I have experiences of red — hypericin

OK, well let's explore one. When was the last time you had an experience of red and how did you know that that's what you were having at the time?

They naturally ought to fight — ssu

OK. So why?

Now we've got past the pointless repetitions of the mere fact that they're probably going to fight and into the matter of interest - on what moral grounds ought they fight?

Do they have a moral right to some piece of geography? If so, did Russia have a similar moral right to Chechnya?

Do they have a moral duty to fight aggressors? If so, then why do we not? Why is NATO not there too?

Do they have a moral right to respond as they see fit? If so, does that autonomy extend to Pro-Russian elements in Crimea and Donbas?

I can clearly see a moral allowance for fighting back. If someone comes to take what's your by force, it seems fair use equal force to retain it. But I can't see how you're getting from a moral allowance to a moral duty - that they actually ought to fight back, not merely that they could.

And when doe they have any moral compulsion to take into account collateral damage? If their actions risk nuclear escalation, or if their action risk further starvation, or health risks in less well-off countries, are they absolved of all responsibility? How so?

How could you possibly know that I’m not one of ‘them experts’, for one — Olivier5

This is why I like discussing with you. You never fail to disappoint. Just when I think your defence mechanisms can't get any more ridiculous, you come out with "I might be an expert". Priceless.

Hey, we might all be experts. Bagsy being the spy.

My analysis is that a very small risk of nuclear escalation exists, additional to what this risk has historically been before February. This risk has evidently already been factored in by NATO members, as evidenced by the lack of allied support for a brand new Ukrainian airforce for instance. That decision was already some form of yielding to the superpower nuclear status of Russia. I think it was enough. In fact I wonder if we shouldn’t revisit the issue of some no-fly-zone, given the current abuse of civilian targets by Russia. — Olivier5

My analysis is that a significant risk of nuclear escalation exists, additional to what this risk has historically been before February. This risk has not fully been factored in by NATO members, as evidenced by the continued supply of weapons for instance. That decision was already some form of yielding to the superpower nuclear status of Russia. I think it wasn't enough. We shouldn’t revisit the issue of some no-fly-zone, given the current risk of severe escalation by Russia.


So that's our uniformed, pointless analyses done. How dull.

Anything of interest to add? Like why you prefer your analysis over that of the experts reaching a different conclusion? You know, the sorts of matters laymen can discuss on a discussion forum.

If you spent less time trying to make everyone else's views out to be "absurd" or, "biased", or uniquely "ideological", and spent a little more time defending why you've chosen your beliefs we might have a more fruitful discussion.

Aren’t you forgetting the perspectival role of the body here? Our use of langauge is not divorced from our embodiment but presupposes it. Thus there needs to be room for unintelligibility in language, which shows up as situations where, for instance a blind person is marginalized from a sighted language community due to a gap in intelligibility. — Joshs

Sure, but this is post hoc. The social constructions from which we build our narratives are made available first (albeit by disproportionately able-bodied folk), the marginalised may well build their narratives in partial response to their more heterodox embodiment, but they still build them out of the social constructions of the culture they've grown up in, they don't somehow switch all that off to revert to private constructions.

Of course, some of those social constructions will be those of the differently able, it's not like there are no narratives around disability.

neither does there exist a socially constructed notion of red that is completely shared within a language community. It would at best be only partially shared, continually contested and redetermined , slightly differently for each participant, in each instantiation, relative to purposes, context and capacities — Joshs

Absolutely. The point is not the universality, it's the direction. We build our narratives, our experiences, out of social constructions, we do not have 'private, ineffable' experiences because the whole concept of 'experience' is itself a social construction - a negotiated, dynamic and fuzzily defined one, sure, but a constructed one nonetheless.

here we have the illusion, encouraged by phenomenology, that there is a clear distinction to be had between red and the-sensation-of-red or the-experience-of-red. And we find folk making claims that relate to Stove's Gem, such as that we really never see red, but only see experience-of-red or sensation-of-red. — Banno

Yeah, as if the decades of people using the word 'red' from toddler's colouring books to traffic signals, had no impact, but rather this yet-to-be-demonstrated 'sensation of red' was driving our whole experience-building practices. It's quite odd.

A blind person would understand all those words and yet know nothing of the sensation of red. — hypericin

So you keep saying, but you're offering nothing by way of argument. I don't agree that there exists a 'sensation of red'. I've studied perception (in relation to the formation of beliefs) and I've found nothing which answers that description. So if you want to make a case that such a thing exists, make that case. Just saying it exists is unconvincing.

A computer can learn how to use the words correctly yet know nothing of what it's talking about. — hypericin

This is just assertion. A computer processes the information about how to use words differently to a human. If it processed them similarly it might well 'know' what it's talking about. Again, there doesn't seem to be anything which answers the description of some body of knowledge that is a 'sensation of red'.

Suppose someone was born with no sensation of pain. They can certainly learn to use "pain", "ouch!", Etc correctly, yet have no knowledge of what pain is like. — hypericin

Again, there doesn't appear to be any such body of knowledge. Pain sensations appear to be constructed, similarly to other emotions.

If there’s no historical precedent for it, how high can this probability be? — Olivier5

As high as the causal factors suggest. Events don't happen because history books dictate they should. Events happen as a consequence of their immediate causes. Expert analysts consider the current set of immediate circumstances to present a small but significant risk of nuclear escalation.

The fact that your analysis is limited to two historical examples is the reason why you are not counted among that body of experts.

As a matter of facts I posted it in response to one of your posts. — Olivier5

This...

Superpowers are perfectly capable of losing a war without using nukes. It has hapened before. Or did the USSR use nuclear weapons against Afghanistan? Did the US use nukes against Vietnam? — Olivier5

...is in reply to https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/758255.

If all your historical examples show is that it's possible for a superpower to lose a war without using nukes, then they are utterly redundant. Nothing in what @Manuel argued suggested an illusion that it was impossible for a superpower to lose a war without using nukes. The argument was about the likelihood.

This tells me a quality of the sensation (vibrancy), another color sensation it reminded you of(blood), and how it later made you feel(calmer). But nothing about the sensation itself. — hypericin

Those are all there is to 'the sensation itself'. You have evidence of something more?

I can understand your account only because I experience the same color sensations. If I did not, if I were blind, or an alien, I wouldn't know what you were talking about, no matter how immersed I was in your culture. — hypericin

@Banno has already disabused you of this misunderstanding. You could and would know exactly what I'm talking about by learning how to use the words correctly.

It outsources its violence to the United States, and thus is complicit — Tzeentch

The indices I cited include measures of outsourcing.

Is your claim then, that Norway is more violent than the US?

you are more than doing enough presenting a coherent position that seeks to de-escalate, none of this macho-bullshit. — Manuel

Thanks. I often wonder if anyone is even reading what I write.

I have trouble understanding the war aims of the people who are argue "for Ukraine." — Manuel

Yes. It's what keeps me here, my interest in what motivates such a position and, more importantly, the methods employed to maintain it against contrary arguments. Endlessly fascinating, but more than a little disturbing too.

You of course, eternally confused as you are. — Olivier5

Then why did you post it in reply to @Manuel?

Clearly there is, but you need to get the idea out of your head that the United States is somehow an example of a small government!

It's tendrils span the globe. There's not a larger government in the world. — Tzeentch

There are many larger governments in terms of spending, taxation, laws, public sectors, and government bodies per capita.

If you want to limit your argument to saying that bigger governments in terms of military and economic influence, are more violent, then I'd agree with you, but you do not.

Then please, demonstrate so. — hypericin

"That red postbox was very vibrant for a moment, it reminded me of blood for some reason, I think it was the horror film I'd just watched. Just as the sun caught it though, the colour was more muted, like autumn leaves, I felt a lot calmer."

as governments have grown larger and more powerful over the course of history, their propensity for violence has likewise grown. — Tzeentch

I've literary cited the evidence to the contrary. If you're going to just keep repeating your position without addressing the opposing evidence then it's pointless discussing the matter.

There is no link between size of government and violence. Larger governments are not more violent. Smaller governments are not less violent. There is no link.

My point is that powerful governments (which to exist must apply large amounts of violence) wreak the most destruction on mankind. — Tzeentch

Yes. And you've failed to prove, of even demonstrate that argument.

Governments currently have an almost total monopoly on violence. They use this monopoly to commit vast atrocities.

Nothing in that proves that non-governed communities would commit fewer atrocities.

The evidence is they would commit the same or more.

You also argued that, in my well-poisoning example, the people ought not coerce the well-poisoner with threat of violence because "violence begets violence". This is also false. The sort of coercive violence a government commits in imposing laws does not beget more violence. If it did you'd see a correlation between the size of government and the levels of violence. There is no such link. In fact it's moderately the opposite.

Is this your idea of a "low coercion" government? — Tzeentch

Yes. In the terms of your argument. You are arguing that violence breeds violence. You are including in "violence" the sorts of government coercion involved in taxation, regulation and public sector work.

The evidence shows that those forms of coercion do not lead to more violence by any measure.

Your claim is therefore wrong.

Some forms of violence might beget more violence, but clearly not all forms of violence do.

Government coercion in the form of regulations, taxation, public sector works, etc generally has either no effect at all or, if anything, produces slightly less violence than lower levels of such coercion as typified by somewhere like Norway when compared to the US.

one cannot say for certain, based on a historical analysis, that Russia will not use nukes in Ukraine. And there is zero historical precedent to say that Russia will certainly use nukes in Ukraine. — Olivier5

So? Who did you think needed telling that?

What, in @Manuel's post gave you the impression he thought Russia either must use nukes or must not?

It was referred to as...

the specter of escalation — Manuel

...and your counterargument was that it was...

absurd — Olivier5

Your evidence from history contradicts neither and supports neither.

Where do you get the idea that the US has "very low measures of government coercion"? — Tzeentch

Gods! Did you even look at any of the links?

Low taxes, low public expenditure, low public sector, low government per capita rates, laissez faire economics...

Governments with higher levels of coercion than the US are less violent.

Do you understand correlation?

The most powerful governments in the world, US / NATO, China and Russia all are holding the world at nuclear gunpoint (and they should all be coloured pitch black).

I'd say that's supports my position, rather than undermines it. — Tzeentch

It doesn't. It supports the tautology that the most violent governments are the most violent governments.

It does not support your view that violence (including coercion) begets violence. That view is directly contradicted by the evidence in that the more coercive governments are not the most violent by any measure.

The most violent governments include highly coercive ones, like Russia, and ones with very low measures of government coercion, like the US.

Smaller government does not less to less violence by any measure.

What do you believe that shows — Tzeentch

It shows that decreasing the size of government, by any measure at all, does not decrease violence.

Your argument that "violence begets violence", if you include the sort of coercive violence governments use, is false. Countries with larger governments (more coercive threat of violence) are not more violent places by any measure, including outsourcing, war, crime, whatever.

Your position is contradicted by the evidence.

That index is nonsense. — Tzeentch

Try this one then https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_Global_Militarization_Index

And here's a different measure of government size. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_government_spending_as_percentage_of_GDP

Still no link.

If you accept my idea of outsourced violence, then I think there's ample reason to believe ever more powerful governments (which rely on ever more elaborate systems of violence to exist) result in ever larger wars, thus more violence. — Tzeentch

I've literally just cited the evidence to the contrary. Bigger governments do not lead to more violence. The Global Peace Index takes several measures of outsourcing into account including UN funding and weapons sales. There's still no link between size of government and violence.

The US has a tiny government per capita, a very low tax regime and a very small public sector. It's by far the most violent government of recent decades.

Norway has a moderate sized government, a huge public sector and very high taxes. Its barely been involved in any wars and has a very low level of internal conflict.

Yep.



Agreed.


None of which removes the fact that there's no evidence of a link between more interventionist government and increased violence.

Decreased governance does not appear to decrease violence, so it's hard to see an argument that no governance would.

Here's a list of countries by public sector size https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_public_sector_size, so you can compare. I see no link at all with measures of violence, do you?

There are no modern communities without governments so this line of argument is fruitless.

Here, however, is the Global Peace Index https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_Peace_Index.
You'll note absolutely no link whatsoever between more laissez faire governments and lower violence.

No governments at all may reduce violence, they may not. We've no way to tell.

What we can tell is that less interventionist government does not lead to less violence.

We're not talking about a mere change in policy here. We can easily argue that Stalin or Mao need not have killed all those people by pointing to human societies where that didn't happen.

You can't point to a modern community with no government and say "look, less violence"

The numbers are irrelevant because you've no contrasting numbers for a modern society without government. That may number in the billions.

Having no contrasting example you must rely on argument, not evidence. So by what mechanism do you see violence reducing absent policing or militaries? What mechanism do you imagine restrain every would be violent criminal from simply carrying out their violent will?

Violence breeds more violence - the cycle of abuse. — Tzeentch

It doesn't seem to. I've been to a number of protests, some have turned violent. Often (though not always) the police's threat of violence is enough to reduce the violence.

At an interpersonal level, violence may breed violence, but with government, military, and policing, you'd find very little argument that their collective threat of violence has actually bred more violence than would be the case without.

Superpowers are perfectly capable of losing a war without using nukes. It has hapened before. Or did the USSR use nuclear weapons against Afghanistan? Did the US use nukes against Vietnam? — Olivier5

What happened to...

Each case is unique. History is not done in a laboratory with interchangeable mice, history is not replicable, and hence the course of history cannot be predicted. Nobody can tell with certainty, faced with situation X, that "based on what history tells us, the right move now is Y", because there never was in history a case that was exactly similar to X. — Olivier5

Suddenly history become all important again now it backs up your position. The case not so "unique" anymore, now it suits you to see it as the same.

I mean, at least wait a full page before completely reversing your argument to suit your pro-US narrative.

They shouldn't resort to violence. — Tzeentch

Why not?

it is absurd to fear a Russian defeat in Ukraine, as you seem to do, on the ground that they will go nuclear if they lose. That idea implies that all non-nuclear nations must always agree to the will of nuclear nations. — Olivier5

Why are your only two options total military defeat or submission to their will? Has the concept of negotiations passed you by entirely?

Who in their right mind would have children at all in a place with only one drinking source?

And in a place where drinking-source-polluting ruffians roam about, no less? — Tzeentch

So in ruffian controlled territory, families ought to just up sticks and move?

Odd then that you use the exact opposite argument again the position that one could up sticks and move if one disagrees with the laws of one's government.

Shall I have children in a place where food is scarce, and then justify my violence towards the people around me because my poor children will starve if I won't? — Tzeentch

You won't have a choice. The children will be located wherever the most powerful bully forces them, and they'll have access to whatever drinking source the most powerful bully allows them access to.

You're denying the right for anyone to try and stop that arrangement.

You cannot process evidence, though, so there'd be no point in giving it to you. — Olivier5

Well then don't give it to me. Give it to all the other people reading the thread. After all...

Uninformed opinions have zero value; and when taken as facts, they even have negative value (are detrimental). — Olivier5

...so we'd best rectify that.

Which position, again? — Olivier5

Your support for continued war. That Ukraine ought (not 'will', 'ought') to regain their lost territory by military means.

More importantly, that others who disagree are so mistaken that the only rational explanation for their position is that they are pro-Russia, or Putin supporters, or even actually work for the FSB.

It's the latter I'm most interested in. The grounds on which you find alternative views so untenable.

Are you seriously trying to claim that no children have ever died from contaminated drinking sources?

Who in their right mind would have a million children in a place with only one drinking source? — Tzeentch

All right. 50.

So why do you ask me? — Olivier5

I'm not asking you for data, I'm asking you why you hold the position you do.

How many Russians have died in this war so far, pray tell? — Olivier5

4.

How many Ukrainians? — Olivier5

100,000,000.

Presumably, if we have "no idea" then you'll have no grounds on which to contest those numbers.


I don't see how Ukraine could justify continuing a war which will likely kill another 45 million people as have already been killed when Russia have sustained only one stubbed toe of a soldier who tripped over a tree stump.

Especially when you consider that under Ukraine, 8,000,000,000 people were unlawfully killed in Crimea...or was it 4? Shame we just can't know these things isn't it.

No problem at all. — Olivier5

Go on then.

While you're at it, we'll have the evidence for...

nuclear escalation is an emotional fantasy entertained by some low-level bureaucrats and angry pundits in Russia, and by some knee-jirking western pundits. — Olivier5

The opposition paries are not banned. — Olivier5

Ukrainians are much freer than the Russians. — Olivier5

The only reason they left Kherson was the suffering they went through there. — Olivier5

Russia getting its way in Ukraine,... would result in attrocious consequences for both Ukrainians and Russians. — Olivier5

The odds for that are minuscule. — Olivier5

Ukrainian victory, ...would likely trigger a revolution in Russia — Olivier5

no one is gambling a nuclear war — Olivier5

So considering that...

Uninformed opinions have zero value; and when taken as facts, they even have negative value (are detrimental). So please stop putting out your uninformed opinion as if they were facts. Try to think before you post, and challenge yourself a bit. — Olivier5

You'll have no trouble backing up that opinion with evidence then.

Well then, don't ask questions that require armchair reckoning... — Olivier5

I'm not. There's a whole army of qualified experts out there publishing their findings from whom you can obtain informed opinion.

The numbers of dead in the war thus far are not 'armchair reckoning', they are statistics gathered by various expert agencies.

The number killed in Crimea under Russian occupation are not 'armchair reckoning', they are figures gathered by several Human Rights groups with many years of experience doing just that.

The chances of Ukraine succeeding in re-taking Crimea are not 'armchair reckoning'. They are figures arrived at by experts with, collectively, hundreds' of man hours in the field doing exactly those kinds of calculations.

The experience of counties under oppressive regimes is not 'armchair reckoning'. Hundreds of historians have carefully reviewed the evidence and reached informed conclusions about how such cultures respond.

If you can't be bothered to back up your opinions with research then stick to topics where the facts don't matter