Comments

  • Australian politics
    Do you root for some kind of indigenismo politics?javi2541997

    Depends on what you mean by indigenismo. I would say that everyone is indigenous to the place that they were born. You are indigenous to Spain, I'm indigenous to Argentina. And, at the end of the day, we're both indigenous to the planet Earth. Draw whatever lines you wish to draw on map. We were both born in the same general territory, because that territory is the Earth as a planet in this case.
  • On religion and suffering
    So Arcane, there is a jot of connectivity. But here is a good place for an observation:
    Conscience, mentioned in the lyrics: This appears when one second guesses one's position. What was at first confidence turns to inquiry, for what one was confident in has been undermined somehow. Think of this as a universal condition, that is, the condition of ALL one has confidence in, and all things have lost the absolute confidence one had in them. Earth crisis, or world crisis, is a crisis in everything, so there is no sanctuary since the world is all there is. Now you have encountered metaphysics. The question the OP asks, indirectly, is where IS one once conscience, the call, beckons, or insists (one can never go back) that all things, values and meaning is without foundation?
    Astrophel

    All of this went way over my head. Can you explain it to me like I'm an idiot?

    EDIT: You know what? I'll just link to a video, and you tell me if it is related to the OP of this Thread in any way. Deal? Here's the video, it's not by Earth Crisis, it's by another band called Brand Nubian:

  • How can one know the ultimate truth about reality?
    @PoeticUniverse And here is the Hegelian version of that:



    [Verse 1]
    I am a shotgun rider
    For the San Jacinto line
    The desert is my brother
    My skin is cracked and dry
    I was riding on a folk coach
    And everything was fine
    Till we took a shorter road
    To save some time
    The bandits only fired once
    They shot me in the chest
    They may have wounded me but
    They'll never get the best
    Of better men
    Cause I'll ride again

    [Verse 2]
    I am a river gambler
    I make a living dealing cards
    My clothes are smooth and honest
    My heart is cold and hard
    I was shuffling for some delta boys
    On a boat for New Orleans
    I was the greatest shark they'd ever seen
    But the captain bumped a sandbar
    And an ace fell from my sleeve
    They threw me overboard
    As I swore I didn't cheat
    But I could swim
    And I'll ride again

    [Chorus]
    We are heroes of the homeland, American remains
    We live in many faces and answer many names
    We will not be forgotten, we won't be left behind
    Our memories live on in mortal minds
    And poets pens
    We'll ride again

    [Verse 3]
    I am a mid-west farmer
    I make a living off the land
    I ride a John Deere tractor
    I'm a liberated man
    But the rain it hasn't fallen
    Since the middle of July
    And if it don't come soon my crops will die
    The bank man says he likes me
    But there's nothing he can do
    He tells me that he's coming
    But the clouds are coming too
    He ain't my friend
    And I'll ride again

    [Verse 4]
    I am an American Indian
    My tribe is Cherokee
    My forefathers loved this land
    They left it here for me
    But the white man came with boats
    And trains and dirty factories
    And poisoned my existence with his deeds
    Nature is our mother
    We are sucklings at her breast
    And he who tries to beat her down
    Will lose her to the rest
    They'll never win
    I'll ride again
    — The Highwaymen
  • How can one know the ultimate truth about reality?
    She continuedPoeticUniverse

    As she always rightly, justly does. As Lzzy Hale says:

    When Kings fall to their knees
    They sing a woman's song
    When birds scream in the trees
    They sing a woman's song
    The sunrise in the east
    Sings a woman's song
    Every heart that beats
    Sings a woman's song
    — Lzzy Hale

  • Australian politics
    @kazan this is an example of what I think about when I think about Oceanic Continentalism:



    EDIT: And, of course, the obligatory AC/DC song, since this is a Thread about Australian politics:

  • Oizys’ Beautiful Garden
    Take a look at this Thread, @Bob Ross. I've moved my comments to another part of the Forum, so that this Thread is only for aphorisms.
  • How can one know the ultimate truth about reality?
    The Primitive Customs of the Hummingbird

    Our Father, the Absolute First
    created himself from the primordial darkness.

    He created the divine soles of his feet,
    His small round throne.
    He created them as he grew in the primordial darkness.

    The reflection of his divine wisdom, his divine all-hearing
    His divine palms holding his scepter and flowering branches
    these Ñamandú created as he grew from the primordial darkness.

    Flowers adorned his divine feathered headdress like drops of dew;
    And amidst the flowers of his sacred feathered crown
    Hummingbird, the primeval bird, gamboled and flew.

    Even while our first Father created his own divine body,
    He existed in the midst of the primordial winds.

    Before he conceived his future earthly dwelling,
    before he conceived his future heavens, his future earth —
    Hummingbird refreshed his mouth.

    It was Hummingbird who sustained Ñamandú with the fruits of paradise.

    Our Father Ñamandú, the First,
    before he created his future paradise
    He did not see the darkness
    although the sun did not yet exist.

    The reflection of his own heart illuminated him;
    His divine wisdom served as the sun.

    Our true Father Ñamandú, the First,
    dwelt amidst the primordial winds;
    Where he stopped to rest
    the Owl produced darkness:
    for already the cradle of night existed.

    Before the true Father Ñamandú, the First,
    created his future paradise, before the creation of the first earth,
    He existed in the midst of the primordial winds.

    The primal winds in which Our Father existed return
    with the arrival of the primal space-time
    with the resurgence of the primitive season.
    As the old season ends
    with the flowering of the lapacho tree
    the winds bring the new season.
    The new winds come, the new space,
    bringing the resurrection of space-time.
    Guarani Creation Myth
  • How can one know the ultimate truth about reality?
    (could be continued)PoeticUniverse

    Allow me to attempt to do just that, by pasting the contents of a comment that I made in another Thread, since I plan to delete them from that other Thread and to preserve them here instead. Notice the Temporal ordering, from the Past to the Present. Notice the Ages or Epochs: The Ancestral Times, when the Guarani People did not yet know the European People, notice then the Colonial Times, and notice then the Modern times:

    1. "Before the earth existed, in the midst of the primordial darkness, before things were known, he created that which would be the foundation of human language, and the true First Father Ñamandu made it part of his own divinity." (Guarani Myth of creation, as recorded in the Ayvu Rapyta)

    2. "They are commonly good soldiers, and of great courage and spirits inclined to war, skilled in the management of all kinds of weapons, and with a specialty in the shotgun, so much so that when they go out on their days, they support themselves with the hunting they do with it, and it is common in those people to deliver a single killing shot to the birds that fly through the air, because one cannot be a good soldier if one cannot, with a single bullet, acquire a dove, or a sparrow." (Ruy Díaz de Guzmán)

    3. "No republic, comparable to that of Plato, will be able to subsist in Europe, based on its impious dogmas. It is more appropriate to ask: Does such a republic exist? Did it ever exist in the world? That is what we propose to investigate here. And we hope to be able to demonstrate that among the Guaraní Indians of America, Plato's political conception was realized, at least approximately." (José Manuel Peramás)

    4."Our laws and our ordinances are close to our situation, but they are general to all of America, and it embraces all climates, all temperaments, all qualities of land; It has interior countries, and coast; open channels for communication, and steep lands that make it difficult; In one part there are mines, in others they are searched for in vain; In some provinces the former owners live and constitute the main population, in others they are barely known. In this labyrinth we need the profound geniuses to search for Ariadne's thread." (Manuel José de Lavardén)

    5. "Any despot can force his slaves to sing hymns to freedom." (Mariano Moreno).

    6. "The Homeland does not make the soldier for him to dishonor it with his crimes, nor does it give him weapons to commit the low act of abusing these advantages, offending the citizens with whose sacrifices it sustains itself. The troops must be all the more virtuous and honest, as they are created to preserve the order of the peoples, strengthen the power of the laws and give strength to the government to execute them and be respected by the wicked, who would be more insolent with the bad example of the military. The Homeland is not a shelter for crimes." (José de San Martín)

    7. "Slaves or men subjected to absolute power do not have a homeland, because the Homeland is not linked to the native land but in the free exercise of Citizen rights." (Esteban Echeverría)

    8. "if you don't take care of your countrymen you're no true patriot." (José Hernández)

    9. "Everything has been written, everything has been said, everything has been made: that's what God heard before creating the world, when there was nothing yet. I have also heard that one, he may have answered from the old, split Nothingness. And then he began." (Macedonio Fernández)

    10. "If the pages of this book contain some successful verse, the reader must excuse me the discourtesy of having usurped it first. Our nothingness differs little; it is a trivial and chance circumstance that you should be the reader of these exercises and I their author." (Jorge Luis Borges)

    EDIT: An alternative translation to "if you don't take care of your countrymen you're no true patriot" could be the following:

    "One does not have patriotism if one does not look out for one's countrymen."

    The original Spanish version says: no tiene patriotismo quien no cuida al compatriota.

    997
    Y he de decir ansí mismo,
    porque de adentro me brota,
    que no tiene patriotismo
    quien no cuida al compatriota.
    José Hernández
  • Oizys’ Beautiful Garden
    I don't mind what you do with your previous post: I am just letting you know that most of them are not aphorisms and this OP is a list of aphorisms.Bob Ross

    Ok, here's what I think would be the best thing to do: I will move them over to the Ultimate Truth about Reality Thread. So, they will be deleted from this thread, but they will be preserved in the other Thread.
  • How can one know the ultimate truth about reality?
    The temporary complexity is way more interesting and lively than the simple Permanent underlying.PoeticUniverse

    Hmmm...
  • Hinton (father of AI) explains why AI is sentient
    I guess they're saying that applying a known solution doesn't indicate intelligence. I was watching a YouTube of a bird using a piece of cracker as fish bait. It would drop the bit in the water and wait for a fish to comefrank

    I think I know what you're getting at. The example that I sometimes think about myself is fishing, when the fish thinks that a plastic bait is real fish food. Like, are the fish deluded? Are they imagining things when they see the lure? Is it pure instinct instead, like, "a mechanical thing"? If so, are they as mindless as a stone? Etc.

    If this is instinctual and all birds do it, it's not a sign of intelligence.frank

    It would be instinctual. "Programmed" behavior, in some sense. "Genetic programing", if you will. But I don't like to use computational metaphors too much.

    But if the bird worked this out on it's own, learning, adapting, adopting new strategies, then it's intelligent.frank

    Well, some animals can do just that. Some birds (crows, I think, or ravens, or something like that) have been studied in that sense, also some mollusks. Primates can obviously do such things without much difficulty.

    The conclusion of the article says the following, among other things:

    Despite not reaching the threshold of artificial intelligence, artificial achievement and expertise systems should, nonetheless, be regarded as remarkable scientific accomplishments, ones that can be anticipated to impact many aspects of society in significant ways.frank

    Not sure what the article's Main Point is, then.
  • Hinton (father of AI) explains why AI is sentient
    There are three important characteristics to this definition. First, when a person's intelligence is considered, it is in the context of their maximal capacity to solve novel problems, not a person's typically manifested intelligent behaviour. (...) Secondly, the essence of human intelligence is closely tied to its application in novel contexts (Davidson & Downing, 2000; Raaheim & Brun, 1985). This entails solving problems that a person has not previously encountered, rather than those with which they are already familiar. (...) Thirdly, human intelligence is underpinned by perceptual-cognitive functions (Thomson, 1919), which, at a basic level, encompass a range of mental processes, including attention, visual perception, auditory perception, and sensory integration (i.e., multiple modalities).Gilles E. Gignac, Eva T. Szodorai

    Hmmm...

    EDIT:

    Though our recommended abstract definition of human intelligence may help elucidate its conceptual nature, it lacks concreteness to be sufficiently useful to guide the development of corresponding psychometric measures of intelligence.Gilles E. Gignac, Eva T. Szodorai

    Yeah, this is a methodological problem. It's a methodological "bad thing", so to speak.

    EDIT 2:

    we propose defining artificial intelligence abstractly as the maximal capacity of an artificial system to successfully achieve a novel goal through computational algorithms.Gilles E. Gignac, Eva T. Szodorai

    Ok. And then they say:

    Our abstract definition of AI is identical to the definition of human intelligence we outlined above, with two exceptions. First, we replaced ‘human’ with ‘artificial system’ to reflect the fundamental distinction between organic, human cognitive processes versus synthetic, computer-based operations inherent in AI systems. Secondly, novel goals are specified to be achieved through the use of computational algorithms, not perceptual-cognitive processes.Gilles E. Gignac, Eva T. Szodorai
  • How can one know the ultimate truth about reality?
    "Ultimate" is the last in a temporal sense, it's the conceptual opposite of the First.

    The Spirit is simply the Culture, as the synthesis of Nature and Idea. There has never been a World Culture, so Hegel's Absolute Spirit (which would be the Absolute Culture, the World Culture) exists but in a very weak sense. It is something real, but in a very weak sense. Reality itself is far stronger in that sense. Reality is greater than the Ultimate Truth about it, it surpasses it, it transcends it, because it is an Absolute of a very different kind, one that exists entirely outside the Ultimate Truth about it.
  • Hinton (father of AI) explains why AI is sentient
    Anyhow, I feel like: "Hinton explains why neither we nor AI are sentient," might be more accurate here. :wink:Count Timothy von Icarus

    It sounds like a brutal thing to say, I would argue that we are sentient and that AI is not, but I'm still reading the paper that @frank linked to.
  • How can one know the ultimate truth about reality?
    Hegel identifies the Permanent and the temporary, but a spirit as mind cannot be First and Fundamental because it is a system of complexity.PoeticUniverse

    I never said that the Hegelian Absolute Spirit was First or Fundamental, all I said is that it is Ultimate and that it is a Truth about something else: Reality itself.

    Or Brahman was bored and dreamed up a Soap Opera channel as life on Earth that does stupid things.PoeticUniverse

    Brahman is the Hindu Absolute, it has some similarity's with Hegel's Absolute, but it's not exactly the same thing. Soap Opera as a concept is an Absolute, but it's different from Brahman and the Hegelian Absolute Spirit. Life is not the Absolute, and the Absolute is not alive. The Earth is not the Absolute, and the Absolute is not Earthly.
  • Unsolvable Political Problems
    ↪Banno
    You're another moron who replies to my threads in order to argue against fantasies in your own mind which have nothing to do with anything I ever said or thought.
    Brendan Golledge

    That's a fallacy. Specifically, an ad hominem fallacy. If a moron says that 2 + 2 = 4, and you say "that's false because you're a moron", then the person who is wrong is you, not the moron, however moronic he may or may not be.
  • How can one know the ultimate truth about reality?
    This should keep you busy and not worrying any more about the ultimate truth…PoeticUniverse

    I already know what the ultimate truth is, about reality. It is Hegel's concept of the Absolute Spirit. And that is not factiality.

    EDIT: The song that I select for this comment is the following one:

  • Behavior and being
    When we read a book about insects or French history, do we only learn about words since that is all the books contain?Count Timothy von Icarus

    I don't think so. It depends on what genre of literature you're reading that in. If it's a work of fiction, then I wouldn't take it seriously in that sense. If it's non-fiction, that's a different story. If it's non-fiction, is it a scientific book? And if it is, who is the publisher? Is it an academic or a non-academic publisher? If it's a non-academic publisher, was the book peer-reviewed before publishing? If the book has no credentials, but it tells you basic facts, such that insects have six legs or that Paris is the capital of France, does that mean that we shouldn't believe what the book is claiming? Etc.

    To be sure, there can be figurative language that is more or less empty, but it is not all empty.Count Timothy von Icarus

    Agree.

    Plato and Dante are two of the finest philosophers in history and both make extensive use of imagery and present their works in narratives packed with symbolism and drama.Count Timothy von Icarus

    Agree.

    They are successful, in part, not in spite of this technique but because of it.Count Timothy von Icarus

    Agree.

    Indeed, both suggest that what they most want to speak about cannot be approached directly, through syllogism and dissertation, but must "leap from one soul to another, as a flame jumps between candles."Count Timothy von Icarus

    Agree.

    IMO, one of the great losses in modern philosophy is its move away from drama and verse.Count Timothy von Icarus

    Agree.

    Nietzsche is a standout for this in our own epoch,Count Timothy von Icarus

    Agree.

    many of the older great works, from Parmenides, to Plato, to St. Augustine, to Boethius, to Dante, to St. John of the Cross to Voltaire are filled with it.Count Timothy von Icarus

    Agree.

    Camus and Sarte it seems, were not enough to start a trend.Count Timothy von Icarus

    Well, they tried, and the best that they managed to produce is people wearing black clothes, that talk at coffee shops, and smoke cigarettes. That's not good enough for me. It's actually bad for me, since I don't smoke (I did smoke, and I managed to quit, but it was incredibly difficult) and I rarely drink coffee.

    Well, it seems like there's quite a lot of agreement between us, @Count Timothy von Icarus. That being the case, I don't see why we can't seem to settle the philosophical point about "The Letter of the Law" versus "The Spirit of the Law". I see that debate in a reductionist way, it boils down to the following choice: literalism or spiritualism, you can't have both. Right? Or do you disagree?
  • How can one know the ultimate truth about reality?
    AI poem extension:PoeticUniverse

    I see your AI move, and I raise you the human poem "All Watched Over by Machines of Loving Grace":

    All Watched Over By Machines Of Loving Grace

    I like to think (and
    the sooner the better!)
    of a cybernetic meadow
    where mammals and computers
    live together in mutually
    programming harmony
    like pure water
    touching clear sky.

    I like to think
    (right now, please!)
    of a cybernetic forest
    filled with pines and electronics
    where deer stroll peacefully
    past computers
    as if they were flowers
    with spinning blossoms.

    I like to think
    (it has to be!)
    of a cybernetic ecology
    where we are free of our labors
    and joined back to nature,
    returned to our mammal
    brothers and sisters,
    and all watched over
    by machines of loving grace
    Richard Brautigan

    EDIT: As for the song, I select the following one for this post:
  • Behavior and being
    I'm not really sure what point you're trying to make.Count Timothy von Icarus

    I'm not sure either, that's why I'm asking for your help. Thank you for taking the time to helping me.

    A blanket renouncement of figurative language and metaphor?Count Timothy von Icarus

    Yes, in some sense. In some contexts, at least. Please hear my argument. When you go to a public library, and you go to the room or area called "silent reading room", you can't raise your voice. You can't talk like you would talk at the coffee shop down the corner. Why not? Because you can't, it's one of the rules. Is it physically impossible to raise your voice in that situation? Of course not. But we have to agree on some very basic social rules here, as a society. In that sense, I would echo Eco (see what I did there?) when he told Rorty that things cannot be pragmatism and convention all the way down. I would say here: things cannot be figurative language and metaphor all the way down. Right?
  • How can one know the ultimate truth about reality?
    Here I set myself to singing
    To the rhythm of the guitar,
    For when a man is kept awake
    By an extraordinary sorrow,
    Like a solitary bird,
    He finds solace in song.
    PoeticUniverse

    That is indeed the semantic translation, but you lose the rhyming structure with that particular translation. It's a real poetic challenge. Like, take a look at this published version:

    I sit here to sing my song
    To the beat of my old guitar
    For the man whose life is a bitter cup,
    With a song may yet his heart lift up,
    As the lonely bird on the leafless tree,
    That sings ‘neat the gloaming star.
    José Hernández

    Here's the theoretical problem: did Hernádez actually say that, those English words? No, he didn't, he wrote the poem in Spanish, so who is the actual Author, here?

    A cheerful AI song I made, extended from Omar Khayyam's Rubaiyat poem, regarding the bird,PoeticUniverse

    Ah, but Artificial Intelligences are awful at Poetry, that is a well-known limitation of theirs : )

    I prefer the art of human beings, such as:



    EDIT: And while I have nothing but patriotic, undying love for Soledad Pastorutti, her optimism is only circumstantial, sadly. For no one said that duty was supposed to be honorable by default. In other words, this is the correct message (sorry, "Sole"):

  • Can we record human experience?
    I'd feel like I'm being misunderstood if people began to wonder if they ought be like bees or ants.Moliere

    But this actually does come up every now and then, in political conversations. Like, I've heard fascists make the argument that human society should be more like an ant society or a bee society precisely because eusocial insects are similar to fascists. As for myself, I can only describe such deluded beliefs (for that is what they are) as a metaphysical and political attempt to erase the very concept of individuality in a social sense. And I say that as objectively and as respectfully as possible.

    But then again, I've also heard hippies make the argument that we should be like bees (not ants, mind you) because bees produce honey, and it is well known that Ambrosia (i.e., honey) is the "Food of the Gods", whatever that means.

    Also, thanks for teaching me about eusociality.Moliere

    It's just a useful reference, nothing more.

    Cool, thanks. I'll think about it, but obviously if I'm mixing them up now it's not the time to disentangle.Moliere

    I can't make that decision for you. Nor would I want to.

    There could be one, but I think it's so far out there that any suggestion will probably be false.Moliere

    Well, in my honest opinion, this is because the social sciences in general are not as scientific as the natural sciences, at least not currently. If we wanna bring up the social sciences so that they are on a par with the natural sciences, then we kinda need to place our bets on scientism, right? Anti-scientism won't get that particular job done. See where I'm commin' from, partner?

    Someone could trip across the right answer, as we've done before. I don't like to cut off ideas in principle -- and really, if I'm a marxist, there ought be a way to do this scientifically.Moliere

    Exactly. It's actually really simple, at the end of the day. Right? I could be wrong about that though, I mean, it is technically a very, very complicated point to make. Just look at this conversation. It's too abstract, in some sense. Like, we need to be a bit more materialistic, here. And yeah, I just say it like that, I just blurt that sort of thing out. Doesn't mean that I don't believe in it.

    I just doubt that there is at the moment, and through my experience with doing union politics, at least, I've sort of come around to thinking there is no scientific analysis of political power -- it's a historical, rather than scientific, phenomena.Moliere

    Well, then, what you're alluding to right there is the following question: "Is historiography a social science?" "Is it a science to begin with, or is it one of the "Humanities" or "Humanistic studies"? And I just don't think that it's a productive discussion at the end of the day, even though people love to discuss it. Like, let's just all come out of the scientism closet: we all believe in scientism at the end of the day, let's not fool ourselves about that. Right? Or do you disagree?
  • How can one know the ultimate truth about reality?
    Hmmm... but is it Divine, yes or no? — Arcane Sandwich


    No. Having no parts makes for the Permanent to be the ultimate lightweight; so it can't have any being, the doomed fate hat is hoped for by those looking for Divine as what's beneath, which is at the wrong level, as simplex, for the complex. Look to the future for higher beings and more complexity, not to the simpler and simpler past.
    PoeticUniverse

    Wow... what wisdom you have. And I sure like that word, simplex. Your skills as muser are even greater than your skills as a Poet.

    My quatrains sort of follow the Rubaiyat rhyme scheme:

    The verses beat the same, in measured chime.
    Lines one-two set the stage, one-two-four rhyme.
    Verse three’s the pivot around which thought turns;
    Line four delivers the sting, just in time.
    PoeticUniverse

    It's a lovely poetic structure, that's for sure. I myself prefer verses with six lines, each line with eight syllables, such as:

    Aquí me pongo a cantar
    Al compás de la vigüela
    Que al hombre que lo desvela
    Una pena estrordinaria,
    Como la ave solitaria
    Con el cantar se consuela
    José Hernández

    The poetic structure of that verse would be:
    1) A
    2) B
    3) B
    4) C
    5) C
    6) B

    Notice that the first line is the only free line in that rhyme pattern, and that the free end-word here is "cantar", which means "sing". That's not a semantic coincidence, that's deliberate. What Hernández is saying here is that the act of singing is an act of freedom. That's the main message of that verse.
  • On religion and suffering
    Well, depends on what they have to say.Astrophel

    It's a song about an eco-terrorist vigilante that says the following:

    Never turn my back on them
    I could never live as I once did
    I have to obey my conscience and answer to all
    That it bids
    Why would the hand of fate place me here
    If it wasn't to heed the call?
    Destined to be the one who steps up
    Out of line to save them all
    — Earth Crisis
  • Can we record human experience?
    Oh yes I have no desire to live in bee-society. For human beings, at least, bees are too collectivist -- we'd suffocate in that society.

    I'm a collectivist, but it's not like I want to emulate the ants or bees. That's insane
    Moliere

    Right, but you wanna know why bees are like that and we're not? This is a curious biological fact that I learned when I was working on my doctoral thesis, which was about the history and philosophy of biology. Check out my explanation of it. Bees have eusociality, and the species Homo sapiens does not have eu-sociality, we only have socialty. Now, what is "eusociality", you might ask? It's a word that biologists use, and it means something like True sociality:

    Eusociality (Greek εὖ eu "good" and social) is the highest level of organization of sociality. It is defined by the following characteristics: cooperative brood care (including care of offspring from other individuals), overlapping generations within a colony of adults, and a division of labor into reproductive and non-reproductive groups. The division of labor creates specialized behavioral groups within an animal society, sometimes called castes. Eusociality is distinguished from all other social systems because individuals of at least one caste usually lose the ability to perform behaviors characteristic of individuals in another caste.Wikipedia

    It's a biological division of labor, or division of labor at the biological level. Bees are not collectivists. They are the worst form of social organization that can ever exist, it is extremely oppressive to the individual bee. We, human beings, would not want to live like that, if we experienced it in person. Or would you disagree with me (on something specific or on everything in general)?

    I could be mixing up topics -- I do it all the time, and would be appreciative if I can see how I'm doing it now (not your job, of course, but mine -- just would be appreciative)Moliere

    It seems to me (and I could be wrong here) that you are mixing them up (here, in this conversation) at the level of the concepts themselves, like, you're mixing them in an almost "mathematical", purely formal way. Metaphorically, it's like you're mixing up Geometry with Algebra in some sense.

    "Power" is a funny word -- Bertrand Russell tried to write a science of power by listing the various categories of power and suggesting it could be measured somehow. I think this is a common misconception of power -- that it's something like Kinetic or Potential Energy, and the greater force wins.

    That's a simplification that works, but is basically false. There is no unit of "Power" in terms of political power.
    Moliere

    Ok, but could there be one? It's just math, at the end of the day, in that sense. For example, you can use Goolge Ngram to look for statistical trends on this and that. For example, right now it has the following three search terms: Albert Einstein,Sherlock Holmes,Frankenstein. Right now, the trend is 1) Frankenstein, 2) Sherlock Holmes, 3) Albert Einstein. So what would we say about that, from the POV of Theory? I would say something like the following: currently, people seem to pay more attention to fictional characters than to real people, though that was not always the case in the past.

    Agree or disagree? And to what percentage? Don't just say "Agree, 100%"

    : )

    By "craft" I meant the sort of thing you're talking about here -- one can become better at something, and a school can use a hierarchy to indicate to students the path they are meant to take. I can see the conflict with what I'm saying, and I'm not sure how to resolve it.Moliere

    Me either : (

    I think in the ideal ideal world I'd prefer it if somehow persons could meaningfully choose to participate in such hierarchies. It's not like learning is bad, and human beings can benefit from that.

    It's that human nature is such that even those benevolent hierarchies are abused -- in various dark ways that we need not go into.
    Moliere

    100%, Agree.
  • On religion and suffering
    Hi. Can I answer with a music video by the band Earth Crisis? Because the lyrics say something about The Hand of Fate. Is that what you're talking about in the OP of this Thread?
  • Oizys’ Beautiful Garden
    "Suffering is a choice."

    This is cruel and simplistic. While there is plenty of suffering that might be avoidable if one could muster the courage/will to act rationally, there is plenty of suffering that is not avoidable. Tell that to the soldiers/victims of war, gang violence, rape, addiction, depression, illness and other gnarly incidents of nature.
    Nils Loc

    Damn, this got real dark all of the sudden.

    Maybe this means we can justify harming others more if all suffering is an individual affair.Nils Loc

    That would be either a scientific hypothesis or a philosophical thesis. Or both. Or perhaps none.
  • Can we record human experience?
    I'm not sure that I'm even challenging these ideas as much as using "hierarchy" differently. That's kind of what I was getting at with the notion that this is a more political than metaphysical statement -- I'm not talking about bees or the mastery of a craft, but power relations between human beings (which are largely defined by decision-making-power, in my mind)Moliere

    Right, but, look at the point I'm making here, for a sec. It seems to me (and I could be wrong here) that you're mixing up the topic of politics with the topic of power. Political power is not the only kind of power. There is such a thing as physical power. That is what we study and apply in Brazilian Jiu Jitsu as a martial art, not a sport (thought it's both, really). The notion here is, if you choke me, for example, and I can't escape the choke, and you don't let go, then I go unconscious. And if you don't release the choke after I become unconscious, I will die. That, is some sort of power, and yet it is not a political power. And, to learn those powers, in the context of a BJJ academy, a clear hierarchy is needed, which is why belts exist in the first place. A belt is just a symbol, you could use some other criteria, such as how many medals have you won at tournaments, or how many trophies, which is what happens in the world of sports.

    I agree that calling the Queen Bee the Queen is a misnomer since bees are much more collectivist than human beings are. At least, from the outside -- it's not like I know how to read bee poetry.Moliere

    I think that bees are fascist in that sense. They seem awful to me. The workers are running the show in a bee colony, all of them are females, there is only one reproductive female (the so-called "Queen"), and there is a caste of lazy, non-working males whose only function is to reproduce with the Queen. If anyone steps out of line, the female worker bees kill that individual. They've been known to kill Queens, males, and other female worker bees. And there are records of this. In short, bee society sucks. Fuck them. I'd rather be a human. And I have the "ontological-political right" to say that because I'm just as much of a living being as them.

    I agree here. I'm not a reductionist marxist type person -- just a marxist in the sense that I read him and respect his ideas and utilize his ideas in understanding the world around me because it's mostly worked so far.Moliere

    Yeah but I do that with a lot of philosophers and you seem to do the same thing, that's what I'm saying. Everyone seems to do that. No one sticks to "just one philosopher". I mean, everyone has their favorite, or their favorites, but it's not like we're ignorant of the fact that other philosophers exist.

    I'd say that a Marxist analysis of society doesn't look to place individuals within the hierarchy in a general sense -- it depends upon the "concrete conditions", and so the truth of placing people in a hierarchy isn't something decided in a conversation of contemplation at all. It's more "scientific", but less scientific in terms of norms -- in a marxist analysis it's class oppression, and not individual oppression, that matters. The concrete conditions could be likened to when we have to actually do something in the now -- who has the decision-making power? who has the money? what do we do to accomplish.....? -- rather than some criteria which will always hold such that we can say "King Charles does 78 oppressions per day", or anything so specific or general as that.Moliere

    I don't know what to say here, my friend, so I'll just blurt out an intellectually reckless claim that I'm willing to argue for, even if I'm just shooting from the hip here: Marxism, by the epistemological standards of the 21st Century, is less scientific than contemporary physics. That's just a fact.
  • Can we record human experience?
    Yup. Not intentionally, of course.Moliere

    Ok, let me see if the following analogy holds up, then. When looking at a bee colony, we usually point to a very large individual bee, which is clearly different from the rest just in purely morphological terms, and we say "that's the Queen". But that's an inaccurate thing to say. There is a hierarchy in a bee colony, but the Queen isn't the one running the show. The Queen bee is something like the "reproducer" of the colony, that is her function. She exists only to create the next generation of bees. She does not tell the other bees what to do, the other bees do their tasks without the Queen telling them to do those tasks (i.e., find nectar, bring it back, make honey, construct more wax cells for the colony, etc.). There is no hierarchical oppression in this scenario, even though there is a hierarchy. Or would you like to challenge the idea that there is a hierarchy in a bee colony?

    You can also say "bees are not human beings". Ok. In that case, let me mention, as an example, the sport of Bazilian Jiu Jitsu. In BJJ, there is a hierarchy of belts. That doesn't mean that the black belts are oppressing the white, blue, purple and brown bets. Or would you like to challenge the idea that BJJ black belts are not oppressing the lower ranked belts?

    - i.e. class is a real thingMoliere

    But it's not the only real thing. Biological sex is a real thing, sexual orientation is a real thing, racial discrimination is a real thing, etc.

    I do not think it ought be a real thing.

    But this is much more political than metaphysical on my part.
    Moliere

    But that's my point. In a classical Marxist analysis of society, for example, or a classical Webberian analysis of society (or just pick whichever sociological theory you happen to agree with), where do you place King Charles? Where do you place Lady Di? Where do you place the Pope? Where would one place the Rolling Stones, or Lionel Messi? Are they oppressing the poor in any meaningful way, if any?
  • Behavior and being
    @Count Timothy von Icarus what do you think of what I said ?
  • Question for Aristotelians
    I wouldn't be so quick to make that judgement. But I don't see what this has to do with whether or not there is a reincarnation of Hegel.Metaphysician Undercover

    Yeah, but what folks are telling me about that, is that to discuss the topic of reincarnation is to go Off Topic in this Thread, since it's about Aristotle and something that Sebastian Rödl said about De Anima. In other words, if I or anyone else wants to talk about reincarnation, we need to do that in another Thread. And after careful consideration, I have arrived that the conclusion that such is indeed the case.

    I guess this depends on what "be turned into" means. There is a break in the continuity of identity which is implied by that phrase. And there is a special term for such a break in the continuity of identity, it is generally known as a "transformation". "Reincarnation" also implies a type of transformation, as does "transubstantiation". The concept of "transformation" has been a great gift to creative philosophers. Now there must have been some jealousy from the mathematicians, because the concept "transformation", has now been adopted into mathematics and physics, enabling lofty sophistry.Metaphysician Undercover

    This, on the other hand, might have something to do with Aristotle. A transformation is just a change of form. The question would be, can an Aristotelian substance change its form and still be the same substance? That's a tricky thing to disentangle, you see. For several reasons. First of all, an Aristotelian substance is composed of matter and form. Arguably, it can change its matter and still be the same substance, but it can't change its form and still be the same substance, because its form is its essence. It helps to use a somewhat scholastic vocabulary here to interpret what Aristotle is meaning to say. But not only from the point of view of medieval realism, as exemplified by Thomas Aquinas, but also from the point of view of medieval nominalism, as exemplified by William of Ockham. I don't see how there can be middle ground between Aquinas and Ockham, as far as philosophy goes. Perhaps Peter Abelard, the medieval French scholastic, could be in some sense a middle ground between Aquinas and Ockham, but I've never actually seen the case spelled out in detail, I've only seen it mentioned or otherwise implied or suggested. So, back to the main point, I would say that an Aristotelian substance cannot change its form and still be the same substance, because the form of the substance is its essence, and if its essence changes, then its identity has changed: it is no longer the same substance, it is instead an entirely different substance. For example, a gold atom has 79 protons in its nucleus. That is the essence of gold, as far as I'm concerned, and it's a curious thing because that's what Kripke said, and I agree with him on that point (thought I don't agree with him on other points). If a gold atom loses just a single proton, it turns into a platinum atom. And if a gold atom gains just one proton, it turns into a mercury atom. At the level of ordinary objects, surely we can distinguish a solid gold bar from a puddle of liquid mercury. Why? Because they have different essences. Why? Because the essence of gold is to have 79 protons in every one of its atoms, and the essence of mercury is to have 80 protons in every one of of its atoms. When a gold atom turns into a mercury atom, what has happened is not the mere addition of a little bit of matter, but rather a change in essence, and consequently, a change in form (solid versus liquid), and consequently, a change in substance (gold is not the same chemical substance as mercury).
  • What are the top 5 heavy metal albums of all time?
    These are my favorites:

    Operation Mindcrime
    Painkiller
    Rust in Peace
    Seventh Son
    Dirt (Alice in Chains)
    RogueAI

    Damn, Queensrÿche in the First Place? Brave move, I can respect that.

    (hello BTW, really scary pseudonym you got there, honestly)

    Judas Priest in second place, that's a bold move. (Or is it a "bald" move, since Rob is bald?)

    Megadeth in third place, Ok. I can respect that.

    By "Seventh Son" I imagine that you're referring to Iron Maiden's album "Seventh Son of a Seventh Son". Ok, I can respect that.

    Alice in Chains is somewhat of an odd choice, but if I can get away with Earth Crisis as a metal band, you most certainly can get away with Alice in Chains as a metal band.

    Mindcrime never gets the credit it deservesRogueAI

    I think that Queensrÿche in general don't get the credit that they deserve. But that's a problem within NWOBHM in general, Iron Maiden just eclipses everything in that scene. You know which one is my favorite from that genre? Angel Witch.
  • What are the top 5 heavy metal albums of all time?
    I don't know Earth CrisisJack Cummins

    There's a Thread that I started in this Forum about their philosophical and political ideas, and there's some Youtube videoclips of their songs that I've embedded into the comments, so if you're interested, that's a useful reference and resource. Basically, I'll tell you what they're all about: they are Vegan Straight Edge.

    I started listening to nu metal initiallyJack Cummins

    I started with Metallica. Awful band, probably the worst band in the history of metal. And I'm allowed to say that because they were the first metal band that I took seriously.

    including Slipknot's 'When All Hope is Gone', some Linkin Park. I really like Marilyn Manson's 'Mechanical Animals'.Jack Cummins

    Slipknot's best album is Mate, Feed, Kill, Repeat. They're from Iowa, so it's understandable that they're essentially a group of Evil Clowns Banging on Trash Cans (Think of the movie Field of Dreams, for example. That's sort of what Slipknot are about, since they even have an album called "Iowa").

    Linkin Park is cool.

    Marilyn Manson gets a 2 out of 5 starts, as far as I'm concerned. He's just a watered-down version of Trent Reznor, IMHO. And his band is just a watered-down version of Trent's band, Nine Inch Nails.

    But I do also like some hardcore/punk, including Against Me. I like Metallica but don't play them too often because they are so dark.Jack Cummins

    Never heard of them. Must be a new band. I'll check them out later, thanks for the reference.
  • How can one know the ultimate truth about reality?
    Not Divine, as in a 'God' Being…PoeticUniverse

    So... as in what, then? Is it Divine, in your opinion? The Absolute. Is it Divine?

    In this lost haunt, on the Orion arm
    Of the Milky Way, safe from the core’s harm,
    We philosophers meet in the tavern,
    As sleuth-hounds, unweaving the Cosmic yarn.
    PoeticUniverse

    Cool verse. But the third one is a free line, because the ending word, "tavern", is the only one that doesn't rhyme there. The same can be said of the fourth line, since it ends with "yarn". Formally, that verse has the following poetic structure:

    1) A
    2) A
    3) B
    4) C

    Here, "A" represents an "ending word", and so does "B". So, the words "arm" and "harm" rhyme with each other, and they "sort of" rhyme with "yarn", but not entirely (because "m" doesn't sound like "n", but it's close). The word "tavern" doesn't rhyme with anything here.

    All of that, is from a purely technical standpoint.

    Divinity does not have to be about a transcendent anthromorphic 'God'.Jack Cummins

    I agree. But what I'm asking is, does Divinity exist, in any way, shape, or form?

    You are the temporary arrangement of the Permanent; so, you are It for a while.PoeticUniverse

    Hmmm... but is it Divine, yes or no?
  • In Support of Western Supremacy, Nationalism, and Imperialism.
    Scandinavia is just a group of three (very different) nations: Sweden, Norway, and Finland.Arcane Sandwich

    I need to correct this thing that I said. Scandinavia also includes Denmark, Iceland, and the Faroe Islands. Why didn't you point out this mistake that I made, @ssu?

    the citizens of the USssu

    We need to agree on some kind of word here, to refer to the citizens of the US. I won't use "gringos" because that's insulting to them, and it's disrespectful. I won't use the word "yankees" because that's completely inaccurate, because the Yankees were the Northern people that fought in the civil war against their South. So, in that sense, a lot people from their South don't see themselves as yankees, they don't claim that cultural heritage, if you will. Think of them like "confederates but in the year 2025", if that makes any sense to you. So, the point is, I don't call them "yankees", though that word is about as common as "gringo". They prefer to call themselves "Americans". Now, I'm not going to force them to stop using that word (nor would I want to), and I'm not going to force them to use the word "North Americans" instead (nor would I want to). All I'm saying is that if they call themselves "Americans", then by the same lights (by parity of reason, that is) I can call myself an "American" in the same sense. Why? Because we're both Americans, just look at the words: North American, South American. We're both Americans. The only difference is that you're from the North and I'm from the South, that's it. You speak English, I speak Spanish. You learned Spanish at school, I learned English at school. I mean, come on, man, this isn't rocket science, it's just basic words. What they actually need, from a purely technical standpoint, is a word that refers uniquely to them, the citizens of the US. Some of them call themselves "USians", pronounced "ooh-sians" (I've seen it, actually. In several places, including this very Forum). That word sounds a bit odd to my ear, so it's understandable that they, given the choice, would want to call themselves "Americans" instead. All I'm saying is, don't deny me that right, because since I'm a South American, I have the same right as a North American to call myself an American simpliciter. But I just say that I'm from Argentina instead, just to avoid unnecessary rambling.

    First of all, many Americans think about secession of their state, at least as a theoretical option.ssu

    Why do you, a Finn, call them "Americans"? Would you call me an "American" as well? You better, or I'll book a flight to Suomi tomorrow and I'll challenge you to tell me that you know more heavy metal bands than I do (please don't ban me from the Forum for that joke, I have enough problems with Swedes as it is, I don't need the Finns against me on this point as well).

    It's usually the American commentators who declare the imminent demise of the EU integration project, something that they have done now for decades.ssu

    Is that a fact or an accusation, Sir?

    Yet what is also telling is that those who really are keeping up the dream of the EU are Ukrainians and Georgians, who have seen how other neighboring countries have become stable and prospered inside the European Union. It's in these countries who want to avoid to be under the control of the Russian Empire that cherish the thought of European integration.ssu

    Hmmm... Do I agree with this? I'm not so sure. Can you just explain this last part to me, please? And explain it to me like I'm really stupid.
  • The Philosophy of Alignment, Using D&D as an Example
    Here's a working example of the Alignment table. Ten years ago, more or less, the philosopher Alain de Botton said that the city of Brisbane, Australia, offers "chaotic ugliness", as was so kind to point out in the "Australian politics" Thread.

    So, if we replace the ethical Good-Evil axis with the aesthetic Beauty-Ugliness axis, the modified Alignment table looks like this:

    Lawful Beautiful - Neutral Beautiful - Chaotic Beautiful
    Lawful Neutral - True Neutral - Chaotic Neutral
    Lawful Ugliness - Neutral Ugliness - Chaotic Ugliness

    So, if we compare the two tables (the original one and the modified one) we arrive at the following conclusion, by deductive reasoning:

    Chaotic Evil = Chaotic Ugliness

    The moral of the story here is that the city of Brisbane has no redeeming qualities whatsoever. I don't share that opinion myself, in case anyone got confused or whatnot.
  • How can one know the ultimate truth about reality?
    You know what? After careful consideration, I have arrived at the following conclusion: you are the best Poet in this forum!

Arcane Sandwich

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