Apple series of Lady in the Lake. :up: :up:

I like some of them, others not so much, like this one…



Even an AI can produce a more interesting cover image.

He’s dedicated to truth, democracy, and saving Americans from being poisoned by big agriculture/pharmaceuticals… so he endorses Trump. :chin:

Just another slimy politician doing what’s best for himself.

I have costal real estate to sell to anyone who gets teary-eyed over these speeches. — Mikie

How much?

In other news, “One of the biggest revisions by the Bureau of Labor Statistics showed that the United States added 818,000 fewer jobs between April 2023 and March 2024.” — NOS4A2

If Trump can be believed this is good news because he reported that those jobs were filled by illegal immigrants. Good news or part of a blizzard of lies and deceit?

… the same be said of politics, philosophy, sports, etc etc etc. — ENOAH

Exactly.

Religious kinship is magnitudes deeper because it assumes shared core values.

is kinship not an ego less drive? I get that quickly egos rush in; buy at its "essence."

I’m afraid that kinship is inherently tribal in nature, and that’s why religions are so tribal in nature.

I can’t agree because, if I’ve been following your reason rightly, your duality (real land/phony water) expresses a fetish. Wouldn’t you feel kinship with anyone who shared your fetish? It need not be a community.

I am flowing on a synthetic river, seeing the real land on both sides of me. I am not saying I can get off the river. I just think it is functional knowing that. — ENOAH

It’s functional in its binding effect with those who also believe as you do, believe in the duality of real lands and phony rivers. You feel kinship with those who see the world as you do, don’t you?

It’s not my term, it’s Constance’s term. As I’ve said from the beginning, I think the essence of religion is binding. If you look at the etymology, it’s in the very name: Latin religare ‘to bind’.

Anyway, to be clear, you admit that your adulation of egolessness is like a fetish?

note that we cannot escape sex as a fetish while being human; just as we cannot escape the ego. — ENOAH

You seem to be suggesting that humans are inherently corrupt or inescapably fetishizing everything. I can agree with this because it means that the essence of religion is fetishism.

It appears you linger at the "institutional" notion of religion. — ENOAH

To used Constance’s simile, you’re saying that it’s like I linger at the fetish notion of sex. The thing is that anything can be fetishized and sex doesn’t necessarily lead to fetishes. Sex can be fully realized without fetishes, indeed more fully realized I might argue.

It’s as though you and Constance insist that sex is a fetish. It is not.

Religion's answer: know that your ego is nothing. — ENOAH

Religions have all sorts of answers to all sorts of questions. It is rather presumptuous of you to try speaking for all religions.

Out of this ever evolving mechanism came countless manifestations--your institutions and ideologies. — ENOAH

Out of religion came countless religions??? That doesn’t make any sense.

It appears that way in religion's manifestation as institutions, I agree. — ENOAH

A religion is an institution or ideology.

religion as a reduced phenomenon is the confrontation we have with a world that is utterly transcendental, and its value-in-the-world puts to inquiry an extraordinary question. — Constance

The question a religion poses is whether you have faith in its *ultimate* authority.

We’re not communicating for some reason.

What are you talking about? :brow: Steve Schmidt is a thirty-year Republican and a political and corporate strategist. He is best known for working on Republican political campaigns, including those of President George W. Bush, California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, and Arizona Senator John McCain during his 2008 presidential campaign.

Have you been reading this and the Trump thread? Not only are mainly democrats partial to this thinking, its a pick-and-choose situation. — AmadeusD

Show instances of this in this or the Trump thread.

Religion is the foundational indeterminacy of our existence, and in this, ethics is underscored. — Constance

Rather, religion is the foundational determinacy of our existence, and in this, ethics is prescribed.

It’s not about policy at all, is it? — NOS4A2

Anyone who is trying to win your vote shouldn't be taken at face-value anyway. — AmadeusD

Is anyone (with the exception of the MAGA cult) foolish enough to take what a politician says at face-value? Anyway, you have a remarkably low tolerance for human sweetness.

I think an impartial viewer would disagree that the exchange is sickly sweet, cartoonish, and ingenuine.

You think they're being plainspoken and nice so they won't be canceled? That would be a moronic strategy.

But there is no better to hide your lack of interviews and lack of transparency behind such a fake exchange. — NOS4A2

Why do you think it’s fake? I wouldn’t think that you would even watch it.

It’s all an opaque act, a virtual candidacy — NOS4A2

I watched 10 minutes of the Harris and Waltz chat just now and if it’s an act they’re good actors. They come off as warm, approachable, and down to earth. The script is on-brand too, with compelling ‘creation stories’ and showcasing their middle-class backgrounds. A masterclass in branding. Isn’t Trump supposed to be the branding expert?

It also presented a stark contrast to the cold elitist labor-hating and weird chat between Trump and Elon.

We both know its meaning. Can you perhaps rephrase the question?

What is being argued here, however, is that there really is one thing that is immune, and this is a qualified immunity: value-in-being. Value qualia, is a good term. Value qualia refers to something that is not in any way or form, language. Tout autre. Think about the qualia of the color, that is, the being-appeared-to redly. We know this is not a language perception, this red-qua-red, and no one will gainsay this. But there is nothing IN the red-qua-red that "speaks," so to speak. — Constance

Not true, the color red speaks, and says different things depending on the form of life it appears in. In an orchard red says “ripe”. In the temperature of objects red say “hot”. In the ‘language’ of color, red is experienced as generally warm compared to a cool color like blue.

Works great. Doesn't ask for email address or anything.

When I asked if you were "claiming that “the good” exists in “the world” separate from minds (words and concepts)" you said yes. To me, that is an exceptional claim. I would like to know why you believe this.

If "the good" (can we say goodness?) exists separate from minds (words and concepts) then where does it exist?

To try to clarify, I offer the example of the moon. If I ask you where the moon exists you might simply point to it, if I were in a position to see your finger. It's not quite that simple though, right? You require an internal model of the world and the moon in order to point your finger at it. If that model didn't exist then you couldn't locate the moon. You would have no concept of 'moon' to begin with. Without an internal model that included the sky, earth, moon, etc. I don't know what you would see if you were looking towards the moon. The existence of the moon is dependent on our internal model of the world that we continually develop throughout life. Is goodness also dependent on our internal model of the world, even though unlike the moon we can't point to it with our index finger? Pain and pleasure are transmitted to the central nervous system in the same manner as all our senses. Where does pleasure exist? Point to where it feels good.

Not sure I understand the question. A place? — Constance

I'm trying to understand how "the good" is fundamentally different than words and concepts. I can't see how "the good" isn't conceptual in nature.

He’s losing his fucking mind. — Mikie

Getting so looney tunes that he's starting to sound like Daffy Duck.

I feel blessed.

Yes. — Constance

Where?

Looks like Melania because she’s squinting? Trump gets weirder by the day.

The idea defended in the OP is both MOST boring and MOST fascinating. For an tried and true intellectual, hell bent on filling space with dialectic, it's the former. But if one is interested in the world and not just the way words work, then the latter. — Constance

Are you claiming that “the good” exists in “the world” separate from minds (words and concepts)?

On order to take metaethics seriously, one has to look, not to the concept, the understanding's counterpart to the living actuality, but to just this actuality. The proof for this lies in the pudding: putting one's hand of a pot of boiling water, for example: NOW you know the REAL ground for the moral prohibition against doing this to others. — Constance

There’s a host of concepts involved in “the moral prohibition against doing this [putting someone’s hand in a pot of boiling water] to others” that is far removed from the experience of that pain. I must not be following rightly.

That's no problem, though the absurd extreme was uncalled-for. — Vera Mont

Talk about blindsight, I don’t think I would have made that blunder if we had this conversation in person.

I meant no disrespect to you or your mother. I apologize if you feel I've been disrespectful or vulgar.

Needs - identification - desire: it's a transition over some period of time. — Vera Mont

I agree that we learn emotion concepts as we develop. Concepts that are triggered in part by interoception. I don't see any reason why these concepts need to be conscious for an intelligence to function. Many things we observe, if not most, are beneath our conscious awareness, and we can react to them emotionally.

Wrong order. Had needs. Learned to identify them. Received appropriate care. Developed desire. Learned to differentiate and express desires. — Vera Mont

I'm imagining baby Vera Mont in her crib expressing her needs (not desires yet?) and your mother trying to satisfy those needs. The cries are relentless. First, she tries to satisfy your needs with food. Perhaps a fat juicy steak sandwich, leftovers from the night before. Nope, that's not it. Maybe baby VM is a born vegetarian? Nope, she spits out the grilled asparagus too. Long story short, it turns out that baby VM's desires for sustenance were rather specific. How could you possibly have known what you wanted so specifically at such a young age? I'm pretty sure you had no trouble differentiating between a steak sandwich, grilled asparagus, and mama's teat.

Yes. The breathing came automatically, as did theneed for nourishment; part of the organic package in which my DNA finds expression. But the desire for I needed as an infant was expressed as crying and physical distress. As a (relatively) autonomous organic entity, I feel the need for nourishment, then conceive a desire for food (sweet? savoury? crisp? soft?) and devise a strategy for obtaining what I desire. — Vera Mont

So you didn't conceive desires as an infant, yet you still had them. :chin:

I'm saying it's impossible for an unconscious entity, however intelligent and powerful, to wish, want, crave, desire, yearn for or in other way conceive a motivation of its own. — Vera Mont

Can you conceive a motivation yourself? Did you conceive the desire to eat, drink, and breathe yourself?