Coming back to the OP:

Wokeness is not simply an ideology or a belief system. Instead, it reveals the irreversible transformation of the autonomous, rational subject of liberalism into a digitized, emotive, and aestheticized form of subjectivity. — Number2018

If wokeness (or its conditions) are irreversible, then is it reasonable to oppose it? Because my approach here is something like: <Wokeness is bad; it should be opposed; what is irreversible cannot be opposed; therefore wokeness is not irreversible>. Yet I must at the same time recognize that the conditions that created wokeness will be very hard to reverse.

Or perhaps my syllogism is off. Perhaps the conditions are irreversible and therefore must be opposed only in roundabout ways.

Fair enough.

This is a rather pervasive cultural issue. An acute example of it was the conversation between Sam Harris and Ezra Klein that I have referenced. The issue is becoming more pervasive because a goal of "colorblindness" is being abandoned within the culture for various different reasons.

I’m not looking for an argument or even an explanation. I’m just curious. Is expressing the opinion that white people are more intelligent as a class than black people cause for immediate banning? — T Clark

Yes. — Jamal

Aren't there multiple studies showing that, for example, Asians have a higher mean IQ than other races? Wikipedia catalogues the general issue of race and intelligence.

I am not saying that the discussion about reason and affect is tangential. I am saying that the broader conversation about intractable disagreement is tangential.

“Fixed” was not the right word. What I meant is a created or preset standard, as if a requirement. An example is philosophy’s historic desire to dictate what is “rational” (assuming universality or generalizability, prediction, completeness, certainty, normativity, etc) ahead of looking for how things have rationality, reasons, things that matter. — Antony Nickles

So I think you're contradicting yourself here, given that you're establishing a created or preset standard, namely, "One should not dictate what is rational ahead of looking for how things have rationality." What you're relying on here is the standard against post hoc rationalization, and this is of course a good standard. But it looks like your objection to preset standards relies on a preset standard.

I believe I said this “out loud” above — Antony Nickles

Sort of, in that you gesture towards your preset standard that you wish to apply, but you don't apply it. You don't say, "This is where my preset standard is being violated and here's why."

The reason is that “‘rational/irrational’ gets in the way”. This seems clear on its face. — Antony Nickles

You told me that you had provided the reason I was asking for, but that my "desire for a specific kind of answer [was] getting in the way." I asked where you had done so, and you said that you did it in your first post, but that you did such a poor job of it that I should look elsewhere. So it looks like my question, "Where can I find this reason?," was never answered.

Just because you don’t understand it — Antony Nickles

I am far from the only one.

Just because you don’t understand it, doesn’t mean I am not saying it, — Antony Nickles

You told me that you've already explained it, I asked where, and you literally failed to tell me where. That's why I came to the conclusion that you haven't done it.

How am I, how is anyone, able to explain something in a way where it anticipates every possible misunderstanding, question, land mine, etc? I have stood here ready to explain, clarify, correct, admit, etc.. Have you done everything you can to understand (even read everything?) before you accuse me of saying nothing? And you accuse me of dodging? Unbelievable. — Antony Nickles

Think about how much ink has been spilt in this thread. An enormous amount. Then when I ask what you are saying, all you come up with is effectively, "Don't dictate what is 'rational' before understanding how things have rationality." That is a truism. Is that all you were saying with this enormous amount of ink? Again, at the very least you would have to say where and how this "dictation" is occurring if it is to count as "saying something."

My reason was to point out a philosophical error that dictates what we see, and overlook. — Antony Nickles

But you didn't point it out. You didn't point to its occurrence. We can do it again: If you've pointed out the error, where did you point it out? In which post?

Take my name out of your mouth. — Antony Nickles

No thanks. The point about your "steering" is deeply relevant. If you would not reject the term "steer" then feel free to correct my interpretation.

Your coercive approach, both publicly and privately, is unfortunate. It is certainly not philosophical.

Richard Rorty made some interesting observations along these lines. — Joshs

Yes, and along the same lines Wittgenstein never seemed to recognize that others would approach him in the way that he approached these other philosophers. There is that general tendency of "exempting oneself."

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I don’t want my position to be misread as a claim that when we deliberate we may be blind to the true motives and meanings of what we are trying to reason about. For any ideas which are important to us, it is a mistake to say they are unconscious or that we are unaware of them. — Joshs

Right, and even if we are blind to a motive or meaning, that blindness must itself be brought to light if it is to be leveraged dialogically.

But I suggest that the more philosophically, spiritually and ethically consequential the topic, the more likely it is that the participants will begin talking past each other, which is where the intransigence of presuppositions I discussed earlier becomes a barrier to consensus, not due to hidden or unconscious dynamics, but the limits of any given framework of intelligibility to assimilate elements outside its range of convenience. — Joshs

Sure, and like I said, this all feels a little bit like a tangential topic.

I feel like I should take issue with the presumption, but the question itself is too broad for me to answer. Nevertheless (stepping in front of the loaded question), what is an example of an error that is moral, say ideological? As, say, opposed to a political one, like dictatorship? — Antony Nickles

There are no hard divides in these categories. The ideological sphere and the political sphere are both part of the moral sphere, and the ideological sphere and the political sphere themselves will overlap, especially depending on how we construe "ideological." So a dictatorship is simultaneously a moral and political phenomenon, and may well be an ideological phenomenon too.

I am asking, "Is it possible for wokeness to be [insert negative valuation here]?" So if our term is "erroneous," then I am asking whether wokeness can be erroneous. Most generally we might ask, "Is it logically possible for wokeness to be bad?"

If you admit that some things are bad, then I at least know that you are in principle willing to admit of the badness of wokeness. If not then I may be up against something quite difficult.

Dewey (as I discuss here) will call intolerance a “treason” to democracy, which would cast one out of the polis, not be “wrong” or a mistake. — Antony Nickles

So for Dewey intolerance is hypothetically wrong given a democratic outlook, but it is not categorically wrong given that there is nothing categorical about a democratic outlook. Is it your position that something like wokeness can be hypothetically wrong (according to a hypothetical imperative), but not wrong per se (according to a non-hypothetical imperative)? If so, then you are saying something like, "The woke person is not simply wrong given that wrongness presupposes standards and all standards are hypothetical."

In AO Deleuze distinguishes between investment in pre-conscious interests and unconscious desires. Pre-conscious interests guide and organize what matters and how it matters. — Joshs

I see your approach and @Antony Nickles' as quite distinct for the relevance of this thread (despite some overlap in general). But there is a point at which they can come together. It is this: we can talk all we like about "pre-conscious interests," "unconscious desires," "a preliminary stage to that in which we know our goals," but all of this is actually non-discursive and therefore separate from what occurs on a philosophy forum. A philosophy forum could be driven by any number of such things, but it is not possible or permissible to directly appeal to such phenomena as justification for this or that claim. The non-discursive aspect must first be made transparent and discursive before it can be utilized within a discursive context such as a philosophy forum.

More simply, a philosophy forum is about deliberation, and we deliberate about that which we are conscious of, not what we are unconscious of. The only way that unconscious entities can be brought to bear within a deliberative philosophy forum is by first bringing them into consciousness.

You rightly take from Wittgenstein the anchoring of sense in systems of intelligibility that he talks about in terms of language games, forms of life and hinges.
What Wittgenstein does not discuss is how difficult one should expect it to be to persuade another to change their way of looking at things. — Joshs

Yes, and I think that lacuna is built in:

As Wittgenstein observes, "There is no why. I simply do not. This is how I act" (OC 148). — Moliere

How should we respond to Wittgenstein here? Apparently by pointing out to him that there is a why, and that other people act differently than he does. As soon as two people who act in foundationally different ways come into contact with one another the "why" will become a question of interest. — Leontiskos

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Armed with this knowledge, you hoped to steer the discussion of wokeness away from what is true, rational , reasonable and logical to a preliminary exploration of the different ways participants construe what is at stake and at issue, and then see what kind of consensus might arise from this hermeneutic exercise. — Joshs

I would say the problem is that @Antony Nickles would reject your verb "steer." He somehow doesn't understand himself to be doing anything. In his mind he is not steering, he is not arguing, he is not taking an ideological side and he is not even acting for the sake of any end or goal whatsoever. Thus it becomes impossible to get him to see the fork in the road between these two approaches that you outline. My underlying point has been, "Hey, there's a fork in the road here. We have to deliberate and discuss which route to take. We can't pretend there isn't a fork while simultaneously picking a side."

I get the oddest responses from Wittgenstenians when I tell them that their activity is not being done for no reason at all - when I tell them that everyone acts for ends, themselves included. They tend to see themselves as eternally above the fray.

I said, “to ignore… in only recognizing fixed standards”, and this would be preset (created) requirements, not “any standards” — Antony Nickles

So do you know what you mean by "fixed standards" vs. "any standards"? Can you provide an example of a non-fixed standard?

And here, as I have said (quite a few times now), I am not trying to cut off argument or dismiss anyone (not saying “can’t critique” or “aren’t allowed”), only suggesting we find out if our (any) assumptions are getting in the way of seeing things clearly. — Antony Nickles

I want you to say out loud what sort of assumption would get in the way of seeing things clearly. You keep alluding to things that you never actually explicate.

I think the presumption here [...] is that I actually do have a position — Antony Nickles

Yes, the presumption is that you do have a position, and that this is why you are interested in this thread. Be forthright about your position, even if your position is not simply pro-woke or anti-woke. Tell us what you are arguing for or against and why, even if you are arguing for greater clarification because you think there is a lack of clarity.

Isn’t this what anyone is against, being judged prematurely, say, based on an inappropriate standard? — Antony Nickles

If you want to be forthright then you have to spell out the inappropriate standard that you think is in play. You can't just keep making vague allusions ad infinitum.

This is an instructive exchange:

I have tried to explain this, make an argument for it; — Antony Nickles

Can you point me to the post where you provide reasons for why we ought to take a step back? — Leontiskos

My first post was to get at why “rational/irrational” gets in the way, and to suggest a way around that, but I think I did such a poor job of it, not expecting confusion in the right places, that I think it better to just see what I am doing in, participate in the method of, the example and maybe hold off of on the larger philosophical issues; — Antony Nickles

So are you saying that you don't really know of a place where you provide reasons for why we ought to take a step back? — Leontiskos

We keep going in this circle because you apparently want to say things without being committ[ed] to saying anything. Every time someone tries to capture what you are saying you balk, and then do not clarify what you are saying. I want you to say something and stick to it. Say something that you are willing to stand behind. Philosophy cannot begin until that occurs.

Let’s start with this: If you agree with Barron that CT doesn’t adhere to an ‘anything goes’ relativism, are you claiming that some wokists do adhere to an ‘anything goes’ relativism? Can you give specific examples here, (besides Amadeus’s assertions)? — Joshs

Sure: the woke belief that (biological) men and (biological) women should compete against one another within the same sport.

I suggest it is extremely unlikely the woke leadership, much less the rank and file, has assimilated any of this stuff — Joshs

I agree, but you are the one who wanted to explore the connection between wokism and philosophical antecedents. Why did you want to do that?

Is it your contention that wokist practices are so wildly deviant from the philosophical antecedents Barron mentions that ‘blurring the difference’ deprives us of a vital understanding of wokists? — Joshs

My contention is that one who "blurs the difference" is able to conclude whatever they want to conclude. For example, you cherry pick a subset of philosophers from a very broad construal of CT, ask how wokism could possibly issue from such thinkers, all the while refusing to consider other thinkers in that very same broad construal of CT. Everything is so loose here that ad hoc reasoning becomes incredibly easy. To give another example, you single out Adorno to somehow justify your highly implausible claim that CT is realist.

Are you suggesting that wokists, in treating others as a means to an end, don’t believe they have intrinsic worth? Should I be looking in the direction of Kant to locate the context of your critique of means-ends thinking? — Joshs

Do you really not know what a means and an end are?

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You may be more conversant with Hegel than I am, but I suspect that thinking a hierarchy of values according to power originates with Hegel’s dialectical ‘stages’ of history. His idea of a totalizing emancipatory telos in the form of absolute Spirit becomes naturalized as dialectical materialism with Marx, and rethought as discursive power relations with CT writers. This is where I situate wokism, more or less. Only with Nietzsche and postmodern writers like Foucault is the logic of an emancipatory hierarchy and telos abandoned.
If to be woke is to be enlightened, then Foucault’s response to Kant’s 1774 essay ‘What is Enlightenment’ is instructive of where he might depart from wokists. He considers enlightenment not as emancipation through reason (as in Kant), but as the use of reason to challenge authority, norms, and institutions. This is true of wokists as well, but woke movements often aim to enforce moral clarity, while Foucault sees that impulse as itself a form of power-knowledge that should be questioned. — Joshs

This seems largely correct, but the more general point is that wokism isn't genealogically simple. It derives from a number of different sources, philosophical and non-philosophical. For example, when I called it a Christian heresy I was saying that one of its sources is Christian morality.

To add on a bit of a late point, I have often found that people who are pro-woke tend to retreat to theoreticals and philosophy while neglecting the material concerns that were brought up. It's an understandable impulse, but a frustrating one. I am sympathetic to moral concerns, obviously, but I find woke actions often have a startling lack of pragmatism backing them up. It gives off the vibe that they would rather lose than compromise what seem to be increasingly rigid beliefs. While I find this admirable to an extent, it makes attempts at rational discussion about pragmatic solutions all but impossible sometimes, even when you ultimately share similar goals. — MrLiminal

Yes, that's a very interesting point. :up:

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That should have been more plainly said by the critic of the critique/assessment. Are you trying to be woke about criticizing wokeness? — Fire Ologist

The "ad hoc" objection could be phrased this way, "You just dislike wokism. You have no real arguments against it; it's just an emotional dislike."

True. So maybe what is peculiar about “wokeness” has not been peculiar at all? “Woke” is merely a new window dressing, a new word, for erroneous justification of emotional conviction? — Fire Ologist

I think it is a particular determination of that broader sort of error. It is also a paradigm example given that its outcomes are so obviously inordinate.

I think this is helpful in furthering the discussion. :up:

We could certainly talk about the relation between reason and "affect," but I want to remain at a different level for a moment. If one holds to a theory in which it is possible for ideological movements such as wokeness to be erroneous, then it is possible for that person to see wokeness as erroneous. Contrariwise, if one holds to a theory in which it is not possible for ideological movements such as wokeness to be erroneous, then it is not possible for that person to see wokeness as erroneous. This point is very similar to my analogy about weeding a garden. Note too that we could substitute different negative valuations for "erroneous."

I am wondering if @Joshs and @Antony Nickles think ideological error (and the attendant rebuke) is possible. My guess is that both of you do not think that moral error is possible (which includes ideological error), and that you hold this for slightly different reasons. If this is right and there are different grounds at play, then I think the anthropological reason-affect approach could be useful in speaking to @Joshs but not in speaking to @Antony Nickles. @Antony Nickles seems to eschew charges of irrationality for a somewhat different reason.

In these terms, my point was that the ad hoc assumption of—inherently to prove legitimacy/not legitimate up front—say, the desire for, a framing of irrationality/emotion, is endemic in philosophy and humanity, and gets in the way of a broader practice of assessment. I should have qualified this with the recognition that there are mistakes (to be) made (bad means), and I do think it is important to sort the wheat from the (general) chaff. And here it seems there is some distinction to be made between (general) bad means separate from certain goals or criteria, and those intrinsic in the value(ing) of certain criteria, and, recognizing there are costs to meeting most goals, is the juice worth the squeeze (and what that is, and if avoidable, able to be mitigated, etc) — Antony Nickles

This is just so hard to read. I'm not sure what you are saying.

Edit: Note too that so much of this can be simplified. An ad hoc assumption merely intended to "prove" legitimacy/illegitimacy up front is already a huge problem.

I asked where you argued that a step back is necessary, and you basically didn't answer my question. So I went back to some of your earlier posts to look. Here is one issue I found:

And what I suggest is not to understand the other’s “experience”, which has been philosophically pictured as ever-present and always “mine”, which manifests as the desire to remain misunderstood (or be clear on its face), or be special by nature (always unique). But it is also used as a justification to ignore the human altogether in only recognizing fixed standards for knowledge and rationality. I take these as a general human desire to avoid responsibility to answer for ourselves and to make others intelligible. — Antony Nickles

I am going to point out some of the grammatical problems first, because these seem to be present throughout. What does "it is" refer to? What does "these" refer to? It's hard to follow what you are saying.

With that said, it seems like your thesis in this paragraph is <We must move beyond fixed standard for knowledge and rationality>. So let me just oppose that thesis of yours. Here are two "fixed standards":

1. We should not put second things first
2. We should not place appearance over reality

A woke example of the first would be an attempt to make diversity an absolute goal. A woke example of the second would be virtue signaling.

Now we can argue over whether the woke do either of these two things, but on your argument that doesn't seem to matter at all. On your argument, even if they do those things, I still can't critique them because my critique involves a "fixed standard for [...] rationality."

To be clear, suppose I accuse the woke of virtue signaling. Someone might respond, "I recognize the standard which says that we should not engage in virtue signaling, but I am not engaged in virtue signaling." Yet that is not the response I am interested in, because it is not your response. Your response is apparently, "To critique on the basis of virtue signaling is to critique on the basis of a fixed standard, and you aren't allowed to appeal to fixed standards; therefore your critique fails." Do we agree that this is your response? If not, then what does it mean to object to fixed standards?

Yes. To qualify as art less, means it only marginally identifies as art. Oatmeal, or a poo painting. This is not a value judgement, this is a statement about what the object is; that is, hardly art at all. You keep insisting that this is a value judgement. — hypericin

Recall:

1. Either some human act/creation is more artistic than some other human act/creation, or else no human act/creation is more artistic than any other human act/creation. — Leontiskos

1a. Either some thing is more artistic than some other thing, or else no thing is more artistic than any other thing. — Leontiskos

[1b. Either some art is better (or more artistic) than other art, or else no art is better (or more artistic) than any other art.] — Leontiskos

Let's do another:

1c. Either some art is less art than other art, or else all art is equally art.

You can't have it both ways. You can't say that all art is equally art, and then say that some art is "barely" art, or that some art "only marginally identifies as art," or that some art is, "hardly art at all." Inclusion within the category 'art' is either absolute or its not. If "art-likeness [...] determines whether something is art or not," and whether something is art or not does not come in degrees, then "art-likeness" cannot come in degrees.

Comparison to absolute? What does that mean? — hypericin

This was the exchange:

• Leontiskos: Someone who desires art will hold that what is more artistic is better than what is less artistic.
• Hypericin: A critic might say, "though the piece is obviously artistic, I don't care for it".

In order to give a valid counterargument you must give an example where someone who desires art holds that what is less artistic is better than what is more artistic. You didn't. You simply gave an example of someone who doesn't like a piece of art. You would have to give an example of an artist who is looking at two pieces of art, says that the first piece is more artistic than the second, and nevertheless holds that the second is better qua art. When we are talking about "better art" we are obviously talking about "better qua art." When you say that someone might prefer an artistically inferior meal to the Michelin meal, you are conflating 'better' qua art with 'better' in some other sense.

How? I don't see it.

Out "notable agreement" speaks only to identity, not quality. It seems you can't stop conflating the two, if you think otherwise. Is the word "qualifies" throwing you off? — hypericin

So:

(A notable point of agreement here may be this: That which barely qualifies as art at all is much more likely to be mistaken for non-art than something which readily qualifies as art, and the person who makes a mistake with regard to the former is much less mistaken than the person who makes a mistake with regard to the latter.) — Leontiskos

On your account, how is it that these two things are true? If the two categories were neatly separate then why are they interrelated in these ways? This is the same question I asked at the bottom of .

Is the word "qualifies" throwing you off? — hypericin

No, the problem is the word "barely," which implies that some things qualify as art less than others. You began using that word when you talked about, "barely belonging to the category at all."

Sorry for the delay, I was camping and wasn't on here much. — hypericin

No worries, although I have lost the thread a little bit.

Someone who desires art will hold that what is more artistic is better than what is less artistic. — Leontiskos

Not true, even though "artistic" is a poor choice of words on my part.

A critic might say, "though the piece is obviously artistic, I don't care for it". This reads normally enough to me. — hypericin

You've switched from a comparison to an absolute. What I said did not imply that an artist must care for every piece of art.

But "artistic" is a bad choice because it not only means "art-like, belonging to the category of art", there are strong positive connotations about quality. — hypericin

I don't think it's a coincidence. What is less obviously art is less art, and what is more obviously art is more art. The semantics of "artistic" simply capture this, and it's no coincidence that "artsy" is much close to slang. Your idea that what counts as art and what counts as good art are two entirely separate issues looks to be mistaken, and one way to see this is by looking at our "notable point of agreement":

(A notable point of agreement here may be this: That which barely qualifies as art at all is much more likely to be mistaken for non-art than something which readily qualifies as art, and the person who makes a mistake with regard to the former is much less mistaken than the person who makes a mistake with regard to the latter.) — Leontiskos

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"Someone who desires art will hold that what is more art-like is better than what is less art-like." Is clearly false. — hypericin

Again, your counterexample is not valid.

Better art does not belong to the category of art more than lesser art. — hypericin

It does.

Either it belongs, it doesn't, or it's marginal. — hypericin

This is not correct. You've been asserting this over and over.

Art-likeness is distinct from quality, and it, not quality, determines whether something is art or not. Do you agree? — hypericin

Art-likeness is not a word, and there's a reason for that. You could make up a word for that which denotes species but not quality, and your statement would be tautologous. That's more or less what you have done.

Great—likely, we’re now much closer to a more nuanced and developed approach to the phenomenon of wokeness. What you describe as “neglect is volitional, albeit indirectly volitional. The short-circuit is favored” corresponds to our response to the pressures of immediate situations. We are constantly required to make decisions about complex matters within very short time spans. — Number2018

Right, and it also corresponds to 's essay about the way that modern technologies promote and exacerbate this tendency.

As a result, many of our decisions become automatized, almost unconscious. This condition affects not only those identified as “woke” but all of us. Woke individuals primarely remain anchored in a relatively localized domain, where they can continuously demonstrate their vigorous sense of moral rightness and commitment to justice. In doing so, they vividly illustrate how rationality can become subsumed by the impact of ‘the short-circuit’. — Number2018

I agree.

Hannah Arendt offered a remarkable account of Eichmann. However, it is not quite accurate to describe him as irrational—he was, in fact, following the bureaucratic logic of the Nazi regime. Most likely, his most consequential decision was joining the Nazi party. From that point on, he became a thoughtless functionary. But that pivotal decision was made at a more subtle level, shaped by unconscious affective forces rather than deliberate reasoning. — Number2018

Good, and we could agree with Hume at least on one point, namely that Eichmann's rationality was placed at the service of Nazism. Eichmann's reason became a slave to his passions, at least if we see Nazism as part of his passions. So Eichmann was involved in a lot of thought and reasoning about how to further his goal of Nazism, but in another sense he was being thoughtless and irrational.

Yes, like we all do in adolescence. — Fire Ologist

Or when we're tired. :lol:

The emotional response to systemic power differences usurps good judgement. — Fire Ologist

Yes.

I think the objection from @Antony Nickles is somewhat related to ad hoc reasoning. A critique or even assessment of wokeness can feel ad hoc (and therefore unsympathetic) if it is not situated within a broader theory of error or understanding/assessing. So perhaps it will help for me to acknowledge that the general error of the woke is not only found elsewhere, but is actually the basis for almost all bad/evil acts of judgment whatsoever. Almost every time we make a true mistake we are involved in this form of neglect.

(The exception for Aquinas is malice, namely when one sees clearly that their act is wrong and they do it anyway. With negligence that clear sight is not in place, and this is the more common case.)

Right, and I was thinking more in terms of breaking off a tangent from an existing thread, but it could also be used to survey interest in an altogether new topic. :up:

I just wanted to make this thread available for future use.

You may be right this; I had thought we were getting somewhere, but getting to what counts for woke, much less to judge if it has ended, has been harder than I considered. — Antony Nickles

Fair enough. :up:

I must apologize for this; it was a joke, in bad taste, which I thought was clear, as you seemed hell-bent on assuming I was somehow, in not attacking your argument, I was attacking you, your character, or your ability to judge at all. Poorly done on my part. — Antony Nickles

No worries. I actually thought you were trying to be polite. I suppose my point is that one can critique someone's judgment or even their character without falling into ad hominem. For example, if my judgment is consistently premature on some given topic then I may well need to consider my ability to judge that sort of topic, or the character that gives rise to such judgments. There is nothing inconsistent in this given that the affective critique of wokeness is similar, and is by definition going to go beyond the merely rational. To critique a movement on affective grounds will certainly look like ad hominem to the untrained eye.

Of course I was saying judgment was being made prematurely, but not any particular judgments, other than the assumption of the rational-irrational dichotomy, which, as I said, is how I got started... — Antony Nickles

Yes, I am going to try to revisit some of your early posts where you talk about that rational-irrational dichotomy. :up:

You're right—and that's likely why I introduced a new example myself: the case of Eichmann. — Number2018

In this context, Eichmann's case can become a paradigmatic example. My knowledge of the case is based primarily on Hannah Arendt’s account. “He merely, to put the matter colloquially, never realized what he was doing… It was sheer thoughtlessness—something by no means identical with stupidity—that predisposed [Eichmann] to become one of the greatest criminals of that period. … That such remoteness from reality and such thoughtlessness can wreak more havoc than all the evil instincts taken together.” (Arendt, ‘Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on the Banality of Evil’, pg 36) — Number2018

I think this could be helpful. I would actually follow Aquinas to a conclusion slightly different from Arendt's. For Aquinas the evil of error is primarily a matter of neglect. For example, when you are excited to visit your beloved you might speed and "forget" the speed limit. You haven't really forgotten it since it's still there in the back of your mind, but you're neglecting it. More generally, there is a sense in which you are capable of following the speed limit and yet choose not to.

One could cash that out in terms of "thoughtlessness," but I think what is happening is more subtle. A kind of short-circuit occurs in the judgment such that one goal is prioritized to such an extent that other goals are ignored (which in this case is a restriction-goal: not-speeding). I agree that this is all deeply bound up with affectivity and the passions, but the moral point I would emphasize is that neglect is volitional, albeit indirectly volitional. The short-circuit is favored. The lover neglects to obey or even consider the rationale for not-speeding, or else he neglects to obey or even consider the cause(s) that would either allow him to consider that rationale, or which obstruct him from being able to consider that rationale.

The affectivity of this case is a kind of obstruction to the judgment, and one which in fact pleases the lover. Without that obstruction he would need to slow down and he would thus delay his union with his beloved. So there is a complex intertwining and mixing of the rationality and the affectivity, and yet the lover who speeds has prioritized his affectivity whereas the lover who does not speed has prioritized his rationality (or has prioritized the broader context of goals by not allowing one to dominate the others). This prioritization often happens over years or decades, fusing with habit and ways of living, and this is why it is so hard to remove ingrained habits or addictions.

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I answer that, A sin is an inordinate act. Accordingly, so far as it is an act, it can have a direct cause, even as any other act; but, so far as it is inordinate, it has a cause, in the same way as a negation or privation can have a cause. Now two causes may be assigned to a negation: in the first place, absence of the cause of affirmation; i.e. the negation of the cause itself, is the cause of the negation in itself; since the result of the removing the cause is the removal of the effect: thus the absence of the sun is the cause of darkness. In the second place, the cause of an affirmation, of which a negation is a sequel, is the accidental cause of the resulting negation: thus fire by causing heat in virtue of its principal tendency, consequently causes a privation of cold. The first of these suffices to cause a simple negation. But, since the inordinateness of sin and of every evil is not a simple negation, but the privation of that which something ought naturally to have, such an inordinateness must needs have an accidental efficient cause. For that which naturally is and ought to be in a thing, is never lacking except on account of some impeding cause. And accordingly we are wont to say that evil, which consists in a certain privation, has a deficient cause, or an accidental efficient cause. Now every accidental cause is reducible to the direct cause. Since then sin, on the part of its inordinateness, has an accidental efficient cause, and on the part of the act, a direct efficient cause, it follows that the inordinateness of sin is a result of the cause of the act. Accordingly then, the will lacking the direction of the rule of reason and of the Divine law, and intent on some mutable good, causes the act of sin directly, and the inordinateness of the act, indirectly, and beside the intention: for the lack of order in the act results from the lack of direction in the will. — Aquinas, ST I-II.75.1 - Whether sin has a cause?

...That gets a bit complicated, but the point is that sin has to do with inordinateness, and that therefore the goal ("good") causes the inordinateness of the act indirectly, beside the intention. What is at stake is a lack of order, not simple thoughtlessness. The lover has failed to order his activity according to the speed limit law; that he has done so is beside his intention; and nevertheless he is still morally culpable for this neglect.

Let’s assume that I am uncertain about what woke is (it seems not far from the truth); think about the criteria you would explain to me so I would be able to tell it from something else I would know that is close to it and/or opposite to it (as we were doing with work experience vs lived experience). — Antony Nickles

I thought lived experience was a woke thing, but I am more than willing to admit I don’t know what I am talking about, or I picked the wrong context. — Antony Nickles

I thought I was speaking Klingon. Yes. How do we tell? What matters to (in judging) it being “woke”? — Antony Nickles

I would say woke has to do with systemic discrimination or systemic inequality, as seen in things like DEI. The woke person thinks there are societal problems that most people are blind or asleep to, and this usually cashes out as what is "systemic," such as "systemic racism."

The whole issue revolves around the question, "How much of a good thing is too much?" Everyone agrees that it is good to oppose certain forms of discrimination or inequality, to a certain extent. The critique of the woke is that they go too far, failing to make proper distinctions and failing to take into account an organic system of competing values. They become affectively set on one value or goal to the detriment of all others.

@Antony Nickles

You want to take a step back to a meta-level, such as <Nathan Jacobs> describes. The problem is that I disagree with the step back you want to take. You think that if we take the time to look at an example we will understand wokeness differently, or else that we will have a more sufficient understanding unto judgment.

I could offer a different step back which responds to your own reasons for wanting to take a step back. The problem is that I think we are <derailing the thread>. Note too that as someone who thinks wokeness is being approached inappropriately in this thread, you wish for the inappropriate approach to cease or to be replaced by a better approach. By constantly attempting to change the subject and introduce new topics or examples, you have effectively ceased the discussion of wokeness that the thread is about. Whether intentional or not, you have effectively derailed the thread from the topic of the OP. Perhaps the tangent would arrive back at the topic of the thread, and perhaps it wouldn’t. Either way, the discussion of the topic of the OP has ceased for very many pages now.

But if we don’t want to create a new thread—and I don’t necessarily have the time to field it—then I can outline the “step back” that I would offer in response to your own jockeying for a “step back.” The key error I see in your approach is your premise which says, “People often make premature judgments, but no one is doing that here.” If people often make premature judgments, then we are not immune; and if you think we need to reconsider the whole issue from a different vantage point, then you probably think we are making premature judgments. Although politeness and tact have their place, we simply cannot traverse this terrain without forthrightly acknowledging that a premature judgment is at stake, and may be being made. If you were to simply bite the bullet and raise this issue of premature judgment, all of the problems with coercion and double standards I have been pointing out would evaporate. This is because we both agree that premature judgments are inappropriate, and therefore in that case we have the same end rather than a coercive or imposed end (similar to my point to Banno <here>).

Besides that, the deeper deeper problem is one of error: what it is, how to address it, how to accuse others of error and then bring them around to a proper understanding, etc. When error is correctable it involves an inconsistency, and the error is removed when the inconsistency is resolved in the right direction. So if you think premature judgments are being made with respect to wokeness, and your interlocutor agrees that premature judgments are impermissible, then if you are able to show your interlocutor that he is making a premature judgment with respect to wokeness he will be have corrected his error. Or if my interlocutor agrees that coercion is impermissible in the sphere of philosophy, and I am able to show him that he is involved in coercion, then he will amend his approach. Yet—not unlike wokeness—there is an affective impediment within our culture to the idea that error concretely exists either in ourselves or in our interlocutors.* This is related to a pluralism which does not want to deem anyone to be wrong.

(Note that this is very similar to what I have run up against in @J's approach to philosophy).

* The great thing about your disposition is that you never double down on the double standard of coercion. You are the first one on TPF who did not do this, and it took me by surprise. When I point out to others their double standard of coercion, they conveniently ignore the point for hundreds of pages, in fact never owning up to it at all.

I assumed that considering using lived experience as a criteria for appointment to a board would be something that would at issue here. As I said, feel free to chose a different example that involves indecision on how to move forward. Having a situation only matters in that we would have existing criteria for doing something, but that there is either something happening that we haven’t considered or new criteria being suggested, etc. that make us uncertain as to how to continue, but, from where we are (lost). I am suggesting that, instead of assuming we understand the criteria and the interests they reflect, we actually investigate a situation with this uncertainty to use the criteria as a way in… — Antony Nickles

Okay, so it looks like you are doing something like this:

1. In the case of wokeness we are uncertain of how to proceed
2. In the case of the board hire they are uncertain of how to proceed
3. Therefore, there is a similarity or analogy between the two cases, where one will help shed light on another

That is helpful, because it gives a kind of rationale for the board example. Yet the difficulty is that I do not understand why you hold to (1). What is uncertain about the topic of this thread, wokeness? Curiously enough, this thread has some of the strongest consensus I have ever seen on TPF. There is very little uncertainty of how to proceed. People from all different philosophical and political backgrounds are agreeing that there are problems with wokeness, and they are in large agreement on what those problems are. So your notion that there is uncertainty about how to proceed does not seem to be in evidence. Could you explain where it is coming from?

wanting to first decide what we are going to do, or imposing criteria for how to decide that, is to skip over examining, in a sense, how the world works. — Antony Nickles

I don't think that's right at all. If we don't know what we want to do, then we don't know what we are doing. But it seems that most all of us in the thread know what we are doing, including the OP. We know the basic genre of activity we are engaged in. To question the idea that we have even this faintest idea of what we are doing seems like a very implausible form of skepticism.

In your board example the board already knows what it is going to do. It is going to hire someone. It just doesn't know who. At least one goal is always in place before we deliberate.

I am simply asking for a good faith effort to try — Antony Nickles

As I have said, if you give us a reason to look for examples of cases where one is uncertain how to proceed, then we will be more likely to engage in efforts to look for examples of cases where one is uncertain how to proceed.

(Is guilting someone coercion?) — Antony Nickles

No, because guilt is self-imposed. Such is an appeal to a principle the person themselves recognizes, not an imposition of a principle.

And my suggestion is to look at the criteria for judging in a particular case (not justifications for x) to find out what is at stake (what is essential about it), as if we don’t yet know, and so would be trying to decide what to do blind (even about a goal). — Antony Nickles

But I think your idea that we will be able to decide what to do without a goal is simply incoherent, and I think any attempt to try to decide what to do without a goal will be wasted time. So I don't want to adopt your premise that one can decide what to do without a goal. I want you to argue for your unintuitive premise, or at least give me a counterexample where someone is trying to decide what to do without a goal.

@Antony Nickles

It is incredibly common on TPF for people to give "random" scenarios such as the board, which then turn out to involve petitio principii, even unbeknownst to them. This happened recently when Srap wanted to frame an issue in terms of moving from one town to another, but in the end his framing . He styled himself as a neutral party, but it turned out he wasn't, which is not surprising. Neutral parties are rare when it comes to these issues where we must all make decisions about the thing at stake. That's why you have to give a rationale for the relevance of your example (analogy?). No one just gives random examples for no reason. I desire transparency.

I have tried to explain this, make an argument for it; — Antony Nickles

Can you point me to the post where you provide reasons for why we ought to take a step back? — Leontiskos

My first post was to get at why “rational/irrational” gets in the way, and to suggest a way around that, but I think I did such a poor job of it, not expecting confusion in the right places, that I think it better to just see what I am doing in, participate in the method of, the example and maybe hold off of on the larger philosophical issues; — Antony Nickles

So are you saying that you don't really know of a place where you provide reasons for why we ought to take a step back? Again, I don't know what your example is supposed to show. I don't know how it counts as a reason.

-

Okay, but how they decide (what is important in deciding) is based on criteria. Contributing to their goals is one criteria (do we have a goal that each other criteria satisfy? “Our goal is to have someone with work experience” How is that saying something different?). There are no more? — Antony Nickles

If you think there is a criterion that is unrelated to the board's goal, then what would that criterion be?

Appointing someone to a board based on "lived experience" is not relevant? — Antony Nickles

I'm asking you to tell us why it is relevant. This is the same issue we ran into earlier. You want us to do something but you won't tell us why. "Let's change our goal." "Why?" "Let's talk about a board." "Why?" It seems to me that just telling people to do things for no reason is coercive, and this is incompatible with philosophy. If you were my Zen master then you could just tell me to do something and I would do it, no questions asked. Or if I accepted your arguments from your own authority, then you could just tell me to do something. In both cases I would trust that you are leading me where I ultimately want to go. But I don't see you as an intrinsic authority who can just give directions without any rationale. So if you want us to talk about a board, then you have to tell us why. Again, should we start talking about surfing? Would I need to provide a reason if I said that?

How is talking about a board going to help us get to where we want to go? How is it related to the topic of this thread, and not a derailment? "Just trust me" is not a reason.

As I said, any other examples are fine by me. (except surfing, though I know there's a joke in there somewhere) — Antony Nickles

Why not surfing? That is precisely the sort of question you need to answer. If you can propose boards for no reason at all, then why can't I propose surfing for no reason at all? If we've done away with reasons then what's the difference?

I’m not attacking a strawman or anything else. I’m merely voicing the opinion that the fundamental conflict is between hierarchical vertical thinking and egalitarian horizontal thinking. — praxis

I don't disagree that the conflict is bound up with that polarity. Let's revisit what you said here:

In the video linked on the previous page, Bishop Barron refers to an 'objective hierarchy of value'—a structure he sees as embedded in the very fabric of reality. While that may be a compelling theological claim, it also implies a preference for maintaining a vertically structured society. And in any vertical structure, there is always a lower class. — praxis

So in Barron's "vertical structure" where justice is good and injustice is bad, the thief is forced to answer to the non-thieves, i.e. he is punished for stealing. That's true, and perhaps it's no coincidence that many of the woke do not believe in theft.

Rather, the fixed hierarchy is key to power stratification that wokeness aims to reduce. — praxis

Well, if you were "merely voicing the opinion [above]," then I don't think you would be using the word "key." That word implies that the non-woke is using hierarchy as a means to their desired end of power stratification. A hierarchy of value results in normative structures and "power stratification" (such as the case where the thief and the non-thief are viewed differently), but I think it is a strawman to impute bad intentions here, as if "power stratification" is the desired end.

But here's a question for you. Take the wokist and place them in every possible world. Is there any possible world where they look around and say, "Ah, there is no power stratification in this world and therefore my wokeness will lie dormant"?

The problem I see with those who promote cryptocurrencies is that they don't appreciate the subtlety of the issue. Their argument is usually grounded as such: <Money is an arbitrary means of exchange; therefore no medium of exchange is better than any other; therefore blockchain is as good as anything else>. As soon as that premise is established they merely attempt to show why blockchain is better than a government-backed currency, for example, and that's the end of it. Not intrinsically better (in terms of worth) but extrinsically better.

World history is the corrective. What medium of exchange is better than blockchain? Precious metals. In order to function, money needs to have worth. Fiat currency involves a jury rigging where what has no worth is accorded worth, is given pseudo-worth. Here is the more accurate argument from the promoter of cryptocurrency:

1. All fiat currencies are arbitrary means of exchange
2. Therefore, no fiat currency is in se better than any other
3. Therefore, blockchain is, prima facie, as good as any other fiat currency

That's a sound argument, but the response is that we don't need to use fiat currency. We could have a monetary standard of precious metals (or else a standard akin to precious metals), and this would be better than both government notes and blockchain. We already have the electronic technology to allow us to avoid carrying physical money, and this could be applied to any relatively transferrable monetary standard.

More simply, here is the argument of the proponent of cryptocurrency:

1. We must either use government-backed currency or cryptocurrency
2. Cryptocurrency is better than government-backed currency
3. Therefore we should use cryptocurrency

And the problem is that (1) is a false dichotomy which overlooks the superior approach which has been used all throughout human history, and which was only truly abandoned within the last century.

By learning that aesthetic appreciation is not a means to an end, we have a better understanding of the phenomenon, but we have nevertheless not honed in on it in a truly singular way. — Leontiskos

I'm tempted to say a "double" way -- at least if negation is allowed. — Moliere

By "singular way" I only meant that although art is an end in itself, nevertheless knowing this does not enable us to distinguish art from other things that are also ends in themselves (e.g. pleasure, friendship, etc.).

Are you saying that we want to be able to say what art isn't?

I ought not to have mentioned sex as an analogue now, I think. Two contentious topics can't clarify one another when they're both contentious. — Moliere

I tend to agree with this. :grin:

We need a situation obviously. I’ll just throw out there what AmadeusD and I started on, which was basically, say, adding people to a board. — Antony Nickles

the ability to contribute to the board's goals
— Antony Nickles

On our exchange, this is what's going on. The rest is window dressing. — AmadeusD

I think AmadeusD is right. A board hires someone who will best contribute to their goals. The rest of your post is based on assumptions about the different kinds of goals different kinds of boards would have. But like my other questions, I don't know why we are pretending we are on a board. I think you have to provide some rationale for why we should think up a pretend "situation" and then think through that pretend scenario.

For example, I might say, "Antony, let's pretend that we're surfing. Let's brainstorm about our criteria for choosing a wave. There's a big wave forming, but it looks like there's a shark nearby..." You might say to me, "This is a thread about wokeness. Why do you want me to pretend I am surfing? Shouldn't we be talking about wokeness in a thread on wokeness? Unless I am missing something and you can give me a good reason why I should pretend I'm surfing...?"

Is your point with the board that if the company serves some group—say a minority—then that minority should be represented on the board, and that this therefore has something to do with DEI?

I have tried to explain this, make an argument for it; — Antony Nickles

Maybe I just missed it. Can you point me to the post where you provide reasons for why we ought to take a step back?

But we never get to opening day and to cash out any of the criteria or see what products sell and which don’t and see a customer smiling as they say “thanks”.

We never conclude something together.

It’s all back-office paperwork. — Fire Ologist

Yes, and this is largely why the "step back" is not necessarily unobjectionable. We have members who literally argue that there is no correct judgment to be had, and when they counsel taking a step back this is what they are aiming at.

I will write the first post. This is meant to be an example for the Staging Area, but maybe we actually do want a new thread. Maybe we don't.

Step 1. Identify the thread and tag those who are participating in the tangential topic.

Thread: The End of Woke
Participants: @Antony Nickles, @AmadeusD, @Fire Ologist, and perhaps @Count Timothy von Icarus and @Joshs


Step 2. Propose or query the idea of a new thread as a means to framing the issue correctly and fairly. Proposing thread titles will be especially helpful. Optionally, one may wish to open a discussion about whether a new thread is necessary.

Hey guys, judging from posts like , , and , it looks like we might have a tangential topic arising within the thread, "The End of Woke." Would it be worthwhile to split the tangent off into a separate thread? If so, how should we frame the new topic? [Insert Leontiskos' starting point for framing the issue here]

...I will actually give a truncated starting point for framing this tangential topic. If I had more time I would write something a bit longer...

The tangent seems to be related to intractable disagreements and how to navigate them. It pertains to the move wherein one implores their interlocutors to shift to a meta-level in order to clarify more fundamental issues or disagreements.

If we did want a new thread for this tangential topic, here are some possible titles. Please add more:

1. Situating goals and interests within practical reason
2. What is the relation between understanding and judgment?
3. How do we argue across differing paradigms?
4. How do we situate interests within political debates?
5. How do we navigate intractable disagreements?
6. Is it possible to navigate intractable disagreements? Do they exist?

[Note that the starting point that @Leontiskos is offering may be highly biased towards his own way of construing the tangent, which is precisely why the Staging Area could be useful.]

Here are a bunch of related quotes that I want to gather together for this post:

That’s why I hoped you would start the interests/criteria method you propose (and which sounds good to me). — Fire Ologist

Also, I am not trying to undermine any assertions or judgments in particular (I am not arguing). I am merely suggesting that it might be helpful to look at what is at stake, how that is to be judged compared to now, etc. Not to judge the criteria (first) but as a means to see what the possibly unexamined interests are. — Antony Nickles

For any discussion of this kind, we need to establish what goals are on the table — AmadeusD

3. The interests are our skin in the game of achieving the goal, not in carrying out the criteria. Criteria do not care how you feel, they care about what you want to achieve. — AmadeusD

Yep, agreed. That's why I resorted to saying we're talking in Circles in my reply to Antony. It seems like no start point is acceptable. — AmadeusD

-

Even before reading these posts I was tempted to make a new thread on this meta-topic, because it is quite prevalent on TPF. Much of this will build on what @AmadeusD has been getting at. Often on TPF people of a certain stripe try to talk about criteria, or frameworks, or something else as if they are presenting a wholly neutral starting point. I was up against the same sort of thing in this thread with @Srap Tasmaner in particular:

J and Srap Tasmaner in particular tried to say, "Let's take a step back into a neutral frame, so that we can examine this more carefully. Now everyone lives in their own framework..." Their "step back" was always a form of question-begging, given that it presupposed the non-overarching, framework-view. That's what happens when someone falsely claims to be taking a neutral stance on some matter on which they are not neutral* (and, in this case, on a matter in which neutrality is not possible). In general and especially in this case, the better thing to do is simply to give arguments for one's position instead of trying to claim the high ground of "objectivity" or "neutrality." — Leontiskos

I don't mean to pick on Antony, as he has been very humble and intellectually honest (and he is not doing the same thing described in that quote). Still, I am going to use him as an example since something very close to his approach is what I am going to try to argue against, or at least qualify in certain ways. In this thread @Antony Nickles has been saying something like, "Before we argue, let's talk about our interests":

Also, I am not trying to undermine any assertions or judgments in particular (I am not arguing). I am merely suggesting that it might be helpful to look at what is at stake, how that is to be judged compared to now, etc. Not to judge the criteria (first) but as a means to see what the possibly unexamined interests are. — Antony Nickles

The problem with this idea is that human action is always goal-directed. We are always acting for an end. It is psychologically impossible to step out of this goal-directedness. This is explicitly true when it comes to practical reason, and therefore it is confused to say, "Let's look at our criteria/interests objectively without making any value judgments; without making any arguments." This cannot be done. There is no such thing as a reason-less volitional act, or an uninterested analysis. The reason someone wants to "take a step back" is because they have already made a judgment and they already have a practical syllogism (even if implicit or subconscious). To advise taking a step back without providing an interest or a reason is inherently problematic, and this is why @Antony Nickles ran into trouble by saying things like, "Our goal is not X."

I would argue that what is always needed is argument. We have to give an argument/reason why we should take a step back, or why we should have a different goal, or why we should examine our implicit assumptions. There is no shortcut around argument. There is no way to rationally motivate (persuade) someone to take a step back without providing an argument/reason.

Arguments don't have to be caustic or burdensome. What is @Antony Nickles' reason/interest for taking a step back? Presumably he wants to take a step back because he thinks it is a good idea to do so, and therefore his argument must communicate to others why it is a good idea to do so. His argument might be <There is a communication breakdown; if we take a step back and re-evaluate our interests we might overcome the communication breakdown; therefore let's take a step back and re-evaluate our interests>. Or if we are going to set an issue before a board or group of people we might want to establish criteria beforehand according to this argument: <If we explicate our criteria for a decision beforehand, then we will be fortified against post hoc rationalization once the arguments begin; it is good to be fortified against post hoc rationalization; therefore we should explicate our criteria beforehand>.

In the present case when "beforehand" is already behind us, I think @Antony Nickles is more or less trying to say what Nathan Jacobs says about the "four levels of discourse" at 1:24:36. It is definitely important to unearth deeper premises in this way, but the premises that are being unearthed are still premises of an argument. Explication of premises is a part of argument, not something that is separate from argument (and in this case the relevant premises are the interests or the criteria which are being applied). Granted, the arguments that occur at these higher levels of discourse have a slightly different and more "meta" flavor than the arguments that occur at lower levels. Also granted, understanding must precede judgment, and therefore we must take pains to understand before we judge. All of this is true, but it doesn't mean that we ever fully step outside of the mode of argument or persuasion, at least when we are on a philosophy forum.

What I always find so ironic on this topic is the line from scripture, "by the mouth of babes and infants..." Too often we think of those who argue for things as naive, and much of philosophy has become purely hypothetical and descriptive, where no one is willing to argue for anything as being true. Ironically, I think the "novices" who are giving arguments for positions are more meta-logically sound than many of the learned. But the difficulty is particularly acute when it comes to moral issues, i.e. deliberation about which course of action to take. Issues like wokeness are moral issues: they are about practical reasoning. In this area of moral or practical deliberation you can't be satisfied with hypothetical judgments. Or as ' put it, "we can pass judgment at any point, and we must at some point."

There is no gainsaying the Bishop on this point, and that’s half the point. — praxis

If there is no gainsaying the Bishop on that point, then you are already committed to the same sort of hierarchy he is.

Rather, the fixed hierarchy is key to power stratification that wokeness aims to reduce. — praxis

My point is that the idea that hierarchical thinking is an evil bogeyman is a strawman. Anyone who admits that some values are higher than others is involved in hierarchical thinking. It's just not about power stratification. The power hermeneutic is something that the woke imposes on everyone and everything.

One of the things I am asking you is this: What would you have decreed if you were instructing the Israelites? — Leontiskos

The difficulty in this question is that:

1. It shifts the discussion from what a perfect being would do to what a nuanced, particular human would do; and

2. We don’t have to have knowledge of what the best choice is to know some of the bad choices. I can say that a pizza-lover does not throwaway a perfectly good pizza without speaking to what a pizza-lover’s best choice is in terms of what to do with it. — Bob Ross

I agree with (2), but I am not asking you what the best choice is. I am asking what you would do, and the implication is that you must be able to provide a better option than the one you are criticizing, not that you must be able to provide the best option. If you cannot provide a better option than the thing you criticize, then your criticism will be otiose or at least severely mitigated. Granted, not-acting is always an option, and so you can object to some action with the mere alternative of not acting at all, but in the case of the Amalekites not-acting may not be a plausible alternative.

If I had to answer, I would say that I would have told the Israelites to focus on themselves and ignore the immoralities of the Amalekites: they don’t have a duty to sacrifice their own people in just wars against abominable nations. I think it is a, e.g., just war to conquer North Korean but I wouldn’t advocate for the US to start WWIII over it. — Bob Ross

In the first place I would point out that the Amalekites lived near the Israelites and were a threat, so in that sense it is a bit different than the U.S. and North Korea. In the second place, in the Biblical mind truly abominable acts are not self-contained. They literally corrupt the earth and the world and empower the demonic presences that are being worshipped through the acts. For this reason the libertarian approach requires a different understanding of reality, where abominations do not pollute or affect the wider world.

If I had to decree the just war, then I would say to:

1. Eliminate the enemy combatants while limiting innocent and non-combatant civilians;

2. Assimilate any of the people that they can without assuming significant risk to their own sovereignty and stability;

3. Segregate those who cannot be assimilated into their own areas and give them the freedom to leave (and go somewhere else) if they want;

4. Give as much aid as feasible to those segregated.

I would hold a significant weight to the in-group over the out-group; so I wouldn’t probably decree any commandments to sacrifice one’s own people to free another people.

Likewise, those who are not assimilated would not be citizens of Israel; so they would, in necessary, be left to themselves if Israel cannot afford to help them; and this could be all the way up to starvation, disease, and death. — Bob Ross

Okay, that approach makes sense. Thanks for providing that. :up:

Yeah, but wouldn’t you agree it would be immoral what they did since it is directly intentional? I’m not saying they would have had this level of a sophistication in their ethics back then; but we know it to be immoral. — Bob Ross

I would say that it is immoral given certain conditions. For example, if the Amalekites and their children were not demonic then the act was immoral; if it was not a delegation of God's legitimate prerogatives then the act was immoral; etc.

The other question here is that if we know it to be immoral but they did not, then was it immoral? We might then say that it was objectively immoral but not subjectively wrong, similar to the case where someone breaks a law that they were not aware of. But even on something like the pedagogical approach God could not say, "Perform this act. It is not objectively immoral" (because this would make God a liar). makes a good point about Samuel as the author, and about the priority of the Pentateuch; but if we supposed that the literal command truly came from God, would it be permissible for God to pedagogically recommend that Israel carry out an act that is objectively but not subjectively immoral? It's an interesting question.

This interpretation seems to superficially reinterpret the text though; given that it explicitly details directly intentionally killing children. Wouldn’t this interpretation jeopardize the entire Bible? If someone can reinterpret what is obviously meant one way as another, then why can’t I about anything therein? — Bob Ross

On one reading it would superficially reinterpret the text. On the reading that provided it would not. The sort of question here asks whether we are permitted to interpret these sorts of post-Pentateuch texts as including the perspective of a fallible author, such as Samuel. I don't think there is anything de facto impossible about doing this, even on the presuppositions of historical theology. Many of the various known contradictions in the Bible (including those I mentioned in to Carlos) have to do with the perspective of the speaker. Only if we make the highest canonical source fallible do we forfeit Biblical inerrancy or strong Biblical authority, which in the Old Testament context would be to make the Pentateuch fallible in this way.

This is the most plausible out of them all, and is the one Aquinas and Craig takes. Again, though, the bullet here is that one has to hold that murder is either not the direct intentional killing of an innocent person or that murder is not always unjust. That is a necessary consequence of this view. — Bob Ross

Sort of. The thing I think you're missing here is the idea that God is not said to murder even though he is the judge of life and death. For example, if there is an angel of death or a "grim reaper" who works at the behest of God, is the angel of death a murderer? Or is he just doing his job? Or one could put it differently and ask whether the fact that God allows death within the world makes him a murderer. Theological traditions do not hold that God or the angel of death are properly involved in murder in these ways. On this point, I see the crux not so much in the definition of murder but in the question of whether God can delegate his power over life and death.

This [idea of demons] is an interesting one I am admittedly not very familiar with: I’ll have to think about that one. — Bob Ross

I think it is definitely part of the Biblical context, but it is not altogether clear to me how this affects the Amalekite children's "right to life." I would want to begin with the question of whether one who is demonic via demonic rites ceases to be human, and then whether their children also cease to be human (in the sense that they lose their presumptive right to life).

This has to be immoral: it would conflate culpability and innocence with the individual and group. — Bob Ross

Well, even on a modern understanding there is commission, there is "aiding and abetting," there is failing to oppose someone in your midst who is involved in commission, etc. So the idea that groups rather than mere individuals are responsible for abominable, public acts is supportable. I think the counterargument lies in the idea that a child or especially an infant does not count as part of the group.

Yeah, that’s true. I am not sure how to interpret the texts. Maybe it is all spiritual lessons; but then what isn’t and what is the lesson? — Bob Ross

Over the years I have come to appreciate the complexity and ambiguity of the Bible, because it does mirror real life. How one is to resolve the difficult tensions and contradictions that arise in life is not obvious, and in the Bible we see people grappling with this same difficulty. There are some deeply interesting writings of J. G. Hamann that have begun to be translated into the English. Hamann was a highly intelligent Christian contemporary of Immanuel Kant, and he was famous for cutting to pieces Kant's cut-and-dried understanding of reality by recourse to philological and Biblical allusions. Schemas such as Kant's tend to oversimplify complex realities, and although Hamann and the Bible are far from simple, they nevertheless reflect the complexity and chaos of real life.

I mean, one of the theological issues undergirding your probing questions is the issue of Biblical inerrancy and how that is supposed to be understood. In one sense the Bible is not inerrant given that there are clear contradictions. What's curious is that the authors and the community were aware of these contradictions and they didn't find them problematic, and from this one would generally deduce that the texts neither aim at nor presuppose inerrancy in that literalistic or top-level sense. This is why what Carlos said about Samuel's authorship and fallibility is not a new idea in theological communities.

Related to these points, it is good to be humble when scrutinizing a text that has a sacred or divine pedigree, because it is very easy to impose personal idioms. Or perhaps put it this way: the more certain we are that something comes from God, the less sure we are about our negative judgments regarding it. I am not faulting your basic method, but rather noting that anyone who approaches a text as sacred will be very receptive to interpretive subtleties. This is because to believe that a being who is infinitely beyond you is communicating with you is to be open to semantic and and metaphysical possibilities that would usually be excluded. One's expectations of depth and overflowing meanings (i.e. being polysemic or plurivocal) increase in proportion to the perceived profundity of their interlocutor.

I am working on an alternative that I will share with you when it is ready to hear your thoughts. — Bob Ross

Okay, sounds good. :up:

The idea that wokeness is heretical is intriguing — praxis

To say that something is heretical is to say that it is a kind of warping of a religious form, and that the warping has become internal to the religion in question. So analogously, if you take poor care of your feet and end up with a fungal infection, that fungal infection is a kind of heresy. It's a problem, it's merged to your own body, it's in some measure your own fault, it is something you have to take care of and take responsibility for, etc.

In the video linked on the previous page, Bishop Barron refers to an 'objective hierarchy of value'—a structure he sees as embedded in the very fabric of reality. — praxis

There is an important point that Barron makes at 53:26, and it is closely related to what I said about putting second things first. There Barron contrasts the absolute values of justice and love as hierarchically superior, with the secundum quid values of diversity, equity, and inclusion as hierarchically inferior. I think it's fairly difficult to gainsay the Bishop on this point and claim that diversity, equity, or inclusion are absolute values. This inversion where one places secondary things into the first place is key to wokism.

Edit: More explicitly:

The idea that wokeness is heretical is intriguing, especially since, on the surface, both wokeness and religion share a common concern — praxis

If X ideology shares nothing in common with Y religion, then it is impossible for X to be a Y heresy. In such a case Y could view X as an error but not as a heresy.

Yep, put too much english on that. — Antony Nickles

Okay. :up:

I’m thinking maybe there isn’t one? I started trying to discuss philosophical assumptions that lead us to misunderstand/pre-judge—miss the actual import—of a moral claim. Maybe this is just a matter of you thinking I’m defending/arguing for something I’m not, and me thinking you don’t get what I am saying. Assumptions? — Antony Nickles

Well, I don't understand why you would find it necessary to discuss philosophical assumptions that lead us to form premature judgments if you don't think any premature judgments are occurring. It seems to me that if someone judges that we should discuss the philosophical assumptions that lead us to form premature judgments, then they have already judged that there are premature judgments occurring. If there are no premature judgments occurring then there is no need to discuss such assumptions. If there are premature judgments occurring then there is need to discuss such assumptions. If there is a good chance that there are premature judgments occurring then there is a good chance that we need to discuss such assumptions.

It would be yes, that was worded poorly. Of course we have to get to a judgment about moral claims; we have to move forward, decide what to do, and on what basis. — Antony Nickles

Okay, I agree. :up:

I will admit that, supposing there is a problem with wokism, the specific remedy is not obvious. Similarly, the remedy and the critique must be proportionate. For example, if a problem is intractable then a heavy-handed critique will be unfitting and hazardous.

It is presumptive to assume that has not taken place, and, again, not my intention. I was only suggesting that, generally, people (and philosophers in particular) do not consider “the ways” in which they judge. Thank you for the serious consideration. — Antony Nickles

Okay, thanks for that.

My deeper point here is not that one cannot claim that sufficient understanding has not taken place, but rather that if one tells their interlocutor that sufficient understanding has not taken place (or implies it) then they must provide their interlocutor with some means for seeing why sufficient understanding has not taken place. In one way or another there must be an attempt to persuade their interlocutor that sufficient understanding has not taken place.

On the contrary, the whole is what gives unity and function to the parts. — Wayfarer

Right.

zygotes — Wayfarer

A zygote is a good example. Its development will literally generate (more) parts which contribute to the pre-existing whole. What occurs is development of a whole, not assembly of parts.

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Top-down implies a force acting from the outside inward — Metaphysician Undercover

Why think that? You won't find that claim anywhere in O'Callaghan's article.

If we propose a distinction of separate parts within an individual being, then the teleology must be pervasive to, i.e. internal to all parts. How could this telos get internal to the most basic, fundamental parts, genes, DNA, etc., through a top-down process? And if we take mind and intention as our example, then we see that each individual human being must willfully take part in human cooperation. And clearly this willful, intentional participation is bottom-up causation. — Metaphysician Undercover

I think you're misunderstanding what is meant by "top-down." Can you give an example of what you believe top-down explanation would be?

The passage is difficult, so read it carefully. Pay particular attention to the conclusion "And he presupposes nothing about them at all, since without him, they are strictly speaking, nothing at all." What the creator gives to the being is "its nature", but this nature which is given, is the nature of a being without a nature. — Metaphysician Undercover

Rather, when God gives a being a nature then that being has a nature. Sort of like when I give you a shoe you have a shoe. The second part of your quote has to do with the idea that there is no pre-existent thing which receives a nature, and that the substance receives both its nature and its existence simultaneously (both logically and temporally). It doesn't mean that the substance has no nature.

Run Adorno through Perplexity. — Joshs

I'm familiar enough with Adorno to know that he leans towards realism. But you've merely found an exception that proves the rule.

The points I’m trying to make concerning Crrical theory are twofold. First, that regardless of how unconventional their realism was, they should not be in danger of being accused of an ‘anything goes’ relativism. — Joshs

And Barron does not accuse them of that. What says there is important. To talk about the philosophical antecedents of wokism is not to talk about wokism per se. You keep blurring the difference.

Instead , [Critical theorists] beleive that material and social formations are grounded in truth, and truth is grounded in metaphysical certainties. — Joshs

That's just not true. Asserting contrary to common knowledge, SEP, and Perplexity.ai is doing you no good on this score.

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So we can say that for a given person within a given time and culture, there will be specific criteria for the goodness or badness of a garden. What are such criteria of goodness based on, and can we generalize these criteria across persons and historical eras? I do believe in a certain notion of cultural progress, both empirical and ethical, so my answer is yes. But since the criteria I thinking are fundamental have to do with the concept of sense-making, it will be less clear in the case of aesthetic phenomena like gardens and works of art how this applies than in the case of the sciences or political systems. — Joshs

Okay. In that case you should try to show why wokeness is needed in the garden.

I believe that all of us are continually evolving within our systems of thought, but at a pace that is determined by the limits of that system. My goal in debating with others is to understand their system of thought from their perspective as well as i can, and to test the validity of my efforts by attempting to plug into the leading edge of their own thinking. If my thinking doesn’t find them where they are at, I will just get the equivalent of a glassy eyes stare of incomprehension or outright hostility. If I am successful in plugging into their cutting edge, they will respond enthusiastically, seeing me as a partner in thought rather than as a threat. — Joshs

I think you're leaving out the part where you pull weeds and disagree with others, and it would be much easier if you forthrightly admitted that you do that too.

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Is the head of a family not an activist in putting into practice their understanding of moral standards in their child raising decisions? Are their parenting decisions not means to an end, that being the raising of good people? — Joshs

No, because they do not treat the children as a means to an end. That their parenting is a means to an end does not mean that their children are a means to an end. You are making rational errors here.

Aren’t all ‘activists’ simply actively putting into practice what they believe to be in the best interest of society as they understand it? — Joshs

Sure, and we've covered this before. Just because someone is trying to do something good doesn't mean they are doing something good, and in this case it doesn't mean that they are not treating everyone as a means to an end. Hitler thought it was in the best interest of society for Jews to die in concentration camps. That doesn't make what he did unobjectionable.

How are the critical comments about wokism in this thread not a form of activism? — Joshs

How are they? Try to argue your position that critically commenting on wokism is a form of activism.

What are the ends the criticisms are a means to? — Joshs

A better life and society for everyone, wokists included. To disagree with someone is not to treat them as a means to an end. To disagree with someone implies that they have intrinsic worth.