what is the basic difference between saving one life no lives or three? No difference? — I like sushi

The difference is 2 lives, or 3 lives. See? I can do arithmetic. First responders face this sort of situation sometimes:- Several casualties, some in dangerous places, some trapped, some bleeding to death. You can't help everyone, so you do the best you can, and it's not a moral question but a practical one, how you can best spend your time. What to do first - get the pregnant woman out of the burning car, or stem the bleeding of the cyclist she ran over, or perform CPR on the old philosopher whose heart attack caused the accident?

So I want to say that it is moral to treat any of these, and one is not more important morally than another. First responders tend to have a checklist so they don't have to think and choose at the time. The checklist is not a moral ordering. It is not immoral to treat the philosopher because the pregnant woman counts double.

Sounds like you’re leaning toward fatalism here? If someone is on fire do you just go about your business or perhaps try to help them? The scenario isn’t much further away from that. — I like sushi

Dude you are reading some very weird shit into what I have said. But normally, when I happen to be passing someone on fire, I find I can wrap them in a blanket or spray them with water without killing anyone else. Have I been doing it wrong all these years? I am fatalist only in the sense that I think everyone dies.

It depends on whether or not you value human life. You’ve shown you don’t already. — I like sushi

No it doesn't. It depends on whether you think the value of life is calculable, such that more is always better, or that there is some virtue formula whereby the value of lives can be compared. Those of us that don't think that find that the information in the trolley problem is of no use to us. I don't know what I would do, but I would feel bad about whatever I did, because death would be the result.

The hypothetical in the OP it is set up to trick you. — I like sushi

I don't think it is. It is set up to investigate moral intuitions in relation to consequentialism.

For an utilitarian, there is a simple calculation of the consequences, that you have made slightly more complicated, but not changed the nature of.

But for a Kantian, there is no calculation to be made, because it is always wrong to use a person as a means, in this case of stopping a trolley. In these days where everything is a trade, and everything has a price, it is quite unusual to find a non-consequentialist outside of religion, but still a lot of people feel a certain repugnance for such moral calculations.

Personally, I would say that there is no moral, and no immoral act, because there is no kindness or unkindness involved either way. If you are a calculator, you make your best calculation; if you are an intervener, you make your best intervention; if you are hesitant you let the dice fall where they will. IOW, it is the mind that is guilty or innocent, and the act and its consequences are mere scenery to the passion play.

It's very hard not to get riled up at times, and I try to remember that the worst of politicians want to exploit my anger. So as my friends here are a bit fractious today, I thought to remind y'all that if you close the border, we'll be making a trade deal for all those avocados at a knockdown price in exchange for the lamb we can't export to the EU any more. Let's try and remember that the dirty foreigners have been feeding us and buying our crap all these years, and are just trying to get by in hard times like we are.

I am not better than most people at immediate sacrifice for distant benefit. — Bitter Crank

Unlike poor BC here, I saw the writing on the wall many years ago, and did the decent thing. Because we are generally quiet, our numbers are always underestimated, but you can see for yourselves that as the rational folks depart, what remains of humanity becomes more and more irrational. Perhaps we should have foreseen that...

The human race will die unless a billion people are killed tomorrow. You are the world leader and have to decide who dies. — I like sushi

We make decisions like that all the time. — NKBJ

Usually, I decide to let the human race die.

If you take solipsism seriously then why would you ask others who you cannot be certain exist about it? — Fooloso4

If I take solipsism seriously, then all the posts in this thread are mine. There are no others, and therefore I am not asking them. Rather, an aspect of myself is asking aspects of myself. It's a very curious thing, but in accounting for the way things appear to be, the solipsist ends up just substituting 'self' for 'world' and 'aspect' for 'individual', and otherwise having a view of things indistinguishable from the non-solipsist.

Aren't women just basically better suited for some roles than men are or are I getting this all mixed up? — Wallows

They're much better at gestation.

Also tall people are better at basketball.

But why are such variations of interest to you? If you imagine that morality is to be judged by what folks have between their legs, you are a bit off-course.

Speaking of mothers, my mother was linguistically and mathematically extremely smart, but was obliged on marriage to give up her work. That was the rule at the time, because people assumed that women are just basically better suited for some roles than men - meaning childcare and domestic servant. My mother might or might not have been the exception, but wasn't given the choice.

People are getting annoyed with you because the things you are saying were used within living memory, and are still used more or less covertly to coerce people into conforming to what is at best an averaged generalised image. Women are not all the same, and some are more 'mannish' than some men. I am a man, and I am shit hot at childcare, apart from the lactating thing. So please stop imposing your 'just basic averages' onto a wonderfully various and individual world.

Absolute denotes 100% certainty. — Devans99

Yes Absolute refers to certainty...

so it is a valid qualifier to use with 'truth'. — Devans99

So it is not a valid qualifier of truth.

Our certainty can be more or less, and maybe absolute or maybe not , but it is certainty of truth that is or isn't absolute, not truth itself.

'Fuzzy logic is a form of many-valued logic in which the truth values of variables may be any real number between 0 and 1 inclusive' — Devans99

Of course, we can make new rules and give new mearnings to terms. And in such terms, with such a logic, you can be right. But fuzzy logic is not the logic of our ordinary speech. If you want to talk in that way, then you have to do it consistently; I think you need to get your head around 2-valued logic before you tackle infinite valued.

↪unenlightened But for an inductive argument, its truth value is neither 100% true or 100% false but somewhere in-between. — Devans99

No. There is nothing between empty and not empty, and there is nothing between true and false. What is not 100% is certainty, but a pocket that is 99% empty is not at all an empty pocket.

But 'truth' has to be qualified. — Devans99

No it doesn't. Arguments are deductive or inductive, Their conclusions are either true or false.
Our knowledge can be certain or uncertain, but propositions are true or false. There is no difference between the truth that my pockets are empty. and the absolute truth that my pockets are empty.

To be honest, I don't understand my own argument, because 'absolute' is a kind of truth the way 'orange' is a kind of intransigence.

See my complaining counter thread.

It seems to me that the way the terms are generally used, patriotism is conceived as a 'good thing', whereas nationalism is morally dubious.

So rather than emphasise the parochial with mere evidence, I would like to wonder whether they are the same thing differently regarded, or if the one is a perversion of the other. I take the latter view.

I suggest that having a commitment to one's government to the land, to the people one lives with is a great moral improvement on the narrow self-concern of the individualist, and this is the essence of patriotism.

And nationalism is that perversion that makes of that commitment a larger self; that is thus overly concerned with borders and distinctions, and sets 'me and mine' in opposition to all things foreign.

Now if I take this conceptual distinction back to the parochial, I start to see in the increase of internal division, in the concern with borders, and foreigners as threats, a consistent movement from patriotism to nationalism both in the US and the UK, and elsewhere.

Immigrants were born outside the Country, — iolo

Alas, the answer you might choose to give, or someone else might choose to give, or the dictionary definition or the legal definition, none of these are what I am asking. Who decided, (was there a discussion or a vote,) that place of birth was of any importance?

To put it in context, when Scotland didn't vote for independence, the line was already drawn that defined Scotland, and only those living north of that line got to vote. Perhaps if Northumberland had been included, the vote would have gone the other way... And when the UK voted to leave the EU, the line was already drawn between those deciding to leave or not, and those being left or not. We (the UK) decided one way. We (Scotland) decided the other way - but for this vote, that line does not exist because... no reason.

Next week, the line of birthplace may supersede the line of citizenship and naturalisation. 'We' could decide that after all immigrants (your definition) shouldn't get to vote. And that can be a democratic decision to eliminate those 30% of votes, but whose vote counts in deciding whose vote counts?

Before you can discern the will of the people, you have to decide the extent of the people.

Therefore, questions of nationhood cannot be decided democratically, though folks like to pretend they can. Likewise, by what voting system is the voting system to be decided? Boundaries and systems of governance are necessarily prior to democracy, and cannot be settled democratically.

One must have recourse to tradition, to geography, to force majeure, to sentiment, to something or other fundamentally morally indefensible. 'We, the people' are of a certain age, a certain race and gender, speak a certain language, live within certain lines. These are decisions that have to be made on the streets, before decisions can be made at the ballot box.

This is why populism is destructive of democracy.

the huge (30%) immigrant vote — iolo

So there are immigrants and natives? And which group gets to count that 30%? Am I native if I am born here, or my parents were born here, or my skin is white? Who decides, and then who decides what the decision means?

"Better death!" - when that becomes the will of the people, it is time to leave.

I've decided to become a hard brexiteer in order to further the causes of Irish unification, Scottish independence and the break up of the United Kingdom. There might even be some democratic reform come out of it - What's not to like about Right Wing Bigots stuffing things up in such an undeniable way? They will of course blame Corbyn and Bercow for everything, but people have already stopped listening...

What is left but gallows humour? These are the people and the institutions that we are mandating to 'take back control'.

We're idiots, babe...

so long as they have their Irn Bru and heroin. — S

"Breu" and "breuroin".

It's the Scottish ancestry coming out in a crisis.

The European Commission has released a statement following vote, calling no-deal "a likely scenario".
The statement reads: "The Commission regrets the negative vote in the House of Commons today.

"As per the European Council (Article 50) decision on 22 March, the period provided for in Article 50(3) is extended to 12 April.

"It will be for the UK to indicate the way forward before that date, for consideration by the European Council.

"A 'no-deal' scenario on 12 April is now a likely scenario. The EU has been preparing for this since December 2017 and is now fully prepared for a 'no-deal' scenario at midnight on 12 April. The EU will remain united.

"The benefits of the Withdrawal Agreement, including a transition period, will in no circumstances be replicated in a 'no-deal' scenario. Sectoral mini-deals are not an option."

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/brexit-news-live-vote-result-theresa-may-deal-withdrawal-agreement-a8844831.html

So no mini-deal on marmite then. You know this means war, don't you?

I see one of them has upside-down marmite, but I can compromise and be flexible. I'm packing.

Thanks! I guess the way we're making your governance look modern, competent, and vaguely rational, you can afford to be generous. :wink:

Does the human rights act include the right to Marmite?

If this is taking back control, I'd rather be losing control.

I thought you were going to make the point that a great programmer still wouldn't know what would show up on his computer screen even if they knew what every circuit and electrical signal etc was but you didn't. — curiousnewbie

Well that was the point, and I'm glad you joined up the dots. But the implication is that even for God, comprehending is exactly equivalent to living. To comprehend the program is to have run the program, if not on the computer, then the equivalent in one's head; to comprehend a consciousness simply is to have lived it through.

What is the point of that question? — andrewk

its lack of evidence-based rigor, and with the collapse of the biological mythology, no longer able to justify its dominance among the various mental helping professions — Chisholm

I think this is the point. If the lumberjack's chainsaw turns out not to have a chain, and the trees turn out to be telegraph poles, then one is entitled to question what he is doing.

What psychiatrists offer to society is that they can eliminate or mitigate the suffering of many people who suffer chronic mental anguish, and in some cases cure them for good. — andrewk

One can say as much for priests. And personally, I am not against priests either.

My daughter is in Australia. Her father is in Wales. we belong to each other, but neither owns the other.
One might want to analyse relations of owning and belonging in terms of benefit and obligation/responsibility.

Consider a man who is 'self-possessed'. He has a certain demeanour of calmness; his obligations are voluntarily assumed, his responses are considered - he is responsive rather than reactive, he has self-control.


Consider too, the medieval notion of society as the Great man, (the king as head, the people as body).

The great man, the great man
Historians his memory
Artists, his senses, thinkers, his brain
Labourers, his growth, explorers, his limbs
And soldiers his death each second
And mystics his rebirth each second
Businessmen, his nervous system
No-hustle men his stomach
Astrologers, his balance, lovers, his loins
His skin it is all patchy
But soon will reach one glowing hue
God is his soul, infinity, his goal
The mystery, his source
And civilisation, he leaves behind
Opinions are his fingernails.

https://www.google.com/search?client=safari&rls=en&q=incredible+string+band+maya+lyrics&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8

Some ideas that might help with the unpacking - something to cut the string, somewhere to put some of the contents, maybe.

Try a slightly tedious but maybe pertinent computer analogy. The Great Electrician/Programmer has created the computer and knows every circuit. and also has created the program and knows every line - to calculate the digits of pi - and yet does not know the value of pi that will be output.

Each iteration of the same circuit and the same program produces a new output, and there is no calculating the output that is quicker or cheaper than running the program. IOW, living is the easiest way to understand the mind, and there is no abstraction that it can be reduced to without loss.

How to access the full report? — Evil

You could ask the Russians.

Here you go chaps, all your difficulties made completely irresolvable.

http://s-f-walker.org.uk/pubsebooks/pdfs/ogden-richards-meaning-all.pdf

Pay particular attention to Chapter 9 on the sixteen (yes count them) main philosophical meanings of "meaning". Oh, and it predates all that 'meaning is use' stuff, so better make it seventeen.

I can't wrap my head around how so many intelligent people can come to so many different conclusions within the world of philosophy. — Edward

One starts philosophy in the middle, and not only in the middle but in the middle of confusion and contradiction. One is using language and asking what is language, one asks from a position thinking one knows and then discovering one was wrong, what it is to know. As if in a maze, folks head towards a hidden exit that may not exist, and make progress in different directions. If anyone ever escaped the maze, their instructions were incomprehensible or unbelievable, and so we set out again, wondering at the folly of our predecessors.

It is the Nazi-Soviet pact of the Brexit debate: a deal so cynical it contains its own gravitational field. May is prepared to offer her resignation in exchange for the deal, on the basis that if it passes she probably won't have to see it through. The Brexit headbangers are prepared to support the deal in exchange for her resignation, on the basis that they will tear up the deal once she is gone. They are shaking hands with knives held behind their back.

And yet here we all are, locked into their swirling psychological horror story, trapped in this dreadful room with them, our national fate dependant on what these cynical, self-interested, mendacious, emotionally incontinent, ideologically deranged buffoons happen to decide at any given moment. Not one person in this rabble believes a single thing they are saying. It is a godawful mixture of religious zeal, personal ambition and tribal lunacy.

https://www.politics.co.uk/blogs/2019/03/27/the-obscene-moral-spectacle-of-theresa-may-s-resignation?fbclid=IwAR1jwnk0EvV_Y-bBhi1U6ovwDGVa19fSrDK6jNWasXzY2QBRnWTucdDkSgI

Yeah, but don't hold back, tell us what you really think. :razz:

Using language to deceive does not completely destroy meaning, if meaning is use. — Metaphysician Undercover

Yes it does. It is happening right now to the media. If you sometimes use language to deceive, you will not be trusted, if you do so as often as not, you won't be listened to at all and your talk will become meaningless because it is no use to anyone else, and thus no use to you either, even as a means to deceive.

So your complaint is that mental illnesses are not reducible to simple underlying physical causes? That's what makes psychology and psychiatry "unscientific" in your assessment? — SophistiCat

Why do you think your one-liner is going to be more clear than my several lengthy posts with references.? What is it about unscientific that requires scare quotes? We say homeopathy is unscientific because there is no evidence that it works, and no evidence for the theory that underpins it.

Perhaps we can talk about 'the medical model' - behaviour understood as illness. Apart from the tradition, which applies also to 'the possession by devils model', what evidence is there that medicine is the right approach as the underlying theory of mental distress?

And why are you talking about 'my assessment' when I have just pointed out a long standing tradition within psychiatry and linked to an ongoing group of critical psychiatrists, along with another well respected expert in the field of addiction, proposing a rather different approach. Why are you even talking about 'my complaint'? I'm only the messenger, stop trying to shoot me.

Do you understand Wittgenstein's premise, "meaning is use"? The meaning of any particular instance of words is what the speaker is doing with those words (use). The speaker uses the words like a tool, doing something, so that the meaning (use) represents the speaker's purpose. — Metaphysician Undercover

No. The use of a screwdriver is to drive screws. If I use it to open a can of paint, it doesn't stop being a screwdriver and become a can opener. If you use words to deceive, you destroy meaning. The boy cries 'wolf' but eventually, it means nothing and has become useless. But you know this - why are you playing tricks?

Carrot and stick May style. 'Back my deal and I'll resign - defeat it, and I'll stay forever.'

In case someone is interested but has missed the substance of my position, I will try and summarise/illuminate.
Back in the early seventies when I was studying philosophy and psychology, specialising in abnormal psychology, there was a deal of criticism of the practice of psychiatry from the libertarian Thomas Szasz, from existentialist Ronald Laing from psychonaut and novelist Ken Kesey, marxist David Cooper. (These were qualified psychiatrists, apart from Ken Kesey.)

At the time, psychiatry was busy divesting itself of the psychoanalytic tradition, which my psychology course dismissed as 'unscientific' (it was a major target of Popper, who was the leading philosopher of science at the time, and dismissed Freud and co as 'unfalsifiable'). But the criticisms of the psychiatrists mentioned above went much further.

The derogatory term for 'unscientific' here is 'quackery' and it is a very serious charge against any medical practice. So Bell's question from 1886 "Exactly what mental illnesses can be said to exist?"
is a vital one. I have already indicated that historically, a number of illnesses have been said to exist that are now regarded as rationalisations and promotions of social prejudice that have no substance. But the problem is, that there are no mental illnesses that can be diagnosed on any basis other than an assessment of behaviour. There is no bug, no gene, no chemical deficiency, no physical property at all that unequivocally marks out any psychological illness. And after 130 plus years, it's a major embarrassment or ought to be, that the scientific basis of psychiatry remains so weak as to be unworthy of the name - illnesses diagnosed on the basis of an individual's assessment of another individual, and treatments assessed in the same way.

However, while the biological neuro-physical materialist objective approach has not been successful, progress has been made in a direction much closer to the discredited psychoanalytic tradition. In very crude outline, the suggestion is that trauma and stress, and particularly childhood trauma activate psychological defensive responses, that are mediated by all those physical factors that have been discovered to be risk factors but not causes. That is to say, even more crudely, most if not all mental distress is a form of PTSD. For a more sensible exposition, see Gabor Mate, a mere medic, but still worth reading.

And so the environment, the society, and personal history returns to prominence, and this demands of the therapist above all a non-traumatising intervention - a humane and respectful relationship to the patient, even if at a moment of crisis, some vigor is required to remove the axe from the mad axeman.

incidentally, if anyone is interested, critical psychiatry is a thing, it's not just some rubbish I made up because I'm horrible.

La la la. counts to 10 slowly.

So what's your complaint? — andrewk

My complaints are many, and they are mainly generalisations admitting of honourable exceptions. My complaint against you is that you are making personal remarks with no justification. And an additional complaint is that when confronted with the nonsensicality of your insinuation that it is not part of a medical profession's remit to criticise and campaign for social improvements, you resort to suggesting that instead that I have denied that any psychiatrist has ever done such a thing. So I question in turn your own sincerity.

in order to encourage you and others to have a little less hubris, a little more humility, and a more careful use of language.
— unenlightened
I don't know why you launched this bitter, unprovoked attack, but it would be a good idea to reflect on why you have done it, rather than doubling down. — andrewk

I really would like to know where you see the bitterness in that quote. As to unprovoked, I think I can point you to the several provocations, not particularly directed at me, but It's off topic really, as are your remarks about me.