I'm for more posting in the Shoutbox, but I'm not convinced as yet there is a mass movement to reverse the earlier decision. It seems hard to get a balance between too dominant and too quiet. We've gone from a page or two a day to a post or two a day. But again, there is no reason for that apart from out of sight out of mind.

. I think location makes the difference, new members do not know about it unless they are called onto one of the Lounge threads. — ArguingWAristotleTiff

Everyone gets a notification now when they start.

Try to be mindful of the conclusions you are drawing because I don't believe that people are "bothered" with posting in the Shoutbox but rather it was a place of common gathering. — ArguingWAristotleTiff

I think you misunderstand the phrase. Anyway, I'm trying to do my bit to drum up morale. :eyes:

What I mean is, we all know where it is (especially the regulars), so the direct problem is not the location as such. It's that we couldn't be bothered posting there. Which is interesting in itself. It's sort of like a negative feedback bandwagon loop thingie rather than anything rational stopping us.

One of the best features of a forum is a lively shoutbox, and I do miss the activity we can find in the shoutbox. — Posty McPostface

Let's all post there more then. Then problem solved, no?

The only reason disabled people are able to survive is because we have a (in my opinion) unjustified desire to keep them alive for some reason. Mainly brought about due to our fear of whether it is wrong to kill any innocent thing, and this of course may due to our violent history as a species and the changes that have come to be within our psychology over the last century — intrapersona

It would be much more justified to kill the morally disabled as they are not just very often stupid but potentially dangerous. Whereas people with Down syndrome, for example, can and do lead happy and productive lives.

I first thought this discussion was some kind of devil's advocate or provocation. Now that it appears that you are actually proposing the genocide of a minority, I'm shutting it down.

(Edit: For the record intrapersona disagrees with my interpretation of his position. I stand by it. You can judge for yourself.)

Expecting the principles of evolution to be of use in defining social policy is like expecting an earthquake to be of use in redesigning your house.

Tend to agree with @unenlightened's common sense approach. What would also guide me would be the fact that all things being equal I would feel guiltier about unforeseen negative consequences arising from not informing than from informing. Or at least from not doing anything as opposed to trying to do something positive. There's a Kantian shade to that too regarding duty etc.

OK, thanks, but with respect to issues of copyright, it's probably better to offer that link by PM, so I've edited your post to reflect that.

Ok, well, like I said, it would help all round. Thanks.

Can you please use the quote function by highlighting text and pressing the quote button or your replies may be missed (and it's messy).

Basically, I get that you're trying to describe a distinction between arbitrary personal judgement and critical identification of poor thinking which is not yet as objective as empirical vetification. What I don't get is what makes you think that. What structural or empirical basis are you using to determine that such a process is possible, because it sounds like just wishful thinking. — Pseudonym

It sounds like you're asking how any judgment of quality of argument that's not empirically verifiable is possible. And then asking for an empirical verification to show that that's the case! But your criticisms of my argument already presume you're acting on the same presumption I am, and know the answer. The structure is at base, the structure of reason, which undergirds empirical verification in the first place.

One of my academic interests is in how people hold and defend belief, particularly in relation to group dynamics. I think my interest here should be obvious from that without me having to spell it out? As to the interest of most people here, I would say the empirical evidence on group behaviour very much opposes your view. Most people are here to reinforce beliefs which confer membership of the social group to which they wish to belong. — Pseudonym

Well, I disagree. I think most people come to a philosophy forum primarily to do philosophy. And empirically based results, for example, a poll alone, won't definitively decide the answer. Theory, reason, and critique of thought would come into play.

Anyway, I think we are at an impasse because you don't appear to want to explicitly accept regular terms of rational engagement which require us to critically analyze each other's posts in order for the conversation to be of any intellectual value. If we really are just pointlessly talking at each other in order to reinforce our beliefs and membership of etc., I suppose we've done enough of that. Really though, I think you're taking a grain of skeptical truth and trying to make a loaf out of it.

Only the abstract is available. It might that you have automatic access through your university system. The rest of us don't though.

(@Pseudonym To clarify, no-one is holding up a completely objective universal metric here by which to make these judgements but supporting the idea that nevertheless some level of judgement can be made and agreed upon (even in philosophy and the arts). Otherwise arguing over anything in those areas would be nonsensical.)

Edit: Put it another way, a lower level of certainty does not indicate complete arbitrariness or a waste of time. The interest is in finding platforms of rationality on which to raise the limited level of certainty the fields in question provide.

There's a fundamental difference between the "origin of fossils and the causes of climate change" and something like philosophical propositions. The theories about climate change or fossil origin are based on empirically verifiable evidence, they both ultimately rely on something which we widely agree on the measurement of and (if they're good theories) they will make predictions which we widely agree on the measurement of. The 'rightness' of a theory about bridge-building is attested to by the ability of a bridge built according to that theory, to hold traffic. No one watches it fall down and claims it a success, no one believes that bridges are 'supposed' to fall down, that being the aim all along. To be honest, teaching English as a language falls more into this camp, the ability to correctly use terms being somewhat widely agreed on. But no similar wide agreement exists for arts and philosophy. There are those for whom Shakespeare does nothing, there are those (Schopenhauer comes to mind) for whom Hegel wrote nothing but mystical nonsense). Any idea that someone can recognise quality thought in these fields by some universal metric is clearly nonsense. — Pseudonym

That's a strawman. We all know there's a difference between science and the arts in terms of empirical verification etc. The analogy I was making was based directly on the pedagogical example given, but more importantly on the recognition of the difference between arbitrary judgment and critical analysis as carried out by anyone seeking to recognize poor thinking of the sort here dubbed "transcendental stupidity". Do you recognize the distinction or not? (Judging from what you wrote, I guess not.)

Who is it that will have developed and refined it, and by what measure will they have identified a need for refinement? What would it 'not working' look like such that it could be recognised as being in need of refinement? If any of these things involved some external empirical fact, then it falls into the camp of fossils and climate change, if all of these considerations are measures 'in house' by a group whose membership criteria consist solely of being judged by the very metrics they're supposedly refining, then the whole system is self-immunised almost by definition. — Pseudonym

We're already veering off topic, and going into the specifics of pedagogical theory would be taking it too far (and I have my own off-topic criticisms of that in any case). Again, the fundamental distinction between arbitrary feelings and critical identification of poor thinking at some level is all I intended to get you to recognize.

Yes, basically I do not see a method for discerning that which is not 'transcendentaly stupid' in fields such as art and metaphysics which does not simply reinforce the subjective views of a particular group. — Pseudonym

I don't see the attraction of a philosophy forum for you then. The interest for most people here is, I would suppose, in making exactly the kinds of judgments you seem to deem impossible.



I am sensing an impasse here...

At this point I don't even know what your positive criticism is. That there should be no level of intuitive judgment at all with regard to so-called "transcendental stupidity"? In which case, for example, university essays could be marked by computers (and I can explain to you how that would be impossibly inaccurate and unfair if you like.). Or you just don't like the name? Or you don't think it exists at all? Or something like it exists, but not in the form described by Street, or what?

Back to the self-immunised selection. Who are those who can think? The ones who give the answers you think are right, of course. — Pseudonym

But your argument is the one that's self-immunizing by continuously conflating any form of judgment with personal preference.

So what do you think your 'intuitive judgement' is other than what 'seems' right? How would you distinguish those two concepts, because they certainly sound similar enough to me not to be labelled 'bizarre'? — Pseudonym

But I already explained that in the case under discussion that intuitive judgements occur in a context in which they are intregrated into a system that is standardized and monitored and based on educational theory not to mention the individual's experience in the field, so it's not simply a case of what seems right. As if we were talking about completely arbitrary judgments. That is what is bizarre. You have to justify your decisions with reference to rubrics, marking criteria, external examiners and so on. If teachers just did what feels right, results would show a lack of consistency and that would have to be dealt with. And individual teachers can and are identified and retrained if necessary if they do this.

Exactly. It fit with your experience. Do you really believe that what you were identifying in those essays was something universal as opposed to your own personal preference. Your "evidence of a structure to thought" was simply evidence of a structure you recognised. — Pseudonym

No, it wasn't. You give the impression you don't understand how teaching, particularly of university-level academic English to non-native speakers, as was my case, works. There's a whole field of educational theory relating to ESL that's been developed and refined for over a century, but particularly in the last fifty years (and specifically pertaining to academic English in the last thirty or so) that gets implemented and is monitored and standardized as part of a system that aims at having some level of objectivity (not that it doesn't have problems, of course). I've alluded to that already. And that forms a framework within which some level of subjective judgment is applied (as it must be).

So, when you say my "evidence of a structure to thought" was simply evidence of a structure I recognized, on one level that's trivially true: By definition, we can't identify something we don't recognize. But the obvious mistake is to draw the conclusion from that that the identification is based simply on "personal preference". It's about as sensible as saying interpretations of arguments concerning the origin of fossils or the cause of climate change just involve personal preferences because those making those judgments are only identifying structures of thought they recognize. It's at best fuzzy thinking and at worst an open invitation to and encouragement of pseudoscience.

Yeah, basically that is what I believe to be the case absent of some specified utility to which the thought is put the achievement of which is empirically verifiable. — Pseudonym

Why post then if your position is it's impossible to judge the difference between a good and a bad argument on its own terms? Incidentally, going back to the example, English language ability has obvious utility and the results of teaching are empirically verifiable according to internal and external criteria, so even in accordance with your conditions as set out here, your criticisms appear to fail.

(

Now obviously as an intelligent adult teaching children, that which you recognise as structure and organisation is quite likely to represent a greater level of consideration than your students, but this cannot simply be presumed to be true for anyone who's had the time to organise their thought, especially about subjects like philosophy and arts. — Pseudonym

Don't know if this is fundamental to your position, but it should be clear from what I wrote that I wasn't teaching children, I was teaching adults in university. When it comes to teaching children, especially young children, judgments concerning quality of thought can be much more fraught wirth difficulty and there is more of a danger of getting it very wrong.)

The fact that you find the idea "intuitively obvious" pretty much says it all. It 'seems' right to you, so it is right and anyone who sees things another way clearly must be wrong. — Pseudonym

No, I already gave reasons why it fit with my experience of pedagogy. See my first response.

How do you see this as democratic... Is it being done by vote? — Pseudonym

The word "democratic" doesn't apply exclusively to elections. I'm using it here in its senses of 'common/shared/available to all' etc.

Who's doing the judging about which expositions express this base stupidity. — Pseudonym

Anyone who can think.

Give me an example of someone not using the idea as a cudgel for an ideology. Again, it's just seeing what 'seems' right to you as being obviously right in a universal sense. What you, and those who share your views, espouse is simply 'the truth' and everyone else is promoting an 'ideology'. — Pseudonym

See my original example. To expand, when judging academic English essays, for example, we look for evidence of thought based on standardised criteria, which are systematised beforehand, continually monitored and peer-compared, and integrated with our intuitive judgements (based on experience) on how well the student has absorbed and reorganised the information learned in combination with their own pre-existing knowledge and skills. The idea that we judge simply on the basis of what 'seems' right or feel we are promoting some universal truth as opposed to everyone else's ideology is bizarre.

the belief that one can even 'teach' English is an ideology. — Pseudonym

No, that's just a belief. Is it something you doubt?

An ideology is a system of beliefs that guides behaviour, particularly in opposition to reasoned judgement, and particularly as a basis or framework for a political or religious movement. There are different philosophies, or ideologies if you like, behind different pedagogical approaches, and the whole unversity system is ideologically based in a broader sense, but within that framework sound and reasonable judgements can still be made concerning quality. To claim that they can't would be analogous to claiming that we can't make sound and reasonable judgements concerning each other's posts here on this forum, and can just retort to every criticism with "well, that just seems right to you".

Please dont ban me, I'm not calling anyone stupid, — Akanthinos

Christ, if we banned everyone who did that, we'd hardly have two members left to rub together to spark an argument... :grin:

You should quote the OP because this seems more about your objections to Street and postmodernism in general than anything he wrote here. For example, what's decribed, "a stupidity built into the nature of thought" could hardly be more democratic. And if someone were to use this idea as a cudgel for an ideology, they'd simply be being hypocrites in an amusing way. Maybe this makes particular sense to me as I've been a teacher, but the idea here also seems intuitively obvious, and some of the responses overly defensive and presumptuous. Maybe, it's just the terminology used or even just the person who wrote the OP...

How does any of this relate to the example, which was pedagogic?

In other words, awareness of the issue of this type of degraded thinking in ourselves and others is precisely what should stop us doing the type of thing you thought you were highlighting.

Dismissing the results of thinking without analysis just on the basis you don't like them would be an example of the type of thing that's being objected to. Plus, @StreetlightX posited the metaphor (which I happen to think is very apt) in response to the example I gave. So, your simply not liking the idea and dismissing it out of hand as "fascistic" and "nuts" without even considering the example or making a serious attempt at your own analysis serves more as an illustration of the point than a criticism of it.

It is readily apparent that a university professor is sufficiently superior than any given person with trisomy 21 (down syndrome). Need I say more?

The basic principle is, if they are able to maintain a positive wellbeing and a benefit to society then existence is allowed. — intrapersona

Not every university professor can maintain a positive sense of well-being and/or is a benefit to society and certainly not every given person with trisomy 21 is unable to maintain a positive wellbeing and/or is of no benefit to society. So, even by your own criteria of whose existence is allowed, the argument isn't sound.

Your statement is irrelevant if you see the post above yours — intrapersona

Well, I was responding to @Pattern-chaser and making a general point rather than commenting on what you said. But your clarification is well-taken.

Stephen Hawking was afflicted later in life, but he is an illustration nevertheless of how misleading the term "disabled" can be.

it may also be the case that the integration/systematization took place internally yet they lacked the linguistic capacity to follow on through. It is often mistaken that people who can't speak well don't think well — intrapersona

Yes, though it was part of the job to try to disentangle those two things as you mentioned. Linguistic errors (unless they obscured intent) were precisely from my perspective (along with factual errors) the lesser kind of errors identified by Street above. It was very difficult sometimes to see the semantic wood from the linguistic trees though. You hope after a time as a teacher you have a sense for that.

"Teachers already know that errors or falsehoods are rarely found in homework (except in those exercises where a fixed result must be produced, or propositions must be translated one by one). Rather, what is more frequently found—and worse—are nonsensical sentences, remarks without interest or importance, banalities mistaken for profundities, ordinary “points” confused with singular points, badly posed or distorted problems, all heavy with dangers, yet the fate of us all.” — StreetlightX

This rings quite true after my several years teaching academic English, essay writing, research and the like. Thought tends to follow the path of least resistance. Factual errors were certainly relevant, but what I was looking for was evidence of structure to thought, a systemization that showed evidence of both absorption of information and organized implementation of it. What I often got though was a disorganized "picture of thought" as if students believed their impressions of what I was trying to impart could simply be regurgitated on the page and it was up to me to reinterpret that back into some properly organized whole. There was a lack of application of thought to thought, and what I tended to be given back was a filtered version of what I gave out rather than a positive transformation of it. I guess the natural form of thought acts to filter input and reproduce partial or degraded impressions rather than to create anything of interest or importance.

"... remarks without interest or importance", what a load of supercilious bullshit. — Pseudonym

Why?

We might have to do some fishing, eh?

By the usual standards of this forum, I've been unusually polite. — Michael Ossipoff

Allow me to complain about this mischaracterization. You haven't broken the rules, but the idea you've been unusually polite by the standards of this forum isn't remotely true. So, you have the right to ignore @schopenhauer1's complaints about you, but please don't bring the rest of us into it.

OK, look, I think the objections here arose from a confusing and unconvincingly argued OP. Your recent long post seems to be an effort at making a more recognizably philosophical point, and pursuing that might make for a more fruitful conversation.

Just saw this reply. As you didn't quote me properly, I missed it. Anyhow, that makes significantly more sense to me than the original.

*Bows gracefully* Is there money to be made from this type of thing, do you think?? :nerd:

(Anyhow, in the absence of knowing what all this is about, I'll leave Marcus to it... [Exit])

According to my dictionary, a panda is something which is "increasingly rare". And judged by his prevalence in modern philosophical considerations, so is God, "increasingly rare". Coincidence, I think not. Ergo, God is a Panda.

What can I say? It worked for me. Of course, that's pretty much smack on the type of thing I'm interested in, so I may be biased. :)

It's open. But there wasn't enough philosophy in it to justify staying in General Phil, so I moved it to the lounge. Maybe philosophy of religion is a better place for it though. So, moved again.

That's torturous and awful all round. I don't think you're being selfish btw. Nor do I think is there any point in punishing yourself further by thinking you might be. You are all suffering more than enough.

Well, it's the distinction that jumps out at me, but there's much more to it. Criticism also covers, for example, literary and philosophical critique where, though agency is a factor, the primary distinction vs. complaining is more like the search for truth rather than the emotional aversion to it as revealed in a negative reaction to a given state of affairs. Anyway, it seems to me it's a particular type of complaining that you are highlighting, and rightly so, as objectionable. I'm, like others, only problematising the generalisation.

Yes, but cherry picking one shade of meaning and ignoring the rest in order to make your comparison is a word game that we all can engage in to draw false equivalences between distinct terms. That aside, what I'm more interested in is what you want to get at re atheism. It seems to me you're overstating your case, but there may be something there worth discussing regardless. Rappers and Pandas aside.

This is awesome. — Pierre-Normand

Second that. As is this: https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/3111/society-of-the-spectacle/p1

Which is high on my list for a reread. :clap: