aggression — Judaka

condemn, demean, mock or hold in contempt people for their actions, characteristics, skills, beliefs, preferences, views etc — Judaka

It looks like there are two things to consider as regards aggression defined as above. There's the person faerself and there are the things that fae's indentified with (actions, characteristics, skills, beliefs, preferences, views, etc.) which I will henceforth refer to as attributes.

I'm not as certain as I'd like to be on this but there seems to be some degree of confusion regarding the identity of a person and the attributes of that person. Sometimes people consider the attribiutes of a person as their identity i.e. a identity (of a person) = (faer) attributes. On this view, to "condemn, demean, mock or hold in contempt" for their attributes is legitimate; after all if the attributes are flawed in any way and if attributes define identity, the aggressor is justified in criticizing the person. I'm working under the assumption that to "condem, demean, mock or hold in contempt" constitute personal attacks.

0ther times, people seem to think that attributes don't define a person at all. To give you some idea of what I mean consider the innumerable instances when we try, successfully or not, to disabuse people of what we ourselves think are harmful/stupid beliefs. As is obvious, this particular fact is predicated on the assumption that a person's identity ain't just faer attributes - there's something more. What this "something more" is is, to my reckoning, is the notion that we're some kind of "vessel/receptacle" which holds attributes and we're at liberty to add/modify/delete our attributes. In this case the "vessel/receptacle" is the identity of a person, the attributes merely contents thereof. From this standpoint, it makes less sense to "condemn, demean, mock or hold in contempt" a person for faer attributes because fae is assuredly not the attributes themselves and to do so would be like thinking e.g. that a cup containing some juice is itself juice.

It bears mentioning though that even under the second interpretation - believing we're vessels/receptacles for attributes - it isn't wholly wrong to "condemn, demean, mock or hold in contempt" a person; after all, people have a choice in what attributes to make their own and that makes us fully accountable for the set of attributes we adopt.

Yes, talk of a "triple S" civilisation is a useful mnemonic and a snappy slogan for introducing people to transhumanism. But are the "three supers" in tension? After all, a quasi-immortal human is scarcely a full-spectrum superintelligence. (1)A constitutionally superhappy human is arguably a walking oxymoron too. For what it's worth, (2)I'm sceptical this lack of enduring identity matters. Archaic humans don't have enduring metaphysical egos either. "Superlongevity" is best conceived as an allusion to how death, decrepitude and aging won't be a feature of post-Darwinian life. A more serious tension is between superintelligence and superhappiness. (3)I suspect that at some stage, posthumans will opt for selective ignorance of the nature of Darwinian life – maybe even total ignorance. A limited amnesia is probably wise even now. There are some states so inexpressibly awful that no one should try to understand them in any deep sense, just prevent their existence. — David Pearce

1. Why is a constitutionally superhappy human "...arguably a walking oxymoron"? Do you mean to say that such a state has to be, in a sense, made complete with the other 2 supers?

2. The way it seems to me, an "...enduring identity..." is the cornerstone of any hedonic philosophy and for that reason applies to transhumanism too. It's my hunch that we care so much about suffering and happiness precisely because of an "...enduring identity..." that, true or not, we possess. "Suffer" and "Happy" are meaningful only when they become "I suffer" and "I'm happy" i.e. there must be a sense of "...enduring identity..." for hedonism to matter in any sense at all.

By way of bolstering my point that an "...enduring identity..." is key to hedonism I'd like to relate an argument made by William Lane Craig which boils down to the claim that human suffering is, as per him, orders of magnitude greater than animal suffering for the reason that people have an "...enduring identity..." I suppose he means to say that being self-aware (enduring identity) there's an added layer to suffering. Granted that William Lane Craig may not be the best authority to cite, I still feel that he makes the case for why hedonism is such a big deal for us humans and by extension to transhumanism.

3. I suppose you have good reasons for recommending (selective) amnesia in re Darwinian life but wouldn't that be counterproductive? Once bitten, twice shy seems to be the adage transhumanism is about - suffering is too much to bear (and happiness is just too irresistable) - and transhumanists have calibrated their response to the problems of Darwinian life accordingly. To forget Darwinian life would be akin to forgetting an important albeit excruciatingly painful lesson which might be detrimental to the transhumanist cause.

Consider the core transhumanist "supers", i.e. superintelligence, superlongevity and superhappiness.
If you could become a full-spectrum superintelligence, would you want to regress to being a simpleton for the rest of the week?
If you could enjoy quasi-eternal youth, would you want to crumble away with the progeroid syndrome we call aging?
If you upgraded your reward circuitry and tasted life based on gradients of superhuman bliss, would you want to revert to the misery and malaise of Darwinian life?
Humans may be prone to nostalgia. Transhumans – if they contemplate Darwinian life at all – won't miss it for a moment.
Pitfalls?
I can think of a few...
https://www.hedweb.com/quora/2015.html#downsides — David Pearce

I see no good reason to disagree with what you say. Darwinian life, as you put it, can't even hold a candle to Transhumanist existence as and when it becomes a reality. Who in her right mind will turn down super-anything let alone superintelligence, superlongevity, and superhappiness.

Correct me if I'm wrong but transhumanism envisions the triad of supers (superintelligence, superlongevity, and superhappiness) to work synergistically, complementing each other as it were to produce an ideal state for humans or even other animals. What if that assumption turns out to be false? What if, for instance, superintelligence, after carefully considering the matter, comes to the conclusion that neither (super)longevity nor (super)happiness deserves as much attention as they're getting in transhumanist circles and recommends these supers be scrapped. I'm not sure if similar arguments can be made based on the other supers but you get the idea, right?

Compared to the superintelligent state transhumanism will one day help us achieve, we, as of this moment, are downright simpletons and thus there's a high likelihood that any claims we make now with regard to what superintelligent transhumans in the distant future might aspire towards is going to be way off the mark. In short, there seems to be significant risk to transhumanism's core ideals from superintelligence. Perhaps this is old news to you.

Shifting their morphology plays a key role in their survival, creating bulkier bodies when put into environments where more developed tadpoles were present, to make it difficult for the individuals to swallow them whole. — Wikipedia

Size-structured cannibalism is cannibalism in which older, larger, more mature individuals consume smaller, younger conspecifics. — Wikipedia

I guess the takeaway is it (size) matters

Then again,

Big things come in small packages. — Anon

and

I don't know how far this is true but it's said that the world's biggest killer is the humble mosquito.

The most deadly animal in the world is the mosquito. It might seem impossible that something so miniscule can kill so many people, but it's true. According to the World Health Organization, mosquito bites result in the deaths of more than 1 million people every year. The majority of these deaths are due to malaria. — Google

You're trying to make it more than it is or was intended to be. — T Clark

And that brings us to what I said earlier:

2. What you see is it (but we refuse to accept it): Reality is exactly as it appears to us and that's all there is to it. The problem is that's a hard pill to swallow for us who yearn for something much grander. Language is fully capable of describing all of reality but that fails to quench the thirst for greatness that's become somewhat of a trademark of humanity. If this is Laozi's message then the Tao Te Ching serves as a warning to posterity that we should steer clear of fantasizing which to "...yearn for something much grander..." is. That he did it in so many words, 9510 to be exact, suggests that this simple message - cease and desist fantasy - isn't going to go down well with people and he needed to use every available linguistic resource (words) to put the point across to the readers. In this case, The Tao That Is Eternal is nothing more than a warning sign whose correct transaltion should be, in my humble opinion, "DON'T GO THERE!" — TheMadFool

The "abandon language" option is not on the menu because of all the language invested in talking about the quality that is difficult to describe. — Valentinus

Agreed. However, note that language in re the Tao Te Ching is like a carpenter who, upon arriving at his workplace, discovers that the only tool that's available to faer is a hammer and thus, he must do everything he has to do, whether its got to do with nails or sawing planks, with the hammer; in other words, this hapless carpenter has no choice. Laozi, under one interpretation - attempting to express the inexpressible - was in a similar situation. He had a message that transcended language but, fortunately or unfortunately, the only way of getting that message across was language.

For my money, Laozi employing language in this fashion - to describe stuff that lies beyond the reach of language - is not entirely without merit. He was a clever man I suppose and all that he would have to do is probe the boundaries of language - stress language to the breaking point and what comes out at the other end is a, hopefully, better understanding of the limits of language and through that get a feel of, get some idea of, what Laozi means by "The Tao that can be named is not the Eternal Tao".

This text is not a testimony of skepticism — Valentinus

I have a different opinion on that matter. Just take a look at the contents and form of Laozi's great work the Tao Te Ching. I have little to say about the contents but what interests me is the form of the Tao Te Ching. I use the word "form" with the meaning it has in logic (arguments). The Tao Te Ching's form consists of contradicting what appears to be generalizations. In one sense, Laozi is trying to rattle our cage, the metaphor of a "cage" is apt, our cages invariably consisting of generalizations (prisons), rules as it were that are key to constructing a coherent/consistent worldview that we rely on to both make sense of reality and also to live out our lives in it. What Laozi achieves with this rather ingenious technique is to create a state of doubt as regards our understanding of the world. Every view of the world is hopelessly deficient and one will always, given enough time, encounter situations that overturn any given view. It reminds me of the children's game snakes & ladders. You might pride yourself in having made progress regarding your grasp of reality and what life, the world, the universe is all about but Laozi rigs the next die roll you make in such a way that you land on a snake's head and down you go, through the snake's belly, to where you began your journey on the board - the square marked number 1, utterly puzzled and violently frustrated that what you thought was true reality was just another illusion. In the simplest of terms, Laozi wants to shake our confidence - rock our boat and even intentionally causing it to capsize (in the worst weather conditions possible would be best) - and one message, among others I guess, is that we must be skeptical of what's bandied about as wisdom/knowledge.

Third option - This is my way of thinking about it. Others see it differently. — T Clark

Excelente Senor/Senora! Kudos to you for seeing that. Percpetive.

The Tao is a metaphysical concept - a way of looking at things — T Clark

if you read my reply to Valentinus above, the Tao is exactly the opposite of what you say it is viz. it is not "...a way of looking at things". In fact it goes to great lengths to disabuse us of the belief that there's "...a way of looking at things" that's complete (everything can be comprehended) and consistent (free of contradictions). In a way the Tao Te Ching is like Godel's Incompleteness Theorems. :chin:

What a strange position. Again, if this is the kind of conclusion that “philosophy” results in, then it’s no wonder it’s become a joke.

I don’t see how that statement should be controversial. You’re stuck in some abstracted world of hypotheticals — Xtrix

Quite possibly but, as you're fully aware, philosophy isn't really about finding definitive answers. In fact, as is repeated ad nauseum, philosophy is all about making sense of issues (questions) that lack a clear answer. Ergo, debate - like the one we're engaged in - is both inevitable and necessary. FYI I'm not claiming that I'm right; all I'm attempting to do is offer a different perspective, one in which what you assert is not wrong of course but is deficient in the sense that it ignores/overlooks an entire side of the story. Apologies if this comes off as unphilosophical.

Complete "cyborgisation", i.e. offloading all today's nasty stuff onto smart prostheses, is one option. A manual override is presumably desirable so no one feels they have permanently lost control of their body. — David Pearce

Indeed! We love choices don't we? even if it's the case that one of them is foolish/mad/both. Something worth exploring but outside the scope of this discussion (or not???) I suppose. I'm trying to consider the scenario in which people might opt out of transhumanism even though it promises so much and has the means to keep those promises. What if transhumanism becomes a reality but people use it only for recreational purposes, you know like going to Disney land? I'm fairly certain that transhumanism would be just too much "fun" to be thought of as a much-deserved break from reality - it would become, no sooner than all its major features become available in the market, a way of life with global appeal - an offer we don't have it in us to refuse. Yet, we seem to be so concerned by choice, would we insist on having an off switch to transhumanist super states? I wonder.

Maximisation is not mandatory by the lights of negative utilitarianism; but I don't rule out that posthumans will view negative utilitarianism as an ancient depressive psychosis, if they even contemplate that perspective at all — David Pearce

I'm inclined to agree. Though we want to remove the thorn in our side (suffering), let's face it, what we really want is the rose (happiness). G'day.

The opening lines of the Tao Te Ching are:

The Tao that can be spoken is not the eternal Tao
The name that can be named is not the eternal name — T Clark

I realized that there are two ways of interpreting these lines and they are:

1. There's more to it than meets the eye: We observe the world and there's a way that it appears to us but, we've learnt and we suspect, appearances can be deceiving or, more to the point, there's more to reality than just what it presents to us. On this reading, language has a blind spot as it were and there are certain aspects of reality that's beyond the reach of language. Laozi then is asking us to, at some point, abandon language for it's utterly useless if one aims to grasp the facets of reality that language can't tackle. Whether it's worth it is a pressing matter but if Laozi's stature is given due consideration, it seems almost priceless. The Toa That Is Eternal is definitely a prize worth the effort spent in attempts to acquire it.

2. What you see is it (but we refuse to accept it): Reality is exactly as it appears to us and that's all there is to it. The problem is that's a hard pill to swallow for us who yearn for something much grander. Language is fully capable of describing all of reality but that fails to quench the thirst for greatness that's become somewhat of a trademark of humanity. If this is Laozi's message then the Tao Te Ching serves as a warning to posterity that we should steer clear of fantasizing which to "...yearn for something much grander..." is. That he did it in so many words, 9510 to be exact, suggests that this simple message - cease and desist fantasy - isn't going to go down well with people and he needed to use every available linguistic resource (words) to put the point across to the readers. In this case, The Tao That Is Eternal is nothing more than a warning sign whose correct transaltion should be, in my humble opinion, "DON'T GO THERE!"

What you don't can often be much more important than what you do. — Manuel

Excelente señor/señora!

doing nothing and contributing nothing is a waste of life — Xtrix

To each his own I suppose and then there's the fact that there are two ways one can make big mistakes with very severe consequences, there are acts (SINS) of commission (my focus) and omission (your focus). It seems that we're both right in our own different ways.

Yes, well put. In their different ways, pain and pleasure alike are coercive. Any parallel between heroin addicts and the drug naïve is apt to sound strained, but endogenous opioid addiction is just as insidious at corrupting our judgement.

The good news is that thanks to biotech the substrates of bliss won't need to be rationed. If mankind opts for a genetically-driven biohappiness revolution, then, in principle at least, everyone's a "winner". Contrast the winners and losers of conventional social reforms. — David Pearce

I like the idea of transhumanism. Happiness (pleasure & suffering) is something that's close to my heart but I'm guessing I'm not alone in this regard.

I want to run something by you though. A while back, on another thread, I voiced the opinion that pleasure and pain were like those LED light indicators on the many contraptions you can buy at a store. So a green light (pleasure) turns on when the contraption (we) is working well and a red light (pain) flashes when the contraption is malfunctioning. It appears that for some reason this system for tracking the wellbeing of a person, unlike that for contraptions (machines), has acquired the qualities of being pleasant (pleasure) and unpleasant (pain). I suggested that what we could do, if feasible, is sever that link between pleasure and the pleasant feeling that comes with it and similarly between pain and unpleasantness. In other words, I envision a state, a future state, in which injury/harm to mind and body would simply cause a red light to flash and when something good happens to us, all that does is turn on a green light, the unpleasantness of pain or the pleasantness of pleasure will be taken out of the equation as it were. I suppose this, again, is just another version of my position that pleasure and pain can be construed as means to ensure our wellbeing and to treat them as ends might just indicate that we've missed the point. It seems I've run out of ideas. Will get back to you if anything catches my eye. Thank you. Have a good day.

discard knowledge (chih) — T Clark

Shouldn't we stop reading the Tao Te Ching at this point?

To the best of my knowledge, there is no alternative. The pleasure-pain axis ensnares us all. Genetically phasing out experience below hedonic zero can make the addiction harmless. The future belongs to opioid-addicted life-lovers, not "hard" antinatalists. Amplifying endogenous opioid function will be vital. Whereas taking exogenous opioids typically subverts human values, raising hedonic range and hedonic set-points can potentially sustain and enrich civilisation. — David Pearce

I second that motion but a word of caution. Although anyone who claims not to be a hedonist is lying through faer teeth, I've always been doubtful in re the status of happiness (pleasure & suffering) in a means-ends context. Hedonic ideas tend to treat happiness as an end in itself, as something of intrinsic worth but happiness can also be viewed as a means to some other end. Consider for example the rather "mundane" example of sex - its pleasure rating is off the charts - and I contend that's because of the how important sex is to survival and adaptation. Put simply, in the case of sex, pleasure is a means - a reward system - put in place by evolution to keep us hooked, as it were, to the two-backed beast i.e. pleasure is simply a means to ensure an end which is continued procreation. Ergo, hedonism could be a case of conflating means and ends and it's my suspicion that the more important something is for evolutionary success, usually interpreted as continued existence/survival, the more pleasurable it is and conversely, the more detrimental to evolutionary success (existence/survival) something is, the more painful it is. In very no-nonsense terms, life makes an offer we can't refuse - pleasure is just too damned irresistible for us to reject anything that has it as part of the deal and thereby hangs a tale, a tale of diabolical deception (kindly excuse the hyperbole but somehow it doesn't feel wrong to describe it as such). The story of hedonism and all things allied to it can be adapted to films. Picture a crime boss (life, evolution) whose evil plan is to make people addicted to a highly potent drug (happiness) and use the addicts to do his bidding in return for a "fix" (a dose of that drug). He could even manipulate the dose of the drug in such a way that the junkies who manage to do what he wants most gets a bigger dose of the drug. That this film adaptation of hedonism is going to be a crime thriller is telling, no?

Right. Notice he didn't say that's all he does. — Xtrix

:up: :ok:

All of humanity's problems stem from man's inability to sit quietly in a room alone — Blaise Pascal

You weren't happy with, and I quote, "...a cloistered monk who contributes nothing to the world." My point is that at least such people don't add to our woes. Sometimes, in my humble opinion, not creating a problem is far far better than being even a perfect solution to one. That's all.

Reality dictates the subjective consensus that aggregates over time. — Zophie

That went over my head. Sorry but can you expand on that a bit? What does it mean, this subjective consensus. That's an oxymoron for you, right?

I ask since your subjective-objective struggle can be solved in reference to a third element if you are looking for an explanation that is relevant to multiple people. Let's call it the Reality Theory. — Zophie

Go on...

I'll put it this way: I have no interest whatsoever in a cloistered monk who contributes nothing to the world — Xtrix

All of humanity's problems stem from man's inability to sit quietly in a room alone — Blaise Pascal

Just thought you might want to know.

Sorry, I can't say it better or more succinctly than I have already. — 180 Proof

:up: No problemo, sir! You've been a big help. Muchas gracias, señor. Que tenga un buen día.

But does size even determine significance? — Pinprick

A good question! The general perception seems to be that bigger is better. I have no clue as to the origin of this belief but I suppose its an evolutionary relic which still has some relevance in this day and age.

However, I remember reading a short story in a comic book when I was around 12ish. There's this pond of fish of all sizes and the biggest ones are the terror, bullying all the smaller ones. One day a fisherman comes to the pond and casts his net. The rest of the tale seems obvious but I'll tell it pro forma. The big fish get caught but the smaller ones slip through the spaces in the net. Bigger, in this case, definitely isn't better.

Are you talking about reality? — Zophie

Why do you ask? Your question presupposes a particular notion of reality that you have which I suppose you feel mine doesn't correspond all that well with. Perhaps we can work towards a mutually acceptable version of our "two" realities and that's what those people who claim that consciousness is subjective have to explain if they're to maintain their position, no?

1. There is something it is like to be a bat.

2. However much I learn about the objective world I can never know what it is like to be a bat.

3. Therefore there is something in reality that is outside of the objective world.

Do you agree with the argument? — Aoife Jones

What is it like to be a bat? To be able to fly on one's own steam, to be able to "see" with your ears and yet have poor eyesight, etc. Since I've never actually done that, I guess I'll never know. No one will I suppose.

What bothers me is if there's a subjective element to consciousness how is it that we can agree on anything at all? Thoughts, sensations (consciousness) are areas we've reached consensus on, something impossible were it that consciousness had a major subjective component that would've precluded such a possibility, no?

More can be said but I'm signing off for now.

It's only a problem in so far as your epistemology is justificatory — 180 Proof

:up: It never struck me that that's a possibility. Non-justificationist epistemology! :chin: What I find intriguing is the definition of knowledge in such a system. The working definition of knowledge has justification as an essential feature, no?

You mentioned Karl Popper's falsifiability theory in relation to science. I'm not all that clear on that score though especially whether Popper's take on what counts as scientific knowledge is justificatory in nature or not. Do you mean to imply that science doesn't involve justification/argument of any kind? Preposterous! In case I've read you wrong, kindly explain yourself. G'day.

A story does have logic to it, even a report of events does. Action occurs in a sequence, for starters. A narrative necessarily has characters, affect, shape, etc. We take for granted the logic of narrative, just like we take for granted the logic of language, and of physical reality, and bracket it all out of our experience. We assume agreement on these aspects of the story. That’s what logic IS. — Possibility

Smith left the room in a huff, his shadow flitting across the wall in the soft light of the setting sun. I looked outside the small window in the room and caught sight of some birds probably on their way to roost for the coming night. The sky was clear except for a few scattered clouds that were glowing red and orange. I picked up the cup and gulped down the remaining coffee.

A sample prose for your consideration. Where's the logic in it? Which are the premises and which are the conclusions?

thank you theMadFool your posts are always interesting, beautiful interpretation. Yes, teaching via example.

I attempt here to write a short story-form lesson.

Welcome to what was.
What will be may not be.
Within a warm place comes warmth.
Ride, jump and be.
See where the flower manifests.
Time struggles to remember.

Something a little more complex...

Life tied mort, wallow in tame facts.
Catch, rip, lease, mellow stomach loch.
Marble fine leap stim, move leave. — ghostlycutter

:up: I'm fond of verse/poetry but not as good as I'd like to be in creating them.

I just realized that the OP, in different words, is actually about The Problem Of The Criterion.

Two questions,

1. How can we know?

2. What do we know?

Can't answer the first query without answering the second. Can't answer the second query without answering the first. It's a vicious circularity of epic proportions, no?

Those who speak don't know. Those who know don't speak — Laozi

He said that did he? — Daemon

What you know you must be able to tell — Socrates

I know that I know nothing — Socrates

:chin:

Doesn't "daemon" have something to do with Socrates? :chin:

I know that uncertainty is frustrating and certainty is foolish. — 180 Proof

If intelligence were a crime, you'd be arrested. :up: :clap:

But you are addicted to opioids. Everyone is hooked:
https://sites.lsa.umich.edu/berridge-lab/research-overview/neuroscience-of-linking-and-wanting/.
Would-be parents might do well to reflect on how breeding creates new endogenous opioid addicts. For evolutionary reasons, humans are mostly blind to the horror of what they are doing:
https://www.hedweb.com/quora/2015.html#agreeantinatal
Addiction corrupts our judgement. It's treatable, but incurable. Transhumanism offers a potential escape-route. — David Pearce

So, why base your philosophy, transhumanism, on what you admit is an addiction? Wouldn't that be a big mistake? Transhumanism, specifically its hedonic component, would in essence be a drug cartel catering to the entire global population and that too from cradle to grave. I raise this issue because addiction is a positive feedback loop and if you convince people that pleasure's the be all and end all of life, I feel things might snowball out of control. I'm a hedonist by the way but that's exactly what worries me - a cocaine addict simply can't see beyond cocaine.

creates" us sick — 180 Proof

Ask yourself, given what we have - focus on our strengths rather than our weaknesses - is a sinless world possible? If you like answer the follow up question, would civilization have been possible if we were truly sick?

Dark matter fits the bill. It doesn't interact electromagnetically at any frequency, it's only detectable as extra gravitational attraction.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dark_matter — fishfry

:up: :ok: I'm familiar with the concept although only in very superficial terms. I'm told that the existence dark matter was hypothesized after normal matter failed to account for certain features of galactic spin behavior.

If the Tao has no logic then there is nothing to understand — ghostlycutter

:up: :clap: A gem of a statement. What if it's a narrative-like composition? You know, like a story. A story has no logic per se, it's simply a report of events, emotions, actions of characters in that story.

I don't know if you've been following along at all. We've been having a discussion of knowledge and how it is handled in the TTC. Why don't you go back and read the posts on Verse 18. Here's the start:

https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/520217

Does your interest fall anywhere in that area? Also, how Taoism fits in with western philosophies has come up a few times in the thread. — T Clark

I'll get back to you. Thanks.

I wonder if physics allows for anything that's totally transparent to all energy. — fishfry

I have no idea but that "anything" would be impossible to detect as detection requires some form of interaction but transparency means none of that. Good day.

One of the most valuable skills one can acquire in life is working out who are the experts in any field any then (critically) deferring to their expertise. — David Pearce

On point. :up:

suffering — David Pearce

If I may say so, in my humble opinion, you clearly have your feet on the ground and though your ideas are somewhat science-fictiony (obvious but bears mentioning) they're meant to tackle problems that are real and urgent.

I've been thinking about suffering and its counterpart happiness for the past few months, never got around to giving it more than a couple of hours of brain-time though. Anyway, what I feel is happiness or more accurately pleasure appears to be highly addictive and we all know one of the most poweful habit-forming drugs in the world are opiods and isn't it curious that endorphins - pleasure biochemicals - resemble opiods in composition and structure?

If you were to allow me to go out on a limb and take you into what's a slight detour from the main issue and ask you to join me in discussing conspiracy theories, I'd say plants with chemicals that produce happiness in humans is rather suspicious don't you agree? Smells fishy to me. Of course this may come across as infantile to you but could plants be manipulating us in ways we're oblivious to? This would be a setback for transhumanism wouldn't it? After all, hedonism isn't then about us and our well-being but could very well be an elaborate deception "masterminded" by plants. There seems to be no evidence for this though but...one can never be too sure.

Aside from the crazy idea I offered in the preceding paragraphs for your amusement, all I wish to convey is how there's a vanishingly thin line between pleasure and an extremely addictive drug. This should, at the very least, prompt you to be cautious about hedonism. I'm not saying that I'm not hedonistic myself. Who isn't? But I don't want to be pleasure or happiness junkie any more than I want to be addicted to heroin or opium. Perhaps I'm talking out of my hat at this point but I'm curious to hear your thoughts on this rather outlandish theory of mine. If you have the time and if you find it deserves a response from you of course.

Transhumanists believe that Intelligent moral agents can do better,. — David Pearce

I'm in full agreement with you. For instance, even if it turns out that random mutation is the best solution to bring about superintelligence, superlongevity, and superhappiness, "intelligent moral agents" can tweak the processes involved - speed up/slow down the mechanism, add/delete DNA segments, etc. - in order to ensure the best outcomes. If another better technique comes to light, even better.

"Don't listen to what your teachers tell ya, you know. Don't pay attention. Just see what they look like and that's how you'll know what life is really gonna be like." -- Woody Allen — Xtrix

Excelente señor/señora! Muchas gracias!

My very own experience with this idea of teachers who don't look anything like what comes out of their mouths has been male gynecologists in teaching hospitals and no I'm not a medical professional.

Good isn't something you are, it's something you do — Kamala Khan (Ms. Marvel)

I should've taken Kamala's words to their logical conclusion.

Everything is pretty much transparent — fishfry

You nailed it. It all depends on what kind of energy we're talking about. A masonry wall is transparent to sound though not to visible light. Walls are also transparent to radio-waves, X-rays, gamma-rays. You get the idea.

That's pretty much my answer too, couldn't have said it better. — Amalac

:wink:

God does not create a world of sin. — spirit-salamander

Therein lies the rub, friend and thank you for bringing it to my attention. I owe you for it but given the possibility that I could be utterly mistaken I'll refrain from thanking you immediately.

Imagine this: Initially I'd like to restrict the domain of discourse to humans only. The question that needs to be asked is, "is it possible (or not) that humans, if they put their heart and soul into it, can live in complete harmony, at peace with each other?" My hunch is that we can. While I don't wish to trivialize the difficulty of such an undertaking, I see no insurmountable barrier to, nothing that would make impossible, a world that's all happiness. If so, God didn't create a world of sin and the sin that we bump into every day of our lives is our own doing. Should you blame god for sin if one admits that living sinless lives is possible? That would be like accusing your boss of poor administration and, with the same breath, admitting that what you've labeled "poor administration" can be solved through interpersonal cooperation. You can't have the cake and eat it too.

This argument unfortunately can't be extended to animals. Why (did god) create carnivores that kill in gruesome ways that are bynames for excruciating pain?

sentient beings are poised to seize control of their own destiny. — David Pearce

I read that as directed evolution by which we can engineer our genes, the difference between it and natural evolution being the former is planned with careful deliberation while the latter is, as you know, random-mutation based. The question that follows naturally though is this: what if a brainstorming session of the world's leading minds came to the conclusion that the best game plan/strategy is precisely what we thought we could do better than i.e. random mutation is the solution "...to seize control of their (our) destiny"? You many ignore this point if you wish but I'd be grateful amd delighted to hear your response.

in short: expect a major evolutionary transition in the development of life. — David Pearce

I have to admit transhumanist ideals are legit goals worth pursuing and I endorse the whole enterprise with great enthusiasm. Good ideas are so hard to come by these days and I deeply admire people such as yourself who've taken the world's problems this seriously and come up with novel and bold solutions. I hope it works out for all of our sakes. The clock is ticking I believe.

Thank you. Have a good day.

I don't know if you'd like to pursue what I'm about to say further but just in case you might like to I'd like to put forth a line of inquiry in re Taoism. It's best illustrated with an example. See below:

Those who speak, dont know. Those who know, don't speak — Laozi

The quote above, without failing to do justice to it, can be interpreted as a claim in epistemology. The statement, itself a handiwork of an Eastern philosopher, is one about a Western philosophical concern viz. epistemology. Further reading Pyrrho, Agrippa, and Munchhausen's trilemma, The Problem Of The Criterion will shed light on how the two are actually one viz. that West and East, though dissimilar in approach and style are in fact on the same page. This is one example I can think of that's amenable to this interpretation.

Another minor nonetheless significant point is that Laozi seems to be deeply concerned by generalizations and that's a very easy mistake to make when one is intellectually lazy. Thus, Laozi is also sharing his views on logical fallacies.

Come to think of it, this is precisely how Taoism is interpreted in the West - selecting specific branches and their allied concepts/theories/whatnot of Western philosophies and using them to contextualize Laozi's many utterances with the aim being to grasp the message contained therein. However this approach to Taoism seems neither systematic nor deliberate i.e. we're doing it instinctively, automatically.

Perhaps if we follow our instincts in this regard and do what we're already doing but this time knowingly and in an organized fashion, what might come out at the other end could quite possibly be a better grasp of Laozi and his cryptic statements.

There's no way we can answer the question without being dishonest.

I would've liked to say that I know nothing but then I know that I know nothing and that's self-refuting.

I would've liked to take Agrippa's route and bring up the Munchhausen trilemma but that to is self-refuting to a certain extent and it's no longer as satisfying as it would be were that not the case.

I guess, given these two limitations, I should simply shut up and not say a word.

Perhaps, instead of all that I wrote above I should post this: :zip: The less said, the better :smile:

Those who speak don't know. Those who know don't speak — Laozi