I think his mistake is to believe that 'experience' is something that can be known in the third person. In other words, experience is not an object of cognition, in the way that an electron or particle or other object can be. We don't know experiences, we have experiences; so any experience has an inescapably first-person element, that is, it is undergone by a subject. So we can't objectify 'the nature of experience' in the way we can the objects and forces that are analysed by the natural sciences.

I thought you meant that I can't have your experience. I hit my thumb with a hammer and I feel pain, but you can't feel my pain. I hit your thumb with a hammer but I feel no pain. We don't share the same experience, we experience what we experience, each in our own way.

So I'm guessing, you don't agree with it.

It's not that I don't agree with it...it is that I am not sure what "mind" means given this interpenetration. If "mind" is some sort of potential latency in matter, I think how that could be is worth exploring, but I don't understand what the inner life of an electron could possibly mean without anthropomorphization. It may well be that all matter entails the possibility of "mind", I don't disagree with that possibility, but I think intentionality remains only a possibility, and not actual, in inert substances.

First of all, 'panpsychism' is the belief that 'everything has mind' in some fundamental sense - electrons , other particles, material objects, and so on, have mind, or are in some sense capable of intentional action. This is proposed to solve, or dissolve, the fundamental dichotomy between 'mind and matter' by saying that mind is 'everywhere' (one meaning of 'pan'). All we're seeing with conscious beings is a highly differentiated form of matter, but matter itself is intrinsically conscious.

I guess if you are a monist then "everything has mind [even though I am not quite sure what "mind" means] seems appropriate, I am not sure this entails that everything is "in some sense capable of intentional action." I think anything that can be defined as living can in some sense demonstrate intentionaly (even if minimally), but I do not think any inert matter can or has demonstrated similar intentionality. If so then for the monist's inert matter's is unintentional, and the question is again what does "mind" mean if this is the case.

All things, living and inert have a history, even if on the micro level it can be very short. If all matter can (in some combination) accommodate life, then mind in some sense must be a potential state of matter, part of matters natural progression or history.

The played out metaphor is between personal identity and the ship's identity. Ships are traditionally female.

I like the following answer in a poem by Steve Gehrke

The Ships of Theseus

The answer of course is that the ship
doesn’t exist, that “ship”
is an abstraction, a conception,
an imaginary tarp thrown
across the garden of the real.
The answer is that the cheap
peasantry of things toils all day
in the kingdom of  language,
every ship like a casket
of words: bulkhead, transom,
mast steps. The answer
is to wake again to the banality
of things, to wade toward
the light inside the plasma
of ideas. But each plank
is woven from your mother’s
hair. The blade of each oar
contains the shadow of
a horse. The answer
is that the self is the glue between
the boards, the cartilage
that holds a world together,
that self is the wax in
the stenographer’s ears,
that there is nothing the mind
won’t sacrifice, each item
another goat tossed into
the lava of our needs.
The answer is that this is just
another poem about divorce,
about untombing the mattress
from the sofa, your body
laid out on the bones of the
double-jointed frame, about
separation, rebuilding, about
your daughter’s missing
teeth. Each time you visit
now you find her partially
replaced, more sturdily
jointed, the weathered joists
of   her childhood being stripped
away. New voice. New hair.
The answer is to stand there
redrawing the constellation
of   the word daughter in
your brain while she tries
to understand exactly who
you are, and breathes out
girl after girl into the entry-
way, a fog of   strangers that
almost evaporates when
you say each other’s
names. Almost, but not quite.
Let it be enough. Already,
a third ship moves
quietly toward you in the night.

I think both ethical theories play a role in how we act. I don't think it is a question of which is more reasonable, rather I think it is a question of pragmatics.

Utilitarianism is consequential, where we anticipate the consequences of acting the way we act and try to act to maximize benefit to others. Virtue Ethics derives the rightness or wrongness of one's conduct from the character of the behavior itself rather than the outcomes of the conduct.

I think in practice, if the consequences of our actions are easy to determine then we tend to act on a Utilitarian basis for the best consequence, but if the consequences can't be determined ahead of time and are too ambiguous for us to predict, then we act based on our moral character.

Socrates
Are we then, my friend, still pregnant and in travail with knowledge, or have we brought forth everything?

Theaetetus
Yes, we have, and, by Zeus, Socrates, with your help I have already said more than there was in me.

Socrates
Then does our art of midwifery declare to us that all the offspring that have been born are mere wind-eggs and not worth rearing?

Theaetetus Dialogue

Socrates' divine midwifery enables him to distinguish true thoughts from false thoughts. He is the sterile medium for delivery and birth of true thoughts and not mere "wind eggs" [it suggests a fart]

“ - It’s a funny old world”!

This is what Margret Thatcher said upon being forced to stand down in November 1990, even though she claimed to have never lost an election in her life.

As we age we tend to beget more wind-eggs.

Jon Stewart last night:

"...and from what I've heard they do anal"

I've always been somewhat at a loss when talking about moral realism. To a large degree it just doesn't fit with my outlook on the world. It not so much that the arguments against realism are convincing as much as none of the arguments for it are. I guess from my perspective I wander, why would there be ways in which we should act - in the realist sense.

Have any of you heard some convincing arguments for realism.

Racial bigotry is 'real', yet Science tells us that there is only one race, the human one. Racial bigotry is a social construction and Morals are also social constructions. If social constructions form the basis for how we behavior, then aren't they real enough?

For social facts, the attitude that we take toward the phenomenon is partly constitutive of the phenomenon … Part of being a cocktail party is being thought to be a cocktail party; part of being a war is being thought to be a war. This is a remarkable feature of social facts; it has no analogue among physical facts. (Searle 1995, 33–34)

Do you think that I am a moral agent in the same way as we are moral agents? Perhaps the "I' is derivative from the "We", where what I say, learn and how I behave mimics the roles I have learned from both global and local narratives.

Reminds me of Pynchon's Gravity Rainbow riff

"You never did the Kenosha Kid". The hero (Tyrone) just got shot up with Sodium amytal (truth serum) and he plays with this phrase. Harold Bloom in his book "Thomas Pynchon" said that Pynchon is
using language "in such a way that it can free itself of its bureaucratizing control of experience" (pg 97).

You never did.
The Kenosha Kid
Bet you never did the "Kenosha," kid!
Bet you never did the "Kenosha Kid."
You! never did the Kenosha Kid
You? Never! Did the Kenosha Kid
You never did 'the,' Kenosha Kid!"

Hi...I would start here:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hedonism

https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/pleasure/

Are we the individual, here to carry out some Protestant Work Ethic ethos? In more general terms, are we here to maintain institutions? To consume, to work, to live in a country is to maintain its institutions. Are we the maintenance crew of some sort of institutional perpetuation.

It is interesting that you ask "Are we the individual, here to carry out some Protestant Work ethos?" No, that ethos is embedded in our culture, in capitalism itself. The Reformation modernized capitalism, work became dignified, it became our way to salvation, it became part of how we approach and appreciate life. The secularization of salvation means that in order to be saved one must be successful in what one does, in work. This idolization of work led to Marx's complex notion of alienation (translates as 'sin' theologically), as a confusion of life with things, a confusion which I think supports Capitalism's progression. The worker satisfies preexisting values not in self development, but in the accumulation of wealth, which is the commodification of value.

Are we the maintenance crew of some sort of institutional perpetuation.

No, but I think that we continually search for extended family, its safety and security, its laws, rules, and hierarchy. Institutions constitute a 'family' that we may be able to join, assume a role and play a part in something which decides how and what we do with a much of lives. As Mitt Romney said, “Corporations are people, my friend.”

Max Weber traces the source of Protestant Work Ethic back to the Reformation, which dignified the spirit of work....all work regardless of kind was dignified, made in service of salvation, to which one was chosen or not, it was very much in the service of capitalism.

What Weber argued, in simple terms:
According to the new Protestant religions, an individual was religiously compelled to follow a secular vocation (German: Beruf) with as much zeal as possible. A person living according to this world view was more likely to accumulate money.
The new religions (in particular, Calvinism and other more austere Protestant sects) effectively forbade wastefully using hard earned money and identified the purchase of luxuries as a sin. Donations to an individual's church or congregation were limited due to the rejection by certain Protestant sects of icons. Finally, donation of money to the poor or to charity was generally frowned on as it was seen as furthering beggary. This social condition was perceived as laziness, burdening their fellow man, and an affront to God; by not working, one failed to glorify God.

The role of grace in Catholicism, is associated with Calvin's Chosen. Salvation for Calvinism was not freely given as grace in the Catholic tradition, but which rather had to be firmly and independently believed by Calvinists, it was not guaranteed.

The 'city on the hill' refers to Governor John Winthrope's 1630 sermon to his 700 Puritan fellow colonists:

“We are a company professing ourselves fellow members of Christ … [We] must love one another with pure heart fervently. We must bear one another’s burdens … We must be willing to abridge ourselves of our superfluities, for the supply of others’ necessities … We must delight in each other; make others’ conditions our own; rejoice together, mourn together, labor and suffer together, always having before our eyes our commission and community in the work, as members of the same body. So we will keep the unity of [God’s] spirit in the bond of peace. The Lord will be our God, and delight to dwell among us, as his own people … [And so we] must consider that we shall be as a city upon a hill. The eyes of all people are upon us. So that if we shall deal falsely with our God in this work we have undertaken, and so cause him to withdraw his present help from us, we shall be made a story and a by-word through the world.”

Wikipedia

Calls to the view this city are common in American politics: JFK, Ronald Reagan, George W. Bush, Barack Obama, all used its metaphor, which leads to the concept of 'American exceptionalism'

Religion/Theology must be the biggest sub-contractor out there. All societies have some form of religious practice and religious norms that have found their way into the all societal institutions and laws, regardless of the country. 'My country', the 'Father/motherland, terms which have a 'god' like quality, infallible in so far as they are virtuous (like reason's infallibility). The Rousseau's 'general will' is god's will (and it's just as likely to be determined :D ).

Society's rules and laws are to a large extent based on religious conventions, what each culture believes is just and fair was prefigured in sacred script. The 'Protestant Ethic' has proved itself valuable to our form of society, it keeps us going, striving and progressing toward, that shining city on the hill.

Saw the film and I agree with TL, it was a nice portrayal, perhaps even true to events as they unfolded, but it didn't grab me. I think character development was lacking, maybe it took too big a chuck of time to encompass.

I liked "The Imitation Game" a 2014 American historical drama thriller film directed by Morten Tyldum and written by Graham Moore loosely based on the biography Alan Turing: The Enigma by Andrew Hodges. This movie had pathos, I felt drawn into the absurd historical circumstances it portrays, even though it exaggerates these circumstances, perhaps because it is able to realistically exaggerate that history. Of course the casting chemistry between Cumberbatch & Knightly was critical to the film's success. This film actually provoked social action. Turing was pardoned and there was an attempt to pardon the 49,000 gay people who were convicted under the same law.

So do you think Fascists, Communists, The Left or The Right, Anarchists can tolerate ideologically free speech or don't these groups make the presupposition (Example: Milo's being turned down by Berkeley's due to Marxist or/& Anarchist protesters or Milo being turned down by CPAC ostensibly for moral reasons) that their followers & perhaps by implication that the pubic will be hurt in some manner by any such speech. The assumption that the masses are too immature to handle certain ideological sophistry, that the masses are unable to think as adults.

if there was some governmental means by which all speech could be forced to be truthful, would we still need free speech?

No, because no one would have anything to say.

Milo did seem to get away with one interesting point: free-speech now appears to be a conservative value more than a liberal one (despite Trump and his thoughts on slander law). That some proponents of the left are so willing to turn on their own and "de-platform" them rather than actually come to consensus or clarification through discussion and debate is a pretty good example of what he meant by this. The obsession of some with political correctness is what I think largely creates the moral superiority complex these de-platformers appeal to in order to feel comfortable doing so. The group feelings based mentality that some use as an approach to progressivism is close to the heart of why serious political discussion has become so difficult of late. If someone gets hurt feelings then according to the PC crowd a crime has been committed, and are therefore they are unable to realistically discuss any controversial issues whatsoever. (unless, (for some reason), the controversy happens to lay at the feet of white-cis-straight-males).

Neo-fascist utilize absolute liberal values such as free speech to 'de-platorm' liberal biases inserting their own spin on these values as viable alternatives (patriotic speech versus 'treasonable' speech), which enables them to escape open censure and gives the general population a definitive versus nebulous direction. The transformation of values in this manner reminds me of religion, and perhaps main stream religions are essentially fascist, where fascism's emphasis on race becomes religion's emphasis on membership.

It is interesting to note that one of Trump's main goals is to overturn the Johnson Amendment, which

The amendment affects nonprofit organizations with 501(c)(3) tax exemptions,[which are subject to absolute prohibitions on engaging in political activities and risk loss of tax-exempt status if violated.Specifically, they are prohibited from conducting political campaign activities to intervene in elections to public office. The Johnson Amendment applies to any 501(c)(3) organization, not just religious 501(c)(3) organizations.

(Wikipedia)

The arguments for and against this amendment revolve around free speech as an absolute right versus the separation of Religion from Politics. The pragmatic political right sees it as a way to channel church/charitable funds into their coffers with no disclosure and at the same time enable pastors to extol their political values.

[As an aside, I think it is interesting to note (this is ongoing) that the contentious state of affairs that surround Pope Francis's liberal attitudes within the Catholic Church are now surfacing. Recently posters went up in Rome with an image of Francis scowling and the following:

“Ah Francis, you’ve taken over congregations, removed priests, decapitated the Order of Malta and the Franciscans of the Immaculate, ignored Cardinals…but where’s your mercy?”

CNA 2/6/17

Then not 10 days later, a fake newspaper with a very conservative content concentrating on Francis's equivocation on divorce (the Conservative's view of Francis' policy) was distributed around Rome.]

I'm not a political historian, but what I do know of Benito Moussilini's fascist regime is that it was created and maintained in part by very passionate and very violent action taken at the street level. By attacking or otherwise compromising their political rivals and detractors (individuals, homes, businesses, events, cities, etc..) early fascists knew that they could forcibly advance their own agenda (or party), and did so happily because in their eyes they were standing on the highest moral ground in sight.

Sounds a lot like the Tea Party lot, they won in the end. Now Dems are going back to the town hall, I wonder if they can be confrontational.

Neo Fascism seems to be very concerned about Nationalism, but now their target population are Muslims and other immigrants, which is ironic given that the USA was settled by immigrants. Today's liberals seem obsessed with political correctness to the extent that they are willing to censor those that ignore their rules. Here is Bill Maher's interview with Milo Yiannopoulos last night. As discussed both of these men were censored at Berkeley (although Maher was able to give his commencement address and the possibility of Yiannopoulos talk caused a riot) which has to be an accomplishment of sorts.

I thought Maher handled him well.

I agree that normativity does not solve the problem. The correspondence between what we say about reality and what reality is, can't be solved but it can be agreed upon.

No. There is no universality in reality, unless you believe in god...there is only agreement and disagreement as to what is.

Hence normativity

If it is wholly a "product of language", and doesn't actually relate to any objective features of the world (besides language itself) then it remains incommensurable, and the implication is that it's arbitrary, without non-circular, non-self-referential standard, or comparison.

,

But isn't that the way reality is, i.e., totally contingent.

Suppose 'universality' is a product of language, that the reduction of what is particular (real) to difference is a function of naming and using of language.

Yes I think there are ways art/aesthetics can be compared to metaphysics, but (coming at it from the opposite direction) unlike the philosopher the artist does not always consciously strive towards the truth. The artist's concern is with his making process, how his work becomes complete. A philosophical text primarily appeals to our intellect, a work of art primarily appeals to our imagination. The art work's truth or lie, beauty or ugliness is outside of it in the community of observers and their narratives. Metaphysical works are judged on their content.

A skeptic or nihilist may not be 'moved' by any work of metaphysics yet the same person may quake in the presence of a truly great work of art. Art's presence becomes manifest in our somatic response to it.

I think both the metaphysician and the artist approach their work as an attempt to solve a problem. The philosophical work attempts answers, and new questions arise which generate new works. The artist's work maybe the only work of art the artist ever achieves, or like a Matisse or a Picasso, artists with lives full of such works.

Art must rise above craft in a manner that is similar to how metaphysics must transcend science.

Politico National Tracking poll 2/15-2/17
http://www.politico.com/f/?id=0000015a-418d-d693-abda-e7cdd76e0000
Note Pocahontas.

Who do you think will stand against Trump, it can't be too early to speculate since they will start running in earnest in 2 more years (sooner if we get lucky) and the Dems will sure to need as much lead time as possible.

I cannot see Elizabeth Warren, she is too polarizing. Biden, but I doubt it. Michelle Obama would be a great choice but the same thing that happened to Hillary would happen to her, and I think she is too smart to run. Kaine? no. Nancy Pelosi is perhaps the most effective vocal critic of Trump right now, but she is like 75 years old. Chuck Schumer nah, too NY. (Kanye of course a long shot, but long shots come in :-d , which tends to upset everyone. He's got too much Chi-town flow)

I think someone who is or was a governor would be a good contender for the Dems. Jerry Brown, unfortunately is too old. Kaine? no, I was not impressed by his VP run. So how about Gov John Hickenlooper of Colorado...he would get my vote, but he maybe perceived as too liberal, unless Trumpster really fucks up, in which case my guess, the conservatives will hibernate in 2020.

Of course maybe our friends in Canada can show us the best way to resist Trump:

Justin Trudeau's handshake with Donald Trump the 'biggest display of dominance in the history of Canada'
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/02/13/justin-trudeau-becomes-latest-world-leader-brave-trumps-awkward/?WT.mc_id=tmg_share_tw

They need to mimic what the Republicans did, which started with gerrymandering their way to optimal Congressional districts. The Dems need to legally challenge the lopsided nature of many of these districts.

It's going to be an uphill march since Republicans now dominate state government, with 32 legislatures and 33 governors.

But, the Dems need a leader who will bring them together and I think they may have a hard time finding one regardless of whom they choose in Atlanta. Either choice will divide the party.

And, no, it was not the Republican machine that secured Trump anything. The Republican machine hated Trump, did everything it could to block Trump, and is now trying to figure out how to deal with Trump.

Don't agree with this at all. The Republican rank and file who comprise their political machine got behind Trump after the convention. The Republican Party gets out the vote, as far as I can figure out it has always been able to get out the vote because Republicans are more orderly, more top down than the Democrats.

I remember being in Rotary a long time ago listening to the Republicans talk about their meetings and how remarkably differential they were to their leaders. The Republican's ability to marshal their members is, to my mind, their key to winning.

But of course the topic is how to resist Trump, he is clearly the President. And, I think Dems need to change party leadership if they want to stand a chance of defeating him in 4 years.

The Republicans have put the Democrats where they were back in 2008 and the Dems need to mimic the GOP in so far as they have the intelligence to do so, which I think is doubtful. The Dems inability to have a hearing on its choice of Supreme Courts Judge last year is symbolic of their impotence as a political party.

The Dems didn't lose the election, they won the popular vote by a margin wider than most historical presidential elections. The argument that they did not listen to their grass roots is mistaken. They lost in the states where the Electoral votes counted the most. They were out played, out strategized, by the Republican political machine.

The Dems need to elect a party leader that can unify their party not a political crony like Debbie W Shultz. Right now the Dems are trying to decide who will lead the party. The two main contenders are championed by different sides of the party, Senator Keith Ellison by Bernie and Labor Secretary Tom Perez by Hillary. The party's decision will be made in Atlanta in a couple of weeks, 2/23-2/25.

There isn't much of a difference in policy between these two contenders, but the party's decision, I think will help determine whether they have a shot at overturning Trump in 2020. Hillary's choice will keep the status quo, and it will continue to lose major elections, in my opinion. If Bernie's choice wins then I think the party will have at least a chance at avoiding cronyism and may have the possibility of developing a strong challenger to Trump.

I don't think the Dems ought to oppose Trump's choice for Supreme Court Justice on the basis of their own impotence as a party, that's ludicrous. Scalia was a conservative and Trump's nominee is a conservative. If the Dems want to oppose him, let them oppose him and justify it on the grounds that he is the wrong person for the job and not some sort of tit for tat inanity.

The Dems need to move past their failures, not wallow in them. The only way to deal with Trump is to keep him (personally) and his policies in court continually over the next 4 years. So far that does not seem to be a problem and it appears as thought millions upon millions of dollars are being funneled into legal challenges. The ACLU raised more than 24 million dollars over the first weekend of Trump's Presidency.

You probably don't want to cash her in or ouside.
Florida is a trip
:-|

You ought to read Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics Book X in conjunction with Plato's Philebus. Aristotle understood Plato (better than any other thinker) and his thoughts on pleasure are very similar to Plato's thought, he adopted much from Plato's Philebus. They differ in regards to pleasure as generation (genesis) process for Plato versus activity (energia) completed action for Aristotle. Good way to approach both works.

Plato is trying to place pleasure/desire in its relationship with knowledge and ultimately what is Good. He wants to show that pleasure is value neutral, a becoming... that because of what it is can not be an end in itself. So when he speaks of a person forming a judgement based on perception and memory he insists that as our judgments can be true or false so too our pleasures can be true or false. He thinks that the Good is the right/correct proportionate mix of true knowledge and true pleasure.

SOCRATES: Now, do we want to say that in the case of good people these pictures are usually true, because they are dear to the gods, while quite the opposite usually holds in the case of wicked ones, or is this not what we ought to sa

Socrates has been discussing human expectations and I think he is suggesting that the pleasures we picture or anticipate by winning a lottery will depend on the kind of person we are, good or wicked.

Bad men, then delight for the most part in false pleasures, good men in true ones

40c

So winning the lottery will not change the kind of person you are.

Beautiful morning yesterday by the ocean. Plein air with others at Boynton Beach Inlet marina. Around 78 degree F & mild breeze. Went over to the ocean, which is on other side of the inlet, but t it was too breezy.