Misogyny is not simply hatred of women. When an Ancient Greek man said I'm glad to be born a Greek, a man and not a woman, that is a brand of misogyny. — isomorph

The only part of this that qualifies as mysogyny is the last bit pertaining to women. The first part is ethnocentrism. The quote is a layer cake of bigotry.

I find this curious. Does this mean a person in a wheelchair is by definition less than fully human? A blind person?
— Tom Storm

That's exactly what I'm not saying, and what I said can't be construed in that way. — isomorph

Ok - apologies - your syntax was unclear but I've re-read it a few times now and I see what you were getting at.

There are a collection of traits that may be expressed differently in individuals, so to define an essence ( for instance running is an essence of being human, some people can't run so they are less human) is to create second class citizens. — isomorph

Essentialism (if applied to human nature) is the notion that there are inherent and unchanging human characteristics and behaviours - innate and fixed. I'm skeptical about this or how far this can be pushed. Perhaps we agree on this.

Worth reading, would you say? — Jamal

Yes. Even if it's just for the curiosity factor. I read the Arthur Waley translation from the 1940's. There may be better versions.

Yesterday I indulged my nostalgia by watching clips of the Japanese TV series Monkey, which was on British TV, and apparently in Australia too, back in the 80s. — Jamal

Yes, I enjoyed them in the 1980's. Made in the late 1970's. Ended up reading the original stories. They are similar. I could never work out why the monk was a beautiful Japanese fashion model (dead at 27 in the mid 1980's). Perhaps it was a bit like Peter Pan, being played by women in the manner of British pantomime. Piggsy was my favorite.

If the aim of physics is to produce a coherent account of how physical things are, then it presupposes coherence, and hence logic. — Banno

:up: Sounds appropriate.

I don't know but can physics be undertaken without the logical axioms - identity, non-contradiction and excluded middle?

( for instance running is an essence of being human, some people can't run so they are less human) — isomorph

I find this curious. Does this mean a person in a wheelchair is by definition less than fully human? A blind person?

So what is your definition of human nature?

In Plato's time slavery was an institution, their own brand of misogyny, which meant that these people did not qualify as essential human beings. — isomorph

Misogyny is hatred of women. Do you simply mean bigotry or misanthropy? The conversation about who we include as citizens has widened over time (some are currently stuck on the trans issue). This is often seen as the hallmark of progress and increasing solidarity.

How is 'human condition;' a useful frame?
— Tom Storm

we are humans on this earth. — isomorph

Not sure this helps much. So the human condition is simply the case that human beings live on this planet?

I think it very much depends on the reader and which books they choose to read. — Fooloso4

Yes, this would seem critical.

To be brief: if one is studying books and thinking about them, is he looking forward or backwards, and in which direction is he living his life? And if the books themselves are determinant, we can ask if the books themselves are forward-looking or back? — tim wood

Not sure I am grasping this. Can't books do both almost simultaneously? I often read books to have something in my head along with memories to draw upon later. Is that forward looking?

My own tentative answer is that books look backwards and are a part of life but not life itself. And further, to live a life, a person must at some point turn away from books – to embrace other occupations and multiply them, not fly them! — tim wood

Many of the great readers I know - who read deeply and voraciously - lack life skills and are the sorts of people whose relationship with the world might be called 'theoretical'. I think some people are propelled into reading on account of other deficits - practical skills, ability to relate to others, etc.

I think reading is a bad word to use to describe a person's relationship with a book. Reading is incomplete unless it comes with comprehension and thought. Like others, I can read Heidegger until the cows come home (for example) and yet never acquire a useful reading of his works. It's interesting how people can read a work and yet somehow avoid making contact with the author's ideas.

(Though I recognize that using the term might have the unfortunate effect of supporting essentialism in the minds of some.) — wonderer1

I'm one of those minds. Can you briefly sketch how the idea of human nature is of help in our understanding of the world and how it might avoid essentialism? As I said earlier, I am open to changing my perspective I have just never seen any use for this frame before.

To oversimplify, we humans are creatures of instinct as much, more, than we are of learning and socialization. We are born with the capacity and drive for language. Our minds are structured by evolution to perceive, learn, and act in the world in a way that keeps us alive. — T Clark

Not sure any of that amounts to an essential nature. The fact that we interact with our environment and try to survive (like most creatures) is true. I'm not sure human nature is a useful frame. We can present the notion that we are a social species. Sure. We cooperate. Sure. But we also have a tendency for mass murder, and mass destruction. We also cooperate in order to commit genocides. I think our capacity for violence is as innate as our capacity for benevolence. Who are we really? We are a mess. We seem to be anything and everything and we are nothing in particular.

The human condition is what we deal with on this earth. — isomorph

How is 'human condition;' a useful frame? Do you mean to say that we have levels of cooperation and technology that allow us to do almost anything, except for 'saving' ourselves from bad politics and environmental destruction?

I'm clarifying my thoughts. — isomorph

No worries.

Does idealism break physics? — bert1

What you often hear from idealists (Kastrup and Hoffman are good examples) is that materialism and a physical world is debunked and quantum physics tells us reality comes into being by the act of observation. Therefore idealism is a more reasonable and parsimonious explanation for our experience. I've often thought that the arguments in favour for idealism are actually more arguments against old school materialism than any great championing of an 'it's all consciousness' style metaphysics.

But I am neither a physicist or an idealist, so my comment was meant to capture the usual tropes provided.

I have a strong belief in the existence and importance of human nature. I tend to growl when I think someone might be questioning that belief — T Clark

I don't know if I believe in something called human nature, nor to I know what the human condition is meant to refer to. Strikes me that the human condition is a terrible term to describe contingent and diverse situations. I don't generally hold an essentialist view of the human animal. What some consider to be human nature seems to me to be a product of social and linguistic constructs rather than a set of inherent traits. But I am happy to be persuaded otherwise.

I don't think you've clearly stated exactly what it is you're trying to say in simple words. The quotations you've provided seem to cloud your meaning instead of making it clearer. — T Clark

I had a similar reaction.

Not sure what is expected from a sprawling OP like this. Are you inviting comment or questions? I'm not sure what it is you are saying.

It might help to try and look at why we keep coming back to these same arguments. I think it to do with the vanity of small differences. We agree on pretty much everything except that final wording, where you say that the world is a construction of the mind, and I point out that the construction is dependent on stuff outside the mind.

I am not at all convinced we are in any substantive disagreement. — Banno

As someone outside of philosophy, I find the debate about idealism to be somewhat pointless. What changes in our lives, either way?

Is it simply the case that idealists are able to accept more 'supernatural' claims because they have determined that nature is ultimately no longer limited by laws of physics?

If idealism is true, I still need to remain gainfully employed, walk to get anywhere, feed the cat, be kind to others. Its appeal seems to be located in it being a kind of conduit to mysticism and other often tedious pursuits.

Presumably, if you give Wigner's friend a gas mask and put her in the box with the cat, the situation for Schrödinger, outside the box, remains unchanged... the cat is alive and dead; yet the situation for Wigner's friend is different - they can see the cat.

And crucially, Wigner's friend and Schrödinger will agree that this is the case. The rules of physics remain the same for both observers.

I'm not keen on philosophers indulging in speculative physics, but it's worth pointing out that "Shut up and calculate!" is itself a worthy metaphysical option:
To shut up and calculate, then, recognises that there are limits to our pathways for understanding. Our only option as scientists is to look, predict and test. This might not be as glamorous an offering as the interpretations we can construct in our minds, but it is the royal road to real knowledge.
— Quantum Wittgenstein — Banno

I think this is very useful advice and well framed.

Even though it is right, its authority cannot be assumed. It confabulates. — Banno

Nicely put. I've been searching for the right word and that's it.

Who says Christian family values aren't identity politics? — ucarr

Of course. And a significant identity politics in the US now is white Christian nationalism. To a detached observer, Trump seems a very astute proponent and beneficiary of this identity politics.

Yes, there is no coherent way to render mind ontologically fundamental, since the notion has its roots only in our naively intuitive apprehension of our own experience. Wayfarer claims he doesn't agree with Kastrup's "mind at large", which I would say is itself an incoherent idea, but he apparently cannot offer any coherent alternative. So, all he can do is vaguely gesture towards something he doesn't seem to want to give up, rather than being able to state a cogent position constituting an ontology. — Janus

I may be wrong, but I think his account is essentially Kantian. We know phenomena (it works for us; science can achieve extraordinary things, etc) but we can say precisely nothing meaningful about noumena. Noumena or the raw 'stuff' that somehow gives rise to our empirical relationship with the world does not require a god or some variation of cosmic consciousness to exist. I guess it is in this knowledge gap that we can insert any number of notions relating to higher consciousness - reincarnation, karma, spirits, clairvoyance, etc.

I can get behind a phenomenological account of idealism, in as much as our values and reality are shaped and codified by our experience, and is the contingent and intersubjective product of culture and linguistic practice. I guess that is a type of idealism - a constructivist account, perhaps. The big question is how useful is this perspective? What can be done with this frame?

With some apprehension, I want to declare that in America, the sacred artifact is not the Holy Cross, but rather the loaded gun — ucarr

Could be true. I would probably say that the ultimate sacred artifact is money. Funneling it from where it needs to be to do good (infrastructure and community) and directing it to corporations and powerful individuals.

Or another interpretation, which I prefer, from Gore Vidal. It's decades old but still seems to resonate. Gore, incidentally, preferred the Greeks to Shakespeare.

There is only one party in the United States, the Property Party … and it has two right wings: Republican and Democrat. Republicans are a bit stupider, more rigid, more doctrinaire in their laissez-faire capitalism than the Democrats, who are cuter, prettier, a bit more corrupt — until recently … and more willing than the Republicans to make small adjustments when the poor, the black, the anti-imperialists get out of hand. But, essentially, there is no difference between the two parties.”

Trump seems to add chaos, incompetence and a rough brand of populism to the Republican approach, which has its own consequences.

Some folk here (perhaps Wayfarer is an example) have an interest in and sympathy for religious/spiritual metaphysics. I wonder if that sometimes engenders an uncomfortable loyalty to ontological idealist metaphysics of a Berkeleyan stripe. If so, it needn't in my view. Just as realism does not entail physicalism, even though they too are natural partners. — bert1

From what I've read @Wayfarer takes care to separate his account of idealism from that of Berkeley.

Has anyone else here had a sense that what they were experiencing in early life wasn't truly real or that it was highly stripped down? — TiredThinker

When I was a child in the 1970's, I certainly 'felt' that reality (specifically my experience of it) was in some way manufactured and wasn't entirely real. That was certainly an acute feeling when I went into the Australian outback. I often wondered if there was some way to get 'behind' it all.

There's also the matter of Kastrup's 'dissociated alters' which explain individual (constrained) experiences of consciousness as tiny slithers of the great mind.

There's three paragraphs in your essay I need to consider more deeply and I'll get back to you.

As for as Kastrup’s idealism - I do question the ‘mind at large’ idea in this essay - Is there ‘mind at large’? - although it’s quite a long piece so don’t feel any obligation. — Wayfarer

That's a very nicely written essay which sits well as a companion piece to your first essay. Excellent work.

Without the organising capability which consciousness brings to the universe, what exists is by definition unintelligible and unknowable. The mind brings an order to experience in light of which data is interpreted and integrated into meaningful information — this is an intrinsic aspect of the meaning of ‘being’. But the sense in which the universe exists apart from or outside that activity is by definition unknown, so there is no need to posit a ‘mind-at-large’ to account for it. We need to learn the humility to accept that the unknown is indeed the unknown, and not to try and fill in the blank with a mysterious ‘super-mind’.

This seems to take us back to Kant's noumenal world, right?

I guess most of our great debates here seem to find their origins in the speculative thinking about this 'unknown, unknown'. Your solution to this is (as you put it) a convergence between cognitivism and philosophical idealism. Do you consider phenomenology, in some of its guises (perhaps the neurophenomenological of Francisco Varela) to be a compromise between your position and one shaped by embodied cognition?

orgive me for my specific interpretation. I don’t think my view on this (or, if there is a God, the truth of it) actually matters to the post, but I’m willing to share my justification.
Honestly, I just defaulted to a monotheistic human-like God concept because that is the God I believe in, but I agree that an open mind is important when discussing this. — Igitur

Just trying to understand your reasoning, Which gods you think are the real gods probably does matter when you are trying to please these gods. It seems you are concerned with doing the right thing by a particular god. How would you even begin such a process? Wouldn't it be important to establish which god is true before working to try to please that god - or those gods? How have you determined that the god you believe in cares how you conduct your life? Do you have a generic Judaeo-Christian deity in mind?

What are your thoughts? — Igitur

I see no reason to accept the idea of any gods. I do believe that humans fear the reality they see before them, especially death, and find themselves doing any number of things to manage their fears - rituals, prayers, gods - all seem to emerge from such anxieties.

I reason that if so, God likely doesn't care if you follow a particular religion, but only if you act according to the correct concepts — Igitur

You seem to hold to a fairly conventional idea of a god. A single god? Why not 2 or 16? A god who is anthropomorphic and pays attention to us and has 'correct concepts'? Why not an indifferent god such as the one of deism? Why not a cosmic consciousness version of theism, such as held by William James?

What reason do you have for believing in your particular account of god?

Why does the rational person choose the worse over the better in this situation? — Count Timothy von Icarus

I have no idea. I'm not sure if I have met any rational persons. Or even what this means. I have met people who use reasoning and have post hoc justifications for their choices. I suspect most people's choices are informed by emotion.

that's more an example of not knowing that not caring though, don't you think? — Dan

No. I wonder what it means to know a moral truth?

Or maybe he’s a trust fund baby with nothing better to do with his cash. — Joshs

I'd be very interested in your general view of this project? To me it seems to be built around a series of old school foundationalist assumptions. Thoughts?

You don't think that someone can understand what's good or right and choose against it? That someone can intentionally do what they know is wrong? — Dan

To some extent, yes. But how do they understand 'wrong'? It will be in the context of some aspect of culture. One they might not care for much. Something may be 'wrong' as far as mainstream culture and the legal system is concerned, but how does this ultimately matter? I've worked a lot with hard core criminals and they have a very strong principles. They are just (as far as the mainstream is concerned) the 'wrong' principles.

Yes. Is it Aristotle? For some the philosophical project is presumably to dispel ignorance.

My issue is not just this notion of 'ignorance', but also flourishing and good? Can we demonstrate that these are any more than abstracts used to loosely describe contingent matters of social practice , etc.

Flourishing strikes me as an enormously nebulous category.

In general, I think defining ethics in terms of freedom can work, since free beings—unconstrained by ignorance or circumstance—will chose what is good, what causes them to flourish, etc. — Count Timothy von Icarus

Why do you say this? Can it be demonstrated?

On the other hand, even if I’m entitled to a personal view, I’m fully aware that not having any letters after my name sorta limits my scholastic value. — Mww

I haven't noticed scholastic value being a priority here.

It is merely an altogether fundamental, hence necessary condition, by which certain types of relations are possible, and these relations pursuant to aesthetic judgements alone. — Mww

So is the OP an attempt to provide a foundation for morality which somehow manages to quantify or capture freedom as something more than a contingent set of relations?

What is your view about a problem like this? Any suggested directions?

I don't think the challenge is in principle possible to provably solve, because value doesn't seem to be a universally objective measure — flannel jesus

Yes, I agree with you.

I don't beleive in moral facts (I don't deny them, but I have heard no good reason to accept the notion) and any underlying axiom we select as foundational for our moral thinking is likely to be a matter of personal preference. The moment we identify some 'foundational truth' isn't it the case that this is built out of values we already find appealing?

Turning morality into a spreadsheet or a flowchart of equations seems to be a futile endeavour. While I am not a philosopher, it would seem to me that moral decisions pivot on empathy, context, and deep ethical considerations (built from culture, experience and language) that go beyond what can be captured in formulas and algorithms.

I could boil the problem down to "how do we resolve conflicts between the freedom of different persons over things choices that belong to them?" but it that question very helpful without the context, hence the non-computer-exploding document. — Dan

I'm not sure what you are asking.

Isn't this dilemma just a situational curiosity which underpins human life - particularly in multi-cultural, pluralist societies? Can there be a just way to resolve disputes when people’s rights or preferences clash? Would there not be a number of 'mechanisms' one could implement?

Are you expecting there to be a correct answer and how will you know it when you see it? How do you determine what is just? Is there an underlying assumption that for this to work you need to be a moral objectivist?

Well, I only say that ethics seems to originate from the suffering of others that one may be able to identify with, either through experience or tacit knowledge. — Shawn

That seems fair.

Yes, I believe that through compassion or empathy, people can find a common goal to which they might aspire towards — Shawn

If this is true, then it would also seem to hold for hatred and resentment.

I'm more in the Hume camp, where people have to have an impetus other than strict rationality to motivate themselves with respect to morality and ethics. — Shawn

I am inclined to hold that the foundation of morality is more deeply rooted in emotional affectivity than in rational deliberation.

Mankind can only hope that there is enough empathy and compassion within itself to recognised our shared struggles. Without such an attitude, what more is existence; but, a show of vanity and pride. — Shawn

Vanity and pride? What you are suggesting seems to correspond to sociopathy, which is often so indifferent towards others that vanity and pride may be irrelevant to its experience. Perhaps you are hinting at hedonistic narcissism?

Yet, not every person grows up to see the suffering of humanities existence. — Shawn

I think most people, if not all, are aware of suffering and pain. Some just don't care. And some enjoy (or perhaps appreciate) the suffering of others, possibly as a way to set themselves apart from the losers.

So, if it is really the case that man must go through some affair, be it positive or negative, to understand what man-kind faces, then what is the proper way to have the discussion about ethics? — Shawn

I don't see how there would be a 'proper' way to talk about ethics? This seems rigid. Wouldn't it be more likely that ethics is a conversation which involves culture, language and experience and could be arrived at through a range of entry points? Some of these more useful for certain circumstances than others.

Are you suggesting that our experience of humanity (or of being) is enough to allow us to be fully are of our common humanity, which leads to solidarity (or empathy)?

Do you have reason to believe in moral facts?

When justifying your own actions or statements, according to what factors do you formulate your argument?

On what grounds do you decide whether a justification is appropriate and valid? — Vera Mont

I don't. I have never been asked why I chose to do a particular thing in moral terms. I generally just do it (feel my way through) and, if pressed, can provide post hoc justifications.

Like all of us, I hold presuppositions or axioms: to promote human flourishing; not to cause suffering. But such principles and the justifications they can engender are interpretive and lack precision. I see morality as essentially a code of conduct that is an evolving conversation over time. It is never conclusively arrived at, is subject to continual revisions and has variations across communities.

I'm not an American, but my colleagues and I have been wondering if a shooter would appear at a Trump event for some time. The fact it happened is not very surprising given the emotion surrounding this politician. I imagine also that preventing these sorts of events is not an exact science. Cue conspiracy theories and general bullshit.



Indeed. Although his base are more likely to talk about Isaiah 45:13. (NIV)

I will raise up Cyrus in my righteousness: I will make all his ways straight. He will rebuild my city and set my exiles free, but not for a price or reward, says the Lord Almighty.”

:up: and it can have brutal effects upon people.

I see no demonstration of karma and it is of no use to me as a concept.

accepted your post as the answer to this thread; but, wanted to further ask, if inference based off of causality is something that only humans can do, (is it called 'backwards rationality')? — Shawn

You'd need to ask an expert. Inferential thinking (making connections between seemingly unrelated pieces of information to draw conclusions) appears to be part of the behavior of animals like family pets. They know that if a drawer opens and a lead is picked up, it means a walk. They know that the fridge opening means food. And animals who have been abused will often cringe when a person raises their hand. They can often and mysteriously tell when the owner is arriving home - even when unscheduled. And much more complicated behaviors. But what does this tell us about making connections, intentionality and pattern recognition?