But perhaps formal authority is simply a marker for internal justification, and it is the latter which ultimately drives the outcome of these experiments?

If I recall correctly there was a version of this experiment in which the instructor issued orders, to be obeyed, it was not the prodding method of the original experiment. The results were far different in that experiment. While people are willing to follow orders based on authority such as a medical recommendation, they are far less willing to obey commands.

If this ''amoral struggle'', a very indifferent analysis in my opinion, defines us what's the point of being good?

There is a difference between knowing what is good and doing what is good. In general we all know what is good, but we don't always do it. We continually struggle with ourselves. That struggle is not moral, our actions, the things we do, are moral or immoral.

I think that Milgram's experiment is very different from Abramovic's performance.

Milgram's experiment purpose was to see how far people would go in their trust of authority. People trust doctors, professors. The results of his experiment are based on the ideological relationship between those in authority we trust and our willingness to retain this trust even when faced by what are apparently cruel actions. Free agency was not in doubt.

In Abramovic's performance she transforms herself into an object. An object exhibiting no agency. Its effect on the audience was not all the same, factions developed, people tried to stop others from hurting her. She allowed people to do whatever they wanted, which eventually brought out the most primitive aspects of the audience relationship to her. Taboos were dropped, and people acted in relationship to an object which presented itself as more than an object.

After 6 hours she stopped her performance and walked towards the audience who fled from her.

Good and evil are essential parts of what make us human, an amoral struggle within us that is never resolved.

What does it mean to say that sweetness exists? The phenomenal makes no sense without me, but the phenomenal is not an hallucination, there is something that is responsible for what I perceive, and it is real or factual. The sensuous is solely the result of my relationship with the world, and it makes no sense to talk about things without me, things in themselves.

I agree, but it is real.

Our understanding of nature is indistinguishable from nature.

When you have a deliriously cool creamy ice cream cone, where do you think that deliciousness, cool, creamy taste is... in the thing? Do you think something exists in the same way as it is given to you, Aren't these qualities dependent on you, and what the ice cream cone is in it self quite different.

I'd say man's essence is identical to his existence, thinking is existence,

Here is what interested me in Laurie Penny's response:

Women generally don't get to think of men as less than human, not because we're inherently better people, not because our magical feminine energy makes us more empathetic, but because patriarchy doesn't let us. We're really not allowed to just not consider men's feelings, or to suppose for an instant that a man's main or only relevance to us might be his prospects as a sexual partner. That's just not the way this culture expects us to think about men. Men get to be whole people at all times. Women get to be objects, or symbols, or alluring aliens whose responses you have to game to "get" what you want

Finding out that you’re not the Rebel Alliance, you’re actually part of the Empire and have been all along, is painful. Believe me, I know. (Although I always saw myself as an Ewok)

My leap here is that the occlusion you mentioned is due to our inherent fear of the patriarchal prohibition against incest. If so then her mention of Star Wars (Vader, Leia & Luke), and the Ewoks (whose language is a play on the Tibetan language) might provide a key for the deconstruction of what is going on between men & women.

I was fascinated by the interchange between Scott & Amy, how she was able to draw him out and at the same time reveal a lot about herself.

As far as experienced versus imaginary hurt , at one level I don't think there is a difference, hurt is hurt. However, psychological trauma induced by an actual events one may or may not be able to assimilate into one's conscious psychological make up. If it can't be assimilated then it becomes disruptive and can affect a person's behavior beyond conscious control. I think imagined hurt by definition is part of a person's psychological make up.

Wikipedia

Arranged marriages are traditional in South Asian society and continue to account for an overwhelming majority of marriages in the Indian subcontinent. Despite the fact that romantic love is "wholly celebrated" in both Indian mass media (such as Bollywood) and folklore, and the arranged marriage tradition lacks any official legal recognition or support, the institution has proved to be "surprisingly robust" in adapting to changed social circumstances and has defied predictions of decline as India modernized.

India has over 1,3 billion people, which suggests to me that appearance might not be the fundamental distinguishing factor you claim.

Our understanding nature is not the same as nature, regardless of the predictive successes of any science, what is in-itself is not an obtainable point of view, stronger version it cannot even be thought. The world as it is, it could be otherwise.

I agree with @unenlightened on this.

There is stuff, and stuff is structured, but structure is not more stuff.

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The facticity of the world is the absence of reason for any reality, there is no ultimate ground for the existence of any being. The world is what it is, the structure we discern is not in the world as such, it is only in what we discern about the world.

I see forgiveness as a processes on an interpersonal basis, a processes that varies greatly depending on who all are involved. There is a difference in forgiving a child, a parent, a friend, a lover, or a stranger. It has to do with fairness, harm, and pain.

How many times have we heard a child or adolescent say to a parent "I hate you", and we discount it because we understand that they really don't understand what it means to hate, how deeply this word can cut. It is quite another thing for a parent to tell a child or adolescent that they are worthless, or no good. I was reading a poem by Philip Larkin the other day. Here are the lines that caught me:

They fuck you up, your mum and dad.
They may not mean to, but they do.
They fill you with the faults they had
And add some extra just for you.

To forgive you have to feel hurt. I don't event think you necessarily have to understand why you feel hurt, but you do have to feel it or act in a way that demonstrates to others that you are hurt. A friend you count on, or some one you love, may inadvertently hurt you and be quite unaware of the pain they have caused you, unless you tell them. In a lot of ways, I think dialogue is the source of openness, from which honest reconciliation, and forgiveness (healing) are possible.

A business relationship is in some ways like a marriage of sorts. One business partner may act in a way that the other deems unfair, but they try to work it out for the sake of their relationship. They talk, they try to find common ground, a way to proceed, because they both need each other. In time, on a new basis of understanding they can move past the prior hurt, the wound heals, and the relationship may grow and even become stronger. It is not the event that counts, it is how the event is handled and what it means to the parties involved, how it is understood and handled, that determines how the hurt heals, and what scars if any remain.

You think Apollonian/Dionysian are opposites or are they complementary?

There is no A series without an ego, which is why some spend so much time ridding themselves of it.

Of course @wosret is right, but I think of Apollonian as cold hard reason, blue as a the blade of a sword, masculine, phallic, ironic and Dionysian as earthy green/brown/grey, the earth as mother, soft, feminine, creative and irrational.

Actually I think the opposite of this is true, the ends are what are questioned by Plato. Pleasure, the different virtues, and virtue itself, are presented as the ends, and the nature of these things is questioned. So he takes words like "pleasure", "courage", "just", "pious", etc., and questions what is meant by these terms, what is referred toby them. So these ends are clearly questioned.

Virtue as an end is not questioned, what virtue consists of is questioned; is pleasure choice-worthy is questioned. Meno asked Socrates 'can virtue be taught' and Socrates says I don't even know what virtue is. The topic is given from the outset and an understanding is sought.

It is not a selection process. It is a process of understanding. Choice, or selection is withheld, suspended in the manner of a skepticism, such that the subject may be understood before selection is made. Each of Plato's dialogues ends without a clear and conclusive understanding of the subject presented, so no selection is actually possible.

Socrates selection process is a process of understanding, it is the basis of the dialectic. He proposes or an interlocutor proposes and idea and in the give and take of their conversation these ideas are thoroughly investigated. Socrates describes himself as a mid-wife who can determine if what they come up with is worth while or not.

my art is in thoroughly examining whether the thought which the mind of the young man brings forth is a false idol or a noble and true birth.

It is a selection process.

Have you not read Plato? Clearly he stated that those using the product ought to have some say in the production of the product. It is produced for their purposes, not for the purpose of the producer. Plato was communist, he proposed communal living, so he lends himself well to a Marxist interpretation.

Double poppycock. The Republic set up different classes in a Utopian society, Marx was after a classless society, how different can you get? Plato Republic has a complex division of labor, with separates classes, it is ruled by a philosopher king, not by the masses. Marx wanted to abolish the division of labor, abolish the class system, with a state ruled democratically by the masses. Their theories of government are almost completely opposite.

The word "knowledge", or "piety", is not what is at question. What is at question is the thing signified by the word. That is why Plato's method is called "dialectics". It is incorrect to say the there is no question as to what the subject is, just because there is no question as to what the word being investigated is. The word is not the subject. The subject is what is referred to by the word, and this is exactly what is at question.

Yes, it is about what is entailed when one says they have knowledge, or piety or virtue but these topics are known as topics to be investigated and Plato uses his dialectic method to approach these topics. I never said his dialogues are about "words", I said he selects or his interlocutor select a topic to discuss. You can't have a discussion about nothing, unless you take 'nothing' itself as the topic of a discussion.

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No and yes:

No, I don't think going back in the past and shooting Hitler in the head would have changed much. He was a product of his time, his society and history up unto his points in time created him. The society that formed Hitler was bound in that direction, and if he were not, there would be others of his ilk. The Great Man theory is bunk.

Therefore I think it is of profound importance to ethics to maintain the reality of the past (and the future). If what happened in the past no longer "exists", then how do we distribute justice and what would be the reasoning behind it? There has to be some reality behind the past for justice to make any sense, otherwise we're starting a clean slate every passing moment.

We live in the present so yes, the past and future are reality for us. The distribution of Justice is based on societal agreement with rules, laws, customs and the rest which are formed in the continuum of the past, present & future. The past and future inexorably impinge on the present which is always becoming either past or future. We abide in the present and it is never static.

Perhaps you are using "given" in a way that I am not familiar with. Desire begins as an indefinite feeling. It is a sort of uneasiness within a person. The feeling must be interpreted then directed towards an object. The object of desire is chosen, not given, and the object of desire is the end.

OK, Plato was not a very psychological philosopher, I am not saying he didn't have his moments but in regards to what is choice worthy or not he was pretty clear. Just look at the subjects of his dialogues, he may not have the answers but he certainly know the topics, the ends are rarely questioned.

You would think that the means must be determined after the end is determined, because how could you ever properly fulfil your desire until after you've determined the object which the desire is for. But there is something very odd which happens with means, and this odd thing is demonstrated by the reality of habituation.

The end is generally the purpose of the dialogue, its topic, such as: can virtue be taught, what is justice, what is piety....and so on and Plato has a general methodology that he uses to approach these topics. The methodology is to question his interlocutors to come up with general ideas that may pertain to the topic and then investigate each idea, see what might be right or wrong with it and go on and on until they can't go any further. It is a selection process.

This is the issue which Socrates addressed when he went around asking skilled people, do you "know" what you are doing. The crafts people are carrying out a procedure, and the end is "given", meaning that the product which is produced will have a form which is determined by this habitual procedure. But Plato suggests that there is something inherently wrong with this procedure. He says that the people who are using the product ought to have some say in the production of the product, such that the product is tailored to the user's satisfaction.

Poppycock, what is that MU, the Marxian interpretation :-x

So the perspective is one of determining what is wanted (knowledge in this case), and asking for what is desired, the end, rather than just taking what is given.

I disagree. The topic is never in question, he may not know exactly what is entailed by the his topic, such as knowledge in his Theaetetus, or Piety in his Euthyphro but there is never a question about the topic itself it is given as the subject of the dialogue.

No, I don't think so. Freedom can't be compromised and still be freedom, such a person cannot be a free agent, and any resultant action can't be construed as moral or immoral. I think this follows from Kant's system.

You argument from authority fails.

He disagreed 12 years later. The work stands on its own, and I am confident that you are wrong.

Kant's ethical system is based on freedom of action, which I contend is non-existent when immanently threatened by an ax murderer.

Yes, but in my opinion Kant had a better answer.

The following from his Groundwork, Part III

Consequently as practical reason or as the will of a rational being it must regard itself as free, that is to say, the will of such a being cannot be a will of its own except under the idea of freedom. This idea must therefore in a practical point of view be ascribed to every rational being.

The threat of the murderer effectively relinquishes "a will of one's own"

Maybe so, but as I already stated, this is extraneous to his earlier work (1785) the Groundwork for the Metaphysics of Morales , which is the basis of his moral system.

As I understand Kant, the maxim of one's action is striped of all empirical content, it becomes a formal principal, and only as such can it be willed as a universal law.

Kant's moral system is built on freedom of action. If so then to lie to an ax murder is neither moral nor immoral because in this circumstance one is not free, so there is no moral choice, in my opinion.

Along these lines:
Repentance has to do with the relationship that holds between justice, punishment and forgiveness. Justice is constructed by man, its transgression leads to punishment and what that punishment entails depends on the law and the contriteness of the repentant for their misdeed. The result of this process is forgiveness.

99.999....% probability

Perhaps the best way to proceed is by taking each point in turn. First

I don't think it is correct to say that means and ends are given for Plato and Aristotle.

Desire is for something, no? So ends are given.

And means vary, they must be deliberated upon but they are known, and must be subject to a selection process.

Dialects for Plato is in the give and take of the dialogue, this is what dialects entails for Plato. The Socratic ignorance is largely ironic, it is his way of putting himself on the same level as his interlocutor, but it is clear from all the dialogues that he knows more than those he questions.

Agree or disagree?

The news about Catalan does not sound good. The government in Madrid is passing a law to enable corporations to move their base of operations without going through shareholder approval and the Catalan government is talking about declaration of independence. Prompting an exodus.

Given Madrid's medieval response to the referendum vote, its response to a declaration of independence may be catastrophic.

Catalonia's President Carles Puigdemont said last night that he wants to reach a negotiated settlement with the Spanish government, calling on King Felipe VI of Spain to push for open dialogue rather than endorsing the "catastrophic" approach by Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy, per the New York Times.

It should be noted that Kant's response to Benjamin Constant's objection was approximately 12 years after he wrote the Groundwork for the Metaphysics of Morals, it is extraneous to this work.

Kant formulated the Categorical Imperative (CI). The CI basically states that only those actions are morally good that can be universal law. Have I got that right?

Not quite. Only those actions whose maxim conforms in form to the demands of duty can be moral and that form must pass the test of non-contradiction in order to be legislated as a universal law.

The thing is that Kant was not trying to produce a theory of applied ethics, I recall reading this in his introduction to the Groundwork, or 2nd Critique. So to judge him on the basis of lying to a murderer is not charitable.

Male:Female::Young:Old
Power involves risk.

This third aspect of the person, spirit (I don't know the Greek word used, but it is translated in different ways), is necessary to explain the interaction between body and mind.

Aristotle called it proairesis, the faculty of choice. It is how we deliberate about the means, not the ends. Both means and ends are given, for Plato & Aristotle, freedom of choice is a selection process for them. If our selections are moral then our soul is in tune (Georgias). The parts of the soul are friends, when they work together.

Paul sees men obeying/disobeying laws. The law against coveting, makes coveting a sin, without the law there is no sin. (Romans 7:7,8). The law speaks in imperatives which naturally arises the passions within us. Paul becomes a stranger unto himself (7,15). Such a concept would have been impossible for Plato or Aristotle. For Paul the only way for man to mend this inner wretchedness through grace.

It was the law of voluntary submission to the law that lead to the discovery of the will. "Thou shalt" is not merely the mind speaking to the body as Augustine put it, but rather it is "Thou shalt will" which implies a yes or no answer.

Augustine tells a joke in his Confessions. What was God doing prior to his creation of the world? Answer, making a hell for those who ask such questions. I am not sure about your interpretation of Augustine. I think he followed Paul much more closely, that he felt that man never is at peace with himself without the mercy of God, that the will is always divided against itself until death, but that is well off topic.

delete, sorry didn't see it was addressed to Fuji

Nick Land dismisses left acceleration/right acceleration for unconditional acceleration. Here is his latest statement.

Read him with a grain of salt.

I am out and about. Please check out quote from Paul's Romans 7 above.
Later

No, I think you are reaching here. Platonic irony has to do with Socratic ignorance. Socrates claimed to know one thing, that he does not know and yet in this knowledge he knows more than all his interlocutors. Platonic irony it that of a great man's dissimulation, not as a vice but as a gentile art.

The concept of a will divided against itself was not available in the ancient Hellenic culture. It is only by means of the division of the will, that Paul could explain sin and grace. The Greeks saw reason and desire as competitive forces (the horses), they did not suspect that there could be a faculty of the mind divided against itself...the will as we know it.

Socrates could never willing do what was unreasonable it would be against his concept of knowledge which is at the heart of Plato's philosophy.

Paul could, he knew he could, and he knew what he ought to do even though he did not always do it and that's the difference. Paul discovered that he could say yes or no, Socrates could never knowing say no to reason.