It wasn't democratic, for the reasons stated, at length, repeatedly above - and let's face it, probably below! The fact the referendum was well attended is not in dispute. The fact people had their reasons, is also not in dispute. The idea the myriad of reasons people voted Leave relate directly and solely to EU membership is a far more dubious proposition. To funnel all that discontent into a policy that would disadvantage those very people most, is the corrupt cheery on the huge shit sundae that is brexit.
— karl stone

You're wrong on that point, as I've also argued throughout this discussion. The referendum was indeed democratic, and not only was it democratic, if it wasn't democratic for the stated reasons, then many other votes would be likewise undemocratic. But that's hogwash. Baden tried to argue that the referendum is a unique situation which warrants exceptional and unprecedented treatment. I don't buy that argument. It ain't that unique. — S

I'm really not wrong though. That's the sad thing. You're only saying that, not actually challenging the facts as I've set them out. Because you can't. Am I right?

The 2016 referendum was utterly corrupt, and brexit is a bad idea. It really is a bad idea. It serves merely to empower a group of people who opted out of the Social Chapter of the Maastricht Treaty to create a low wage, low regulation jobs market, while selling off all the council housing, and selling off the utilities for peanuts to their city slicker pals, who failed to put accession controls in place on the 2007 expansion of the EU, so all those immigrants came to Britain to work in that low wage, low regulation jobs market, who refused to build council housing while subsidizing shitty wages with tax payers money, starving public services of funding. None of which is the EU's fault. So yes, people had their reasons - but to funnel their discontent into a policy that will give those Thatcherite Tory bastards a clean slate and absolute power is the very worst thing those with real grievances could possibly do.

We'll still have our democracy though, so your premise is flawed. It's far from ideal that we've got ourselves in such a mess that one possible resolution which needs to be considered is going back on the results of a democratic vote. A democratic vote the result of which both main parties committed to honouring. But a no-deal Brexit is not a price worth paying for that. Not out of my wallet, anyway.

Cue the pro-Brexit propaganda, cherry picking, etc. — S

It wasn't democratic, for the reasons stated, at length, repeatedly above - and let's face it, probably below! The fact the referendum was well attended is not in dispute. The fact people had their reasons, is also not in dispute. The idea the myriad of reasons people voted Leave relate directly and solely to EU membership is a far more dubious proposition. To funnel all that generalized discontent into a specific policy that would disadvantage those very people most, is the rotten cherry atop the huge shit sundae that is brexit.

A hypothetical scenario? Do you expect me to respond to that? Something dredged from your fevered brexiteer imagination - when you won't respond to the facts laid out before you?
— karl stone

You haven't laid out a single fact though. — Inis

Another from the "brexit no matter what" club? The facts don't matter to you. Nothing else does. You have nothing to say, so STFU. Or engage with the facts:

The 2016 referendum was corrupt and anti democratic in about six...teen different ways. As already stated, Cameron was a long term eurosceptic who defied the expressed will of Parliament to provide for a referendum entirely on his own recog - as a manifesto commitment no-one could obstruct. I've explained how his immigration pledge and renegotiation sabotaged his credibility, even as he appointed himself chief spokesman for Remain. And that's saying nothing of the rumour he once fucked a pig!

But take your pick from a menu of other anti-democratic elements:

Take the fact Cameron told the public, the result of a legally advisory referendum would be implemented, thereby forcing the hand of Parliament, in relation to the chaos caused by a screeching racist and absurdly false propaganda campaign, stolen facebook data, Russian interference, financial corruption. And that's to say nothing of the brutal murder of an MP during the campaign - threats to march on Parliament, and judges declared "enemies of the people" in the media. Add to that the fact that the official Leave campaign was outsourced to an unaccountable rabid right wing economic policy pressure group called the Tax Payer's Alliance, while the Remain campaign was kept in house, and controlled by Cameron and his aide, Craig Oliver.

Skip forward to today, and Cameron's Home Secretary - who cancelled the EU-ID card scheme that would have given the UK control, sacked the head of the borders agency, Brodie Clarke, and allowed 660,000 immigrants into the country in 2015, and published those figures in the campaign period - is now pressing on with brexit based on a corrupt referendum, a marginal 52%/48% vote, rejected by MP's, rejected by the House of Lords - then I fail to see how the term "democracy" applies.

and:


Too much credit? Credit is given where it's due. Cameron has a first class degree in politics from Oxford, and cut his teeth in politics as advisor to eurosceptic MP Micheal Howard. In 2005, Cameron wrote a manifesto for Howard, that contains Leave campaign rhetoric word for word, relating immigration and EU membership - and demanding an in/out referendum.

Cameron provided for that referendum 10 years later - but we are supposed to believe he didn't really want to. People are led to believe he was forced into it by the rise of UKIP - a tiny anti immigrant party who were absolutely nowhere until Cameron's absurd immigration pledge, and who were never a threat to Cameron because we vote in constituencies - not nationally. Given that's factually wrong - why do people believe it? And how can anyone imagine Cameron believed his immigration pledge - to which he added, "or vote me out."

Credit where credit is due - Cameron worked all his political life for this, and he got what he wanted. The idea a man with a first in PPE from Oxford, who rose like a rocket through the ranks of the Conservative Party to become PM, 'fell out of the EU by accident' is absurd on the face of it. It's not incompetence, it's genius. Only, criminal genius.

Again, you seem to be sidestepping the issues raised in my posts. The 2016 referendum was undemocratic and corrupt
— karl stone

And had Remain won, I'm sure you would be complaining about the corruption. — Inis

A hypothetical scenario? Do you expect me to respond to that? Something dredged from your fevered brexiteer imagination - when you won't respond to the facts laid out before you? So let's get this straight - your position is: brexit no matter what. Yes? So now you can STFU. You have nothing else to say.

But we agree that it's nonsense either way, so let's not quibble.
— S

If UK abandons democracy, it will be like France on a Saturday, except it will be every day. — Inis

Great comment mate. Compared my comments:

The 2016 referendum was corrupt and anti democratic in about six...teen different ways. As already stated, Cameron was a long term eurosceptic who defied the expressed will of Parliament to provide for a referendum entirely on his own recog - as a manifesto commitment no-one could obstruct. I've explained how his immigration pledge and renegotiation sabotaged his credibility, even as he appointed himself chief spokesman for Remain. And that's saying nothing of the rumour he once fucked a pig!

But take your pick from a menu of other anti-democratic elements:

Take the fact Cameron told the public, the result of a legally advisory referendum would be implemented, thereby forcing the hand of Parliament, in relation to the chaos caused by a screeching racist and absurdly false propaganda campaign, stolen facebook data, Russian interference, financial corruption. And that's to say nothing of the brutal murder of an MP during the campaign - threats to march on Parliament, and judges declared "enemies of the people" in the media. Add to that the fact that the official Leave campaign was outsourced to an unaccountable rabid right wing economic policy pressure group called the Tax Payer's Alliance, while the Remain campaign was kept in house, and controlled by Cameron and his aide, Craig Oliver.

Skip forward to today, and Cameron's Home Secretary - who cancelled the EU-ID card scheme that would have given the UK control, sacked the head of the borders agency, Brodie Clarke, and allowed 660,000 immigrants into the country in 2015, and published those figures in the campaign period - is now pressing on with brexit based on a corrupt referendum, a marginal 52%/48% vote, rejected by MP's, rejected by the House of Lords - then I fail to see how the term "democracy" applies.

and:


Too much credit? Credit is given where it's due. Cameron has a first class degree in politics from Oxford, and cut his teeth in politics as advisor to eurosceptic MP Micheal Howard. In 2005, Cameron wrote a manifesto for Howard, that contains Leave campaign rhetoric word for word, relating immigration and EU membership - and demanding an in/out referendum.

Cameron provided for that referendum 10 years later - but we are supposed to believe he didn't really want to. People are led to believe he was forced into it by the rise of UKIP - a tiny anti immigrant party who were absolutely nowhere until Cameron's absurd immigration pledge, and who were never a threat to Cameron because we vote in constituencies - not nationally. Given that's factually wrong - why do people believe it? And how can anyone imagine Cameron believed his immigration pledge - to which he added, "or vote me out."

Credit where credit is due - Cameron worked all his political life for this, and he got what he wanted. The idea a man with a first in PPE from Oxford, who rose like a rocket through the ranks of the Conservative Party to become PM, 'fell out of the EU by accident' is absurd on the face of it. It's not incompetence, it's genius. Only, criminal genius. — karl stone

That's a very compelling argument. Thanks for that!

You mean pro-Democracy nonsense, surely.

The UK cancelled their referendum on EU membership in 2006 because it was clear that the people would vote the same way as France and the Netherlands. At that point the idea that a referendum should be ignored, as they did on the continent, was anathema to even the Europhiles. How things change. — Inis

Again, you seem to be sidestepping the issues raised in my posts. The 2016 referendum was undemocratic and corrupt, and a valid democratic result cannot follow from an undemocratic and corrupt process. The vote should be ignored. It was a split decision in an advisory referendum. Despite rampant corruption, leave won by a nose. It's not the will of the people. There's no plan that commands a majority in the House of Commons, or the Lords, and the policy is a failed policy - certain to result in a damaging no-deal exit. Absolutely it should be ...set aside.

Lord Hill resigned if I recall correctly. But in fact, national appointees to the EU Commission represent the EU. Nation state governments are represented in the Council of Ministers, and the people are represented in the EU Parliament. — karl stone

You note correctly, that you have no representation on the EU body with monopoly on legislative initiative, monopoly on fiscal initiative, and which enforces EU treaties. You seem to be happy with this anti-democratic arrangement, yet complain that when people actually vote, the process is undemocratic. This makes no sense, unless you really don't care for democracy, but are happy to smear your opponents as undemocratic, because you know they care about such things. — Inis

Why did you respond to me with a subject entirely unrelated to anything I wrote? If you don't recall, I said this:

The 2016 referendum was corrupt and anti democratic in about six...teen different ways. As already stated, Cameron was a long term eurosceptic who defied the expressed will of Parliament to provide for a referendum entirely on his own recog - as a manifesto commitment no-one could obstruct. I've explained how his immigration pledge and renegotiation sabotaged his credibility, even as he appointed himself chief spokesman for Remain. And that's saying nothing of the rumour he once fucked a pig!

But take your pick from a menu of other anti-democratic elements:

Take the fact Cameron told the public, the result of a legally advisory referendum would be implemented, thereby forcing the hand of Parliament, in relation to the chaos caused by a screeching racist and absurdly false propaganda campaign, stolen facebook data, Russian interference, financial corruption. And that's to say nothing of the brutal murder of an MP during the campaign - threats to march on Parliament, and judges declared "enemies of the people" in the media. Add to that the fact that the official Leave campaign was outsourced to an unaccountable rabid right wing economic policy pressure group called the Tax Payer's Alliance, while the Remain campaign was kept in house, and controlled by Cameron and his aide, Craig Oliver.

Skip forward to today, and Cameron's Home Secretary - who cancelled the EU-ID card scheme that would have given the UK control, sacked the head of the borders agency, Brodie Clarke, and allowed 660,000 immigrants into the country in 2015, and published those figures in the campaign period - is now pressing on with brexit based on a corrupt referendum, a marginal 52%/48% vote, rejected by MP's, rejected by the House of Lords - then I fail to see how the term "democracy" applies.
— karl stone

and:

Too much credit? Credit is given where it's due. Cameron has a first class degree in politics from Oxford, and cut his teeth in politics as advisor to eurosceptic MP Micheal Howard. In 2005, Cameron wrote a manifesto for Howard, that contains Leave campaign rhetoric word for word, relating immigration and EU membership - and demanding an in/out referendum.

Cameron provided for that referendum 10 years later - but we are supposed to believe he didn't really want to. People are led to believe he was forced into it by the rise of UKIP - a tiny anti immigrant party who were absolutely nowhere until Cameron's absurd immigration pledge, and who were never a threat to Cameron because we vote in constituencies - not nationally. Given that's factually wrong - why do people believe it? And how can anyone imagine Cameron believed his immigration pledge - to which he added, "or vote me out."

Credit where credit is due - Cameron worked all his political life for this, and he got what he wanted. The idea a man with a first in PPE from Oxford, who rose like a rocket through the ranks of the Conservative Party to become PM, 'fell out of the EU by accident' is absurd on the face of it. It's not incompetence, it's genius. Only, criminal genius. — karl stone

Do I bore you?

No. These:

The 2016 referendum was corrupt and anti democratic in about six...teen different ways. As already stated, Cameron was a long term eurosceptic who defied the expressed will of Parliament to provide for a referendum entirely on his own recog - as a manifesto commitment no-one could obstruct. I've explained how his immigration pledge and renegotiation sabotaged his credibility, even as he appointed himself chief spokesman for Remain. And that's saying nothing of the rumour he once fucked a pig!

But take your pick from a menu of other anti-democratic elements:

Take the fact Cameron told the public, the result of a legally advisory referendum would be implemented, thereby forcing the hand of Parliament, in relation to the chaos caused by a screeching racist and absurdly false propaganda campaign, stolen facebook data, Russian interference, financial corruption. And that's to say nothing of the brutal murder of an MP during the campaign - threats to march on Parliament, and judges declared "enemies of the people" in the media. Add to that the fact that the official Leave campaign was outsourced to an unaccountable rabid right wing economic policy pressure group called the Tax Payer's Alliance, while the Remain campaign was kept in house, and controlled by Cameron and his aide, Craig Oliver.

Skip forward to today, and Cameron's Home Secretary - who cancelled the EU-ID card scheme that would have given the UK control, sacked the head of the borders agency, Brodie Clarke, and allowed 660,000 immigrants into the country in 2015, and published those figures in the campaign period - is now pressing on with brexit based on a corrupt referendum, a marginal 52%/48% vote, rejected by MP's, rejected by the House of Lords - then I fail to see how the term "democracy" applies. — karl stone

and:

Too much credit? Credit is given where it's due. Cameron has a first class degree in politics from Oxford, and cut his teeth in politics as advisor to eurosceptic MP Micheal Howard. In 2005, Cameron wrote a manifesto for Howard, that contains Leave campaign rhetoric word for word, relating immigration and EU membership - and demanding an in/out referendum.

Cameron provided for that referendum 10 years later - but we are supposed to believe he didn't really want to. People are led to believe he was forced into it by the rise of UKIP - a tiny anti immigrant party who were absolutely nowhere until Cameron's absurd immigration pledge, and who were never a threat to Cameron because we vote in constituencies - not nationally. Given that's factually wrong - why do people believe it? And how can anyone imagine Cameron believed his immigration pledge - to which he added, "or vote me out."

Credit where credit is due - Cameron worked all his political life for this, and he got what he wanted. The idea a man with a first in PPE from Oxford, who rose like a rocket through the ranks of the Conservative Party to become PM, 'fell out of the EU by accident' is absurd on the face of it. It's not incompetence, it's genius. Only, criminal genius. — karl stone

You're right. I just can't think of any other examples of clever and qualified politicians whose plans have backfired. Is that even possible? — S

My informed and well worth reading posts have disappeared up the page under this progression of mindless pro brexit nonsense.

The 2016 referendum was corrupt and anti democratic in about six...teen different ways.
— karl stone

Who represents you on the EU Commission? — Inis

Lord Hill resigned if I recall correctly. But in fact, national appointees to the EU Commission represent the EU. Nation state governments are represented in the Council of Ministers, and the people are represented in the EU Parliament.

Contrary to common misconceptions, while the EU Commission alone proposes legislation, legislative proposals are developed in coordination with the Council and Parliament. Proposals are then voted on by the Council and the Parliament, but the Commission has no voting rights whatsoever. It's actually a very transparent and elegantly democratic system.

Brexit is a criminal conspiracy against the British people.
— karl stone

Grab your tin foil hats, folks! (It's incompetence, not conspiracy. You're giving Cameron & Co. too much credit). — S

Too much credit? Credit is given where it's due. Cameron has a first class degree in politics from Oxford, and cut his teeth in politics as advisor to eurosceptic MP Micheal Howard. In 2005, Cameron wrote a manifesto for Howard, that contains Leave campaign rhetoric word for word, relating immigration and EU membership - and demanding an in/out referendum.

Cameron provided for that referendum 10 years later - but we are supposed to believe he didn't really want to. People are led to believe he was forced into it by the rise of UKIP - a tiny anti immigrant party who were absolutely nowhere until Cameron's absurd immigration pledge, and who were never a threat to Cameron because we vote in constituencies - not nationally. Given that's factually wrong - why do people believe it? And how can anyone imagine Cameron believed his immigration pledge - to which he added, "or vote me out."

Credit where credit is due - Cameron worked all his political life for this, and he got what he wanted. The idea a man with a first in PPE from Oxford, who rose like a rocket through the ranks of the Conservative Party to become PM, 'fell out of the EU by accident' is absurd on the face of it. It's not incompetence, it's genius. Only, criminal genius.

p.s. check youtube, Cameron, 2009, Lisbon Treaty

Well, in the specific case of Brexit, democracy is embodied in the referendum, its result. and the government's promise to implement the result. This culminated in the EU (Withdrawal) Act which became law in June 2018. The well-funded attempts by the Establishment, the Elites, and Corporatists to undermine the democratic process, will have repercussions far beyond Brexit, if they succeed. — Inis

The 2016 referendum was corrupt and anti democratic in about six...teen different ways. As already stated, Cameron was a long term eurosceptic who defied the expressed will of Parliament to provide for a referendum entirely on his own recog - as a manifesto commitment no-one could obstruct. I've explained how his immigration pledge and renegotiation sabotaged his credibility, even as he appointed himself chief spokesman for Remain. And that's saying nothing of the rumour he once fucked a pig!

But take your pick from a menu of other anti-democratic elements:

Take the fact Cameron told the public, the result of a legally advisory referendum would be implemented, thereby forcing the hand of Parliament, in relation to the chaos caused by a screeching racist and absurdly false propaganda campaign, stolen facebook data, Russian interference, financial corruption. And that's to say nothing of the brutal murder of an MP during the campaign - threats to march on Parliament, and judges declared "enemies of the people" in the media. Add to that the fact that the official Leave campaign was outsourced to an unaccountable rabid right wing economic policy pressure group called the Tax Payer's Alliance, while the Remain campaign was kept in house, and controlled by Cameron and his aide, Craig Oliver.

Skip forward to today, and Cameron's Home Secretary - who cancelled the EU-ID card scheme that would have given the UK control, sacked the head of the borders agency, Brodie Clarke, and allowed 660,000 immigrants into the country in 2015, and published those figures in the campaign period - is now pressing on with brexit based on a corrupt referendum, a marginal 52%/48% vote, rejected by MP's, rejected by the House of Lords - then I fail to see how the term "democracy" applies.

Brexit is a criminal conspiracy against the British people.
— karl stone

How would you characterise the Soros funded campaign by the elites to undermine democracy? — Inis

I'd have to ask - when you say "democracy" what on earth are you referring to?

Brexit is a criminal conspiracy against the British people.

Cameron was a eurosceptic who sabotaged his credibility, and lost on purpose for Remain.

He cancelled an EU-ID card scheme in 2010, and his Home Secretary Theresa May presented the bill to Parliament. The same year he made a bizarre immigration pledge - adding, "or vote me out" - which Theresa May failed to deliver in spectacular fashion.

Cameron announced there would be a referendum in 2013, in defiance of the expressed will of Parliament in 2011, who rejected a referendum by 485/111. Cameron then made it a manifesto commitment the Commons could not block, and the Lords could not amend. So Cameron DICTATED there would be an in/out referendum on the EU.

The EUID card could have given UK government exact numbers on who came and went, how long they stayed, and - as allowed under EU law, remove them if not employed after three months.

Instead, 330,000 EU immigrants in 2015, figures published during the campaign period.

Add to that Cameron's "renegotiation" weeks before the vote - that was predestined to fail because it asked for things that would require EU treaty change. It served to educate the public - with all the coverage it got in the media, but had no genuine purpose.

As soon as he touched back down on UK soil, he appointed himself chief advocate for Remain - and appointed his aide, Craig Oliver, to oversee the Remain campaign.

When Cameron resigned, Craig Oliver was recommended for a knighthood. May was promoted to Prime Minister - and is pushing on with brexit based on a crooked referendum, a marginal vote, rejected by MP's, and rejected by the House of Lords, regardless!

It's a criminal conspiracy.

If hunter gatherers had not discovered God, and appointed him as an objective authority for social morality - such that, tribes could overcome their natural tribal hierarchies without slaughtering eachother, the civilization that gave rise to the Nazis could not have occurred, and we'd still be running around in the forest with sharp sticks
— karl stone

My point was that Nietzsche wasn't talking about God or religion in general, but about Christianity and the Christian God. So even if it were true that hunter gatherers united because of their discovery of God, which I doubt ( I think technology, agriculture was the primary cause and religion followed to 'keep' these new societies together), even then this isn't a counter argument to Nietzsches point. — ChatteringMonkey

My argument is not that hunter gatherer tribes untied "because" of their discovery of God - they united because of the practical benefits you allude to. God is not the why, but the how. Specifically, how they overcame the 'alpha male' problem. They adopted a common understanding of reality, in which God served as objective authority for laws that applied equally to everyone. This created a template for how society was possible - and that template was reworked endlessly before we get to Judeo Christian morality.

Then there's a misunderstanding in Nietzsche - following from Darwin's survival of the fittest, actually not Darwin - but Darwin's bulldog, name of Huxely, I think - that natural morality was merely selfish and violent. I don't believe that's so - in part because of the fact they stuck together and raised children.

All that said, the "transvaluation of values" is a real phenomenon. It's the difference between tribal and multi-tribal morality, wherein the former, is the rule of the alpha male, and the latter, an explicit moral code justified with reference to the authority of God, applying equally to both tribes within the fledgling society. Nietzsche's misunderstanding of this phenomenon led him to God is dead, nihilism and the unermennsch. But he's wrong. Even the alpha male within the hunter gatherer tribe was not selfish, immoral and brutal. When that happens in chimpanzee society - the beta males join forces and drive him out or kill him.

This leads, oddly to Hobbe's Leviathan - and his observation that the King cannot simply behave tyrannically, because the cost is ultimately too great. These are natural laws mirrored in political philosophy. So please, feel free to disagree - but if you think my argument is that it was "because" of God - hunter gatherers joined together, and that's not just a careless form of words, I can only repeat what I've already said. Of course there were practical benefits of cooperation, but a cooperative multi-tribal society was difficult to maintain without an objective authority i.e. God.

Then, in regard to Nietzsche - you have another misunderstanding to contend with that revolves around Galileo's imprisonment and trial for heresy by the Church, for formulating scientific method in the first place, rather than recognizing that scientific truth is valid knowledge of Creation - and thus, effectively the word of God. So really, the Church set religion and science a collision course. Nietzsche plucked at these threads, but failed to understand, and drew all the wrong conclusions.

I don't know much about Nazis - as I said at the beginning. I have only the most cursory understanding of how Nietzsche plays into Nazism, and have shied away from comment on that matter. I'm more familiar with the idea of the ubermensch as it plays out in Dostoevsky's Crime and Punishment. A great book, well worth reading - for it indicates, something else I believe follows from the evolutionary reality, and goes undiscovered and misunderstood by Nietzsche.

In my view, human beings are moral creatures. Chimpanzees are moral creatures in a primitive tribalistic sense. Raskalinkov kills two women because he thinks himself above herd morality - but that's not the seat of morality. It's in us, ingrained by evolution in a tribal context.

It only becomes explicit - where hunter gatherer tribes need to join together, and that's religion. Nietzsche didn't understand this, but Dostoevsky did, because Raskalinkov breaks down under the weight of his guilty conscience. He can't even spend the proceeds of the crime while he's starving. So, there is no ubermensch because human beings are possessed of an innate moral sensibility. Nietzsche is quite simply factually incorrect.

Nietzsche is referring to a metaphysical God. “God is dead” doesn’t refers to the existence or even just to the death of a religious tradition in society. He is making a specific metaphysical point about our world and our place within it. — TheWillowOfDarkness

And I'm making a point about the role God served in civilization - as objective authority for moral law, not saying anything about whether God exists or not. I've stated plainly that I don't know, and no-one else knows either. Do you? Hold the front page of Time Magazine. Do you?

Obviously, a Darwinian explanation of the origins of man undermines religious conceptions of reality, but that is explained. The Church made a mistake when they imprisoned and tried Galileo for heresy. They should have embraced Galileo as discovering the means to decode the word of God as made manifest in Creation. If there's a Creator God, (as I suggest was first hit upon by some pre-historic homo sapien, fashioning a stone hand axe - when it occurred to him to ask, "if I made this, who made me, and who made the world?") and if, science is true, then science is the word of God.

Primitive homo sapiens went on to employ God as objective authority for moral law, to enable hunter gatherer tribes to join together, as the basis of society and civilization. This eventually led to Judeo Christian religious ideation, and Darwin, and Nietzsche's effect on society. But that's not what should have happened. The effect of imprisoning Galileo was immense - and still resounds unto this day. The Church effectively divorced science as an understanding of reality, from science as a cornucopia of endless bounty - upturned by industry in pursuit of profit from the 1700's.

Religious, political and economic ideological bases of civilization were protected, at the cost of using science as a tool, but ignoring science as a rule for the conduct of human affairs. We lent the power of science and technology to primitive ideologies, and the consequences persist. You may have noted, we have all the knowledge and technology we need to address climate change, deforestation, over-fishing, pollution and so on, but don't. Why? Because we apply technology as ideology dictates, not as scientific truth dictates. We have ignored 'the word of God' - as revealed by science!

..we need to accept a scientific understanding of reality
— karl stone

This would seem difficult to do when one insists on ignoring readily available evidence from the real world. — Jake

What evidence, and who is ignoring it? I set out ideas I spent a lot of time and effort on - and this is my thanks, is it? Let me make myself quite clear. If you can't tell truth from a hole in the ground, then your entire silly species will end up in the hole. If you don't like that, think on how much future generations are going to despise you. Think on what they will suffer. It's all me, me, me with you people. Get a grip.

I'm tired and I'm going to bed. I got about three lines in when the irresistible droop of dog-tiredness hit me. Maybe it's a consequence of you throwing any old shite at me - to suggest I'm wrong. That could get very tiring, very quickly. If you're as energetic as you seem, might I suggest having a proper go at understanding what I'm actually saying, before insisting I'm wrong. Organisms effect the environment! No shit! What's your real problem?

Your thinking is rooted in a particular metaphysics (worldview, paradigm, personal construct system) just as is everyone else's. That worldview evolves over time, but very slowly — Joshs

If philosophy doesn't begin with epistemology, then it's basically intellectual masturbation. Take Heidegger and his obsession with being, from which people such as he are able to construe endless - perhaps socially useful, but more often socially destructive implications.

Why is being fundamental - and by what rules does he proceed? Truth is not his guide, facts are either adduced or cast aside to suit his argument. Maybe there's some loose logic, or process of reason to string things together - but based on some insubstantial concept that more likely arises from language than reality. It's tosh, designed to paper over the mistake of suppressing science as truth for 400 years.

"To my mind, science has nothing to say on the existence of God."

They may not talk about God, but science has plenty to say about metaphysics, in the sense that every era of science implies its own understanding of method that changes over time with shifts in philosophy(Bacon, Popper, Kuhn, Feyerabend), which is rooted in underlying metaphysical assumptions that are generally hidden from them. — Joshs

Metaphysics is tosh.

Bear in mind please that the modern ideas of God are recent, and we can not assume at all that they were equivalent to what people believed tens of thousands years ago. The concepts of divinity have changed over time as human social phenomena changed; it is true as you say that Heaven is in correspondence with social hierarchies, and helps to legitimate these structures. But the God that Nietzsche declared dead was his society´s God; when people become atheist, they are atheist of the god of their parents, and assume that all of the other gods are false or are different images of the god of his parents. — DiegoT

Imagine if, instead of arrest and trial for heresy - the Church of Rome had welcomed Galileo as discovering the means to decode the word of God as made manifest in Creation, and thereafter - scientific knowledge were pursued as a sacred trust and integrated into religion, politics and economics - such that our politics bridged the divide between Hume's ought and is. The role of politicians would simply be to know what's true, and do what's right in terms of what's true. Had that occurred, Nietzsche's philosophical campaign against Judeo-Christian morality would not have occurred.

To my mind, science has nothing to say on the existence of God. It remains a mystery even while the earth most certainly does orbit the sun in contradiction of religious orthodoxy. This is consistent with the development of knowledge over time, from less to more, and worse to better - and would not imply, religious political and economic ideologies unable to recognize climate change as a fact, nor apply technologies we have available to combat it.

Clearly, therefore Nietzsche was as wrong as is Richard Dawkins to conflate religion and God. They are not the same thing. I don't know if God exists or not, but I do know the Bible says the earth is fixed in the heavens and it isn't. It's actually spiralling through space.

Why do we identify with and care for children if there is not evolutionariliy adapted brain module or predisposition for it? Nietzsche calls into question the "opposition" between egoism and altruism, the view that a selfish agent cannot act altruistically. For instance, caring for something smaller and weaker doesn't threaten us, thereby allowing us to validate our own competence an worth. Isnt this what the unconditional and utterly dependent love of a child for the parent accomplish? — Joshs

Social life co-operation, caring for the young are possible for Nietzsche, not because of either an inherited gene for altruism or a divine inspiration, but out of pragmatic necessity. — Joshs

The goalposts keep moving look. Before it was pragmatic necessity, now it's selfish agents can act altruistically. Neitzsche's arguments are very difficult to read - it's quite possible he said both, in which case I would urge you to take the matter up with him, only "Nietzsche is dead" (God.)

The small tribes were either absorbed by the larger tribes, or annihilated by the larger tribes.

Please look at the history of North America, a well documented historical event not lost in the mists of time. The larger more powerful tribe of Europeans annihilated the less numerous and less powerful native peoples, and then absorbed the few natives that remained once the invasion was complete. The native Americans did much the same thing among themselves before the Europeans arrived. The big fish ate the little fish.

(see above)
— Jake

The question I'm hoping might be addressed is...

Can any human invented philosophy which conflicts too much with the laws of nature survive?

Before Karl argues too much, please note you've made essentially this same point all over the forum. — Jake

Given that I've argued above that the fundamental law of nature is truth, and that we need to accept a scientific understanding of reality in common as a basis to address global scale threats like climate change, no!

However, at the same time - we are who we are, and have to 'get there' from here. This is where the principle of 'existential necessity' is such a vitally important limit upon, and justification of, science as truth. We need to accept that science is true, but limit the implications to matters of existential necessity.

How the coming together happened is that the smaller tribes were vulnerable, so they joined bigger tribes to be safer. — Jake

Decent conjecture, but if so, why didn't civilization happen earlier, given that evidence of a truly human intellect - as evidenced in cave art, burial of the dead, improved tools, jewelry - can be found in a 'creative explosion' dated to about 50,000 years ago? (according to Phieffer) But civilization only occurs from 15-20,000 years ago at most. That gap requires explanation - and bunching together for safety doesn't suffice.

I think your intuition about tribes needing new religious myths and deities might be right, but it is generally believed that this came as a result of these tribal people having to live and organize themselves within the walls of the first cities. Civilization is the process of developing the kind of culture needed to make cities work, and that implied an evolution of our divine pantheon in the direction of ever more abstract and less tribal deities. This said, the Göbekli Tepe ruins, that predate any other religious building by several millennia and were built way before the first small cities were erected, might change this theory and give your hypothesis a good chance. Who knows! — DiegoT

I'd push that back a lot further - to explain how hunter gatherer tribes joined together. It's not merely an intuition, but an informed guess at an event lost in the mists. It occurs to me that the idea of God must have had a first occurrence. So, really - we are asking when that idea first occurred, and what the consequences were. I'd like to place it right at the dawn of a truly human intellect, but that seems a bit ambitious - even for God. At some point though - it seems likely to me, that some primitive human being - making a stone hand axe, wondered who made him, and who made the world? How long that occurred before hunter gatherer tribes joined together to form societies and civilizations - is open to conjecture, but I cannot imagine cities occurred first, and religion came after.

My informed guess is based on study of chimpanzee social hierarchy and 'morality' - not an explicit moral code, but an ingrained sense, promoted by the reciprocal sharing of food, grooming, and defense of the troop. The troop is naturally ruled by an alpha male and his lieutenants, a dynamic that projected onto human tribal arrangements suggests it would be very difficult for two such tribes to join together. Any dispute over food or mating opportunities leads to the division of the multi-tribal, fledgling society. Only by outsourcing moral authority to God, could the two smaller hierarchical triangles exist within the larger hierarchical triangle of a multi-tribal society - where all were subject to laws attributed to the authority of God. This then might suggest that pyramids are representations of society - and go some way to explaining why both Egyptians and Aztecs (?) built them. Pyramids both represented society, and demonstrated the awesome power of social cooperation.

Because social cooperation was necessary to build in this manner, and given the nature of naturally occurring tribal hierarchy, it seems impossible to me that cities came first and religion afterward, and impossible that multi-tribal society could have occurred without knowledge of God. Then you can relate all this back to Nietzsche and the transvaluation of values, God is dead, the ubermensch, and the Nazis sawing off the tree branch on which they unwittingly perched.

No, I did not say demonic but daemonic, as in the Greek meaning as used by Greek philosophers. I did not use immoral either, but amoral. These deities were symbolic apprehensions of the laws of Nature, as they are manifested in socio-natural phenomena. The idea of moral and immoral as "natural laws" is known from the late Iron Age onwards, the last centuries of the Age of Aries. — DiegoT

I must bow to your superior knowledge of Ancient myths. I assume only they served useful social purposes in the evolutionary development of humankind. It is perhaps for someone learned like yourself, to seek to understand what these purposes were.

My core philosophy addresses one main useful purpose - that of uniting hunter gatherer tribes. I sought to explain the 35,000 year gap between evidence of a truly human intellect, and the earliest civilizations. It was clearly very difficult for hunter gatherer tribes to join together, and adopting common religious symbolism - I argue, is how it eventually happened, and is consistent with the occurrence of religion as a foundation of civilizations, developed in isolation of eachother all the world over. It also explains the 'transvaluation of values' in other terms, and Galileo's arrest and imprisonment for heresy, and our mistaken relation to scientific truth, that prevents us from applying technologies we have available.

Contrasting and comparing with Nietzsche - with whom I have some familiarity, has caused me to go beyond my core arguments, and now you tempt me further beyond my knowledge base. I cannot follow.

Clearly, the fundamental law of nature is truth
— karl stone
Thjs resounds with me, because it is in accordance with Greek philosophy and Egyptian philosophy (Maat) — DiegoT

I'm delighted to hear that. My philosophy is also consistent with a sustainable future. I discussed it at some length with Jake in my thread 'How to Save the World' on this forum.

Gotta be honest here Karl, I'm growing weary of reading this in every post you share. Everything in all of time and space can not be shoehorned in to this pet theory of yours. — Jake

Then don't read it, or suffer weariness. My philosophy. Your choice. But my philosophy knocks Nietzsche's into a cocked hat.

I´m not sure that hunter gatherers appointed any supernatural being as authority for morality. It is difficult to guess and impossible to settle what people in prehistory really thought and believed. However, from the Ancient literary sources that were based on long oral traditions, we can deduce that their gods were not moral. They were daemonic creatures: that is, the "spirit" or functional structure that Ancient people recognized in natural and social phenomena, with both positive and negative traits (from human point of view). For example, the daemonic traits of electricity are that it is awesome and more powerful than many other things, but very dangerous and deadly, just like Thor or Jupiter were. When Zeus, the daemonic symbol of lightning manifested himself at the request of misguided Semele, she was carbonized. From her body was rescued Dionisos, who carried the yang energy of his father Zeus but manifested it in more mortal-friendly ways (up to a point).

Zeus or Ra were sacred, but not moral. If you go to West African gods or Mesoamerican gods, you will notice that this amoral condition was even more obvious. There is no point in appeasing and sacrificing to moral and good gods; you make sacrifices to daemonic entities that are hungry and need to be tamed or kept satisfied.

We don´t have evidence of deities with moral atributions prior to the Axial age. — DiegoT

Spoken like a true Judeo Christian farmer, but Gods of hunting and war were not demonic. Their "morality" fed and defended primitive societies. What's immoral about that? Let's not do theology here. I'm not trying to analyse the myth by adopting its dogma. Rather, given the fact of evolutionary development, it follows that such ideas occurred in the course of the evolutionary and intellectual development - from animal ignorance into human knowledge over time, and served useful social purposes. Or perhaps frivolous ones. After all - what's life without a little whimsy?

The question I'm trying to get to is, how far beyond the laws of nature can human beings go? — Jake

It depends on what you think the fundamental law of nature is. If you think it's "big fish eat little fish" - then you run into your problem, but it isn't. It doesn't explain very much at all. The fundamental law of nature is truth.

Consider the structure of DNA - a twisted ladder that splits down the middle, to attract matching chemical elements from the environment to replicate.

Now consider the fact that a bird build's a nest before it lays eggs, not because it knows and plans ahead - but because the behaviour is ingrained into the organism by the necessity of being correct to reality, (in this case a temporal dynamic), or be rendered extinct.

Now consider humankind, who reject a scientific understanding of reality in favour of religious, political and economic ideological conventions - in relation to the theoretical possibility, that we could accept science is true, apply technology on the basis of scientific merit, and overcome global scale threats - caused by acting on the basis of ideological conventions, and that currently appear intractable for ideological reasons.

Clearly, the fundamental law of nature is truth - physiological, behavioural and intellectual. The observation that "big fish eat little fish" is necessarily subsequent in the order condescendi, and unnecessary to a valid relation to reality.

It's simply indisputable that in nature the big fish eat the little fish. In human affairs as well we can see that the big people typically dominate the little people. Judeo-Christian ethics attempts to establish another rule book in which the weak are protected by the strong. How far can this new paradigm be taken before it collides with long standing natural law which is beyond our ability to edit? The Nazis are just an example of one group of people who concluded that Judeo-Christian ethics are an idealistic fantasy in conflict with the laws of nature. The Nazis just did what all the other great powers were doing, without the Christian and Marxist rationalizations layered on top. We are the predator, and you the prey. No bullshit involved. — Jake

You miss the essence of Nietzsche, which was his discovery that truth, rather than being sovereign, is handmaiden of the will , and will is non-self aware, a product of perspective, which itself is arbitrary. Social life co-operation, caring for the young are possible for Nietzsche, not because of either an inherited gene for altruism or a divine inspiration, but out of pragmatic necessity. He was the first radical relativist. He understood Darwinism better than Darwin did. — Joshs

Please explain. What is the pragmatic necessity for an individual described as ubermensch in Nietzsche's philosophy, to spend the vast personal and economic resources to raise the young? Particularly in a state of nature it would seem entirely counter productive. One easily imagines the crying infant attracting predators, and hampering defense - as well as requiring food and many years of patient tutelage. What's the overriding pragmatic necessity?

I'm sorry, I don't have time for a full response at the moment, so just this for now...

I just think they didn't really understand Darwinism. We still use the idea of "survival of the fittest" today, but what Nietzsche and the Nazis thought that meant was brutal, selfish and violent behavior was natural - and therefore moral. That's wrong - and just couldn't have been the case - because hunter gatherers raised children, and because the economics doesn't work.
— karl stone

Well, brutal, selfish and violent behavior is normal. That's how nature works. And that's how most of the human world is ruled to this day, Russia and China come to mind. The economics do work. We stole North America from native peoples with ruthless force, and now we are prospering from the stolen bounty, while native peoples typically live in poverty. If the economics of conquest don't work, why did the British Empire dominate the world for hundreds of years? Why did the Romans dominate for so long in their time? — Jake

Is it? I go outside, and I don't see that. I see millions of people getting through almost everyday without killing anyone, or even having a fight. If the episodes you describe were grounded in human nature - it's not universally evident. If however, those behaviors are grounded in beliefs, that justify us, while dehumanizing the other, it might explain why the Conquistadors, for example - were entirely civilized on one side of the Atlantic, yet somewhat less so on the other.

If hunter gatherers had not discovered God, and appointed him as an objective authority for social morality - such that, tribes could overcome their natural tribal hierarchies without slaughtering eachother
— karl stone

Really? Have you read any anthropology, zoology, ecology... basically anything on the subject ever? The natural world is absolutely abundant with cooperative behaviour and intra specific murder remains relatively rare. Are you suggesting that wolves have found God too? — Isaac

Yes, I have read extensively. No, I don't think wolves have found God. Thank you for your post.

The Nazis wouldn't have been possible if hunter gatherers had not invented religion to overcome the aplha male problem, and join together to form societies and civilizations, Nietzsche and the Nazis did not understand this. Were it not for the "transvaluation of values" inherent to Judeo-Christian morality - we'd still be running around naked in the forest with sharp sticks.
— karl stone

I don't think I agree with this. We were long past running arround naked with sharp sticks when Judeo-christian morality came around. — ChatteringMonkey

Great point CM. It suggests you really understood the argument. Judeo Christian morality occurred quite a long time after hunter gatherers first discovered God as an objective authority, to allow them to overcome the alpha male problem and join together. The first religions were not Judeo Christian morality, but created a template for how civilization works. This template was applied and reapplied, reworked and re-developed over and over again. It's important to note that this says nothing about the existence of God, but it does tell us a great deal about religion's role as the foundation of societies and civilizations.

If hunter gatherers had not discovered God, and appointed him as an objective authority for social morality - such that, tribes could overcome their natural tribal hierarchies without slaughtering eachother, the civilization that gave rise to the Nazis could not have occurred, and we'd still be running around in the forest with sharp sticks. This seems absurd, but human evolutionary history is millions of years, and civilization is but a few thousand years. It could easily have been the case. Thus, the Nazis essentially sawed off the tree branch upon which they were perched.

It's awfully rude - and I mean no disrespect, but can I please direct your attention to my response to Jake above. I would have to reproduce everything I've just written to him, to answer the points you raise, and while it's an imposition upon you, I know - if you revise your questions and beat Jake to the punch, I'll do the same to him next time! Or not - but it does make sense on this occasion. I was fairly definitive in my response to Jake, and I have nothing more to say than I said there.

Good points Karl!

Ok, so those humans who came together in larger groups out competed the smaller groups, and we saw tribes become villages become cities become nations. Religions and morality do seem to be part of this unifying process, though probably not the only factor.

So we see that the Soviet Union, a larger nation, defeated Germany, a smaller nation. But, how did the Soviet Union become a larger nation? Through the application of the law of the jungle. Same thing with America. Same thing with the British Empire. All these larger powers were built through a sustained campaign of ruthless conquest. Today, the world's largest nation China is held together by the application of centralized systematic fear. The United States was held together in the 19th century by a horrific war imposed upon those who wished to leave the union. — Jake

Those are indisputable historical facts, but like I said earlier, we are developing from animal ignorance into human knowledge over time. Social morality as religion was invented, causing the 'transvaluation of values' Nietzsche identified - but misunderstood, and biological evolution trails behind intellectual and social evolution, and furthermore, that ingrained moral sense can be perverted by ideas, to justify both the good, i.e. society, and unimaginable evil with considerable equanimity.

Then, you have to consider the jurisdiction issue, and the fact that our religious morality is not their religious morality. Both are inward looking, self congratulatory, soft constraints, that justify us relative to them. We demonize them, because they are not us - and we're right, such that therefore, they must be wrong and undeserving of moral consideration. It's not wrong to kill them - even while it would be murder to kill one of us.

Maybe it wasn't morality which held the primitive societies together, but rather fear of neighboring societies? Maybe the alpha male problem was solved by killing off competing alpha males, just as has been the pattern in nature for a billion years? — Jake

But human beings are moral creatures. They must have been to raise children. The same in group / out group moral dynamics that applied to nations going to war with eachother, is the same hunter gatherer tribal morality played out on a much larger scale - in relation to ideas like religion, nation, and economic ideology. Inward looking moral systems that make us good, and them bad.

With regard to your other question, it doesn't scan. I don't doubt there was inter-tribal conflict - but the idea that society and civilization was achieved through murdering the men and taking the women of other tribes fails economically. Consider the burden it would create, to guard against enemies from within and without. We watch the borders and trust those at our backs - and that's how it had to occur, and did occur. If it hadn't, then why the 'transvaluation of values' Nietzsche identified - but misunderstood?

Hunter gatherer tribes joined together by adopting in common, God as an objective authority for social morality. That's the transvaluation, and the only way it works economically; that is, with regard to the resources they had, including human resources - to perform the roles necessary to a functioning and developing society. And because we know that all primitive civilizations developed art, architecture, jewelry, pottery, agriculture, clothing - all the same things, all the world over, but in culturally distinct ways, it's safe to assume God as objective authority for social morality is also a universal.

It seems to me the Nazis were pretty realistic about how the human realm and the natural world it arises from actually works. Perhaps they were unrealistic in not grasping the important role the illusion of morality plays? — Jake

I just think they didn't really understand Darwinism. We still use the idea of "survival of the fittest" today, but what Nietzsche and the Nazis thought that meant was brutal, selfish and violent behavior was natural - and therefore moral. That's wrong - and just couldn't have been the case - because hunter gatherers raised children, and because the economics doesn't work. Human beings are moral creatures - like chimpanzees groom eachother and share food within the tribe, and remember who reciprocates and who doesn't. There's a naturally occurring inward looking morality - that was built upon by agreeing a common idea of God, essentially, the alpha male, or Ubermensch in the sky - to whom both tribes agreed to bow, eventually forging a common identity, that as they grew, then came into conflict with other such religious, political and economic identities - and off we go again.

Back to Nietzsche, and the Nazis - essentially they killed the Ubermensch in the sky, and took divine authority unto themselves. But they didn't understand the implication from the Darwinian tree of life, that all organisms are related, that all human beings are members of the same species - and virtually identical in evolutionary terms. It's said that if the whole of evolutionary history were mapped onto your wingspan, human history would be a but shaving from a fingernail. The idea of racial differences is thus in truth, an idea that can only occur within a single frame, at 16 frames a second, from a movie that lasts all week. So to imagine that survival of the fittest implied total warfare and racial eugenics is factually wrong; an erroneous belief that perverted the naturally occurring moral sense to justify unimaginable evil.

Here - you may recall from the other thread, I would cite the significance of recognizing a scientific understanding of reality in common. But that's another argument, and I'm not going to hijack this thread merely to explain again - "how to save the world."

The Nazis wouldn't have been possible if hunter gatherers had not invented religion to overcome the aplha male problem, and join together to form societies and civilizations, Nietzsche and the Nazis did not understand this. Were it not for the "transvaluation of values" inherent to Judeo-Christian morality - we'd still be running around naked in the forest with sharp sticks.

One might therefore speculate that, Nietzsche declaring "God is dead" undermined moral values justified by divine authority, and thereby allowed for the 'uncivilized' behaviors of the Nazis.
— karl stone

Nietzsche didn't declare 'God is dead' himself, it was a description of what had allready happened at that time... but people generally didn't fully realise the ramifications of it yet. If the cornerstone 'God' falls, so must the morality that is build on it eventually, it's a package deal of sorts. Scientific inquiry killed God, or in other words the search for truth killed God.... or ultimately, Christianity killed God itself because truth was one of it's core values. — ChatteringMonkey

Reasonable remarks overall there CM, but of course - declaring God is dead only had the effect it did, insofar as Nietzsche's philosophy influenced Nazism. No-one is suggesting Nietzsche was the sole factor responsible for the Nazis, nor that the conflict between science and religion began and ended with Nietzsche. Arguably, it began with Galileo's imprisonment and trail for heresy in 1634 - which somewhat contradicts your assertion that truth is a core Christian value. If you think Christianity is truth then sure, it's a core value. But it moves!

I would say right back at you - because your post is very well written, but I have some problems with your argument.

It seems to ignore the fact that we are evolving, from ignorance into knowledge over time - from a state of nature to become civilized beings, from agrarian to industrial, from local to global and so on. You therefore omit that different systems of government and economics developed in isolation of eachother, grew and came into conflict - to thereby imply that we choose to practice a big fish eat little fish ethos, where we might not.

Power dynamics naturally exist, but the larger part of religious, moral, legal and political philosophy is dedicated to defining the legitimate limits of power, and that's only possible insofar as ideas have jurisdiction - which is far from global. Economics also naturally exists - it can be applied to the way in which troops of chimpanzees groom eachother and share food, and they remember who is selfish, and then refuse to reciprocate. Practicing economics within and between the limited jurisdictions described has the consequence that little fish are eaten by the big fish, but it is not something we choose in every moment, as Hitler chose it - based on Nietzsche's philosophy. It is a developmental problem.

Overwhelmingly, in the west - economic outcomes are defined by the random distribution of talents by nature, and industriousness. Certainly, there are questions of equality of opportunity that follow from the socio-economic class status one happens to be born into - but we do not, for example, have the racial hierarchy policies that Hitler adopted, and that persist in some parts of the world. We have developed beyond that, even if many would argue there's still a long way to go.

All that said, it is in my opinion a mistake, and counter productive to project backward in time - the moral values we have developed in the present, to earlier stages of development - or, in denial of those claims of injustice, choose the big fish eat little fish ethos that Hitler chose.

Science is the Lying Game. A good lie must mix facts with the lie; and it must really hard to expose. In Sweden they give annually the prizes to the best lies of the year. Isaac Newton invented a lie that was only exposed four centuries later, that is why we consider him one of the greatest scientists in History. When you expose a great lie, you get to try to say another whopper; and Einstein took advantage of this rule to tell his own lies. They were so damn good they gave him the Swedish trophy as the best fabrication in Chemistry. Many physicists today dream of exposing Einstein´s relativistic lie; but it´s hard because Einstein was so good a concocting falsehood. Karl Popper helped to improve the Lying Game by introducing new rules. — DiegoT

Are you serious, or making a joke? Either way, it's funny.

Does the spherical Earth cast doubt upon Popper’s claims about scientific theories never been confirmed? — Craig

The degree of confidence that a spherical earth exists is very high, but we could all be brains in jars. We could all be plugged into the matrix in an entirely different kind of reality, and when we wake up - find that the spherical earth we thought we experienced was an illusion. If that happened that would be new information that falsified the spherical earth hypothesis.

Here's where it gets interesting. Occam's razor, basically states that the simplest adequate explanation is the best - and so the possibility that, just maybe - we are brains in jars, has to be considered in terms of how likely it is - and in those terms can be dismissed. So, while there remains a doubt - as expressed in Descartes Meditations, that some evil demon may be deceiving us in everything we seem to experience, that doubt is subject to a probability test - and all this feeds into scientific method, and empiricism.

Empirical proof does not follow from the facts per se - but from independent confirmation of the experimental methodology, and findings. It's considered proof, but held to be contingent on the possibility of the improbable variable turning up. A variable that might be foreseeable - but considered too unlikely to factor into the hypothesis, or an entirely unforeseeable variable, in light of which the proof is falsified. So the answer is both yes and no. Can we have proof? Yes. Can we have absolute proof? No!