natural endowments or life prospects, so the personal case seems to force them into a general understanding that the life of someone more comfortable can partially blind the to (there are just enough breaths that the river gives you to believe that pulling your head above water is a sot of 'gift' that the river gives you, notwithstanding it's the river drowning you to begin with).

Cioran is so handsome :3

I actually don't think he is saying that time existed in any absolute sense before consciousness. — schopenhauer1

Time doesn't really 'exist,' for Schopenhauer, since existence is 'reality' or roughly 'causality,' which presupposes time. Time isn't real in the Kantian framework in a very substantive sense -- it's ideal.

Time/space/causality is simply the flip side of will. Time/space/causality only adheres in organisms. Organisms cannot exist before point 0. Since time/space/causality is the flip side of will, since organisms need to exist for there to be time/space/causality, then organisms had to exist in some ever present state for there to be time/space/causality. — schopenhauer1

You are thinking of the world as temporal in-itself, which Schop. denies. It's as if the organisms are 'keeping' time in place, so they had to be around since the beginning, making sure that the time before there was time didn't cause a paradox. But if you scrap all that and realize that time isn't real in the above sense, none of this is problematic.

This to me, just seems intuitively not convincing. It does seem that there was a time/space causality before the first organism. — schopenhauer1

There was, but this fact only arises once consciousness does. In other words, the way consciousness is structured is such that it must project time backward.

Why do you think the explanation given in section 7 of WWR is inadequate?

There's a difference between the intentionality of experience (the blue sky) and the substance of experience (the qualia, allegedly). — Michael

When people say things like this, I just don't know. Maybe there are p-zombies. Allegedly.

The notion 'qualia' is itself not a naturally occurring, ordinary everyday idea, but an artificially produced, extraordinary philosophical idea, probably incomprehensible to, and certainly not spontaneously entertained by, most people. — John

The word isn't naturally occurring, but the idea is. To deny that people have a notion of experience that's pretty much exactly what philosophers call qualia (and ordinarily people just call 'experience' or something like that) seems to me to be absurd and a losing battle. Philosophers don't want there to be such a thing, but that's a different matter.

The very fact that it is widely rejected by philosophers shows that it is far from being a necessary idea. — John

It obviously shows no such thing, but since you knew that I'm not sure why you said this.

I don't think so. Consciousness is ordinarily understood to be consciousness of oneself, other people, animals, things, thoughts, bodily feelings, emotions, memories, not qualia. — John

Not really. First of all, if someone asks, 'is he conscious?' what they mean is something like 'is he having experiences?' as opposed to being 'blacked out.' They don't mean 'is he conscious of x?' Second of all, you're not conscious of your emotions, at least not primarily; you have emotions, which are feelings. To be conscious is to have qualia, or experiences, not to be conscious of them.

This seems to me what people mean by 'consciousness,' and an attempt to redefine it and then deal with that technical notion isn't of that much interest.

but it intrigues me as to why TGW thinks that consciousness must be defined in terms of qualia. — John

That's how the word is ordinarily used -- it isn't 'defined' that way.

That's not the impression I get from the way he talks about his position. but okay.

That's not my definition. That's just what the word means.

I don't think I'm infallible, there's just always a cost to bothering with communication, and there's no obligation to bother with it. Is it really such a big deal that not everyone in the world agrees with you?

About the Chronos paradox and the need for representations to be supported by organisms?

It's fine. I'm a little sick of all of it myself I feel like I've already 'graduated,' no one has anything interesting to say on the subject I haven't heard already, and I think the important insights can't be communicated anyway.

So of course if you define p-zombies in such a way that it means they lack any and all qualia — darthbarracuda

I didn't define anything?

Just take them at their word. — Michael

But that's what I'm doing, taking Dennett at his word that he doesn't have qualia, and is is a p-zombie. Why not take him at his word that he has consciousness instead? Because the former, not the latter, is his primary theoretical motivation.

You will be claiming that you don't have consciousness if your belief that consciousness isn't qualia can't be made sense of. For instance, suppose I claim I have no legs, but that I believe walking has nothing to do with legs -- do I therefore claim I can't walk? Of course I do, even though I deny it, because my belief that walking doesn't require legs is wrong (and perhaps nonsensical).

Obviously not, but I don't see what that has to do with anything.

But suppose that we can't make sense of consciousness on terms that doesn't somehow equate it with the presence of qualia. It would follow that the only way to deny that one has qualia is to deny that one is conscious.

P-zombies lack consciousness. Only if consciousness is to be understood as qualia would a lack of qualia mean a lack of consciousness. But some, e.g. Dennett, claim that this isn't the case. — Michael

I can't understand the claim that consciousness doesn't consist in qualia as anything other than a redefinition of consciousness from its lay meaning to some technical meaning. But isn't the lay meaning what we're interested in? You can gerrymander the definition to show whatever you want, but the result won't be interesting.

By 'consciousness' I don't, and don't think I can, understand anything but qualia, at least if the term is used in anything like its ordinary way.

But some philosophers claim that if something is physiologically and behaviourally identical to conscious people then ipso facto it is conscious. — Michael

If they claim people are conscious, then there is no dispute, since they don't think they're p-zombies.

But for those who think that consciousness at least as popularly conceived in terms of qualia is illusory, they literally are claiming that people who are behaviorally identical to humans (namely, all humans) lack consciousness (in the relevant sense), and so are p-zombies.

Of course, they may be justified in this claim using their own case, since as p-zombies they can't conceive of qualia. But for those who aren't, the argument won't be compelling.

they're claiming that the notion of p-zombies doesn't make sense. — Michael

That depends on what you mean. On certain understandings of the terms, many philosophers not only believe the concept makes sense, but is actualized in their own case and presumably for the case of all human beings. This won't be the case if you have some lame understanding of what 'consciousness' is (i.e., something other than consciousness) that is functional, behavioral, etc. But that's just definition-gerrymandering and produces nothing of substance, since it will probably end up borderline tautological and have nothing to say about consciousness in the interesting sense, i.e. subjective experience. If the latter is meant, of course the notion of a p-zombie makes sense, in the sense that the average person understand what's meant by it with no difficulty.

Aren't p-zombies just people with no qualia? So doesn't every philosopher who denies there are qualia, claim to be a p-zombie?

I don't see any paradox in Schopenhauer's views. At best he's forced to 'admit' that there's something unknowable about the Will, which is hardly surprising because it's the noumenon. The time stuff isn't paradoxical unless you adopt assumptions from outside his framework.

That's what the Socratic method is all about. "You said it, not me." Why would Dennett take offense at people agreeing with him?

So Dennett isn't plugging his ears and claiming the elephant in the room doesn't exist. He's just claiming that the elephant (simpliciter) isn't an elephant but something else. — darthbarracuda

I'm not saying he's plugging his ears. I'm saying maybe he doesn't understand the concept because he has no qualia.

Should we automatically think that those who believe qualia is non-real are p-zombies? Shouldn't we give them the benefit of the doubt? — darthbarracuda

I don't understand. Wouldn't believing they're p-zombies be giving them the benefit of the doubt?

A philosophical zombie wouldn't even be able to comprehend the very concept of qualia. — darthbarracuda

But philosophers claim precisely not to be able to understand it, or that it's fundamentally confused, mistaken, or unintelligible. Aren't you just helping my case?

Should we think that those who believe in god are somehow structurally different than those who do not? — darthbarracuda

I think that's a realistic possibility.

The magical new breed of Indigo Children: kids claim to 'see' colors.

(+ are you not making the same appeal to individual eccentricity by positing the existence of p-zombie types?) — csalisbury

What if there's qualia gene buried somewhere? Outward signs include professing belief in qualia, being homosexual, and browsing DeviantArt?

That's a little psychoanalytical. I don't think an entire cultural or professional tendency can be reduced to individual quirks, unless these are somehow common to a large number of philosophers.

Dennett don't think they lack something while others have it - they think that qualitative experience as a whole is a myth. — darthbarracuda

Right, so since this view is obviously false, one hypothesis is that Dennett thinks this because he has no qualitative experiences, so they're incomprehensible to him.

Which philosophers claim to be p-zombies? — csalisbury

I would like to know which philosophers claim they are p-zombies. — darthbarracuda

The majority of mainstream analytic philosophers.

I'd think they were lying (like the aforementioned philosophers) ;)

I like TGW's rainbow-over-a-storm metaphor. — csalisbury

It's Schopenhauer's! :)

1) If subject needs object, how would that occur prior to the first organisms who create representations to know itself? How would the force of gravity allow Will to know itself? — schopenhauer1

Before there are sentient creatures, there are no subjects or objects.

Pre-conscious forces result in consciousness arising as a kind of 'arms race' that the will sets up against itself: when forces clash, new forces arise to 'resolve' the dispute, and consciousness is basically just an extremely convoluted way for the Will to 'eat itself' by navigating its increasingly complex and painful urges. Schop. basically articulates a kind of pre-Darwinian theory of evolution, but one that applies 'all the way down,' not just to biological organisms. Basically the whole universe is in a competition for survival against itself and there is perpetual pressure to develop more and more complex ways of willing. Consciousness is a sort of growth out of the will, which services its desires by finding a way to objectify and control them.

2) If organisms can change, this contradicts the Schopenhauer's platonic forms. Evolution does not happen on grand scales as much as microchanges that might become catalyzed by large catastrophes. Anyways, it seems that the phenomena of mutations in DNA and natural selection, does not lend itself to the idea of stable Platonic gradations or Ideas that Schopenhauer thought existed and accounted for objects being the way they are when influenced by the PSR and space/time/causality. — schopenhauer1

Schopenhauer's Ideas don't really seem to play the same generative role that Plato's do. Yes, he believes in timeless forms, but his notion of time is more nuanced than Plato's -- thee is a sense in which time doesn't 'really' pass, but not in the sense that it's the moving image of some eternal atempral thing, but rather because like with Kant time is just a form of intuition, and so at any point the Ideas will always appear eternal and tenseless, and can only be grasped aesthetically when representation examines itself in momentary freedom from the will. Can new Ideas rise up in time? Well, yes and no -- Schop. claims that animals arose at some point in natural history. But the idea that an Idea arises as well is literally nonsensical -- for there to be an Idea is for it to appear timelessly, in the 'standing present,' like a rainbow over a storm, there as a 'result' of what's happening and yet not really there, not really interacting with anything. Schop. is very Eastern in considering time ultimately to be a kind of illusion. It only exists insofar as it services the will's ends and is tied to the individual organism seeking out satisfactions of its individual will, but to contemplate the Forms or Ideas is to represent independently of the will, and so not to see things as arising and disappearing in time.

A Feast for Crows is great. Once all the mandatory big plot is out of the way and the world is established, you get these great little insights into the corners of the world. I don't know if you've gotten to Brienne's Cracklaw Point plot yet, but it's great, you find out that a large region of the Crownlands has been de facto independent from the crown for centuries and has its own mythology, border squabbles, etc. I love that kind of stuff. That's what I mean by ASOIAF not always feeling like the product of one person's imagination -- he puts in these little realistic inconsistencies in the world.

You can't really get that from a TV show, which only has time for the middle of the middle of the main plot, and so ends up feeling like more of an obvious contrivance, like a soap opera, where characters behave the way they do because the writers need them to, and not because they might be seen as part of a larger functioning world.