At least the Americans' attitude to capital punishment is getting more progressive:

If Ronnie Pickering (who?) had had a gun we may not have ended up with this gem:



Actually I'm sure Ronnie would have refrained from shooting and he regrets what happened here. But I've seen more chaotic and less funny videos of confrontations.

So you expect people to be different just because the topic is philosophy? — Marchesk

I expect people to do philosophy, and be philosophical, on a philosophy forum. Whether that's the same or different from the rest of the web is of no relevance.

Doing philosophy is exactly an exchange of of information and viewpoints.
— bert1

Is it? — Marchesk

No, it's only partly that, you're right. It's also critical evaluation of those views, identifying inconsistencies, fallacies, suggesting repairs to arguments, making implicit assumptions explicit, and so on.

Is that what professional philosophers do? — Marchesk

At their best, yes, (assuming my revised statement above).

Or do they also advance their own positions? — Marchesk

They do that too. In the process of doing that they critically evaluate their own view as well as others, if only to be seen to be playing the game.

How is it possible to correct a question?

Also, I'd like to point out that your question was an attempt at defending your position by pressing mine. — Marchesk

Was it? How do you know?

I don't care what most online discussions are. This is a philosophy forum. Doing philosophy is exactly an exchange of of information and viewpoints. This being very AT is a point in favour of AT communication on a philosophy forum. Saying your (non)-communication is classically NT is on topic in a thread about autistic communication.

So, lets try again,

What constitutes winning?

What are we doing here? Feuding, arguing or sophistry?

Indeed, you did say 'try to win'. And I said:

"What constitutes winning?"

Which you ignored. This is classic NT behaviour.

What constitutes 'winning'?

The essence of arguing is listening to and responding in good faith to points people make and questions they ask. What you are describing is not arguing, but rhetoric.

I've watched the video now, thanks for linking to it. It's a great look into an autistic person's life. I did wonder if she was hamming it up slightly, but that doesn't really matter if true.

I have some sympathy with mcdoodle's take on it.

Maybe people engaged in philosophical discussion deliberately choose to not answer questions as a debate tactic. — Marchesk

In which case they are not doing philosophy and have no business on a philosophy forum.

Or they don't like your questions and would rather ask you a question back.

Well, that's just psychotic, or at least rude.

Or perhaps they see your questions as an attempt to frame the debate in a way favoring your position.

But we can address that while answering the question. Good philosophers would welcome questions that favour an opinion contrary to their own. It gives them something to argue about.

These are all common strategies in any discussion forum across the net. Often times questions are asked in an attempt to force a poster to answer a certain way. But most posters are smart enough to see through that.

Well if they are smart enough to see through that they are smart enough to answer the question and make the points they want to make. Non-engagement is anti-social, and anti-philosophical. It might be appropriate on a forum dedicated to sophistry, but not on a philosophy forum.

If we think non-answering of questions is OK, we get a situation in which people fail to philosophically interact.

For you it is.

Here's what this sounds like to me bert. Imagine a community of people called the lefters who have only one arm, the left one, and they walk around wearing capes so that nobody can see their disability. One of them says...

On so many occasions I have met a BT (brachiotypical) person, and most of the time they offer their right hand. This seems like a straightforward social disability, and it is the norm. You just can't shake hands properly like that. On the other hand, my handshakes with other lefters are always perfect. I meet one and they always offer their left hand. This is first class interpersonal etiquette.
— A. Lefter — jamalrob

Sure. This shows that there are two groups of people with different cultures, needs, abilities, etc. The narrative is that autistics are deficient on NT terms, which is true. The opposite narrative is also true, that NTs are deficient on autistic terms. Consider this:

Neurotypical syndrome is a neurobiological disorder characterized by preoccupation with social concerns, delusions of superiority, and obsession with conformity.

It is not always good communication to answer every question that is asked, and a response that ignores the questions completely may still be a good way of taking the conversation forward, allowing the questioner to see that the questions were misplaced, or trying to tackle things from a different angle.

Not with philosophy. You can do both, answer questions and change the subject if you want. Not answering questions is just rude. Also, saying "That's the wrong question" is extremely offensive. Questions can't be wrong. It's implying that the questioner doesn't know what they are themselves interested in. A question defines what someone wants to talk about, and can't be wrong.

And from the questioner's standpoint, a response that doesn't directly answer their questions but nevertheless shows a deep insight into what they have said can be more satisfying; I often find point-by-point responses pedantic and facile. Granted, this way of responding may not work for everyone, may be difficult for some people to understand, and is sometimes open to abuse, but that doesn't make it "second class".

Again, you can do both. You can respect the questioner by answering their question, and then you can go on to make whatever deep point you like. Or if there really is no mileage in answering the question, or you don't know how to answer it, you can say so. At least that isn't completely ignoring someone's interests.

I'm sorry if this would get me boo'd off the stage at Autscape.

I don't think it would as long as you acknowledged that there is an equally valid autistic culture.

Indeed, I agree with you.

I used to find the rudeness on the old PF very upsetting sometimes. I wonder if Paul had implemented a kind of laser option that shot out of users webcams and blinded them if they were rude, and members could sort of 'shoot' each other, PF would have been a more polite place.

Asking people to give up guns is asking them to give up power. This is difficult for anyone, not just Americans like Tiff, especially if no one else around them is doing the same.

By having "armed citizens" we have gun massacre after gun massacre. And to think that other armed citizens will prevent it is not absurd. — Landru Guide Us

I think the 'not' is a typo. I agree with your post by the way.

Indeed, I was wondering if Mars Man had made the long journey home to the red planet. Although I found him infuriating he did have some redeeming qualities, and sometimes made some good points among the sea of incomprehensible verbosity. He made some good one-liners. One of his funniest ones was aimed at you, accusing you of "Romping through the pastures of ignorance" or something like that.

She looks OK to me.

Are you pining for Mars Man?

that honoured spouse thinks the whole thing is a waste of time — Wayfarer

It's us or her, Wayfarer. I'm not having this half-arsed commitment to philosophy, whichever forum it's on.

The absence of eyerolling is indeed a major plus.

I think jamalrob has set a better tone than Paul did.

I love the monthly reading group, even though I haven't got time to get stuck into it.

TGW is here.

And you can do both. I still post on PF.

One method of dealing with challenging behaviour is distraction. We should talk to ISIS about, say, global warming, road safety, poisoning bees and mass extinction. And then while they're talking about that, they're not bombing people. It would also foster a sense of proportion on both sides.

Only aspects of it are. Forums and other forms of dialogue are naturally social, but introspection and unshared thoughts are not. Both can count as doing philosophy. — Sapientia

A distinctly modern notion. The ancient philosophers would have argued that philosophy simply cannot be done in isolation and without cross-examination. It was the image of Descartes shut up in his room that started the trend towards believing that philosophy could be done alone. But even then there were letters containing objections and encouragements traded back and forth before any of his works were completed. — Postmodern Beatnik

Sure. My statement was very ambiguous. What I was getting at is that philosophy hacks away at the foundations of our world view in a rather inconsiderate way. It has no concern for what we feel or want, and can destroy our self-image. Doing this kind of thing in the company of others can be very anti-social in that it causes discord and distress. But that's philosophy, it's hard and nasty. To ease this we should be polite and considerate. But I think having likes and other social pokings is a distraction from the business of philosophy, which has precisely no regard for such things. If we were not such social creatures likes and dislikes would be of little interest, but being what we are we tend to first pay attention to how much rep someone has got before we read what they have to say, or we skim down the page of posts to first look at the ones with the most likes or dislikes, to see what has affected people the most. Maybe that's a good thing, but it's not philosophy. I understand that forums are also about building social relationships. But that can happen anyway without likes and dislikes.

I voted for the 'get rid of them completely option'. Philosophy is naturally anti-social. But I guess being philosophers is not all we are, so I'm not that bothered if they are kept in whatever form.

I like the way the tree on the right shares its lines with the rock below.

The view you expressed is perfectly understandable. It's the standard view. Autism is generally (but not universally) thought of by non-autistic researchers, doctors, psychiatrists in terms of straightforward malfunctions and deficits. I only know differently because I've been involved with autistic self-advocates and Autscape.

It's provocative to reflect that while autistics suffer from a degraded form of interpersonal communication, that may be just what allows them to experience an enhanced form of extrapersonal communication. — Baden

:) You'd get boo'd off the stage for that at Autscape! For many autistics, myself included, NT interpersonal communication seems dysfunctional and degraded. On so many occasions I have written an email to an NT person containing, say, three questions. They answer none of them, and ask me a question instead. This seems like a straightforward communication disability, and it is the norm. Heck, this shit was routine on PF and drove me nuts. You just can't have a proper conversation like that. On the other hand, my email communication with other autistics is crystal clear. I ask three questions, and I get three answers, even if all three answers are 'I don't know' or 'I don't know what you are asking'. This is first class interpersonal communication.

I enjoyed your sympathetic treatment of this, Street. Life would be better for autistics if more NTs were as understanding as you are here. There has been research suggesting that autistic people do not (or cannot) filter sensory input in the way NTs do and so are exposed to a far higher volume of information to process and get overloaded and can't cope way more quickly than NTs. Similarly, autistics tend not to make assumptions, which relates to taking things literally and difficulty with some metaphors and so on, and so require additional explicit information to fully understand what is going on from an NT perspective. I haven't actually looked at the vid yet but will do later.

WikiLoopr makes it easier.

'Mangle' gets stuck in a different loop. But all the other ones I've tried get stuck at ontology and philosophy. I find that immensely pleasing for some reason.

22 for 'plank'. 'Murder' is the record holder so far.

Infinte for "conscious" and "aware" because they loop back on themselves. — Benkei

Wooow, you can't get more fitting than that! This is amazing. Consciousness knows consciousness by reflexion.

That's really interesting. It's like going down the family tree of knowledge, starting with the particular and moving to the general and ending in philosophy at the trunk. Presumably this doesn't work so well with other subject areas like, say, economics... I'll try.

...Nope, once we get to philosophy it starts looping back on itself via existence, ontology and other such abstract universal concepts.

Yes, I was just trying to say something in favour of having a gun. I think there are many more bad things about having a gun than good things. But that doesn't alter the good thing about having a gun, although I accept the point that some skill and luck is needed. It's important to be able to separate goods from bads. Taking herion has lots of bads, but it has a clear good as well because of the feeling it gives.

The Aussie comedian makes some very good points.

Having a gun is good because it increases your power over medium-sized and large creatures in your environment.

If someone is intent on doing harm they will not stop because of lack of a gun. — Sir2u

A gun makes it a heck of a lot easier.

Can we get 49 people to contribute $1 a month by standing order to an account in jamalrob's name? I'd be happy to be one of the 49.

Alternatively we could get 24.5 people to contribute $2 per month.

Or, to stay in whole numbers, we could have a Board of The Seven who each contribute $7 a month and have special status.

Thanks Baden.

The Physics and Metaphysics of Biosemiotics, H. H. Pattee. I always struggled to understand what the hell Apo was going on about, but he sounded like he knew what he was talking about and recommended this paper for us fools to read. I thought we could give it a go, if only so we could tell him what a condescending shit he is from a position of knowledge.

HOW TO DEFINE CONSCIOUSNESS—AND HOW NOT TO DEFINECONSCIOUSNESS, Max Velmans This is a pretty simple paper which nevertheless makes some really important points.

I'd be embarrassed. I did ceramics at school and a bit at university, and I've done a few abortive things after that, but nothing worth posting I don't think. I'd have to digitise it somehow as well. I loved art when I was a kid, though, and was quite good at it (for a kid) and I've been interested ever since, just never done much. Always meant to. Just like the book everyone isn't writing.

In art I think limiting decisions can be very helpful, whether that limiting is by the mechanics of the medium, or a design brief, or whatever. Otherwise the freedom to do anything is dizzying and frightening. Or that's how I find it anyway.

I don't think that I'm suggesting anything controversial at all, but quite universal, and ubiquitous. Causing someone harm and deriving pleasure from it is what villains do (it's what psychopaths do, which is the evilest psychological profile you can give someone) , feeling remorse and reforming their ways is what anti-heroes do, and heroes don't even derive pleasure from the suffering of their enemies when they deserve it (though anti-heroes may, because they're still a little bad, but it's forgivable, because we want the villain to suffer too, because even we aren't as pure hearted and good as the hero, even though we recognize their not deriving pleasure from the suffering of the villain as a higher good)..

I don't feel the need to speculate why this is the case, I think that it is sufficient to point out that it is the case. — Wosret

This doesn't harm the hedonist's position, though. If deriving pleasure from causing harm is more evil than simply causing the harm, it's because the knowledge that someone is deriving pleasure makes us (and perhaps the victim) feel extra shitty, and that's why it's extra bad. It's still pain = evil and pleasure = good.

I like Shmik's self-portrait too. Sometimes when drawing a picture I struggle to leave out details and simplify. Shmik has made some decisions about where to change from one shade of grey to another, something that I struggle to do because it's somewhat arbitrary, but it makes for a better overall effect than trying to make all the transitions accurate and smooth.