Yes, I guess it is positive to teach them what violence is without taboos. The opposite would make them blind. So if we take this from the roots we can avoid conflict situations in the future.
It is not the right way when we see a kid suffering of domestic violence and then say the usual: "let's put him in a psychologist"

Is a lack of Taoism in this kid's life really the thing pushing him toward following a similar path to his father, brother and neighbours? — Kenosha Kid

What a good example. First of all, I think this child has bad luck because he is raised in a very backwards house. We have to do something with this kid because is our duty.
Probably Taoism will not be so effective but who knows? What if we can expand his point of view?
Due to his racist father the kid never heard about Asian culture, so we can be there and help to understand the world is bigger than hate.

Yes! Exactly, because only in this way I guess it could be more understood (ethics and being a good citizen) in those young minds.
I am perceiving that Confucius or Taoism is not conceived good enough among the members. What I was trying to say is that probably teaching kids something so exotic as "Tao Te Ching" could impact positively in them. But forget it, I am dreaming a lot :death:

Agreed, but that's no reason to indoctrinate children with them. (There may be better reasons to do just that.) — Kenosha Kid

I promise I laughed :rofl: because my intention is not about indoctrinate them but just assure these ideas or principles are clearly taught in society because I feel they are like forgotten or something.

Why would you assume children do not already know? — Isaac

Because children tend to be innocent in these issues and complex aspects. Sometimes they are linving/making violence when they don't truly know what they are doing.
There are cases where children live domestic violence but they don't get the situation until they become older.

I think we need to look principally to the present problem and future solutions more than picking a past philosophy though. — Kenosha Kid

I understand your point but I think Greek philosophy or Taoism is not old because their principles are everywhere and I guess we can grew our future up starting in this area. We should never forget these old theories

.

We need to understand what makes people antisocial. — Kenosha Kid

Probably but being antisocial not necessarily drive us on being violent or having aggressive attitude. To be honest with you, I consider myself as antisocial but this doesn’t cause on me have the feeling or ambition to fight against another one or being involved in a riot...

And if Confucius and Chinese philosophy have failed to promote ethical behavior in China, why should we expect them to do so in the West? — Apollodorus

This is a good question indeed. It made me feel a feeling dilemma. If in China doesn’t work Taoism why I should believe it as a West citizen? It shook my head.
Despite the fact it could have their own debilities I still believe in Tao and Confucius as in Greek philosophy. As a globe with many paradigms, and then just probably the situation can change.

For example, what we are sharing both you and me is beautiful because we are debating different points of views without aggressive vocabulary. This is due to how we have a good development in philosophy and knowledge. Why not develop this practice as a normal issue?

So it seems that Confucius and Chinese philosophy was not much help .... — Apollodorus

Dude, it helps... The problem here is that the people is not caring at all. The example you wrote above increases my arguments. It does not mater if we are in Asia or West. Guangxi massacre is another example as Holocaust. Society acting violent because the lack of ethics.

But what could such a "solid base of violence" be? — Heiko

For example:

If I live in a backwards country where I cannot even go to university, it is acceptable and understandable to be violent with the government because it is literally limiting all my rights as a person.
But, it is not the same if I use violence as a normal/regular practice or even just to have fun. If I am in a mass and then I kill you because you are different, this is totally insane and should not be allowed in our modern Era.

The problem here is that people looks like not care at all about the government but confronting with individuals just to calm their own frustrations.

You think you are alone in seeing this - that you are somehow exceptional ? — Amity

No. I don't think I am the only one since the moment I share the same importance of avoiding as you do. But yes, sometimes I feel I am alone in this context or probably how I overact in this iusse. Am I sounding paranoid? Probably...

I disagree and think you are wrong to come to such a generalised conclusion. — Amity

It could be. I posted a generalised conclusion. Nevertheless I still defend that the porcentage of people not caring at all is big enough. Trust me. You can feel and see the violence and aggressive vocabulary everywhere. When you watch a football match and a random player calls to another an offensive word, everyone looks cheerful in it and it is disgusting as hell.
The masses are revolted and hesitated than ever. I guess we will not see a good pacifier leader as Muhammad Ghandi anymore...

There have been to many of those who were legitimated by history. — Heiko

It is not the same context... We live now in a democratic world. Probably in the most peaceful period humans ever lived by far...
Also, I do not mean about politics or revolutions. I am talking about violence without a solid base. Killing another person just because is funny or different from me... This is happening more than ever.

Extreme capitalism (with no reigns) — Trey

This is how literally you ruled the world for a century. I don't understand why you complain right now.
You say Americans don't feel proud and united? I bet you don't know Spain :rofl:

Join the :broken: Dreams Club. — TheMadFool

Already joined :broken: :up: :rofl:

think both children and adults know exactly how outrageous violence is. Victims and perpetrators alike.
When it comes to gangs involved in e.g. drug feuds and targeting pupils out of school, then the question is how to reach them and change behaviour. Why do gangs exist ?
This is not a new phenomenon - here's a history of Glasgow gangs:
It starts with a black and white photo of 'A gang fight on Tollcross Road, Parkhead in 1933'
https://www.glasgowlive.co.uk/news/history/history-glasgows-street-gangs-tongs-12252432 — Amity

Thanks for sharing this article. Nevertheless, I disagree with your point that most of the people know how outrageous violence is. I feel like literally the young people love this issue. They are most of the time making riots and not respecting the authority at all... Covid is a good example in this context. Most of the people do not care at all. Instead of giving a good image as a young people they only make messes and chaos.
When I see or read a news where some young group kill another for no reason I feel how our education system is in a collapse. It is time to reinforce it.

It will take more than that. Perhaps by looking at why the education system itself fails pupils.
Using punishment measures including exclusions and isolation booths for bad behaviour.
Exclusions are not a punishment or a deterrent: they’re a day off school.

Excluding pupils for a long period of time means they miss valuable teaching time and are immediately put at a disadvantage — Amity

Agree! To be honest with you Amity, I never understood what a punishment in school actually means. When I was in school most of the teachers punished me without free hour because I was bad at maths. This created a trauma in numbers developing a low self-esteem on me in terms of mathematics. Sometimes I think they school failed on me because they did not want me as good math student at all.

I guess the key could be a class with zero punishment. If teachers start listening more to their students the tables could turn on. The ethics class should be prepared as a gift. Every classmate have to go to understand how to be a decent person. This is not depend on good grades or marks.
If the kids learn languages and maths since they are kids why don't teach them to some ethical values?

A very raw person might actually prefer a bodily confrontation to endless discussions. — Heiko

This a problem we have to face then. This is why I want to develop a criteria where probably ethics can lead us in a more pacific relationship. Despite the fact most of the people want confrontation, doesn't mean endless discussions are clueless or worthless. To be honest I defend if we develop more dialogues probably we would limit or avoid wars, riots, chaos, etc...

Tom, I think you could like this following page where it shows what (more or less) I want to get about: Prudence, Goodness and Wisdom.

What specific ideas would help and how? What is your evidence that these ideas make a difference? — Tom Storm

To be honest I do not have any evidence is these ideas make a difference. It is just a belief. I only want to improve our educational system with the goal of avoiding violence so I thought Buddhism or Taoism would be a good starting point because most of the people who follow this paths tend to be pacific.
Probably, it could help, but I don't put it on practice yet. It is only a dream.

, it might be better to teach/model the benefits of community and cooperation. — Tom Storm

Agree! With this teaching tool probably we would avoid selfish and dangerous people in the society. But please, I still defend we have to provide kids how bad is a toxic behavior along the classmates...

And how specifically would they help in the West? — Tom Storm

I guess it can help in the West because it develops our paradigm. We can learn through Asian philosophy that there are other paths to grow up as a good person, or at least civic one.
Sometimes I feel most of the students do not understand about Greek or Roman culture. This is why we don't have many thinkers...
What about if we expand our paradigm getting involved in Taoism or Confucius? Probably can help a little bit.

______________________________________________
The Master said, "Acquired by unrighteousness,
wealth and rank are to me as a floating cloud."

Confucius, Analects XVII:15/16, translation after James Legge [1893], Arthur Waley [1938], and D.C. Lau [1979]

being a dreamer! — TheMadFool

Thank you so much! I have in mind many weird aspects about "changing the world" but I end up unmotivated due to how drastic and cruel the world can be.

you have to participate in a system that essentially incentivises you to get ahead at any cost? — ChatteringMonkey

Agree! Then, this is why we are failing as a civic society because the “system” teaches us how to be so destructive in our environment. The rule here is Homo homini lupus. We all met someone in our university or work who is literally a lone wolf who doesn’t care if he/she sacrifices you for anything.

This is why I think the issue goes further than just educational system (which obviously is an important pillar) but what if we try of restart our establishment? Sounds impossible but I think is better late than never. I don’t see the benefits of being selfish and violent in this contemporary Era. It is time to come backs to easier times where the duty was happiness.

Are we so primitive that we are the equivalent of tribal natives waiting being invaded by intergalactic conquistador? — SteveMinjares

I guess you would like to read the theory of “dark forest” in the context you are asking for: https://www.google.es/amp/s/techcrunch.com/2019/01/20/technologys-dark-forest/amp/

My intention was not emphasize Asian philosophy over a Western one. Those were just examples of how we can develop ethics inside society and then probably we would get lower violence/hate rates.

Keep in mind that if we study closer the western philosophy we can be so technical that people who not cares about philosophy will end up misunderstood. I guess the key here is try to be the simplest to enter in the young’s minds (example, students between 15 and 18 years old)

It doesn’t matter at all the academic religion because this issue is for professionals of philosophy. I mean teaching the basic principles using both Asian and Western philosophy and I believe it can fit...
I remember in my school my philosophy teacher never told me anything about Tao Te Ching neither Confucius.

Another one:

Isn't it shù?" , "What you do not want yourself," , "Don't do to others."
Confucianism in a single moral principle? This is about , "consideration" or "reciprocity"
This is the Golden Rule with negatives, and so sometimes is called the "Silver Rule." However, it may be better with the negatives. "Do onto others," could mean that masochists are justified in being sadists. This version, merely negative, is more in the right spirit of morality, which is to prohibit harmful and unjust actions

What is your philosophy which sees you through ? — Amity

Probably it would sound quite basic but Taoism and Confucius helped me out in this issue.
For example, this analetcs of Confucius, developed on me a criteria in ethics.

1. The master said: Isn't that of consideration? What you don't want for yourself, don't do it to others. Key aspects on Confucius.

Taoism:

Verse 104: "When the way prevails, fleet-footed horses are relegated to ploughing the fields; when the way does not prevail in the empire, war-horses breed on the border." Taoism

I know this analetcs are free to interpret but somehow I feel like Asian philosophy is there to provide peace and happiness.
Also, we should not forget about Siddhartha Gautama and buddishm:" Ah, love, let us be true
To one another! for the world, which seems
To lie before us like a land of dreams,
So various, so beautiful, so new,
Hath really neither joy, nor love, nor light,
Nor certitude, nor peace, nor help for pain;
And we are here as on a darkling plain
Swept with confused alarms of struggle and flight,
Where ignorant armies clash by night" The basics teachings of Buddhism.

I think this thread is another good example of how important is to avoid religion in our purpose to develop philosophy and ethics.

We all already know that this war is just religious and ethnic issues. It does not matter at all which are the facts or arguments of both Israel and Palestinian. The only truth here is all dead citizens. Probably you would be angry at politicians thinking why they do not do anything at all. Well they are just masks and actors so we have to start in the point where we should not expect anything from them. But why they want to divide us afterwards? I think it is an act of negligence from a public representation.

Everything is wrong in this context because there are a lot of lives depending in some buffets or offices. Why the people with this amount of power do not spread empathy and ethics? Since the moment they would not do anything to us, it is time to reach our own path to developing a better educational system. Only in this way we will avoid difficult situations as the war between Israel and Palestinians.

Thanks Amity for this reply.

The sad truth of society, people don't listen to philosophers and arguments, but listen to demagogues and slogans. And if we let this happen once, the most awful people will take advantage of our naivety, and gullibility. — Art Stoic Spirit

Good one :up: this shows how our modern society works...

Which philosophy helps us do this ? Perhaps insights from stoicism or pragmatism... — Amity

I understand this point but I think we don't need be so necessarily academic. I guess the point is provide to people a good quality in ethics to just develop the basic points of civics. If a few of them want to be more technical, then here is where we bring up the academics papers or researchers.
It is fine if they end up knowing that violence is not the solution in the path of human relations.

Another educational resource:
Fear and Paradoxes of War — Amity

Thanks for sharing it :up:

It starts by looking at the self. The mind. I think. — Amity

Yes it does I am agree with you. Sometimes I have the feeling that I am a part of big mass which orientes me how I should live by. I even make the mistake of forgetting what is the path of happiness according to my own circumstances.
Whenever I look deeply to myself I get a double dilemma: everybody is wrong or I am wrong because I see the life and the individuals so drastically different from how "supposedly" the world does.
I feel sick when I see violence (As Alex in the famous book and film "A clockwork orange") but somehow there are an important who loves it or even feel sexually attracted to it.
I feel the world is sick and the unique vaccine is ethics and a solid educational system.

what we can do to face violence? what are the solutions to make peacefull world? — Zekkari Mohamed

I know this thread is old but it is so necessary to put it on the table. It is crazy how the violence increased drastically in the recent years. A group of teenagers killed another citizen of 24 years old just for a simple discussion. Also a group of Dutch citizens murdered another one from their country just because was “fun” getting involved in a riot or fighting against strangers.

I am feeling we are losing as a civilized world because most of the young groups see the violence as a funny issue. There are a lot of hate in the ambient, from the politicians to the social media. We have to stop it immediately. I think we have to reconsider how our educational system is working because I feel is fading away. I would sound totalitarian but I guess ethics should be more important at schools than religion.
One of the main goals should be teach to kids how outrageous is the violence and how important is respect other people’s lives and integrity. If we do not do so we will continue having a lot of disgraces and probably a WWIII. The language and discourse of the public representatives is bad. Only spread words to make conflicts. It remembers me of the new PM of Perú, Castillo, whose first discourse was attacking Spanish for no reasons or just past issues in conquista. I don’t understand why these politicians want to divide us but we have to learn how to avoid their toxic discourse and share empathy through our relationships.

A confederacy of dunces by John Kennedy Toole.
Essay about the Greeks by Friedrich Nietzsche.

Despite the fact I have zero likes so a weak reputation, I think it is a good system because it shows the quality of a user. I remember when under the username appeared the total amount of posts and I guess this system just puts out how active you are but not the worth.

I am interested in to understand metaphysics more specifically. So, my question in simple, which is the properly definition of metaphysics? How many academies worked on it along the centuries ?

Interesting point of view and life experience. It would sound weird but I was raised in an atheist home... My parents never taught me any kind of religion and I went only to secular schools. Nevertheless, they never imposed me atheism at all because they said I was free to believe if I wanted to.
Anyhow, despite my grow experience, I never been interested in religion for myself... But yes probably my parents were important in this path of being free thinker.

Via experiences — Bylaw

I respect your beliefs and opinions but how you can experience something that you never seen or heard or even touched before as "God"?
I guess this is why sometimes you can have these periods of doubt.

Hello Elucid! I think your question can fit in the answer of Aristotle's theory of motion (Aristotle )

Motion," says Aristotle, "is the actualization of what potentially
is"

W. D. Ross writes:
For Aristotle "motion is 'the actualization of that which is potentially, as such.' I.e. if there is something which is actually x and potentially
y, motion is the making actual of its y-ness."

I do understand your point/argument from an ethical point of view but sadly, pharmacies and overall pharmacology are lobbies which create a lot of money to politicians or at least to the leviathan (Hobbes’s leviathan )

Here we have an interesting ethical dilemma about how the role of pharmacies could change:
A) the government control the prices of medicines. Somehow this method or criteria will be thought as “communist” rule of law. So most of the entrepreneurs and lobbies will not accept it.
B) pure savage capitalism. Can’t you buy a medicine or COVID vaccine? Sorry is your fault… we are not guilty of your poverty (they would think…)
C) sorry but it is not third way. We can’t get a middle pattern where both pharmacies and citizens win. Can we here agree that pharmacies are important lobbies who act silently?

Whenever we argue about ethical dilemmas always appear a pharmacy issue where related to controlling medication.

I wish I can keep «zero» as my number in the name. Zero means infinite or metaphysics for some philosophers. Absence perception and the philosophy of zero

Basically, the best book on ethics is An Empty Book — TheMadFool

Keep it in my next book list too :up:

What Every Man Thinks About Apart from Sex. — TheMadFool

This title makes me feel so interested in the book right now. I don't know why but I guess I thought literally this for years. Fortunately, I am one of those weird "freaks" who loves think or speak about everything except/apart sex.

Do you have links in English to those cases against inditex and zara? Could be a blueprint for more. — Benkei

I want to share with you three important links.

http://www.izquierdadiario.es/De-explotar-costureras-gallegas-a-ninos-en-Bangladesh-el-secreto-de-Inditex-y-Amancio-Ortega

Sorry the one above is in Spanish but trust me is so worthy to have it because it explains so good how Inditex is guilty of slavery. Try to translate the page with Google translator.

https://www.business-humanrights.org/en/latest-news/zara-hit-by-slave-labour-allegations-argentina/
This one is in English but it comes from Argentina.

https://www.google.com/amp/s/english.elpais.com/elpais/2019/05/21/inenglish/1558430833_506530.html%3foutputType=amp

This one also in English where political party "Podemos" is against Inditex.

So I've just written to an electronics review site to start including information about sourcing of materials and start taking human rights abuses into account when awarding rewards. — Benkei

Interesting and good one! China is powerful (and probably unstoppable in some countries of Africa and America...) due to this development of "cheap" electronic devices where all the rich entrepreneurs go just to build with zero costs. I see you are interested if we can block or at least penalized China, I guess the European Union has to do something better and be brave against Xi Jinping threats.
Here in Spain, a political party called "Podemos" put a warrant against Zara and Inditex for having their industries in China, Bangladesh, India, etc... Trying to make them put it on Spain or an European country. I don't know how is going but at least Zara paid a huge amount of money by the penalty of having those companies in these countries.
Also, interesting fact, "Real Institute El Cano" which is responsible for the Spanish image and language along the world, is trying to make "again" good relationships between Spain and Hispanoamerica because they see how silently China is getting more deeply in the economies of countries like Mexico, Paraguay, Ecuador, Honduras, etc...
While the new prime of Minister of Ecuador wants to work with Spain and Europe, Daniel Ortega as Prime Minister of Nicaragua, wants to be with China. I guess Nicaragua will have a bad future in the coming years...