The wrong idea about what?

Is there any doubt that some people really do live better lives than others? Must we accept that mass murderers just have a different idea about what makes a good life?

It all ties into whether or not one can say what it means to be a good person, or to have lived a successful life, or is flourishing as a human, doesn't it?

Aristotle believed that man is a social, rational animal... that man has an essence. And in the same way we can say about a tree, "that is a healthy, flourishing tree", we can say about an individual man, "that man is flourishing." Eudaimonia is the term the ancients came up with to describe a flourishing human life. But different schools of thought disagreed about what was necessary and sufficient for eudaimonia. For the Epicureans, the claim was, "the lack of pain (or maybe it was 'maximizing pleasure over the long run') is necessary and sufficient for eudaimonia". For the Stoics, it was "virtue is necessary and sufficient for eudaimonia".

But, today some people do deny that man has a nature, and claim rather that "existence precedes essence". They claim that each individual decides for himself what makes his life a good one.

So, someone dies.. and they're judged by an unfair judge... You propose that this dead person then start murdering people? How would that help?

But what about an unfair judge? — szardosszemagad

Is there anything I can do about it?

If I'm not judged, that would be okay, too. If I was to know in advance there was no afterlife, that would be okay, too.

Having read Plato, I think I'm okay with being judged by a good, objective judge, if it comes to that.

Wittgenstein
Putnam
Kripke
Quine

Shestov
Gabriel Marcel
Berdyaev

I'm not sure how to sell anyone on reading them. The first four are important philosophers in the recent history of analytic philosophy. I wanted to explore existentialism as well, and am looking for good role models. Marcel fits the bill. When I started looking into Marcel and Christian Existentialism, I came across Shestov and Berdyaev.

Right now, I'd like to concentrate on Putnam.

Have you considered and rejected Epicureanism?

I've looked into different views of what happens after we die.

Aristotle: Believed the soul survived, but also that there would be no consciousness, so no afterlife

Epicureans: They believed that death was the end, so no afterlife. They compared death to the time before one was born. You don't have negative thoughts about the time before you were born, so why would you have negative thoughts about the time after you die?

Stoics: It was a little complicated because at least some of them believed that some (especially virtuous?)conscious souls lived on after death, but even those souls would eventually be destroyed in the great conflagration, and then everything would be recreated again. They seemed to console themselves with the notion that we all would be living our lives over and over again.

I suppose you could ask, "why are there quantum fields rather than nothing?" But if by something, you mean something physical, then it appears you can get physical stuff from the non-physical. (if quantum fields are defined as being non-physical).

that something has come out of nothing — Alan Watts in Behold The Spirit

Yes, something does come from nothing. https://www.thenational.ae/uae/science/something-from-nothing-is-a-quantum-possibility-1.542263 At least in the quantum world.

You're welcome. I enjoyed his book, The Mind of God.

Paul Davies is a scientist and has written a couple of books exploring the possibility of God. He's not religious, by the way.

Regarding personal histories: Existentialism may mean more to me than it does to other people because I grew up in and with a very rigid system of fundamentalist Christian young earth creationism. About 25 years ago, I started doubting the veracity of literalism and started looking for another system as a replacement.

I experienced a lot of rigid dogma and egoism (in Christianity and among atheists- I explored atheism for a while). Egoism to me is the belief that if one could just have complete control over one's environment (including outcomes and the responses of others) then one would be living the best life possible.

It does seem likely that one could subscribe to a system (like Stoicism, or Christianity) and just treat existentialists as those who remind us that:

• No system is complete
• Because no system is complete, a system can attempt to put constraints on reality that don't actually apply- those constraints can and should be challenged
• Experiences, history (our own and that of philosophy) and relationships are important
• Dogma and egoism can cause harm

Considering the fact that we are talking about Christian Existentialists in this thread, it's obvious that existentialists can work within existing systems.

Sounds very similar to existential psychotherapy.

What makes you think so?

I'm listening to this today. It's from Berdyaev's The Destiny of Man: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IjczKNt-kmQ

I like the way he thinks. I just ordered The Meaning of the Creative Act.

Did Berdyaev write about how the creative act is sometimes not so idyllic as it's usually portrayed? I believe Shestov pointed out that artists and authors could sometimes feel frustrated with their creations and the creative act.

I find Kirkegaard hard to handle. He seems so extreme. In many ways, I'm looking for a role model, and I don't find his lifestyle to be appealing. Kirkegaard saw himself as being a modern Socrates with a divine mission. He wanted to shake things up, to get a reaction, and sarcasm and irony were his main tools. He may have lived the life he wanted, but it was short and stressful.

Only very superficially. He's on my list of people to read.

Do we have a "right" to be here, even if we don't have a God-given reason? Do we experience ourselves as puppets? As sinners in the hands of some angry stand-in for God (a god-object that might be an abstract principle that has us wringing our hands like naughty children)? — 0af

Have you ever read any of the Christian Existentialists?

I'm not sure why anyone would want to if they were rational enough to consider the consequences... but, (and these are types of negative choices that Sartre liked to talk about), one is free to drive against a red light.

One person Sartre describes is the Cliff Walker. This man walks down a narrow pass on top of a tall, steep cliff. The man isn’t afraid of falling off, he has sure footing, nor of the wind blowing him sideways and to his death (it is a calm breezy day). He is more afraid that he will be overcome by an insatiable desire to throw himself from this height. This type of fear isn’t as forward facing as it would be if he was afraid of tripping to his death. He doesn’t trust himself enough.

One of my defining lessons learned from Sartre was the Condemnation to Freedom. The cliff walker suffers with this condemnation of freedom when he looks at the fall before him. He knows that he has the freedom to jump for no other reason than to jump. That freedom terrifies him. He has no real control over his identity when these fears take him over. There’s no truth to his being when he considers his freedom to desire to jump to the abyss. — blogger

But, the context of my post is that we're all free to pursue the lives we like. Someone who owns a business and is making a lot of money, for example, is free to walk away from his business and huge house, forsake the life of luxury and hitchhike to South America with the intent to live out his life helping the poor. The people in his life may not like it, the public is bound to criticize him, and he may not actually survive the trip.. but he is free to pursue that lifestyle.

And someone who has been living with the conviction that some system of thought has all the answers, is free to start questioning that system, and/or take seriously the criticisms of that system.

But, then why bring up extreme negative cases like stealing wallets, or trying to fly off buildings?
Using your reasoning, isn't it also the case that one can only "try to buy groceries"?

I did mention consequences.

What kinds of things should people in general not even attempt, because of these constraints and limitations?

Are you saying, that when existentialists say, "we're free" (or condemned to be free), our response should be, "no, we're not.... there are limitations and constraints."?

So, you're saying we're not actually free, because other people have choices, as well? What other constraints? You mention outcomes.

What exactly flies in the face of everyday experiences?

I'm intrigued by the concept of "transcendence" as employed by Marcel, as well.

What I like most is the idea that I can live whatever type of life I want, that I'm free to pursue (or not pursue) whatever system of philosophy I like. Of course, the flip-side is to acknowledge that I'm totally responsible for my choices. I can't blame anyone else for the choices I make or the consequences that follow.

I am not nearly as familiar with the thinkers you cited as I am with Kierkegaard, Nietzsche, Heidegger, & Sartre. I find it very, very hard to lump all of the existentialists into one particular camp because they disagree on many, many points. — Brian

I did generalize in regards to the 3 I mentioned in my OP (I'm most familiar with Gabriel Marcel). I can't think of any points on which the 3 disagree, however. I think it's more the case that each of the 3 I mentioned pursues his own existentialist philosophy in a slightly different way.

Sartre and Marcel knew each other and each responded to and mentioned the other by name in their writings (most notably in Sartre's Existentialism is a Humanism and Marcel's Existence and Human Freedom).

They also, I think, have a tendency to emphasize the negative sides of the human experience. Negative emotions like dread, anxiety, despair, etc. And phenomena that are traditionally conceived of as negative, especially the concept of death and human finitude as well as the idea of "the nothing" and nihilism in general. — Brian

One of the criticisms that Marcel made of Sartre's views was his negativism. Marcel was of the opinion that Sartre made judgments he didn't have to (we are condemned to be free). It's interesting that Marcel was raised in a non-religious home and was an agnostic, but his writings explored the themes of fidelity, faith, hope and charity. A Christian Catholic writer (Francois Muriac) wrote to him and pointed out that those themes required the existence of God. Marcel agreed and converted to Catholicism.

Another point of contention between Marcel and Sartre was that Marcel was all about openness, and he pointed out that Sartre was not open to some ideas and concepts (God, seeing the positive aspects of freedom).

Marcel did also have some positive things to say about Sartre's writing, and there were points upon which they agreed.

Does Marcel have anything to say about being authentic? I would imagine he does as it's a pretty common existentialist theme. — Brian

I don't know that Marcel used the term, "authentic", but I've read several of his plays, and his characters display authenticity. Marcel approaches the topic from the viewpoint of materialism. He suggests that the modern world is one in which people are often treated like mechanical objects, instead of beings who are experiencing the world. He explored the themes of openness and availability, and I'd argue that those require authenticity.

I think I misinterpreted your argument from the beginning.

It looks like what you're saying is that God A can either make something that God B cannot destroy, or he can't. If God A can make something that cannot be destroyed by God B, then God B isn't omnipotent. If God A can't make something that God B can destroy, then God A isn't omnipotent. <--- is that a valid summation?

I'm not sure how the above helps your argument- if you're saying that the USSR and the US are like gods, then you must admit they both exist, and you've provided us with a counter-argument.

On the other hand, are you invoking this unstated premise? "Gods are like countries (both can be destroyed)." Isn't it rather the case that Gods can't be destroyed (killed), but countries can be?

How about this counter-argument?
Gods (immortal, all-powerful beings) can't be killed. Therefore any number of them could exist simultaneously (after all, many cultures envisioned a pantheon of gods).

Can you find a loophole in my argument? — TheMadFool

Another of your unstated premises is: "a God can be killed".

I don't know what would happen if one God attacked another, but I can imagine that the God being attacked wouldn't even bother defending Himself if He couldn't be killed. And if the attacking God knew His attacks would be ineffective, He wouldn't even bother attacking in the first place.

Several non-theist philosophers have written about objective morality.

Paul Boghossian is Silver professor of philosophy at New York University, where he was Chair of the Department for ten years (1994�"2004) and responsible for building it into one of the top philosophy programs in the world.[1] His research interests include epistemology, the philosophy of mind, and the philosophy of language. He is Director of the New York Institute of Philosophy and research professor at the University of Birmingham.

Timothy Williamson is a British philosopher whose main research interests are in philosophical logic, philosophy of language, epistemology and metaphysics.

He is currently the Wykeham Professor of Logic at the University of Oxford, and Fellow of New College, Oxford. He was previously Professor of Logic and Metaphysics at the University of Edinburgh (1995�"2000); Fellow and Lecturer in Philosophy at University College, Oxford (1988�"1994); and Lecturer in Philosophy at Trinity College, Dublin (1980�"1988). He was president of the Aristotelian Society from 2004 to 2005.

He is a Fellow of the British Academy (FBA),[1] the Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters,[2] Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh (FRSE) and a Foreign Honorary Fellow of the American Academy of Arts & Sciences.


Simon Blackburn is a British academic philosopher known for his work in metaethics, where he defends quasi-realism, and in the philosophy of language; more recently, he has gained a large general audience from his efforts to popularise philosophy. He retired as professor of philosophy at the University of Cambridge in 2011, but remains a distinguished research professor of philosophy at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, teaching every fall semester. He is also a Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge, and a member of the professoriate of New College of the Humanities. He was previously a Fellow of Pembroke College, Oxford and has also taught full-time at the University of North Carolina as an Edna J. Koury Professor. He is a former president of the Aristotelian Society, having served the 2009�"2010 term.

Walter Sinnott-Armstrong (born 1955) is an American philosopher. He specializes in ethics, epistemology, and more recently in neuroethics, the philosophy of law, and the philosophy of cognitive science. He is the Chauncey Stillman Professor of Practical Ethics in the Department of Philosophy and the Kenan Institute for Ethics at Duke University.[1] He earned his Ph.D. from Yale University under the supervision of Robert Fogelin and Ruth Barcan Marcus, and taught for many years at Dartmouth College, before moving to Duke.[2]

His Moral Skepticisms (2006) defends the view that we do not have fully adequate responses to the moral skeptic. It also defends a coherentist moral epistemology, which he has defended for decades. His Morality Without God? (2009) endorses the moral philosophy of his former colleague Bernard Gert as an alternative to religious views of morality.

In 1999, he debated William Lane Craig in a debate titled "God? A Debate Between A Christian and An Atheist".[3]

Walter Sinnott-Armstrong argues that God is not only not essential to morality, but moral behaviour should be independent of religion. A separate entity one could say. He strongly disagrees with several core ideas: 1. that atheists are immoral people; 2. that any society will become like lord of the flies if it becomes too secular; 3. that without morality being laid out in front of us, like a commandment, we have no reason to be moral; 4. that absolute moral standards require the existence of a God( he sees that people themselves are inherently good and not bad); and 5. that without religion, we simply couldn't know what is bad and what is good.

Dan Fincke also argues in defense of objective morality.

@ the OP
I didn't read through the entire thread, so I don't know if anyone else pointed out that you're assuming that omnipotent beings would want to kill other omnipotent beings.

How about this argument? I call it, "Proof that there can be more than one God".
x is god
y is god
gods are omnibenevolent
omnibenevolent beings have no desire to kill others
therefore it's possible that there are 2 (or more) gods

I was born in late December. I identify as INTJ.

I'm reminded that although Marcel coined the term "Existentialism", he also later rejected the label, because of the way Sartre used it. He preferred the term "Neo-Socratic".