To say that moral claims can be true is to say that there are inherently true moral claims, claims that by definition are not supported by external evidence. Such claims are needed because extrinsic truths depend on intrinsic truths to be truths. It cannot be that the only moral claims that are truthful are those that depend on other moral claims to be true. Any moral justification that lies outside the thing itself - extrinsic morality - "x is good because it does abc and abc is good" - requires claims outside itself to be truth in order for it to be truth. This creates a never-ending chain of justifications, each new justification passing the problem onto something else. This is moral relativism and subjectivism. They are absurd, literally.

The problem of needing axioms is not the problem, the problem is that there are no such moral axioms that are true. Valor is only good because of its effects. So is truth, justice, love, peace, etc. The closest any system (that I know of) gets to claiming moral axioms is hedonism. In it, good feelings are good, bad feelings are bad. But they're wrong: they're merely things that evolution created to help us survive. They are not actually inherently good or bad, despite Hedonism's claims. There is no true reason why they should or should not exist. — Leftist

Your position looks contradictory, here is why: on one side, you claim that extrinsic truths depend on intrinsic truths (that I assume you would call “true axioms”) and that intrinsic truths (=true axioms) by definition are not supported by external evidence, so extrinsic truths depend on truths not supported by external evidence (=true axioms). At the same time, you claim that moral claims can not be intrinsic truths (=true axioms) because “good feeling” and “bad feeling” are not inherently good nor bad because of evolution. The problem is that either “evolution” is an external condition for the truth of our moral claims, but you stated that intrinsic moral truths are such that are not supported by external evidence, so truths about evolution are irrelevant for intrinsic moral truths to be true axioms. In other words, taking evolution as an external condition of truth for moral claims contradicts your definition of true axiom. Or “evolution” is taken as an internal condition for the truth of our moral claims, but then this supports the claim that “hedonistic” axioms are inherently true moral claims. In other words, taking evolution as an internal condition of truth for moral claims contradicts your claim that there are no moral axioms that are true.

this fantasy in which the United States is some spreader of peace and love — Tzeentch

Can you quote anybody here talking about the US as "some spreader of peace and love"?

the foolish notion that countries in the EU and NATO are sovereign — Tzeentch

Maybe it's your notion of "sovereignty" which is foolish. Indeed its normative usage in international relations is more nuanced than you might think, for example it shouldn't be confused with the notion of "independence" nor "autarchy" nor with "territorial control": Sovereignty may be recognized even when the sovereign body possesses no territory or its territory is under partial or total occupation by another power. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sovereignty#External

if the premise is true, that doesn’t logically prove the definition. — neomac


Nope. Indeed it doesn't.

that premise is compatible with other arguably more plausible definitions like “Ukrainian is a person with Ukrainian passport”, incompatible with the definition you provided: indeed not all persons under the rule of the government of Ukraine are Ukrainians, likely the non-Ukrainian foreign professional, tourists or residents located in Ukraine. — neomac


It is, yes.

the claim “Ukrainians will always be controlled by Ukraine” doesn’t logically follow from your definition of “Ukrainian” unless “Ukraine” in your conclusion is understood NOT as a territorial entity but as the government of Ukraine. — neomac


That's right..

Other irrelevant facts about my post are that it contained 114 words and doesn't once use the letter 'j'... if you're starting a collection . — Isaac

The facts I listed are relevant to establish whether your argument is fallacious. Your stats aren’t.

The argument is that control over the people of Ukraine is in the hands of the Ukrainian government.

The idea of a group of people literally controlling a 'territory' is absurd (what are they going to to do control it's geography?). What is controlled is people not land , and the way people control people is primarily via a government making laws. So the only matter in consideration is what government controls which people, and by what means. — Isaac

The expression “controlling a territory” was more clear before you tried to clarify it. Indeed what your clarification misses is that the idea of “controlling a territory” suggests a geographic perimeter for people’s or government’s controlling activity. Not surprisingly you talk about “government of Ukraine” to refer to a government meant to rule over the territorial entity called “Ukraine” and not “Botswana”.
Besides “primarily” doesn’t mean exclusively nor necessarily. But, most importantly, a government controlling a territory doesn’t need to be one that represents people’s will in a democratic way, which is a more relevant point to @Olivier5’s argument as far as I understood it.
See clarification is very important for rational people debating over complex topics. Unfortunately you spectacularly suck at it.

The argument is that there's no 'natural unit' of people who all have some single homogeneous set of needs so the grouping used has no bearing on the life of any given member. — Isaac

No bearing?! If one is Australian, then she doesn’t need a permit to enter and live there, while non-Australians do, so the grouping based on citizenship has a bearing on people’s life.

Each individual ukrainian might be better off sharing their control over their government with other Ukrainians, or New Yorkers, or Parisians. — Isaac

Not sure what you can infer from such a random hypothetical.

There's nothing about the border of Ukraine which makes the people within it better off sharing control with each other than with people outside that border. — Isaac

It sounds like claiming: “There is nothing about the walls of a flat which makes the family members within it better off sharing control with each other than with people outside those walls” which, if it has a meaning, is likely a preposterous one.

Your comment here makes no sense at all. Nowhere is the word 'clarified' clarified., nor what you mean by 'supposed to mean'. In fact your whole post is just garbage. What do you mean by "make any sense" in the first sentence. You've not provided any measure of what 'making sense' would constitute, nor a method for how we'd judge it. And "play any other role" is ambiguous. What is a 'role' here, how do we determine whether something is or is not 'playing a role', your argument is just nonsensical unless you can define these terms and how we'd measure them. Then there's "arguably more plausible". How are we going to judge if something is, in fact, arguable? Or plausible? Without these things defined first we can't possibly make any sense at all of what you've written. "Likely". How likley? You've got to be specific here otherwise we can't judge. Is 80% enough? Baysian or frequentist likelihood? How will we measure it?
It seems you've got a ton of work to do before anyone can make any sense whatsoever of your post. Alternatively, we could act like reasonably intelligent adults and accept that although some terms have fuzzy definitions we need not clarify every single one in advance of making any point. — Isaac

I agree about your claim marked in bold. But here you are clearly abusing it, and playing dumb is making things look even worse. Indeed you spontaneously proposed a definition of “Ukrainian” and a clarification of “controlling a territory”, namely two very ordinary notions that so far the interlocutors you are dealing with managed to use intelligibly and correctly without your proposals (luckily so, since they are ineffective). Yet you don’t feel the need to define nor clarify the locution “morally 'correct' unit of government” which sounds pretty esoteric (google reports zero results for “morally 'correct' unit of government”), indeed nobody has used it so far, except you, and despite sounding very important to you since you keep framing your thoughts on this war in moral terms?! And then you dare lecturing me if I protest about it?! Are you crazy?!

But then it seems absent of asking for definitions, you've nothing to say. — Isaac

It hurts, I know. Sorry, but not sorry.

What about Ukraine being under the control of Ukrainians? Is that totally out of question? — Olivier5


Doesn’t make any sense. Since’Ukrainian' is not a natural kind, it's not a subspecies, or a genetic type, Ukrainians will always be controlled by Ukraine since the definition of ’Ukrainian' is 'person under the rule of the government of Ukraine’.

There's no difference between a citizen of Donetsk having to accept power sharing with a citizen of Lvov, than that same citizen having to accept power sharing with a citizen of Rostov, or New York, or Paris. They're all miles away. No magic connects Lvov and Donetsk more than New York and Donetsk that somehow magically renders the former a morally 'correct' unit of government, but the latter not. — Isaac

Your argument doesn’t make any sense: first, the premise “Since ‘Ukrainian' is not a natural kind, it's not a subspecies, or a genetic type” doesn't seem to play any other role than putatively supporting your definition of ’Ukrainian’ as 'person under the rule of the government of Ukraine’. Even if the premise is true, that doesn’t logically prove the definition. Indeed that premise is compatible with other arguably more plausible definitions like “Ukrainian is a person with Ukrainian passport”, incompatible with the definition you provided: indeed not all persons under the rule of the government of Ukraine are Ukrainians, likely the non-Ukrainian foreign professional, tourists or residents located in Ukraine.
Second, the claim “Ukrainians will always be controlled by Ukraine” doesn’t logically follow from your definition of “Ukrainian” unless “Ukraine” in your conclusion is understood NOT as a territorial entity but as the government of Ukraine. Yet, if @Olivier5’s claim has to do with control of territorial entity (Ukraine) by a group of people (the Ukrainians), as it seems to me, then your argument is irrelevant, because your argument deals with the control of a government (the government of Ukraine) over a group of people (the Ukrainians).
Third, nowhere is clarified what “morally 'correct' unit of government” is supposed to mean, nor why “mileage” would make no difference in identifying “morally 'correct' unit of government”, nor why these claims would be relevant for Olivier’s question to another interlocutor.

:up:

If nothing else, it fits the signature of Putin's Russia. Other than that, I'd take it with a grain of salt. — jorndoe

Agreed. But it's interesting to keep an eye on, since not only Russia is reluctant to return the occupied Kuril Islands to Japan but it also started militarizing them: https://www.trtworld.com/magazine/why-are-russia-and-japan-gridlocked-on-the-question-of-the-kuril-islands-58074

fun fact: https://www.newsweek.com/russia-planned-attack-japan-2021-fsb-letters-1762133

Meaning pointing out US's invasion of Iraq was not an act of "defiance" does not create some situation where the "contrasting" the concepts of maverick and defiance has anything to do with anything.

You receive criticism ... can't deal with it, then move the goal posts. Obviously, you're no longer remotely arguing that Russia's breaking or not breaking international law is a justification for Western policies. — boethius

But I wasn’t talking about the American invasion of Iraq, I was talking about Russian invasion of Ukraine. To repeat it once more:
I listed facts that support that claim, like the fact that Russia didn’t halt its invasion even after a UN resolution against it as widely voted by West/NATO/US, with ensuing sanctions and continued military support to Ukraine by the West. If that’s not an act of defiance by Russia against West/NATO/US, then I don’t understand your usage of the word “defiance”: if X is warned, condemned and sanctioned by Y for a certain choice, and X knowingly pursues its choice despite of that, that’s for me enough to call X’s behavior defiant toward Y. EVEN MORE SO, if X were to question Y’s authority with “tu quoque” arguments (as you suggest with “but also the US has little respect for international law”)!!!
Your criticism doesn’t address my claim and plays with words (“maverick”, “justification”) in interpreting my original claims which weren’t using such terms. Your conceptually confused or caricatural way of rendering my claims is good to mislead or brainwash you, not me. Anyways yes the Western reaction against Russia is justified on geopolitical and legal grounds.

I point out that your argument about "defiance" is unsound and invalid, at no point does party A defying party B tell us anything about who is justified and what any of those or then third parties should do about it, and you then formulate my position as somehow contrasting maverick with defiance ... but they are compatible. Sure, you can also have the maverick defier, but that was not my statement which was just pointing out the US invasion of Iraq was not "an act of defiance” and then pointed out how your whole topsy-turvy defiance logic makes no sense.
Which you've entirely abandoned, formulating your position as very clearly support for US hegemony. — “boethius

First, in your blablabla is not clear to me what argument you claim as being invalid and unsound (the piece you quote is not my argument, but arguably Isaac's), so first show the argument of mine you are objecting to, then show why it is invalid, then show why it is unsound. Second, I didn't express myself the way you report "A defying party B tell us anything about who is justified". Third, you said I committed a strawman before making the distinction between maverick and defiant attitude [1], and what follows doesn’t prove that my objection to Isaac’s argument from the post you cite was a strawman wrt Isaac’s argument, it just offers another argument which is supposed to somehow save Isaac’s argument. However Isaac’s argument as it is formulated remains fallacious or inconclusive as I claimed. Four, your distinction between maverick and defiant is a diversion from what I was talking about, and it's irrelevant wrt what I originally claimed (it doesn't matter only who transgresses international law, but also against whom the transgression has been committed, especially if it looks like an insubordination from a minor power to a greater power), so why on earth would I let you drag me into a dispute grounded on a misunderstanding? Five, I didn’t abandon anything, it’s you who is progressively discovering how poor your understanding of my claim was and still is.
Anyways feel free to brainwash yourself into believing otherwise. Along with your sidekick. As I said, it's pathetic but expected. Fun fact is that even in two you can't manage to build a decent objection.

No, when we say you've moved the goal posts to something trivial, the triviality maybe true, but that doesn't support your position.

You have a bunch of elements in an argument that doesn't support your position: we point that out and then you move the goal posts to focusing on just one element, such as "defiance", or then just generalising your argument into a tautology which you quite clearly didn't say, but very clearly said something specific but unfortunately unsupported. — boethius

You and your sidekick focused on the word “defiance” from a comment of mine addressed to another interlocutor and for reasons apparently evident to you both, and yet when I questioned you both you are incapable of making a point without rephrasing in a caricatural or confused way my claims. Besides you are no credible referee nor credible reporter of our past exchanges. So I don’t see the point of such preposterous summaries other then offering cues to your sidekick to parrot.
BTW my claimes are "trivialities" or "tautologies" or "both"? Quote 2 trivialities/tautologies I claimed, and quote the claims expressing my position which the trivialities/tautologies I claimed later were moving from.

Do you just not remember what you've already written and what we've been discussing?

And the problem I see is that Russia doesn't simply want to take a piece of land from Ukraine, but it wants to do it expressly in defiance and at the expense of the West/NATO/US: starting with the violation of international law till aiming at establishing a new World Order in alliance with at least two other authoritarian regimes (China and Iran) [1]. — neomac


Clearly your position at the time can be summarised as Russia defying international law, the West/NATO/US therefore needing to apply that law somehow, and to make things more abundantly clear "violation of international law" is another way to say "defiance of international law”. — boethius

NO, IT CAN’T be summarised in the way you rephrased it. I wrote in defiance and at the expense of the West/NATO/US not in defiance of international law. I get that the expression “Russia defying international law” is useful for your and your sidekick’s preposterous counterargument. But that’s NOT what I said. So it was you who tried to generalise my argument into a dumb claim about international law violations and arbitrarily conflating it into international law defiance. And that's why you committed a fallacious strawman argument against me! But once you realised how dumb your counterargument is, you started accusing me of shifting subjects to “tautologies” (do you know what “tautology” means? Explain that to me!) which you must agree with. How pathetic is that.

So you're saying something that is of "practical rationality" to do would not be justified to do it? Why would it being both practical and rational to do ... not therefore be a justification to do it?

How is "practical rationality" anything other than a pseudo-intellectual bullshit way of saying "justification".

If I ask why you did something and you answered with the practical and rational reasons for doing it, how is that not you justifying your actions with those reasons? — “boethius

I clarified what I mean by “practical rationality” as applied to geopolitics: rational geopolitical agents must (logical requirement) effectively link geopolitical means to geopolitical goals.. While we could use the word “justification” to refer to practical rationality, one could use it also to refer to “moral justification” and “legal justification”. For that reason, there is a risk of conflation between three different cases of justification, and that’s why I didn’t use it. Since you didn’t clarify the way you use the notion of “justification” I’m not sure we share the same usage, nor I’m sure that you are not conflating different meanings (indeed, I suspect you conflate different meanings). In any case I do not feel compelled to use your wording to express my ideas.

Again, so if Russia wins the "struggle" over Ukraine then it's actions were justified all along and Ukraine just picked the wrong side since 2014?

You're only substantive criticism of Russia seems to be they haven't won yet ... but the US hasn't won this struggle yet either. “Might is right" is not a slogan, it's just exactly what you are describing: if the US can dominate Russia in this confrontation then it should do so, which of course exact same thing applies to Russia dominating Ukraine. — boethius

See how you reframe all my claims with terms I didn’t use, to make claims I didn’t make, while ignoring my other contextual claims or subsequent clarifications, and despite the fact that I complained about such approach several times?
My claim is more like this: if the US has valid reasons to perceive Russia as a security threat and has effective means to repel such threat, then it’s rational for the US to act accordingly. As it is doing.
The claim “might is right" is conceptually confused or misleading, it doesn't sound anything but a slogan to me. I could never use it to express my beliefs.

Nothing is preventing anyone here arguing the cost is worth it. No one in the West hesitates to argue the cost to defeat Hitler was worth it. Sometimes great causes have great costs.

Of course, in the case of WWII the people arguing the cost was worth it actually sent their own soldiers to fight and share that cost. Saying the cost to Ukraine is worth it for our policies, such as not needing to "win" just damage Russia a lot, is quite clearly a cynical exploitation of Ukraine for our own ends.

However, nothing stops anyone from arguing the cynical exploitation and manipulation of Ukraine for our own ends is justifiable, that we will save more lives in the long run in the Baltics and Poland.

However, my question is not some "conceptual framework" that makes sense to reject. If you advocate some goal, such as in this case harming the Russians, "what would be a reasonable cost to attain that goal?" is just common sense. Obviously you wouldn't sacrifice every single American to harm one Russian soldiers knee ... so between that and achieve your objective at the cost of a cup of coffee there obviously some zone of acceptable cost (to the US, to NATO, to Ukraine) which you're comfortable with.

It's simply a common sense question to participants who reject a negotiated peace and any essentially any compromise whatsoever, what cost to Ukraine they think would be worthwhile in refusing to compromise. Would 300 000 lives be worth it to conquer Crimea? Is clearly a reasonable question. Of course, people can argue that 300 000 lives wouldn't be worth it, but it can be conquered with some amount of lives that is worth it. However, to be an honest participant in this debate one should be able to answer such simple questions.

That the questions simply point to a total incoherence, ignorance and Russophobia underpinning your position doesn't somehow make these simple questions as part of some "conceptual framework" that can be rejected. — boethius

I argued against such putative “simple questions” a while ago. They are not simple, they are simplistic. In other words, I find them conceptually flawed.

Like who? The Baltic states? Poland? Germany?
And in what conditions and scenario does Russia just start invading East-ward?
Also, if Russia can do what you say here, doesn't that just make them the Hegemon? — boethius

All the alleged reasons that pushed Russia against the West (NATO expansion, Russophobia, protection of Russian minorities, existential threat, securing strategic military assets like in Crimea) may still be exploitable in the future once Russia recovers enough to pursue its geopolitical ambitions and if circumstances are more favourable (e.g. a US more isolationist toward Europe, China more supportive toward Russia) that could be a problem for unprepared westerners. But it’s not on me to figure out future plausible geopolitical scenarios and security threats from an authoritarian, expansionist and anti-Western Russia, I’m not a geopolitical analyst. I just read them.

You say this question of cost is both dumb and emotional/moral blackmail ... while stating you already answered this question literally a few sentences later:

Is the cost to Ukraine of such a policy morally acceptable?
— boethius

I answered yes and argued for it a while ago. It was among my first posts to the thread. — boethius

Right. Indeed, also on that occasion I criticised the conceptual framework of my interlocutor who was wondering the same questions and supports your views. I'll let you guess who he was.


[1]

What's the purpose of "defiance" in your strawman here? — boethius

Why strawman? — neomac

Your full sentence was referring to Russia, whereas my statement was referring to the US invading Iraq was not "defiance". — boethius

Meaning?

Your full sentence was referring to Russia, whereas my statement was referring to the US invading Iraq was not "defiance". Maybe follow the context.

You then setup some sort of maverick-defiance strawman stated above, which obviously has nothing to do with anything. As the following statements you cite demonstrate, pretty much doing anything can be construed as "defiance" of someone who disagrees.

Why are we talking about defiance? Because your argument about the West needing to deal with Russia's "defiance" (originally of international law) justifying Western policy, couldn’t standup to Isaac's criticism so you've again do what you always do and focus on some trivialities and moving the goalposts: in this case moving the goal posts from Russia is defying international law and that broadly support your position, to Russia is defying the “West". — boethius

Same steamy pile of shit as usual:
First, you keep repeating that I made a strawman argument. Do you know what strawman argument means? Explained that to me. And show me how that applies to my counterarguments.
Second, I already explained what I mean by “defiance”, it’s you who didn’t.
Third, your and Isaac’s duo-promotion is pathetic, but expected. Intellectually misery at its finest. Besides I don’t care about the scores you assign to me, I care about arguments.
Forth, every time you call my claims trivialities, that means you agree with me. And since I keep disagreeing with you by virtue of those alleged trivialities, then it means that you disagree with yourself. Do you see the problem, dude?
Besides my arguments are always the same ones. Just looping through them for a while now. And if I find your approach conceptually flawed, I don’t feel rationally compelled to stick to it.
Fifth, quote where I made such a claim “Russia is defying international law”, you serial liar.

Notice how this, your actual position of supporting US hegemonic power, has nothing to do with justifications of US actions — boethius

What do you mean by “justification”? I clarified for the thousand time my point when talking about practical rationality. While you keep playing with words.

First thing to notice, is that if Russia is a Hegemonic power in its neighbourhood then Ukraine should be compelled to treat Russia with submissiveness.

The only justification here is who has the hegemonic power in the region should call the shots in Ukraine. If Russia comes out on top in the war then it was the Hegemonic power all along, Ukraine should have submitted and that would be that.

Your argument basically boils down to might is right, so who has the might is the key question which the war is going to uncover. — boethius

No, there is no reason to constrain the field to region in the sense you suggest here. When great powers struggle for hegemony they can do so over all domains within their reach on earth, sea, space, virtual space. Small powers pick their side according to their means and convenience. Besides I don’t reason through caricatural slogans like “might is right”. I’m not sure it makes even sense.

Just wow. The question of whether the cost to Ukraine of our policies of encouraging, financing, arming more war is worthwhile cost so far to accomplish ... "liberation" of the Donbas? Crimea? well whatever it's accomplished compared to the offer at the start of the war, and what cost do Zelenskyites think would be reasonable to pay to accomplish the objectives of the "common cause" ...

... is akin to asking if being gay is a sin against God to an atheist. — boethius

When you are asking ME your questions you look as dumb, yes. I don’t share your conceptual assumptions. And for exactly the same reason, your rhetoric attempt of emotional/moral blackmailing me looks even dumber to me. And if you are doing it for your fans and sidekicks, I don’t give a shit about it.

Your whole premise is:
Russia is no peer of the US on the geopolitical arena. Period. — neomac
... So what's there to fear? — boethius

Russia can still do lots of damage and especially at the expense of the American allies. Indeed if there is going to be a more direct clash between the 2 powers, this is going more likely to happen in Europe than on the American soil.

s the cost to Ukraine of such a policy morally acceptable? — boethius

I answered yes and argued for it a while ago. It was among my first posts to the thread.

Where do I do this? — boethius

Here:

"move fast and break things" maverick attitude, and not some sort of act of defiance. — boethius

The US's maverick attitude in invading Iraq with sufficient justification or a credible plan, somehow succeeding in making things worse than under Saddam, is an act of defiance against international law and morality. If Russia is doing the same, that's just called “learning” — boethius

Then neither Russia nor you learnt well. First of all the act of “defiance” which I’m interested in must be assessed wrt the subjects supporting some international law resolution against the violator. So my question to you is: what is the UN resolution that the US was acting against during its invasion of Iraq, exactly?
Secondly, the US’s invasion turned out to be a reputational failure for the US and set a dangerous precedent exploitable by anti-Western authoritarian regimes. Still the US is the hegemonic power which the Westerns rely on, so Western countries are not compelled to treat Russia with the same submissiveness they treat American abuses on geopolitical grounds. Russia is no peer of the US on the geopolitical arena. Period.
Third, as I said elsewhere, I’m siding with the US not because I think the US is good nor because I think the US is good for the West, but because I think Russia or China would be worse than the US for the West if they managed to extend their hegemonic influence at the expense of the American hegemony in the West. So until there is a better alternative for the Westerners in the foreseeable future, I would find more reasonable to partner with the US than to partner with Russia or China.

The word play in this little dialogue is your use of the word “defiance” to somehow imply justification of something, in this case, Western policies.

Russia and allies "defied" Hitler in WWII ... did that make Hitler’s war justified?

"Defiance" doesn't justify anything. Ukraine was defying Russia by financing and arming Nazi's ... so according to you the entire Russian war effort is justified due to the defiance of Ukraine. — boethius

The word “defiance” is perfectly intelligible with or without reference to any legal or moral justification as a form of intentional disobedience. Since I’m reasoning on geopolitical grounds, I will assess Russian geopolitical posture as the challenger of the West accordingly.
Concerning your likely confused questions, rational geopolitical agents must (logical requirement) effectively link geopolitical means to geopolitical goals. That’s how practical rationality must be applied to geopolitics. This is true for ALL geopolitical players: Nazi Germany, Soviet Union, China, ISIS, the US, Ukraine, Switzerland, the Vatican, Roman Empire, etc.

Again, what threat? Make your case. Russia is about to invade all of Western Europe? — boethius

Looping for the thousand time on the same point: the problem I see is that Russia doesn't simply want to take a piece of land from Ukraine, but it wants to do it expressly in defiance and at the expense of the West/NATO/US: starting with the violation of international law till aiming at establishing a new World Order in alliance with at least two other authoritarian regimes (China and Iran) [1]. Besides Russia is capable to blackmail the West (and the rest of the world) with wheat and gas supply (among others), threaten it with nuclear weapons, fund pro-Russian lobbies in the West, conduct cyber-warfare against Western facilities/institutions and project military assets in Africa, Middle East and Mediterranean sea through the Black Sea (basically encircling Europe), while increasing Putin's authoritarian regime and spiking Russian budget for military expenditure [2] with the money earned during Putin's 20 years of happy business with the West, instead of investing this money to improve and widen system of rights, education and welfare for his people.

... with it's incompetent army that can't do anything right? — boethius

Wrong, with its incompetent army Russia did lots of damage. So far not enough to win its strategic war against the West, though.

The key question of the recent dialogue is "at what cost to Ukraine?" and is this cost reasonable to ask a proxy to pay.

You and all the other Zelenskyites simply keep dodging the question. — boethius

Your question is based on assumptions we do not share. It’s like asking to an atheist: is being gay a sin against God or not? Likely the atheist answer won’t be based on what is claimed in the Bible, but on his disbelief of any such thing as “sins against God”, right?
The same between us, so here is my answer: at whatever cost Ukraine and the West as geopolitical agents are willing to pay. It’s reasonable in geopolitical terms if it’s effective for any of them. Hopefully for both of them.
Besides given the rate I'm repeating my answers to your objections, it's less that I'm dodging your questions and more that you are playing dumb.

There is no guarantee that the current policies actually turn out bad for Russia. — boethius

We are reasoning under uncertainty. Yawn.

In the current trajectory, Russia will have a far stronger army, ramped up arms industry, and has already reoriented its entire economy away from the West so if the West isn't willing to do more, Russia now has basically a free hand vis-a-vis it's neighbour’s. — boethius

What?!

What has the war established so far? — boethius

So far? NATO alliance was revived (and will likely expand). Russian original goals failed. Russia has been humiliated on the battlefield. And other countries are distancing themselves from Russia (even countries within within Russian sphere of influence, like Kazakhstan).

It's mostly established NATO cannot defeat Russia through proxy means and is unwilling to intervene directly and sanctions are an empty threat that have already been expended, and the Russian military is willing to suffer large costs to achieve military objectives and can and will destroy your essential infrastructure if you "defy" them.

We keep on being told Ukrainian victory is just a battle away, but that hasn't happened. — boethius

The same blablabla. We have already been through this, here is my answer once again:
The end game for NATO/US involvement in this war doesn’t need to be to stop Russia or overturn its regime. But to inflict as much enduring damage as possible to Russian power (in terms of its economic system, its system of alliance, its capacity of military projection outside its borders, its its technology supply, its military and geopolitical status) to the point it is not longer perceived as a non-negligible geopolitical threat to the West.

P1. If West/NATO/US has little respect for international law, then Russia didn’t violate international law in defiance of West/NATO/US
P2. West/NATO/US has little respect for international law
C. Russia didn’t violate international in defiance of West/NATO/US — neomac


Again, more bullshit soup.

What's the purpose of "defiance" in your strawman here? — boethius

Why strawman?

Obviously if West/NATO/US has little respect for international law, then breaking international law is a homage to their realpolitik "move fast and break things" maverick attitude, and not some sort of act of defiance. — boethius

You are contrasting "maverick attitude" with "some sort of act of defiance", as if if they were incompatible, while Russia can be described as both. You are just playing with words (without defining them) and I don't care about your miserable rhetoric games. What I care about is the substantial security threats that an expansionist Russia constitute for the West.
BTW there is no international law resolution that NATO expansion has violated. While there is an international law resolution against Russian invasion of Ukraine. So what homage are you talking about?

You seem to be holding on this word defiance like mould to stale bread because if Russia is "defying" the West ... then it follows in the topsy-turvy mental gymnastics of the propagandist the West must do something about that "defiance", regardless of the consequence on Ukrainians or even if our anti-defiance policies even work. — boethius

Here I re-edited your caricatural bullshit to something that can express justified Western security concerns. BTW the West is already doing something about Russian defiant attitude, no matter what the Western propagandist and the pro-Russia propagandist like you is saying.

In other words, you just have "tautologies" that in the end you must agree with, dude. So suck it up and move on.

So the problem I saw here was that violating international law is not in defiance of "the West/NATO/US” because "the West/NATO/US" have little respect for international law either. — Isaac

And that objection is supposed to prove an “obvious error” I committed?! Are you crazy?! Aside from the fact that it fails to land anywhere near the target, I don’t even see how it can take off. Indeed, as it is formulated, your objection is a non sequitur, logically speaking. To be logically valid, it should look something like:

• P1. If West/NATO/US has little respect for international law, then Russia didn’t violate international law in defiance of West/NATO/US
• P2. West/NATO/US has little respect for international law
• C. Russia didn’t violate international in defiance of West/NATO/US

To be sound both premises must be true. Let’s assume for the sake of the argument that P2 is true, what about P1? Is it obviously true?! To me it’s the opposite of it. If it’s an empirical claim, where is the evidence to support it? If it’s a semantic entailment, can you exactly spell out what that is?
Anyways your objection totally misses the target. Let me repeat once again the point: my main claim wasn’t about international law violations but about Russian defiant attitude against West/NATO/US support for Ukraine. So I listed facts that support that claim, like the fact that Russia didn’t halt its invasion even after a UN resolution against it as widely voted by West/NATO/US, with ensuing sanctions and continued military support to Ukraine by the West. If that’s not an act of defiance by Russia against West/NATO/US, then I don’t understand your usage of the word “defiance”: if X is warned, condemned and sanctioned by Y for a certain choice, and X knowingly pursues its choice despite of that, that’s for me enough to call X’s behavior defiant toward Y. EVEN MORE SO, if X were to question Y’s authority with “tu quoque” arguments (as you suggest with “but also the US has little respect for international law”)!!!

Also, I found your evidence that this is, indeed, Russia’s intent to be sketchy at best. A lot of supposition, very little empirical ground. — Isaac

At this point, I don’t know really nor I’m sure I care about how you assess empirical evidence for whatever claim about “Russia’s intent” in this war made by avg dudes on a philosophy forum, not to mention that I take the facts I listed in my argument as common knowledge as the obvious mundane truism that Russia violated international laws. But you can always show me a comment of yours about Russia’s intent (or the US, NATO, West, Ukraine intent for that matter) that is more than “sketchy at best” and with great “empirical ground” and I might reconsider.

This doesn't seem to have a point related to the argument. You've stated a fact (Russia has this capability) but you've not made any argument about what is consequent to that fact. No one has expressed disagreement on those grounds, nor any argument assuming the opposite. So the statement just hangs purposelessly. Yes, Russia has that capability. So what? — Isaac

Security concerns are about means and intentions of potential hostile subjects: Russia has proven capability of damaging the West and proven intent to do so. If you do not understand the purpose of my argument about security concerns for the West (because I care for the West and reject Russian expansionism), that’s intellectually self-discrediting. These are pretty basic concepts and “as I said, you need to meet a minimum threshold of comprehension to take in part in discussions at this level”.

The argument being made is that Russia getting its way would be bad, but Russia not getting its way would be bad too (nuclear escalation). Therefore some negotiated compromise between the two positions is the best course of action.
You've only concurred that, yes, Russia getting its way would be bad. This adds nothing to the discussion because we were all already agreed on that matter, it's right there in the argument.
To dispute the argument, you have to show that one is worse than the other. Not merely that one is bad. — Isaac

To begin with, who is “we”? You commented a post of mine which was part of an exchange I had with another interlocutor. In that exchange he didn’t claim anywhere Russia getting its way would be bad for the reasons I discussed (as far as I read and remember of his previous posts he simply acknowledged that Russian aggression must be morally condemned, then he questioned the Western support of Ukraine for the risk of nuclear escalation). That’s why I discussed them. Actually, at some point, he expressed his disagreement with me. For that reason, I find your claim “we were all already agreed on that matter” twice false.
Secondly, I don’t buy the caricatural way you frame the problem, nor I care much about you pressing anybody to delimit the scope of the discussion the way you see fit. As far as I’m concerned, I don’t assume that my understanding of this war is nearly enough as good as the Western administrations’ one, starting with the US. And I have no strong reasons to question rationality, means and intentions of all directly or indirectly involved parties about avoiding any spiraling of this war into a nuclear world war, even in the case that tactical nuclear weapons would be used by Russia. From the news reporting the American establishment representatives’ doubts about the Ukrainian intentions to seize back Crimea (like Gen. M. Milley), one can guess some pressure by the Americans on the Ukrainians to get back at the negotiation table. Even in this case, that alone wouldn’t be enough evidence to support the idea that the Americans are acting primarily out of concern for a nuclear escalation. Also because in an hypothetical scenario where Russia is in such desperate conditions to use tactical nuclear weapons at some point, I wouldn’t exclude that the Western following military response, however not in kind, may decisively worsen the Russian situation on the battlefield.
Anyways, currently, there seems to be still room for continuing an attrition warfare without involving nuclear weapons. And if that’s expected to be in line with Western and Ukrainian objectives at the expense of an expansionist Russia, I’d welcome it too.

When you later reduced it to nothing more than "Russia broke international law", I found I agree entirely. — Isaac

What was exactly that I reduced before reducing it? Can you spell it out? Can you quote me?
Indeed I said a lot more than "Russia broke international law". Here, I'll repeat it again:
the problem I see is that Russia doesn't simply want to take a piece of land from Ukraine, but it wants to do it expressly in defiance and at the expense of the West/NATO/US: starting with the violation of international law till aiming at establishing a new World Order in alliance with at least two other authoritarian regimes (China and Iran) [1]. Besides Russia is capable to blackmail the West (and the rest of the world) with wheat and gas supply (among others), threaten it with nuclear weapons, fund pro-Russian lobbies in the West, conduct cyber-warfare against Western facilities/institutions and project military assets in Africa, Middle East and Mediterranean sea through the Black Sea (basically encircling Europe), while increasing Putin's authoritarian regime and spiking Russian budget for military expenditure [2] with the money earned during Putin's 20 years of happy business with the West, instead of investing this money to improve and widen system of rights, education and welfare for his people.
So I do not see how exactly letting Russia get what it wants expressly out of fear of Russia under the eyes all other authoritarian challengers of the West is to the best interest of the West (if you care for the West, of course).
Do you have any ideas about this issue? Maybe we can try see things from a different perspective: maybe it's not simply that the West is helping the Ukrainians but also that the Ukrainians are helping the West.
Why did you select just that fact from all I said, believing it was an "error" and then LATER you agreed with it. What is the error? Can you spell it out? Can you talk me through it?

There's nothing to rebut. I completely agreed. — Isaac

BTW, if you agree with all I wrote, then why did you write the following claim?

None of this nonsensical verbiage alleviates your error. — Isaac

Why "nonsensical"? why "error"? All that sounds contradictory with your claim that you agree with me, right? do you agree on that truism too?

Probably, from past experience, when pushed you'll end up claiming it only says that Russia exists, or that people sometimes think before they act. You seem to want to write at enormous length explaining boring and obvious truisms that everybody already knows.

I expect I'll agree with your next post too if it is, as I predict, a 500 word masterpiece concluding that, yes, there is a war in Ukraine. — Isaac

Probably, from past experience (and this quotation confirms it), when pushed or catastrophically fail to understand and rebut on rational grounds, you'll end up caricaturing your opponent's view to make a point. How pathetic. Ops, I just stated another example of boring and obvious truisms that everybody already knows ! LOL

Back to the same transparent strategy you used last time when boethius pointed out your obvious error. Reduce the scope of your claim to something so utterly mundane that no one could disagree. — Isaac

He didn't point any "obvious error". You can't even clarify what the error is, as he couldn't. But I understand that as his sidekick you should try to come to rescue and troll once more over the same shit. "Same transparent strategy". Besides if you agree and what I say is mundane, where is the error? What's more catastrophic in your support to boethious' position is that he (not me) essentially believes that international law is ornamental and zero meaning, but if it's that the case then the putative examples of international law violations and injustice by the US are violations of something ornamental and meaningless! So what's the point of crying justice over something ornamental and meaningless? None, right?
I made plenty of claims, so it's not my fault if you both pick always the claim you finally end up agreeing with. Choose better next time.

So what you're now saying is just that Russia broke international law. Yes. Well done. — Isaac

Now? That's the same fact I claimed in the piece you yourself quoted: the problem I see is that Russia doesn't simply want to take a piece of land from Ukraine, but it wants to do it expressly in defiance and at the expense of the West/NATO/US: starting with the violation of international law
Where is the error dude? Can you spell it out?
Besides I didn't just claim a fact, I brought it in support of my claim about Russian expansionist attitude "in defiance and at the expense of the West/NATO/US". Isn't that obviously true? it's all mundane and tautological, yes?


All I said about international law is consistent with what I already told you a while ago:

Besides global governance institutions far from being an infallible or impartial normative constraining factor for geopolitical agents, they are often instruments of geopolitical power, so it’s naive to form rational expectations from global governance institutions and their history without considering the subjacent geopolitical power struggles or equilibria. Always for the same reason, prescriptions (moral, legal, epistemic) to be rational must be grounded on possibilities, means, powers. So we shouldn’t confuse the expert in the domain of what is allowed by the norm, with the expert in the domain of what can be done with proper means. Or infer from what the expert of the normative domain assesses as legitimate or illegitimate the conclusion that is what is likely the case (this would be a confusion between should and can) without further assumptions. Failing to acknowledge this would amount to another rational failure of yours. — neomac

So now do you agree with that too? it's all mundane and tautological, yes?

From November 1 to December 31, 2022, call up for military service citizens of the Russian Federation aged 18 to 27 years who are not in the reserve and are subject in accordance with Federal Law No. 53-FZ of March 28, 1998 "On military duty and military service" call for military service, in the amount of 120,000 people.
https://rg.ru/documents/2022/09/30/prezident-ukaz691-site-dok.html

Irrespective of GDP - putting that aside, the money the US spends on the military is absurd. Anything Russia or China do pales in comparison to what the US does when it comes to spending. I do not see a good justification for it at all. — Manuel

Until you provide a reliable accounting model estimating how much military budget the US must spend wrt its security goals and geopolitical ambitions better than the impression the comparison between Russia/China military expenditure vs the US military expenditure has on you, your judgement doesn't sound that persuasive to me.

So are you saying that you support the West or no? Based on this comment, I think you sound like a West is good (or least bad) type of person. — Manuel

I'm not here to reason through slogans. But, as I said, we can't likely hope to be more than polarised political "meme" vectors in the geopolitical arena..

What I would add, is that I don't think we have good reasons to believe Russia will come out of this war in good shape. It has a population problem, it's economy is far from being optimally used, without even considering the effects of the sanctions long-term. — Manuel

"Not in good shape" sounds good, "not likely be a security threat to the West for another couple of decades at least" sounds better.

None of this nonsensical verbiage alleviates your error. You said that...

the problem I see is that Russia doesn't simply want to take a piece of land from Ukraine, but it wants to do it expressly in defiance and at the expense of the West/NATO/US: starting with the violation of international law — neomac


How is it a problem that Russia are violating international law, when America clearly violates international law all the time? — Isaac

What error are you blabbering about? Why nonsensical? Why "clearly"?
First, if you are talking about international law, it should be a resolution within international law to establish what constitutes its violation.
Second, when I talked about international law violation by Russia I'm talking about this:
UN responses to Russian invasion
See also: Reactions to the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine § Intergovernmental and international organizations, United Nations Security Council Resolution 2623, and United Nations General Assembly Resolution ES-11/1
On 26 February 2022, Russia vetoed a UN Security Council resolution that would have called for Russia to immediately cease its attack on Ukraine. China, India, and the United Arab Emirates abstained from the vote; the 11 remaining members of the Security Council voted in favor of the resolution.[39][40] Days later, a UN General Assembly resolution condemning the Russian invasion was passed with an overwhelming 141–5 vote majority, with 35 nations abstaining.[41]
Among other statements, the General Assembly resolution called upon Russia to abide by the UN Charter and the 1970 Declaration on Principles of International Law concerning Friendly Relations.[41] The Declaration on Friendly Relations says that assisting a rebel group in another nation would threaten the target country's "territorial integrity," and that states have a duty to refrain from engaging in such actions.[42]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Legality_of_the_2022_Russian_invasion_of_Ukraine
Third, I didn't claim that the US didn't commit international law violations, I simply claimed that Russia did.
Four, the international law violations I'm interested in must be related to the THE PROBLEM I SEE : "Russia doesn't simply want to take a piece of land from Ukraine, but it wants to do it expressly in defiance and at the expense of the West/NATO/US". So OBVIOUSLY I'm interested in the violations committed by Russia against West/NATO/US.

How do you like our disagreement, Pollyanna?

The preservation of truth includes the preservation of falsity. — creativesoul — creativesoul

What?!

How exactly is "there is a cow in the field" valid? — creativesoul

You are evidently confused. In the quoted claims of mine the word "valid" is taken as qualifying "justification" (not "assertion")

Evidently, the above is not true in standard formal logic. My error. Good thing none of my objections to Gettier require it to be. — creativesoul

Sure, dude, whatever makes you happy.

Is this an objection to my post? If so, that's a strawman argument since you are suggesting that I believe "the West is a power for good for the rest of the world" which thing I never stated nor believe. On the other side, if you are simply suggesting that I believe "the West is a power for good" because I'm living in the West where is the objection? You yourself claimed: "Which it mostly only is when you actually live there".
In any case, I never stated such a slogan "the West is a power for good" nor I would express myself in such terms. — neomac


So the West should lose then? — Benkei

What?! Is that a logic inference, dude?

Here's the US attitude to 'international law' - From https://towardfreedom.org/story/archives/americas/the-u-s-makes-a-mockery-of-treaties-and-international-law/ — Isaac

So what? First of all American violations, withdrawals, refusal to ratify or to sign, undermining of international law that your piece of propaganda has comfortably summarised, however concerning from a geopolitical point of view or eventually legitimate in terms of principles, are often alleged by authoritarian States which themselves have being accused of analogous behaviour, or for American domestic political competition (see the concerns about Trump’s administration attitude toward international law for example). Secondly, and most importantly, International Law is a dimension of geopolitics, so the attitude of ALL geopolitical players toward it will realistically serve geopolitical goals as bluntly clarified by John Bolton in his extended quote [1]. So more important of the attitude of the US toward international law is all other players (allies and enemies) attitude toward the US. Third, I’m siding with the US not because I think the US is good nor because I think the US is good for the West, but because I think Russia or China would be worse than the US for the West if they managed to extend their hegemonic influence at the expense of the American hegemony in the West. So until there is a better alternative for the Westerners in the foreseeable future, I would find more reasonable to partner with the US than to partner with Russia or China.
Do you enjoy our disagreement, Pollyanna?



[1]
There is no such thing as the United Nations. There is an international community that occasionally can be led by the only real power left in the world and that is the United States when it suits our interest and we can get others to go along
https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/19374/

What are you including in the west? — Manuel

I would include North America, EU, UK, Norway most certainly.

They are constantly overspending on the military, no matter who gets in power. — Manuel

“Overspending” in what sense? Not wrt their GDP. As by comparison with other countries, in an age of great power competition we may reasonably expect that the American military spending can grow more likely than decrease to at least preserve their overwhelming military superiority. Yet that’s not enough to think that the American commitment to the security of the West won’t change. Besides if there is a military clash between the US and Russia is more likely going to happen in Europe than in the US (as the Ukrainian war is reminding us of). So I’d find more reasonable to hit an expansionist Russia as hard as possible when it’s in a weaker position, than wait for Russia to recover and give it another try in the future just for the fun of it.

Anything beyond 5 years is way too much speculation in my view. We don't know what will happen. — Manuel

Yet that’s what I take strategic thinking in geopolitics to be all about. Even the demographic crisis that China is expected to face - as you were talking about and you didn’t calculate by yourself, I guess - doesn’t concern the next 5 years, right? If you feel dispensed from engaging in such kind of speculation like anticipating potentially hostile competitors’ moves far before they could actually happen, States will do it at your place anyways and likely much better than you could ever possibly afford because they have means and that’s necessary for their own survival.

I don't even know how to reply to this, because it looks to me so, so far removed from actual possibility. There's been talk - for some time now - of the whole "decline of the American Empire" and so on. — Manuel

What is "far removed from actual possibility”? I’m talking about things that happened and are happening. Besides the West is not just the US.

First of all, this overlooks a crucial problem for China: drastic declining population numbers. This is going to severely affect economic output. — Manuel

Demographic dynamics are one aspect of the problem sure. But a part from the fact that it would be more useful to compare demographic trends of Russia and China wrt the Western countries, considering that now the Rest is ~7B vs the West ~1B (that the difference could grow in the future, see Africa and India), and that authoritarian regimes are trying to extend their sphere of influence particularly in the Rest of the world (according to which - somebody could say - the West "it's been mostly shit" [cit.]), the demographic trends won’t be in favour of the West for the foreseeable future.

But the main point to me anyway, is to ask, how many military bases does the US have around the world? Around 750.
How many does Russia have? 20. What about China? 1. That makes a grand total of 21 military bases vs 750 — Manuel

Now is the case, but how about the future? Considering the growing military buildup of authoritarian regimes (that at this point doesn’t concern anymore only land and maritime control but also space control), the American temptation to reduce their military commitment around the world (due to the costs of maintaining such bases, the pressure of isolationist trends to the point of even having a anti-NATO presidential administration partnering with Putin, and deep unresolved domestic politics issues), and other Western countries weaknesses in military capabilities and mindset (many Westerners are scared to think of a military confrontation with Russia), your observation doesn’t sound all that reassuring at all. Besides military security is not the only issue. There is also economic and political security. Russian attempts to destabilise Western politics through lobby, cyber-warfare and undercover alliance (like with Hungary and Serbia) are already severely insidious and can likely continue in the future. As well as the Russian capacity of threatening economic security by destabilising the market of commodities like for wheat and gas (among others) can likely continue in the future.
Most importantly, it’s precisely because the West didn’t consider Russia or China a security threat that Russia and China could grow richer in 30 years of Western-led globalisation and support their hegemonic ambitions at the expense of the West. It’s after 22 years of economic partnership with the West and Western complacency with Putin’s expansionism in Ukraine since 2014, that Putin could likely feel encouraged to push further his hegemonic agenda.

↪Manuel
That entire post is build on the predicate that the West is a power for good. Which it mostly only is when you actually live there. For the rest of the world it's been mostly shit. — Benkei

Is this an objection to my post? If so, that's a strawman argument since you are suggesting that I believe "the West is a power for good for the rest of the world" which thing I never stated nor believe. On the other side, if you are simply suggesting that I believe "the West is a power for good" because I'm living in the West where is the objection? You yourself claimed: "Which it mostly only is when you actually live there".
In any case, I never stated such a slogan "the West is a power for good" nor I would express myself in such terms.

You preposterously chopped my quotation ( Valid deductions preserve truth, if premises are true ) to suggest a contradiction which doesn't exist. How pathetic is that?!

In logic, specifically in deductive reasoning, an argument is valid if and only if it takes a form that makes it impossible for the premises to be true and the conclusion nevertheless to be false.[1] It is not required for a valid argument to have premises that are actually true,[2] but to have premises that, if they were true, would guarantee the truth of the argument's conclusion. Valid arguments must be clearly expressed by means of sentences called well-formed formulas (also called wffs or simply formulas).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Validity_(logic)

Either it's not a valid deduction or valid deductions do not preserve truth. — creativesoul

Well then you are unfamiliar with standard logic:

Validity of deduction is not affected by the truth of the premise or the truth of the conclusion. The following deduction is perfectly valid:

All animals live on Mars.
All humans are animals.
Therefore, all humans live on Mars.

The problem with the argument is that it is not sound. In order for a deductive argument to be sound, the argument must be valid and all the premises must be true.[3]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Validity_(logic)


However, an argument can be valid without being sound. For example:

All birds can fly.
Penguins are birds.
Therefore, penguins can fly.

This argument is valid as the conclusion must be true assuming the premises are true. However, the first premise is false. Not all birds can fly (for example, penguins). For an argument to be sound, the argument must be valid and its premises must be true.[2

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soundness


If you ignore or refuse standard logic, let's leave it at that. I'm not here for keep a record of your intellectual failures.

Which is why I said that this situation in Ukraine now bears little (save superficial) resemblance to Afghanistan.

Yes, they will need to consider what would be a fair deal to them, as well as to Russia. It won't be trivial, but it must be done. — Manuel

You switched back to what the Ukrainians want. But we wanted to consider all other players too. Russia is not the only other player. There is also the West front supporting Ukraine, and the Rest front supporting Russia or trying to remain neutral. And the problem I see is that Russia doesn't simply want to take a piece of land from Ukraine, but it wants to do it expressly in defiance and at the expense of the West/NATO/US: starting with the violation of international law till aiming at establishing a new World Order in alliance with at least two other authoritarian regimes (China and Iran) [1]. Besides Russia is capable to blackmail the West (and the rest of the world) with wheat and gas supply (among others), threaten it with nuclear weapons, fund pro-Russian lobbies in the West, conduct cyber-warfare against Western facilities/institutions and project military assets in Africa, Middle East and Mediterranean sea through the Black Sea (basically encircling Europe), while increasing Putin's authoritarian regime and spiking Russian budget for military expenditure [2] with the money earned during Putin's 20 years of happy business with the West, instead of investing this money to improve and widen system of rights, education and welfare for his people.
So I do not see how exactly letting Russia get what it wants expressly out of fear of Russia under the eyes all other authoritarian challengers of the West is to the best interest of the West (if you care for the West, of course).
Do you have any ideas about this issue? Maybe we can try see things from a different perspective: maybe it's not simply that the West is helping the Ukrainians but also that the Ukrainians are helping the West.

[1]
https://valdaiclub.com/events/posts/articles/vladimir-putin-meets-with-members-of-the-valdai-club/
http://clcr.over-blog.com/article-putin-s-munich-speech-93308395.html
https://edition.cnn.com/2022/09/14/china/xi-putin-meeting-sco-summit-analysis-intl-hnk/index.htmlhttps://www.institutmontaigne.org/en/analysis/towards-asian-geopolitical-alliance
https://moderndiplomacy.eu/2022/07/28/the-axis-of-russia-iran-and-china-birth-of-a-new-world-order/

[2]
https://www.statista.com/statistics/1203160/military-expenditure-russia/

Russia risks becoming ungovernable and descending into chaos
https://www.economist.com/the-world-ahead/2022/11/18/russia-risks-becoming-ungovernable-and-descending-into-chaos

As far as I'm concerned something like "moral ground" just defines a set of conditions. The debate is about what sorts of conditions belong in that set. If I pre-define the set, then the conditions which belong in it become a matter of mere accordance with that (my) definition. A fairly boring exercise in consistency - we might as well be doing maths. The interesting discussion is in the disagreements about the definition (about what belongs in that set) and the reasons for believing in those criteria. — Isaac

If you want to have a fair intellectual debate on matter of morality you have to be ready to explicit your own set of conditions and your own reasons for believing them to others as well. Otherwise your interlocutor has no compelling reason to find your interest in their views or questioning their views intellectually challenging (even more so if you do not care about consistency). This becomes evident when you frame a problem within your idiosyncratic set of assumptions which others do not necessarily share and then you complain that they keep dodging your questions based on such assumptions (like "How many lives is that region's choice of governance worth?") precisely for that reason.

And if you are interested in the disagreement then why you write comments such as the following?

This is why I like discussing with you. You never fail to disappoint. — Isaac

So that's our uniformed, pointless analyses done. How dull. — Isaac

Now we've got past the pointless repetitions of the mere fact that they're probably going to fight and into the matter of interest - on what moral grounds ought they fight?

Do they have a moral right to some piece of geography? If so, did Russia have a similar moral right to Chechnya?

Do they have a moral duty to fight aggressors? If so, then why do we not? Why is NATO not there too?

Do they have a moral right to respond as they see fit? If so, does that autonomy extend to Pro-Russian elements in Crimea and Donbas? — Isaac

If you do not clarify what you consider "moral ground" vs "non-moral ground" and "moral right" vs "non-moral right", "moral duty" vs "non-moral duty" and there is no convergence in the usage of such notions, you and your interlocutor will inadvertently talk past each other. Examples may be very helpful in clarifying things: e.g. "If someone comes to take what's your by force, it seems fair use equal force to retain it". Here is mine "if someone comes to take what's legitimately yours by force, it seems fair to use all force it's necessary to retain it if not more to deter or disable the robber, or even other potential robbers from trying to do it again".

if you fall in line with Western Propaganda (US, EU, British, Australian), you are being brave, support democracy and are against dictatorship.
If you disagree and think this war should end now, then one is a Putin Supporter and a sympathizer for dictators. — Manuel

I think that polarization is inevitable as well as the risk of being perceived by other interlocutors as serving somebody else's political agenda (implicitly or explicitly). The reason is that we are part of a competitive game (at all levels) that is bigger than us and the endgame will impact all of us. So whatever nuance and impartiality one may want to put in their own views, it is likely going to get lost in the process of collective choice making. In other words, we can reason and analyse geopolitical conflicts of such magnitude for the intellectual fun of it (or for moral concerns?) in a forum but in the end we can't likely hope to be more than polarised political "meme" vectors in the geopolitical arena.

By now the Palestinian cause is widely recognized, up until the mid-early 2000's, if you supported Palestine, you were a terrorist sympathizer. Do they have a chance to get a two-state solution? Israel is uninterested and is instead stealing everything of value in the West Bank. What options do they have? They could try and change Israeli society from the inside through the Arab parties - unlikely to happen but it's an option.

Or they could keep forcing for a two-state solution, which is what is recognized by international law. Regardless of how they act, they will be killed, as can be seen almost every day in Israeli news. It makes sense for them to get a state, if only to be able to live a semi normal life.

The Kurds have been betrayed by everybody at one point or another. They do have a quite advanced society, which merits autonomy. Will they get it? Who knows. These topics deserve whole threads not brief comments. — Manuel

The reason why I cited those examples (along with the Afghan case) is because you claimed: As I see it, by arguing that Russia will end up with a portion (if not all of it) of the seized territory, it is pointless to let civilians die with no realistic hope of retaining such lands. The story of those people fighting for their "claimed" land for generations shows that their motivation and endurance is not weakened by to the kind of reasoning that makes you think their fight is pointless. And Ukrainians may show analogous motivation and endurance wrt the Russians, no matter how much land Russia has currently annexed nor to what extent it has military means to preserve it.

But on to the important issue, what was there in Afghanistan than the Soviet Union cared enough about such that they would resort to nuclear war? Did "the West" sanction the Soviet Union for going into Afghanistan? Did the West say that victory for them means that the Soviet Union cannot win this war?

Was the global economy in a fritz because of Soviet war in Afghanistan?

No - these are quite different times. The stakes are much higher in all respects. — Manuel

You are moving from what is at stake for Afghans (which is relevant to guide our expectations about their behavior and prospects of success), to what is at stake for all other players. So I’d say we concur on a couple of points: first, if we want to better assess the relevance of a conflict for us we should move from the stakes of one player to the stakes of all other players directly and indirectly impacted by such conflict (including us). Second, the Ukrainian conflict risks to become a more open & direct confrontation between Russia and the West than the Afghan proxy war because Russia has annexed Ukrainian territories [1].
Therefore I wouldn’t talk just about what Ukrainians want and can achieve at the expense of Russia, but also about what the West wants and can achieve at the expense of Russia.


[1] FYI, concerning Western sanctions against the USSR for the soviet aggression in Afghanistan, you can read here: http://www.americanstudies.history.knu.ua/en/archive/11-2/2021-11-kovalkov/

I reject the rules of entailment because, as Gettier showed, we can use them to go from a belief that cannot be true to a belief that is. Logical/valid argument/reasoning preserves truth. — creativesoul

Evidently you have no fucking clue what you are talking about. Valid deductions preserve truth, if premises are true, but that doesn't require nor imply that premises must be true! Indeed, valid deductions can very well conclude with true propositions (expressing beliefs) from false propositions (expressing beliefs)! Here is the example:
P1: All dogs are trees
P2: All trees are mammals
C: All dogs are mammals
This is a VALID DEDUCTION and the CONCLUSION IS TRUE, yet BOTH PREMISES ARE FALSE. Evidently you ignore the distinction between valid and sound deduction. And you want to discuss Gettier? Embarrassing.

BTW, since you keep dodging questions:

Still waiting for you to clarify how and why you changed your views or the way you present them. — neomac

Slantchev's blog (https://slantchev.wordpress.com/) is plenty of good reads against the pundits (e.g. Mearshemier, Walt, Kupchan) cited by the pro-Russians. Among others.

The issue you are pointing to, namely sacrificing "people for an uncertain... outcome", is less problematic from a narrative perspective, because they are fighting against an aggressor for dignity's sake. — Manuel

What does dignity have to do with land to you? Consider the case of, Kurds and Palestinians, they are fighting against much greater regional foreign powers for having a land internationally acknowledged to them and sovereign (which never happened) for generations. Do they have any chance to win for something they "never" had? How many lives is their fight worth?

As I see it, by arguing that Russia will end up with a portion (if not all of it) of the seized territory, it is pointless to let civilians die with no realistic hope of retaining such lands — Manuel

The ~9 year Soviet-Afghan war caused between 6.5%–11.5% of Afghanistan's 1979 population of 13.5 million is estimated to have perished in the conflict. The war caused grave destruction in Afghanistan (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soviet%E2%80%93Afghan_War) what were the chances for the Afghans to win a war against the second strongest army in the world of a state with nuclear weapons? What was that chance at the beginning of the war, in the middle of the war, and by the end of the war? Finally the Soviet Union withdraw and the Soviets' failure in the war is thought to be a contributing factor to the fall of the Soviet Union (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soviet%E2%80%93Afghan_War)

The Russians invade (see? we told you! NATO is to blame), Russia captures nearly a third of Ukraine (Kyiv in 3 days, let Putin have it!), Russia stalls (don’t help Ukraine, we are prolonging the war), Ukraine goes on the counter-offensive (Putin is being backed into a corner! let him have Ukraine or else… NUKES!), Russia annexes Ukrainian territory (Putin is now committed and will never back down, let’s not escalate this), Russia mobilizes (see! escalation! we warned you! Ukraine will lose!), Ukraine liberates Kherson (Putin is losing, and therefore is even more dangerous now than ever, let him have Ukraine), Ukrainian missile accidentally strays into Poland (there it is, the escalation is here! risks! we must be careful… and let Putin have Ukraine).
https://slantchev.wordpress.com/2022/11/17/it-does-not-matter-what-happens-putin-must-be-given-a-slice-of-ukraine-walt-in-fp/

You wrote:

my "side" is effectively saying that Ukraine is going to have to give up more land. That's not a palatable view, but I happen to think it is the least harmful one. — Manuel

My question is: why do you think that "Ukraine is going to have to give up more land" is not a palatable view? Don't you think that "Ukraine is going to have to sacrifice more lives to have a chance of regaining lands" is not a palatable view either? Yet Ukrainians seem to find sacrificing or risking their people's life for an uncertain but desirable outcome (namely fighting to free their lands) more palatable than conceding lands. So what is making conceding lands instead of sacrificing people to free lands so unpalatable?

That's not a palatable view — Manuel

Why do you think it's not a palatable view?

"there is a cow in the field" is justified because you equivocate and/or abuse the term "valid". — creativesoul

I find your objections intelligible as farts, dude. As I stated, mine is just a proposal which must be judged on its own merit (consistency and explanatory/analytic power to say the least) not as a terminological issue. Indeed, I'm neither confusing my extended usage (valid/sound justification) with the standard usage (valid/sound deduction), nor violating the standard usage (i.e. I claimed nowhere that a deduction is valid when the standard usage claims it's not), so where on earth is the equivocation or the abuse exactly? Can you spell it out?
Concerning its analytic power, my proposal identifies and fixes an ambiguity in the standard usage of "justification" (e.g. does a misperception justify or not a certain belief? Justification with or without no false lemma? What is a partial justification?) by comparison to the standard and unambiguous distinction between valid and sound deduction, and this in turn clarifies where Gettier examples go wrong (they are grounded on a standard yet ambiguous understanding of "justification").
If we do not converge in the way we frame the problem, starting with clarifying the notion of "justification" which you never did, there is no chance we'll understand each other.

BTW,

Still waiting for you to clarify how and why you changed your views or the way you present them. — neomac

I'm not playing this "let's wait a few pages and then pretend there's no citations" game. — Isaac

That's the game I'm playing: link the source you quote (if available online). And I couldn't find such a link from your previous posts.