Yes, society would be destroyed without our human construct of empathy and morality. This is why we engage in them: to prevent the dystopia in which one would not like to live in. — JacobPhilosophy

This is the basic error I was describing (if by "we" you include egoism / self interest): the egoist may appreciate what "Western civilization" provides for him, but will not sacrifice anything to maintain or advance it it. The egoist (by definition) does not value anything other than himself; exterior things are not valued and it is a self-contradiction to say the egoist "engages" with empathy and morality to prevent dystopia. That is the whole point of egoism: one owes nothing to society, has no duty towards social outcomes as a whole.

The fundamental confusion egoist "philosophy" engages in is confusing "appreciation" with "value". Both the egoist and the altruist appreciate a favour, but the egoist does not "value" favours in a general sense of maintaining social bonds as the altruist does. The egoist appreciates a favour to themselves, and cares nothing about doing favours in the sense of expecting nothing in return (if the self-interest maximizing egoist provides a favour it is by definition justified as part of a plan to get something greater in return, whether a direct implied debt relationship with the recipient of the favour or then as a stochastic process of being perceived as "generous", with the plan of leveraging this to get more than the favours cost; but only because society values generosity, not the egoist himself).

So, I would agree that egoists may "appreciate" complex society in the sense of having received the favour from everyone who contributed to complex society. However, the egoist, by definition, does not value complex society in itself and therefore feels no duty to take on any risk or cost for a better social outcome generally.

Of course, there are some instances where individual profit align with general social outcomes, but putting any emphasis on this only demonstrates a total ignorance of how complex society actually functions and the various duties required to maintain it.

The egoist engages in only the appearance of empathy and (other people's) morality to take advantage of people who will, due to these appearances, carry out duties towards the egoist. If we look at the morality of the egoism itself, there is simply no trace of such a duty.

It simply makes no sense to say the egoist "engages in empathy and morality" for a better collective outcome. Egoist morality is only concerned with the egoist's outcome; if other people have a different morality, that's simply wrong according to the egoist, and something to understand and take advantage of, but does not exist "side by side" internally with the egoists own conception of morality. The egoist engages with other people's ideas of empathy and morality only insofar as it benefits themselves (that's just what egoism means). Within the egoist morality, it simply makes no sense to say "the egoist, in pursuing self interest, can still be moral" as "moral" within the egoist system is simply pursuing self interest; it is a bait and switch fallacy to view "moral" within the egoists own logic as referring to "society's definition of moral" and that the egoist is concerned about putting in some effort to align with this conception (the egoist doesn't care: pursuing self interest is what's moral within the egoist system because moral is defined as pursuing self interest; if you want to believe moral also refers to something else, then the egoist is willing to tell you what you want to hear, if there is some benefit to them for telling this lie; indeed, perhaps willing to believe this lie themselves if they see some benefit to themselves to being more genuine in telling the lie).

Egoists that are constantly trying to prove that egoist morality happens to align with collectivist moralities about social outcomes as a whole, either do not understand their own assertions; if one only cares about oneself, by definition one simply doesn't care about society and what might happen if everyone else also cared only about themselves, or they do understand this obvious point, but are lying about it to build an audience for their own benefit.

So, if by "we" you are talking about people that engage in empathy and morality for a better social outcome, and willing to bear some cost to achieve it (from doing favours to promote social bonds, to paying taxes, to doing the not corrupt thing even at great personal risk or opportunity cost, to jumping on a grenade), then you are talking about altruists broadly construed, and excluding the egoist from this "we"; the egoist is happy to take advantage of these altruists, but is not contributing to the same goal in any regard: the egoist is happy to receive a favour, is happy get tax subsidies for his business, is happy to deal with incorruptible police and detectives (when the egoist is in the "right" even according to the erroneous conception of right that society has - of course wants to deal with corruptible police and judges when such conditions support his predation), is happy when another soldier jumps on a grenade for him, but the egoist, by definition, does not reciprocate any of these things for the sake of maintaining complex society in itself.

Nearly everyone has access to resources which train citizens for reasoning analytically at a high enough level that ideological discernments are a cinch and intellectual self-control strong if so desired, with the majority of the population easily seeing through any form of rhetorical b.s. via reflection. — Enrique

Nearly everyone has access as you say, but not everyone has the leisure, and perhaps innate capacities, to both develop and defend against deluges of propaganda; the rhetorical b.s. as you put it. Nevertheless, where we do see both the access to as well as the time and energy to develop, such as (Nordics, Switzerland, New Zealand) we do see more "enlightened" development of traditional organizations (rehabilitation based justice, free education at all levels, respect for nature) compared with both previous times in those countries as well as other contemporary places.

So, given these counter examples, I would argue that where the access is real and not hypothetical there is essentially the "enlightened society" enlightenment thinkers dreamed of.

A potential counter-thesis to corrupt institutions being due to the failures of commoner individuals to get enlightened, would be that those institutions were already sufficiently corrupt to simply keep the lid on enlightenment by corrupting education (indoctrination and control, rather than as free as feasible discussion and curiosity), depriving people of the energy and means to enlighten themselves outside education, and inundations of propaganda. Of course, the onus falls on those individuals that do happen upon the luxury of enlightenment to fight such corruption, but the situation is not a virtuous cycle as in the fully developed welfare states (where education, lack of corruption and functioning institutions, leads to even more education and even less corruption and even better working institutions).

I have lived in both kinds of places, and although cooperative primary and secondary education, strong tendency of higher education access not reinforcing existing class structures, low corruption and good institutions don't solve everyone's problems, it's a pretty radical difference in terms of social experience, and if we compare this social experience to 18th century Europe, it's clearly a "pretty good go" at enlightened society as was conceived of at the time. If everywhere was organized like Switzerland, our political discussions would be very different; there would still be problems to solve, but it's difficult to even imagine what the difference would be in such a scenario compared with the problems we face as a global society today.

That's not a false dichotomy though, that's exactly what is meant by it: not "subjective" in the sense of relative to any particular subject. — Pfhorrest

It can be true of a particular subject, doesn't exclude that it is true for other subjects or even all subjects.

If we're saying it's true for all subjects, the common terminology is to say "it's universally true" or "true for all moral agents". If all we're maintaining is that it's true for all subjects, it's clearly awkward to say that such a claim is "objective".

Now, if we're claiming it's true for all subjects due to the properties of objects or then due to some sense that is akin to how we sense objects (a sense object just like other sense objects like a chair), then it is less awkward to say we are "being objective". This diction choice makes sense, but is clearly not equivalent to universal moral claims and theories in general that are not referencing objects (as sense data or then as simply things existing independently of subjects).

Now, you can stick to a terminology where "objective" just means "universally true" or "true for all moral agents"; obviously nothing's stopping you. But clearly more effort is then needed to be clear that there's not necessarily any "object" with respect to which we are being objective; there could be only subjects and they're ideas that we're dealing with under the category of "objective", as nothing is stopping me from placing great emphasis on everything we can possibly say about this word choice.

Even empiricism about reality is "subjective" in that it has something to do with subjects: empiricism appeals to sensory experience, which is had by the subjects of that sensory experience. But besides radical empiricisms like subjective idealism or solipsism, it's not "subjective" in the sense that what any particular subject experiences matters more than any other; the objective empirical truth is that which is available to all subjects' sensory experience, without bias. — Pfhorrest

You seem here just illustrating how opposing "objective" to "subjective" creates a false dichotomy. The use of the word "subjective" does not immediately imply that one experience matters more than another; this is easily a straw man of "subjective" theories such as "transcendental idealism" of Kant. Saying something is subjective can simply mean it is a property of subjects and not objects, which in turn doesn't exclude objects being subjective properties of a particular insistent kind of which there seems relatively easy agreement between different subjects (again, agreement subjectively experienced).

This "objective is what many subjects will agree about" (what the expression "objective" usually means: we and other agree this chair weighs 5 kilos), is clearly still dependent on subjective experience and so in contradiction to the definition of of objective as "independent from what people think". In otherwords, we can get to an objective belief about the situation, but still posit the object we are objective about has a existence apart from such an objective process; i.e. the "thing in itself".

Facts do not usually reference "things in themselves" (as independent of experience) but rather the conclusions that we are able to draw from our sense experience. Saying "it's a fact" implies there's at least some subjective experience somewhere justifying the belief; a fact is clearly dependent on what people think. It is just sloppy to say "claims that are true for all subjects; universally true claims" are "claims that are true independent of what anyone thinks"; these are two different assertions which could overlap but need not to.

For instance, a "claim that is true independent of what anyone thinks ... simply because no one has any experience at all about the object of that claim", maybe true, but is clearly not a "fact" in the sense of something we know (seems irrelevant to say there nevertheless exists a fact no one knows about this object no one has any experience about about, but we can presume they exist for the sake of argument), but more importantly, by definition, whatever facts we presume to exist about the unknown are not and cannot be universal claims true for all subjects (that all subjects should make such a claim that no subject knows anything about, because the claim is about something detached, and thus independent, from all subjective experiences).

Kant uses the term "thing in itself" to refer to the objects existence or essence independent of people's thoughts and ideas about it (the noumena which Kant claims we can never know as it truly is); it's clearly making a mess of things to then claim Kant's beliefs about things and moral principles are "objective" in the sense of being things or claims independent of thoughts (he is very clear we can know nothing, i.e. have no specific belief, of the noumena, we can only form belies about the phenomena; we presuppose the noumena exists but we do not come to "know" the noumena itself, only the phenomena, which does depend on our minds). And this is only for "the physical world", it's pretty clear Kant does not view the categorical imperative as noumena.

There is further confusions that can arise as it's only a "universal moral truth" in Kant's system to carry out a duty to other moral agents as ends in themselves; there is still potential of a plurality of moral principles that satisfy the categorical imperative (if it means respecting others as having intrinsic value and not being a hypocrite, there maybe many moral principles with respect to many situations that satisfy this conditions). So again, it's not clear if the specific moral principles we need to make decisions are "facts"; being a hypocrite is wrong, but there remains many ways to be right (again, we can stretch the definition of fact if we want to cover this, but we're clearly far removed from physical facts; so far removed that it's just simply recipe for confusion; we do not have all these considerations when we ask "what the facts are" of a situation).

In other-words, "objective" isn't used by Kant to describe his moral theory, and doesn't appear in discussions of Kant's moral theory by major sources, and the reason maybe because it's better to follow Kant's reasoning through all these nuances rather than redefine what his theory means in terms of objective truths and facts.

Also, "object" in general doesn't only have the one sense that we use of physical objects, as a "being" or "entity". It can also mean "end", "purpose", "aim", "goal", etc. (As in, "the object of this exercise is ..."). A moral object is something that something can be good for. It's basically just a good, a thing to be sought after, what to work toward. Moral objectivity implies that there is something that is actually good to strive for and work toward, rather than just whatever various subjects feel like doing; just like factual objectivity implies that there is something that is actually real to know and understand, rather than just whatever various subjects perceive. — Pfhorrest

Sure, you can redefine "being objective" as "pursuing a goal" rather than "facts", but all the examples covered so far have been quite clearly using "objective" as relating to "facts"; the hypothetical that another meaning could have been used that is less confusingly related to morality as just stating basically morality is about "goalism" (... and relativists can also have goals ... so the whole point of the distinction with relativism no longer makes any sense), is simply more confusing.

Again, no one's stopping you from using confusing terminology and "striking true" regardless, but no one's stopping me from pointing out the potential confusions so people are prepared to evaluate the success or failure of the undertaking.

For those interested in the positive proof side of this small o "objectivist" debate.

The small o "objectivist", or even just the word "objective" itself, does not appear in wikipedia's entry on "normative ethics", and if you click through to the usual suspects of "deontology", "consequentialism", "virtue ethics", you do not get appearance of small o "objectivists".

Simply going through such material should be enough to convince oneself that small o "objectivist" is not a popular terminology; it is not usual to say of universalist ethical theories that they are "objective".

Where we do find a notable "objective" (though not small o "objectivist") is in the entry on meta-ethics under the heading "moral realism":

Moral realism

Moral realism (in the robust sense; cf. moral universalism for the minimalist sense) holds that such propositions are about robust or mind-independent facts, that is, not facts about any person or group's subjective opinion, but about objective features of the world. Meta-ethical theories are commonly categorized as either a form of realism or as one of three forms of "anti-realism" regarding moral facts: ethical subjectivism, error theory, or non-cognitivism. Realism comes in two main varieties:

Ethical naturalism holds that there are objective moral properties and that these properties are reducible or stand in some metaphysical relation (such as supervenience) to entirely non-ethical properties. Most ethical naturalists hold that we have empirical knowledge of moral truths. Ethical naturalism was implicitly assumed by many modern ethical theorists, particularly utilitarians.
Ethical non-naturalism, as put forward by G. E. Moore, holds that there are objective and irreducible moral properties (such as the property of 'goodness'), and that we sometimes have intuitive or otherwise a priori awareness of moral properties or of moral truths. Moore's open question argument against what he considered the naturalistic fallacy was largely responsible for the birth of meta-ethical research in contemporary analytic philosophy." — Meta-ethics

And, of note, both these moral realisms listed, use of "objective" is referring to objects, and employed in this way it has a clear meaning that we somehow "observe" these moral properties like we do other properties about objects (either we have a moral sense, or the moral information is derivable from the empirical information); a clear meaning that follows from "object" in the word "objective", but is not synonymous with "universal"; moral rationalism is opposed to moral naturalism, yet both can be formulated to be making universalist moral claims: that universal moral claims are justified through appeals to reason for moral rationalism, and that universal moral claims are justified with respect to sensing the physical world in some way in the case of naturalism. So, this is completely compatible with what I have stated in previous comments: that to say moral principles are "objective" makes sense if we're talking about sense data in the same way we have sense data of other physical objects (that we sense what is right and wrong, whether directly or through some synthesis of such data without invoking an implicit deontological or conequentialist or vitue based evaluation that is not itself derived from sense data in a similar way).

Moral Objectivism: The view that what is right or wrong doesn’t depend on what anyone thinks is right or wrong. That is, the view that the 'moral facts' are like 'physical' facts in that what the facts are does not depend on what anyone thinks they are. Objectivist theories tend to come in two sorts:
(i) Duty Based Theories (or Deontological Theories): Theories that claim that what determines whether an act is morally right or wrong is the kind of act it is.

E.g., Immanuel Kant (1724-1804) thought that all acts should be judged according to a rule he called the Categorical Imperative: "Act only according to that maxim [i.e., rule] whereby you can at the same time will that it become a universal law." That is, he thought the only kind of act one should ever commit is one that could be willed to be a universal law.

Clearly, 'moral facts' are simply not like 'physical' facts, but differ in very critical ways, and the example of Kant that immediately follows this is very debatable a "factual statement". It's also debatable as simply truth, if we want to quibble and say facts are just any truth, independent of what anyone thinks, as clearly the requirement to will the principle to be a universal law is a thought dependent process.

No where does Kant say moral facts are similar to physical facts.

Kant goes to some lengths to justify going from physical facts (sense data) to physical principles, and that this is not a simple extension of our collection of facts (Hume is fundamentally right about induction) but transcends all our facts to arrive at principles that we believe to be universally true (we nevertheless are justified in basically ignoring the problem of induction as everyone usually does, we'll just take 900 pages to do so on this occasion).

Kant uses or develops terms such as a priori, posteori, synthetic a priori, categorical, judgement as opposed to sense data, pure reason, practical reason, transcendental idealism, and so on, precisely because his views cannot be expressed as simply stating "physical facts" and "moral facts".

The categorical imperative is built on all these distinctions and arguments to arrive at true moral principles we must transcend our moral feelings about situations in the most general sense to arrive at a duty towards all moral agents as ends in themselves. It's misleading to say the categorical imperative leads to moral facts or is itself a moral fact; its simply not clear what facts mean outside verifiable physical phenomena just as "being objective" has no clear meaning if we're not "being objective about things that are objects" (to illustrate, it's not clear what it means to say "this painting is objectively more beautiful than this other painting" whereas it is clear what we mean when we say "this table is objectively 2 meters long as opposed to my subjective feeling that it was shorter than 2 meters").

As you may know, there's lot's to argue about, but whatever these arguments about what Kant really means (and if so, was he right), it is simply a complete misrepresentation of Kant to describe him as viewing ethics as discovering 'moral facts' similar to 'physical facts'; the situation is much more complicated than viewing 'moral facts' akin to 'physical facts' even insofar as we believe they are true independently of our own minds (which transcendental idealism we can interpret to preclude in principle the independence from our own minds; that we cannot actually get out of our minds and ideas to an objective view, the actual noumena, of even mundane facts if we're now interpreting facts as agreed on phenomena, but must transcend, which is opposed to just asserting whatever we believe are facts in a naive realism that 'moral facts' seems to imply).

Now, this definition may simply be reporting how people (since Rand and who have read and largely like Rand) have been defining "moral objectivism", and so accurately reporting this usage, but that does not make the usage "have nothing to do with Rand" nor even imply the usage makes any sense. It seems pretty clear to me Objectivists made "moral objectivism" a thing and by using this terminology introduced themselves this moral taxonomy in introductory material that they can now point to and say "see, moral objectivism is a thing". People who have not thought through that it's simply not a good term as simply doesn't relate to objects if we're talking about moral principles, may also adopt the terminology as they see it elsewhere, which is fine as far as it goes, but seems to me also fine to point out the confusions that immediately arise from this classification structure, likely influence of Rand one may expect around any corner once hearing "objectivist", and pointing to the alternative definitions that seem more current in the history of philosophy and in the rest of the world.

"Objective morality" is often used interchangeably with "moral realism," but that doesn't clarify things much. As Crispin Wright quipped, "a philosopher who asserts that she is a realist about theoretical science, for example, or ethics, has probably, for most philosophical audiences, accomplished little more than to clear her throat." (But the same can be said about many philosophical terms of art.) — SophistiCat

I definitely agree that, on first sight, "objective" seems to be harmless enough as meaning "it's true of reality". However, if we're formulating moral realism as "there are real moral truths out there ... but they are not physical things ... not physical objects" then if we use objective as a substitute for realism we arrive at "objective truths about things that are not objects". It's clumsy speech at best, which is why, in my opinion, it simply didn't catch on. Rand chose "Objectivist" precisely because it wasn't referring to a clearly defined philosophical tradition at the time (and is a good contrast to bleeding heart liberals and other collectivists, bringing their subjective empathy for the poor into things), as she viewed herself as skipping over and superseding all of philosophy since Aristotle, she was fairly clear about not being part of any philosophical tradition since Aristotle.

Though I agree if one was not really aware of Rand it can seem fine to start an analysis with defining "objective moral truths" to mean "universal moral truths" (until one starts to analyse moral principles as clearly pertaining to subjects and not objects, and sticking to "objective" will simply cause confusion), but if one is aware of Rand, then defining small "o" objectivism seems very clear to me a form of historical revisionism to place Rand in a broader philosophical tradition to relate her to other more well regarded philosophers (possibility for the reasons that they made more sense).

So, this historical revisionism is of curious interest to me, but also that this particular "term of art" sets up directly the false dichotomy with moral subjectivism. And it's not only me that has pointed out the association with Randianism.

There is simply none of the "great philosophers" I am aware of that uses this term small o "moral objectivist", so creating the taxonomy tree with "moral objectivist" as the broad class of theories in opposition to moral relativism is clearly a contemporary attempt, that considering the close association with Randianism, I feel it's entirely valid to question the claims that it's not associated with Randianism and a revisionist or apologetics or nudge-nudge-wink-wink to Randians in some way. It seems pretty clear to me this whole "moral objectivist taxonomy projects" is a clear favour to Randians of putting their precious foundational identity word "objective" as a shining star atop of the mighty moral Christmas tree.

The third link you post is a book by Michael Huemer, who I've already cited, and who has long critiques of Rand.

The following responds to "The Objectivist Ethics" by Ayn Rand. I assume the reader is familiar with it. I begin with a general overview of what is wrong with it. I follow this with a set of more detailed comments, which make a paragraph-by-paragraph examination of her statements in the essay. The latter also elaborates further some of the points made in the overview. — Critique of The Objectivist Ethics - Michael Huemer

The first link you post is indeed more scholarly but is arguing for moral realism, as "objective in some way". Perusing the book (what pages are available for free), a central theme is analyzing "rational egoism" and different analytical approaches, but mainly seems to be refuting "objectivism" as a justification for believing something is true. From what I gather, a main purpose of the book is to demonstrate that moral realism is not "objectivism". My guess is the author is aware of the popularity of Objectivism arguments, as the book is published in 1989 by an American author, and the rejections of "objectivism" in various specific contexts, and focus on "rational egoism", but transposed into scholarly terms, is a terminology chosen to be both scholarly and analyzing "big O" Objectivism at the same time (big "O" Objectivism is not worth considering directly, but the basic themes of rational egoism and universal moral truths based on realism, which we can call "objective" if we want, are still relevant for analysis).

I don't know why you make so much of this. — SophistiCat

The reason I dwell on this point is that there's simply lot's of Randians in the US (on the Supreme court to boot), and simply using the term "objectivism" they clearly view as some small victory for Rand, whether they are explicit or closet supporters. I've had lot's of debates with explicit or closet Randians and setting up the terminology "Objectivist" is a very important starting point, and since it sets up false dichotomies (as they use it, such as in the OP here), I find it's best to simply keep to this point than to accept the terminology and then try to explain later that subjective truths can be universal. I have simply never encountered the term "Objectivist" outside people influenced by Rand. In doing some digging, the term does appear from time to time before Rand, but for different things, not in the way the OP uses it; opposing "objectivism" to "subjectivism" seems pretty clearly a framework started by Rand and is a false dichotomy as it pertains to morals, as I've explained (so, perhaps why the term was not used in this way before).

As the OP states:

I mean only what's also called "moral universalism" — Pfhorrest

However, moral universalism is compatible with moral subjectivism formulated in the sense that moral properties (where moral principles are said to "exist") are a matter of subjects and not objects. So, to use the terminology "moral objectivism" as equivalent to "moral universalism" seems to quite clearly setup either confusion or straight-up contradiction when talking about moral universalism that is also moral subjectivism. Likewise, if we try to more rigorously define "objective", a usual formulation is simply what different subjects will agree to, so objective depends on subjective, just many subjects perhaps debating for many a time; so, if we have a sort of Popperian view of objective built upon subjects, it's again simply confusing to then say objectivism is opposed to subjectivism. Of course, if we view "objective" as only a process or a quality that can be said of objects, measurable things, then we avoid all such confusions. If we're not using "objective" in anyway apart from saying "it's true" then it's just a confusing extra emblem that contains no meaning, as it then takes time to determine that nothing is meant more than "it's true"; but then, of course, everyone will claim to be objective in this way, including moral relativist (they are just "being objective" that no moral truths are universally true; i.e. everyone is objectivist).

This fallacy has already been addressed by Plato, and others, but probably the go to is by Kant.

To paraphrase, the idea the self sacrificing soldier feels some "noble pleasure" presupposes that the act is indeed noble according to some non-pleasure based standard of ethics.

If there was no such conception of duty apart from self pleasure or self interest, then there would simply be no conception to self-sacrifice to begin with. Anyone who did that would be just viewed as foolish and misguided; that the only reasonable approach to soldiery is to fight only insofar as it maximizes self preservation (the basis for both pleasure and interest) which would mean to desert, commit treason, kill one's own side and run off with the food, if it is expedient to survival (i.e. only fight the "enemy" if it's likely an easy enough victory with a low chance of death).

The "egoist" theorist can of course repair the situation by simply claiming that societies have developed ideas to manipulate people to sacrifice themselves for the "good" of society, but that good is actually bad and you shouldn't listen to it; in other words that, as expected, societies that survive do so due to people willing to defend and buildup those societies, but it's not reasonable for an ego to partake in such defending, only opportunistically extract benefit from the chaos of war or then the naivity of peace; that society as we know it should disintegrate if everyone was reasonably egotistical: police are worse than the mob, soldiers don't hesitate to kill their officers or each other and switch sides or run as soon as their in any real personal danger, judges only rule based on the biggest bribes, no one does business in good faith out of principle, all supply lines are full of dangerous counterfeit etc. and we would return to a system of hunter gatherer with at best close-kin ties (that we continuously try to repress for own benefit rather than our literal sons and daughters). And the critical part, is that all actors would view such a process as reasonable; of course no one would act any differently than what maximizes their gain, and if complex institutions can't exist under such conditions then complex institutions are bad and shouldn't exist.

And some do make this coherent argument, but mostly the "egoists" want the benefits of a highly prized "Western civilization", but just take all the institutions for granted and deny the altruistic component of their own conformity to the law, or enough of them as a reasonable basis for civilization. For, it sort of gives up the game that the egoist approach would lead to social break-down if everyone was extracting value and no one willing to take any risk for the sake of building value for the group without getting any in return (the self sacrifice of the soldier being the most extreme example) - reaping where another sow as it were - (i.e. collectivist actions of one form or another). Most people simply don't want to devalue the soldiers altruistic sacrifice on their behalf, so the "soldier sacrificing him or herself is for a short term pleasure" is a sort of ego-projection onto altruism; i.e. I like when people do altruistic things for me or for the good of society (the incorruptible judge, the relentless alcoholic detective, the firefighter, the police officer), but I'm not going to do those things and I don't want to conclude such people are better than me nor are doing something radically different to selfishness upon which complex society is built and I highly appreciate as a sort of refined civilization connoisseur (the only true gentlemen) ... so, I'm going to claim seemingly selfless acts are as selfish as my own selfishness just deriving a different form of pleasure.

In some cases, I get the sense the author does not agree with the self sacrificing soldier, but realizes their audience expects such actions to be praised and they'll lose attention if they don't say "yes, the soldier that jumped on a grenade to save his comrades isn't bad in my egoist framework that seems on first viewing, and perhaps every subsequent viewing, incompatible with the soldiers actions; indeed, not simply the self sacrificing but all loyal soldiers in all places and at all times as the only loyalty is to oneself, which is what egoism obviously means; therefore, considering this, here's some bullshit that paints over the picture".

In other cases, such authors seem to be genuinely committed to the idea the soldier's sacrifice for freedom is "good" and also committed to "egoism" as the only ethical foundation, and so concluding the self sacrificing soldier is actually acting fully egotistical for some short term perceived benefit or pleasure or forward looking reverse-nostalgia to being remembered nobly, is the only available solution if the idea these two notions are simply incompatible is investigated, as it's clearly "unfair".

However, in both cases, if "the good" is self-interest of one form or another, then taking on harm for the benefit of others is clearly "bad" and following this logic nowhere appears that there's some "pleasure" based on some perceived virtuous actions toward others (we don't care about them) or a pleasure based on the opinion of others (we don't care about the opinions of others in themselves, only insofar as knowledge of them can be used for self benefit, which is logically impossible to do if one is dead). So, clearly the pleasure the soldier feels is not a "good pleasure" but a pleasure born from social conditioning that is bad, of which the entire egotistical project is to rid oneself of; the short term pleasure, if it is there, clearly can only come from social manipulation which we want to avoid in the egoist framework. An "enlightened egoist" would simply not consider jumping on the grenade, but would only be considering self preservation; appreciative if some fool did jump on it, but otherwise just trying to get out of the way of the impending shrapnel. If the pleasure isn't even there for the foolish soldier that does jump, maybe the soldier really is acting selflessly and this whole "it's a pleasure to be blown up in the short term" is hapless psychological projection onto a non-refutable hypothesis (which can be ever guarded preciously within the self as totally true).

Also of note, when adopting this system there does not remain standing some "standard of ethic" apart from self interest in this pleasure maximizing sense. The question "the dictators benefits from doing something ethical" simply doesn't make sense. We simply don't care about other people and their misguided ethical notions that are not egotistical nor society as a whole and if it's going in a "good direction" or not. All other ethical standards other than selfishness are simply false. There can't be two mutually exclusive definitions of ethics within a coherent ethic; it simply makes no sense to say "only selfishness is reasonable ... but ... nevertheless I can tweak my actions to be compatible with (i.e. be an entrepreneurs and not a mobster) and I can tweak institutions (support them being not totally corrupt) to still result in good social outcomes' see, I'm still a good person according to social norms, which I just started by saying are false if not selfish"; if only selfishness is the reasonable ethic, then there simply is no standard upon which to judge the law abiding entrepreneur is better in principle than the mobster (or the entrepreneur that is also a mobster and captures the institutions meant to regulate his activity by exploiting the selfish philosophy or simply cowardice of the, so called, public servants within that institution) and there is no standard upon which to judge society as a whole as "better off with non-corrupt judges"; we simply don't care whether judges are corrupt or not in some general sense if we are only focused on ourself, they should be corrupt if they can get away with it and they obviously can get away with it if they are all trying to be corrupt (which they all should be trying to be), good for them, but, what matters to me (which is all that counts in such a philosophy) is simply understanding whatever the judge believes, in order to get what I want if we happen to make an encounter in a trial (if he's a fool, I'll need to invent some socialist bullshit to justify my actions are in the public good, or maybe just kill all the witnesses if I can get away with it; if he's smart, then I'll need to have the bigger bribe or bigger threat to get a satisfactory exchange for the service I want).

I've lived in the US my entire life and associating lower-case "objectivism" with Randianism sounds very weird and parochial to my ear — Pfhorrest

That's because Randians put some effort to reformulate Randianism without explicitly defending Rand (as she said the quiet pars out loud, and that becomes a nuisance in the long term). Turning the "O" in "Objectivism" to an "o" is another small step in this process. I have simply never encountered the term "objectivism" outside the Randian tradition (i.e. people who have read Rand and appreciated her work, empathize with her and her protagonists and agree with the main point).

FWIW, a quick Google for "moral objectivism" shows only #6 out of the top ten results having anything to do with Rand, and the rest using the more general sense that I'm using here. — Pfhorrest

I ran the same experiment, so here we can be objective about something.

#0

This site can’t be reached, www.ucs.mun.ca took too long to respond.
Try:

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ERR_CONNECTION_TIMED_OUT — Moral Relativism and Objectivism

#1

Robust moral realism, the meta-ethical position that ethical sentences express factual propositions about robust or mind-independent features of the world, and that some such propositions are true.

Moral universalism, the meta-ethical position that some system of ethics or morality is universally valid, without any further semantic or metaphysical claim.

The ethical branch of Ayn Rand's philosophy of Objectivism (Ayn Rand). — Moral objectivism - wikipedia

So either talking about something we already have a word for ... or talking about Rand.

#2

Moral objectivism is the position that moral truths exist independantly from opinion.

There are several versions of moral objectivism, of varying levels of strentgth. They area, from weakest to strongest:

Moral universalism
Moral realism
Moral absolutism — Moral Objectivism -

"Philosophy Index" is made for homeschooling by North Gate Academy. Essentially every link is broken; going to the home page and clicking "Camus" (or any other philosopher) just gets to a "404 not found" page. According to North Gate Academy: "Northgate strives to foster a culture of excellence in learning based on biblical teachings, in a flexible and nurturing online learning environment." So, not dedicated to philosophy as such.

If this is google's second choice, rather than Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, or Oxford, or even just any university online material ... maybe this tells us something, but moving on.

#3

On a side note: Don’t confuse moral objectivism with Objectivism. Objectivism is an ethical theory
proposed by Ayn Rand which is related to Ethical Egoism, a theory we will discuss later in the course. — Introduction to Ethics - Indian Hills community colledge

I can only help but notice the close association with Rand and that Randiasm will be taught in this "introduction to Ethics".

#4
[quote=Our Morality: A Defense of Moral Objectivism - Mitchell Silver
;https://philosophynow.org/issues/83/Our_Morality_A_Defense_of_Moral_Objectivism]
Among the rules that can motivate actions and determine judgments are those that classify all possible actions as either permissible or impermissible. I call such rules ‘categorical permissibility rules’ (henceforth, simply ‘permissibility rules’). Common examples of permissibility rules include: it is always impermissible to act in a way that will not increase overall happiness or reduce overall suffering (John Stuart Mill promoted that one); it is always impermissible to treat someone merely as a means (a favorite of Immanuel Kant’s); never do to others that which is hateful to you (the Talmudic version of a commonplace in religious ethics); always obey whatever the priest tells you God has commanded (another commonplace in religious traditions); and, never act against self-interest (Ayn Rand). Less common, but equally possible permissibility rules include: never run for a bus (Mel Brooks); and, never act against Mitchell Silver’s interests (no one, alas). There are an endless number of possible permissibility rules.]

This is simply a bizarre essay in terms of making new labels for things referred to within the essay.

Why makeup the term "categorical permissibility rules" without explaining how it is either exactly the same or then in some way different than Kant's "Categorical Imperative", and, moreover, go onto to reference Kant as an example of a categorical permissibility rule in the next sentence? Also, if all these previous authors such as John Stuart Mill, Kant, Talmudic authors, common place religious traditions, Ayn Rand, Mel Brooks, it makes us wonder whether there was a term for these contrasting ideas with moral subjectivism (which the author clearly doesn't understand that moral principles existing subjectively does not necessarily imply they cannot be universal, as they can nevertheless be true for all subjective view points in one way or another; so he is just ignorant about the subject matter) and to contrast with moral relativism.

The author also doesn't follow the above quote with the obvious followup claim that insofar as these "categorical permissibility rules" are incompatible with each other, some or all of them are wrong and have no justification for believing in them, but rather goes on to defend commitment to one's chosen "permissibility rule" as a reasonable thing, which is moral relativism.

We could go on, but the casual mention of Ayn Rand along side Kant, Mill, the Talmud, is clearly someone who is self consciously reformulating the foundations of Randianism (either to attract that Randian audience or then to show Randianism as "reasonable" for the authors own empathy with Rand). We can also notice in passing how the only principle mentioned in "other religions" is to " obey whatever the priest tells you God has commanded" rather than "do onto others as you would have them do onto you" (Jesus) or "Love the whole world as if it were your self; then you will truly care fore all things" (Tao) or "Teach this triple truth to all: A generous heart, kind speech, and a life of service and compassion are the things which renew humanity" (Buddha) ... but nope, the "commonplace belief" in religion outside the Talmud is "do as the priest says".

#5

"My morality, the morality of reason, is contained in a single axiom: existence exists—and in a single choice: to live. The rest proceeds from these. To live, man must hold three things as the ruling values of his life: Reason—Purpose—Self-esteem. Reason, as his only tool of knowledge—Purpose, as his choice of the happiness which that tool must proceed to achieve—Self-esteem, as his inviolate certainty that his mind is competent to think and his person is worthy of happiness, which means: worthy of living. These three values imply and require all of man's virtues…"
— Ayn Rand , Atlas Shrugged .

For thousands of years, people have been taught that goodness consists in serving others. "Love your brother as yourself" teach the Christian scriptures. "From each according to his ability, to each according to his need" preach the Marxists. Even the liberal Utilitarian philosophers, many of whom defended free market capitalism, taught that one should act always to attain "the greatest good for the greatest number." The result of this code has been a bloody trail of wars and revolutions to enforce self-sacrifice, and an endless struggle in society to achieve equality among people. — What is the Objectivist Position in Morality (Ethics)? - Atlas society

I suppose this is the one of the six that was indeed associated with Rand.

#6

"Objectivism" denotes the thesis that morality is objective. Subjectivism holds that morality is subjective. Relativism holds that morality is relative. In the sequel, I am interested in distinguishing moral objectivism from its denial; therefore, I assume that "relative" and "subjective" both mean "non-objective". If they do not already mean this, then I stipulate that meaning hereby. There are a number of people who believe moral relativism so defined. — Moral Objectivism by Michael Huemer - This is an undergraduate paper from circa 1992

... just, wow. Xism is X, Yism is Y, Zism is Z; I assume Y and Z both mean not-X; I don't know if this is true ... so in case it's not I'm stipulating it anyway??? :(

Sigh, again, subjectivist approach to ethics can be simply that moral principles are properties of subjects, not objects, but this does not stop moral claims from being true for all subjects (universal to all moral agents).

Michael Huemer has long essays critiquing Rand's "Objectivism" while building his alternative "objectivism", and is really a great example typifying this group of people in the US who see Rand as worthy of lengthy reflection and critique, whether water to fill one's vase or an anvil to sharpen one's blade.

General Conclusion:

On just the quality of the sources and authors alone, without reviewing the content, one can conclude that "objectivist" isn't really a thing in world philosophical debate; it is confined to the US and not associated with major publications nor major authors and philosophers.

If we look into the content, we find the authors specifically reference Rand in their discussion of "objectivism". It is simply the history of the term that it was posited by Randians as a more "proper philosophical" reformulation of the basic Randian approach (inventing a philosophical tradition after Rand in which Rand is just one formulation; that Rand was right for being a "moral objectivist" even there's some fault in her particular "Objectivism"; but then denying small "o" objectivism has nothing to do with Rand is like positing small "k" kantianism has nothing to do with Kant; it's just juvenile hair splitting of terminology distinctions that have no basis in history and clearly don't make sense; it's simply not reasonable to use the label small "k" kant, have a similar starting point and terminology, a "Categorical Permissibility" if you will, but refuse any relation to the big "K" Kant). The labels of moral universalism, moral absolutism, moral rationalism, deontology, moral naturalism, already exist, so to rename one or all of these concepts "moral objectivism" without any need is, in the contemporary scene, to place oneself in the Randian tradition and not these other traditions (in searching around "objectivism" was used a bit as an expression, but was synonymous to moral naturalism; "objectivism" as simply moral universalism is not naturalism, as there are universalist moral theories not founded on nature but logic and "moral agents" in the most general sense or then founded on the divine, neither of which are based on nature as we find it).

Equating "objective" with "reasonable" is a Randian invention, and all the top 6 google hits for "moral objectivism" are American sources or authors, most mention Rand explicitly.

The small "o" objectivists I have encountered are people who are trying to reformulate Rand's basic program (wittingly or unwittingly), are deep in her frame as red pillars would say, and see "objective" as the natural alternative to "relativism" based on the mistaken association of relativism with subjectivism (they see Rand's basic terminology, aka false dichotomy, as making sense but want to draw slightly different conclusions than Rand; rather than see Rand as total nonsense and joining the philosophical conversation and using the common terminology, and lack of an obvious false dichotomy between "subjective" and "universally true", found within the debates that happened between Aristotle and Rand as a superior idea; and, to be sure, we should also be clear that Aristotle didn't view moral principles as similar to physical objects).

All philosophers of note view moral principles as subjective, a property of subjects and not objects, because it's obviously true; how we subjects might justify moral principles and are those justifications true of all subjects (through reason or divine decree or happenstance) or then fundamentally arbitrary or then individually contingent (somehow neither arbitrary nor universal) being the key contentions. Likewise, nearly all philosophers would say their approach is "reasonable", and so whatever moral principles they decide on (for themselves or for everyone or for some) follows reasonably from reasonable things to believe; moral relativists are also saying their moral principles, which they are free to choose, follow from the reasonable conclusion that moral relativism is true and they are thus free to choose (just as having a preference for blue over red without insisting everyone have the same preference doesn't make one unreasonable; so, another false dichotomy to say moral objectivism views morality as derivable from reason in contrast to moral relativism that does not).

Philosophers have proposed similar "sense experience" of moral principles as we have with objects, but have been quite cognizant that such "moral sense" is not the same kind of sense as heat or sight; there's also already a word for such a proposed sense, "our conscience"; this "conscience" would be the closest philosophical idea of morality being objective (we can sense moral principles just as we can sense objects; i.e. we can be objective about both and "sense the truth" in some sense and in a similar way; the difference being we cannot use an apparatus to settle a debate about whether one moral principle is weightier than another as we can use an apparatus to settle a debate about whether this rock is weightier than this log, and it is this lack of apparatus to settle debates that leads such philosophers to be clear moral principles are not objects); this lack of an apparatus to measure an object is the main difficulty these philosophers try to contend with, and so again, even if there is a proposed "moral sense" such moral principles to be sensed are not objects (if Rand or her "objective" followers read any philosophy, they would have realize simply saying "I'm the objective one" doesn't suddenly conjure the truth out of thousands of years of philosophical debate between different subjects). So, simply following our conscience in a naive way (our altruism if we feel it) would be the theory most inline with "objectivism" based on what it means to conclude about something objectively (through our senses).

I was leery about going along with "objectivist," but I thought Randianism was obscure and disreputable enough that there would be little chance of confusion. — SophistiCat

Yes, my remark was vis-a-vis the OP. I don't have a problem with OP's defining their own terms ... but I don't have a problem criticizing those term selections either.

If you have never lived in the US then Randianism does seem completely disreputable and irrelevant. However, for those in the US, the word "objectivist" has clear Randian connotations, and insisting on the idea that "still, morals can be objective; objectivism as such can still make sense" I would interpret to be closet Randianism (a basic empathy with the Randian objective, but without committing to defending her arguments directly, as that hasn't worked out well).

I think Pfhorrest is apt to treat moral propositions much like a physicalist would treat propositions about the physical world, and he believes that we can use something like a scientific method for discovering moral truths. In any case "objective morality" is a term of art, though I wouldn't have a use for it. — SophistiCat

Yes, I understand the basic idea of the program, but clearly morals aren't discoverable by a physicalist process as such, moral principles are clearly not objects like a chair or a fork. Universal morals can still only exist subjectively, just with the qualifier of being true for all subjects (such as a categorical imperative binding all moral agents), and clearly cannot exist as an object with measurable properties; we can never settle a moral principle debate by simply weighing or timing or measuring the distance or angle of some apparatus with respect to some physical object.

Normally, I don't care so much about such labels, I'd be willing to roll with it as you have been doing and being content to just note traditions that have used other words for the same idea, but in this case the label more or less contains the basic error in reasoning which is a misunderstanding of the scientific process, and so I think it is worth dwelling upon. The word "objectivist" simply sets up all sorts of bait and switch fallacy as it's associated with the scientific method (that clearly "works") but also employed colloquially as a sort of "virtue" of removing one's biases; however, neither does the scientific method nor attempting to remove biases conclude with any moral principles. In the case of science as such the scientism fallacy is well trodden ground, but the more colloquial interpretation of "being objective" is a more subtle fallacy in the category of the virtue moral distinction (more subtle as pertaining to inner qualities, so at least on the same side, or the perhaps somewhere in the middle if we view our faculties as objects, of the subjective-objective divide, and clearly closely related to moral principles as such as we require virtues to implement any moral project effectively); the usual examples being discipline and courage being a virtue we can understand the import of but doesn't resolve any moral debate as to what goals one should pursue with discipline and courage, and so dedicating oneself to such virtues as somehow fundamental is simply a ruse to avoid reviewing one's actual moral values and activities; such as the Nazi's for whom discipline and courage was everything -- and, to make no mistake, I would closely associate with Randianism: it's all about feeling better than other people, in the case of Rand having the virtue of "being objective" (a more "modern" virtue than the ancients listed, and therefore quite sophisticated), which for her meant despising altruism and a basic misunderstanding of the idea of collective action, makes you better than other people.

I think the fact is that COVID-19 will surely be a focus of research even after the pandemic, hence there will be a lot of scrutiny about it. Hence I think this question can be answered. Simply too many labs are focusing on COVID-19 now. Yet unfortunately the answer won't make everybody happy, so it can remain quite vague as many things do at the present and you have to know your biology. — ssu

The problem is that the question is simply not resolvable in a lab. All three scenarios do not form a refutable hypothesis (a recipe that if followed, can confirm the hypothesis to any good faith actor).

For instance, it's been reported yesterday that the particular strain of coronavirus that COVID19 came from has found in the host bats. This does not rule out a lab accident, nor does it rule out a bioweapon. Obviously, labs collecting bat viruses could accidentally release one even without ever knowing they even had it. Likewise, bioweapons creators may seek to find viruses in nature that are the closest to being a strategic threat (either to create a weapon or investigate such potential weapons to mount a defense); indeed, this is "plan A" in the bioweapon creation tool box.

So, unless extremely obvious gene-editing techniques are used, none of the scenarios are really resolvable in a lab.

In terms of "what's mostly likely" given the available evidence, the problem is likelihood requires a null hypothesis to form. Getting a royal flush does not indicate in itself cheating as the null hypothesis is that royal flushes happen, as do "lucky streaks" etc. Following an individual player we need some time for "lucky hands" to happen in enough frequency to indicate cheating. However, if we're looking at a whole population of gamblers there is going to be people on entirely natural lucky streaks on the tail end.

The problem with calculating a null hypothesis for the pandemic is that a pandemic can happen at any time starting essentially anywhere, and has, so far, happened only once in our modern economy (which is very different from the 1918 or black plague economy; so these reference events inform us a type of phenomena can happen, but don't really provide a statistical natural background context of some sort). The statistical problems approaching this kind of unique event that can happen anywhere on the planet over a long period of time are essentially non-resolvable; any event of this kind is going to have all sorts of "peculiarities" associated with it, and there's little way to calculate what we should expect in terms of the "natural peculiarities" of a big unique event that can happen anywhere.

Relativism is most commonly associated with the view that what is moral is defined by the moral standards of one's culture. In that sense it still has an objective component - it just makes morality more granular and more entangled with human subjectivity than a thoroughgoing objectivist like Kant or Mill might like. — SophistiCat

If it's along the lines of Rorty or Berlin, or even Chomsky for that matter, they usually call this pluralism to differentiate with relativism, which is usually referenced as the "relative the individual and what the individual thinks or feels".

Pluralism contextualizes things to cultures and groups, but does not deny the requirement of some absolute moral standards (many cultures can be "good" in very different ways with some moral onus to respect the culture one is in, but this does not mean all cultures are good).

The problem with pluralism, or "group relativism", as a moral foundation in itself, is that it does not resolve any particular ethical issue. Since cultures aren't static and "what is good" even within one culture is always in motion, any particular ethical issue we can always claim to be simply ahead of our times and the culture will catch up and vindicate us. So, even within pluralism we can always extend the logic to collapse to individual relativism on any particular issue.

Pluralists authors generally don't deny this problem and that one still needs individual commitment to some absolutist ethical standards to function (from which different cultures can simply become "bad"; which is a feature we generally want as we do want to say Naziism was simply bad and Nazi's don't make a credible defense in saying their culture was pro-genocide).

Pluralists such as Berlin, Rorty, Chomsky want to avoid unnecessary conflict through intercultural respect and understanding, insofar as their pluralism goes, but they do not view pluralism as a moral foundation in itself; they would all reject "my culture tells me this is ok, therefore it is ok".

Berlin (in my view) is the most clear minded about this. Rorty and Chomsky seem much more reluctant to articulate that pluralism does not resolve one's own ethical problems, as they seem to want to avoid getting into any "Kantian style" categorical imperative debates (though for radically different reasons; Rorty rejects the idea of "truth correspondence" theories full stop, which makes universal moral claims a dubious enterprise; whereas Chomsky seems to want to have "correspondence truth" but only scientific and that therefore his "universal values" that make pluralism work are somehow coming from social evolution, "wide agreement" or a "narrow part of the spectrum" or similar phrasing, at least in his debate with Foucault that's what I understood).

Of note, Rorty goes to some lengths to argue against identity politics as a form of "multi-culturalism" and seems to view Chomsky as too radically pluralist.

Another notable author in the pluralism debate is McIntyre, who seems to agree with pluralism in principle ... but because it doesn't work (results in unresolvable differences) we must go back to being good Catholics.

I'm not sure we have a disagreement on these points, or it's simply adding some points to your points.

I would also like to emphasize what other's have pointed out, that we have "universalism" and "absolutism" to refer to ideas of the "true-true" about ethical principles, and that using the word "objectivism" is simply associating oneself with Randianism and the argument "objectively we should still use the word objectivst even if we don't agree with Rand" isn't really convincing as we already have other words and "objective" isn't a good word about moral truths as "being objective" connotes looking at a situation and trying to see the physical facts for what what they are (i.e. what are the physical objects as independent from my own subjective interpretation as is possible to achieve). No philosopher posits that moral truths, if they exist, are the same kind of thing as physical objects of which it makes sense to be "objective" about (that we can simply go and measure a moral truth as 5kg, 50cm tall and 40cm wide); indeed, the whole point of the word "objective" is in the context that we have different values, goals, and experience but can still agree on some physical facts about the real world (if we both make a good faith attempt at "being objective" and collaborate on at least this issue to start as common ground); so, as it is normally used it's simply a self contradiction to be "objective" about said values and goals (which remain, in essentially any philosophy, subjective things that we cannot observe in the same way as a chair, regardless of what justifications we have for said values and goals).

You're using a proposition here, the truth value of which you do not know, assume it as true and then conclude that that is any type of evidence. — Benkei

I just don't see where you get that from. It seems really clear in the paragraph you cite.

If there is an HIV gene in coronavirus that is evidence — boethius

I'm saying here is that "if there is an HIV gene in coronavirus that is evidence"; in other words, a fact of the case.

(and, please note, I say "assuming this is true" in my analysis) — boethius

I was analyzing the Nobel Laureates argument, of which my first step is to see if it's sound or not, and I conclude it's unsound (i.e. if the premise is true, the conclusion does not follow; it's pretty normal to assume the premises are true in prefacing an analysis of soundness; if the argument is sound, then validity becomes the next step to check; since I conclude it's not sound, I simply don't care about the premises).

However, simply because the argument is not sound does not render the purported facts that the argument is based on untrue and furthermore not-evidence.

This is all I'm explaining in saying:

that would need to be established if one wanted to argue that the virus was genetically engineered with HIV (if other evidence came to light, such as testimony of a researcher claiming they were involved in mixing HIV and coronavirus, it would of course be necessary to establish whether HIV genes really are in coronavirus in the first place, because it's important evidence to such an argument). — boethius

If it's true, then it's relevant evidence. This seems obvious to me for the reason I explain.

I'm making an "if" based statement: If it is true, it would have some relevance and be counted as evidence, as it's plausibly connected to the case.

This is in contrast to things that are true but don't have any plausible connection to the case (i.e. "the moon orbits the earth" I think we would agree is true, but also agree is not evidence in the coronavirus origins case), and also in contrast to things that are simply untrue (i.e. "Trump went on national television and admitted to personally creating coronavirus", I think we would agree is false and therefore not evidence because it is simply not a fact).

Again, you seem to just want to gatekeep what counts as evidence and so what arguments are allowed to be made in the first place. I am simply doing no such gatekeeping. If facts are consistent with a theory, I'm willing to admit that those facts are consistent with the proposed theory, why pretend otherwise. If the theory is plausibly connected to the origins of coronavirus I am willing to label such facts "evidence". Doesn't make the theory true, but if I'm not able to rule it out then the facts it's based on seem to me relevant evidence in the case (i.e. something we would want to keep a note of in the event further evidence starts to confirm the theory in question).

If you have no issue with any of my analysis, that your only issue is with labeling things evidence until "the case is closed" and we know the truth and can thus separate the relevant facts from the irrelevant (i.e. make a box of the "evidence that proved the case"), then I'd have no problem keeping to the more rigorous terminology of "potential evidence"; that everything that is a fact and plausibly connected to the case, has merely only the "potential" to become "evidence" in the event the case can be closed and we can go through the "evidence locker" and throw out all the details that turned out to be irrelevant (i.e. throw out the "evidence" from the "evidence locker" that we no longer need and therefore is "not evidence"). But if that's our disagreement, it seems your issue is with your own profession and not with me; it seems simply the case that detectives and lawyers claim to be "collecting evidence" and do not scrupulously stick to the more rigorous "collecting potential evidence" to put in the "potential evidence locker" to then "throw out potential evidence that turns out not to be actual evidence"; and so, evidence is used both in the context of "potential evidence to make a given case provided further evidence comes to light that proves it" (which is inclusive of everything that might be relevant) as well as in the context of "the case was proven based on this body of evidence" (which is exclusive of the things that turned out to be irrelevant). I completely agree that a profession which prides itself on rigorous thinking simply makes a fool of itself in using the word evidence to have different extension referents in different contexts and in the same case (before and after it is closed), and it is this sloppy non-rigorous diction that gives rise to the idea that "there's evidence that supports an argument" being true can be seen to imply, to the general public, that "the argument is the most likely because there is evidence" (i.e. the legal community has setup the opportunity for bait-and-switch fallacy on the ambiguity of the meaning of evidence; a crime? I think that is a case here we can settle).

You are willing to entertain that because Jane was murdered in her bedroom and because John's handprints are all over the house but not yet found in her bedroom that this is circumstantial evidence of John having murdered Jane. — Benkei

I haven't used circumstantial evidence in this way.

I'm willing to entertain a Nobel Laureate's (for work on HIV) claims about HIV and coronavirus, in the sense that claims by such a person warrants some analysis; otherwise, it's just picking and choosing experts.

I'm willing to assign the label of "circumstantial evidence" to facts about circumstances that are at least somewhat connected to the case, even if it doesn't help draw conclusions as to likelihood, now or in the future. This is how wikipedia describes "circumstantial evidence": weak evidence that is compatible with contradictory accounts; wikipedia does not say circumstantial evidence needs to make a scenario "more likely" (it's a fact of the case compatible with a theory; doesn't mean that theory is more likely).

I've gone to some lengths to demonstrate the same circumstantial evidence can be accounted for in all 3 scenarios, and that none of the circumstantial evidence (at the moment) makes any of the 3 scenarios "more likely" in any meaningful statistical sense (every "this is more likely" theory I have seen so far simply expresses the "feeling" of the theorizer based on their world view).

For instance, I go to some trouble to explain that even distance to the lab maybe no more significant than the null hypothesis (both in the distribution of labs, population centers, and likely pandemic virus reservoirs; as well as the sense that novel viruses are likely to be first noticed near a lab). However, that the first notable outbreak was at some distance to a lab is still "circumstantial evidence", just doesn't tell us much at the moment of what conclusion is more likely (i.e. it's circumstantial evidence an intense amount of statistics would be required to plausibly interpret).

When I describe a scenario and the circumstantial evidence that's compatible with such a scenario, it's not to say that scenario is more likely because there is "circumstantial evidence", it's just to show such a scenario is compatible with what we know so far; I do so for each scenario to demonstrate my opinion that no scenario can be ruled out as far as I can tell. To say one scenario "is more likely" would be an amazingly complicated statistical exercise, and so I don't have an opinion on likelihood either; I'm sure such studies will be done, but I doubt very much the authors will claim to have actually increased confidence in one conclusion or another (the "models of history" that would be needed are beyond our grasp to make; i.e. the best we can do is very simplified assumptions of how the world works, so simplified that it doesn't really tell us anything).

So, I am not providing any analysis of what's "more likely" but I am interested to analyse arguments that do make such claims (whether the Nobel Laureate claiming it's spliced from HIV; claims that it's for sure not engineered; claims that it's likely an accident; all three I am willing to analyse, and all three I find unsound; which is why I don't care about what we label "circumstantial evidence" or not, in each case the conclusions don't follow from the circumstantial evidence offered as premises, so who cares about whether the circumstantial evidence in question is even true; it doesn't matter if there's an HIV gene as it's presence tells us nothing since HIV is already a pandemic and we can expect it will spread successful genes around in co-infection events; it doesn't matter if there's no "telltale" signs of bio engineering as a bioweapon engineer may go to some lengths to remove such telltale signs (i.e. making sure the genome accomplishes the task at hand within the bounds of what peers will view as "statistically normal"); it doesn't matter the distance to the lab if we don't have the null hypothesis expected radius of such pandemic outbreak to such labs in our particular moment in history).

There is no circumstantial evidence, only a hypothesis which is not supported by any type of evidence. — Benkei

I'm not sure what you are disagreeing with.

The very definition of circumstantial evidence I cited from wikipedia is that it is very weak and compatible with mutually exclusive hypothesis. I am using circumstantial evidence in the way wikipedia describes.

Your issue with my statements seem to be you want to gate-keep the word evidence for the lawyer community.

If someone brings up a fact, and it seems plausibly tied to the case, I simply see no problem calling it evidence and analyzing from there. Questioning whether it counts as evidence or not seems a sterile debate. A detective tries to collect or record all the "evidence" in a case, without prejudice as to what's important enough to be called "evidence".

I have no problem saying "we have evidence" and concluding "based on the evidence, no scenario seems more likely", which is my position.

So, if you want to set yourself up as arbiter of what counts as evidence (what premises people are even allowed to propose for making an argument), then I am happy to continue there.

If we ignore the debate about evidence, our real difference, however, is you seem to think a lack of evidence proving (or even establishing as more slightly more likely) that the pandemic is a lab accident or purposefully released, means it's more likely it's natural.

Though I agree there's no evidence indicating a lab accident or purposeful release of the virus is more likely, I disagree that the natural occurring hypothesis is by definition the default hypothesis.

The paper "proving it's not engineered" is clearly bad faith. It is simply a non-refutable statement, as we cannot prove it's impossible to engineer a virus to not-appear-engineered, which would be a clear and strong motivation in the scenario where the virus is engineered. Indeed, it's fairly trivial to be convinced that such an engineering method is feasible, since both natural biology and biology manipulation are stochastic process so we can simply repeat techniques until they randomly appear natural.

So, if it's non-refutable to begin with, it's not science whatever these so called scientists are doing in the paper.

A scientifically valid approach would require, as a first step, a challenge to experts around the world to engineer viruses to appear natural and the team conducting the study trying to differentiate between these and other viruses actually taken from nature. If they are able to find the engineered virus in each challenge submitted by other labs around the world, then the idea they have such a detection ability becomes more credible. We would still need to wonder whether bio-weapons labs are not far, far ahead for such an exercise to be meaningful, but at least we have a starting point of a claim that has been properly submitted to refutation. So, this would be a refutable based framework for determining the engineered can be consistently differentiated from the natural by experts trying to defeat such detection, at least in the current state of civilian bioengineering.

Without such an adversarial framework, the claims these academics are making are simply their opinions based on non-refutable reasoning; i.e. they are not doing science as is understood by their contemporaries.

Now, that such academics are willing to squander their intellectual credibility and demonstrate they have either no basic critical thinking skills, no understanding of the scientific method or then they are simply liars, doesn't mean the virus is engineered, only that stupid is as stupid does.

Be that as it may, to be abundantly clear, I have not claimed here coronavirus has a "HIV gene" only that the we can't simply ignore a Nobel Prize winner (for work on HIV) claim that it does and it proves it's engineered (we need to actually analyse what we can before determining that this Nobel Prize winner's analysis makes no sense, which I bother to do, and by extension the Nobel Prize makes no sense as a standard of the "true-true" expertise).

I legitimately do not see any compelling reason to believe any of the scenarios (natural, accident, or on purpose) are ruled out in any significant way based on the information that's available.

All arguments, presented here or elsewhere of what is "more likely", seem to be mainly about the world view of the person proposing the argument. If one's world view is that "China would, like, for sure never release an epidemic with pandemic potential on their own population" then one is likely to conclude it's either natural or an accident. If one believes that "scientists are, like, totally competent and there's never, ever any reason to question scientific institutions are for the public good, even in totalitarian China", then one is likely to conclude it's not a lab leak. If one "doesn't believe in coincidences" in these tense geopolitical times, then one is likely to suspect foul play.

I realize Trump supporters are essentially rabid to believe it's not natural, so as to have a scapegoat. However, if there really is no compelling evidence one way or another, my view is that it only helps them to claim otherwise. Putting "credibility" behind the opposite of what Trump supporters, or Trump himself, believes simply because they believe it and entertaining the possibility "helps Trump", simply erodes the credibility put forth to back such counterclaims, and boost Trump supporters when they can show their basic ideas have not in fact been "ruled out" and alternative "debunking" has holes.

In my opinion, it's more productive to accept there is no compelling evidence (we just don't know, and I think likely at this point we will never know; and if we do find out, it won't be from any analysis that happens on the internet) because there is no compelling evidence, in order to move onto what we can know: which is if US intelligence suspected a bio-attack or then a bio-weapon leak, obviously the US administration did not do anything about it, for instance contain it when it was still possible to have an effective containment policy (what I advocated when I first joined this thread many moons ago) and when they failed to act on that, followup with further failure to prepare; and, more importantly, the global system, and in particular the US, was knowingly vulnerable to such a pandemic threat because ignoring it maximized short term profits: In other words, the market is not efficient at allocating resources, and, in addition, the US security establishment does not bother much to ensure the US is secure from threats to US citizens that don't happen to coincide with arms sales and imperialism (i.e. either way, US citizens aren't the object of "US security"; well, not in the way the republicans previously liked to imagine). So, regardless of the scenario of the emergence of the pandemic, we can draw the same conclusions: If it was an attack then it's an easy attack exploiting a weakness elites in the West didn't care to fix because of money and they don't care about the poor as they can get top-notch care and just hide from the virus anyways. If it's a lab leak, then obviously far more regulation is needed about these labs and drastically or fully cutting plane travel ties with any dystopian totalitarian state which cannot be trusted to police best practices. If it's natural, then capitalism as we know it today, in particular in the US, was obviously unprepared for a known risk along with bad public health policies in general that amplify that risk, unwilling to do a flight freeze in the critical moment because "will someone please think of the airplane stonks!", lacking the institutions to keep society stable in such a health and economic crisis, yet unhesitating to bail out the wealthy while they huddled in their compounds and traveled to islands and yachts and New Zealand to insulate themselves from the consequence of their governing system. I.e. we can draw sound conclusions about our leaders and sound policy recommendations about the current system in any of the potential scenarios.

I am saying that there is a higher likelihood based on circumstances of the case, not that there is right now any direct evidence. — schopenhauer1

Though I agree with your general position vis-a-vis @Benkei, that circumstantial evidence is still evidence we need to consider (if only to guide further investigation as you point out), it is not correct to say, at this time, "there is a higher likelihood" it is a lab accident.

To arrive at such a conclusion, we'd need to build numerical models of the different scenarios. To conclude the outbreak was "suspiciously close" to the lab in the first place, we'd need a statistical model that tells us the places where a pandemic outbreak is likely (population center, close contact with viral reservoirs) and some average distance to labs that study such viruses. If labs that study viruses are closely correlated with reservoirs and population centers within which an outbreak is most likely, then we can't really conclude anything based on the location of the outbreak and the location of the lab.

People have literally gone to jail based on statistical evidence (provided by legit statisticians) that didn't bother to run the null hypothesis scenario (which goes to show how easy these mistakes are to make).

So, until running the null hypothesis of the expected distance between labs that study viruses and completely independent outbreaks of those viruses, we can't do much with simply the distance between the outbreak and the lab. We may find that the lab will be likely in the city center, as that's where people work, and the first noticeable outbreak will likely be in the city center because that's where people are densely packed together to support a really noticeable outbreak.

It's still circumstantial evidence (a fact of the case that there is a lab at some distance to the outbreak), but we cannot conclude this circumstantial evidence renders any scenario "more likely" without actual
statistical models and calculations (which would be a lot of work).

Where there is stronger evidence is the claim employees of the lab had a side business of selling research animals to the exotic animal market that has been identified as the likely source of the initial outbreak.

But let's first consider how @Benkei is able to show this also wouldn't count as evidence even if it was true (which I am not claiming it is true, there are propaganda efforts from state actors spinning things one way or another; so I am fairly skeptical of any given purported fact).

And to be abundantly clear, whatever the origin of the virus, Trump has been completely incompetent in managing the crisis, and the virus origin issue in the right wing spin machine is largely to deflect from this, invoking mostly unsound or preposterous theories. However, not analyzing things properly, that revealing an argument to be unsound does not establish that the conclusions are untrue (if we have no sound and valid argument to the contrary, which at the moment we don't), in my opinion helps the right wing spin machine as they can point to these flaws in reasoning.

At the moment there is simply no strong evidence for any scenario; we cannot exclude natural random emergence, we cannot exclude a lab accident, we cannot exclude deliberate design and release (researchers who claim "there's no genetic evidence the virus is engineered", such as the lancet paper on this topic, are not considering what equally, or more, skilled actors would do to try to outwit exactly such an analysis, and it's simply intellectually dishonest to not entertain such a scenario; what's possible at the cutting edge of biowarfare we civilians simply don't know, and I would wager that of such people who do have cutting edge biowarfare expertise and have formed analysis on the coronavirus origin are state secrets on every side at the moment. For instance, considering:

Dr Lentzos said the issue of the virus' origin was a "very difficult question", and added that "there have been quiet, behind-the-scene discussions... in the biosecurity expert community, questioning the seafood market origin that has come out very strongly from China". — BBC

We can note Dr Lentzos doesn't tell us the actual content of these quiet behind-the-scene discussions of the biosecurity expert community.

This lack of knowledge about the cutting edge doesn't establish anything, but it is simply intellectually honest to admit we don't know what a sophisticated actor would be able to do). In my view, if tempting right wing reality deniers to exit the right wing spin machine is possible at all, it is by demonstrating the highest standards of intellectual honesty, and foregoing the use of the jump to conclusions mat on all occasions.

There can be lot's of motivations to create a pandemic from both state and non-state actors and there are means, both known and unknown, to find or craft the "sweet spot" virus; this scenario is relevant as, if it is true, such actors may have more planned for us so it would be best to find them out if they exist and, if they don't have further nefarious undertakings, seeking justice for the crime is a noble thing in itself.

Likewise, laboratory leaks happen; this scenario is relevant because, if it is true, it is best to know how it happened and review and increase lab standards accordingly.

Pandemics can occur naturally, if this is true of this case, it is best to know this to be able to understand how to avoid or contain such naturally occurring pandemics in the future.

In all cases, the world's institutions, in particularly the US, were woefully incompetent in managing the pandemic, and the origin of the virus should not, in any case, deflect from such failure and what it says about the people in charge at the moment as well as the neoliberal ideological approach to government (not mandating private enterprise have a stockpile of PPE for a known threat because it is more profitable for them to have only just-in-time supply lines, not shutting down air travel early because it would decrease airline stock and best to err on the side of airline stock, not nationalizing and rationing essential supplies so as not to set a precedent that government can more efficiently manage resources relative a crisis as well as ensure corrupt investor interests can make bank off the crisis, bailing out corporations and not people, and in the case of the US, not having universal health-care and other social safety-net institutions that allow the population and political system to weather these sorts of crisis without massive avoidable suffering, along with all the other day-to-day reasons to have such institutions).

I am willing to analyse the origins of the virus honestly, which at the moment my honest analysis is we don't know the origins (the circumstantial evidence we currently have can fit all sorts of mutually exclusive theories fine and dandy), and in exchange I can more easily expect honest evaluation of the failures of neoliberalism as a governing ideology and the right-wing fact denying enterprise and its role in supporting neoliberal ideology along with even more extreme delusions that even centrist mainstream neoliberals want to move away from.

Sigh. No, I'm not. I'm not going to condense months of criminal law study in a single post to explain this to you. Look it up. — Benkei

Dude, have you read the wikipedia entry on "evidence"?

Evidence, broadly construed, is anything presented in support of an assertion[1], because evident things are undoubted. There are two kind of evidence: intellectual evidence (the obvious, the evident) and empirical evidence (proofs).

The mentioned support may be strong or weak. The strongest type of evidence is that which provides direct proof of the truth of an assertion. At the other extreme is evidence that is merely consistent with an assertion but does not rule out other, contradictory assertions, as in circumstantial evidence. — evidence

If there is an HIV gene in coronavirus that is evidence, a "fact of the case" (and, please note, I say "assuming this is true" in my analysis), that would need to be established if one wanted to argue that the virus was genetically engineered with HIV (if other evidence came to light, such as testimony of a researcher claiming they were involved in mixing HIV and coronavirus, it would of course be necessary to establish whether HIV genes really are in coronavirus in the first place, because it's important evidence to such an argument).

I go to some lengths to explain that even if this evidence was true (HIV genes are in coronavirus), Luc Montagnier argument is unsound because there's other natural explanations for why a gene may appear both in HIV and coronavirus; viruses transfer genes all the time between each other in nature. However, if there's such a gene, it is still a fact of the case: a piece of evidence. Only much more evidence would be required to conclude that it was indeed genetically engineered.

I go to some lengths to explain why Luc Montagnier argument makes little sense. However, he does have a Nobel Prize for work on HIV, so it's difficult to to just dismiss his claims prima faci, without some analysis.

And, I would argue, it's this sort of intellectual dishonesty -- using "Nobel Prize" as a bludgeon of expertise when Nobel Prize winners support something the left supports (such as action is needed on climate change), but summarily dismissed when a Nobel winner says something "against the narrative" -- is what help fuel Trump supporters.

Luc Montagnier argument definitely sounds like "bullshit", as put it, which I agree with. However, it's still bullshit coming from a Nobel Prize winner, so can't just be ignored; simply ignoring it fuels the right wing spin machine's projection of their own intellectual dishonesty upon the left.

I also go to some lengths to explain why circumstantial evidence, such as "que bueno" or the proximity to the lab to the outbreak, as wikipedia says, "does not rule out other, contradictory assertions". It's still evidence though, just not something, in itself, that establishes any strong conclusions. I literally say:

However, as far as I know there is no hard evidence that it is lab origin, only circumstantial evidence. The problem with circumstantial evidence is that it's difficult to calculate probabilities because it's difficult to identify independent variables, dependent variables, cause and effect (without which calculations are nonsensical). — boethius

I then go on to explain that the same circumstantial evidence can be accounted for in completely different theories.

Circumstantial evidence is not strong evidence, but it is still in the category of "evidence" that can participate in the "facts of the case" (such as a insurance payout for a fire participating to establish motive for setting the fire; if there was no evidence of an insurance payout, it becomes much more difficult to argue there was motivation to achieve such thing); of course, only the circumstantial evidence of insurance payouts doesn't prove anything, much more evidence would be needed; but the basic fact of the insurance policy existing is still relevant among such a further body of evidence for insurance fraud.

The word "evidence" is literally right in the label "circumstantial evidence".

But please, prey tell, what would I learn in months of your criminal law tutoring that would illuminate me to the errors in the wikipedia entry so that I may correct it for the benefit of all mankind?

There is no circumstantial evidence, only a hypothesis which is not supported by any type of evidence. — Benkei

You're confusing evidence with proof, due to your fear that simply entertaining the hypothesis fuels Trump supporters.

Furthermore, my analysis was based on the assumption that the premises under consideration are true (I haven't bothered to check as it changes little). If the premises are true, that there is an HIV gene in coronavirus that is the key to it's success, then this is indeed evidence of genetic manipulation. It is not proof, however, which I explain in my analysis as there are other explanations for the gene being there.

Likewise, "que beuno" is evidence that the benefiting party may have been motivated to create such a benefit. If we look at the outcomes, China has indeed benefited in terms of increasing mass surveillance, shutting down Hong Kong independent governance (whatever was left of it) and also benefits from the chaos in the United States. These elements are simply true and cannot be ignored, they are evidence.

Again, I go to some lengths to explain they are not proof, as there are other explanations that account for the same pieces of evidence. Indeed, a global disruptive event will create winners and losers, so if it was completely random emergence of the virus of course someone will benefit. A property owner may benefit from the insurance money from a fire, it is not proof that it's arson, but it is evidence that there was potential motivation.

To be clear, I am not taking sides here. We know pandemics occur naturally (as they happened before genetic engineering) but we also know bio-warfare and lab accidents happen. Random emergence of the virus is completely adequate to explain what we see, even moreso in combination with Trump weakening pandemic institutional preparedness. However, we also can surmise that if the pandemic was deliberate (China being only one of many suspects) that it would be made to seem as natural as possible and numerical analysis would be used to design both the qualities of virus as well as the initial outbreak circumstances.

I see lot's of evidence that can be called on to support lot's of theories. I see no proof of any one theory, however, nor even a leading candidate.

Yes all this stuff you mention sounds like bullshit, and I was not referring to this, or any similar-dubious claim, so this is kind of a non-sequitor to my claim, though interesting to learn the nutty theories out there. — schopenhauer1

Your first question is has this been talked about. These theories, which we agree are bullshit, have been talked about the most, as far as I have been able to see.

Because of the nutty arguments supporting a lab origin, the liberal media has avoided the subject; usually choosing to imply that the debunking of nutty theories means that the basic idea has also been debunked.

I am simply providing context for your observation that this subject hasn't been talked about a lot.

I make it very clear this is not in relation to your statements, just how about the public discourse (one side has talked about it a lot, advancing nutty theories about it as deflection of excuses for Trump, and the liberal media has largely taken the position that to entertain the lab origin hypothesis is to support Trump).

I make this clear by clearly stating:

However, as ↪schopenhauer1, points out, there's no way to rule out a lab origin, either by accident or on purpose — boethius

I agree it's completely possible that the virus has a lab origin; I have mentioned this possibility on this very forum months ago.

However, as far as I know there is no hard evidence that it is lab origin, only circumstantial evidence. The problem with circumstantial evidence is that it's difficult to calculate probabilities because it's difficult to identify independent variables, dependent variables, cause and effect (without which calculations are nonsensical).

For instance: is the proximity of the outbreak to the Wuhan lab, that studied coronaviruses, likely due to the Wuhan lab releasing the virus? Or, does the Wuhan lab study coronaviruses as they have access to the same viral reservoir from which a pandemic would also likely emerge? Or was the virus discovered near the Wuhan lab because the Wuhan lab is able to study these viruses, but the real original outbreak was elsewhere but ability to collect evidence decreases radically the further into the past and the further away from such labs (early transmission chains of novel viruses can meander a lot, due to the chaotic nature of statistics at small numbers but also because the virus may require an incubation period of, on average only ever so slightly greater than 1 replication rate, to build up mutations to arrive at higher replication rates to cause outbreaks). Or, is there enough bio-labs close to enough population centers that an outbreak at random weighted for how people happen to be distributed is simply likely to happen "suspiciously close" to a lab without any relation between the lab and the outbreak one way or another.

In terms of historical political circumstantial evidence, is the timing of the pandemic likely because "it was the right time to release a pandemic to implement further surveillance measures with contact tracing as an excuse, cause global chaos in which killing protests in Hong Kong is convenient and "maybe it's genocide" of Muslims forgotten, without much fear of losing relative power because the incompetence of Trump ensures the virus won't be managed well in the US and there's little risk of auto-inflicting a large comparative economic wound (such as in the scenario that all flights are stopped to China to contain the virus until China is virus free, that the West simply manages things well generally to prevent and control outbreaks (such as SARS 1)" or is it likely "the governing incompetence of Trump the cause of dismantling the global pandemic response system, international coordination to respond to crisis more generally, and that pandemic potential outbreaks are happening regularly (SARS, Ebola, MERS, Swineflu), that high volume plane travel has rendered this sort of situation explosive for a while, but risks have been mitigated "just ever so slightly competently enough" and getting rid of these suppression mechanisms was simply lifting the lid on the whole thing and a pandemic the expected result." Or, was this virus simply the "100 year" emergence of a "sweet spot virus" impossible to contain, and that such a virus emerging at any time will have always historical circumstances supporting one political narrative or another (political intrigue, great power rivalry, winners and losers in a globally disruptive event, being more or less constant explanatory elements).

So, it's difficult to come to definite conclusions based on circumstantial evidence, but we are in agreement that the possibilities are worth entertaining as simply "the state of knowledge at the moment is open on the issue" as well as for the fact evidence may accumulate in one direction or another over time.

That's been dismissed as a hoax. — Benkei

What has been largely dismissed is various claims of genetic "proof" that the virus was engineered by gene splicing. I believe there was some Indian studies, or just one study, that sparked off these claims.

More famously, there's a French researcher, Luc Montagnier, accredited with discovering HIV causing AIDS, who claims the corona virus is for certain has a genetic splice of HIV, that it can't be natural. In the same interview, he makes the bizarre followup claims, to paraphrase, "that because it's unnatural, it is not in harmony with nature and thus will evolve away and be gone [by about nowish]" as well as an unrelated claim about his current research into the potential for electromagnetic waves to cure viral diseases. The interview is available here; this was right-wing super-juice as it both simultaneously supports the Wuhan lab origin hypothesis, China's attacked the US if you want to spin things that way, and supports the notion that the threat of the virus is completely overblown as it's not "natural" (supporting, as a subpoint, that the hubris of such scientists is ultimately futile against the power of God's maintained natural balance which is also why climate change isn't a threat) and so is already gone by nowish, and it's clams by a Nobel prize winner so "lefty-facty" people are hypocrites for not believing it wholesale. Unfortunately, the liberal media is so science illiterate and simply corrupt that this sort of highly dubious claims from someone already approved by the establishment cannot be dealt with.

Picking apart the claims is a pretty simple task.

Luc Montagnier supports the HIV engineered hypothesis based on the mathematical permutations required to create the same gene. Even assuming the gene is the same as HIV and a the mathematical permutations requires astronomical (i.e. even if the premises are correct, which I'm not sure about but don't need to bother to even check) the conclusions doesn't follow since viruses do not all evolve independently but share genetic information between them all the time. Someone infected with HIV, or an animal with a related virus, then infected with the coronavirus could pass the HIV gene to coronavius. Indeed, if the gene in question is what makes coronavirus so effective (the motivation for engineering into the virus in the first place) then it also has an advantage in transferring around in natural hosts as it provides the new virus with an immense advantage.

In other words, this "Nobel Prize" winner doesn't understand the basics of his own domain of expertise.

The even more bizarre claim that the virus is "non-harmonious" and therefore will just go away, doesn't even have a plausible mechanism, as the viral replication lines (chains of replication from one cell to another, one host to another) are happening all over the globe and at very different rates or replication, and there is simply no mechanism available to coordinate all these viral lineages to somehow peter-out.

His current research on radiation curing viral diseases is far fetched enough that a credible person realizes some basic proof of concept is required to entertain the idea; such as breaking apart suspended virus particles with EM frequencies (at energy levels well below what would just ionize or then cook the whole body). I.e. a credible person would preamble with such research, or then focus on these steps of proof of concept that could eventually lead to therapeutic application down the road. Presented as he does, it simply sounds completely delusional, and that he is engaged in some macabre program of trial and error of microwaving lot's of mice (and to the small mind of the bureaucrat, if a Nobel Prize winner wants to microwave some mice, it's not like anyone's proved otherwise; if we can broadcast television, why not health?).

However, as , points out, there's no way to rule out a lab origin, either by accident or on purpose, and any credible analysis must admit that if the premises are true, the conclusion still maybe true; and even if the conclusion isn't true, it doesn't rule out other bio-engineering techniques; therefore, it's better to ignore the issue altogether, and fuel claims of a conspiracy to suppress these sorts of claims (which, to be clear, there is a conspiracy between corporate media owners and executives to shape public discourse, and spinning a lack of evidence of one claim as positive proof of the opposing claim, that also lacks evidence, is a manifestation of this conspiracy to shape public discourse; there is only, ironically, a much stronger conspiracy in right wing media to shape right-wing discourse to be so far removed from reality, for instance repeating the idea that they are the real intellectuals and the more liberal media the real conspiracy funded by Soros and run by cultural Marxists et. al., that public discourse more generally is not even possible).

No there isn't. Universities are mostly private institutions and the state plays no part in their curriculum nor their decision about who to award doctorates to. — Isaac

You have no idea how the state functions, and you do not have the cognitive ability to participate in this discussion as anything other than a troll to put on display the hackish foolery of yourself and your colleagues.

Make a separate thread if you want to argue "private universities" are "independent institutions" that are legitimately independent of state power and do not serve as proxies to that state power for implementing state policy.

Furthermore, where's you "evidence" to establish "mostly". Lot's of people and universities in China, lot's of public funded and publicly owned universities in Europe. Lot's of "private universities" receiving state subsidy in exchange for conforming to state policy. These are in the minority according to you?

By "mostly" do you mean "mostly in the world" or just referring only to your own delusional understanding of things to maintain your precious ego with regard to what you delusionally believe will help your case.

The mere appearance of "independent intellectuals patting each other on the back" does not establish that those intellectuals are independent and not state agents. The mere appearance of "a legitimate state" does not establish that such a state is legitimate.

For, we expect the hackish fool to claim he's not a hackish fool. We expect agents of the state participating in the central delusion that they are not agents of the state and that they offer independent council and research to critique the state, to claim they are not state agents and their council and critique is genuine and not delusional.

To remind you of your own claim again:

And yet, despite repeated requests you've given not one shred of evidence to demonstrate that this actually happens (outside of your fevered imagination) in anywhere other than oppressive regimes - which we all know already are bad places, so you're not serving up anything new here. — Isaac

When you say "outside your fevered imagination" this is to further emphasize the obvious claim "we all know here" you are making that oppressive regimes are easy to identify. That, even if my analysis is obviously true for oppressive regimes, that we need not engage in analysis of what oppression means and if it can manifest in more subtle ways than China and North Korea. You are saying trust to appearances by literally making the statement that that "one shred of evidence to demonstrate that this actually happens (outside of your fevered imagination)".

You did not say "ok, yes, I agree Chinese psychologists are agents of the state participating in oppression, selected either for their willingness to do so or then delusions about state legitimacy, but, you haven't provided evidence that this occurs in any nominal Western Democracy". To which I could reply, "Ah, someone with the cognitive abilities to understand the analysis so far and that further political analysis is required to evaluate state legitimacy in places where, if it is there, it is not obviously so (well, at least to the privileged classes that live there ... just like Chinese state illegitimacy and oppression is not obvious to the privileged classes that live in China)."

So, unless you demonstrate you have the cognitive abilities to understand your own words and honesty about what "outside your fevered imagination" was meant to mean in relation to "oppressive regimes -which we already know are bad places", then there is no longer any purpose for me to engage in discussion with you, due to your lack of cognitive abilities to participate usefully in the discussion because you are a hack and a fool.

Not that I will abandon this discussion, but my next post will treat you as my case-study research subject to understand how psychologists in illegitimate states maintain their delusion. Fortunately I don't need state license for this particular form of psychological research. For the benefit of people following this conversation, I will demonstrate exactly how various smoke screens are thrown up and immediately abandoned when they don't work, exactly how strawmen are frantically crafted into an army of confusing discourse, how goal posts are moved again and again, how ad hominems are brandied about but dropped as soon as it's realized the "stigma power" the research subject "Isaac" is deluded in believing to have is not effective, how desperate the research subject "Isaac" is to transition the conversation to "peer reviewed" research in a field that has no intellectual legitimacy at all (other than as an afterthought to political analysis) because there is no credible way to disentangle psychology from state power, and, ultimately, how the research subject "Isaac", probably because he was selected from birth by various forms of state apparatus at various gates (the first selection gate simply being the class one is born into or then deluded into wanting to be apart of out of self-hatred for one's origins), participates in the central delusion that he lives in a legitimate state that does not maintain oppressive class relations, that he lends his credibility to other state agents who maintain this delusion for themselves and the populace with more clinical precision, and does research within the bounds and for the purposes of state policy (obviously, nothing politically relevant, and certainly the lack of any politically relevant ideas or intuitions or basic social skills that were not developed as a child, due to a postulated emotionally deprived upbringing, also played a part in the selection of the research subject "Isaac" to serve state purposes at later selection gates, and filtering out other candidates who would be "trouble makers" due to a more lucid understanding of political analysis and better infant phase social skill development, such as object permanence; that the research subject "Isaac" is unable to fix permanently abstract concepts in order to participate in clear adult discussion, but such concepts simply disappear and reaper and how they are related in each appearance is not understood by the research subject but rather the research subject "Isaac" treats such appearances as separate and therefore appears foolish and hackish and lacking in basic cognitive ability to anyone who is able to see where these conceptual objects go when they are not in direct manifestation).

"Oppressive regimes - which we all know are bad places" is not a claim, it's a qualifier. Not the set {oppressive regimes}, but the subset {oppressive regimes which we all know are bad places}. — Isaac

A qualifier of who?

Does the Chinese Communist Party qualify as "we all".

If your statement has any content, it is because "we all" relates to obviousness, that the analysis is only applicable to places that are "obviously bad" and that we need not think about other places not on our "obviously bad list". Your use of "regimes" provides this obvious interpretation, that there are "other oppressive regimes" but with regard to them as well we "all know they are bad places".

Now, if you are walking this interpretation back to an idea that "we all" does not relate to obviousness, then your statement is simply "your analysis applies only to those places we all know it applies; and, by we all I mean to refer only to those people who agree with me of where it applies and already agree with me on where it does not apply".

This is meaningless, unless, again, you are using "we all" to refer to people that agree to you because the agreement is obvious; otherwise, who cares who agrees with you or not.

So, investigation, political analysis, is needed to try to distinguish between the places where the analysis applies or not, the "bad places" and the "good places".

You do not have the cognitive abilities to follow this conversation, you don't even know where you are in the chain of argumentation. I have not even arrived at "how do we know which states are oppressive or not", so by jumping to this topic, you only demonstrate your fear of eventually getting to that topic (because you are a hack and a fool).

You claimed that psychogists were agents of the state because they required state permission to carry out their research. Forget the title of the thread, you made a claim within it and I'm disputing that claim. — Isaac

More strawmen. You do not have the cognitive skills to understand my arguments.

I mentioned 3 things: 1. Psychologists are selected because they already agree with state policy (there is a large state apparatus one needs to navigate to become a psychologist with lot's of filtering at lot's of steps), 2. Psychologists need permission from the state to carry out research or then to "cure people", 3. Psychologists receive state subsidy (directly or from state proxies) to get the resources to do research (vast majority of the time).

I've already mentioned legitimate sates also maintains policy through these mechanisms, and will also use coercive force to stop psychologists breaking the rules. The difference is, a legitimate state tends to have 'reasonable rules" (because the policy is to have "reasonable rules").

I will not bother to explain why you thought your strawman would work and why it doesn't actually work. I will only mention here that you don't have the cognitive skills to follow this conversation, you are a hack and a fool.

My claim is that they are not generally agents of the state because they do not generally need a licence to practice psychological research, they do not have to conform to state policy to do research. — Isaac

Psychologists do not need a degree (which is a license from the state) to be a "psychologist", nor "generally" work in institutions that contain a large network of people and state licenses for those people and institution as a whole, nor get permission from various oversight boards (which are specific license to perform specific actions) to conduct human experiments on a case by case basis?

Psychologists do not "generally need" state subsidy directly, or through proxies, to perform their research?

We all know they need lot's of licenses to interact with research subjects and also money from the state to fund those interactions, and I mean "we all" here to mean "obviously it's the case".

You do not have the cognitive skills to follow this conversation, you are a hack and a fool.

State policy (in both legitimate and illegitimate states) allows for choices. Those allowed choices, formally or functionally, reflect state policy. For state agents, their space of choice conforms further to state policy through the process of being selected for "proper belief in state policy" in the first place and the type of funding that is available (both generally speaking as well as the case by case basis of grant approval in particular cases).

Your discursive, and perhaps thinking method too, is to simply throw up tons and tons of straw, and you think you've accomplished something when your interlocutor cannot exhaustively analysis each piece of straw in every straw man you present. Certainly, you believe that with enough straw, the weight and the pressure of it will be so great as to produce one tiny diamond that you can run off with and covet. But that's not how diamonds are made, no one's ever just piled a bunch of straw to make a diamond, so when you find rocks in your straw piles it's simply more delusion when you think they are diamonds.

The criticism of Trump of many retired generals is actually notable. — ssu

In my opinion, we were very close to a formal coup, but Trump backed down.

This was certainly not inevitable, in terms of how "crazy" Trump would go as well as the US military reaction.

The US is reaping the dividends of having a history of "okish" democratic legitimacy most of the time (what is new with Trump and contemporary Republicans is that they are clearly fully intent in entrenching minority rule -- through the SCOTUS and their legal corruption and gerrymandering rulings, as well as the senate and presidency -- rather than minority rule being a temporary democratic weakness that plausibly self corrects and is credibly "checked and balances" meanwhile). So this is heartening to see, as there wasn't much way of being certain about military reaction at the start of the crisis.

Obviously Trump's "show of force" in the church was a communication mistake, as well as his "domination remark". Likewise, the general who talked about the "the battle space" was a mistake (either from Trump's perspective or then his own perspective, assuming that's what he wanted too).

Both these things not only helped lose the wider media battle over the political interpretation of looting, but were "hooks" to allow other elements of the military to declare that they do not view the American people as enemies and that's not what America is about. Extremely laudable.

I agree that retired generals primarily carried this message to avoid a formally "rogue" military.

Also this kind of notification to the forces from the top echelon of the US armed forces is quite rare. (And note that it has been unclassified too). General Milley is the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the highest ranking general in the armed forces: — ssu

Possibly unprecedented, would be interesting to know if there are any parallels.

Whatever the case, it was clearly Trump's desire to "dominate the streets" and be able to send in the military to do that, and it's not just retired generals with "vague insinuations", message has been pretty clear even from currently serving generals, so we do have essentially open defiance. This was the big question for me; a few individuals at the top of a command structure can make things go in radically different ways depending on their level of defiance or cooperation, and even enthusiasm.

The communication battle over "police brutality is bad sure, but what we really need is to put down these riots" seems to have ended in favour of "police brutality is still the problem, not the rioters". Demonstrating more police brutality against protesters of police brutality, and shooting members of the media, obviously didn't help the argument.

So, it seems to me the situation has returned back to the political sphere. The military nature of the issue has been deescalated, for now.

Of course, we can't exclude some new "chaotic emergency" even greater than the riots happening, but, the political problems being so deep in anycase, I think worthwhile to discuss further what a political solution could look like in the current context. So I will update my analysis in my next post.

In the meanwhile,

It's not the first locale to break up a department, but no cities as populous have ever attempted it. Minneapolis city council members haven't specified what or who will replace it if the department disbands.

Camden, New Jersey, may be the closest thing to a case study they can get.

The city, home to a population about 17% of Minneapolis' size, dissolved its police department in 2012 and replaced it with an entirely new one after corruption rendered the existing agency unfixable.

Before its police reforms, Camden was routinely named one of the most violent cities in the US. Now, seven years after the old department was booted, the city's crime has dropped by close to half. Officers host outdoor parties for residents and knock on doors to introduce themselves. It's a radically different Camden than it was even a decade ago. Here's how they did it. — CNN

Is an interesting read.

My claim is that I think you, I and anyone else taking part in this discussion would agree that China and North Korea are 'obviously' oppressive regimes. — Isaac

To quote you again:

And yet, despite repeated requests you've given not one shred of evidence to demonstrate that this actually happens (outside of your fevered imagination) in anywhere other than oppressive regimes - which we all know already are bad places, so you're not serving up anything new here. — Isaac

You're key operative claim here is "oppressive regimes - which we all know are bad places".

The OP is literally entitled "Mental health under an illegitimate state".

So, either your complaint is "you're just analyzing the OP, what's up with that?".

Or, then you're trying to say something less transparently bad faith, relating "we all know" to "oppressive regimes", that this is somehow obvious to determine, that agents of the state, such as psychologists, we can't assume may try to lead us to believe a illegitimate state they represent is a legitimate state, that political analysis is not first required wherever we are that is independent of state agents -- outside China and North Korea, which I guess you do accept the framework and all the analytical conclusions I've presented, and that their psychologists do try to gaslight their people (being selected for this delusion in the first place, or then generally conforming to it anyways) as to the local oppression levels; that this is key state policy to maintain to stay in one's job as a psychologist in these places (or do you not accept the analysis even for these "bad places"?).

I've just supplied the rest of my list, China and North Korea. — Isaac

So to be perfectly clear, these are the only places on earth where state oppression exists, that you know to be "bad places"?

You've checked, it's obvious.

To summarize: You're defending the claim that not only that you've checked but that furthermore it's obvious, that you don't need to supply your own criteria of "oppression" and "bad place", as that's obvious too, and any debate about anywhere else concerning these political topics can be dismissed prima faci, as the list is clear and settled in your mind: China and North Korea, t'is all.

Yes, that's exactly what I'm claiming. — Isaac

But, according to yourself:

I said 'oppressive regimes which we all know are bad' and I've already provided my list. China. The only place you've drawn any modern examples from. — Isaac

So according to you, there's evidence this happens in China.

You're refusal to provide the rest of your "list" or then your denial of the basic syntax of your own claims, again, just demonstrates you don't have the cognitive skills to participate in this conversation, that you are a hack and fool.

You're claim in it's formal form is: "there's only evidence where there's obviously evidence! Ha! Show me the evidence!".

When I inquire about "the obvious nature of the evidence" you are unable to follow through and complete your list of "bad place" that you "already know" (the claim we "all know" these things is even more absurd, but let's start with your own part of "we all").

actually happens (outside of your fevered imagination) in anywhere other than oppressive regimes - which we all know already are bad places — Isaac

You are saying you "already know" what are "bad places" to which my analysis applies.

Tell us the whole list, not just China. Or then accept you didn't have the cognitive skills to understand your own claim, but now that it's been explained to you, you realize it's a hackish and foolish thing to do.

I said 'oppressive regimes which we all know are bad' and I've already provided my list. China. — Isaac

Your list includes only china?

May I remind you of your claim, since not only you don't have the cognitive skills to follow what I'm saying, you don't have the cognitive skills to even follow what you're saying:

And yet, despite repeated requests you've given not one shred of evidence to demonstrate that this actually happens (outside of your fevered imagination) in anywhere other than oppressive regimes - which we all know already are bad places, so you're not serving up anything new here. — Isaac

Do you even understand your own claim here? That "I am not serving up anything new" because "there is not a shred of evidence this actually happens".

Are you not able to read that you put an "s" at the end of "regimes" and thus implying you know there are more oppressive regimes other than China.

Is your list "China" or is it "China" in addition to other "regimes"?

Since it's obvious to you and something you already know, provide the list from memory according to your criteria of "oppressive and bad".

I didn't claim I "know" which regimes are oppressive and bad and which aren't, you're making this claim. Tell us so that we may know what you know (or then, either way, we can then evaluate this as evidence you don't have the cognitive skills to follow this conversation, and you are a hack and a fool).

No, I'm saying that the only modern example you've provided so far of state control over the direction of psychological research is China — Isaac

This is a philosophy forum, it is fairly usual to be concerned with sound argumentation, that conclusions follow from the premises.

Here, I am concerned with what arguments with regard to psychology and psychologists follow from the conclusion one lives in a illegitimate state.

I could carry on in this discussion making no empirical investigation at all, leaving it an exercise to the reader to decide whether illegitimate states even can exist, if they do are any around, and if they are around which one's are which. Since everyone seems to agree, including yourself, that oppressive regimes can exist, do exist, and China is one such example, I have provided some additional argumentation on this agreed premise and another premise:

insofar as a community of psychologists conceive of themselves as part of a global community that includes China and derives their expert legitimacy, in part, from the global nature of the community — boethius

However, on the subject of empirical claims, you make the empirical claim:

oppressive regimes - which we all know already are bad places — Isaac

Please write a simple list from memory of all the countries and which are oppressive and bad places and which not, since you know this information.

And yet, despite repeated requests you've given not one shred of evidence to demonstrate that this actually happens (outside of your fevered imagination) in anywhere other than oppressive regimes - which we all know already are bad places, so you're not serving up anything new here. — Isaac

So you're saying that the difference between an illegitimate and legitimate state, a "bad place" and "oppressive regimes", is obvious?

I don't want there to be any doubt that you are holding this view, I said I would provide examples if you fully clarified your claim of ignorance:

I'll provide examples if you are really so intent on claiming ignorance and demonstrating you are a total hack and fool before whoever is following this conversation. — boethius

You seem to have moved the goal posts, so please first clarify your position relative the first issue (the "state stopping psychologists practice and research, generally speaking, if it doesn't conform to state policy").

So clarify this first issue where you "wanted examples", and then clarify that you really do need examples of state legitimacy being up for debate.

Furthermore, your whole question simply ignores that people in "oppressive regimes - which we all know already are bad places" may want good faith analysis about their situation to be created that it may get to them one way or another.

It is only in your "fevered imagination" that I am saying anything else. I have never claimed I am an oracle of state legitimacy, I have made it very clear it is up for debate in each instance, in terms of the criteria and it's realization (that's what assuming a premise means, "assuming this is true, what follows"). Of course, if it is up for debate and a psychologist claims it's not, that such analysis is only relevant in "oppressive regimes - which we all know already are bad places", then that psychologist is completely delusional.

Not that it's likely I'll support your view you live in a legitimate state (assuming you abandon your delusion it's not up for debate, that we already "know" what countries are oppressive and not), which according to me would be based on majority rule with credible safeguards towards the influence of money and propaganda; but, I want it to be clear to people following this conversation that you don't have the cognitive abilities to interpret what has been said so far, and you are a hack and a fool.

My point though is that being a participant in an institution the state tries to coopt does not make you a state agent. — Pfhorrest

In my terminology, you are a state agent in this case, but you can still choose whether to subvert or not the institution's relation to state policy. Whole institutions can try to subvert state policy.

The reason to use this terminology is because we can't easily tell subversive and conformist state agents apart, they may seem the same. The other reason to use this terminology is because it's likewise unclear if a subversive state agent is successful in their subversion or not. A subversive state agent must usually still carry out at least some actions that genuinely contribute to state policy, so they are state agents under any definition while doing such actions; it takes a much larger analysis to conclude whether they are "doing some state agent duties but on the whole effectively undermining state policy".

It is simpler, in my view, to start analysis with who appears to be state agents, why we identify them as such and what processes lead to such appearances, and then go onto to discuss what state agents might be doing with regard to state policy (such as effective, incompetent, subversive, benign agents, and whether they are mostly deciding or following, mostly planning or implementing).

When @unenlightened jokes about "hippies putting on suits" it's an observation about what they seemed to mostly have done in practice, not that it was unavoidable.

From the state agent's point of view (actually wanting to be lucid and be morally autonomous agents and not just conform to state policy), it is necessary to fully acknowledge state agency and one's contribution to maintaining state policy and keep track of that in order to be able to contrast that with other activity and be able to conclude "I am doing more to change the system from within than maintain it".

Spies supported by hostile nation states have little problem doing this, but it turns out "revolutionary hippies" coming off a sabbatical year of recreational drug use and sexual exploration then putting on suits do not leave us with much historical evidence that they were so effective in practice (on the whole) as what they seemed to imagine would happen. I wasn't there, but @unenlightened maybe able to provide us more insight into what may have lead to such lack of historical evidence.

You could say the same about academic philosophers. — A Seagull

I did say the same:

The same can only be said of all academic scientists: the primary roll of mathematics, physics and engineering becomes the arms industry, the primary roll of "political science" becomes apologetics for the state, the primary roll of creative pursuits becomes entertainment and distraction, the primary roll of psychology becomes manipulative marketing, the primary roll of philosophy becomes the denial of moral courage as a component of "the good life", if not the denial of any moral truth as such. — boethius

It was on another thread, so I wouldn't expect you to have read it, but suffice to say we are in agreement here.

Tony Gibson was an English psychologist and anarchist. (First google result for anarchist psychologists.) As an anarchist he obviously didn’t believe the state was legitimate, but he was still a psychologist nevertheless. Which disproves your quoted statement as an absolute truth. — Pfhorrest

I say: we must evaluate the political situation before we can evaluate what state agents tell us.

I say: state agents are selected for certain criteria, such as belief the state is legitimate.

I do not say the state is perfect and always perfectly selects candidates who believe in state legitimacy now and forever.

There can be exceptions. If I conclude the state I am in is not legitimate, and I decide I need a psychologist anyway, I will search for psychologists attempting to subvert the state, for they potentially have a reasonable view of reality and agreement with my own morality (therefore genuinely want to accomplish what I want to accomplish, which is a better ally than someone who doesn't). Depending on the level of oppression (which is not binary but a scale or a space) such people may be easier or harder to find, but the point is my political evaluation changes completely my method of search and who I am searching for.

If I conclude the state is legitimate, then psychologists who claim otherwise will likely be the delusional ones.

So, I completely agree when you say:

I’m not questioning your general thesis that (of course) the state tried to coopt the institution of psychology to it own ends, like it does every institution. Just saying that you can’t dismiss every participant in every such institution as an agent of the state. There are people in every institution the state tries to coopt who don’t go along willingly if at all, and though the state tries to get rid of them when it can (of course), it’s usually not completely successful, and sometimes not very at all. — Pfhorrest

As I mention in another reply "Edward Snowden did not remain a contractor for the NSA."

The main purpose of the OP is to establish that political reality precedes psychological reality, in the academic sense of some science and mental health service.

State agents can subvert and undermine or even be traitors to state policy, but, as you clearly agree, we can't expect this to be the norm; so, what we expect from state agents will follow from our evaluation of the state as a whole.

Where in all that does it bring anything to Boethius's utterly ludicrous point that psychology prevents new mental structures toward truth while philosophy encourages them? — Isaac

The OP is about "Mental health under an illegitimate state".

I agree that Turing was not helped by psychologists, and I would argue that psychology as a whole does far more damage in such cases than the previous "criminality"; for, at least when dealt with as a matter of law, the role of state power and political and moral analysis is clear, and the homosexual can take a political stand to subvert the law and the state and, failing in this, the oppression of the state (assuming homosexuality is not immoral, which I think we agree on) is clear cut. In such a situation the psychologist is simply gaslighting homosexuals and confusing society by pretending there is a "scientific problem" with a "scientific solution", rather than a moral discussion with a political solution.

If we agree here more-or-less, you are simply adding weight to my "ludicrous point that psychology prevents new mental structures toward truth while philosophy encourages them".

The issue of homosexuality in @unenlightened's example is one of state legitimacy.

First, democratic legitimacy and the role of homosexual repression, and sexual repression more generally, in maintaining totalitarian structures. Second, moral legitimacy.

When psychologists believe a state they represent (for instance to "understand and cure homosexuality") is legitimate when it is not (more so if they believe it is not even up for debate), they are delusional and the entire practice of psychology becomes the maintenance of this central delusion.

People, under such circumstance, come to psychologists with a simple message "I am being oppressed" and the psychologist has a simple reply "sit down and shut up, let me oppress you some more". Both the psychologist and the individual, more often than not, are in delusion about this reality, but that delusion is irrelevant to the political situation and power relationship.

According to what legitimate state means to me:

In a legitimate state, the psychologist explains to the patient that peaceful means are easily available and viable for healthy engagement in political process, because this is true.

In an illegitimate state, the psychologist explains to the patient that peaceful means are easily available and viable for healthy engagement in political process, but this is a lie because it isn't true.

The idea that one is in a good social structure when one is actually in a bad social structure, is the worst and most evil possible gaslighting and "prevents new mental structures toward truth"; indeed, I would argue the most critical truth of all in terms of our relation to society and all of our actions that have any import at all.

In an illegitimate state, police (on the whole) gas and crack the heads of malcontents and resistors to dissuade them of exploring effective avenues of change to the political structure.

In an illegitimate state, psychologists (on the whole) gaslight and crack the heads of malcontents and resistors to dissuade them of exploring effective avenues of change to the political structure.

In a legitimate state (on the whole) both police and psychologists may not only do nothing to prevent change to political structure, but maybe active agents of such change themselves.

One of the questions I'm not clear about in relation to the op is how to tell a legitimate state from an illegitimate one. — unenlightened

Yes, one must first conclude if one is living in a legitimate or illegitimate state.

This is beyond the scope of the OP. However one decides, one cannot base such a evaluation on the authority of psychologists or other state agents (they have been selected, either way, because they believe the state is legitimate).

Therefore, political analysis precedes psychology both in terms of intellectual structure and practice. Psychologists cannot be separated away from state legitimacy and claim to be involved in some independent scientific reality.

Psychology is an afterthought to political analysis, in terms of understanding of social structure and moral evaluation of that structure.

If one concludes one is living in a legitimate state, I would argue it is reasonable to be less suspicious, though still critical, of state agents, including psychologists.

It's not a law of nature. You can guess what will probably happen, but for that you need data. — Echarmion

You're first response is that explaining "the definition of a threat" as it's used in a sentence is circular logic. That didn't work, so now you're claiming that "threat response isn't a law of nature".

You are unable to follow this conversation, you either do not have the cognitive abilities or then are of ridiculous bad faith.

Either way, you just demonstrate to anyone who is following you are a hack and a fool.

But this of course doesn't actually tell me anything about your response. It can equally explain any outcome and therefore is useless as an analysis. — Echarmion

That not what is at issue. It is part of my "threat identification process" to decide on some action, small or large, with regard to the threat I identify. I may misidentify a threat, I may have no effective actions available, I may at first simply think about it further, I may act immediately.

If you want to create the straw man of someone else who does absolutely nothing about threats, that understand threats to be "that which someone should do nothing about", be my guest.

It's even more ridiculous as the actual subject matter is states, and my personal example was just to illustrate what the word "threat" means. If you want to believe states are so inept as to have no threat identification process, or that such a situation is an edge of relevance to this situation, again, you simply demonstrate your inability to follow this conversation and that you are a threat and a fool.

You have said nothing of "analytical value" about my statement:

The state feels threatened because the state genuinely identifies with it's citizens and wants to protect citizens from unethical human experimentation. — boethius

That you seem to have issue with.

That's not at all a given. A state might not have enough power to fully control what is considered permissible or ethical. — Echarmion

Again, a strawman. I did not say a state has some sort of omnipotence, only that they respond to what they "feel threatened" by (could be a state agent deciding whether to file or not file a report about what they have perceived, could be just filing a report to recommend "monitor" this threat further, could be large scale mobilization and declaration of war). I say "feel threatened" because response is with regards to perception, on the individual case as with the case of a group or a state.

You do not have have the cognitive abilities to follow this conversation, and you are a hack and a fool.

That's a useful heuristic (whatever the state funds it probably considers useful), but it's just a heuristic. There might be other considerations in play, since decisionmaking in a state isn't monolithic and a state might have to negotiate with other actors. — Echarmion

Again, another strawman. I did not say the state does not need to negotiate with other actors, for instance other states (legitimate or not), its own state agents or its own.

The state does not always get what it wants. State policy does not immediately translate into reality.

The framework of this discussion is that state have policies, and the primary mechanism for selecting agents to carry out state policy is ensuring, state agents already believe in state policy when they are selected, and furthermore the primary mechanism of deciding on the vast majority of research that happens is through state subsidy.

You do not have the cognitive abilities to follow this conversation, you are a hack and a fool.

I did not say there is no negotiation that happens in such processes, nor that such mechanisms are perfect.

If you want to argue that, because of ambiguity in what state policy actually is at any given time and imperfection of mechanisms to implement that state policy, that therefore "no states exist" or then "all states are legitimate", or "states have no influence on state agents", you are welcome to start a new OP that makes such a claim.

I have also stated already said that "changing the system from within" can be done, it is just hard since institutions resisting such change will usually fire you as soon they understand what you are doing is a real threat.

Edward Snowden did not remain a contractor for the NSA.

Other "trouble makers" can remain nuances and avoid pretext for firing and navigate other responses. The state learns from such experiences to increase attention to filtering out such people in the first place.

How state agents can subvert the state institutions they are involved in is a separate discussion to this OP.

In terms of mental health under an illegitimate state, the argument of the OP is that psychologists are state agents that are employed to deny the reality of the illegitimate state and to promote productive or then benign "normal" behavior with regard to state power structures; therefore, insofar as they believe the sate is legitimate when it is not, they are delusional and one should be deeply suspicious of them, individually and as a community.

A useful "heuristic", as you might say, for dealing with state agents.

I am interested in hearing more on your thoughts about Stoicism and similar philosophies like Buddhism. I wanted that to be the focus of the conversation I was trying to start, but you barely said anything about it. — Pfhorrest

Yes, I also rather discuss the actual OP.

My argument is that philosophy cannot be approached from a point of view of mental health.

It simply doesn't make sense to say "I will become Buddhist to improve my mental health through meditation" or "I will become a Christian to improve my mental health through forgiveness and church community" or "I will become a Stoic to improve my mental health through ataraxia".

We cannot define mental health nor what is "good and bad" is in terms of mental states without a philosophical position in the first place.

For instance, a Christian will view "guilt" as a healthy motivation towards accepting moral failing and asking forgiveness. Other philosophies may view the same "guilt" as unhealthy. Even within the Christian community there will be disagreement as to how far exactly this "guilt" should go, exactly what it should be and for what it should be felt.

I say concluding that stoicism is actually true will improve mental health, not as a comment on the psychological process of truth conclusion, but because committing to the truth of some philosophy provides the basis of good and bad upon which mental states can be evaluated. From the perspective of assuming stoicism is true, it is mentally healthy to accept this as true, since it's true; likewise, for any other philosophy.

Now, one might be tempted to say one must not only commit to the philosophy and that philosophy must be "actually true" to improve health, but that would be to miss the point. In so saying, we are positing that a characteristic of the "true true" is that it improves mental health; but if we just finished saying we need the true-true in the first place to evaluate mental health in the first place, then there is no outside objective perspective (such as the psychologist deceives people into believing exists and that they are some sort of expert on this deception) upon which an evaluation of mental health apart from belief about good and bad can be established. Such an erroneous approach also leads to the unintelligible perspective that "feeling" (as some sort of supposed objective measure of mental health) is some sort of barometer for truth, rather than the arguments that support such a truth conclusion; this is dangerous not only because there is no reason to assume feelings inform us of what is true, but even more dangerous because there is no reason to assume that the worst lies do not create the best feelings from this fictitious objective mental health perspective.

In order to evaluate one's mental health, one must first conclude one's feelings and thoughts are "bad" or then "good", and how to go from the first to the latter. The psychologist wants to avoid the obvious philosophical implications of such an evaluation within which they have no epistemic authority, and change the conversation towards merely what appears to themselves (the key point) as good and bad and take the patient, and even society as a whole, through meandering maze of confusing discourse and, wherever possible to make a buck for themselves and their partners in this scheme, a pharmacology haze.

If a psychologist really is an agent of a illegitimate state -- or then, again a key point, there is debate either way -- and the psychologist does not either advertise themselves as an agent of an illegitimate state or then invite the debate and defend their own case on equal epistemic footing, the psychologist is simply maintaining their own delusion, the delusion of the patient about the psychologist, and the delusion of society about psychology as a whole. They may say "it's good to be deluded about these things and avoid pointing towards these delusions" but that's a delusional thing to say as well.

With regard to stoicism, therefore, it makes much more sense the simple question "is Stoicism true?" and "If so, how should a stoic consider things and what should a Stoic do about such considerations today?".

So you should have no trouble providing evidence of cases where this has happened, together with an explanation of the mechanism that was used. — Isaac

You are telling me that you know of no cases in your field where people's research or practices that have been stopped by the state throughout the history of psychology? By stopped, I mean either a refusal of a request (refusing to sanction the requested actions) or then intervening afterwards due to (from the perspective of the state, deceptive description of the requested permissions) nor are you aware of changes to state policy that made previous kinds of actions no longer permissible.

I'll provide examples if you are really so intent on claiming ignorance and demonstrating you are a total hack and fool before whoever is following this conversation.

I said 'anywhere in the world' by way of asking for proof that such processes were endemic. Picking the most oppressive state in the world as an example hardly makes your case. — Isaac

I never said the process was "endemic".

You clearly do not have the cognitive capabilities to follow the conversation, one such cognitive ability being the "reading of words".

I will, from now on, be simply pointing out the strawmen you create and repeating your lack of cognitive skills needed to debate, at least in good faith, each time I see it. I will no longer bother to go through the exercise of brushing aside your strawmen for completeness sake; if you want to surround yourself with an army of straw, that's only kindle for the burning of your own soul.

That was not my claim, it was Echarmion's. You know, the one whom you earlier accused of not reading the posts carefully. — Isaac

Ah, I am unable to tell you two apart, I will be more careful. Fools seem all the same to me, lacking any distinguishing personality.

So, what is your view on the re-education camps?

Let's continue the conversation from there.

That's a nice bit of circular logic. The state will stop your from doing things it views as threatening. And it views as threatening that which it stops you from doing. — Echarmion

It's not circular, it's simply the definition of "what you do when you see a threat: you act with regard to that threat".

If you threaten my life, I will act; if you threaten my business, I will act. My action will be based on my evaluation of the threat and what is an justifiable and effective response.

What is "ethical research", or otherwise permissible research, in a given state is the state policy about what kind of research it views as non-threatening. Research the state subsidizes in a given state, is that state policy of what kind of research it views as useful, under one argument or another (why else would it fund it).

Not so complicated that we can't, when accusing one institution of being complicit in class oppression, racial segregation, genocide...produce just the tiniest shred of actual evidence beyond insinuation and conspiracy-theorist level speculation. — Isaac

Class relations are not, in their essential character, conspiratorial. The class of people called "slaves" in pre-revolutionary and post-revolutionary America was not a speculative thing; it really existed. The "institution of slavery" is in reference to real institutions that really existed to maintain slavery.

Nothing has transpired politically since then to assume that similar structures of oppression relating classes of people to institutions, to one degree or another of oppression, can simply no longer exist, and, if they do, would have nothing to do with the institutions that we may find to be operating in any particular nation or globally; or that we may simply carve out broad exceptions to such query because it is inconvenient to the enjoyment of class privilege.

You may argue a particular institution is not involved in maintaining oppressive relations, you may argue a particular institution is involved, yes, but "on the whole" contributing more to liberty than oppression (that the left hand washes the right). I am completely open to such claims and such analysis.

But, if the claim is that institutions are by nature, or at least Western institutions, incapable of involvement in oppression, then it seems you have a psychological problem of interpreting reality. Unfortunately, there's no pill I am licensed to provide that fixes this level of denial.

No, you absolutely will not. There are very few states left in the world where all forms of threat to state policy results in expatriation or imprisonment. Some will, others won't. — Isaac

You have a complete inability to participate in the conversation at a cognitive level.

I said three possibilities: "stopped, removed, or imprisoned". If the state feels your activity is threatening there will be a response, whether a legitimate or illegitimate state.

In a legitimate state, the state is not threatened by legitimate research into the mechanism and consequence of state policy and power.

However, the legitimate state will still stop you from conducting research it views as threatening. If you engage in human experimentation the state views as illegal and unethical, the state will stop you, arrest you, or then send you back to where you came from. The state feels threatened because the state genuinely identifies with it's citizens and wants to protect citizens from unethical human experimentation.

Now, in a illegitimate state, if you carried out research to investigate and expose unethical human experimentation, then the state would feel threatened because it does not identify with its citizenry and requires what people elsewhere say is "unethical research" in order to understand and control its citizenry, and would stop you, arrest you or send you back to where you came from.

If the state is not interested in your research, it is because the state does not feel threatened by your research.

However, more generally, research conforms to state policy because research is funded by the state or proxies to the state. Researchers who insist on not conforming may have some degree of toleration by the state due to the potential for blow back of "interference in supposed objective researchers"; however, there is always a point beyond which the state will directly interfere, and, more importantly, what the state learns from such experience is that it needs to better filter out such people from getting the token of credible expertise to begin with.

The legitimate state learns it must better filter out people willing to break "humane ethical principles" in human experimentation.

The illegitimate state learns it must better filter out people unwilling to break such principles, and even more so people willing to "make a scene" about such unethical behaviour and institutional design in a general (both in terms of human experimentation and other things).

Rambling on about China for a few paragraphs is not an answer. — Isaac

You say "anywhere in the world" and I use the example of China and your own claim that "I was not under the impression they're premised on mental disease at all, but rather on lack of proper socialisation" and your ability to verify that "impression" by scientific research, and you view this as "rambling".

Amazing, truly amazing.

But we don't 'lend our credibility to Chinese state agents'. — Isaac

This is off topic for this thread, as the OP is about mental health under a illegitimate state, so I will make a new thread and make my case that insofar as a community of psychologists conceive of themselves as part of a global community that includes China and derives their expert legitimacy, in part, from the global nature of the community, then they are both directly enabling Chinese state agency by supporting, collaborating with and training Chinese state agents, but also covering for Chinese state policy with their credibility, insofar as they don't vocally denounce it and cut community ties and are willing to say statements like "I was not under the impression they're premised on mental disease at all, but rather on lack of proper socialisation", which, of course, is only "scientifically" supported by the "evidence" provided by Chinese state agents carrying out the policy.

No, you stated that all psychologists (clinicaland research) need a state license to practice. I'm asking you what form that licence takes around the world and where, in it's provisions, is the requirement to uphold state policy. — Isaac

If you go to a state and threaten state policy, you will be stopped if not removed from the country, if not arrested and placed in prison.

Go to China and verify if they are really "I was not under the impression they're premised on mental disease at all, but rather on lack of proper socialisation".

Maybe this premise is true, or untrue. If it is true, you should be able to conduct research to demonstrate that, and perhaps, with sociologist colleagues, further investigate if this "lack of proper socialisation" is likewise true or untrue, in order to help verify or then help correct Chinese state policy.

Now, insofar as you accept that Chinese state power would not allow you do to that (try to get to the truth as a so called "scientist" to verify your own "impressions"), then insofar as you can "research around the world" it is, in its essential character, a state license to uphold state policy wherever you go.

Furthermore, insofar as you, or any in your profession anywhere in the world, lend your credibility to Chinese state agents as well as communities and institutions that help train Chinese state agents, then you are party to the crimes of the Chinese state.

If you lend someone your credibility, you receive in return their moral culpability.

Likewise, insofar as you cite in your research any research conducted in China or by agents or proxies of China, you are extending Chinese state power.