How many of you would propose it is down to one thing: that people are really born bad or good eggs, or that really there is only conditioning and interpersonal influence at work. Who would propose that it is in fact an obligatory combination. That both are neccesary to give rise to certain outcomes. Please support your arguments with examples. — Benj96

People are born either bad or good -- so nature. I apologize in advance to those who disagree. When we apply intelligence to behavior, i.e. learning, experiment, results, we are turning to nurture to modify bad behaviors. Look at recidivism of criminals (although it's not confined to those who went to prison as we do have other bad people at large also).

An explanation of what something “is” or isn’t— that’s dealing with meaning, and is a kind of definition. — Mikie

You're not convinced with your own assertion. "Kind of"?

I want to use the example of surgery. If you find someone cutting though the flesh and rearranging the organs of another human being, is he performing surgery? After all, these are what surgeons do when they operate. But what if that someone is not a doctor? -- certainly he's not performing surgery because the definition of surgery is limited to the "practice of medicine" which could only be applied to doctors.

Philosophy involves ongoing conversation -- whether written or verbal. But not all ongoing conversations are doing philosophy.

Not a puzzle. A woman's bodily autonomy does not transfer to a murderer. — LuckyR

But the definition of a fetus by the state changes depending on who terminates the life of the fetus.

If it's a woman's action that terminates the fetus, then that's legal. But if it's another person, it's homicide. The fetus has two ways of legal existence, concurrently.

Funny that you’d end your post with a definition of philosophy as an “ongoing conversation.” — Mikie

I disagree. Banno's comment is an explanation of doing philosophy, not its definition.

I'm not posting here to argue for or against abortion. I want to just explain something that's irreconcilable about pro-abortion and anti-abortion societies.

When someone announces the pregnancy, her whole circle celebrates: there's formal announcement, there's gender-reveal (shown in theaters, no less), there's baby shower-- when I was a kid I thought they literally bathe the pregnant woman in front of the guests) then there's the birth, and finally the christening where food and gifts are used to celebrate this important occasion. Following this, a lot of legal rights accrue to the baby: the mother could be prosecuted for drug use while pregnant, the baby has the right to be taken care of and not neglected, and of course, if the baby dies at the hands of the parents or any member of their society, there's homicide or infanticide.

Meanwhile, within the same society, the pregnant woman can decide to terminate the pregnancy without any reason required. Because in the pro-choice stance, it doesn't matter whether the fetus growing inside is the woman's own flesh and blood. She is not held accountable morally to spare the fetus just because it's her own blood. This is what it means by her-body-her-choice. The fetus has no right to use the woman's body to grow to full viability. At any given point during the pregnancy, the fetus doesn't count as an entity. Note that if you're one of the guests in a baby shower, you're celebrating the woman, not the fetus inside the womb.

Then here comes another puzzling thing. Suppose a woman decides to terminate the pregnancy and made an appointment with a doctor two weeks from now. Suppose that an intruder attacks the woman and kills her and the baby before the appointment. The state can then charge the intruder with double homicide -- never mind that the woman doesn't' want the baby and is about to terminate it. Depending on what country or state in the US you're in, killing a pregnant woman is double homicide.

In a society where govenments try to tell you what is true and raise you into believing what you believe, — Hailey

Any government does not have a monopoly in information. This is what a common person believes -- that everything that comes out as information is created by the government. There are modern intelligentsias who continually write, if not verbally contribute, about the society. There are also the capitalist multi-nationals who continue to shape our beliefs -- good or bad.

This leads to the individuals recognition that they’re in a self created bubble allows room for their self emergence from it and different perspectives on life and reality and maybe a pursuit of knowledge be that self-knowledge or philosophy.

But why philosophy anyway ? If a person is happy who needs it ? It’s often recognised that life is suffering and ignorance is bliss but are these just convenient aphorisms or is the truth somewhere in between? — simplyG

The truth is somewhere in between. Life is not suffering. Life is one huge experimental lab that anyone could explore and try things out. It should allow you to think and be satisfied, be unhappy, or happy about what you find. (JS Mill might help here as a reference). Philosophy is a refuge to those who find that material things do not make them satisfied -- or they find that material possessions or wanting material possessions leave them empty. Science is also that -- many inventors in the past had devoted their entire life -- often dying without success -- working on their projects. Then, there's the artistic or creative realm where you can bury yourself just creating.

Bubbles are good -- if it leaves you not wanting other-wordly things. If it leaves you self-sufficient. I don't allow in my little circle individuals who suck. The energy vampires, as you some call them, have no life other than dump on you their dramas. And it's repeated everyday, multiple times a day. If you examine the way they think, there's really nothing exciting happening there.

We all think we’re special. — Mikie

This is not the norm unless you are a narcissist. I mean that in a factual way. Most people have a good sense of more here, little there, okay, and good. In fact, even an egoistic individual would only be egoistic within his own circle around him -- usually a very tiny one: himself and another person.

"Egoistic" as used here is not the philosophical egoism.

where do the loan repayments come from? — LuckyR

I could explain some of it, but won't.

Do you think some kind of scheme should be put into place to help minimum wage workers in later life? I do. Maybe open up a pension/saving scheme to set up like I said? Good idea or bad idea? — I like sushi

Good idea on paper. I would like an automatic benefit plan for minimum wage. The good argument is, the retail and food sectors really need people to work at low wage. They need people to stay at that level. The bad argument is, any employment benefits, including health coverage, is part of the compensation package. That is, you need to include that in the calculation of their overall compensation. So, the cost to the employers is much higher than the actual per hour rate. Labor is one of the most expensive costs in running a business. (Don't worry, come staff reduction, the highly compensated employees are always the ones being scrutinized. But this is for another topic).

The problem is, pension doesn't always mean people can make ends meet. One, if they're married, they need to stay married so that money can go along way -- one household only. The ones who can afford to be alone in retirement are those that were highly paid during their active working years (not minimum wage).

Second, shit can happen to anyone. Irresponsible money handling can still lead to broke-ass life despite the high income production.

This can be a good topic on a separate thread.

I didn't buy the ticket. I want a real freak show, not modalities and scenarios.

A two-prong dilemma doesn't count.

So, please excuse my joke at your expense. — BC

lol. No problem. :up:

Thus, Fukuyama appears to be looking in the wrong place for a new movement. — Count Timothy von Icarus

To me, his mistake is to think that history -- or the development of political history is linear. The ancients actually thought it was a cycle, in which the liberal democratic form is just going through its phase, and then another political form replaces it. There were probably 4 or 5 forms of a government. They cycle around until it repeats.

Rather, he thought (he is writing in 1989-1992) that no alternative to liberal democracy could emerge that would be widely considered to be a more legitimate alternative. — Count Timothy von Icarus

That's assuming that "political freedom" and individuality continue to be the ideal values. But we can't even fathom now that a possibility exists that the development in eons, human minds could change into something we wouldn't recognize now. Maybe humans would actually turn docile and think that an oligarchy is desirable -- so long as the needs of the population are being met, the oligarchs are the ideal masters. Maybe in eons, the population do not want to be responsible for their own life and want the ruling elite to take care of everything.

Ancient philosophy was designed for the sake of living a truly eudaimonic life. The modern philosophies that have risen since the Enlightenment need to shift towards this paradigm of therapeía, that is to say, "healing. — Dermot Griffin

We can't have this if our world worships massive material wealth -- the surplus economy where only those in position to hold the surpluses flourish.

Great, IF the spouse has lots of cash,

I don't recommend it. — L'éléphant

Especially if one IS the rich spouse. — BC

No, we're not talking about cash or "one rich spouse". We're on topic here as below:

that would mean they have to pay capital gains tax. — Mikie

This is the topic.

This is a funny thread.

So, what do they do instead? — Mikie

A spouse dying also works. I don't recommend it. But that's how it can work too.

I'd define reality as "The sum of everything that is objectively true right now." — Cidat

Reality is the whole cosmos. But in philosophy, we really do not have a hard definition of it. Philosophers do not intentionally define it, for good reason. Instead, what we have is a contrast against appearance, illusion, imagination, and possibilities. This is the best way to understand what we mean by reality. A negative definition works better than any other attempts.

Someone on a philosophy forum once said the amount of new information (they might have said knowledge) in a dictionary is essentially zero, because all the dictionary does is refer to itself. That's always stuck with me. What do you think of that? — RogueAI

To me this is incorrect as there are actually panels of experts who write the dictionary, they're just not cited for each word definition. So, it looks like "no human source" was used in the making of the dictionary. Besides, words, as years go by can change its meaning due to change in population's way of talking or writing. And more words are added to the dictionary, as we now know "google" is a verb.

What’s annoying is how expensive it is. — Mikie

Exactly.

[1]

Influencers. — Sir2u

[2] people who go to concerts so they could hear themselves talk nonstop. They do this intentionally.

[3] Drivers who hit pedestrians. WTF, man! :scream:

[4] Drunk drivers. There should be a breathalyzer device in the car to start the ignition. But it wouldn't take long before people could fool the breathalyzer. So, I don't know.

[5] People who eat ramen everyday. Look, it's good. But everyday? We're not in apocalypse yet.

[6] Animal abuse

[7] Dragon fruit.

I’m also basically jobless/unemployed, and not interested at all to run his (my father’s) businesses ... — niki wonoto

Stop being a selfish asshole. Help your father with his struggling business in any way you can – help your family, help your brother, contribute to your community. Whatever good you've experienced and benefitted from, sir, you owe them all – which is a debt none of us can repay but we can honor by taking care of others beginning with those closest to us. — 180 Proof

Yes, this is all good.

Also, tell niki wonoto to open himself/herself to the world -- even in small ways. Make his life mean something to others, if he can't make it meaningful to himself. It's gonna be a very tiny circle -- not plastered on magazines or websites. So, one, he needs courage to face the fact that he is nothing to the world, he's a nobody; but that he can use his living daylights to help his family, or someone else. It won't be easy because the lack of motivation is the enemy. But as I just mentioned, courage is the key here. Courage to disobey his mind, and do something.

Btw, all this lifelong career is bullshit. An acquaintance got fired from his job. So, what he did immediately -- he passed the cpa exam and got his license. Then abandoned it and enrolled back to college to study physics. He's arrogant in a good way. He wanted to prove he didn't get fired because of incompetence. He wanted to prove to them that he was bored to his skull.

So anyway, niki wonoto's life can be a series of gig jobs. Forget about retirement or planning for the future. Just work to eat and pay for electricity. That's it.

Does what we designate as time really only refer to the awareness of time? — Pantagruel

the present moment may be all which exists, but how are we to understand looking back? I think we just have to take past, present and future as structures in human cognition which help us to make sense of our reality, but I don't know how much we can say beyond this. We can't really examine time outside of our experience of it. — Tom Storm

We don't have awareness of time, per se. If there's "nothing" in the universe but time, then we wouldn't be able to perceive it. How we perceive time is through object permanence and memory. I saw a huge tree when I passed the bridge, then I came back the same way and saw the tree again. In my memory, I saw a tree on my way, then I saw it again on my way back. The two moments are both in our thought. The second time triggered my memory that I saw that tree the first time. If I deliberate further, because my mind has object permanence, I believe that I will pass that tree again tomorrow if I go that way (unless someone cut down the tree before I get there).

Edit. there are things that we perceive that isn't temporal.

However, that is not the comparison I was making. I was trying to distinguish the two concepts:
human-motivated technology from independent AI motivation — Vera Mont

Ah! I see where you're not clear about. The AI is not "independent" or autonomous, as we say about humans. The AI can be launched once and be automatic. Independent/autonomous is not the same as automatic. There is no motivation (as there is no intentionality). It's the widening or limiting the restrictions, that's where you're supposed to look at.

I didn't say anything about futility. I said it was insufficient; i.e. does not avert the danger. — Vera Mont

Read the fallacy of appeal to futility.

There are humans behind every gun that kills a schoolchild, too. Is that the "danger of guns"? — Vera Mont

Yes.

Prosecuting the few fraudulent users of AI who can be caught won't stop the fraud; — Vera Mont

The appeal to futility actually benefits the fraudsters and scammers. And it's incorrect to think that it's futile. It's not futile. Minimizing fraud and danger is a strong response to fraud and danger. Why not just ban all vehicles, since each year thousands die from vehicular crashes?

This might cause me some alarm, but if I am unfamiliar, fundamentally, with what an object is, then there is no way for me to differentiate the lion from everything else in the environment perceived. In other words, I would have to pick out the lion first, before I have good reason to avoid it.

But I can pick out lions, and other things. How do I do this? — NotAristotle

And the answer to your question is, you would not have grown into adulthood, or into childhood without object-perception. Unless you are blind, no nerve endings to feel objects, and no other sensory features, and no perception of time (memory) -- in which case you would not have survived infancy -- then you really do not have a choice but be conditioned to know these things. This is your realism at its best.

No, the world does not appear to us as a painting simply because we perceive boundaries and points and edges. You can't escape your perception, so you have no choice but to view the world through these lenses.

The internet is already up to it nostrils in disinformation of every kind. That's all human-motivated, human-initiated activity. — Vera Mont

But AI doing any of that on its own initiative? Improbable. — Vera Mont

Yes, of course. There are humans behind the AI -- humans that could be prosecuted for fraud, disinformation, and whatever.

The issue is that unregulated AI has the potential to promote propaganda, malicious agendas etc with highly convincing/persuasive rhetoric. In that way AI can be used in a non measured, non objective and unethical way. — Benj96

Yes, this. Our world is now beginning to show machine worship, like we've never seen before. Some because there's tons of money to be gained, others because technology worship is their way to fit in society. Was it Einstein who championed the scientific rhetoric? (God bless him)

Both scientists and philosophers can work together to keep the human perspective strong. Humans have the evolutionary-perception advantage, which took millions to perfect. Don't ever forget this. The amygdaloid complex took 7 million years to evolve into what now is in the human brain. We have nuclei in our brain. If this does not impress you about humans, then go join the AI.

Just a thought experiment: Imagine the internet full of AI-created information websites. Other AI would subscribe, click on ads created by AI themselves, purchase goods, give product reviews, drive stocks upwards or downwards. Imagine the AI driving the economy downwards. AI economic terrorism. Is this possible?

When users create poems for their dog using AI, it's all innocent and fun. Until it's not.

Seems to me that even if we are mistaken, viz. interpretation, about what is there, when we are faced with some illusion, we are never mistaken that there is something there. We are only ever mistaken about what it is. — NotAristotle

Yes, this is the gist of the cogito.

What I noticed about his 'Ouamuamua coverage, which included a book, was his dogmatic insistence that this object must be an extraterrestrial artifact. That is what other scientists have taken him to task for. He seems to brook no disagreement, and has written polemical articles attacking critics for being narrow-minded and dogmatic. — Wayfarer

A cure for a dogmatic person is time.

Alien debris had reached the Earth, but the aliens themselves were nowhere to be seen? Unfortunately for him, he exhibits the same patterns as other alien flying object videos -- always grainy, unrecognizable, blurred, dark, and shaky camera.

Don’t know what others think but it seems to me Loeb has become somewhat obsessive in his quest, to the detriment of his overall reputation. Of course, if the titanium-alloy spherules turn out to be the real enchilada, then I’ll happily eat my words. — Wayfarer

I made a post earlier in this Illusion thread mentioning error in beliefs.

Avi Loeb is neither wrong nor right in his belief at this point. If he gathers more evidence of the existence of aliens and their technology, then at some point in our life, his hypothesis could be correct and his belief vindicated. But for now, he can't claim the truth or we can't claim the falsity of his belief.

↪goremand

, an illusion happens at the level of perception, while a misinterpretation happens (obviously) at the level of interpretation — goremand

Many psychologists and philosophers today would argue that perception is interpretation all the way down. — Joshs

↪Joshs

While it may be that it's not human nature to perceive without also interpreting, I think the two are distinct. I would say a camera is an example of perception without interpretation in the sense I mean. — goremand

The camera is recording, not perceiving. When humans perceive something they are not just detecting it with their eyes, there is a whole perceptual apparatus attached to the act of seeing that just isnt present in a camera, yet. — DingoJones

The above quoted posts are an interesting exchange.
Perception implies the mind and beliefs (true belief or false belief). So, a distinction between perception and interpretation does not make sense. (To understand this further, I mentioned in another thread at one time that when we talk (philosophically, scientifically) of awareness/consciousness, we are talking about the central nervous system. But there is a sort of a zombie nervous system that does not require our mind in order for it to function, and that is the enteric nervous system. (Look this up please).

That said, Goremand's analysis of illusion is a good one. Where does the error -- or the illusion -- occur? In the epistemological analysis of beliefs, it is a matter of various facts associated with an assertion. Should we prefer being justified or possessing the truth?
I believe that every individual walking around has a brain inside their skull. But I could not attain the truth of this belief because I wouldn't be able to open every person's skull to check if there's a brain inside.

To me @Judaka's and @unenlightened's posts complete my response to the "Does ethics apply to thoughts " question.

I'm not seeing why acquiring the capacity for reason should not be thought of as a result of evolutionary biology, driven by adaptation. — Janus

Because there's nothing in the theory that addresses it specifically. The theory is about the factors that contribute to the survival and evolution of species. — Wayfarer

No, the study of civilization, which includes evolution, is also the study about the intelligence of humans over epochs. What Janus might be referring to is the study of logic, which is a modern development. The "capacity for reason", as civilization reveals, is actually the capacity to use tools, for example.

I have forgotten that this is Pantagruel's thread. I thought it was Gnomon's. Sorry.

In very summary terms, scientific methodology has yielded many amazing and indispensable discoveries and innovations, but it doesn't necessarily comprehend or address the problems of philosophy, and the attempt to squeeze those problems into the procrustean bed of the objective sciences has deleterious consequences. — Wayfarer

Yes, scientism becoming the predominant view.

Is there an example of such a thing you can identify? — Tom Storm

Telling a lie while believing otherwise -- your pulse betrays you. The brain sometimes has its own motivation. Hence, there are times you make mistakes in the process of executing a particular action: you forgot to turn off the light when you exited your house, you forgot to lock your door, you missed your exit on the road.

Edit: intuition is a very private conscious deliberation -- private is the key word. When you know the subject well, your intuition will also be strong, so strong that you act on it confidently.

Whistling is hard.

THE TITLE OF THIS POST IS HOW TO PUT TOGETHER A SYSTEM OF METAPHYSICS IN WHICH THE ONTOLOGY IS THE ISSUE.

But, for the moment, I want to address this even though it has nothing to do with the topic:

which is interchangeable with matter through said equation - was THE fundamental existent. — Wayfarer

Are you serious? The equation calls for the measure/quantity contained "in this matter" to come up with "that capacity" in joules. You're confusing identity with the equivalence.

@Pantagruel's post above is an excellent introduction to what a metaphysical system should be.

In my own thesis I define Energy as a form of Information (power to cause change in form or state), which is also a causal interrelationship (e.g. organization)*4, not a thing in itself. — Gnomon

Rule 1. Thingness is a metaphysical must have, if you're going to have an ontology. Without the thingness, it's either an accidental feature or a conditional feature which must depend on other essences for it to exist. Determinate things are what we call things in metaphysics.

Energy is not a cause". Philosopher David Hume discussed the mysteries of Causation at a time before scientists had pieced together our modern notion of Energy. He referred to the producer of causation as an "illusion"*1, but Einstein might say it is a "stubborn illusion", that there is some kind of physical "connection" between Cause & Effect*2. — Gnomon

Rule 2. Causation is at the heart of a metaphysical system -- and it is what we know as scientific causation that involves the physical/material entities. Without a thing that can cause something or in relation with causes, it has no essential existence.

Energy is not a substance, not something in the sense of “some thing”. Energy often appears to be a substance that flows, for example if charging a battery or an electrical capacitor. — Gnomon

Rule 3: The Doctrine of Haecceity. That tree is a tree. Treeness is what makes a tree a tree. Use haecceity to assign an identity to a thing. There is mindness in "mind" as explained by Descartes or Kant. If you cannot have a uniqueness of a substance, then you don't have a system. All you have is a parasite feature that cannot exist without the other features. It is a conditional existence. Haecceity also calls for the "wholeness" -- the mind is a whole thing. If you posit that the mind exists, then it is the measure of all things.

Data is defined as individual facts, while information is the organization and interpretation of those facts. — Gnomon

Rule 4: Prehension is what you are talking about and facts are what we spit out when we have enough prehension of a thing or phenomenon. We use language to put together a statement of facts. Information is our own expression of the thing that caused us to have this epistemic values. Your metaphysical system is working well if you could come up with data or information in the process of your existence. So, if the mind is the thing, then the mind perceives, makes logical connections, makes hypotheses, puts together a coherent explanation of the world.

I suppose you are restricting the term "cause" to some particular traditional definition. — Gnomon

How else are you defining it then?

But it's now clear that Energy does not have a material existence. Instead, it is merely a (mathematical??) relationship between things*2 — Gnomon

Then it fails to be a thing (being a thing would qualify it as a candidate for the fundamental reality or existent.

If the ability or capacity or power or force that we refer to as Energy is not a Cause, what is it? Isn't Causation what Energy does? — Gnomon

That's for you to explain in this thread. I'm waiting for an explanation as to why it is a cause, and why it is fundamental.

Energy is relative, but what's interesting that for any observer, it's always conserved. — Gnomon

If it's relative, then it cannot be a cause. It's also contradictory to "conserved".

Food for thought for you: Gravity is also just there. Why is gravity not the ultimate reality?

But as was made clear by the four causes, 4 is the perfect answer here. — simplyG

How so? Energy is not a cause.

Inches & miles are conventional measures of space, not space itself. — Gnomon

Energy is a measure of capacity, not the thing it is measuring. It is not a cause. It cannot be a cause. It is also not a thing that exists as if it has a categorical substance. Please define "energy". If energy exists, it's because there are things!