:up: thanks Tom

I don't expect leaders to be perfect or to role play sober righteousness — Tom Storm

This is why I feel I was born in the wrong era. I see I am wrong but I literally expect from them righteousness, purity, honour, etc... more or less as samurai leaders were back then in Japan for example. The Bushido principle.

to be honest. — universeness

Completely. You are approaching to my point then

I prefer my politicians to act human and not some fake archetype of virtuosity. — universeness

According to your thoughts, how is to "act human"?

"Christian philosophy" too, it seems, had died on that cross with the first and last Christian. — 180 Proof

:100: :clap:

What we should expect from our representatives is to manage political problems, manage a country, solve socio-economic issues and possibly have a vision about where we should go to — Benkei

Fully agreed. But not any person can manage such complex responsibility. How can we expect from the PM to solve inflation or unemployment if she is not responsible with herself? This is what I wanted to mean with my points.
Probably I am wrong but I cannot imagine a politician taking care of big problems if she/he is involved in private parties. It is not related to drugs or dance it is about rectitude and maturity.

If you don't understand drug use and addiction, you can't regulate it in a manner that makes sense. — Benkei

You can take part in this issue through many ways. I guess it is not necessary to go to a party in Ibiza to understand that drug abuse is painful to your health...

It would mean she has no idea about life, — Benkei

Here is we disagree and it is fine. We have totally different concepts of life. What I wanted to say in your thread is the fact that we should expect more righteousness from a public representative. If she loves to be a young lady (despite she is already 36 years old) is ok but please do not be a politician then.

I'm a bit disappointed the drug test turned out negative to be honest. — Benkei

I personally think is not funny at all. There are a lot of young people who die because of overdose every year...

I can’t prove that you’re joking, but I’ll assume you are. No one can really believe such idiocy. — Xtrix

I am not joking. Why am I call a mad man when I only pretend to establish purity?

You mistake the illusion of a staid public image for statecraft. Appearance over substance. — Fooloso4

That's what politicians are. Appearance...

Imagine being offended by a woman dancing at a private party. How truly pathetic. — Xtrix

We are not speaking about a random woman. She is the public representative of Finland.

My own take on the "dark forest" analogy is much less anthropic (or anthropocentric) than Liu Cixin's. Here are links to old posts on two old threads: — 180 Proof

:up: :100: Thanks for sharing!

Is having sex "unprofessional" or beneath the dignity of the office? — Xtrix

Yes. As I said previously. If you cannot avoid "private" affairs, you are not ready for public responsibility.

Thanks for understanding me friend. That's the word I was looking for: maturity. Excellent. She is a damn 36 years old PM of Finland not an university student...

Then why not discuss what she has done professionally rather than clutching your pearls because she was videoed dancing at a private party? — Fooloso4

But Benkei started this OP to debate about this specific behaviour not her professional agenda...

It is unprofessional because of her behaviour. It is not all about to "dance" in a "private" party. We are not debating about a normal person as you and me but the PM of Finland.
We should expect more straightness from a PM. We even criticised Boris Johson for the same reason when he was partying at downing street

A politician should not be involved in "private" affairs because she is a public representative. If you cannot avoid private practices, do not be a politician and stay as an average person in society.
Some of the characteristics of a good politician are transparency and straightness

No. It is not about double standard. She is the PM and public representative of a nation. She has the aim to act in the most honorable and rectitude way possible. We are living in a difficult social context and we expect from a statesman to be, at least, professional. Right?
It is quite contradictory, isn't it? Probably she has the average discourse of how to be an exemplary citizen and look at her dancing and acting like an immature teenager.

:up: :fire: Agreed.



I wish technology is not able to solve the nature of passing away. Death is one of the purest conditions of humankind. If we develop worthy plans and projects is precisely for this reason because our time on the earth is limited. When a person passes away, it flourishes a different concept about him: the one you had when this person was alive and the one you have now when is dead.

Any response to whatever stimuli totally depends on whoever is at the receiving end, the (collective) size of the receiving end and the interpretation of gesture, motivation and movement at both ends. — Seeker

:up: :100:

Yes that's right. But I guess that the appearance of an extraterrestrial life would makes us to stay alert and probably to act in the military way.

:up:

you mean, can we defend ourselves from an invasion?, still no! In the latter case, they (little green men) maybe counting on us not being ready in any sense of that word! — Agent Smith

Completely agree :up: I want to share an interesting opinion from Liu Cixin:
The universe is a dark forest. Every civilization is an armed hunter stalking through the trees like a ghost, gently pushing aside branches that block the path and trying to tread without sound. Even breathing is done with care. The hunter has to be careful, because everywhere in the forest are stealthy hunters like him. If he finds another life—another hunter, angel, or a demon, a delicate infant to tottering old man, a fairy or demigod—there’s only one thing he can do: open fire and eliminate them.

When someone from an in-group errs, the mistake is chalked up to the individual, as a personal failing; when someone from an out-group goofs up, it's the entire group that's blamed. Sic vita est — Agent Smith

Agreed. :100: :up:

No more countries, no more currencies, no gods, no race other than the human race, no private ownership of land, no rich, no poor, no utopia or dystopia. — universeness

Sorry but I am pure defender of private ownership myself :rofl: I always been inspired by John Locke:

Some of the features of Locke's economic thinking would echo down the years, and not always to good consequence. Thus, Locke's notion is that labor creates value: "For 'tis Labour indeed that puts the difference of value on every thing" Locke uses this in the first instance to explain why people have a right to property.
Locke, of course, thinks that the ownership of property is justified because labor has been "mixed" with it.

The great and chief end therefore, of Mens uniting into Commonwealths, and putting themselves under Government, is the Preservation of their Property. To which in the state of Nature there are many things wanting. [ibid., §124]

as well as the Romani people and Cagot in Europe — universeness

Interesting text. Romani people is also called gypsy. In my country there are a lot of them and I have to be honest. There are some prejudices against them in the same sense the text you quoted previously.
If you check the etymology of the word gypsy, gitano, tsigane, etc... you would find pejorative meanings according to each country, for example:

• English: it comes from the word "gyp" which means scam.
• German: it comes from the word "zigeuner" which means thief
• Spanish: it comes from the word "gitano" which means liar
• Hungarian: it comes from the word "szégany" which means poor

Well the last year I started an OP related to this: The etymological prejudice of the word gypsy.

What I mean is: sometimes we have to use lies to help others because it is right despite the fact that we are avoiding to them the truth.
Sometimes the truth could be painful.

In short does the notion of correctness apply to the definition of truth? — Agent Smith

I think not. Correctness depends on a way of functional ethics which leads some dilemmas. For example: the "correct" way of helping a kid who passed through a trauma is avoiding him from it even with lies. I am acting so correctly but... I am not telling to that kid the "truth" right?

Premise : 1 : a statement or idea taken to be true and on which an argument or reasoning may be based.
Note --- For Christians, the veracity of the New Testament is their basic premise or axiom. Yet, for Muslims, the authenticity of the Koran is their starting point for reasoning. Belief bias is what allows some premises to "make sense" within one belief system, and to be non-sense for another. — Gnomon

Good explanation, indeed. This is how religion works. I like how you described that New Testament or Quran are their "starting point of reasoning."
So they always start with a (false?) premise that God does exist and then, whatever it goes successively.

but now I’m overwhelmed with feelings and thoughts that there is no reason to go on — rossii

One reason to go on: your family, friends or relatives. I understand what you are feeling because I walked through the same process. If suicide would sink your beloved ones in devastation and misery, please do not do it. That would be disrespectful and dishonorable.
If you feel that you don't find a meaning in life you would end up in an infinite loop because the nature of life is meaningless

I've always viewed science as discovering what is known from definitions. Philosophy questions definitions themselves. — Philosophim

:up: :100:

How do we verify our truth theory, if its pure metaphysics? — Yohan

This reality, then, that gives their truth to the objects of knowledge and the power of knowing to the knower, you must say is the idea of the good, and you must conceive it as being the cause of knowledge and of truth in so far as known. Plato, Republic, 508e, Republic II.

Don't expect to evolve to transhumanism or "Post-humanism" if we do not understand ourselves yet.
I think all of those tendencies are higher than we usually wonder about.

+/-/×/÷ — Agent Smith

I would say +.

Eudomonia + wisdom = beautitudo!

Eudaimonia? — Agent Smith

:up: :smile:

This seems to me to be imposing a scientific/Cartesian worldview on the Greeks. One that emphasizes epistemology. So the rest of the post is founded upon what I see is a false premise. — Xtrix

Agreed. :up: :fire:

Philosophy (original meaning) is the search for truth; — A Christian Philosophy

Well, not really. Aristotle on Nichomachean Ethics proposed that one of the aim of wisdom was happiness.

All human activities are done in order to attain something that is good. We don’t do something because we think it will be bad for us. In addition, most of these activities are not the main objective, but rather a means to a higher end. Consequently, the activity that is an end in itself, writes the prolific philosopher, is the highest good, and that good is happiness. We aim at happiness for its own sake, not because it will achieve something else. Happiness, therefore, is our greatest mission. - Aristotle, The Goal of Happiness: A summary of Nicomachean Ethics

Still blaming illusions, religion, witchcraft, irrationality, for the problems of science and technology? No, it is not the insane who are destroying the world, but the reasonable, pragmatic, scientific, progressives. — unenlightened

:up: :100:

I want to quote from the book Gods in Everyman by Jean Shinoda Bolen, M.D.. — Athena

Interesting and good quote indeed. But I disagree with Jean Shinoda Bolen in the following fact:

The text says: When we are accepted and allowed to be genuine. it's possible to have self-esteem and authenticity together. This develops only if we are encouraged rather than disheartened by the reactions of significant others to us, when we are spontaneous and truthful, or when we are absorbed in whatever gives us joy.

I think having self-esteem is not connected to be accepted by others. A good example of this could be the Japnase writer Yukio Mishima. He had a lot of self-esteem... but trust he was so far of being accepted by the Japanese society.
This is why I like him a lot. He represents the art of writing and thinking not matter if the "mass" would accept you or not.
The important achievement here is gaining self-esteem with your own self. Not caring if we do not fit in the society or we are not accepted by them

It’s just the death throes of another establishment political dynasty. The Cheneys, the Clintons, the Bushs — NOS4A2

Well, don't forget the Trumps then: — ssu

It is interesting to point out the fact of how a politician is reviled after the end of his legislature.
I cannot remember a "dynasty" who has good memories about their actions when they were in power. Whenever the legislature ends, most of the people get tired of them. We can say it is normal because a politician tend to worn-out during the course of a government. But this is insane.
Nobody ends up remembering them with good words.

So what is the real responsibility afterwards? How worthy is to put them in power?
I think the elections are there just to remove the old ones and put others. But what I mean is that none of them would make a real difference from the previous one.

If there were direct awareness of events at the cosmic and the quantum scale (which is the limit towards which intellectual awareness itself proceeds), to what extent would that awareness be representable or translatable into human scales of awareness? — Pantagruel

Language could be an important tool to help us to find out cosmical awareness. I think it is only representable in our human scales if we understand it. We are not able to understand it if we do not share the same language. So (probably I am wrong) I think we have to start in the point which can allow us to understand the cosmos better than we usually do. Then, if we ever get more precisely data from the universe we would have more chances to translate it in our scale of awareness.
You put good examples as mythology, cogito, etc... but I think one of the limitations is time.
Universe seems to be timeless. At least it looks like that the consciousness of passing time is not around there.

attending cogito ergo sum may be a projection of the direct awareness of a more expansive consciousness. — Pantagruel

This was the example I was thinking too! :eyes: :clap:

But having the world's largest Muslim nation is not related to be extremist. It is a recent but good democracy: Since 1999, Indonesia has had a multi-party system. In all legislative elections since the fall of the New Order, no political party has managed to win an overall majority of seats. The Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle (PDI-P), which secured the most votes in the 2019 elections, is the party of the incumbent president, Joko Widodo. Other notable parties include the Party of the Functional Groups (Golkar), the Great Indonesia Movement Party (Gerindra), the Democratic Party, and the Prosperous Justice Party (PKS).

They are so far from feudal states such as Afghanistan or Iran

Had this happened in Iran or Indonesia, it would've made complete sense. — Agent Smith

Why in Indonesia? It is true they are Muslims, but they are not extremists as much as Saudi Arabia or Iran.