So the laws of nature for a given possible world are designed. — A Christian Philosophy

Total non sequitur.



I think the point he's driving for is that for a philosopher, the term is ridiculous. It's a totally reasonable and real physics thing though. I suggest his point is irrelevant anyhow, But this seemed to me the crossed purpose there. "instantaneous" doesn't hold it's standard meaning in that phrase.

If everybody agrees on something, there isn't much discussion then, is there? — ssu

Ah yeah I see what you're getting at. Weirdly, I get about 50/50 left/right content. Commentary seems very much skewed - But again, I don't know everything so i put this entirely to the side for now.

Talk of an overreaction. — ssu

I think, possibly, the Biden-era mouthpieces constantly contradicting earlier policies (including Obama's) was an overreaction to Trump doing similar things to Obama (and prior liberals). I think your example is a good one in terms of "point and laugh", but not a great one in terms of consequence. I think politicians lying about their academic career is worse, for example.

I'm unsure I can accept the leap from "choice-worthy" (based on??) to "ought to be chosen" which amounts to "ought to be done". Can you perhaps make clearer what that connection is?

Can't quite grasp your views, but I found this further reading fun https://scholarship.law.nd.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=2295&context=law_faculty_scholarship

Remember the algorithms, what makes a debate. It's not those who agree — ssu

I maybe either too dumb or too tired to know what you're saying here?

Yes. There wasn't much from the moderates about hte abysmal Biden era, though. I think there's an imbalance in this sense. Its more acceptable to talk shit about "right wing" concepts and people. Same as there is no issue, whatever, with publicly saying something like "What the fuck is wrong with white people?" But if you switched any other ethnicity in.. you're in hot water.

Extremely, risibly misleading. This is not the result of 'poverty' and this barely gets a decent connection between the policies in question and the results. It even brings in COVID considerations. And we're talking about "poverty" deaths? Hehehe.

That's a whole other question. — J

GEnerally agreed they don't follow. But you can't get to the idea of an arbiter of good and bad from the fact that some actions are "choice-worthy" because good and bad don't come into that, prima facie.

Thanks! — Leontiskos

Very welcome!

the situation where you dismiss someone based on a moral judgment of their own actions or behavior — Leontiskos

I think this is the right way to think of a 'moral' judgement in this context.

In your head are you saying to them, "I am dismissing you because you are clearly not listening, and I would do so even if I had ample time to engage you"? — Leontiskos

This probably happens, but in terms of habit, no, this isn't the case. What I'm thinking internally is "I have other things to be getting on with, and this is not satisfying enough to overturn my commitment to the other things" or something similar. I often engage in hilariously dumb conversations when I have the time (I find it relaxing, in some way, so there's no sort of sacrifice happening there).

I think it would be worthwhile to explore the idea that we dismiss someone who is clearly not listening to us. — Leontiskos

To be fair, I think its a dismissal of the event, not the person. I think this is a crucial difference between some practical constraint, and some psychological constraint (the oft-repeated "I just can't..." among younger socio-political commentators). Leading to...

From this it sounds like you would reject the idea that a material position is sufficient grounds for dismissal. — Leontiskos

This one is a bit more complicated. What do we mean by "dismissal"? Are you dismissing the person, as a whole, from your entire worldly purview? Are you dismissing that view of theirs? Are you dismissing their expertise on a topic they're woefully unqualified to profess on?
In the case, that i take from you OP, that we're wanting to morally condemn the person in a way that means something like "they are a bad person, and I won't engage with them", then no. No, I don't think I've had that happen in the last decade at least. Views are views. People are people. People hold views but do not become them.

Up front, Stanley has proved himself one of the least-respectable thinkers of hte last 20 years with his constant tirades against reality over the last while - mainly on Twitter, where his a misogynistic dickhead who cannot, if his life depended on it, shut up and listen to a woman.

That said, I think you're right lmao. If everyone know the 'truth' as such, about Trump, it would far, far, far harder to take him seriously and thus vote for him.

His support of Israel equals Hitler. — Athena

This is utterly insane though, sorry.

Sex is factually binary and gender doesn't need to be, but clearly does not vary independently. That seems to be what actually happens, and the 'theoretical' case.

The UK has got it right, I think. And they've been very clear about the fact that this doesn't pose any risk to trans people. But it does remove the risk from biological females (i prefer the term women, ftr, but that's nto important here).

Nice post - I think its possible you're still perhaps uneasy with some of hte more confronting issues. One might be that junk is not relevant to whether one is one sex or not. Klinefelters shows us that males can have "female" breast development to a certain degree. Or Swyer syndrome giving (some) males a vulva. Unfortuantely, even the literature that gets published makes this mistake
Under the heading "Sex Determination" we get the following:

"The pioneering experiments of fetal sexual differentiation carried out by Alfred Jost in the 1940’s clearly established that the existence of the testes determines the sexually dimorphic fate of the internal and external genitalia (Fig. 2) (58, 59). Irrespective of their chromosomal constitution, when the gonadal primordia differentiate into testes, all internal and external genitalia develop following the male pathway. When no testes are present, the genitalia develop along the female pathway. The existence of ovaries has no effect on fetal differentiation of the genitalia. The paramount importance of testicular differentiation for fetal sex development has prompted the use of the expression “sex determination” to refer to the differentiation of the bipotential or primitive gonads into testes."

These are phenotypic considerations and are about Sex Differentiation, not determination (not to mention that's also misleading - the sexually dimorphic 'fate' is tied to fertility). The activation (or not) of the SRY gene is what determines the above set of possible carry-throughs. The above pathways overlap/go awry when there is a genetic aberration after sex has been determined, in terms of form and function. SRY is the determinate of sex. It is misleading to claim that odd chromosomal situations, or ambiguous/unexpected phenotypes are determinative of sex (I do not think this is what you were saying, but this is my first post in the thread so making more of it than you need care about).

What "woman" and "man" mean, socially, has not determinate imo. Use them how you see fit. Just don't pretend you're talking about sex, and everything is generally a-ok.

showing hundreds of thousands dying from poverty — Down The Rabbit Hole

In the UK? heh.

This strikes me as a defense similar to those Randians who defend NAP where it makes absolutely no sense to do so, and they end up in knots.

THe questions being asked in the OP are not ones which have answers, generally. Nor could they. The explication cannot support much of anything.

Brilliant and vulnerable OP. Good stuff. I'll have a think and say something deeper, but this struck me:

"

But now I look back and don't see a bold radical, but rather a brat, childishly excited by grand projects and noble causes, to the extent that I was willing to brush aside the suffering that I thought necessary to bring about a great future. — Jamal

Well. fucking. done. If more could see this, we would be much better off IMO.

It's not failing; it's being beaten down by more aggressive forces. — Vera Mont

This attitude is why it's failing. Leontiskos (and, in my view, the OP) makes the point very well.
Pretending that you're "right" and it must be something else is the single biggest driver of being a dick, failing and not getting better at things.

Liberalism suffers all three, in the modern world. That doesn't mean the principle is hollow or unhelpful. It means the ideology exemplified by Vera's post and much of OPs explication is what's being criticised. It's possible Banno made that mistake too, but I've not read past this first page so ...

You did.
But putting that to one side, nothing in that comment gives me any reason to take "random" seriously in it. You not knowing why something occurs doesn't make it random.

Again, what you in fact claimed: — javra

So, totally not at all what you said I did. This is getting bizarre my guy.

Rationally then, your affirmations entail that in the absence of a non-egalitarian, hence authoritarian leadership which "oversees", societies will have ample "abuse" ingroup — javra

That is not rational. That is you making assumptions and putting words in my mouth. Forgive me for skimming the rest of this. You're clearly not here to engage in anything but a pissing match.

Can you then, instead, reference tribes wherein abuse is rampant ingroup due to not having authoritarian leadersphip? — javra

No idea what you're talking about anymore. You're contradicting your claim, reversing hte question you've posed to me, and in any case i've given ample reason to dismiss these quibbles.

Might as well be calling me a porcupine. Name-calling, while it might have its political advantages amongst some, is not something that validates affirmations, though. — javra

Or for fucks sake. Take care mate.

If "good" is taken to mean "choice-worthy," — Count Timothy von Icarus

It's never been explained that way in any ethics (or morality) courses i've taken or seen. It is always described as "right" and "wrong" action. "Good" and "bad" are noted to be arbiters of that. But arbiters of 'good' and 'bad' are literally nowhere to be seen, except within agreements between people. Is this clearer?

I think @J is on the right track.

Ethics is not coherent. But that doesn't make it not useful. Flippant Eg: Virtue Ethics is an absolutely ridiculous concept. "Do what improves your character" is one of the dumbest, vaguest and unhelpful concepts society could instantiate.
But, nevertheless, it is a very effective way for people to review their actions and views with some circumspection. We can't really expect more from humans without God, so "As far as it goes" virtue ethics is successful. It just doesn't go far, because it can't do what Ethics, proper, wants: Arbitrate between "right" and "Wrong" actions.

Perhaps we just understand what's going on differently. Seems a common thing among "ethicists". For people on a forum throwing pseudo-essays around, it's almost assuredly some of hte issue.

NB: I do think these types of discussions are the dead-end of Ethics. They can be fun, but they are the inevitable result of cordially disagreeing about what should be done. There is, usually, no answer which isn't goal-oriented. The goal, itself, can't be assessed in the same way.

It wasn't intended as an objection, exactly. — Ludwig V

Totally fair enough.

how does emotivism distinguish between emotions that are reactions to judgements of taste and emotions that are reactions to judgements of ethical value? — Ludwig V

I may not understand the question, but this strikes me as "How does one delineate between water from a spring, and water from a lake?" Well, you don't. You delineate their sources. AS you've done, fairly clearly. There's no reason to go further. However...

The trouble is that the border country between actions that affect other people and those that don't is hotly contested. — Ludwig V

is certainly true. I think this is where people decide to be "hard line" in their ethical view. Usually, without actually examining it. Such is life.

Should I distinguish between ethics and morality? If not, how to these two questions fit together? — Ludwig V

I think so. Ethics is the study of moral views, as far as I understand. So ethics is assessing action, and morality is the basis for the actions in the first place. An ethical view would necessarily inform your moral views. I can see a clear difference, but I have also understood arguments that they are not actually distinct. Such is life, lol.

One thing to note, that I think its a truism, applied to any and all exchanges i'm having here"

Not "good" is not at all the same as "not good". I do not think this is being noticed.

Actually many people are disgusted about both sides. — ssu

If that's the case, I've definitely missed it being more than a small, almost fringe, group. Though it may just be that these people are not commentators.

Fixed it for you — Benkei

Not all men.

Do any people push back against insanity in these environments, or is that beyond the pale? — Jeremy Murray

Its hard to know how this works. I am fairly constantly pushing back, and it seems fairly successful when it's done in an academic fashion.
The course I'm in currently has a module on slurs. In that module, we will be allowed to say whatever we want in service of discussion of Phil of Language. I imagine that would bring up both the weak "I don't like opinions" people and the "Finally, some real meat" types. Will be fun to see in a few weeks when it comes up.

But I would point out that people call food good in part because it is necessary to survive — Leontiskos

Sure. Something I think is misguided. But I understand that this doesn't sit perfectly.

Both are true at the same time. — Leontiskos

You've done nothing to support this. It is necessary (as we both know, empirically). That htis is good is totally arbitrary. Unless you've made some claim before entering the discussion, which means "good" is to be interpreted as "that which is necessary for survival" or something similar. Have you?

You are avoiding answering the question. — Leontiskos

No. I'm telling you it was non sequitur. Feel how you want to about that. But it was loaded and I wanted clarification as to what you had loaded into it. If you don't want to give it, that's fine. I wont engage.

And I think we both know that the correct answer to (3) is, "No." — Leontiskos

I don't even know quite what you were getting at mate. Perhaps read my comments in better faith. I wanted clarification, and I do not take anything you've said here on board because its jumping hte gun something fierce.

Is there an arbiter of true and false? — Leontiskos

Not in the strict sense of those words. We have theories that apply to different facets of life, and in some of them we get T and F values. In some we don't. Logic (pure logic, so not applicable to most things in the world) has a convenient status here, but real life isn't that simple. Heck, language can't even account for Truth and Falsity correctly or consistently.

Do we need an arbiter before we can see that 2+2=4? — Leontiskos

I'm sorry, are you trying to suggest that Ethics is a mathematical function? If so we have no basis for discussion. Otherwise, I can't tell what you're getting at in this reply.

why would it be needed in ethics? — Leontiskos

It isn't. But if you want 'good' and 'bad' to mean much of anything, you need one. I don't claim they do, so I don't need one.

Autonomous Morality and the Idea of the Noble," — Leontiskos

In the first section, he outlines almost exactly what I've suggested Ethics functions 'as'.

"The prudential ‘ought’ rests for its force on the facts about the contingent desires and interests people have, and just tells one what one ought to do if one is to satisfy them."

I find nothing further on which would counter this position. It's arbitrary. Obviously. If you'd like to point me somewhere in the article, more than happy to review and adjust.

Really cool thread.

I don't think there's a good answer other than "I have limited time" for non-theists. Most theists have a weak argument, anyway. I don't think there is anything but a rational justification for dismissing one on the basis of what they're saying. Is it a waste of your time? Fair enough. But you can't use morality to justify your own morality, which is what must be informing your actions. Its just instrumental rationality that would have you not 'waste time' or some such.

But unfortunately, that says absolutely nothing about the other person, and only about you and your views. I don't think many people front to that. Therefore, most people interpret their dismissiveness/discontinuance in such circumstances as morally justified. In some sense, it is. Their moral views justified the action. But it seems to me this is, prima facie, just toddler-like over-emotional behaviour. It isn't moral. It's "I'm right, you're wrong". So we're left with the practical consideration of whether or not its helpful/beneficial/worth it to continue the exchange/relationship.

For me, the only time I genuinely feel justified in dismissing someone is when they clearly are not listening. Their views never make me feel justified in shutting them down.
My views do, though, at times, because I think practical considerations are in play and not moral ones.

You did not respond to the claim that food is (deemed) good by all. — Leontiskos

It was an unreasonable claim in teh discussion. That is simply not how food is characterized. It is necessary to survive. Colloquially referring to this as 'good' is a psychological trick and not an ethical claim. Come on now.

I assume you agree — Leontiskos

Yessir - I wasn't purposefully dodging it. My response was tactical and addressing that wasn't needed.

3. If so, are those rhymes and reasons altogether different than those which guide other people's acts — Leontiskos

Bit of a non sequitur going on here. I would want to know your motivation from 2 to 3 there - or perhaps, what you would expect one to say and what you think that might mean.

The good is arbitrary. There is no arbiter. There are things people like, and things people don't like. The pervasiveness of any given view doesn't lend it any supremacy in a meta conversation about it's worth. It works. That doesn't say anything about its rightness. It should be clear from my babblings on any of these sorts of threads that I'm not entirely comfortable emotionally/intuitively with this. I'm much closer to wanting somethign in the realm of waht I feel you're failing to support. But, intellectually it's pretty simple to me - there is no arbiter of good and bad. For htis reason, either we need to change the conversation into something more subjective but still somehow measurable (i.e something like individual desire divided by the general harm/good it would do for the chosen cultural goals of that time and place in question) to talk ab out how best to act in given times and palces or to simply accept that ethics is properly a conversation about how conflicting views of good and bad must cooperate.

It's not even a pseudo science. It's not at all a science, of any kind. Its whirling and whistling.

Nothing in your second post does anything but elucidate, in apparently sober terms, the emotional valence of ethical considerations.

You've leapfrogged hte entire problem, and gone with accepting "good" and "bad" as they are, where they lie. Not doing ethics, anyway, as whether something is good or bad has nothing to do with whether that should arbitrate our actions.

It's hard to think that one is posing a serious question when they issue the challenge, "But how do you know that it is good to not be in pain?" — Leontiskos

It seems clear that the latter is more secure — Leontiskos

Err nope. There's no relationship between the two, but habit. If you want to invoke some kind of causation between an act and ipso facto good and bad (bare, not for some particular goal i.e not having your eyes burned out) then you've got your entire task still in front of you. I'm waiting.

They aren't strawmen, because they are actual behaviours of leftists. Again, that you are not aware isn't an excuse. I even gave you the benefit of the doubt on that.
If you're not aware, you're not aware. But you can still not be an absolute idiot and respond in such a childish, ignorant way.

Everything i said is outright, 100% true. BLM riots= justified. Luigi Mangione(murder) = justified. Defrauding hte IRS (Patrisse Cullors) = justified. Abusing, assaulting and literally 'hate speech'ing your political opponents = justified. Property damage (lets just use the moment, and think Tesla) = justified.
Censorship (COVID, Biden laptop etc..)=justified.

If you disagree with all the above, its rich calling yourself leftist. Not even aware of what the label captures.

And before you do something supremely ignorant, what the Right do is utterly irrelevant to this exchange. I even noted that at least when the right do similar things, its openly hypocritical. Leftists just move the goal post and then insult you when you point it out (as you do, constantly - so maybe I was wrong).

So, yeah. If you don't know what you're talking about it's best not to talk.

To begin with, can you provide references evidencing that modern hunter-gather societies - or at least some such - are of an authoritarian leadership which so 'oversees' all others in the tribe so as to preserve social cohesion? — javra

No, because I didn't claim this. I sense some bristling in this response, so forgive me for being pretty lack luster in mine. I don't care for bristles. I talked about hte subjection of women. So, yeah, i'll be answering to that. I've also noted how self-defeating many of your bristles are. Not looking good for future exchanges, I have to say.

ve previously given references to my affirmations — javra

You gave me a Wikipedia list? No facts involved, my man.

It was also one which you can just click on each of those pages, and check their social organisation: in almost all cases, men hunt and build and marriage/sex is patriarchal - even in the cases where this is, supposedly, not the case, the article contradicts itself, The very first one:

"In the Aka community, despite a sexual division of labor where women primarily serve as caregivers, male and female roles are highly flexible and interchangeable. Women hunt while men care for children, and vice versa, without stigma or loss of status. Women are not only as likely as men to hunt but can even be more proficient hunters."

If you're not seeing a problem, I can't say I care to explain it. Next, we get:

"leadership roles such as kombeti (leader), tuma (elephant hunter), and nganga (top healer) are consistently held by men in a community studied by anthropologist Barry Hewlett.[7]"

And, as I suspected in my earlier post/s, the article also very vaguely points out that colonialism changed their behaviours. No mention of the social changes, though you could simply go looking:

"Resulting changes in Aka social organization are difficult if not impossible to reconstruct for this early period. "
Given that other groups lost their strict women-subjecting culture upon colonisation (an example below) this isn't a stretch to say "I think someone's avoiding something"

Another random click:

the Moriori, in their attempts to get rid of gendered violence institutionalized it

"...because men get angry and during such anger feel the will to strike, that so they may, but only with a rod the thickness of a thumb, and one stretch of the arms length, and thrash away, but that on an abrasion of the hide, or first sign of blood, all should consider honour satisfied.

— Oral tradition[30]"

Another:

"The Ket was incorporated into the Russian state in the 17th century. Their efforts to resist were unsuccessful as the Russians deported them to different places in an attempt to break up their resistance. This broke up their strictly organized patriarchal social system and their way of life disintegrated."

And one more:

"The Bambuti tend to follow a patrilineal descent system, and their residences after marriage are patrilocal..... The only type of group seen amongst the Bambuti is the nuclear family."

"Sister exchange is the common form of marriage. Based on reciprocal exchange, men from other bands exchange sisters or other females to whom they have ties.[9]"

Clearly not egalitarian, despite the claim (not referenced) in the following paragraph, that they are.

I also spent about eight years looking in to and speaking with members of Amazonian tribes (for different reasons) and it was patently obvious all of those groups (Jivaro, Shipibo, Ashaninka etc..) are patriarchal through endless books, conversations and papers - I can't pull out some specific reference without carrying out some actual research, which this thread doesn't call for.

Further, this concept of hte 'noble savage" or some weird idea that indigenous societies were more just than ours needs to stop. They were mostly brutal and unforgiving.

You just named their cause.

I've never seen anything uncaused. I have no reason to think that would fail prior to the big bang. Maybe a better thing would be to say "I want to know why the singularity existed".

Is this to say that devoid of some authoritarian oversight humans - and, in particular, men - are naturally abusive? — javra

Hard to use the word abusive, but in modern parlance, yeah, sure, i'll take that. But I don't think calling a natural proclivity "abusive" helps the discussion, though. It's currently abusive behaviour because of hte fact that male power has been checked, and its an abuse of power.
Anyhow, I think without oversight, survival success is the overarching metric, and people will do all sorts of what we call abusive stuff when they can particularly when communication is less nuanced. Moreover, I think the impetus to fuck anything that moves is one that we never, and will never, shake and men have the entire advantage there. Degrees, obviously, but the Jason Momoa-looking among us would, I take it, always understand their power and the lack of oversight/retribution for same. I cannot see why they would refrain from raping ad infinitum in that world.

How then to account for the general egalitarianism of the hunter-gatherer tribes which are present in the current day? — javra

Easy: The rest of the world are no longer in those situations. My knowledge of several of those groups is that they are decidedly not egalitarian, even in principle. "traditional" gender roles are traditional because they are naturally enacted when required. We, in the modern world, don't require them. But that subjection of women to their men, rife in pretty much every group on that list. Is that not abusive? In many, the (implicit) rape and marrying off of children (girls) is rife.

Issues such as this then signifying that men will naturally rape as many women as they/we can — javra

Not quite, but most of the way down that line, yes, i think so. The fact that this has never actually stopped, seems an obvious clue. There are plenty of societies in which raping women is accepted, and sometimes protected by law. Do you think this might be a reflection of a type of nature?

How would you define the field of ethics? — Count Timothy von Icarus

Fair enough, on your explication here, as to how we could be at an impasse. That said, I think I did point this out (perhaps implicitly) earlier in the exchange:
Ethics are to do with how we act, specifically, as regards other people (or organisms, I guess). Ethics aren't about human flourishing any more than the rules of football are about scoring touchdowns/goals (depending on your hemisphere). Even expanded concepts of ethics are about how to deal with A.I, aliens, non-existent people, people who can't feel etc.. etc. There are no ethical theories on how best to do any thing. The fact that the above gives us literally no basis to assert anything as 'true' is exactly why being an ethical objectivist is ridiculous, in my view. You have to do something else to get anything like objectivism.

Not a problem, I appreciate that.

That's fair, and yes, It's clearly an issue. Management in universities is increasingly (old news) of that kind. My current courses are... well, the courses are good.. but they're very hard to get through being brow-beaten constantly for existing. No wonder faith in Uni is falling fast.
I do think wokeness is an own-goal. So much so that the groups in question don't even notice it. Even when they lose as unlosable election.

The biggest problem I see is that people can make it all the way to PhD by doing what they're told, but believing something utterly preposterous and incoherent.
I have several (fellow) students in my current classes who say the most unreasonable, clearly incorrect stuff about factual matters - but they're passing. These types of people believe, truly, that there is no use for the concept of objectivity, and that there is no such thing as logical constraint on claims.
These people will become philosophers of nonsense. There are thousands. No wonder it doesn't pay.

No reason to label people who support the logical position to keep transgender males from being in women sports without that meaning they are bigoted. — philosch

Very good to keep in mind. Probably something for Wayfarer, but he's also explained himself in a way that makes me far, far less bristly at it (I have made clear elsewhere, but I am not a Trump supporter in any way other than it's entertaining, and I don't take life seriously enough to be like others hereabouts when it comes to 'existential crisis').

an echo chamber of hyperbolic nonsense. — philosch

Is what political discussions tend to be.

Do you/we though? This isn't meant to be inflammatory - sure you still don't care?

I want to know what caused the singularity. I don't much care about what caused it to collapse (explode).

They aren't strawmen. They are how leftists behave, en masse, where their behaviour can be reviewed (interviews, protests, news reports, instagram content etc...). If you're not aware of this, that's fine, but it is the case.

Aside from that, which I understand could just be that you've not seen the above in action, which is fine, to your initial response, I don't think you're really being genuine here. That's why I called is disingenuous. "favouring human rights" could be the label for any number of things. In practice, it tends to far overstep the concept of human rights. That's an entirely different discussion, but just something to understand why I think that description is disingenuous.

The human good is not reducible to health, but it involves health. — Count Timothy von Icarus

Certainly can, but there's no reason to suppose someone who doesn't think so is wrong. This is my entire point (and I think most of the discussion is happening, inadvertently, on a level above this). What objectivity is there to the claim that health is constitutive (even partly) of "the good for man"? It may well be that elimination is the best thing for man (at an extreme). There's no arguments which could counter this, to my knowledge, so I think there's a lot of presupposition going on. But in general, I would agree, that and did say as much. It will bear a lot of weigh in ethical reasoning, but not ethical concepts I don't think.

It is not good for some fish to be placed in saltwater — Count Timothy von Icarus

This is incorrect, as I see. It is bad for the body of a fish to be placed in saltwater (salmon notwithstanding). This is does not carry an ethical claim and so the bare assertion actually requires some prior justification (this, perhaps, being hte level issue noted above). It may be that fish don't experience in the sense required for ethical consideration. I'm not aware one way or the other, but certainly its a reasonable assumption (even on a 50/50 basis) of a lower fish like a guppy or plecostomus.

An appropriate amount of oxygen is said to be both "good" and "healthy," in virtue of how it promotes man's well-being and health respectively, for instance. — Count Timothy von Icarus

That something is said, doesn't make it so. It is good for a man to continue breathing oxygen (and in turn, continue living). This still doesn't become an ethical claim. It is merely medical fact, aimed at a chosen goal. I can't see that this is an ethical claim. It's 'good' in terms of a specific goal. Maybe you're not stating that you see ethics as tied to specific goals. Though, if that's the case, everything is up for grabs.

What's the objection here? — Count Timothy von Icarus

If my response were agreed with (not that it should,just illustrating) then your claim is clearly not an ethical one. The objection is that you're calling a mere fact an ethical statement. Its an is, not an ought.

But that doesn't mean there are facts relevant to how to do these successfully. — Count Timothy von Icarus

There clearly are. Maybe you've misspoken here? But again, they aren't ethical facts. So, I'm unsure how your initial question (in this quote) could be answered. The objection hasn't even been addressed.

But neither is the relationship between alcohol and well-being amongst men random and unknowable. It is regular and knowable. — Count Timothy von Icarus

And non-ethical (as yet, on your account).

That "alcoholism" is not good for well-being is something that can at least be established — Count Timothy von Icarus

Yep. Still failing to see how this is an ethical statement (i've cut the quote because I don't think your point requires that justification. The above stands to reason).

Yes, a fair point. Embarrassingly ignorant of me (genuinely).

All the women I know have horror stories about men. — RogueAI

Not at the women I know, so he is definitely wrong. That's not to bring down the importance of the issue, but it is actually pretty important to note, even if the 100% were even a reasonable take, that it is a small proportion of men. Not noting, and genuinely taking this into account, leads to endless cycles of gendered bias, in both directions, as reaction to prevailing wisdom. I suppose it could be said that at least women have a legitimate claim to care about this, but I think that misses the point. Not listening got us there. And it will again.

why do we think it matters if women fared better in prehistoric times than today? — Hanover

If there is a way to avoid teh above (whther you read my words as impugning conversations around harm to women, or conversations around men) we want it.
If there were societies in the past that were truly egalitarian (i content there are none), then surely we want, for policy reasons, to understand how and why (and, how and why it changed), no?

I think it would also be extremely interesting, if we had a way to know what went on back then, to add to our pool of data about human behaviour under different circumstances and more specifically, gender relations.

I think the idea that a pre-historic society was egalitarian is pretty much a DOA. Nothing to it. The less oversight society has, more abuse happens.

You said a lot more than that.

That's not correct, at all. Violation of human rights, when you're grop thinks it's ok, is the MO of 'leftist' thinking (i don't put you in this category, btw). Murder, when the group think it's ok, is leftist thinking. Crime, when you think it's Ok, is leftist thinking. Fraud, when the group thinks its OK is leftist thinking. Authoritarian behaviour "under the right circumstances" if leftist thinking. Censorship, when the group agrees, is leftist thinking.

These are anti-democracy. I make no further comment, other than to say your disingenuous description tells me you reject all of the above. And so, in turn, should probably be rejecting leftism.

At least on the right, these are still a violation, just a(n intensely) hypocritical one.

You said literally more than that, and it was what I pre-empted. That's ok, fella.

Please do. It's already bringing the level of discourse down. At least move it to the lounge.

The emotivist is normally doing something very similar. "Show me the empiricist explanation of beauty, ideally reducing it to mathematics or prediction, or it is illusory." Yet if beauty, truth, and goodness are "illusory" they certainly aren't illusory in the way a stick appears bent in water, and it seems fair turn around and demand an account of how such an "illusion" occurs. — Count Timothy von Icarus

False.

They don't care that this isn't how the Constitution says how these things should be done. — ssu

Yeah, which is a bit wild given their position on that document by lip service.

I've said that when these populists go on with things like talking of annexations of territory, it's like summoning up the devil. — ssu

Yes, that's been quite troubling for sure. That spells out something far beyond any domestic issues that are present, as far as i can see.