I have listened to the 10.000 days album several times now. The way bass and percussion move and change together permits the other effects.
The drumming is so certain to itself.

I like the way the rhythm guitar in 'right in two' becomes the melodic line.

That is one tight band. I did not know of it.

There is the question of how having consciousness is an advantage but being able to say how it happens as a process we can recognize through scientific inquiry is another matter. Being able to see it as a result of development does not mean we understand it as such.

I read the problem Chalmers presents as a problem of building models.
Can there be a completely 'objective' model that explains the experience of consciousness? The experience is presented as a phenomena, one of the things that needs to be explained.
From that perspective, evolution is not an explanation.

It's tricky because people think they have best intentions but what of the morality of arrogance to give people a game that is played in real time, lest death to begin with? — schopenhauer1

It would be reasonable for Job to complain about doing a good job of being a person and yet getting a lot of suffering in return. And if he knew it was all because of some bizarre wager upon his response, that, too, would be a fair cause for objection.

The game quality is a form of suffering. That Job can confirm for himself that he is not at fault is outside of the game is important. That doesn't answer your question about justification but is an attempt to talk about the problem.

If you click on the three horizontal dots to the right of the swoopy reply arrow, you have the option to 'share.' When clicked, an address pops up which can be pasted into your private message and hyperlinked. It isn't as precise as the quote function but lets the reader go to the post where the quote appears.

I will do that to your post: https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/12984/starting-private-conversations-through-text-selection/p1

The first amendment in the U.S. constitution says that people can decide for themselves what to believe. The secular is about having a choice rather than living within a theocracy. In that respect, it is not a declaration of anything other than agreeing to not kill each other on the basis of what we think.

It is an experiment. Some of the results are not encouraging.

Well said. The status quo has been upended. The future is unlikely to be a reset of the previous deals.

Yes, work is necessary. Finding a way to make it worthwhile beyond answering that necessity is a good thing. Don't you experience satisfaction when you overcome a difficult task? Don't you take notice of the relative freedom that becoming skilled imparts?

The idea of living in a world where nothing is required from me sounds like being a zombie.

That aspect of Russia having a European identity is why I wonder about all the other ultra-nationalists in different states. Those different culture wars contest collective security on the basis of identity rather than a Chomsky style critique of empire. Their enemies are within the state.

As a builder, working with materials is learning the best way to perform to make the desired thing. In agriculture, growing is act of nature combined with skilled labor. In both cases understanding and discipline are needed for the successful production of what we need to live. I call it a 'relationship to the cosmos' because part of performing well is a kind of attention.

In Zhuangzi, the skill of the Butcher is found by responding to resistance in a way that finds the most effortless path.

That aspect of work does not address all aspects of having to live by the 'sweat of our brows." The dynamic of wanting to have a say in the outcome of those who one supports and loves is preferable to the passivity of eking out existence with minimum effort. Labor feels punitive if not freely chosen as what is pursued. The response of an individual obviously cannot remove the quality of suffering but there can be a conversation.

Great observation about the life span of psychological models.

Jules Evan's observation that such models are vulnerable to becoming tools for nefarious ends is very interesting.

An interesting feature of Finland being outside of the Article 5 protection is that they can respond to any actual incursion from Russia without it being the NATO fight Putin is slavering for. Once Finland becomes a member, that freedom of movement will have conditions that will restrict Finland from counter attacking as they see fit. Neutrality has its benefits.

In some ways, Russia has been protected by NATO since collective war is always more lugubrious than unilateral action.

I agree that work is difficult and is always related to an acceptance of conditions of what is possible or demanded.

The discipline required to make some things is not only a matter of doing enough for other people. The art demands its own harsh necessity.

Good performance requires a lightness of hand and spirit combined with a resolve to deliver the best result.

This isn't to say that such a personal perspective overrules others. But the reverse is also not true. There is a relationship to the cosmos established when one can actually do stuff that is not there when one cannot.

The approach of Vygotsky is interesting. He called for research that was not just based upon personal testimony.
In opposition to the behaviorists who said that such reports were not data, Vygotsky recognized that the development of individuals needed more than their reports to build models to try and understand the process..
How Skinner got to a place where it had to be one thing or another is a mystery.

As a more general principle, my position has always been absolutely clear, i.e., every country and continent should belong to its rightful owners. — Apollodorus

Since that has been the central issue under contention for every war ever, the observation lacks the clarity you were hoping for.

Or this:

Do you mean like this:

Interesting play of piano as percussion versus melody. Or both, if that is the movement.

Seriously, where did all the roubles go!? — Count Timothy von Icarus

London.

The "Biscuits with Gravy" sounds like the tastier dish to order on that menu, especially after Lavrov just said that Hitler probably had Jewish blood and that self-hating Jews are the most dangerous kind.

Pogroms are back! Such fun for the entire family.

Oh.
I will try again tomorrow. Time for bed.

Are you asking me to quote what you have said to show that I have read you carefully enough?

The point is that the separation you have made between the interests of the Russians and the 'west' do not amount to a fundamental disagreement about 'world order'.

Russian Imperialists have bank accounts in Western Banks. The system does not work without that Capital. You seem to be the summer child of unfortunate winter.

So, what makes it special enough to oppose the 'west' as anything different from what they are up to?

I know some of the nefarious happenings after the fall of the wall.

Your derision does not clarify the difference between capitalists I asked about.

One origin for prayer may be from associating an expression of gratitude for good fortune to whatever agency is making it possible.

So, not a matter of belief as much as a measure of respect. Honoring the gods may not bring hoped for results but pissing them off seems like a bad idea.

Being polite was the first martial art.

The Western calls for, and attempts to institute "progressive change in Russia" is the direct reason why Putin exists, and why people are dying in Ukraine today — StreetlightX

The 'west' did not require the failed state of the USSR to transfer it's wealth into fungible goods and Capital secured in global markets. That is on them. That is why Russia is called a kleptocracy.

It can be argued that such practices are not much different from what is happening elsewhere but to do so deflates the idea that there is something different or even interesting about the Russian capitalists. If the logic of money explains 'western' interest, how is that different from 'Russian' interests? To insist upon a difference will put you in bed with Apollodorus who says that:

NATO’s jihad on Russia may or may not lead to a military and economic defeat of Russia, but it may equally be the beginning of the end for America and Europe. — Apollodorus

Are you on board with that program?

Your last question is boring. I will leave you to your own devices.

It seems unlikely to me that the different lines of production you point to can be separated so sharply.

That puts the date pretty far back.

Your idea suggests we knew ourselves as sovereign individuals long ago but lost that knowledge through unfortunate political formations. It is a mythological thought current through many cultures. An interesting article of faith against the backdrop of the epistemology you seemed to have affirmed.

What distinguishes those two things? Or, asked another way, when did the fake stuff emerge?

There needs to be a healthy balance between faith and reason. — Dermot Griffin

What does bringing that about look like?

The Enlightenment was motivated, in part, by the desire to not be told what to think by the powers that be. Is the better civilization reached by 'freedom' from the influence of reason or by reestablishing the control that lives of faith often live under?

The latter option is easy to imagine because it has been done many times in the past. The former option has been expressed as a communitarian right to live separately from others to preserve belief but is rarely depicted as the ruling principle of a civilization.

I figured that referencing Ecclesiastes would indicate that I was not claiming some fantastic advance for mankind as such.

Technology has made it increasingly easy to kill people but your proposal that 'barbarism' of the sort that does not recognize 'honor', did not occur before WW1 is fantasy. People have been wiping out other people for time out of mind.

It is difficult, if not impossible, to measure the misery of the present age with that suffered in the past. A fair amount of the testimony suggests that Ecclesiastes was right in saying that it is the Same Day, just different shit.

The present world order is terrible, unjust, and insane but I will take it over the Hundreds of Years of religious wars and the slavery of subsistence living.

Oh wait, we are still doing all of that. But not so much. And not being convinced that there was a Golden Age of simplicity lets me appreciate the benefits and freedom of movement denied to previous generations, at least to the point where I am not burned for being a heretic. The process that made that less likely surely owes a lot to the Enlightenment. It is as if a certain group of people got together and wondered how to constrain the power of these simple people so assured of their own righteousness.

This response from the Russian military reminds me of how the U.S. decided not to wipe out populations in Vietnam they were capable of doing at the time. And there are those who insisted that reluctance, in that regard, was the cause of defeat.

The Westmoreland cost / benefit analysis was given a shot in blood and dollars. Is there a parallel in the present situation?

Yes, the thing about how MAD works is that a preemptive strike would require a massive saturation of fire to avoid having launch sources taken out by the other side. But having the chance to launch all one's missiles does not stop other people firing before they are hit.

Lavrov is not referring to the possible use of tactical nukes because that would signal a loss of confidence in the methods already being employed to defeat Ukraine which are going swimmingly by his account.

An interesting counterpoint to Spinoza cancelling the notion of will as ether a prerogative of the divine or what individuals do is that he places much value in being less stupid as an agent of change in the world.