Comments

  • Euthyphro
    ↪frank

    Not being able to tag a label such as "materialist" or "idealist" upon a reading is to restrain from formulating a last word that is the product of a doctrine.
  • Euthyphro
    You are presenting ideas about Plato that most would hold to be absurd — frank
  • Euthyphro
    ↪frank

    You mean other than the quote from you saying it?
  • Euthyphro
    You are presenting ideas about Plato that most would hold to be absurd — frank

    In the academic milieu of the last 100 years or so, Fooloso4's approach to read the dialogues as not being a map to a doctrine is the commonly accepted practice. Who are the "most" people you are pointing to?

    I don't ask that rhetorically. I am only familiar with the "close study of the text" method that was my freshman year in college 45 years ago.
  • Euthyphro
    The communist idea of raising children in the just city was intended to avoid such conflicts of interest, but in an actual city would be a source of endless conflict, I think it was also intended to be anti-ideological. What seems best in speech is not what is best in practice. — Fooloso4

    I agree that the distinction between speech and practice is critical and is the woof and warp of the Republic. But it doesn't seem to me to be a matter of either/or. As you note, the competing and converging influences of city and family create the environment we live in.

    From that perspective, I would call the ideas for raising and educating children in "the city of words" communitarian rather than communist. The practice of philosophy by Socrates is, in that way, a form of education by the "city" in contrast to families reproducing their culture. Socrates acceptance of the judgment against him is a declaration that while he belongs to the city, the city also belongs to him.

    Another element that makes the distinction complicated is how various "schools of thought" interact on the scene. They are like families themselves in some ways. They reproduce over generations and compete with other "families" in the public square. The legitimacy of the City as itself has to stand above these in practice somehow.
  • Euthyphro
    ↪Apollodorus

    My comment was not meant to argue against that aspect of Socrates' approach. I was hoping to bring up the views of generation and respect for family into the picture.
  • Euthyphro
    But it is not so straight forward. In the Republic it is agreed that justice is "minding your own business" (433b). What is and is not your own business? Plato does not provide complete answers to the "what is X?" questions. Instead he guides our own inquiry. — Fooloso4

    Some of the matter of what is "one's business" relates to family obligations in tension with others. There is piety as it relates to the gods but also the respect for the lives of parents and ancestors. The notion in the Republic that the City raise children instead of parents is drawn in sharp contrast to the fact that it is Socrates' brother who demands an argument that justice is not an arbitrary agenda of the strong. It seems that the family is not accepted as righteous without qualification but neither are the bonds of growing up together from a common source treated with contempt.

    When reading Euthyphro with this tension in mind, it is striking that Socrates considers the betrayal of the the father as not warranted by the arguments presented as advancing the desires of particular gods.
  • Euthyphro
    ↪Apollodorus

    Please refrain from the gratuitous ad hominem commentary.
  • Philosphical Poems
    ↪T Clark

    Merwin does recognize what Frost is pointing at. On the other hand, Merwin uses "us" and "we" differently; He expresses certainty about his perceptions and encounters but is unsure about the world unless it can show itself. Like the following:

    Twilight

    Oh you are never tame
    fire on a mountain
    eyes beside water
    first day of petals

    lying across the bed
    in afternoon rainlight
    arms of evening
    wherever we are is a shore.

    - W.S. Merwin, Flower & Hand, page 47

    So it is "Taoist" in recognizing limits of speech but is reluctant to draw conclusions as others do.
  • Philosphical Poems
    ↪T Clark

    W.S. Merwin tackles some phenomenology:

    Talking

    Whatever I talk about is yesterday
    by the time I see anything it is gone
    the only way I can see today
    is as yesterday

    I talk with words I remember
    about what has already happened
    what I want to talk about is no longer there
    it is not there

    today I say only what I remember
    even when I am speaking of today

    nobody else remembers what I remember
    not even the same names

    I tell parts of a story
    that once occurred
    and I laugh with surprise at what disappeared
    though I remember it so well

    From Flower and Hand
  • What happens to consciousness when we die?
    Some people believe in immortality and others see death as the end. These are speculations, and I am an agnostic on that matter. But I am curious about what the experience of dreaming consciousness will be after death, even if it is an end. I think it will be of significance in some sense to our identity. — Jack Cummins

    One interesting thing about the Bushido code is that acceptance of death does not change "who you are." It is suggested that self awareness will become more capable and effective when you stop playing with the inevitable.
  • If you had everything
    ↪Benj96

    I am not sure who has who.
    I inherited my Grandfather's books. Where should they go when i go?
    There are all my books. Where should they go next?
    I have all these tools, maybe my closest possessions in terms of daily life. I use them now and they should be used after I am gone.
    Other people will live in this house after I am gone, just as the other people who lived here before I showed up.

    I am fortunate to have these problems, seeing the alternatives.
    I don't know what to make of it all.
  • What are you listening to right now?
    This is pretty good:
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=giYvwLM-JEo
  • What is the purpose of dreaming and what do dreams tell us?
    ↪Jack Cummins

    Sleep, perchance to dream.
  • What is the purpose of dreaming and what do dreams tell us?
    ↪Tom Storm

    A reasonable concept, as far as it goes.
    But it does presume a lot of process of digestion that should not be taken as a given.
  • Is Stoicism a better guide to living than Christianity
    ↪god must be atheist

    The pleasure is mine.
  • Is Stoicism a better guide to living than Christianity
    ↪god must be atheist

    Well, the jibe aside, I meant to say, as you noted, that Maslow did not describe what "self-actualizing" meant as a quality in itself. My comment was only to remark that perhaps he was aware of that shortcoming. It is one way to read him. There are others.
  • What is the purpose of dreaming and what do dreams tell us?
    ↪MAYAEL

    As far as lucid dreaming goes, it seems to me the reason one gets tired is that it does not allow for the not lucid part to have a chance.

    As a person who works pretty hard, I need that other source.
  • What is the purpose of dreaming and what do dreams tell us?
    ↪James Riley

    Like Hamlet?
  • What is the purpose of dreaming and what do dreams tell us?
    That dreams involve wrestling with fear and anxiety is obvious.
    There is a problem-solving component interweaved with those conditions that returns us to consciousness sometimes. Some dreams seem like programs where you have to lose the game. But one permits them to continue. Sometimes that works out. Usually I am glad when the sequence comes to an end.

    I agree with Jung that trying to get a handle on the symbolism is more like understanding grammar than predicates.

    Sometimes, I hold on to a dream as a message. Other times, discard them as scenes that belong where they happened. This is a difficult subject to approach philosophically because it involves whether one is in a relationship with a daemon on or not. If that notion is meaningless, then the topic will not be the same for any who do accept something of that kind.
  • Is Stoicism a better guide to living than Christianity
    So M coined this phrase, I suspected, in order to finish the the thought process like every goal-oriented person does, and he carefully chose an expression that sounds meaningful while completely devoid of the same. — god must be atheist

    The way I understand his approach is that we can itemize our limitations but not what being bound by them permits to exist. So the "actualization" regards being able to be an agent more than making whatever that "self" may be come into existence ex nihilo.
  • The Deadend, and the Wastelands of Philosophy and Culture
    Alienation is complex. When referring to the context of Eliot's poems, I didn't hope to make it simpler.
    Caught in his moment, he navigated as well as he could. I figure we are all like that.
    As a matter of philosophy, alternatives are possible. A chance to change the deal.
    The kind of thing that is not settled for all time but more of a working agreement.
    Chess with the Devil, if you will.
  • Statism: The Prevailing Ideology
    ↪NOS4A2

    The "idea that states form and rule by conquest and exploitation" is an odd place to find the "individual liberty" you also advocate.
    So, you have two "statisms." One you like and one you don't. You eschew the use of social contracts but seem to be expecting a better deal in one system versus another for yourself.
    I don't understand the difference you are claiming.
  • Statism: The Prevailing Ideology
    ↪NOS4A2

    The State sucks, for sure.
    The absence of State sucks too.
    There are various arguments from Hobbes and Rousseau who put the matter into relief. For them, the issue considered where the arrangements between persons cancelled some more "natural" order that was in force before.
    And that approach does have the virtue of owning the opposite idea.
    If "statism" is an idea by itself, I am not able to perceive it.
  • The Deadend, and the Wastelands of Philosophy and Culture
    ↪Jack Cummins

    It does apply to all of us. I didn't mean it only related to those who experience war directly. There is the alienation between those who do and don't. And there are people who are missing.
  • The Deadend, and the Wastelands of Philosophy and Culture
    In regards to Eliot, some regard for the generation(s) lost at war(s) merits notice. The dry voices of the Hollow Men come from victims of trauma who are required to change the subject to talk at all. The appearance of automatons doesn't inform the necessity of becoming one.
  • Why Descartes' Cogito Sum Is Not Indubitably Certain
    ↪charles ferraro

    In line with his wishes, I have simply tried to formulate a new version or example of hyperbolic doubt which I have argued the purported truth of the Cogito Sum performance cannot survive. — charles ferraro

    Taking, for the moment, that was his wish, what becomes of the investigations of the world he was principally interested in?
  • Why Descartes' Cogito Sum Is Not Indubitably Certain
    ↪charles ferraro

    As the statement appears in the Discourse Upon Method, the interest is in establishing a way to distinguish facts from whimsy. So, not an exploration of the self as a thinker but more about whether using the self to locate facts is a viable practice.

    Maybe the approach is flawed. But the results should be measured against what Descartes hoped for it, not against a speculation he displayed little interest in.
  • Is Stoicism a better guide to living than Christianity
    ↪Ross Campbell

    @Outlander makes a good point about how the emphasis in one argument does not connect easily with the emphasis in others. It is not like they share the gaps between them. We, as readers supply the gaps. I think comparisons need more specificity than comparing "schools of thought."

    So it might be more engaging to compare Kierkegaard's Works of Love with Epictetus's Enchiridion. Or some other specific sets of instruction on doing what is best.
  • What is your understanding of 'reality'?
    There is agreement of consensus (we agree that we agree) and there is agreement of understanding. I think that latter is far more substantial, in the sense that it perhaps transcends the limitations of symbolic meaning. — Pantagruel

    This reflects my experience in the trades. There is a lot of disagreement about the best approach to a problem but much agreement about what is kicking our ass. The ostensive gesture toward the present necessity.
  • Question about the Christian Trinity
    Wouldn’t this amount to nothing more than talking to yourself? — Pinprick

    The idea of different agencies is strongly influenced by Gnostic concepts. Some of their creation stories involve the interaction of separate agents well before the "world" is made. Scholars do not agree about the sources involved. It is complicated.

    As a matter of Pauline theology, the incarnation relates to the first separation of Adam being cast out of Paradise by the Creator. The sacrifice of the Son is an opportunity to return. But it is just an offer that means nothing without takers.

    Pascal and wagers and such.
  • Plato's Phaedo
    ↪Fooloso4

    Thank you for the suggestions. Theaetetus is of great interest to me.
  • Plato's Phaedo
    ↪Amity
    It is a difficult matter to explore because who else did/does this sort of thing? — Valentinus


    I skipped over this earlier - not paying attention to the second part.
    What did you mean by 'this sort of thing' ?
    Stories within a story showing different perspectives ? With the motives of the author(s) in question ?     — Amity

    I was referring to Plato. He is unique in gathering a record of dialogues with different "schools" of thought as actual discussions. The approach of Aristotle of formulating different arguments and comparing them is more like what we are used to.
  • Plato's Phaedo
    ↪Fooloso4

    Agreed.
    It is a difficult matter to explore because who else did/does this sort of thing?
    The unique quality is exposing oneself to argument, no matter the consequence.
  • Plato's Phaedo
    ↪Wayfarer

    Well, I brought it up because myths were being discussed and there is a dialogue devoted to them.

    I read the dialogues as conversations between themselves. They disagree with each other. Some things become more important in one place than in another. But Plato himself puts them side by side. Like they need each other.
  • Plato's Phaedo
    ↪Wayfarer

    The relationship between "universals and particulars" is mixed up with different ways we have talked about them over a long time.

    What strikes me about the Timaeus passage is the "one who weaves" the immortal and the mortal together must be ourselves. Or if not ourselves, pretty closely related. It is left open as a consideration.
  • Plato's Phaedo
    ↪Wayfarer

    Could it not be the case that the exhortation to ‘repeat such things to himself’ is so as not to loose sight of the importance of the ‘care of the soul’? (Perhaps even as a mantra.) I find that a much more cohesive explanation, than the idea that Socrates (and Plato) are covertly signalling doubt about the immortality of the soul. — Wayfarer

    Looking at the matter through Timaeus, the identification of oneself as a soul in the sense of being the person you are after death is in tension with the recognition of our mortality. The myth of the Creator working through agents of creation distinguishes mortal man in this way:

    On the other hand, if they were created by me and received life at my hands, they would be on an equality with the gods. In order then that they may be mortal, and that this universe be truly universal, do ye, according to your natures, betake yourselves to the formation of animals, imitating the power which was shown by me in creating you.
    The part of them worthy of the name immortal, which is called divine and is the guiding principle of those who are willing to follow justice and you--of that divine part I will myself now sow the seed, and having made a beginning, I will hand the work over to you. And do ye then interweave the mortal with the immortal and make and begat living creatures, and give them food and make them to grow, and receive them again in death. — Plato, Timaeus,41b, translated by Benjamin Jowett

    That is not the sort of immortality many are hoping for.
  • Plato's Phaedo
    ↪Fooloso4

    I learned a lot.
    The absence of Plato in the discussion is very strange set against the work to make the dialogues a report of what Socrates said. There is something about the distance from what happened that frames the dialogues.
  • 'What Are We?' What Does it Mean to be Human?
    ↪Jack Cummins

    We have our lives. It includes varying levels of suffering compared to other people who are alive.
    And we struggle with ourselves.
    I have no idea what is going on.
  • Emotional Intelligence
    I meant a good EQ and a good IQ struggle with each other sometimes.
    Not mutually exclusive categories.
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