The fact that we are self-aware is nothing but an illusion, which is a good thing, because this means we don’t die entirely as long as this universe exists. We just change our form.

Is that a fact?

Is this alleged illusion your hedge against death?

If self-awareness is an illusion, why isn't your claim that we exist (in some form) as long as the universe exists also an illusion?

Change form -- into what? Not only are the atoms which make up our bodies the products of dying stars, those atoms have been recycled through every organism that has existed since... let's say 3.7 billion years ago, give or take 15 minutes. Not only that, but some of those atoms also partiipated in being rocks for a while. Your atoms are goin to do the same thing -- leave you behind and become something else which will also be short lived.

In my universe, the lame don't walk, the blind don't see, and the dead stay dead. Entirely. That's what death means. Non-existence, period. But take heart. You sofa and shoes will join you in oblivion at their earliest possible convenience.

Who knew there were ‘amateur balloonist groups’? — Wayfarer

No body knew that. What you call 'amateur balloon groups' are insidious front groups for aliens without flying saucers (awfs). Commercial airline travel became so unpleasant that aliens resorted to balloons--and now that option is gone, thanks to the corrosive Chinese.

Tesla self-driving-car owners beware: your vehicle software is vulnerable to undetectable alien overrides and Teslas are nicer than unheated balloons.

Ask @Shawn. Hmm, he hasn't been active for 6 days. Hope you are OK, Shawn!

I also have a question: "Why almost all known conspiracy theories involve the US?" — Alkis Piskas

Because we're the tallest hog in the trough.

The payload was a dead alien travelling with the balloon. — Alkis Piskas

I also have questions: How would we know whether an alien was dead or alive? Why would a allegedly dead alien be traveling with the balloon? How was the alien getting around before it allegedly died? What happened to the allegedly dead alien's flat round space ship?

Now I worry we have entered another period like the time before WWI. — T Clark

Your worries are why "The End of the World Is Just the Beginning" is such a great book title. And the book, which is about Mapping the Collapse of Globalization is full of TIL moments.

"Here's the deal" the US said to the world. "We'll keep the peace and maintain open trade on the high seas. Our stateside market will be open to your exports. You can become richer. In return, you will, ah, cooperate with us. (In other words, do what we want you to do).

This deal was on offer after WWII and was gradually extended. Nixon invited China into the deal. They did very well as a result. Was NATO's expansion the last part of that, after the USSR collapsed? The US made globalization happen because (surprise) it was in our best interests. But, according to Peter Zeihan, the era of globalization is over because the US doesn't need it.

It isn't hard to see why Mother Russia didn't like having her former client states sucked up into somebody else's embrace. It is also not hard to see why her former client states switched partners between waltzes. The western powers (the US & Company) have, of course, been unkind to Mother Russia ever since the Bolsheviks.

And to be frank, Mother Russia has not been the ideal parent for ages, what with serfdom, despotic Tsars, Siberia, KGB, etc. Plus, Mother Russia was so XXX large nobody could swallow her up. What to do, what to do, what to do? Fence her in!

[It should go without saying, but it has to be said, great nations don't become great without stepping on as many faces it takes. The US is no different.]

My initial thought was that Ukraine is very brave but Russia is very big. If NATO stays on the side lines and "only" remains the supplier of weaponry, my guess is that Russia will still be able to eventually grind them down and win. After that, God only knows.

Ukraine doesn't seem to be releasing its own fatality figures, but anybody can see that the war is costing Ukraine many many billions of dollars worth of damage to essential infrastructure and (in time) to its agriculture and industry.

Meanwhile, deglobalization will change the global economy -- drastically for many nations which are doing well now because they can import adequate food in exchange for their raw materials. Once world trade starts shrinking, adequate food imports will dry up.

Having some sort of strong central government seems to be an important factor in how much violence a society tolerates. Where there is a strong government, the lid is kept on top of simmering interpersonal aggressions. Lose the state and things can get bad quickly.

I'm can't remember the source, but one scholar said that if you look at the recovered skulls of our hunter-gatherer ancestors or "cavemen" there was a fairly high percentage of bashed in skulls. That isn't to say they were terrible people -- just that violencce was resorted to fairly often.

Responding to your year old post...

Seems like you might want to find some new bars to hang out in.

Of course it's possible. BUT, the politics of Europe were unstable before the assassination. To some extent Serbia provided more of a pretext for powers like Russia and Germany to make and urge bellicose action, and less of a good reason.

It has been said that the leadership of 1914 Europe stumbled into WWI, and once it started couldn't achieve an outright victory in battle. The two power groups just ground against each other in really bad trench warfare which was lethal without being effective.

I don't view all wars as pointless, but WWI certainly was.

Anyway, what do you think? — Xanatos

I think it is inappropriate to take concepts developed to deal with personal and community health (like harm reduction applied to sex or injectable drug use) and apply the concepts to international relations, or visa versa. Governments and nations operate differently than individuals and small groups. Nations are not, for instance, "addicted to oil". Oil is sought after because it is the most portable affordable high energy fuel, par excellence.

Germany was not interested in negotiating with Poland over anything. They intended to wipe out Poland and Poles, just as they intended to eliminate Jews and Slavic people.

True enough, a Serbian-backed terrorist killed the Archduke and his wife. the Austro-Hungarian (A-H) Empire couldn't overlook an assassination of the heir to the throne. But Serbia didn't cause WWI, and once the fatal shot was fired, harm reduction was not an option Serbia could pursue. The A-H Empire was backed by Germany. Serbia's ally was Russia. Russia's ally was France. Britain sided with France. Turkey sided with Germany, War was declared on once side then the other.

The population of Serbia was about 3,000,000 in 1913. The number of dead soldiers and civilians in WWI was about 20,000,000. Nobody thought that Serbia was worth 20,000,000 deaths and another 20,000,000 injured, if they thought of Serbia at all. A lot of people were not clear as to WHAT WWI was about. One very clear thing is that WWI was continued 20 years later in WWII.

The Triple Entente (Britain, France, and Russia) fought the Central Powers (Turkey, Germany and A-H.) Serbia did not play a large role in the war.

Governments are made up of individuals who form a collective policy making/executing body. Governments, nations, don't have friends. They have interests. Which interest is most important determines policy.

For Ukraine, my guess is that they, individually and collectively, have a much greater interest in independence than the peace of the conquered. Ukrainians had been ruled by Russia before (1919-1990), during the Soviet era, and they didn't like it. They were the first formerly Soviet Republic to announce they were leaving the Union after it collapsed 30 odd years ago.

Peter Ziehan (author, The End of the World is Just the Beginning: Mapping the Collapse of Globalization) thinks Russia wants to repossess the Ukraine as part of Russia's long term strategy to establish secure western borders and buffer states between itself and (now, NATO). Interests, again, rather than individual obnoxiousness.

Particles have been superseded by fields
@gnomon was composed of particles.
Therefore
Gnomon has been superseded.

Sad.

:100:

That's Thomas Nagel. The bridge-laws guy is Ernest Nagel. — frank

Here we are reducing everything to physics but the right nagel escapes us.

On the one hand... Why are you telling me about flushing toilets in Psycho?

On the other hand... That's very interesting. I suppose the sound of a toilet flushing reminded people of urination and defecation, Horrors! :scream:

Wikipedia says that Psycho, 1960, was loosely based on the 1957 true story of Ed Gein, a man in central Wisconsin who was found to have a lot of body parts in his house -- never a good sign. He had murdered a couple of women and dug up several bodies. It got a lot of news coverage. I was 11 at the time.

I didn't associate Psycho (when I finally saw it many years after it first came out) with Ed Gein.

There are "shocking pictures" on line taken at the time of Gein's arrest. For instance, here's a picture of his kitchen. It's a mess, for sure. But shocking?



Here's a chair found in the house made with human skin. It really should be shocking, but a lot of shocking water has gone under the bridge since 1957.



Gein died in a Madison, Wisconsin mental hospital in 1984.

I don't have answers to good questions like yours. — Agent Smith

It's a great mercy that this is no longer my problem. My successors in sex education did pretty much the same thing as I did, but then the treatment of HIV/AIDS greatly improved, and AIDS "ceased to be a big problem" so it was said. The air has gone out of strenuous public health work, seems like. Covid 19 received a vigorous response, but a lot of people resisted vaccination, isolation, masks, social distancing, etc.

Sexually transmitted diseases are not getting appropriate attention. especially since the antibiotic resistance of Chlamydia trachomatis and Neisseria gonorrhoeae is quite advanced. Syphilis remains curable with penicillin, but left untreated it is still a serious disease. Human papilloma virus (HPV) can become a chronic genital wart problem, and type 16 and 18 (if I remember correctly) cause cancer. I had throat cancer which was caused by HPV.

A state of crisis is always helpful in building public health capacity. Never let a good crisis go to waste! Unfortunately, a lot of serious health problems seem to have become routine, part of the scenery. Very fat people, for example. Vaping. Drug use. etc...

Bad idea — T Clark

Alright, it's settled. Put a notice in The Boston Globe informing hopeful recipients that they are officially shit out of luck.

Civil suits are not the same as reparations — T Clark

Granted.

Good arguments can be made for and against reparations. I have lots of doubts about reparations because there are philosophical and practical difficulties. Who is guilty? How far back does victimhood go? Who will be charged for the genocide of the native people? What constitutes reparation?

Germany was already subject to intense moral judgement before WWII was over. A criminal investigation commenced, charges were brought, and some reparations programs were instituted. We are now decades and centuries past the beginning of the British colonies and the several kinds of bad things that followed.

From whom is a problem; the flip side is to whom. And what exactly, and how much?

Some say that the billions spent on various forms of benefit programs (including all the rental housing that the federal government built) constitutes a substantial reparation.

I find it somewhat questionable when people come forward perhaps 50 years after being fondled, seduced, or raped and file criminal charges or sue the church, the actor, the school, or... somebody for damages.

On the other hand, the successors of Hooker Chemical were brought into court to take responsibility for Love Canal in Niagara, New York. Founded 1903, Hooker was absorbed by Occidental Petroleum in 1968. You remember, but for those who don't, Love Canal was Hooker's toxic waste dump. Later housing was built in close proximity to the leaking barrels. The company became notorious in the 1960s, when residents near its chemical waste site, Love Canal, reported extraordinarily high incidences of leukemia, birth defects, and other injuries.

Tort law seems to tolerate a long gap between event and consequence.

The FHA was established in 1935. Its policies shaped housing discrimination into the present moment. There's an 88 year gap between the FDR's signature and the very small number of blacks living in Boston's better suburbs. The injustice is that that certain types of people were unequivocally prohibited from benefiting from accumulating equity as the values of suburban properties rose.

Is this a past injustice or a current injustice?

Morally speaking, probably not. However, I'd say a direct link between the benefit and the crime should be present for it to be immoral. — Tzeentch

Establishing criminality in the case of legally authorized activity is difficult. Responsibility, sure. Guilt not so much.

Here's a more contemporary example.

The Roosevelt Administration sent a large package of New Deal legislation to Congress. Southern Democratic congressmen (the 'solid south') imposed, or attempted to impose, a heavy racial bias on the implementation of the legislation. For example, they attempted to exclude blacks from Social Security -- and were, to some extent, successful. The Federal Housing Administration (FHA) was prevented from funding mixed-race housing (integrated housing, in other words). The FHA planned, and largely underwrote the huge expansion of all-white suburbs by directing banks to write mortgages for whites, and not blacks. Public housing was prescribed for blacks.

Public housing wasn't in itself a bad thing. In many cases the public housing buildings were of very good quality. There was a substantial population of people in cities who needed good rental housing, and the FHA programs met much of that need. Unfortunately, other urban processes were at work. As whites opted for the new suburbs, a good share of their city property was bought up for rental purposes, and high rates of rent were charged the blacks who rented them. The rates that blacks were paying were high enough that they could have afforded to buy property, there or in the suburbs, and they been allowed to do so.

Another problem of the public housing is that the cities were handed the responsibility of maintaining the federally-built public housing. A good many cities neglected the property and it deteriorated. Where cities did maintain the property, the housing is still in good condition. They may not be choice rental units, but they are at least fairly good.

Over time, public housing authorities changed the demographics of the public housing units -- shifting away from small working families and the elderly, to welfare families with several children apiece. As the children grew from toddlers to teen agers, the number of people (and teens, particularly) in the public housing units passed the critical density point, after which social chaos results. Social chaos plus neglected maintenance produced a fast downward spiral, and before long the public housing units were ruined.

In Chicago, and other cities where neglect and density produced disaster, the public housing units have been mostly demolished. What happened to the residents? Section 8 housing, presumably, and that is spread over a wide area. Nobody knows for sure what happened to all the former tenants.

Cabrini Green, very inconveniently located close to the Magnificent Mile high end shopping strip (North Michigan Ave.) has been torn down and new units of low-rise middle-income housing has replaced it. Well thank heavens for that! I mean, who wants to come out of Neiman Marcus and get panhandled (or worse? Give the poor folks in the upper class a break.

It isn't the case that the residents of public housing had no moral agency in wrecking their homes. Some of them engaged in criminal predation while others resisted the criminals. Unfortunately, the criminals won.

Can we count the millions spent (billions in current dollars) as reparations?

Should your wealth be confiscated to recompense someone else? — Andrew4Handel

Were we to have a fair economic system, then a good share of the wealth the 1% has accumulated in just the last 40 years -- at the expense of the large majority of workers -- would, yes, be confiscated. Ripped right out of their greedy hands.

So, that's why it's the system that needs to be changed -- not just fleecing a few people. I have no problem with fleecing the 1%; I don't want them recovering their unfair share.

inherited privilege — Andrew4Handel

Of course we inherit all sorts of biological traits, but privilege isn't one of them. What gives a person privilege is money. If I take away every last dime belonging to Mark Zuckerberg, Elon Musk, or Bill Gates (pick your favorite billionaire) and leave them flat out impoverished on the street, they won't have many privileges. Come to think of it, why don't we do just that?

You were systemically disadvantaged in a number of ways: by class, race, religion, psychology, and social traits. Maybe sexual orientation? Cut race out and most Americans have been disadvantaged on the same basis. Most Americans? Most Americans are working class, and the working class has been systematically exploited since the Pilgrims landed on Plymouth Rock.

It's the ongoing unfairness and privilege that remain today. — T Clark

I agree, but how long is "the present"? I consider at least the last 125 years to constitute our material "present". The modern age of technology, industry, science, and the arts began in the late 19th century.

For some people, the cultural and social "present" is the last 15 minutes; for others it stretches back decades or centuries. For those with a long-term present, American slavery is part of their present. The dispossession of the Western Hemisphere of the native people is a "present moment" to some.

Replacing capitalism with socialism could, might, be one way of getting at ongoing and past injustices. Setting aside what will be a small share of the total wealth of the country (whichever country/county/city is thinking about reparations) will leave the inherited system intact. The cash will not necessarily have that large a benefit. People who have their act together will benefit from a $50,000 check. People whose lives are messed up won't be able to benefit so much.

Some white people in liberal neighborhoods are quite enthusiastic about having legally invalid race covenants removed from their property titles. Big deal! It's just so much virtue signaling. The white owners have no intentions of sacrificing their home equity (which some minorities claim was earned at their expense).

If collective guilt is invalid, so is collective innocence and virtue. Sorting out the deserving and undeserving would be a classic counterproductive approach.

what time the train to Sydney leaves Southern Cross Station. — Tom Storm

Who gave you permission to go to Sydney?

the authorities are the only legitimate truth sayers — Athena

Well, yes. What's the point of being a powerful authority if you can't decide what is true? "We'll decide what the Truth is, thank you, and perhaps we will provide you with an abbreviated, sanitized version at some point in the future, depending on our estimate of what you need to know. People don't like being burdened with disturbing information. In any case, don't call us, we'll call you."

Great! My bus today passed a new Dunkin' Donuts on Snelling Avenue in St. Paul -- I was happy to see it, since they don't have a big presence here. Glam Donuts and A Baker's Wife in Minneapolis both do a fairly good job. But I used to think that DD's glazed raised were definitive. Are they, still?

Here is a sample itinerary of a workplace that fosters learning and exploration: — schopenhauer1

I had two jobs that both achieved your goals. One was in the AIDS Prevention program at the Minnesota AIDS Project starting around 1987. Our work day was loosely structured, and some of us had work which was done outside the building. We collaborated a lot, shared information, worked together on editing pamphlets, and so on. We could still smoke indoors at the time, so the smoking lounge was the place to take the pulse of the agency.

The critical piece was the sense that we were involved in a common struggle, and while there were major differences in education background, no one pulled rank. Crisis-urgency helped us, of course. Many AIDS programs around the country had similar highly successful years before AIDS became deeply established. By the time it became clear that HIV was here to stay, and then became somewhat treatable, then very treatable (but not curable) the sense of elan was gone. Then it became humdrum public health work.

The other very good job was in the media center of a college library -- early 70s. This job taught me a lot. There was no crisis here, no life or death issues. The program leader was immensely enthusiastic about all sorts of instructional technology, and engaged faculty in his projects. Possibilities were wide open and co-workers were encouraged -- more like compelled -- to try out anything that seemed like it might work. It wasn't a 3 ring circus -- this was, after all, an over-all tightly wrapped Catholic men's college, and there were people in the hierarchy who didn't hesitate to slam on the brakes if they didn't like something, We would have been successful instructional technology revolutionaries if the Internet, wide bandwidth, and more powerful desktop computers had been available to us. It's what we were reaching toward.

I won't go into the assorted crummy jobs, but they were alienating and alienated; dull; routinized; tradition bound, discouraged innovation; hierarchical, and so on.

But the donuts have to be made I get it. — schopenhauer1

No you don't get it. Your schedule indicates that the donuts aren't going to be made until 1:00 in the afternoon. The best sales period (early morning) will have been missed. Workers elsewhere will be deprived of the irreplaceable fried glazed-raised to go with their coffee. The entire city will be negatively affected. I'm calling a group criticism meeting, Herr Schopenhauer, and you will be Topic Numero Uno.

Your answer is indicative of the general trend towards radical individualism- the one that self-help books thrive on. — schopenhauer1

OUCH! That's pretty painful.

How about changes at a societal level? — schopenhauer1

a critical task of "revolutionary socialists" ought to be imagining a society operating under socialist principles. — BC

The vision of a better, more humane - human - society comes from a) criticism of the existing society, and speculation about a better society. Any meaningful change in society has to be collective rather than individual. Just because I feel better now. than I used to doesn't mean I think it is up to individuals to solve these problems alone.

For instance, I welcome automation. A lot of boring tedious work really should be done by computers and robots. Coupled with automation should be a universal basic income system to avoid poverty among the displaced workers.

Of course, some people like doing routinized work -- I don't understand it, but they do.

There is the idea that people who have been relieved of boring routinized jobs can shift over to fascinating fulfilling work. Whether any such thing can, or would happen, isn't clear to me. Maybe it is a mistake to suppose that people would fill their days with fulfilling work. Maybe they would do what otherwise unoccupied people have always done: socialize, play, eat, etc. And that would be just fine.

Yes, I can se BC coming in with some joke regarding the last sentence, something about scanning groceries at the checkout line and its connection with Plato's Forms — schopenhauer1

Well! I would have made a great joke if you hadn't already told it! Thanks a lot!

meaningfulness in the mundane — schopenhauer1

Wasn't the "Protestant work ethic" an effort to make the mundane meaningful? The idea was that all work was as sacred as the labor of priests. So, scanning groceries was a service to God and Man, alike.

As far as I know, from personal experience and good authority, the Protestant Work Ethic is dead, ground up in the gears of alienating industrial labor, soulless bureaucratic paper processing, the treadmill of consumption for the sake of production, and more besides. As far as the religious interpretation goes, the religious establishment's connection to the masses, and the masses' utilization of 'mainline religious teaching' is all pretty much dying or dead.

This all didn't happen yesterday -- more like a many decades long process.

there seems to be lack of "meaningfulness in the mundane", whereby the meaningful informs the mundane — schopenhauer1

Absolutely!

Can alienated people in an alienating culture overcome their alienation? I don't know if they can or not.

In various discussions around here about the meaningless universe it has been repeatedly asserted that man can impose, import, invent, invoke, create ... meaning.

How well is that working? Reasonably well.

BUT if one feels mired in anomie, alienation, meaninglessness, soullessness, etc. it is natural to believe that everyone is in the same hopeless boat. If one is NOT mired in the dark swamp, it is difficult to understand why some people are. I have had some long episodes of feeling alienated, meaningless, soulless, etc. in the past; and I have had some long episodes of feeling connected to and part of a solid meaning system.

What made the difference, moving from one state to another. Well, I don't know, exactly. Grace is as good an explanation as I can find.

...the technocratic practicality of the Western values... is really what counts. — schopenhauer1

Yes, that's what really counts in the marketplace. The market place is very big and billions of people do their material thing there and there everything is reduced to the cash nexus. Nothing new about the, and I expect it will continue on until there is no more future.

As dominant as it is, most people are still not merely functionaries in the marketplace, and if they can be coaxed away from their smartphone tethers and social media flowage, there is still the possibility of ideas taking flight.

Ah, don't ask me how to make that happen.

So, what are the best genres in which to speculate?

Religion of an open-ended sort
Philosophy as long as we're not rehashing Plato till the cows come home
Literature is not always speculative, but it certainly can be
History requires speculation, imagination, to put flesh on the bare bones of fact
and ??? there must be more

Music? Art? Surely.

So, the art of speculative thought has NOT been lost -- it just doesn't rate mention in the Financial Times or Wall Street Journal.

Many socialists either came from the working class, as I did, or strongly identify with the class that does the work.

However, a critical task of "revolutionary socialists" ought to be imagining a society operating under socialist principles. What is "heaven on earth" going to be like? Some socialists, at least, stop before they do any speculation and say that it will be up to the existing people in the would-be revolutionary society to decide what they want. All well and good. However, I think people need a vision to inspire struggle. Maybe they need a vision just to keep on keeping on, Else, it might very well all be for naught.

Dystopias seem to be a more popular topic for speculation for some reason. It might motivate corporate leaders to try harder at achieving decarbonizing goals, if they speculated more about bad things could (and probably will) get 25 years down the line or 100 years. B. F. Skinner, the behaviorist, wrote a book--Walden Two--about a utopian society operating with behavioral psychology principles. Seemed lie a dull place to live. Brave New World, of course--but was that utopian or dystopian speculation?

Another way in which speculation takes on more importance is that AI and automation stand a good chance at taking over activities that we find challenging and/or satisfying. If they take over speculation as well, then we're totally screwed, like the sorcerer's apprentice who knew enough magic to start the broom working on its own, but not enough magic to stop it.

Unfortunately, speculation about the nature of existence and metaphysics, which once held great appeal, has declined in popularity and remains a niche pursuit. — schopenhauer1

Wait a minute. When did "speculation about the nature of existence and metaphysics" have great appeal? What exactly are you referencing here? Literature? Philosophy? Film? Beer hall conversation?

You might be right, but I'm not sure what you are claiming.

My reading of history and literature leads me to think that "speculation about the nature of existence and metaphysics" has always been a niche activity.

the pleasure of hard tasks is rooted in the accomplishment of a specific, concrete goal — schopenhauer1

Indeed, and that pleasure has been enjoyed for quite a long time -- especially by the people supervising or profiting from the hard work of accomplishment. Not sure how much the grunts working away in the pits felt about it.

get to know them first — RBS

I've always preferred the "sex first, lengthy conversation later" approach. Unless a really good conversation came first. Then I'd skip over the sex part and stick with friendship.

(Romantic) lovers can become friends, but friends don't become (romantic) lovers, which is OK because friendship lasts longer than (romantic) love.

At least, in my experience.

And lovers do well to become friends, because then their relationship has a much longer future.

Romantic relationships which end abruptly do not become friendships. Kicking somebody out of bed usually means The End. Move on.

Why can't friendships turn into (romantic) love? Carnality. Friends are not judged as potential sex partners. Potential sex partners aren't judged on the longer-term potentials of friendship. The attempt to shift friendship into romantic love is likely to lead to conflict.

to a person who needs a cure? — Moliere

More like a society that needs a cure.

Sorry to hear that you are anomic; it's probably not a great place to be.

Absurdism, nihilism, existentialism, postmodernism and critical theory are anomic and appeal to anomics. — introbert

From my perspective, anomie isn't something one would opt for; rather, it is something that happens to an individual and to groups of people. Once there is a "breakdown of social bonds between an individual and the community", then I suppose nihilism and absurdism, postmodernism, and so on would settle in.

One is where one is, and if it's in anomie, then that's that, at least for the time being.

How old are you? I'm way over the hill myself, and it seems like anomie is more likely to be a condition of younger people (like 20s, 30s). Bug or feature? It seems like anomie is less a 'bug' of younger people and more a 'feature'. When I was in my 20s, 30s, I found the kind of stuff that you are talking about much more attractive. It isn't a sign of 'immaturity'; it's more like having 'not that much to lose'. As people get older, they have more to lose. I'm not thinking of property here; their social connections and commitments weigh more.

there seems to be a lot less weird philosophical types than there was in the mid-twentieth century — introbert

I'd be very surprised if there were fewer weird philosophical (or any other weird) types around now than there were mid-twentieth century. And is that a good thing or a bad thing, from your perspective? I'm sorry if my efforts at weirdness have not been altogether convincing,

My own experience with living in an increasingly rationalized society, is that a person who is inclined to thinking over practice (work), subjectivism over objectivity, irrationalism over rationalism, disobediance over obedience, critical thought over conformity, individual over communitarian, free over totalitarian and various other things that are easily rationalized, will struggle mentally in an environment where there is prevailing psychiatry that features all of these things. — introbert

Of course. Anyone who pursues a full-court press of subjectivism, irrationalism, disobedience, nonconformism, individualism, and various other things is going to run into strong resistance because this approach will either strongly resemble--or will in effect be --antisocial. This person is going to be a voice howling in the wilderness. Pariah or prophet?

BTW, why do you place critical thinking in opposition to conformity? Do you suppose that only rebels employ critical thinking? Conformists do too,

Humans employ moderate amounts of rationality and irrationality or obedience and disobedienc--some of each in all the paired terms you employ.

The early sociological theory on 'anomie', which features elements of mental disorder, should be looked at as a starting point for anyone critical of the healing of the soul of the body of the individual, by a communitarian, totalitarian, objective, professional, and obedient social institution of influence. — introbert

Anomie: In sociology, anomie is a social condition defined by an uprooting or breakdown of any moral values, standards or guidance for individuals to follow. Anomie is believed to possibly evolve from conflict of belief systems and causes breakdown of social bonds between an individual and the community...

Are you for or against anomie? Can't tell from what you said.

People employ all sorts of policing to manage society besides formal police and agents with policing authority like psychiatrists. Some of it is formal, and a lot of it is informal. Sharp eyed old ladies in apartment buildings, for instance.

Sometimes we rub up against too many abrasive social surfaces and become raw and irritated all over. Then it is time to withdraw to one's room to sooth the sores and develop a little thicker skin. I spend a lot of time by myself. It helps.

Moral, ethical, practical, political... -- all kinds of questions arise from what happens in laboratories and factories Some of what has been done has proved to be very beneficial, some of it has proved to be very harmful. Generate your own positive and negative list.

There is an unfortunate reason why we do not put a stop to potentially dangerous activities (like modifying the human genome, like burning mega billions of tons of fossil fuel):

The time frame in which we can think and act meaningfully about risk is short. This is the case whether it involves our personal behavior or the activities of large institutions. We just didn't evolve the capacity to act upon consequences that are only 50 years away from fulfillment. And that is under the best of circumstances.

Global heating was a problem about which we had time to do something 50 years ago. Unfortunately, we just couldn't react in a meaningful way to the heat forecasts of the (then, next; now, this) century. The mid-century mark is only 27 years away.

So, thinking about potentials for harm from genetic research fits right in here. Genetic alterations will have long-term consequences -- perhaps very beneficial, perhaps not. If the negative consequences show up in the first 3 to 5 years, perhaps the brakes can be applied. If the bad consequences won't materialize for perhaps 3 human generations out -- roughly 100 years -- then we will worry about it later. Maybe in 50 years -- by which time it will be too late.

Throw in financial incentives for doing risky research... it's likely to be a done deal.

The guy does have a radio-voice. Pretty good.

"If the ends do not justify the means, what in god's name does?" V. Lenin

A nuanced range of responses is required, But in the end, affordable, secure housing, better jobs and incomes, access to education and health services are critical elements. — Tom Storm

Your long experience gives you good insight.

Prior to "urban renewal", Minneapolis had a large population of older men who had been part of the heavy industry of mining and lumber. They were and were not homeless. They had housing -- flop houses providing rock bottom shelter. There were a couple of charities providing some food, and there were a lot of small cheap cafes (and liquor stores, of course). The flop houses were warehouses that had been divided up into boxes, each box having a lockable door. Wire fencing covered the open top. The spaces were not well ventilated or heated and sanitation facilities were minimal.

Starting in the 1950s, Minneapolis decided to scrape off the dilapidated blocks and build new. I've never seen any documentation about whaat happened to the several hundred old guys who had been living there. They just sort of disappeared (which, is what the city fathers hoped would happen). It took around 30-50 years for the rebuilding to occur, and there are still some empty lots.

Minneapolis didn't have a significant visible homeless problem until 2020 in the form of large encampments in public parks. Minneapolis likes its parks, and it wasn't long before the people in these camps were cleared out by park police. Efforts were made by social services to respond to this outbreak of homelessness, and for the most part, they are not visible again. I was downtown yesterday and there were a few panhandlers on the main street. This was during a brief warm day between very cold weather. One of them was 'sunning' on the cold wet sidewalk. I've seen him around downtown before. He's part of the "tolerable level" of rock bottom poverty. (He's inside somewhere -- he wasn't dressed to survive the winter outside.).

The city and and developers--sources of money--do not want to build housing for the explicitly homeless. (Lutheran Social Services and Catholic Charities have built a little, and the Ojibwa Tribe of Minnesota has several buildings for homeless tribal members.). Where to put it and how to run it seem to be insurmountable difficulties. Having formerly homeless people next door is about as popular as having a group home for serial rapists in the neighborhood. Not going to happen.

The magic formula seems to be to find some unattractive land or build in a rougher neighborhood and do so 'quietly'. Homeless housing with services does work reasonably well.

Gracias.

So, the question then is, what can we, and what should we do about it? Various approaches have been tried; some working better than others. I'm not an expert on this, and what may seem like obvious solutions may not produce the desired results

Just building housing may not be enough. A program in Minneapolis houses "public inebriates" -- chronic alcoholics. Residents get a room with a bath (and some services). They do not have to stop drinking, but they can only drink in their rooms -- not the hallways or common areas. This follows the Housing First approach.

Housing First's main priority is providing shelter; once shelter is in place, additional services aimed at dealing with their other problems comes into play. Opposite this approach is Treatment First. Addicts (drugs, alcohol) first go to treatment. If they are successful, then other services follow, such as housing. Neither approach is magic and there is a failure rate--not sure what it is. The traits that lead to and maintain addiction do not result in highly responsible behavior.

Criminalization is another approach. Drug and alcohol addicts are jailed. This might serve as both treatment and housing, but such a happy combination doesn't generally happen in prison. Plus, prisons are not drug proof, and they are hardly healthy environments.

Neglect is a time honored method. Let them rot. If they become too much of a nuisance (like collecting into large encampments in downtown or neighborhood areas), chase them out and burn everything. This approach will satisfy the affected property owners as long as the homeless don't return.

Neglect is the cheapest approach for a city and county -- the levels of government generally dealing with the homeless. The expenditures for housing units and treatment may not yield a monetary return, either for the city or for the GDP. A chronic addict may never become productive. Wait, aren't people more important than money? Well, for budgetary purposes, no. There is only so much tax income to go around and cities and counties--even wealthy ones--generally don't have cash laying around.

Prevention. Great idea. How do we go about that? A lot of homelessness is the result of chronic alcohol and drug abuse. So far we haven't found a very good way to prevent people from becoming alcoholics and drug addicts. [Most adults who use drugs and/or alcohol won't become alcoholics OR drug addicts. But some will--millions of them.]

Would fewer people become addicts if society were better, nicer, more humane, more ... all sorts of things? Maybe. But, cocaine, heroin, meth, alcohol -- even tobacco -- are highly addicting. I was addicted to tobacco. I started smoking way after it was well known that smoking causes cancer, lung, and heart disease. I quit on my own, as most people who quit tobacco do. Some hard drug addicts are able to quit on their own too, and for others, treatment is quite successful.

What will work? I don't know.

Good point! "Poor" and "poverty" do indeed have gradations quite apart from "relative poverty" (feeling poor because your friends have more money than you do).

First, class. The middle (entrepreneurial or professional) and upper 'kept' classes are not 'poor'. The working class can be divided up into four parts of various population size

Upper Working Class - steady employment, wages sufficient to avoid the stresses of poverty, but are not "comfortable"; they usually have minimal or no savings.

Middle Working Class - intermittent employment and wages insufficient to avoid periodic periods of economic distress (poverty).

Lower Working Class - intermittent and low wages which entail the continual stress of poverty.

Lumpenproletariat - destitute; not employed; may subsist on low government payments; immiserated; living outside of most social networks; homeless; unhoused (living on the street); unable to overcome their circumstances.

Add mental illness and drug addiction to anyone in the Working Class, and they may plunge into the abyss of destitution at the bottom, below the lowest rung of the ladder of success.

Over the last 40 to 50 years, long-term economic policies have reduced the wealth that was held by the working class. Job losses, stagnant wage growth, and steady inflation are to blame. The wealth drain has pushed millions of workers downward toward the middle and lower levels of the working class. Those who were formerly lower working class have been sunk into the abyss.

So, poverty exists on a gradient and is dynamic -- who is poor, and how poor they are changes over time.