They thought they were managing to make a choice outside the approved ones. Or at least, I think that was a big factor. I don't like the guy and I think he's like a black sheep of the family, but still family to the oligarchy, so, yeah, they messed up. Though I think Clinton would have had us in Syria in much more volatile ways. She is definitely on the neo-con bandwagon. We might have missed something even worse than what Trump has so far managed. The real loss was Sanders who Clinton and the Dems fucked over.

I've thought for a bit of bringing up the issue somewhere implicit in this that you must have a parsimony position on laws. IOW if we can't decide if something is causal, then we don't make a law. We keep laws to a minimum. I say this because it would be hard for you to argue, given your ideas about cause, that for example a hate speech law would cause bad thing to happen.

But then it seems that even arguing in favor of parsimony would normally entail saying it's better that way, and that this would be justified using effects. The negative effects of not being parsimonius.

Or?

Yes. And while I'm not saying it's like this everywhere, in my experience this seems to be how police have treated speed limits for quite some time. People only seem to get pulled over if they're driving recklessly, not because they're speeding. — Terrapin Station

That's not my experience. You do get to go up to five over on the highway, but above that, you can be driving just peachy and get pulled over. And I've been pulled over for things that don't affect safety like an outdated registration sticker. Heck, I've been pulled over for not looking right, which may have some correlation with driving poorly, but I wasn't exhibiting the latter.

I'm in favor of basing that stuff on ability (to consent in a standard way), not age. — Terrapin Station

So there would have to be some kind of psychological evaluation in cases where children were purported to have given consent to adults?

Just as a complete aside... Don't you live in a democracy? Why would you be concerned about the direction the democratically elected government is taking, but relived by the arming of the very demos that elected them in the first place. Seemed incongruous enough to pique my curiosity. — Isaac

I don't think I live in a democracy. I think the demos, as you call them, get to choose between approved candidates the oligarchy puts in front of them.

I have trouble coming up with a rule or set of rules. I am probing Terrapin because fortunately, I think, for this discussion, he is an absolutist (at least so far) so that helps us understand what this entails. But honestly I don't have any easy answer here. I'd go into gun control but it would be a tangent. I hate gun culture. On the other hand with the militarization of law enforcement, the increasing centralization of power in the US and also centralization of media, the changes via executive order in the ways martial law and use of troops on american soil and a bunch of other trends I find menacing, I am also glad that there are a lot of armed citizens. It would make a direct shift over the full on open fascism - as opposed to the oligarchy that pretends to be a democracy - much easier if we took away those guns.

I find anyone who thinks any of this simple and clear to have something I don't have.

If one allows for all speech and this includes in situations where there is a power differential or an authority relation, then yes, that first part is a result. This is what I am probing Terrapin around.

so are you in favor of eliminated speed limits?, perhaps leaving them as recommendations. Does this extend to age restrictions? things like the age one can get a driver's licence - or, as I mull it over, getting rid of licences at all, since these are statistical protection - or buy a whisky shot at a bar or give consent to sex.

As an aside: I often get taken as trying to trap people. I won't claim I don't do that, but in general, I am probing things to get a sense of what a position entails and actually is.

It would rather be like claiming that smoking causes lung cancer where one isn't buying causal determinism in general--say where one believes that ALL phenomena are akin to probabilistic phenomena. — Terrapin Station

Here's where I have a door open to hate speech laws: I don't like probablistic treatment of individuals. So, if I seem to be doing something that might be lead to problems in some percentage of people, so I get punished, I am resistent. This even includes anything from jaywalking to driving over the speed limit in the world of traffic and elsewhere in other facets of life.

But if something repeatedly leads to statistical results I think there's a conundrum. I can want to defend the individual discriminated against by a law that limits him or her, but also want to protect other people from the statistical results of what happens when many engage in the activity. It's just statistics, it seems to me is a good defense, of the user, but a poor shrug in relation to victims.

And in the end on hate speech I am not sure where i come down -though there are many other issues involved as to why, not just the one above.

I think that for most medical claims, we don't know causes very well. Genetics seem to have a lot more to do with it than we usually stress culturally. At any rate, it's well-known that we continually come out with studies a la "coffee is good for you," "No, coffee is bad for you," "Chocolate is bad for you," "No, chocolate is good for you," etc., and not just because of different details. — Terrapin Station

Though I haven't heard much positive with cigarrettes, for example. Would you think that telling people that regular cigarette smoking increases your chances of lung cancer and emphysema would be ok? (I know you are a free speech purist, so you must, certainly allow for such utterances even by institutions, but would you consider it wrong and philosophically ungrounded)

And I know you prefer a very focused discussion, but let me throw out alcohol. Alcohol cannot make a driver make poor decisions on the road, and some can handle percentages in the blood much higher than others. Would you based on these facts think that restricting driving while intoxicated is wrong?

Or making the introduction of toxins in food potentially illegal, even though responses vary between humans and some will even be immune to direct poisons?

I am obviously trying to skirt about the word 'cause' and head for situations where statistics come into play. Obviously there are many situations where statistics are up in the air (chocolate) but others with much stronger indications of underlying contribution to results.

You want to argue causation. Correlations do not imply causation. That's not dismissing correlations as such. They simply do not imply causation. — Terrapin Station

I keep thinking of public health issues. Do you see smoking as causal in lung cancer, even though it is often not sufficient?

So, flashers flashing where they like and pedophiles getting off near schools?

I realize those are extreme examples, but then, that's one way to test.

And how do we determine what a child wants to wear and when a parent has done something wrong. Hairshirts, burkha, nude?

Then a small but important part of Harvey Weintein's behavior was using nakedness and partial nakedness in ambiguous meetings as part of a dominance and abuse practice. It would seem like worksplaces and then situations where there are serious power imbalances, authority roles, etc., might make complete freedom with clothing problematic.

And then private institutions, like corporations, have all sorts of control over employee garb. I would love to see that radically dismantled right off the bat. But I would, still, understand a bank wanting their tellers to be clothed.

If a certain style of dress symbolizes something that conflicts with a society's values, I consequently see no issue in forbidding it. — Tzeentch

Every country does this already. The difference between allowing the visibility of men's and women's nipples makes it easy to see this has cultural ideas built in, though really cultural ideas run through whatever the dress codes are. Further hijabs don't just symbolize something that conflicts with society's values, they are something that does. Or potentially do, depending on the society's values. We wouldn't say handcuffs merely symbolize state power. I do realize that's a more extreme example. In any case no one can wear whatever they want. Or not wear. Unless they are in certain private areas, like a nudist colony.

I agree that the charge of anti-Semitism can be an oversimplification, but I do think that there is a case to made for that anti-Semitism is problem in the Left. — thewonder

There is certainly a great deal of criticism of Israel, but I don't see this carried over, in general, to Jewish people. And oddly, these are not the conspiracy theorists, either, who nowadays tend to be more on the right, sadly enough.

I don't think that the impossiblity of an estimation of Israeli power necessarily implies that overestimations can't be anti-Semitic. I think that he makes a good point by stating that Jews, Zionism, and Israel are percieved as having more power than they actually do. — thewonder

To me that's creating a criterion which, since it is not quantifiable, allows people to be labeled anti-semitic when they are not. I agree, one can overestimate the amount of power. My issue is with being able to say when that has happened.

Say, for instance, that an art band creates a glyph that they put on a shirt. This glyph somehow gets co-opted by Fascist terrorists through no fault of the band. The wearing of the shirt in support of Fascist terrorism becomes enough of a phenomenon to warrant concern. The banning of the wearing of the shirt is not a solution to the problem. The root causes of Fascist terrorism need to be addressed. — thewonder

How does one address the root causes of Islamic or north african ideas about women and their clothes and not be what you are calling totalititarian? What's the counterproposal?

I actually agree, I wouldn't outlaw women wearing the hijab, though I might for minors, that is girls.

He does go on to state that "The way in which antisemitism is distinguished, and should be distinguished, from racism, has to do with the sort of imaginary of power, attributed to the Jews, Zionism, and Israel, — thewonder

I wouldn't know how to estimate the levels of power involved. How does one look at the participation at high levels of Jewish people and Jewish organizations in the US media, private sector and government and say its power level X and this means influence Y? I can't do that. I don't think in terms of Jewish conspiracies or equate Jews with the elite. I just think that his thinking there is confused. It's as if a rational person would have a good estimate of the power. I think it makes more sense to say that such a person would see a systematic use of that power by Jews AS Jews for Israeli or Jewish purposes,whatever that would mean.

I also think it would be very hard for a citizen to estimate the power of Israel, and thus via an overestimation be judged anti-semitic.

He's describing Structural Antisemitism as a form of racism which is slated as rudimentary anti-Capitalism. — thewonder

There is antisemitism that is anticommunist/socialist. There is race hatred that comes out of religion. There is antisemitism that is happily couples with hatred of blacks and arabs and is extremely procapitalist. There are all sorts of individual takes on anti-semitism also swirling around out there. I do agree with the OP that to class conspiracy theoriests as anti-semites as a rule is confused.

Postone is too dismissive of naive anti-Capitalism which he writes off as more or less just being "anti-Semitic" when a person honestly just might not know all that much about Capitalism. — thewonder

Or might be suffering the consequences of it. Or might be Jewish and not a self-hating Jew, who, for a variety of possible reasons dislikes capitalism or current forms of it.

The oversimplification of people - by calling them anti-semites or any other oversimplification - who say there are conspiracies not currently accepted to exist at broad levels of the population
is
1) not an effective way to change anyone's mind
2) not separating the wheat from the chaff
3) facile
4) fundamentally confused, since there are conspiracies, so even the name itself implies false things

You might want to put your brain in gear so as to not look completely stupid and remember as you speak of others. — Gnostic Christian Bishop

So if someone believes in supernatural things, you assume that they will treat others immorally?

I wasn't expecting a precise, unfailing and perfect definition.
I read this...

The wrongness starts when we would entice others to hate the other along with our personal hatred — god must be atheist

And it led me to ask how you (and from there how one) would distinguish between speech that expresses hate - which you think is fine - and speech that incites other to hate - which you do not think is fine.

If you use your intuition and cannot further define your position, fine.

I'm not sure what you mean. I do know what postmodernism means, at least, a range of meanings. If one is saying hate speech is problematic but one thinks that expression of hatred can be ok, it seems like there would some criteria. I am asking what they are. I am not sure how postmodernism comes into that.

You can hate me, and you can express it on these pages. And I can hate you, and I expressed on these pages that I do, and there is nothing wrong with that. The wrongness starts when we would entice others to hate the other along with our personal hatred. — god must be atheist

So what are your rules for acceptable expressions of hate and not? If when telling one person you hate them you justifiy it and others can see this, could this not incite hatred in others? Likewise with groups?What makes a communication of hatred one that incites others? Is it labeling them a certain way? Playing to the gallery?

It seems like you are stating a conclusion. I read the post and it seems like it is presented as deduction, when in fact it is just a conclusion.Might be the correct conclusion, but it doesn't seem like an argument.

It seems like he might have had the judgment you are not tolerant of different religious beliefs. This is not because of the behavior of some members, but even intolerant of beliefs you consider supernatural, for example. It was that sentence that was highlighted.

Western views are everywhere around the world. They're the standard according to which the upper classes of many non-western countries mold themselves. I think it's a little absurd to claim that western views have failed. — Echarmion

The upper classes do not hold Western values. At least not modern ones. They increasingly see themselves above the law and have not the slightest problem with undermining democracy and fighting legislative changes that might make this harder to do both at home and abroad-

Not the retributive, but the consequensive. That if one identifies and continues to attach (to life, to what one wants, to others) the entanglment continues or can get worse and one will suffer. It doesn't have the moral tinge the Hinduism especially Western versions of Hindu karma can have, but there is a judgment that the problem is your having wanted. What for me are natural human facets are pathologized. Now, of course, if he was right, well, that's the way it is. But I don't think he was. That however gets very hard to demonstrate, but I don't think he actually solved the problem. He came up with a way to locally detach from it - in the habitual expert meditator - and around him or her this detachment, and the judgments inherent in it - actually increase the judgments of emotions and desire, and do not help us solve the problems.

Buddhist Karma ideas vary but there is the idea that one's habits of mind, degree of identification with emotions and passions are causal in leading one into darker more entangled futures. One's experiences are the fruit of past attitudes. In fact this is why some parts of modern Buddhist have rebelled against this:

Loy goes on to argue that the view that suffering such as that undergone by Holocaust victims could be attributed in part to the karmic ripenings of those victims is "fundamentalism, which blames the victims and rationalizes their horrific fate," and that this is "something no longer to be tolerated quietly. It is time for modern Buddhists and modern Buddhism to outgrow it" by revising or discarding the teachings on karma.[133]

The nearest thing that Western culture had to spiritual enlightenment was Christianity, without it, it will relapse into Imperial Rome. — Wayfarer

I am not sure what this means. Europe acted quite like Rome in the Americas. But I am sure I am missing what you are saying.

Right so the “necessary condition for doing science” is an action. Choosing/evaluating is an action, it is something that you are doing.
As you just said, the action still takes place. Free will doesnt determine whether it does or not. In order for your argument to work it would have to. You have to adjust your argument so it addresses free will, not the act itself. In order to do that, you need to offer support for defining free will as the act, which as I said I agree seems a more sensible way of defining it. — DingoJones

I think this is right and that the issue gets very complicated since we have no model for free will. I do think the ability to assess rationality is problematic once one of one's axioms is determinism. IOW if one's evaluations are utterly determined they may not be based on what we think they are based on. We would also be compelled to think we are rational, though not necessarily at all because we are rational and because of what we think is evidence of it.

How would a person who conclusions are utterly compelled to seem rational, but might not be, be able to assess this?

I agree - whenever karma is used to rationalise misfortune or blame, it's superstitious fatalism. The only beneficial aspect of believing in karma is as a positive corrective, i.e. the realisation that whatever you do will come back to you. — Wayfarer

Which if true, would be then true. But then even that means that if you are raped, then you raped before. Not a pleasant bit of insight to take in and if not the case, and I do not think it is the case, a real crime on the metaphysical level. I am utterly open to past lives and patterns, but from my experiences it is nto like this at all. People tend to find similar positions and carry out the same problematic acts and attitudes over long periods of time. It is the learning from inside the pattern that needs to take place, not some 'see how bad that was' karmic smack. Nice idea but not what I see going on. Does anyone think Hitler came back in his next life, suddenly transformed into some minority who minding his own business is dragged off to a camp. That is just not what is energy field (just throwing out a term not to be taken literally) is going to do. He didn't unlearn all his power mongering and harsness from dying in that bunker. He came back, somewhere most likely, with the same programming, perhaps even more desperately driven to dominate, control, rule, crush, clean out. It's a bizarre idea that souls would suddenly shed a perpetrating set of attitudes and come back as with a victim attitude, for exmaple. Or that what pulls they have magnetically (me again making up terms as metaphors not as literal) that will draw towards them entirely different life patterns. No, they come back with much the same attitudes, unless they manage in death bed encounters or over their lifetimes, to face their shortcomings and real motivations and fears. It is coming to face with what is really going on in oneself that breaks the pattern, not some Karmic flipflopping where you are born with entirely new patterns and draws.

We're a heathen culture. With technology. — Wayfarer

The Abrahamists and the technocrats have a long history of abusing pagans.

Not that you are wrong, but you can also look at pagans as people with non-dominant technologies and religions.

During a recent period of mindless internet browsing, I came across the Wild Hunt website.
The site appears to be dedicated to all things "Pagan".
The piece that got my attention was that about "Heathenism", a devotion to "ancient Germanic mythology".
Anyone have any thoughts about the legitimacy of this practice and how it may be related to "white supremacy"? — Teller

Being a pagan or heathen might mean one is connecting to pre-Christian, regional religions and connect this to nationalism or a particular race. But using these terms might simply mean one is attracted to the religions,w hich could be seen as indigenous. IOW gods, rather than God, nature centeredness, shamanistic tendencies, pantheistic elements
and without
some of the anti-body
anti-emotion
anti-sex
aspects of the Abrahamic religions.

Since pagan and heathens were words used by people within 'civilization' for those outside, it has a bit of a spit in the face, I'll use that label as a term of pride. Similar patterns have happened with gay and
oppressed minorities where they tweak judgmental terms from the outside and use them in idiosyncratic ways.

In any case, there is no necessary connection between, say, being a pagan in Germany and being a neo-Nazi.

To pretend that we can successfully operate a human society without censorship is naive
— Pattern-chaser

Holy moley. — Terrapin Station

I would actually start at the other end. Let's make it safe for the most vulnerable at the same time extremely important free speech like whisteblowers. It is actually getting worse for whistelblowers. Obama was terrible about them. Businesses have even more options now. The media are more centralized which can make it harder to find a solid outlet willing to protect the whisteblower.

What if you heard a word from a language you do not understand? It’s a word, it has meaning, but it could only cause confusion. Did the word cause confusion, or was it your lack of knowledge that did it? — NOS4A2

It could be a range of situations with different weights of causes. Some where the speaker is more resposible, though my brain state or knowledge base is also causal. Someone yelling bomb at the airport, in L.A. say, has a strong statististical chance of causal some terror in a number of people and likely very quick, potentially harmful movement in a number of people. We tend to hold people responsible for actions that have statisticial outcomes, not just inevitable ones. It is possible you, as an individual, never hold people responsible, if there is any possibility someone's actions might not have led to problems. I think it is very unlikely you do this, but I don't know you. Perjury, for example, might not convince a jury you are guilty, but most people want that to be a crime. Now the perjurious individual may not be understood, and, in fact, the jury's various brains must 'understand' that witness, understand 'English', draw certain conclusions from your lies. They may not do this. But they may. And so we make this a crime even though it is not like firing a bullet at someone's brain. It is not Newtonian. But still we hold the person responsible for an immoral and illegal act, even though they are not in full control of the outcome.

Oh, sorry, missed the double neg. Go forth, then, consistent one, and speak freely.

Sorry, what? ;-) That second sentence doesn't make sense to me. — Terrapin Station

Sorry. I'll just shift it to a question. How come the bomb utterance is an exception to free speech? And, I certainly get the specific problems that come up with yelling 'bomb'. The answer I am looking for is related to a general rule for exceptions to absolute free speech. Why is free will no longer an issue in this case?

That seems like the most logical thing to do. I mean, defenders of a faith are usually well practiced, and will go to any lengths to argue their beliefs, even in a dishonest way. They're like trained soldiers. — Purple Pond

Sure. And even with, well, theists who are not like this, or really anyone who does not share your beliefs, it's a rare discussion that changes people's minds. And there are very few actual open minds out there, even though many people like to constrast themselves with whomever their ideological or paradigmatic enemies are. It doesn't even have to be dishonest. People's minds will slide away from discomfort or put your arguments in grooves, rather than responding to them specifically. This is common here and I am sure it happens with me also. We do not like cognitive dissonence. In all the arguments and discussions I have read online, it has so rarely happened that anyone has every said 'You point here I think must be wrong, but so far I can't see why.' Let me get back to you on that. And that's in discussions between secular people also. I do see people concede points, though it's rare. But actually admitting being stumped but not ready to give in - a very common and natural state - I almost never see written down online or hear it in live discussions. There are other types of admission I never see either. Generally speaking most posts will contain statements of certainty, no concessions, and this can go on between two or more quite rational and very intelligent people for page after page. That simply can't be a full disclosure type of discussion. They must be hopping over moments of confusion or not even noticing points they didn't like the feel of or missing that they slightly changed the argument they are responding two, or shifted the context and so on. Defenders of the faith may well deserve their rep, but I think the difference is more one of elegance and subtlety than stubbornness and irrationality.

I would if I grew up in a completely secular household, not isolated in a religious community, and not have been indoctrinated with their beliefs. I'm surrounded by religion. I can't ignore it. — Purple Pond

Might it still, despite this, not be better to avoid the debate?

Yelling "bomb"? Yes, I'd not have that be illegal. — Terrapin Station

OK, and is this because it is approaching newtonian types of causality. IOW statistically high chance that people will behave in certain ways that we don't want them to for not reason?

So, bomb in the airport is ok, since people can choose whether to fall for it. I am still also on this causality issue, not just trying to corner you on free speech per se. I think causes can end up, in non-experimental situations, being statististical. IOW they blend with other causes and will, if introduced, lead to effects, ones that are even predictable, but not in all cases. And as I said above this does not necessarily mean that hate speech should be illegal even if agreed to.

.

I would never do any of that stuff. I'm a free speech absolutist, and that includes that I'd not make slander/libel illegal or want it socially pressured away a la firing someone, etc. — Terrapin Station

Ok, fair enough. It certainly is possible to be consistent on the issue and you seem to be. You must consider a fairly wide range of policies, laws and regulation to be wrong. Employers giving false negative references, slander and libel laws you covered, screaming 'bomb' at the airport, false reporting of crimes, lying about income to the IRS - this might be seen positively to someone who might be a libertarian in other ways - ( And presumably even at the organizational level frees speech would hold: The New York Times can print what it likes even if untrue.) Does this absolutism hold for contractual type situations? - doctors/psychologists breaching patient/doctor confidentiality, company product secrets, - and then similar situations like what would be considered perjury?