Comments

  • The Hyper-inflation of Outrage and Victimhood.
    Intersectionality is nothing more than a call to listen to people's testimony from different backgrounds to learn about those groups. Nothing essential about this call changes when those groups are typical social demographics.

    Intersectionality is rooted in noticing that people from different backgrounds tend to have different experiences and think differently.

    Put in a bit of effort to listen to people's perspectives, exposing yourself to backgrounds from a different part of the system we're all in and maybe you'll notice structural differences.
    fdrake

    Two things. First, perhaps a differentiation between intersectionality and weaponized intersectionality. If all you mean is listening/understanding people, then Ill just keep calling that listening/understanding to people and you can call it intersectionality. If the idea is to listen to people based on the immutable characteristics like race or gender then I think its at best naive to the reality of how that is being used as a weapon by the aforementioned victim/outrage movement/culture.
    Secon, I think its more accurate to frame it as different people equals different experience. Adding background just leaves the door open fir the above mentioned weaponisation.
  • The Hyper-inflation of Outrage and Victimhood.


    The problem with that is that things like race or sexual orientation are not nearly as strong an indicator as the actual individuals traits. You get much more mileage asking about peoples experiences based on their actual experiences rather than the experiences you think (or even they think) they have had based on their race, gender or whatever other immutable trait they might posses.
    You say its simple, but that is becuase you have made it that way, you just judge everything through the lense of immutable traits, a label that satisfies some but is not actually all that accurate (only in the most superficial ways). People are much more than these immutable traits, but if one views them as individuals then that will greatly hamper the outrage agenda and virtue signalling VagabondSpectre is talking about here.
    Also, your anecdotal experience of how you are treated by certain kinds of people (whom I would just call people, your specificity seems totally irrelevent to me) is not really addressing whats being discussed here.
    This is specifically about a movement, one that operates under the guise and as the unsolicited, unelected, and unverified spokespeople of minority groups in service of an outrage or victim culture. The movement is about power and revenge. Power to elevate certain groups above other groups and revenge for percieved slights of the past targeting innocent people today based on purely superficial traits like the color of their skin (white) or their gender (male).
    Whether not you yourself are part of this movement or not I do not know, but its out there and its ugly and its precisely the same kind of false justification anti black/proponents of slavery used to dehumanise blacks in the US long ago. It is a rationalisation structure created not in service to anything just or righteous but rather for a dark emotional fulfilment.
  • How does an omniscient god overcome skepticism?


    Ill second andrewk, you are asking real questions. Philosophy isnt just about the catagory of existence, anything is fair game up until (imo) it overlaps with science. Zenos may have been able to create a paradox with his philosophical efforts but needs to quickly step aside when low and behold Achilles wins the race and the turtle turns out to indeed eventually finish the race.
  • How does an omniscient god overcome skepticism?


    I think that by definition omniscience precludes philisophical skepticism. Its knowledge of all that is, including all the facts, all the answers to all the questions, what is certain, what isnt certain, how everything works, what skepticisms are true or untrue...everything.
    He knows he isnt a brain in a vat because he knows everything. Nothing is beyond his knowledge, so if he was a brain in a vat he would know that too.
    I don’t think your question is sensical, how does he know? He is omniscient.
  • The Hyper-inflation of Outrage and Victimhood.


    Honestly I think people are already waking up to it. The groups themselves are in the minority and people are wising up to the dangers of this sort of toxic virtue signalling, im so tempted to call it a fad and a fading one at that....but....it has infected our academia, it permeates our media intake in subtle and not so subtle ways and although people may have noticed and developed disdain they still dont seem to see the danger.
    Your outrage seems entirely justified to me, and theirs certainly does not.
  • The Hyper-inflation of Outrage and Victimhood.


    Im not exactly sure what exactly you are offering for discussion here, but your coments seem accurate to me. There is a problem, and its clearly firmly entrenched.
    At its base, this seems to stem from scoring social points which is normal in human cultures but there is something darker and more negative about what you are describing isnt there? The social points are being scored in a game of us vs them, rank tribalism. The harder you attack the more virtuous you are and the more points you score. The more points you are trying to score the more you become enslaved to the group think, and dependant on scoring, its cyclical and escalating. These groups will quickly turn on dissenters, because of course they are awarded social points for doing so.
  • Who Cares What Stephen Hawking Writes about God?


    You might be desperate to not believe in god if you were living through the horrors of religion run amok, wouldnt you? If the idea of, in the words of Hitchens, a celestial dictatorship is horrifying to you then I could see a certain desperation there.
    Other than that, I think I agree with the sentiment that it would be odd to be desperate to not believe in god, especially a very benign version. I suppose it depends on how a person comes to such beliefs in the first place.
  • Stipulative definitions.


    Depends on what we mean by human dignity. Ill confess I do not have a clear idea of what I myself meant by it. Concerning morals and ethics, I think of human dignity in terms of something like honour, a principal or set of principals that we sort of cherish for their own sake or for our own sake but this has its own problems, it is an inherantly selfish act to maintain principalsor set of principals.
  • Who Cares What Stephen Hawking Writes about God?
    Are thoughts the function of a brain or is the brain just a device for conveying them?TWI

    I would say the former, a function of the brain.
  • Who Cares What Stephen Hawking Writes about God?


    My brain doesnt always feed me the truth. Its functions can be quite deceptive, and quite easily deceived, so as I said I think objective corroboration is the tool used.
  • Who Cares What Stephen Hawking Writes about God?
    How do you differentiate anything at all from delusion?Jeremiah

    Objective corroboration.
  • Who Cares What Stephen Hawking Writes about God?
    I can't differentiate with language only within myself.TWI

    And how do you do that? Thats the exact thing Im asking you about, and wonder how you differentiate between that feeling you have and delusion.
  • Who Cares What Stephen Hawking Writes about God?
    If everyone is God, as myself and millions of people believe, then all of 'us' are very familiar with God and even talk to Him/Her/It on a regular basis.TWI

    How would you differentiate that from delusion?
  • Who Cares What Stephen Hawking Writes about God?
    Good. Some aggressive Atheists, but not you, like to loudly and continually assert that that they know others' beliefs, and that those other beliefs are less justified than their own.Michael Ossipoff

    You quoted me and then responded to the quote by addressing “aggressive atheists”. Was it not your intention to attach the behaviour you describe to me? Obviously you have retracted the labeling if that is the case, but note how that was a fairly confusing way to make your point.
  • Who Cares What Stephen Hawking Writes about God?
    ...and there is a door-to-door-promotion denomination that has asserted that God exists physically. But, if your objections only apply to religions that assert that God exists physically, then maybe you should clarify that when expressing your objection. When you do, specify the denomination.Michael Ossipoff

    Irrelevant sidestepping. I did not make a nonsensical statement, thats what I was addressing. Your suggestion that I should have clarified isnt even valid, you presumed I was using your own definition and took issue based on that. This is your mistake, not mine sir.
  • Who Cares What Stephen Hawking Writes about God?
    No, it's common knowledgeMichael Ossipoff

    Lol, so you felt the need to specify it because...?
  • Who Cares What Stephen Hawking Writes about God?
    Who cares what anyone, ever, writes about God?StreetlightX

    You do, as evidenced by your response here.
  • Stipulative definitions.


    I mean tool in a general sense. Something useful or enabling of any given task.
    Ethics/morality are tools for us to get along with each other, to create well functioning societies/interactions and I would say in some sense to service our ownnhuman dignity, although I admit the last one is rather nebulous and perhaps idiosyncratic.
  • Who Cares What Stephen Hawking Writes about God?
    There's nothing wrong with saying that you don't share someone else's worldview. But to say that everyone must share your Science-Worship world view, or else they're wrong, that's presumptuous.Michael Ossipoff

    I do not worship science, this is a purely ignorant statement on your part. I also said nothing about everyone having to share my world view. Presumptious of me?! You sir, are the one being presumptious here. If you would like to know what I think, you are free to ask although now I might be hesitant to do so. Its not hard to tell which of us is the crusader here, you have shown yourself only too eager to operate from your own presumptions in service of your views on “science worship”.
  • Who Cares What Stephen Hawking Writes about God?
    A nonsensical statement on the face of it.Michael Ossipoff

    No its not, as someone pointed out if god is said to exist physically then science would have a role to play.
  • Who Cares What Stephen Hawking Writes about God?
    ...the phyisical world.Michael Ossipoff

    Yes, science deals with physical world. Do I really need to specify that?
  • Who Cares What Stephen Hawking Writes about God?

    Hawking makes a scientific case for there not being a god, which he is perfectly qualified to do so. Now, either you go with that or you posit god as magic that science cannot measure. If you do the latter then Hawking or anyone else is equally qualified to answer the question and whatever their answer happens to be, one (who posits god as something notknowable/measurable) has no valid way of rejecting the answer given.
    There are no credentials or “background” knowledge that helps determine if there is a god at all in the latter case, so it shouldnt bother anyone for Hawking to say yay or nay.
  • Stipulative definitions.

    I didnt say rules are bad, I just meant that ethical rules are like any other rules.
    I dont understand “this place is like one”...?
    I dont think we take rules to be “true”, I think we agree to follow them or not. They are a tool.
  • Stipulative definitions.

    Ah, I see. Yea, like any set of rules.
  • Stipulative definitions.

    I guess it depends on what you mean by idealised...to me that seems like an unnecessary layer you are adding there...
  • Stipulative definitions.

    I prefer to think of morals as inconsistent or consistent rather than true/false. Its not about what moral position someone has, but rather how they arrived there. True morality cannot exist without a basic principal of consistency, it must abhor hypocracy and the double standard or it has no validity, it is meaningless otherwise. Consistency is One of the traits from which we get an objective moral standard.
  • Stipulative definitions.

    Unfortunately Im not sure what you are asking my opinion on here.
    Do you intend those quoted portions as false moral axioms?
    It doesnt seem odd to me for people to make attempts to come up with ways of thinking about morality or moral structures.
    Im not sure any morality isnt intended to be idealized. Aren’t morals always intended as ideal?
  • Stipulative definitions.

    Lol, ok well let me see if I get it here..
    Sounds like you are saying any given conception of morality results in synthetic a posteriori conclusions about morality. I take it you are a moral relativist of some kind?
    I dont see how you get to calling it “art”, am
    I being to literal?
  • Stipulative definitions.

    Well I imagine things that are very polarised like religion result in more of this poor behaviour we are talking about. It doesnt help that with religion, certain positions are necessarily insulting to the other side.
    What do you mean by “art of morality”?
  • Stipulative definitions.

    I think the burden should not be on the OP so much as the people responding. You should clarify what someone means before trying to counter-argue or engage with them.
    I suppose its the responsibility for all parties, but I observe that people are more careful in their OP than people are to respond to them. They care less about what the person is trying to say and much more about picking out things they can use to bolster thier own pre-existing position or (one that particularly annoys me) to use what they can in the OP to twist the intended topic to one of thier own pet opinions.
  • Stipulative definitions.
    There is more to this that just common vs stipulative definitions. Further confusing/adding difficulty to these online discussions is intellectually dishonest definitions, meant to purposely skew the available responses. That itself is further muddied by the fact that in certain context real, solid discussion actually requires the pirposeful skewing minus the intellectual dishonesty. Hard to see the difference sometimes, even for the person doing it.
    There is also a semantic consideration as well. Ive observed that there is often a sloppy conflation of definition of words and semantics with the argument/concept being discussed or proffered.
    Not trying to ride a high horse here, im guilty myself.
    Its much more important to try and understand what a person means rather than focus on the specific words they use. This is a problem of the medium I believe. Most of communication is non verbal and so we trade much of our ability to convey our POV for a certain precision and the sweet sweet worldwide connectivity (how else do you get such a huge variety of perspectives so easily and enumerate?). Im not sure the tradeoff is worth it as far as productive discussion goes...shitty quality or none at all?
  • Free until commanded
    The capacity for freedom in slaves made them deserving of freedom. So, the android, capable of experiencing and enjoying liberty, should be freed.TheMadFool

    I really like that phrasing. The capacity for freedom is what makes the freedom something deserved.
    Thats really the only reason you need. I would take it further and say that the capacity for freedom is an equal measure of how much freedom is deserved (owed?). This very nicely takes care of freedom as it exists in human relationships (the way we treat our kids for exemple, what freedoms a parent should restrict and ehen they must let go).
    Another stepfurther and you answer many ethical questions as well from that simple sentiment, thanks for that.
  • Objection to the Ontological Argument

    The foreknowledge of what the person will choose doesn't effect the choice the person will make, unless the person with foreknowledge tells the person but even then not in every case.
    Let me demonstrate:
    You have a choice between your worst possible scenario or your best possible scenario.
    I know which one you will choose, does that mean you no longer have a choice? Certainly not, you still have very good reasons for choosing your best possible scenario and very good reasons to not choose your worst possible scenario. Fate has nothing to do with it, foreknowledge of something isnt fate. It is simply an awareness of the factors that will lead to a certain decision.
  • Objection to the Ontological Argument
    I think he meant the specific characteristics he mentioned, the 3 “O”’s as it were.
    I would take it a step further and suggest the traits themselves are nonsensical,
  • Objection to the Ontological Argument
    Why would a person have free will just becuase someone else has foreknowledge of the choice they will make?
  • Why am I me?
    A popular question. Why am I me? Why am I not the person next to me? When I die, will I be another person in the past or future? Was I another person before I was born? If so, why am I not everyone?JohnLocke

    You are you as a result of a dynamic combination of nature and nurture, a deterministic result.
    You are not the person next to you because the person next to you has a different set of deterministic results than you do. When you die, you will not be anyone, past, future or present.
    Before you were born, you were not a person (or if you prefer, pick your own cut off point during your mothers pregnancy).
  • Evidence for the supernatural
    I certainly do not agree to that. It isnt “like” a religion either.
    You’ll have to forgive me, I didnt know I was wading into part of an overall agenda you are devoted to pushing. Referencing some of the other threads you posted in I see it now, Im content to move on from this and let those other discussions bear thier fruit.
  • Evidence for the supernatural

    Now you are just backing further into the weeds sir. Anything you are committed to is a religion now? You are certainly free to dilute the word religion so that all human endeavours are religions, but its clear you are doing so only to prop up this false equivalency.
    Further, your point about materialists and aggressive atheists has already been refuted. I repeat, you are talking about certain people, not Materialism. Your problem with certain individuals is not relevent to Materialism being or not being a religion. Its a conflation you are making in order to once again, prop up this false equivalency.
    You reiterate this point twice more before the end of your post. It is irrelevant, but it does show a devotion of your own to this false equivalence of yours. Is it your religion? My guess is that you would be happy to call it religion if it meant that in so doing you get to continue treating Materialism (and atheism, which I suspect is what this is really about.) as a religion as well.
    I get it, there is a cleverness, an amusing irony to calling someone who does not believe in religion a religious person but your claim is none the less quite fallacious.
    Anyway, since your argument is clearly with certain people rather than Materialism or atheism I suggest you take it up with them. From what I can tell (Im new to the forum) you will be accommodated.
    Thanks for the discussion :)