We are conditioned into naturalism and scientific realism by consensus, and it's often hard to question. — Wayfarer

Empirical theories need to be validated against observational evidence - although even that is now being disputed - but metaphysical postulates cannot. — Wayfarer

So, such things as logical principles, scientific laws, mathematical objects, are all essential to empirical science, but they don't necessarily exist in time and space either. Rather, they form part of the architecture of reason, by means of which judgements about time and space are arrived at. — Wayfarer

I'm a bit hesitant to reply to this, because you touch on a lot of things, and I'm not sure I can do justice to the all issues being raised. But anyway, with that caveat out of the way...

My first general remark would be, aren't we always conditioned into something? I get that you are not a big fan of scientific realism and naturalism, but it's not as if past times were free of conditioning, to put it mildly. At least the scientific method comes with the tools to question itself. And for me that is important, because, what can I say... I like clear skies.

Concerning metaphysics, I kind of agree with Nietzsche's view on that, namely that most of it springs from the psychology and the moral views of people. Absent any way to verify it, what informs those metaphysical views really? Reason you might say, but reason doesn't inform us about anything absent empirical data, it needs something to work with. Take for instance quantum mechanics, one of the reasons why there are so many perfectly reasonable interpretations right now is because there is no empirical data to rule out any of them. Reason alone doesn't get you there if there is no data. And then there's a history of metaphysics being used to ground all kinds of moral theories. So yeah, metaphysics I try to stay away from as much as possible.

About the last quote, of course the language we use to describe the world doesn't exist in space and time. It's merely a description of world, not the world itself. The laws themselves do not exist, right? Take for instance the second law of thermodynamics, entropy never decreases over time. The universe doesn't behave like that because there exists a law that makes or causes the universe to behave that way. Rather the universe behaves that way because there are a lot more high entropy configurations of the universe then low entropy states, and statistically, given enough time, it will therefore naturally end up higher entropy. The law is an abstraction and description of that process, not the cause.

And finally, I don't think logical principles, scientific laws, mathematical objects, etc... have historically been developed apart from the empirical sciences, in a pure reason kind of way, so that we can use them. They have being developed in concert with each other, the one pushing the other and vice versa. They are tools, and people don't care about developing tools that have no use... usually.

Of course. You're modern. — Wayfarer

A snide reply doesn't really deserve an answer. But I will say this, Socrates and his followers weren't exactly classical either, they were just wrong. They represented a break from and a decline for ancient classical Greece. Only then did they turn away from the sensual to the abstract, when Greece (Edit: Athens I should say) was already in decline.

Yeah I guess I was born that epoch.

Necessary truths are not ‘in time’. I think you're making the mistake of believing they're real in an objective sense, when they're actually transcendental or necessary truths - ‘true in all possible worlds’.

In matter-form dualism, the form is what makes particulars intelligible. It is also what brings order out of chaos, as matter in itself is unintelligible until it takes form. That is why, for classical dualism, the form or principle of a particular is what is real, as it is grasped intuitively by the intellect rather than mediated by sense. The form is also what a particular truly is, whereas this or that instance is accidental and temporal.

Don’t overlook the original impetus of philosophy was to identify an unchanging reality in the flux of experience. — Wayfarer

I don't think they are real in an objective sense, in fact I don't think the word true applies at all to 'necessary truths'. Truth value comes from verification, you check to see if a statement is true or not by looking. Logical necessity is only truth-preserving if you will, i.e. 'if the premise is true, then what follows logically is also true'.

This all seems completely backwards to me. Ideas are not real, precisely because they don't exist in time. That's what it means to be real, to exist in space and time. Only particulars exist, and universals are abstractions of those. They enables us to 'abstract away from reality' to gain more general applicable knowledge. But that knowledge is not reality itself. I mean, that's like saying the map is more real that the world it is based on.

And yes, the original impetus of philosophy was mistaken.... a mistake we struggled the next couple of millennia to get away from. The fact that we have a need for certainty or permanence is no reason to assume that that can be attained. There is no unchanging reality is what our senses tell us.

Yeah and I'm pretty sure Nietzsche didn't see it that way either. That the empirical world is ever changing, is not a reason to conclude that it is not real... it's the other way arround. We should should be suspicious of knowledge taken to far on the back of axiomatic principles like the law of identity, because the world does in fact seem to be ever changing. Only when we freeze time does the law really hold up.

And I take that to be the question of the OP, what then is the justification of it? It can't be proven because it's the basis of the whole system, and only if things are frozen in time do they remain the exact same thing. So I think the justification is not because it's true, proven or follows from our experience of the world. The justification is utility, because it works... for our purposes. Things remain constant enough, or change slow enough, that we can assign categories and work with them. It's the best and only thing we have to attain some kind of knowledge about the world.

The thing you need to get, I think, is that X=X says something about the language we use to describe the world, and not necessarily about the world itself.

In the world nothing is perfectly identical to some other thing. Every apple has some, even if only miniscule, difference compared to another apple. But they are similar enough that we can abstract away from raw sense-data and make up categories and use those to be able think further than mere experience of fleeting moments.

It's not a perfect tool, and that is important to realise so you don't expect things it can't deliver. But at the same time, it's still the best tool we have even if imperfect.

So... to answer your question, this is not about proving x=x, x strictly speaking doesn't equal x. It's about utility, we want x to be equal to x so can get along with whatever it is we want to infer from that.

Ok fair enough. QM is a bit over my head I'm afraid, and scientists are not sure how to interpret it either at the moment it seems, so I don't have much to add to that.

Good luck, and thx for the conversation.

Ok, I see we have different definitions of information. For me, information is a limitation of the possible worlds we are in. Like if a number is between one and infinity, we have less information about it than when a number is between one and two. And when we make an empirical observation, that limits off the possible worlds where that observation would not happen. In my definition all my prior claims are correct. — Qmeri

Ok, I still don't see then how you can end up assigning probabilities to God or Living in a simulation then.

You start with zero information... and you end with zero information, because we can do no observations that limits possible worlds. And assigning equal probabilities to all possible world with zero information seems like an baseless assumption. Why are we assigning equal probability to all possible worlds? We just don't know.

Data about the world, or sense-data if you will.

In my view no new information can be gained by logic alone, that are just tautologies or repackaging of the same information.

Like, Socrates is unmarried, therefor Socrates is a bachelor... no new information is gained, your are just using other words to say the same thing.

I said that even without information we can see that most humans in most possible worlds don't have golden fists in their asses. — Qmeri

But you cannot even concieve of humans if you have no prior information. And why would any property be more likely if you know nothing about them?

Logic does not care what universe something is from. The whole idea of logically possible worlds is about taking into account every possible universe - and we can derive useful realizations from that. Like: "I think, therefore I am." That is not related to our universe - it is true in all logically possible universes even without any information. — Qmeri

"I think, therefor I am" does not follow in a simulated world, if we take existing to be physical, which we tend to, as we wouldn't typically say pokemon exist.

I don't see how you can derive usefull realizations from them.

We can also evaluate probabilities. Almost in no possible world do most humans have a golden fist in their ass - therefore even without any information you can say that if you are a random human, you probably don't have a golden fist in your ass. — Qmeri

You do not start from zero information there though, you start from an idea of what humans are, and derive the improbability of such a creature having a golden fist up their ass from your information about humans.

Probabilities typically are assigned when you have incomplete information... but you do have some information, and sensible probabilities start from there.

For example when you know the composition of a deck of 52 cards, you can calculate the probably of you drawing two aces from that deck. If I say however, I will deal you two cards from a deck that can be infinitely large (but you do not know how large it is) and has any number of random symboled cards in it, how will you calculate the probability of drawing two aces then? Sure, you can assign probabilities, but they don't mean anything without some prior information.

Likewise with God and simulations, they are not of this universe, and so we know nothing of that place... therefor no sensible probabilities can be made. You need some information to start with.

If you think they have to be or just can't be given sensible probabilities, please demonstrate — Qmeri

What are you going to base those probabilities on if you have no possible way of veryfying anything about them? If probabilities are based on nothing, then what's the point of those probabilities?

Not everything can sensibly be assigned probabilities, some things are beyond our ability to verify either way, like say if we are living in a simulation or not, or God.

And yes, I'd say mental health or sanity can be a rational reason for choosing a belief beyond probabilities. We are not machines and have emotional needs... some beliefs concerning identity, free will and the like, possibly are better believing in for your sanity, whether they are true or not.

I think you misunderstood what I meant. I was referring to the fact that technological developments will help give companies and countries more of a reason to switch to renewables over relying on traditional fuels since they will be cheaper and less costly overall on a financial level. Like I said before, these technologies are becoming competitive and will take over in the coming years. My only hope is that it will be sooner rather than later given the limited time frame we have to act on the environment.

One reason why I liked the vanilla Green New Deal was that it can be argued both on an economic and environmental level. Even if you have people on the right that don't care/believe in climate change, they can still be persuaded on the economic opportunities of green technology. So much as governments are involved, I think they should in part be investing and subsidizing R&D on renewables and EVs, especially if it moves funds away from fossil fuel subsidies.

Anyways, since we're on the topic of taxation, it really depends on what the taxation is. If it's gonna be regressive like the ones in France, then of course that's a backwards way of going about it since it disproportionately hurts the poor over the rich. A carbon tax that is rebated back to the people like in Canada would be more palatable IMO. In addition, there are also tax credits that incentivize people to switch to EVs and renewables that should be considered as well. — Mr Bee

I did not misunderstand you I think. The technology could become competitive on it's own… but it's no certainty, I don't think. Either way you cannot really rely on the economy alone. But I do agree with your general point that any solution will have to take into account both economy and ecology.

Regarding taxation, yes, in principle you could go any direction with taxes. Because of the usual political forces at play though, it usually goes in certain directions.

Shaming of public officials may not sway their hearts on a personal level, but if it hurts their public standing so as to hurt their businesses or reelection chances then they'll be obligated to act whether they want to or not. Bolsonaro clearly doesn't give a damn about the Amazon burning, but the global outcry of the Amazon's destruction led to organizations like the EU to reconsider their trade deals with Brazil which convinced him to finally send in the military to put them out. Of course this isn't gonna stop him completely but it helps limit the damage he is doing. — Mr Bee

I've been thinking about this, because you do have a point…. but I don't like it :-). That is no rational argument ofcourse, so i'll try to articulate what doesn't sit well with me.

This only works to some extend, I think. One, because in principle it works only on perception of behaviour… . If they can get away with hiding the shamed behaviour than that is what they will try to do, and then things get potentially worse because there are no limits to what you can do if the behaviour isn't visible anymore. This akin to the arguments as to why criminalizing drugs doesn't work all that well.

Second, there are deminishing returns to this tactic it seems to me. Attentions of people are limited. If you flood them with messages of doom, at some point they invariably will stop caring… and then the tactic becomes ineffective in the long term.

And third, shaming distances you from the shamed. If the solution to the problem ultimately will have to entail making a deal with everybody, then shaming has probably made that more difficult.

I have no solution.

First off, the needs of economic an political value would change if there was no need for work and robots did everything, no? — schopenhauer1

Yes it would presumably change in favour of the owners of the robots, who now own everything without conditions.

Thus, the "leverage" would not even be a part of the equation being everyone has the goods and services they need. — schopenhauer1

It will allways be a part of the equation, the leverage will just be 0 then for the valueless. Everybody does not automatically have all the goods and services they need... that would only be the case if the owners of the means of production decide it so.

Economic power is a part of let's say "total aggregate power"... and ultimately (no matter how much rules you make) this will allways be the biggest factor in determining who get's to decide.

But who cares. — schopenhauer1

People care, because if they are valueless in economic terms, the next step is that they will be no factor in political deliberation, or maybe I should say even less a factor.

So it's not that they should care 'inherently' about the economy, that misses the point, it's because it will have negative consequence for them if they are valueless regardless of them caring about it or not.

Edit: To give an example, one way of weighing on political decision-making for the not-so-rich, is going on a strike. That works some of the time because going on a strike causes economic damage. It gives you a form of economic leverage. Economic value translates into political power, so if you are economically valueless where does that leave you then?

In light of that what then should guide a person to formulate his or her own values, if you don't mind me badgering you? — Wallows

This is a very difficult question, and I'm not sure if I can adequately answer that...

But the way I see it, is that we do not start in a vacuum. We get raised by our parents and in a society that promotes certain values. And we also find ourselves in certain positions relative to that society. By the time we are sufficiently self-reflective and can start thinking about these things we already have a good amount of baggage that we can't merely make abstraction of. You start from somewhere...

The other important factor is your temperament. A good part of it is probably biologically determined, and so formulating your values (which goes to the core of your being) is not so much a matter of choice, but of discovering what those are.

And you find out what those are by trying different things in the first place, and then reflecting on your experiences afterwards. What did you agree with, and what didn't sit well, what choices did you make and why etc... If you manage to abstract that into more general values, you can then again go the other way by drawing the ramifications of those values by comparing them against certain concrete possible scenarios... and tease out contradiction along the way. And ultimately, like I said in earlier post, try to figure out how you want to deal with those. It might mean abandoning certain inherited values altogether, or sometimes that is not possible, and you'll have to try to reconcile conflicting values.

Needless to say maybe, but this isn't done overnight... it might take a while.

Is it necessary that one abandon ones belief posing as the solution here? — Wallows

No maybe not, maybe that's to strong of a claim. Your could also accept that you have different values, and look for a solution that is a compromise between the two.

Yes, if not a contradiction, then what exactly is it, then? — Wallows

It is still a contradiction, but you can't really say it's because of bad logic or because the premises are not true. Truth doesn't really apply there.

To give a simplified example, you get raised with two values, to be ambitious and to enjoy life. If you start to reason from those values to be able to decide on concrete actions in your life, often enough you will come to the conclusion that they lead to opposite courses of action. This isn't because one of the values is wrong per se, you can't 'correct' a mistake to solve the contradiction (like you can in maths or the exact sciences). You then could decide to choose between values and abandon one of them, or maybe if you can't, you need to figure out when you will favour one over the other etc...

This is often why in political discussions people tend to talk past eachother. People simply have different values that aren't compatible. and then the discussion cannot really be resolved... other than someone abandoning their values in favour of the other.

I wouldn't expect Google's algorithm to favour philosophical answers.

The word 'solve' is maybe not the best word there, and the question is a bit general as the answer will differ depending on the subject matter.

We allways use a language, be it maths or a regular language, to speak about anything. One way you can get a contradiction is if you made a mistake in the logical steps leading up to the contradictory conclusions. That is generally true for all subject matters.

Another way you can get contradictions, even if you made no logical mistake, is because of the premisses. Here it will depend on the subject matter what a contradiction means.

In maths and the exact sciences for instance it can only mean that your premisses are wrong if no logical mistakes where made. Wrong premisses can be the result of wrong assumptions or bad data. It is assumed here that if you talk about the 'world' then there shouldn't be any contradictions, so a solution should be possible in principle… by examining your logic or your premisses.

If we are talking about something man-made however, like values, morals or law for instance, contradictions need not necessarily imply a logical mistake or faulty premisses, because we aren't describing the world, but we create values and morals etc... and those could be contradictory. The way to deal with those is not necessarily by 'solving them', but could be to just accept it and make amends for values that are necessarily contradictory.

I get all that.

I started this thread on a whim. The OP videos juxtaposed Greta's impassioned speech with images of extravagant pollution. As if to say fuck this little girl and the earth she rode in on: Let's own the libs by grandiosely toxifying the earth. A death-cult psychology. That's what fascinates me. — ZzzoneiroCosm

Ok fair enough.

Looking back at the clip of her speech, I get that some people would want to make fun of her, she does come across as an insufferable brat there.

Indeed, it sucks to get a consensus on the issue. That's sort of the reason why I have less faith in government bodies to change things given how democratic systems can simply elect psychopaths like Trump or Bolsonaro at any point and cause chaos. They've had a chance to do things for decades now and we're still figuring it out.

Likely we won't be seeing massive change until an economic incentive comes in to push people to switch to renewables, cause apparently that's all that people care about. Thankfully renewables have become competitive and electric vehicles are catching on so there's hope on that front. I just hope that people start adopting it en masse like they did smartphones. — Mr Bee

Yeah and those economic incentives likely will have to come in the form of taxes, at least in part. That could work, one problem with that route though, is that those taxations often hurt the poor the most.

Public shaming for one. Protests have been effective more or less historically. And it's not like she's wrong in blaming world leaders, cause they're supposed to be the people who look out for the best interests of the people, and they're failing at it. — Mr Bee

I'm not a huge fan of public shaming. Psychopaths typically don't feel shame. And more generally, I don't think shaming changes the behaviour of people for the better usually. You give an incentive to people to hide their behaviour yes, and then another layer of bad gets pilled on top of it.

There's so many lies and contortions of fact on both sides. The more information I have, the less dizzy I feel. — ZzzoneiroCosm

I mean the basic science is pretty well established by now, as far as science can be established I guess.

The earth is warming faster than anything in recent history, and we are definitely a factor in that by emitting lots of greenhouse gasses.

Projections are generally more than 2 degree if we keep going the way we are going, i.e. if we don't reduce emissions.

Where things get murky is, how bad will it really be, and what can we reasonably do about it.

There are a number of scenario's in which a certain raise in temperature could trigger other reinforcing factors, like it is speculated to have happened with a couple of extinctions events in the earths history,,. but there is still a lot of uncertainty around those as far as I know.

And what can we do about it, is probably the most complex question in this issue, because there just so much to consider there. For one thing it isn't even clear, I don't think, that reducing greenhouse emissions now (by an amount that is realistic without tanking the whole system for example) will have that great of an impact on climate change in the short term. Greenhouse gasses stay in the atmosphere for a very long time, and the effects of reducing emissions now may only have a marginal effect on climate change in the next 20 to 50 years. If this is the case, then it could be the case for instance that all the money that is spend to reduce emmissions (by a relatively insignificant amount) could be better spend into damage control and innovation to find better ways of getting the gasses out of the atmosphere etc...

Okay. I was interested to know if there was evidence of lib-nut foul play. — ZzzoneiroCosm

An honest question for information without any bias eh, you don't see those a lot around here :-).

I have no 'smoking gun' evidence of such foul play, no. But let's just say I just have a decent amount of experience in these things, and that is my intuition. And I don't want to necessarily imply anything egregious either, but I would be surprised that nobody has taken an interest in Greta's dealings.

I don't think Thunberg is trying to be an expert at all on the subject if her message is simply to "listen to the scientists". So much as she's asking people to listen to her, it's to take the actual experts on the matter seriously, people who are older, have degrees, and a lifetime of experience studying the issue.

It would be fantastic if we can all agree that climate change is happening, urgent action needs to be done, and we simply disagree as to the specifics of what approach to take. However, as seen in the recent COP25 our world leaders are not even at that stage yet and that's the problem. — Mr Bee

One of the problems on the policy half of the question is that it's a bureaucratic and political mess to get something done. This isn't even only a problem for this particular issue. It just isn't that easy to get anything done on that level. I think most concerned, apart from some idiots, are well aware that this is a serious problem. I don't think she is convincing a lot of people that weren't already convinced. And then what does it help really, to keep shouting and blaming everybody?

Providing evidence to support an assertion - that's a game to you? — ZzzoneiroCosm

Look, this was not the point of my post, it really doesn't matter all that much to me if she is being 'used' or not. I don't care to split hairs over what 'being used' exactly means, and what would exactly counts as evidence for that claim... and waste a bunch of time on something that is ultimately not the point.

I'm asking you what evidence you can provide that Greta is being used. — ZzzoneiroCosm

Nope sorry, not interested in playing that game.

What evidence is there that Greta is being used? — ZzzoneiroCosm

No human being is an island. These ideas didn't magically pop into Greta's head from nowhere. She is influenced and continues to be under influence by other groups of people.

You think she acts wholly on her own without any support from other people?

Clarity. Your point is well taken. There is a difference between the statement of the problem and possible solutions. But shooting the messenger does not serve clarity, rather the opposite. Why do that? — tim wood

Tim Wood, it's not that i'm necessarily condoning that behaviour, I'm just saying this is the way it goes. If you enter the political arena and take an (extreme) stand on one side, you will get shot at (metaphorical).

Ofcourse this debate is ideological.

There are two sperate things here.

One is the question whether climate is changing and what the causes and effects are etc. This is a scientific question, and there's pretty much a consensus on this in the scientific community.

And then there is the question of what we can do about it. This is a policy question, and ideologies will certainly play a part in that. There's a host of different things you can do to try to address the problem, all with different pro's and con's having an impact on other policy issues.

Greta Thunberg is essentially akin to a fundamentalist, she only sees this one problem (that of climate change) and doesn't have the knowledge nor life-experience to be able to properly assess the complexity of the policy question.

The fact that someone has it right on the first question doesn't mean their opinion is worth anything on the second question.

She's just a child with views you could expect of an average... child. But then she is being used to sell the ideology of one part of the political spectrum. Ofcourse she will get a lot of flak for that, what do you expect?

One thing that is missing in your rant is maybe the social/moral dimension.

Intelligence relies on doubting. You only get smart by questioning things over a pro-longed period of time. And so it naturally undercuts intuïtions and faith.

Historically and evolutionary, the individual heavily relied on the succes of the group, and so generally anything that threatened the group was frowned upon.

A group of people allways is in flux untill someone establishes dominance and imposses an order so that the group can function as more than a mere collection of individuals, and more as a unit.

To keep everybody functioning in that specific order (and to keep on top), those in power essentially made up stories so that people don't start questioning the imposed order... If the order falls away it's back to flux and a struggle for power, harming the functioning of the group as a unit in the proces (and necessarily also harming the individual that relies on the group).

Intelligentsia are a treat to said order because they question those stories, and so in the proces also threaten the order imposed.

In the end Socrates had to drink his Hemlock for questioning the Gods!

I would have thought Thrasymachus' whole contention would rely on 'pay' and 'self interest' being the only true 'benefit' of the practice.
That must mean that while Thrasymachus acknowledges another type of benefit that isn't monetary, he's contending that the monetary benefit is a primary motivation ahead of any other motivations that he wouldn't see as beneficial at all. — Yanni

'Monetary benefit' and 'self-interest'/'benefit in general' need not be identical. Why couldn't he see other motivations as potentially beneficial?

Yes, I would agree life is important but I would still base it on the merits of that life. The import of a life correlates directly with the important things dine with that life. — DingoJones

But who decides what is important? Who get's to determine what is valuable. The killer and murderer will think his life has value… You seem to be implying some objective standard.

Anyway, I think I agree, I think life is not inherently valuable. That is probably a leftover from religious ages. Though usually people will think their life is valuable, and usually any type of value-system will recognise the value of peoples lifes, because it is at least recognised that people value their own lifes.

But I do think life can have 'negative' value sometimes, to the person itself, and to other people too. In a lot of Western countries euthanasia is legal, precisly because it is recognised that it can happen that a life is not worth living anymore.

"Intrinsic value" is a bit of a problematic concept. We value things, or give a value to somethings as human beings. There's nothing really intrinsically valuable, as in having some objective value in itself outside of someone valuing it.

That said, most people value being alive (as opposed to being dead), as it is a prerequisite for everything else really... you need to be alive before other things even can have value to you.

So even if it is not necessarily sacred or intrinsically valuable, etc... life seems to be pretty important however you slice it.

Yeah I got that, but you wanted to add "conventionally considered" because you seemed to think that was necessary to make some kind of distinction there, whereas I think it is redundant because it can really only be interpreted that way, in the past tense anyway... which is why i wrote what I wrote.

I think we agree, ultimately.

It's morally permissible to do x" is an opinion that someone can have, a way that they can feel about interpersonal behavior. — Terrapin Station

Right, 'It's morally permissible to do x' in the mouth of someone, is then the expression of the moral feelings of that someone.

'It was morally permissible' (past tense) however, can't be an expression of a moral attitude a person wants to voice (because it's the past), but only really makes sense as a description, of a group of people having had those moral feelings. If it only was one person then it seems like you would specify that, right (person x had that moral feeling)?

Maybe you think it doesn't makes a whole lot of sense to make those 'it was'- statements about moral feelings because not all people had the same feelings etc.... but I think it's a meaningful statement one can make. There's a sense in which the overal moral feelings concerning slavery have changed over the years, across the board... so that you can make meaningful descriptive 'it was'-statements about it.

Likewise, present-tense 'it is morally acceptable'-statements can also be descriptive if enough people agree, and so they need not be allways expressive.

Do you believe all moral debate is pointless/useless? — Mark Dennis

I'm sure Terrapin Station can answer for himself, but I do want to give you my answer too because I think it's an important question, and our meta-ethical stances seem to overlap at least to some extend.

In the absence of objective morality and moral claims not having truth-value, I think it is even more important to have moral dialogue. Because one consequence of that view is that you cannot just find or discover moral facts, we have to create or construct them. Dialogue then serves a vital role to refine, clarify and generally evolve your moral ideas.

Furthermore the only way to get to some kind of morality that transcends individual moral stances, which I think is necessary to live together somewhat successfully in groups, is to agree on certain moral ideas... and agreement necessarily implies that you debate what you want to agree on first.

We could say that it was true that it was conventionally considered morally permissible. That's an important distinction to make. — Terrapin Station

Sure, though I'm not entirely sure what "it was morally permissible" could mean otherwise in the absence of an objective morality.

The US tends to produce do-gooders. A less famous example is Herbert Hoover, who felt it was important to lead a multi-national team to rescue starving Russians. They discovered that they couldn't distribute aid because the railroad had broken down. So they fixed the railroad. Little did the participants know: Lenin wanted those people to starve to death. Bizarre, but true.

If you read the article posted in the OP, Buchanan gives more recent examples of the same thing: interference that proceeded from good intentions (to protect the development of democratic nations), but that 1) is costly to the US, and 2) is not welcomed by the affected regions. — frank

Political and military action usually isn't decided by one person. There may be exceptions sure (especially for smaller interventions), but usually there is a process of determining those decisions that involves a dialogue and weighing pro's and con's etc... Maybe this will sound overly cynical, but I find it hard to believe that the protection of the development of other democratic nations would be the only or even the first motive of any larger scale military action.

Beyond that, I think the world should shift to looking at China as a peace-keeper, not the US. — frank

I can understand that sentiment considering all that has happened over the last 70 years... but I can't really see it ending well with China as a peacekeeper.

What I hope for is some kind of power equilibrium developing between the US and China, and then some sensible leaders ala Roosevelt coming together and devising a supranational organisation, backed up with some real power and legitimacy, to end the whole superpower-peacekeeper situation.