Modern Gnostic Christians name our god "I am", and yes, we do mean ourselves. — Gnostic Christian Bishop

Hubris Alert clang clang clang clang clang

Remember the tobacco industries frauds. Watch the documentary --- What the Health--- and see fraud taken to the point, again, to where the government is knowingly killing it's people. — Gnostic Christian Bishop

You are fixated on "the government". The government wasn't growing tobacco, making it into cigarettes, cigars, snuff, or chewing tobacco. They weren't promoting it by using every trick in the book. Who was doing that? R. J. Reynolds, Phillip Morris, British American Tobacco, Lorillard, et al were doing all that. Who was profiting from tobacco sales? The stockholders of the tobacco companies.

I used to smoke--I pretty much liked smoking--(Marlboro) and was the government putting a gun to my head to do that? No. I decided I wanted to smoke (as an adult, yet -- two years out of college, fully aware of the surgeon general's report. Did the government make me quit (25 years ago)? No. I chose to quit.

There is a lot of ragging on the masses of "stupid people" going on here. Who here is not part of the masses?

My focus here is the immorality of the governments, the oligarch's lackeys, as you seem to know, so I reject your labels. — Gnostic Christian Bishop

You can reject whatever labels you want. But... if you focus on the evils of "the government" to the exclusion of all else, that puts you in the camp of the libertarians. Or the camp of "everyone is too stupid to see how right I am" or the terminal conspiratorialist camp. Take your pick.

You seem to be peeved that there are no people, organizations, governments, corporations, or anything else with sterling moral credentials. Why would there be? We all have feet of clay. We are not gods.

expect now a knock on my door now, and before I know it, I'll be given a lethal injection between two toes, and the coroner's report will say "Cardiac arrest". — god must be atheist

They don't need to hide behind needles between the toes. A bullet through the head (faster, cheaper, better) and the coroner's report will still say, as you said, "cardiac arrest", or maybe if they are in a comic mood, "failure to thrive".

We have all accepted to be slaves. Shame on us all.
We do not live in a Democracy. We live in a Hypocrisy.
We can easily rid ourselves of poverty.
Should we?
Morality says yes.
Will we do the right thing?
Not till hell freezes over. — Gnostic Christian Bishop

We live in a kleptocracy, or a plutocracy, or an oligarchy masquerading as a democracy. We (the western industrialized countries) can rid ourselves of poverty. Yes, we should. But we almost certainly will not.

Your anarchist or libertarian focus, whatever it is, causes you to focus on The Government as the chief author of all that is bad. The government, Marx said, is a committee to organize the affairs of the wealthy. The bourgeoisie (wealthy people) have been in possession of the U. S. Government since the Mayflower Compact of 1620 (exaggeration for effect). The government has assisted the bourgeoisie in getting and keeping as much wealth as possible, except for a few fairly brief periods of time when the wealthy had to hand over more, but never so much that they weren't very rich any more.

The business of America is run by the businesses of America. Business is not run by the government. The businesses decide how much to pay people, and as a rule pay them the lowest possible wage that the market will bear. That doesn't mean that everybody is getting minimum wages, but it does mean that a lot of people (big portions of the working population) are getting a lot less than they could be getting.

All legislation begins with a person pushing the idea. That is all I or you can do. — Gnostic Christian Bishop

Sort of. But much more effective is organizing very large numbers of people to push ideas, and take concrete action if their pushing is ignored. What sort of concrete action? Well, the minimum is voting the recalcitrant sons of bitches out of office. Then there is union organizing on a massive scale; there is civil disobedience; there are mass demonstrations, boycotts, work stoppages -- let your imagination go!

That means we need the positive emotions, and we should avoid the negative emotions, as well as apathy. — TranscendedRealms

We need both. Screaming fear is what gets our asses in gear when a clearly visible existential threat appears -- the big crocodile about to eliminate us from our gene pool. Obviously walking around with fear and dread all the time is not a good thing. Similarly, walking around in the haze of warm fuzzy gauzy joy isn't a good thing either--except for the hungry croc.

Things can go haywire in a brain; there are lots of problems people have that originate in brain function. Many of these 'features' or 'flaws' in brain function are not a choice. Nobody wants to be bi-polar, chronically depressed, or psychotic -- it just isn't much fun. I feel much happier, more positive, and so forth now than I did 15 years ago. Why? I don't know, exactly. Things changed. I didn't choose it.

Without these feelings, we can't experience any of those things. — TranscendedRealms

The history of brains is quite long -- about 5 hundred million years. Animals (like us) rely on emotions to provide the impetus to act, to give the 'feeling' of reality to experience. We wouldn't FEEL love without neurotransmitters provided by the limbic system of the brain -- and neither would creatures with brain plans much older than ours -- birds.

The neurons that figure out how to replace a light bulb aren't the same ones that provide the sense of urgency in getting the damn thing changed. We need both.

you can get incredibly upset and smash the toilet seat down angrily if you break a shoe-lace — god must be atheist

Congratulations! You are the first person in the history of Philosophy to connect smashing toilet seats with broken shoe laces. How was this crucial connection overlooked for so long?

1. what are the basic things that u need to know in order to become an idea machine?
3. how to compound interest your intellect and make quantum leaps from things you already know?
4. what do I need to add to my knowledge so I can compound interest it efficiently and effortlessly, and naturally, what are the basic building blocks to becoming a genius?
6. what are the mistakes that makes your mind less
efficient in processing data and learning? how to process data faster?
how to recognize patterns faster?
how to think ? how to make your mind really clear? (methods of
thinking)
8. how to develop photographic memory?
9. what can open my mind and expand my consciousness to gain access to infinite possibilities?
(sharpening the senses and becoming sensitive, how to intentionally connect the two hemispheres of the mind? connecting to other minds maybe?) — regel

1. The typical human is already an idea machine, but people make only a few "quantum leaps". Most of the time we make little leaps. If you are lucky, your little leaps will add up to a big leap. On the other hand, your little leaps may lead you to fall flat on your face. Hey, that's life for you.

3-4. Read widely; take risks (I'm not talking about sky diving; take intellectual and emotional risks). Try different ideas on for size. Mix with a variety of people-types. Leave your comfort zone every now and then. Allow 'down time' for your mind to roam. Sleep well. The brain consolidates learning at night, while you sleep, more efficiently than when you are awake all night.

6. Habits of life get in the way. People who are sleep deprived, drink and drug too much, are driving themselves crazy; are undisciplined all the time; don't get organized (in the ordinary sense of the word)--all this sort of the thing impedes clear thinking.

7. You either are born with an 'eidetic" or photographic memory or you are not. In any case, walking around with a million photographs in your head that you haven't processed isn't going to help you. Your memory is good enough as it is. But... one can learn how to improve memory.

9. Surprise! Mother Nature, who designed your brain's hemi-spheres, didn't forget to connect the two halves. The hemispheres of your brain are connected by the corpus callosum. What you need is already there.

Want to do a Vulcan mind meld with somebody? sit down and talk to them honestly, listen attentively.

There are amazing things to discover about how the brain works, but that isn't going to help you. By the time you are old enough to write a post on The Philosophy Forum, the Jello of your brain has pretty much set. Yes, there is such a thing as brain plasticity, but that's under the control of your DNA. Keep your brain busy with good work and it will serve you well.

We all have limitations. We might want to think like the young Einstein, but that kind of genius isn't handed out freely. As you move through your life, accept who you are becoming, even as you maintain reasonable aspirations (in other words, don't get carried away with absurd goals). Much of who you are going to be has already been determined. That's true for all of us. We aren't blank slates; we don't get to be whatever we want to be.

Take the difference between the famous New Caledonia Crows and African Grey Parrots. They're both very smart birds. The crows are workaholics. Give them toys and opportunities to "play" and they turn the toys into tools. Parrots, on the other hand, also demonstrate intelligence AND they like to play.

Neither the crow nor the parrot had a choice. In a sense, neither do we. We are at least somewhat programmed by DNA and very early environment and experiences. If you are a crow, make the most of it -- just as if you happen to be a parrot.

Johnson is purely a mop-topped heat-seeking missile for power — Baden

A bomb? Yes, in so many ways; a heat-seeking missile... Donald and Boris are both too much the lard ass to soar. They roll and crush.

In America, each new bad president makes the last bad president look better in retrospect. Do you think Boris will improve May or Cameron?

I sometimes think my goal is just to keep you interested and sharing for as long as possible — ZhouBoTong

Fish will bite if you've got good bait, and that is definitely attractive.

So, on the coinage issue:

The revival of 'In God We Trust' The 1950s, however, witnessed a dramatic resurgence of religious language in government and politics.

The phrase "in god we trust" on money was first proposed by northerners during the Civil War. There was also an attempt at that time to add "god language" to the preamble of the U. S, Constitution. It didn't fly at that time, and in the years that followed.

On the P of A issue:

The Pledge of Allegiance was written in August 1892 by the socialist minister Francis Bellamy (1855-1931). It was originally published in The Youth's Companion on September 8, 1892. Bellamy had hoped that the pledge would be used by citizens in any country.

In its original form it read:

"I pledge allegiance to my Flag and the Republic for which it stands, one nation, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all."
In 1923, the words, "the Flag of the United States of America" were added.

Ah, news to me. So, that a socialist wrote the pledge explains the original absence of any named country, since socialists (officially) are in favor of doing away with borders.

While I was there (in the 1950s) I was too young to be making cogent observations. But one of the clearly memorable themes of the 1950s -- at least in the small town midwest where I lived -- was a very strong anticommunism. This ran parallel with other strong themes. It was all very conspiratorial: The atheistic communists are infiltrating the nation [like termites, they might have said, gnawing away at the beams, pillars, and floorboards of democracy]. Their goal is to conquer America, and turn it into a part of the international communist world. (Well, that was at least somewhat true). We have since discovered that there really weren't all that many communists in the United States. Their numbers were largest during the Great Depression. And the Communist Party USA was on the right side of the civil rights movement--they contributed manpower and funds to help the movement from early on.

I had never considered this connection, nor ever read anything like that. It seems obviously correct once you mention it though. — ZhouBoTong

Yeah, there is a difference between religious language about God and political language about god. We expect believers to trust in God. That's sort of their thing. But politicians don't characteristically rely on miraculous beings to win. They rely on a jaded electorates, smoky back rooms, money changing hands, lies, untruths, distortions, etc.

WHAT people believed about communism and communists was pretty heavily flavored by government agencies, business groups, and the police in the person of rabid anti-communist, anti-homosexual (and probably homosexual himself) J. Edgar Hoover, the long-time head of the FBI.

You probably haven't heard of it, but the FBI ran a program called COINTELPRO -- COunter INTELligence PROgram. It ran from 1956 to 1971, but people didn't know about it until the 1970s. It was a major effort to surveil, infiltrate, disrupt, and discredit domestic political groups of which the FBI disapproved. That included civil rights groups, leftists (not communists), Communists, women's liberation groups, anti-Vietnam War groups, campus activist groups, etc. They didn't plant bombs or assassinate people, but they interfered in ways that made political activist work less successful, because the various organizations were dealing with organizational problems that COINTELPRO caused.

COINTELPRO was closed down after the story came out, but rest assured, the government didn't give up on surveillance and infiltration of domestic political activists.

no sound on this computer — ZhouBoTong

So much for the digital revolution. I've had problems sharing files with other people and they with me. Quite often the video won't play, or it will play without sound. Too many variables to track down. Sorry you couldn't hear it. You can always go on YouTube (where I got it) and search for the piece. I'm beginning to find that YouTube's collection of music is as complete, if not more so, than iTunes. And, so far, one can listen for free.

I also can't see him lasting long. And I hope I'm right. He's for tax cuts for the rich, he has a record of gross incompetence, he has made comments suggestive of racism, sexism, homophobia, and islamophobia, he has a bad character, he deliberately evades giving straight and honest answers to questions, he's shallow and out for himself... — S

Right. Well, many of us truthfully said the same thing about one Donald Trump, and it seems quite possible that he could get re-elected. No one every went broke underestimating the intelligence of the electorate. If you can fool enough of the people enough of the time, you can get elected and re-elected.

Well... Here we go again. Another raving bloody loony in an office they have no business being in. — Mark Dennis

Exactly.

As a true Scotsman, what do you think are the chances of Scotland severing it's union with England?

"Did you or did you not go to the market yesterday" — Robint

"I am a good player, if not the best" — Robint

You are correct in identifying these two constructions as ambiguous. "Did you go to the market yesterday?" is clear. The 'rhetorical' purpose of the first statement's construction is to bear down on the witness [or the husband, the wife, the maid, the child...] with imperious phrasing.

The second statement isn't a good example, as written. I would expect to hear "I am an excellent player, if not the best." There is too large a gap between "good player" and "the best". In any case, the speaker is leaving himself a little space to maneuver. He wants to boast, but isn't quite bold enough to claim the top spot. Mohammed Ali (the boxer) was bold enough; he proclaimed "I am the greatest!"

Ambiguity just goes with the territory of language--any language--as people use it in their customary habit. Maybe in 90% of everyday conversation ambiguous language is precise enough. In the remaining 10% confusion demands clarification: "Which scalpel do you want, doctor?" Any speaker can speak (write) more precisely, less ambiguously, with practice and when required by circumstances.

I don't know whether English is the most difficult language to learn, or not. Children can learn any language, even two or three unrelated languages at the same time.

Do you think in America that maybe patriotism merged with religion around the 1950s (ie the pledge of allegiance), resulting in part of the difference between Europe and America? — ZhouBoTong

No. Religion and patriotism had gotten into bed together long before the 1950s. The Civil War broke several denominations apart, as churches in a given region aligned themselves with local politics. The United States was not very religious in the colonial period, some reports have it. The Second Great Awakening was a 19th century affair. The latter part of the 19th century and early 20th century was maybe "peak politics and Religion" time.

At the end of the 1950s, religion in America crashed. Millions of people -- Catholic and Protestant -- left their churches and did not return. Since the 1960s hemorrhage, membership has continued to bleed away, just not quite as fast.

I do remember when the Pledge of Allegiance was changed -- I think I was in 3rd grade, so... 1954 or '55. I remember learning the "under god" bit. There was that conflicting drive -- to add god to the pledge of allegiance, and Madeleine Murray O'Hare's drive to get "In God We Trust" off the money, and to ban school prayer. Official prayer got banned. I think the drive to put "under god" in the pledge of allegiance may have been more an anti-communist angle than a "religious" angle. But I'm projecting backwards. I certainly wasn't thinking about that at the time.

Time for the 3rd Great Awakening? — ZhouBoTong

Your guess is as good as anybody else's on this question. We, or the Europeans, could certainly experience a great awakening of some kind. But... who the hell knows?

How similar are the beliefs of Christians in China to those of Christians in the US? — ZhouBoTong

I really don't know.

Well, this has been very interesting.

Baroque is the one with the tinny noise? Harpsichord I believe? — ZhouBoTong

Harpsichords were in use for quite a stretch. Johann Sebastian Bach would probably object strenuously to "tinny noise". But baroque composers didn't have the benefit of later technology -- like the piano, where the strings are struck by the hammers producing nice solid base notes, instead of the strings being plucked in the Harpsichord--producing that finicky plucky sound. The strings on their violins were made out of gut -- literally, dried out guts. Nothing wrong with that -- we still make products out of cow gut. Dissolving sutures in that cut you got stitched up? Gut. Plastic and metal strings produce more sound. Quite a few instruments that we consider essential hadn't been invented yet in the baroque period.

here's a piece that will sound 'tinny': Vivaldi's Mandolin Concerto in C Major. Here's another 'tinny' piece,

one written by Bill Monroe in his later years for mandolin; he died in 1996 at 84. Monroe was one of the 'inventors' of bluegrass music. He isn't playing in a 'tinny' way; it's just the sound of the instrument.

So what about folk: Where Legit Folk leaves off and protest songs or labor ballads and so forth pick up is not of much interest to me. A good song is a good song. Here's a song sung by Country Joe McDonald, who began back in the 1960s doing anti-Vietnam War songs. One of his later albums are WWI songs which he set to music or he reads. My favorite on that album is the Ballad of Jean Deprez. It's a poem by Robert Service about WWI (or could be the Franco-Prussian War of 1870). It's quite stirring.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xMCBOXTPOVo

Actually, I like most music from the Medieval to the John Adams' opera, "Nixon in China" or Dr. Atomic. Rock and Roll, opera, Big band, brass band, dance band, and organ -- it's all good.

Yes. It does seem like a stretch that an immortal, invisible, God only wise; most blessed, most glorious, the Ancient of Days; Almighty, victorious; Unresting, unhasting; not wanting, not wasting--and more besides--could be rationalized from naturalism's perspective.

Smith's hymn is quite popular among ex-Anglican and ex-Methodist atheists.

Here's William Blake's Ancient of Days, applying his compass to the earth.

I also think it meets a need that not everyone has. — ZhouBoTong

Quite so. And if religion is a need (I don't think it is) it's an itch that can be scratched in various ways.

they prefer an answer that soothes their emotions vs an answer that soothes their intellect — ZhouBoTong

Well, cradle atheists and ardent believers alike both like and need their emotions and intellects soothed regularly--by some balm or other. And atheist and believer alike can find it difficult to find just the right content cocktail to keep themselves happy. This is so because LIFE, whether one is an atheist, deist, or theist, is difficult, annoying, full of irritations (other atheists and other believers, for instance) and hard. It is a struggle to find the right "bar" that is serving up the right "content cocktail" at the moment.

As Karl Marx said, "Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people." Marx wanted to abolish what he identified as the capitalist / industrial exploitation that drove people to desire and need the comforts of religion.

So for Marx, religion is a consequence of oppression and the abolition of oppressive conditions makes it possible for religion to decay and disappear.

I like Marx here. Let's compare the United States and Europe--the former where religion has remained very strong and the latter where religion is very diminished. Europe, despite or because of two world wars has built a pretty strong social security system that considerably softens the effect of capitalism.

The United States has maintained a harsher version of capitalism with fewer shock absorbers (social services). Exploitation has been somewhat more naked here. A connection? Probably. Of course, there are other reasons too -- the American church (broadly speaking) has experienced regular renewal over the last two centuries -- up until the 1960s. Since 1960, religious participation across the board had dropped significantly. But "religiousness" is still more common here than in Europe.

Interestingly, there are now 67 million Christians in China. There are other religions too, like Buddhism and Islam. China's religious population seems to have grown while the country was becoming better off. But then, China isn't like Europe or North America.

Baroque music is one of my favorite comforts, Vivaldi, et al. That and folk. Folk and Baroque. That and good books. My current top read is THE GENIUS OF BIRDS by Jennifer Ackerman. Go Birds!

I've never said anything that sensible.

when either say predicts the end of the UK if they do or don't Brexit — Coben

The sceptered isle of Britain won't sink into the sea on the basis of Brexit. But the United Kingdom could come apart and not be the UK anymore. Scotland, part of the UK for 300 years, could sever its union. So could Wales (probably won't). Northern Ireland--god only knows. So, theoretically, Brexit could scuttle the United Kingdom.

England will probably remain England. Maybe Cornwall will decide to reclaim itself. Maybe SE England will shed the poorer northern portions. Maybe London will become a city-state. Or maybe London will get swamped by rising ocean levels.

I do think reasoned opinions should flow quite naturally from source texts though, and be demonstrable on demand. — Pantagruel

Where did you steal this idea from, exactly? Sources, please. :naughty:

How would one go about telling these people that they are asking for something that is not available or not necessary? — god must be atheist

I make statements all the time based on years of reading; I often do not know exactly where something came from. The accumulation of ideas you will pick up from reading become your ideas. I didn't invent the theory of evolution -- I picked that up from lectures, reading, discussions. Evolutionary theory is now part of my thinking.

If you don't have specific sources for a statement (and you might not--this isn't a graduate seminar, after all) then just say so, or ignore the request.

Why the ongoing badgering, then? How does one stop such badgering, which included egging-on insults, like "you haven't shown anything", "your reasoning is faulty", etc, when these are empty accusations without merit? — god must be atheist

Some people are badgers, and that's just what they do. I've seen this kind of repeated response quite a few times over the years in various threads--"you didn't explain anything", "you still haven't answered my question", "you haven't shown anything", etc. The badgers quite often have no more insight into the issue at hand than they accuse their targets of having.

Sometimes you just have to move on, and ignore some people.

but why does one need to defend against false criticism? — god must be atheist

If someone has made a serious criticism, like "You have completely misunderstood Hegel", and you believe you have not misunderstood Hegel or Kant or Socrates or Joe Blow, it is worth your time to answer -- if possible. Like, ask the nabob of negativity, "How have I misunderstood Hegel? You've made a serious claim -- prove it." But again, this isn't a graduate seminar. Sometimes it's a fair response to ignore people.

Why is it a fair response in this forum to ignore people sometimes? Well, batting the ping pong ball of a disagreement back and forth too many times makes for tiresome reading, and it wastes time. It might look like productive engagement (it might even be productive, under some circumstances) but often it is just tedious mental ping pong. "No you didn't", Yes, I did", ad nauseam.

All purpose rule of thumb: A lot of people are just annoying.

I noticed that often when I appeal to common sense, people will want some background reference, or statistical or other evidence to support an opinion. — god must be atheist

Some rhetoric teachers recommend NOT appealing to common sense. For one, common sense is perhaps a good deal less common than we hope, and for two, it either doesn't mean anything in particular, or it means nothing. I don't care if you use the phrase "common sense" but it does have rhetorical deficiencies.

If you say something that somebody else doesn't particularly like the sound of, an easy negative response is to ask for evidence, or a reference. In many cases, we can cite actual evidence and give references for our statements, but it's a lot of trouble to track it all down. Everyone knows this.

If I say, "Gay is good." I have stated a personal opinion with which others can only respond to by stating their own opinions. So you can say "Yes, gay is good" or "Gay is not good." Either way, it's merely your opinion, and my opinion is merely mine.

If I stated that "The human species will be wiped out by 2200 because of global warming." I am making a statement which may be factually based, may be factually erroneous, may be misinformation, or may be wishful thinking. In this case, people can, should, and ought to ask for the evidence behind my statement.

I can't say, "Oh, it's just my opinion." I need to cite scientific reports that suggest that global warming from greenhouse gases will make life untenable by 2200, or that disease and starvation will wipe us out (because of global warming), or something else.

As it happens, I don't believe that we will be wiped out by 2200. I would expect to see population levels dropping steadily by that time, heading toward a new, lower, equilibrium level. Disease and starvation, massive flooding, hot weather, high humidity, bad storms, etc. will probably be the new normal. I believe there is some evidence that if trends continue, the environment which we are accustomed to will gradually disappear and be replaced by the one I just described.

The trick is to not make really bold claims without providing information (or a source, at least) to back it up. If you make a statement of shocking opinion, then you should explain why you hold that opinion.

People may (will, pretty much) still give you negative feedback. There's nothing anyone can do to prevent that. It goes with the territory.

that apparently balances out the cosmos — Andrew4Handel

I've never been able to get petty cash to balance, so even thinking about balancing the cosmos is well above my competence level.

even if one is not an antinatalist there is a case for reducing the number of people to reduce the amount of suffering — Andrew4Handel

On this I agree wholeheartedly. The growing number of people in the world are exceeding the globe's carrying capacity. Reducing the population by means beyond normal attrition will also entail great suffering. Population reduction is not something we need to plan for or execute. Natural processes will intervene at some point and carry out the reduction for us, on us.

We could work harder to reduce birth rates, however. Greater prosperity tends to lower birth rates, but it will not lead to zero population growth soon enough. Birth control must be pursued much more aggressively. More aggressive birth control--not for extinction of suffering--though fewer people means fewer people suffering--but for survival of the species.

Sorry for the lack of precision. I tend to lump them at that level all together. CEOs, one would expect, would bring proven performance ability.

As a whole is the paragraph sort of saying, "common decency should be, and typically has been, common"...? — ZhouBoTong

Yes.

People get along with each other most of the time because people are social animals, life is difficult and requires cooperation, and social cooperation is rewarded in the form of peaceful, productive societies where life is better. Religion usually helps promote peaceful productive societies by encouraging people to get along together (unless it doesn't). Religion also helps assuage the suffering that leads to dying, and the existential fear of death itself. They might take care of the sick and dying, or offer consoling words about sickness, dying, and death.

Is it the case that ONLY RELIGIONS can do what religions do? Probably. Religious work, like civil engineering, is specialized -- requiring a preference for such work, training, practice, support, supervision, and so forth.

Religions are the organization most ready to answer people's "existential questions" Philosophy might also be able to answer those questions, but philosophy isn't organized to go forth and comfort the world's existential fears. Philosophers committed to an open-ended search the truth might irritate people too much. Mourners at the grave side want to hear something like "I am the resurrection and the live everlasting" and really don't want to hear about the lack of proof for or against a cold afterlife. An overly persistent and obtuse philosopher might end up being at his own burial, as the outraged mourners, armed with handy shovels, close up the ends of the philosopher's insistently open-ended thinking.

I think the Monty Python comedy group would have been the people to dramatize the philosopher's last funeral (were they still in business).

Biden-Warren, I can see it. — Wayfarer

Have you had your vision checked recently? (jokey quip)

You might be right. I feel neutral toward Biden, positive toward Warren. Warren is loaded with policy ideas, true enough, and expresses her ideas in a forthright and an articulate manner. However, in order for her to be able to DO GOOD POLICY (outside of executive orders) she would have to have a Democratic majority in the Senate and House, and not just for the first two years. The house/senate limitation applies to everyone, of course, for good or for ill.

The Republican Party has executed a long-term policy of getting control of state houses (where redistricting for Congress is done after the Censes) and has also been working on courts and state legislatures to protect rather old-fashioned methods of voter barriers like gerrymandering and "voter fraud" initiatives. Voter fraud has become a true rarity, so voter fraud is code for barring minorities and the elderly, both of whom are more likely to vote liberal. Poll taxes aren't going to work and neither are literacy tests. What they are using now is restrictive rules to deter minority and elderly voter registration.

This far sighted, patient projected is paying off. It reminds one of the long-term patient, hard working effort to block Roe vs. Wade. The secular right and the religious right have been working on this since 1973, when Roe vs. Wade was handed down.

The Democratic Party does not seem to have anything like the same long term, patient, strategy in place like the Republicans have. The Republicans have done well in the research and development department where they have discovered routes to long-term power that had eluded them for quite some time. I have not heard of anything similar in liberal circles.

Guardian Cartoon

I think he'll be re-elected, so my long term plan involves ignoring the news. — frank

This is an understandable response, and fairly sensible. The news coverage highlights the steady progress of a malignancy, and who needs that?

Our timeline on American politics is too short, here. If you look at politics in America since 1960, you can chart a steady trend away from substantive candidates and campaigns. Richard Nixon "lost" the Kennedy-Nixon Debate" because (the pundits said) he had a 5 o'clock shadow and looked tired. Looking tired? 5:00 shadow? Election by election the importance of clever theatrics has grown and the importance of content in the campaign has decreased.

The Platform Committees of the two nominating conventions used to receive attention. Not any more. Who cares what the platform is when you have fascinating personalities?

There are significant differences between the Republic and the Democratic Party, of course. For the last 40 years, the Republicans have paid more attention to their long-term project of reducing government--both in its regulatory guise and in its social services guise. Conservatives have resented the New Deal for the last 85 years. Democrats have tried to maintain and extend it.

It was under a Democrat (Bill Clinton) that "Welfare as we know it" was ended (i.e., reduced). It was under a Republican (Ronald Reagan) that the government response to the AIDS epidemic was poor. It was under a Republic (Bush II) that we became mired in a middle east war, and it was under a Democrat (Obama) that we stayed there.

Trump illustrates two personal characteristics that are relevant: First, as a CEO, he behaves in the presidency as if was a CEO--with lots of prerogatives, and not part of a government. Secondly, as has been noted, he doesn't deal with specific issues as much as incite political arousal toward easy targets.

And it isn't just Trump, of course. There are also many millions of voters who find in his incitements an answer to their many (some quite justified) resentments. How many millions? Enough in the right states to get him elected in 2016 by an Electoral College total of 304 electoral votes to 227. One may not like the Electoral College, but until the constitution is changed, there It is.

The Democrats should not compete with Trump in a race to the bottom of the barrel of electoral strategies. They have plenty of good issues and good rhetoric that can incite and inspire their base, and even steal some Trump voters--provided they focus on winning majorities in the crucial states of the Electoral College.

It will be a tricky high wire act.

During the 1960s and into the 1970s, "Love It or Leave It" was a common taunt. It meant that you should love the country the same way the taunter did: get behind our military (even if the current war was stupid); support the troops; honor the flag; get a hair cut, get a job -- all that. I was told to love it or leave it many times.

It seems to me that "go back where you came from" or "go back home" has about the same loading as "love It or Leave It." If you don't love the country now the way the taunter does, the taunter in chief, especially, it means you don't share the dominant paradigm. Back in the day, when the Black Panther Party was in the news a lot (even though they were actually pretty small potatoes as organizations go) they incited a lot of hatred. Black activists of all sorts were told to "go back to Africa".

Love It or Leave It, Go Back Where You Came From, Go Back to Africa (or wherever), are taunts to "get with the program". More often than not the taunts come/came from working class whites who were not, when they were taunting long-haired hippies or blacks, in the armed services. Working class whites were drafted at a higher rate than white college students (who might have been working class too). They felt they were bearing an unfair 'class burden'. Their burden was lighter than the black working class who got drafted a lot more often than white working class men.

White working class men end up taking the side they do because they are more or less conventionally patriotic, and even if they have been ill served by the system, they feel they have a stake in it. Working class blacks are conventionally patriotic too, but are generally have no delusions that they have a very deep stake In the system, or that the system is on their side.

The object of Trump's taunt was no congresswoman. It was his electoral base: They, of course, like the attention Trump gives them (that's the most they're going to get out of Trump, too) and they easily respond to the resentment-pandering that Trump does. It's entertaining. "Lock her up" / "Send her back" -- are just obvious chants for Trump audiences to use.

Any speaker who so wishes can coax a crowd into a frenzy with the right suggestions. Different folks need different strokes. A Sanders crowd or a Warren Crowd or a Trump crowd can all be turned on with the right--but quite different--words. Trump seems to have a feel for his people, which is important for him since his whole strategy has been to pander.

Memo to everyone who feels a bit schitzoidal: Some of us are not good diagnosticians. Please be as blatant as possible. Mention your medications. Tell us your symptoms. DSM references are always helpful. Share your worst hospitalization experiences. were your parents a form of cruel and unusual punishment? Have you been cruelly jilted recently? Any really weird hallucinations? Is God talking to you a lot? All that sort of thing.

I couldn't get him in focus on my radar. It didn't occur to me that something might be seriously wrong with him. So much for my diagnostic skills! :down: Sometimes it is just blatantly obvious, but... not this time.

I found Ilya to be a most annoying poster. His posts were just so... out of whack, to use the technical term. He didn't seem to engage.

Does or should Hotelling's Law apply to potential democratic candidates-who would want to win, quite obviously-against Trump in 2020? — Wallows

In as much as candidates have to be marketed to potential buyers (voters) this 'law' or effect will probably come into play. I doesn't help us determine which candidate has the best ideas, the cleanest record, the most sordid history, or the greatest leadership skills. But it is handy to think about candidates the way one thinks about mustard. Which one to buy? Maybe French's--the standard yellow variety [Biden] or a coarse ground one with a touch of honey or horseradish [Sanders/Warren]?

Shampoo, mustard, beer, and political candidates have to fall within a fairly narrow range of acceptability. "standing out against the background" of other candidates is a necessary risk. If all of the candidates form the undifferentiated background, then none of them can become 'visible'. if they stand out too much, they will seem like a gang of outliers.

Bernie Sanders stands out; I like the way he stands out, but I fear that for many Democratic voters, or disaffected Republican voters, he will seem like an outlier. "Socialist" sounds good to me, but I am in a small minority of the electorate who actually like the sound of that word. Elizabeth Warren is also attractive, but may stand out (from the other candidates) a bit too much. She, like Sanders, is a highly differentiated candidate -- both in what she says, and the sharp focus with which she presents her views.

Amy Klobuchar, from my state, is pretty close to being a gray cypher of a presidential candidate. She seems too undifferentiated. She's sort of like Seth Moulton, not memorable. Biden also has too much history, too differentiated because of his long service in the middle of the road.

Pete Buttigieg is also too differentiated, and not very experienced. Were he a straight guy with a wife and 2 children, I think he'd be raising far less money and getting less attention. I like the idea of a gay president, but I really have very little idea what Peter would attempt to accomplish.

Whoever comes to lead in the nomination race needs to be able to articulate sound programs aimed at global warming, a national health finance system, the trillion or so in college loan debt, and the like. Out Trumping Trump is a losing strategy. In the election, it is important that there be a clear programatic choice.

You two are complaining about the TRVL Channel and the History Channel, no doubt right on target. I'd add that National Public Radio and Public Television aren't as good as they used to be as well, but both at least still bear a strong resemblance to organization with intact integrity.

So, what is the problem?

#1, quality programming costs money, and really great programming is quite expensive.
#2, quality programming requires really (A) smart and (B) creative people to produce it.
#3, there are too many channels of programming to supply for there to be enough quality programming to go around.
#4, as H. L. Mencken, the Sage of Baltimore, wrote [or should have written, if he didn't] "Nobody ever went broke underestimating the level of American taste [or intelligence].

Some people, none of them associated with this site directly or indirectly, actually prefer schlock*** to quality. Many people actually prefer high quality television programming, but tire of higher-brow English accents, which the BBC does so well. But Masterpiece Theater can't be on 24/7. David Attenborough is getting pretty old. Here's a keepsake memory of the old boy:





***Yiddish, trash

Trump doesn't make speeches. He makes sporadic remarks strategically aimed at incite. — Metaphysician Undercover

Exactly.

People pick and choose what they want to abide by according to their interpretation of the scripture. — chatterbears

And this is EXACTLY what people should and must do. — Bitter Crank

Chatterbears: Do you believe the Bible (OT or NT or Koran) is inerrant? Do you believe that everything in the Bible or the Koran must be applied as literally and precisely as possible?

If you don't, then you should be quite happy to have people pick and choose what they want to abide by. If you do, then of course you would expect people to march in lock step with everything the Bible or Koran says.

By the way, you may have noticed that religious law is not secular law, the law of the land. People in most societies are required to abide by secular law, first and last. If they practice slavery, then they will subject to severe punishment. If they burn witches, they should expect either the death penalty themselves, or at least a long prison term.

Some societies follow religious law (like strict sharia law). If the community and civil authorities are willing, maybe one can get away with burning witches or killing homosexuals. At one time, in some later-enlightened western European countries, it was possible to get away with burning/hanging/drowning witches. In New England, at one time, one could get expelled from the community for disagreeing with John Calvin. Pretty strict, they were.

What kind of society do you want? One where people obey secular law and pick and chose which religious rules to pay attention to, or a society where secular and religious law are the same, and may not have a choice?

Pick and choose, Chatterbears.

I'm willing to say some religions are just plain bad. Westboro Baptist Church Christians are bad. The Aztec religion was bad. Heretic burning Christians were bad. The Islamic State lunatics are bad. Bad, not merely wrong.

From the standpoint of atheism, all religions which posit supernatural beings are wrong, no matter how good they are. Maybe the best versions of atheist Buddhism manage to be both good and right, but I am not sure. Buddhists in Burma have been behaving badly, recently. So there is that.

Most people in the world do, and probably always have, lived sort of parallel lives, believing in this or that religion on the one hand. On the other hand they have followed the otherwise secular rules of society. One either barters at the market for dried fish, or one just pays the asking price. One doesn't throw one's garbage on the neighbors lawn whether one is Hindu, Zoroastrian, or Animist.

Our very own Esoteric Ecumenist Humanist.

There are several theories about dreaming: Freuds, of course: dreams are the work of the subconscious expressing its hot mess in a way that the conscious mind or ego can tolerate.

Another theory is that dreams are a by-product of the nightly task of organizing the memories of the day. Psychologists determined quite a while ago that students who go to bed after a day of study remember more the next day than students who stayed up all night trying to learn more.

IF the brain is organizing material, then it must employ some obscure operations.

your mother can morph into your dog, your job can become your knapsack, and they house you live in in the middle of the forest becomes a song, or a lover, or hunger. — god must be atheist

I opt for the obscure operation theory. Brains evolved a long time before we appeared. The so-far inscrutable methods of the brain don't have to be "logical" -- they just have to work, and for the most part they do.

If we constantly rehash an event, there is no room in our minds to rehash new, other events. — god must be atheist

The old saw about us using only 1/10th of our brains is totally erroneous. We use the whole brain all the time. And the capacity of the brain to remember things seems very large, but it can't be infinite. At some point, our brains get 'full'. And fortunately we forget, not just because some memories are really inconvenient, but because a lot of them are just useless. What is the point of remembering every glass of milk one ever drank?

Maybe new memories are plugged into empty slots, sort of at random, and a memory about your mother and your dog end up in adjacent slots. In the process of nighttime organizing, the brain trips over "mother/dog" and suddenly your dog is scolding you or you are petting your mother-- well, lets not get into all that too deeply. You and your analyst will have to sort that out.