Or I could just say it’s all a system of stimuli and responses with no inner life, self-awareness, decision-making capability or rational capability.

We could say the same thing about animals. — Fire Ologist

Since you’ve addressed canids, you are claiming that packs of wild canids (wolves, cayotes, dingos, etc.) engage in no reasoning whatsoever when entrapping their prey (which can sometimes cause sever injury to them, if not their death – with a moose as one example of such prey - and which are in many ways unpredictable in what they do) and then bringing it down?

Can’t so far find a reference to this experiment online, but during my university years I was told by a professor of a scientific experiment where an otherwise friendly dog was made to go insane: biting all humans that surrounded and biting itself while foaming at the mouth. The experiment is easy to understand, and maybe even empathize with. From my best recollection of how this experiment went: A dog is accustomed via operational conditioning to obtain food after touching its nose to a door that has a circle depicted on it. The dog is then faced with two doors: one with a circle where it gets its food and one with an ellipse which, when touched, transfers an electric shock to the dog. The dog via brief experience then always touches the door with the circle and always avoids the door with the ellipse. The experiment then makes the circle more elliptical and the ellipse more circular. The dog has no issues in yet going to touch with its nose the door with the more circular figure. This until the two doors – more properly the circular ellipse and the elliptical circle – become indistinguishable by it. At this culminating point, the heretofore friendly dog goes insane as described.

Granting that this experiment did in fact take place, why would the dog go mad – this as most likely would any human child if not also adult human faced with the same contextual constraints forced upon them – if the dog engaged in no reasoning whatsoever when selecting the door with the more circular ellipse over the door with the more elliptical figure?

What some might well find to be horrific experiments on lesser animals – with dogs as one very commonly used species (in part because they’re easy to obtain, such as from shelters) – are maybe far more common than typically known. And in all these at times sadistic experiments on lesser animals (with very many being far more sadistic/horrific than the one I’ve just mentioned), there is assumed a potential benefit to humans down the line - to human brains and human minds. (I’ve worked in a neuroscience lab where I had to perform partial lobotomies on birds and then, after some time, perfuse them (while they were alive, of course) so as to extract their then paraformaldehyde-hardened brain for slicing and then observation of neurons under the microscope – this, in short, to better study the neuroscience of language acquisition and application. I’ve said “sadistic” because I’ve observed firsthand how some, but certainly not all, fellow experiments obtained pleasure from the suffering of the birds during the process – this rather than in any way empathizing with their condition which we had inflicted upon them. Doubtless that empathizing with their condition would have been uncomfortable if not painful for them.)

And yes, sometimes such experiments on lesser animals are the only means we have at our disposal for better understanding the structure of the brain and the correlating mind without harming humans. (And, in fairness, sometimes they are utterly idiotic, to not here also address ethical considerations.)

That said, what sound reasoning would there be in all these many experiments on animals were there to be no continuity between the minds of animals and those of humans? Here to include the mind’s utilization of some form of reasoning, however diminished by comparison to human reasoning it might be. Example: what could we possibly learn about ourselves as humans by placing rats in T-mazes and the like were there to be no continuity in cognitive faculties among lesser animals and us?

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To be clear, this is not to deny that we as humans are of a different level of cognition than all other animal species - making us as a species quite exceptional. In so asking, I only uphold that there is however no absolute divide between the cognition of humans and that of lesser animals.

Yes. It ALL sounds tongue in cheek :) It is simple yet possibly a key instrument in so many factors including the development of Reason itself perhaps? — I like sushi

Granting that I"m properly understanding this quote, I don't identify the conceptual drift toward monotheism(s) with the key instrument to the development of reason. Instead, I tend to identify monotheistic notions of God with the average human impetus, or desire, for some authority that overshadows all others. This, in turn, can either lead to authoritarianism, if not despotic yearnings and practices, which I view as bad/unethical/etc. or else toward egalitarian universals of being: with "natural laws" quickly here coming to mind as one version of this (be they found in materialisms or in monotheisms or else in spiritualities such as the Logos of the Stoics ... the latter, quite obviously, standing at a stark crossroad to most monotheistic worldviews wherein a superlative personhood as absolute authority is championed from which the logos ("the word") stems).

In short, I disagree that the development of reason is to be associated with the "ultimate personhood" issue. (Whether one to any extent agrees or disagrees with it, Buddhism is certainly entwined with a vast amount of reasoning, for example, and there is no ultimate personhood in it.)

And the latter are not part of the predominant Western tradition as mentioned. Hence why I stated there is no Primary equivalent in Eastern traditions (note: I use the term 'traditions' rather than 'religions'). Brahma is an especially concept that really does not fit into the Western conceptions of God.

I should perhaps have outlined the Monotheistic nature of Western/Middle Eastern traditions shifting dramatically away from pantheisms and birthing the concept of God as an amalgam of 'ideas' under the hood of a singular form. — I like sushi

I can get this, though I find it overlooks the yet quite persisting perspective of "Nature worship" to be found in a significant quantity of Western traditions (with various forms of Neo-paganism as one blatant example). A Buddhist or Hindu, for example, does not engage in the same trains of thought as do Westerners when it comes to this, such that Buddhism and Hinduism can at best only be described as forms of Nature-worship only from the vantage of Westerner's projections. This much like they could all be declared as "pagans" by some monotheists.

To this effect, having read Eliade's "Shamanism" some time ago, you'll find the notion of nature-worship quite well alighted to the concept of shamanism, for example. And shamanism, though nowadays in some cases extended to Eastern traditions - say, for one example, by addressing the original Buddha as a shaman of the East - is well enough rooted in Western practices and perspectives: shamanism historically stemmed from Siberia with enough affirming it to originate from traditions along the Caucasus Mountains, and from the latter we get the term "Caucasian" which, at least in the USA, is often used to strictly denote white people of European decent.)

At pith, Nature as something deserving of worship is deeply rooted in Western traditions (with Western notions of Gaia and of Pan as just two examples of this), rather than in Eastern traditions. And although a relative minority nowadays, we all intuitively know that tree-hugges are nature-worshipers. And while the perspective isn't commonly professed, a far greater quantity of people in the West hold affinities to such nature-worshiping perspectives.

This outlines the modern Eastern and Western differences. Underneath though I guess I am suggesting personification or not we are viewing the slow and steady progress of human intellect toying with higher concepts and occasionally becoming seduced by them to greater or lesser degrees, with greater or lesser focus on this or that cosmological concern (life, death, morality, harmony, justice, nature etc.,.). — I like sushi

Again, contemplating the strictly Western notions of (non-monotheistic) Logos, as one example, is to itself be addressing "higher concepts" that concern the cosmological concerns you specify. No superlative personhood required.

I think this kind of encapsulates the idea of a kind of Theological Olympics. — I like sushi

Yet in nature-worship perspectives there doesn't occur the conviction that "there can be only one (at the expense of all others)", this as the competitions of the Olympics might insinuate. The only "one" here would then be Nature itself - the one uni-verse or else one cosmos - as well as, potentially, some either explicitly or implicitly held notion similar to (if not identical to) what in Platonism and Neoplatonism is addressed as the Good, which, again, can only be singular. Yet nature-worshiping traditions of Western origin (mostly of the West's past yet some still persisting to the present) they yet are.

Edit: I in all this neglected to explicitly addresses the traditions of Native American (First Nation) Indians. Which, although not directly descending from the Caucasus Mountains via Europe, are all nature-worshiping perspective distinct from typical Eastern views all the same.

I’d say that there can be no concept of divinity without a concept of spirituality, and no concept of God devoid of a concept of divinity.

Based on what I’ve read you saying, when the term “God” is interpreted (as you intend in this thread so far) as an all-this-and-that personhood, this then becomes a personification of divinity such that the “biggest” possible personhood is that of God’s. Note, however, that this very understanding stands in stark contrast to notions such as those of pantheism and panentheism for example – wherein everything that we moderners understand by “nature” will itself be (both macrocosmically and microcosmically, and everything in-between, all of ourselves included) denoted as “God” with a capital “G”.

Consider the typical monotheistic view: Divinity is not equivalent to nature, and God is the supreme personhood that dictates both all divinity and nature.

Then consider the typical polytheistic view (which grew out of animism (which, oddly enough, is just a different wording for panpsychism in that both concepts affirm that everything is endowed with anima/psyche, i.e. soul)): the gods - here with a small “g” - are all at one with, else aspects of, nature (i.e., of logos, or else the anima mundi, and so forth).

These two just mentioned perspectives present diametrically opposite worldviews: the first where divinity ≠ nature (e.g., such that the super-natural is divided from and hence not nature), and the second where divinity = nature (e.g., such that the super-natural is that aspect, or those aspects, of Nature which consists of Nature’s upper, or uppermost, layers – such as in terms of layers of Heraclitus or else Stoic logos – basically translating into the non-mundane/profane aspects of Nature, the latter being where we humans typically (else, always) find ourselves dwelling.)

From this vantage, in further considering the divinity ≠ nature worldview, one could potentially go from “my dad can beat up your dad” to “my deity can beat up your deity” to “there is, or else must be, a deity (i.e., a personhood) which is supreme and cannot be beaten by anything other”. A bit tongue in cheek maybe, but psychologically believable all the same, I think. This being in relative keeping with the OP.

Still, this tends to overlook the diametrically opposite worldview of God wherein God = Cosmic Divinity = Nature. (A perspective that can be found in many non-Abrahamic worldviews as well as in Abrahamic ones, with at least certain forms of Kabbalism as example of the latter). In this worldview of God = Nature the following childhood paradox of God loses its validity, for it fully translates into: “If Nature is all-powerful, can Nature create a rock that is too heave for Nature to lift?” You’ll maybe note that in this understanding, God = Nature per se holds no personhood and cannot be personified as something that “can lift a rock” (as though the rock were something other than itself). In this latter worldview, then, the gods (again, with a small “g”) maybe could each lift their own share of rocks, but no individual god equates to the cosmic totality of being which in this worldview is pantheistic God/Nature.

I could think of yet other interpretations of God (maybe in keeping with what stated) but I yet find these two just mentioned quite pertinent – at the very least to Western history. And let’s not forget that monotheism evolved out of polytheistic cultures, with henotheism as an in-between.

I've answered your question. Did you not see the answer? — Leontiskos

Nope. Care to re-quote it?

The question here is whether you contradict yourself in claiming to accept all three stipulations while simultaneously claiming that it is okay to intentionally harm others (or, put differently, whether the stipulations entail pacifism). As I have shown, the three stipulations do logically entail the conclusion <It is always impermissible to harm others>, and therefore you contradict yourself by claiming that you accept the three stipulations while maintaining that it is sometimes permissible to (intentionally) harm others. — Leontiskos

As I've previously explained and illustrated via example, it is not contradictory to maintain the three stipulations of the OP - for intending the least of all wrongs when no other alternative is in any way available to you is a good, and not a bad. Maintaining the three stipulations can become contradictory when reinterpreted in the fashion you have. But, as I've previously expressed and exemplified, this is not how I myself interpret the OP's three stipulations.

<It is always impermissible to harm others> — Leontiskos

This, though, to me is incomprehensible, for it entails things such as the following: it is - this at the same time and in the same respect - always impermissible to both a) eat food and thereby harm other selves by requiring their death so as to sustain one's own life and b) harming one's own self via the self-murder (i.e., suicide) of starvation by not eating food. And this so far to me is a clear-cut case of contradiction irrespective of how it's interpreted.

Now you want me to enter into a debate about whether one should choose the least of all wrongs. — Leontiskos

No. I was merely interested in your answer to the questions I've asked of you, and this repeatedly.

I am not a consequentialist, and because of this I do not think one should do what is wrong. — Leontiskos

Again: Is it right to choose the least of all wrongs when no other alternatives are available to you? If so, then so choosing the least of all wrongs is doing what is right - rather then doing what is wrong.

But I am not going to enter into this debate in full. — Leontiskos

I will not plead for you to give your honest answer to the simple question I've asked. And I'm interested in honest debates where both understand themselves and their views to be fallible - this rather than infallible. So, unless there will be further need to reply, I'll call it quits for my part.

BTW, I'm leaving the debate open, but if the counter hinges on the notion of "someone" in the third assertion (harming someone is X) this will open a can of worms as to what "someone" gets to be denoted as.

One one hand, for one example, here strictly addressing humans: Are those which some humans deem to be sub-human humans, such as slaves, on a par to the someones that are not slaves but slave owners? So, can a pacifist flagellate a slave and still be a genuine pacifist - this in respect to those who are someone on a par to themselves?

Else, can a pacifist engage in psychologically torturing another someone on ground that they in no way violently harm the other's physical being? Presuming not, what then about nagging (as one type of mind/brain fuc*ing) another someone; is this not a milder form of the same type of harm to the other that can be expressed via the concept of "psychological torture"? So, is a pacifist still a pacifist if they perpetually nag others about certain issues; say, maybe, such as about needing to be pacifists (which do no harm whatsoever) themselves?

This, again, to me gets into issues of what selfhood consists of. Which I find difficult. But, maybe unlike some others, I do maintain that lesser lifeforms are endowed with their own selfhood ... which they too defend as best they can and which can likewise be harmed.

This post being neither here nor there. It's been mentioned just in case the issue of harm were to be declared only pertinent to "someones" as this term is typically understood, such that harm could then only be validly claimed of persons, i.e. humans.

Edit: Here is a more formal version, which may help you see your contradiction:

1. It is morally impermissible to perform an action that is X.
2. It is morally impermissible to directly intend something that is X—even for the sake of something good.
3. Harming someone is X.
4. Therefore, pacifism is true.

(2 is strictly speaking superfluous, but I think Bob was going for the exhaustive division noted above.) — Leontiskos

In reply to this edit: Since you're being ultra-formal in reasoning, what pacifist (either directly or indirectly) causes no harm to other life in their persisting to live by consuming nutrients via food?* In the absence of such a pacifist, your reasoning (maybe in the interpretation of premises affirmed) can only be fallacious (... goodness intending though it might be) - for even the most stringent of pacifists will indeed by necessity engage in the harm of selfhood pertaining either to other living things or to their own life.

* This as per my previously given example:

Ought I harm that farm animal by killing it as humanely as possible so as to eat and thereby live? Or ought I harm that farm animal by killing it in as inhumane way as possible so as to eat and thereby life? (Same could be said of plants by they way, lifeforms that they themselves are.) Or ought I harm no other living being so as to eat and thereby live and, in so not doing, basically commit suicide via starvation? These are all wrongs, but they vary in their degrees. — javra

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I'd still appreciate answers to my two previous questions regarding your views, to be found here and here.

BTW, you latch onto your individual understanding of the three stipulations and the perceived logic that then ensues, but you have not yet answered the question I've asked.

To be more blunt about it: is it good to choose the least of all wrongs or is it bad to choose the least of all wrongs?

A simple and direct question that ought to hold a simple and direct answer.

Then you are directly denying #3. — Leontiskos

Nope, I uphold it. But then, once again, we're likely interpreting it in significantly different ways,

When would harm be an ultimate, absolute, pure, complete, etc. "good"? Oh, here presuming a lack of subjectivism ... wherein it can so be because some subjective being so declares it to be. I liken the likes of Hitler and Stalin to such beings.

The stipulations logically entail the conclusion that harm cannot be done. You say you accept all three stipulations but then go on to say that harm can be done. It seems that if you want to hold to harm consequentialism then you will at least need to reject #2, no? — Leontiskos

We then obviously hold rather different interpretations of #2:

2. It is morally impermissible to directly intend something bad—even for the sake of something good; — Bob Ross

Is it a bad to choose - or else to intend the manifestation of - the lease bad from all alternatives that are available to oneself at the juncture of the given choice?

Irrespective of what your anticipated answer will be, I again deem the choosing of the least bad to be a good in an of itself, rather than a bad in and of itself. In so deeming, I then further deem the choice thus made to be the intentioning of something good - here in the sense of "best" - rather then the intentioning of something bad. The latter "intentioning of a bad" I strictly reserve for intentioning any alternative other than that which is least bad. Concrete examples are a dime a dozen. As one measly example: Ought I harm that farm animal by killing it as humanely as possible so as to eat and thereby live? Or ought I harm that farm animal by killing it in as inhumane way as possible so as to eat and thereby life? (Same could be said of plants by they way, lifeforms that they themselves are.) Or ought I harm no other living being so as to eat and thereby live and, in so not doing, basically commit suicide via starvation? These are all wrongs, but they vary in their degrees.

Feel free to comment on the last paragraph, of course, but please do provide an answer to the question I've asked.

This is pretty stark consequentialism, is it not? Especially your final sentence? — Leontiskos

Maybe I don't fully follow your quite terse reply - but in terms of all actions having their consequence ... sure, why not?

Is there any rational or ethical disagreement with what I've stated in the quote you provided?

Self-defense is usually defined in a way to include the defense of other innocents as well. — Bob Ross

I'm not familiar with such a (most especially "usual") definition. See for example self-defense as its defined by a global wiki.

What references do you have for the definition you present?

Did you read the OP? The OP is exploring what justification exists for self-defense's permissibility given certain stipulations. — Bob Ross

(Just saw your update in the OP.)

I might have not been clear enough:

I accept all three stipulations, though their interpretations might (I don’t yet know) somewhat differ between us. So I thereby endorse #3 in an ultimate sense of what is bad.

Yet my primary resolution to the issue (placing the issue of selfhood(s) and its comparative value aside) was expressed here, albeit in question form:

And is it not a good to choose the lesser of two wrongs whenever no other alternative is in any way available to you? — javra

In short, when the only available alternatives to one are all of differing degrees of wrongness, or of badness, then it is virtuous (and hence good) to choose that alternative which is the least wrong, or bad, among the available alternatives. This in contrast to choosing an alternative which is more or else most wrong, hence bad.

Choosing not to choose between the alternatives in this situation would also be, by my reckoning, a non-virtuous act - for, in so choosing not to choose, one then of one's own accord allows for the possibility of the more or else worst wrong to be actualized.

I deem this same reasoning to then likewise apply to abortions, to surgeries, etc.

Given the following stipulations, I am wondering if there is a way to salvage the principle of self-defense; and would like to here all of your responses.

The moral principles and facts being stipulated are that:

1. It is morally impermissible to perform an action that is in-itself bad;
2. It is morally impermissible to directly intend something bad—even for the sake of something good;
3. Harming someone is, in-itself, bad.

It seems to me, under these stipulations, that one could never justify self-defense—e.g., harming someone that is about to kill you—because it will always be the case in such examples that one directly intends to harm that person for the sake of saving themselves. — Bob Ross

Has anyone yet mentioned that self-defense is nearly by definition a preventing of harm to one’s own self?

A murderer wants to murder you. On what grounds is allowing the murderer (whose intentions are most always deemed unethical to begin with) his desire of harming your own being to be deemed anything but bad?

So, harm in some ultimate sense is a bad thing. OK. If so, then in the case of conflicts such as the one specified, harm to someone is inevitable: either to you, to your assailant, or to both. Given the murderer’s intention of murdering you, what then makes the harm to the murderer’s self of greater wrong than the harm to your own self? And, again, the murderer is unethical while you (I can only presume) are not unethical (at least no where near the same extent).

And is it not a good to choose the lesser of two wrongs whenever no other alternative is in any way available to you?

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The OP’s question runs far deeper, though: what grants a given self more value, or worth, than some other self whenever any conflict between selves occurs?

More concretely exemplified via just a few examples: what make one’s loved one more important than the stranger down the street as a self; what makes a human self more important than a dog’s selfhood; what makes a virtuous person’s self (say a Mother Teresa or a Gandhi) of more worth than the self of a person filled with actively occurring vice (say a Hitler or a Stalin); and so on and so forth.

This isn’t an easy question to answer as far as I know, but it does determine what harm to what self is prioritized over the lack of harm to the other self - this in our judgements of right and wrong - whenever conflicts between selves occur. And I sincerely believe that only in this issue’s answer can be found an understanding of what justifies self-defense. Tricky issue, though.

BTW, leaning on issues of self-preservation doesn't to me seem to offer much help: the murderer is attempting to preserve their total selfhood (with mind and its desires included) in attempting to murder you on par to you attempting to preserve your own total selfhood (likewise with mind and one's own desires included) in attempting to not be murdered. To in any way prevent a self-identified murderer from being a murderer is then, technically at least, to harm the murderer's selfhood - such that it is no longer preserved via means antithetical to the self's desires. But, then, this gets into issues of what a selfhood is defined by: knowing oneself to be "the most financially wealthy person in the world", for example, requires the self-preservation of this identity/selfhood ... this in parallel to how a person who knows themselves to be domineering (with a murderer as one possible extreme example) requires the self-preservation of one's rank as a top dog that can thereby do anything they please, so to speak. All this is to say that a self is more than just a physical body, and that self-preservation thereby addresses more than a physical body's continuation of being. So the question of what a self is plays a major role in the issue of what self-defense is, of when it is virtuous, and of when it might not be (say, Hitler's actions in self-defense of his total being as a fascistic dictator.)

I am a moral sceptic. I can pretend to believe this or that for the sake of an argument but in this case it is pretty hard to respond more without getting bogged down.

I am convinced we can move beyond the current 'moral' paradigm. What that would mean to anyone else if I could explain better I am unsure. — I like sushi

I find that quite fair. It's been good talking to you, btw. :up:

But the question: Do you believe it is possible for future generations of humans to become more moral by comparison to the morality of humans today? — javra


Jordan Peterson has an interesting opinion on that:

https://www.youtube.com/shorts/cIDopS5C1Ck

A wallflower guy might benefit from some training in narcissistic psychopathy, you know, sort of to balance him out a bit.

In other words, don't be too nice. — Tarskian

Here’s an antithetical opinion: whomever makes a strict equivalency between morality and niceness can only in some way be an immoral individual. For instance, morality can require that one kill a murderer so as to prevent the injustice of, say, an innocent child being murdered; this in contrast to passively watching the murderer brutally murdering the child and doing nothing about it so as to not have blood on one’s own hands or, just as bad, so as to not risk one’s own death. And to intend to kill is to not be “nice”.

But, when it comes to the moral killing of another human, in the words of Winston Churchill: When you have to kill a man, it costs nothing to be polite. For example, to insult the man, to unnecessarily brutalize the man, or else to piss on the dead man’s corpse after killing him is to be an immoral killer of another man – in contrast to being a moral killer of another man. Most soldiers know all about this, irrespective of whether they choose to be moral about their activities in war or not.

Inside I am John Lenon's Imagine, but outwardly I know it is better to stem liberal views because they can often cause way more harm than we intuitively expect. — I like sushi

There’s a reason for the affirmation that the path to hell is paved with good intentions. I get that: the axis powers of WWII wanting to pave the way to a global utopia, ditto with communism, to not get into so many cults whose cult-of-personality ends up doing monstrous things, or else the intentions of Christian Nationalism, and so forth. As I previously said, I can sympathize with many of your views, including this one. But I do not find the truism of this just affirmed maxim to then indicate that one should not hold good intentions to begin with.

But the question: Do you believe it is possible for future generations of humans to become more moral by comparison to the morality of humans today? — javra

Have I in anyway managed to cover this question to your satisfaction? I doubt I have! Feel free to reform it in some way as I cannot possibly begin to answer it without writing a few thousand words. — I like sushi

I don’t know how else to phrase things in a succinct manner. To me there can be no utopia in the absence of a heightened morality shared by all, or at least most, constituents of the addressed society. I again find the possibility of a world devoid of rape and murder to be contingent on a great number of societal (both economic and political) changes toward more ethical and less corrupt systems. In the absence of this requirement for greater morality, what one ends up with is dystopias, which are a dime a dozen. So I’ll just restructure the previously given expression: Is the morality of humans as a whole only something that can either get worse or remain the same for all time yet to come or, else, can it improve relative to its present day and past manifestations?

If this doesn’t help, we might well be dealing with disagreements regarding any number of underlying metaphysical issues, such as with the metaphysical issue of whether morality is relative or not. In other words, if the good is something we make up as we go or else is something universal to all sentience. And I’ll back away from any such discussion for the time being.

Even with this there is a question of how we can possibly measure morality let alone dictate what degree of morality is optimal. — I like sushi

To me this is a wrong framing of the question. One cannot in any way accurately measure quantitatively physiological pain, much less physiological pain. Yet they do occur qualitatively and we all (mostly) can discern that having a splinter in one's finger is vastly overshadowed by having that finger amputated without anesthesia, this in terms of pain - both physical and psychological. As to optimal morality, I don't see any endpoint in sight where morality becomes optimal - unless we start philosophizing about metaphysical issues and thereby entertain such notions as possibilities of a universally obtained Nirvana, which would be an endpoint to morality. But in more practical terms, the sky's the limit to better morality.

A perfect example of how doing something that seems good, like protecting children from trauma, actually results in something bad. Making mistakes and having 'traumas' as children is a good thing. Children need to learn how to deal with difficult situations rather than be protected from them. The assumption that such parenting would lead to more 'morality' in society could just as easily do the exact opposite. — I like sushi

I wasn't addressing parents' reprimanding their children or the like but to all various forms of child abuse. I for the life of me can't see how, for one example, the raping of children can be a good thing (such as on grounds of preparing them for adulthood), yet it occurs far too often. Parenting aside, with sex trafficking of children on the rise in more developed societies today. Again, pointing to a lack of scruples.

if such an ideal comes at the cost of increased discrimination then is it utopian? — I like sushi

Or are you basically framing this as a more progressively moral society will extinguish all of these inequalities to the point where we all see each other as being equal? If so, this is 'leveling the playing field' and I think it would fall apart fairly quickly in larger populations for reasons I have outlined. — I like sushi

As in being equal in potential if not intrinsic value, not in height, sex, abilities, etc. And yes, as has always been the case so too it shall always be: one rotten apple will more easily spoil the bunch. It's why a functional society will always discriminate against rotten apples such as mass-murderers, for one extreme example. Maybe more pertinent in some ways, for tolerance to be ongoing there needs to occur a discrimination of, or intolerance toward, intolerant people - here with a slight equivocation in terms of "intolerance" - otherwise the formerly tolerant society perishes via its own complacency.

I still affirm that a tolerant society in which no one rapes of murders is by today's standard a utopia.

In short, what you are proposing is a ideal but does not look anything like a utopian ideal as it is looking at societal problems as being ONE problem and in pursuing with the same vigor as a utopian ideal would leave other pressing matters floundering in its wake. — I like sushi

Ah, but I can see no way in which such a society can come about sans a restructuring of some sort of both (always human devised) economics and politics. As just one example, today's globalized economy of "greed is good" is antithetical to a moral society wherein greed is disparaged and one seeks to help out one's fellow man - rather than hording as much financial and social capitol for oneself at expense of others whom one couldn't care less for. The valuing of greed is antithetical to the valuing of empathy - and the valuing of greed is intrinsic to the lives of all today: if not directly then by constraining what one can do with one's life via societal (which I take to include both economic and political) pressures.

If something we would refer to today as a utopian ideal was to come into existence in our lifetime, via some unknown paradigm shift, I absolutely do not believe anyone would purposely have instigated it. — I like sushi

Within our lifetime I find it exceedingly doubtful, if not laughable. Still, I agree with this conclusion. It would by entailment need to be purposefully enforced by everyone (or at least the vast majority) from which the society is constituted.

If things go our way we claim authorship, yet if things go against what we say we are even more quick to distance ourselves from immediate participation (the neuroscientific evidence for this is pretty conclusive)*. — I like sushi

And yet I deem self-honesty to be deeply entwined with scruples. The less honesty one has with oneself the less scruples one has. Trump as but one prevalent and unfortunate example of this.

As to the very notion of utopia, it reminds me of these lyrics from a song by Sting: "To search for perfection is all very well, but to look for heaven is to live here in hell." All humans have faults and so no human can be perfect, this by sheer fact of being human, if not, more generally speaking, a living being; e.g. perfectly innocent (in the sense of perfectly devoid of blame and hence perfectly guiltless). This then thoroughly applies to all members of any society, be it past, present, or any future one. But just as things in a society can get worse, they can likewise get better - over time, of course. (BTW, plenty of people seek redemption from their past and present vices - one can even say it's sane to so want - but far too many expect it to come from the skies as thought by the wave of some magic wand rather than through the hard work of it being actualized, to whatever extent, from within in one's future interactions with others and with oneself.)

A society - to drive the point home, say a global society - wherein humans neither rape nor murder is by today's standards a pure utopia (a nowhere place). I'd like to live there though I know I never will. Granting its future possibility, though, once humanity might get to such a place, new utopias will then present themselves. Again, here paraphrasing, to aim for perfection in incremental steps is all very well, but to assume a place where egos occur with no suffering is to always live in misery. So to me, there is no such thing as a final utopian dwelling to be validly envisioned. If this is what you conceive of by the term "utopia", then I agree. But, again, who would deny that a world devoid of rape and murder is not sheer utopia from today's vantage? That it's a worthwhile aspiration, however, is another matter - one that I personally endorse in so far as more of us ought to be looking into possible means of better approximating such, currently, nowhere place, i.e. utopian ideal.

I can sympathize with a lot of your arguments. An “utopian ideal” without any specificity is nothing more than a nondescript generality. So, for the sake of argument, I’ll provide one specific to what I would deem to be an utopian society: A society where humans do not rape nor murder other humans. (Of note, I take non-coercive angry sex and the justified killing of other humans, such as in times of war, to constitute neither rape nor murder, respectively.)

In today’s world, a society where humans neither rape nor murder is not possible. There’s too much immorality and endorsement of it from nearly everyone (e.g., our glorification of criminals in a good sum of the movies we watch with glee and, so, in the stories we tell ourselves) to make such a society viable.

But the question: Do you believe it is possible for future generations of humans to become more moral by comparison to the morality of humans today?

The economic and political specificity of the hows aside, I take it that this would in part require that people become better parents of their own volition, thereby resulting in future generations of people that have less childhood psychological trauma, that have less defense mechanisms as adults for the traumas they / we experienced as children, and that thereby grow up having more scruples. (Though only part of the story, I do deem this step requisite to any actualization of the aim just specified.)

If it is metaphysically possible for people to of their volition become better parents (say, maybe, in part due to changed societal constraints), then it is possible for next generations to become more moral. And were this to persist we would attain a society wherein people no longer rape or murder other people. And this, to me, would be a utopian society. One whose very notion and possibility many nowadays will scoff at.

In short, should this ideal of humans no longer raping and murdering other humans – which is quite utopian – be denounced and shunned by everyone the world over? This on grounds that some of the possible means toward such an end can only result in dystopias?

Ha. Well, in honesty, I can’t help but smirk at such interpretations of Buddhism. So the original Buddha, who reputedly actualized an awareness of Nirvana while sitting underneath a tree, this prior to doing his best at spreading his insights to others, intended nothing, pursued nothing, wanted nothing, and hence desired nothing, etc. – in other words, held no teloi which he pursued - after his actualization of Nirvana, this when he started teaching others about Nirvana / Buddhism? It’s not something I find rationally cogent. I mean it’s as nonsensical to me as is the affirmation of a triangular square. So I end up guessing that there's something lost in translation when it comes to “the absence of desires”. But, as you say, to each their own – here, specifically, in regard to their own interpretations. I say all this in partial jest and in partial sobriety.

And, of course, I detected the antithesis being secular philosophies like Buddhism, which simply seek tranquility and a reduction of suffering. — Shawn

Isn't the Buddhist notion of Nirvana supposed to be literal bliss? For example:

In the Mahāparinirvāṇa Sūtra, the Buddha speak of four attributes which make up nirvana. Writing on this Mahayana understanding of nirvana, William Edward Soothill and Lewis Hodous state:

'The Nirvana Sutra claims for nirvana the ancient ideas of permanence, bliss, personality, purity in the transcendental realm. Mahayana declares that Hinayana, by denying personality in the transcendental realm, denies the existence of the Buddha. In Mahayana, final nirvana is both mundane and transcendental, and is also used as a term for the Absolute.[221] — https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nirvana_(Buddhism)#Mah%C4%81parinirv%C4%81%E1%B9%87a_S%C5%ABtra

If so, it's still the pursuit of eudemonia by other names and frameworks. Not so different in this regard. Just saying.

Aristotle really set in motion the telos of human aspirations, which is quite a sad state of affairs. — Shawn

I'm not sure in what sense to best interpret this. Is it Aristotle's notions on happiness or the current state of affairs regarding it that is to be taken as sad?

Human collective goals shouldn't be defined by what standardized method or aims people have for themselves. If it really has to be Marx, then to each his/her own, right? Of course this is the end goal of communism, but is 'to each their own' too idealistic? — Shawn

Never been attracted to Marx. I personally find "From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs" to be an at best nearsighted slogan. For example, the so called cheater (can be found in ethological studies of other species just as much as in studies of humanity) will after all have their own abilities of cheating the community and its systems, in other words they are good at personal gains at the expense of others in their society by profiting from others' efforts without investing any effort themselves. This being detrimental to the community they partake of, parasitically so. Or for another, the stronger and yet more sensitive and compassionate heart might not have a so called need for social approval, warmth, love, etc. for their preservation of being whereas many a silly person will have a need for such conditions with the slightest incursion upon their ego; should we then punish people who are strong and compassionate by withholding our affection, gratitude, and warmth so as to reward those who throw temper tantrums on a dime with the same? I find so doing both unjust and also a means of degenerating the society one lives in. I don't want to turn this into a debate on core Marxist stances, but, in short, despite the many instances where Marxism can have its import, I still find there is a crucially important place for merit and just deserves which Marxism, from all I so far know of it, does not address as pivotal to well-being.

What do you think about this whole history of eudaimonia and the pursuit of happiness? — Shawn

Man, that's a big topic. I so far interpret Aristotelian / Ancient Greek eudemonia to be something akin to actualizing to the fullest the most positive potentials of being one is endowed with; i.e., with success in terms of actualized virtues rather than in terms of material possessions, the latter taking second place and being indifferent to the first. While the English term and concept of "happiness" can significantly overlap with eudemonia, it to me is primarily far more brute in nature: here basically specifying having the good fortune, luck, good happenstance in actualizing that which one intends to actualize, irrespective of what that might be. It's opposite, suffering (to me etymologically connoting carrying an (unwanted) weight or burden), is then the obstruction to actualizing that which one intends to actualize. Thereby making it different in many respects from physical pain. While deep-seated happiness might be one and the same with eudemonia in most cases, happiness tout court is not. Here we get the happiness of the mass-murder who succeeds in mass-murdering. Or, more tritely, the happiness of blowing one's nose upon so intending. Compare with the suffering of discovering one's arm paralyzed upon intending to blow one's nose so that one is incapable of doing what one actively intends to do (or of the mass-murder imprisoned - by societal pressures if not by a prison cell - and thereby obstructed from actualizing what they yearn to actualize).

So, to me, in short, eudemonia is all well and good - but it stands out among all other forms of happiness as something that is far more stable and enduring in its nature, such that the greater the eudemonia accomplished the greater the hardships which can be endured without falling into disarray. Whereas happiness - or rather the desire for it - as it was just specified in its most general sense is a brute fact of all sentience, human or otherwise, and is almost tautologically so: it would be logically contradictory that one at the same time and in the same respect both a) intends the actualization of X and b) intends that X not be actualized. Whatever one's intent, when and if it becomes actualized, then happiness in this generalized sense is obtained.

Given all this, I find the affirmation of "(a right to) the freedom to pursue eudemonia however one deems its obtainment best actualized" to be far more apt then the nonspecific saying of "the freedom to pursue happiness". The latter can, again, apply to a mass-murderer's freedom to mass-murder, whereas the former will not.

That's the basic overview of my perspectives on the matter.

Bringing this back to the OP, having a ubiquitous happiness in the general sense for all humans all the time is rather impossible: human interaction will guarantee the occurrence of some suffering in some humans some of the time. But having a far greater eudemonia for all humans worldwide - though contingent on many a variable and by far easier said than done - is not something that is beyond the range of what is possible. But - as previously said, because one cannot impose comradery and succeed at having genuine comradeship, this as communism has so far attempted to do, without it backfiring - I don't find communism to be a good approach toward such ideal/goal of a greater eudemonia for all humans world over. (If there's to be any hope for such, I so far think functional and genuine democracies are the way to go - this in contrast to banana republics, kleptocracies, and the like, i.e. in contrast to perversions of what democracies are meant to be where the democracy in name only is both corrupt and dysfunctional.)

A society without pain, suffering, disease, wars, poverty or even death. — kindred

That to me does not define utopia but what some assume to be an Abrahamic Heaven somewhere up in the skies. I fully agree that suffering - as possibility if not actuality - is part and parcel of existing, and that to in any way exist in manners where no suffering can ever occur will be a strict metaphysical impossibility.

That said, as to the question of whether utopias are possible, go back far enough in human history and the world as it currently is can only be described as a societal utopia relative to the former times addressed. This not only technologically but, again, societally. If nothing else, I'm here thinking in relation to Homo Sapiens cave men.

So, to then claim that it is impossible for global humanity to live in a utopia by today's standards, this in say a thousand years from now (this were humanity to still then occur), can only be an unsupportable opinion.

Then again, that a future utopia by today's standards of humanity is possible does not entail the future actuality of such.

What is the individual to the collective? If it has been collectively decided to aim for happiness on an collective level, then what meaning could individual happiness mean to anyone?

Was the failure of communism mainly due to pursuing happiness not as a methodology or process; but, as the final goal of the system itself? I find it hard to interpret this ad hoc argument any differently, than to say that communism failed due to pursuing happiness and collectivism too stringently, while forgetting how such an aim could be attained methodologically.

What are your thoughts on the matter? — Shawn

Regarding communism: The ideology of communism writ large is pivoted around egalitarianism. The reality of any Stalinist communism that has ever occurred has been totalitarianism justified via gross perversions, rhetorical or otherwise, of egalitarian ideology. George Orwell’s satires – Animal Farm and 1984 – illustrate this state of affairs quite nicely: as can for example be found in the “all animals are equal but some are more equal than others” motif. One cannot hold a gun to another’s head with the ultimatum of either being one’s “comrade” or else dying and expect to thereby gain a newfound genuine friendship in the other – much less impose via violence and coercion a society of fraternal love among all of the society’s individuals, such that all members of the society become bona fide comrades (with bona fide comradery shared by all). Yet this is precisely what all (in one way or another, Stalinist) communist states have attempted to do, historically speaking. To claim these totalitarian systems to have been, or else be, egalitarian on account of the ideologies which they claimed to sponsor (metaphorically stated, as in that of “all animals being equal”) would be a profound error.

Regarding happiness: the “pursuit of happiness” is grossly nonspecific in its as-is laconic expression. A mass-murdering rapist’s happiness is in murdering and raping as many as possible. With suffering ensuing when he is obstructed from so doing. Yet the happiness of such a mass-murderer in character is no less real (as either actuality or potential) as is the happiness of a humanitarian philanthropist who succeeds in his/her pursuits. The book/movie A Clockwork Orange speaks nicely to this multifaceted issue of “pursuit of happiness”.

Regarding individual vs. collective happiness: This dichotomy can only occur when the happiness addressed is zero-sum, i.e. the others must lose so that one might win/gain/succeed. This, however, stands in stark contrast to symbiotic, or else reciprocal, forms of happiness: happiness which can only occur when all members concerned succeed in that which they individually desire, and this as a cohort. As just three examples of the latter, neither the happiness of living in a healthy community (be this a neighborhood, a town, or a nation, etc.), nor the happiness of having genuine friendships, nor the happiness of being in a loving romantic relationship will pin one’s individual happiness against the collective happiness of all those concerned. Instead, the two types of happiness – that of individual and collective - in these three cases are co-dependent: neither individual nor collective happiness can occur in the absence of the other.

One can of course declare that symbiotic forms of happiness – wherein mutual benefit occurs - is false, illusory, wrong, unrealistic, weak, etc., and thereby declare that so too must then by entailment be the ideal of a symbiotic happiness shared by all humans. This, though, would however then champion the ideal of zero-sum forms of happiness maintained by all – maybe needless to add, thereby however inadvertently sponsoring the mass-murder’s happiness (which is zero-sum in relation to those murdered and raped) as something just as worthy of pursuit as would be all other zero-sum forms of happiness (for the only thing standing in the way of this latter happiness is the desire to preserve the symbiotic happiness of the community in which the mass-murder also happens to live).

To this I'll add that egalitarian ideals (be they communistic, anarchistic, or democratic) entwine the ideal of symbiotic happiness among all, whereas totalitarian ideals can only be about zero-sum happiness by necessity of what totalitarianism prescribes.

The reason I call attention to it, is from my very brief reading, the is very much concerned with he problem of reflexivity in transcendental knowledge - how the self can know the self. — Wayfarer

Other's stern enough affirmations of my interpretations being unquestionably wrong aside, it might be of interest that the Ancient Greek term for "to know", γιγνώσκω • (gignṓskō), can have the sense of "to be aware (of)" and "to understand".

For my part, I find Plotinus's writing to be very metaphorical, non-analytical, and at times equivocal, and so I find a literalist interpretation of it to in many ways be nearly as nonsensical as a literalist interpretations of most any poem's true intended meaning. Nor do I interpret anyone as being infallible, Plotinus as no exception. Notwithstanding, Plotinus repeatedly affirms the One to be pure Unity devoid of any and all multiplicity/duality and, as previously quoted, to have the Intellectual-Principle "overflowing" from it - hence not being it itself. I myself find questionable the extent to which Plotinus wants to say that the One thinks/knows itself rather than the intellectual-Principle so thinking/knowing itself; again, as the two quotes that follow to me illustrate, I myself don't find a univocal clarity in his writings regarding this matter. All the same:

As an excerpt from the 5th enniad:

1. Are we to think that a being knowing itself must contain diversity, that self-knowledge can be affirmed only when some one phase of the self perceives other phases, and that therefore an absolutely simplex entity would be equally incapable of introversion and of self-awareness?

No: a being that has no parts or phases may have this consciousness; in fact there would be no real self-knowing in an entity presented as knowing itself in virtue of being a compound- some single element in it perceiving other elements- as we may know our own form and entire bodily organism by sense-perception: such knowing does not cover the whole field; the knowing element has not had the required cognisance at once of its associates and of itself; this is not the self-knower asked for; it is merely something that knows something else.

Either we must exhibit the self-knowing of an uncompounded being- and show how that is possible- or abandon the belief that any being can possess veritable self-cognition. — THE FIFTH ENNEAD: THIRD TRACTATE: Section 1

And then there are passages such as this one:

5. Does it all come down, then, to one phase of the self knowing another phase?

That would be a case of knower distinguished from known, and would not be self-knowing.

What, then, if the total combination were supposed to be of one piece, knower quite undistinguished from known, so that, seeing any given part of itself as identical with itself, it sees itself by means of itself, knower and known thus being entirely without differentiation?

To begin with, the distinction in one self thus suggested is a strange phenomenon. How is the self to make the partition? The thing cannot happen of itself. And, again, which phase makes it? The phase that decides to be the knower or that which is to be the known? Then how can the knowing phase know itself in the known when it has chosen to be the knower and put itself apart from the known? In such self-knowledge by sundering it can be aware only of the object, not of the agent; it will not know its entire content, or itself as an integral whole; it knows the phase seen but not the seeing phase and thus has knowledge of something else, not self-knowledge.

In order to perfect self-knowing it must bring over from itself the knowing phase as well: seeing subject and seen objects must be present as one thing. Now if in this coalescence of seeing subject with seen objects, the objects were merely representations of the reality, the subject would not possess the realities: if it is to possess them it must do so not by seeing them as the result of any self-division but by knowing them, containing them, before any self-division occurs.

At that, the object known must be identical with the knowing act [or agent], the Intellectual-Principle, therefore, identical with the Intellectual Realm. And in fact, if this identity does not exist, neither does truth; the Principle that should contain realities is found to contain a transcript, something different from the realities; that constitutes non-Truth; Truth cannot apply to something conflicting with itself; what it affirms it must also be.

Thus we find that the Intellectual-Principle, the Intellectual Realm and Real Being constitute one thing, which is the Primal Being; the primal Intellectual-Principle is that which contains the realities or, rather, which is identical with them.

But taking Primal Intellection and its intellectual object to be a unity, how does that give an Intellective Being knowing itself? An intellection enveloping its object or identical with it is far from exhibiting the Intellectual-Principle as self-knowing.

All turns on the identity. The intellectual object is itself an activity, not a mere potentiality; it is not lifeless; nor are the life and intellection brought into it as into something naturally devoid of them, some stone or other dead matter; no, the intellectual object is essentially existent, the primal reality. As an active force, the first activity, it must be, also itself, the noblest intellection, intellection possessing real being since it is entirely true; and such an intellection, primal and primally existent, can be no other than the primal principle of Intellection: for that primal principle is no potentiality and cannot be an agent distinct from its act and thus, once more, possessing its essential being as a mere potentiality. As an act- and one whose very being is an act- it must be undistinguishably identical with its act: but Being and the Intellectual object are also identical with that act; therefore the Intellectual-Principle, its exercise of intellection and the object of intellection all are identical. Given its intellection identical with intellectual object and the object identical with the Principle itself, it cannot but have self-knowledge: its intellection operates by the intellectual act which is itself upon the intellectual object which similarly is itself. It possesses self-knowing, thus, on every count; the act is itself; and the object seen in that act- self, is itself. — THE FIFTH ENNEAD: THIRD TRACTATE: Section 5

To be clear, I do not ascribe to everything Plotinus states as thought it were a necessary truth. Nevertheless, given the Ancient Greek term for "to know", one can then understand Plotinus as a affirming that (be the "Primal Intellection" intended as something that pertains to the One or else strictly to the Intellectual-Principle that overflows from the One) the addressed knower or thinker of itself holds absolutely no duality between the subject of awareness/understanding (hence, of knowledge/thought) and its object of awareness/understanding. This such that the subject of awareness and the object of awareness are one and the same, in a state of absolute Unity.

Here, then, there will be no intetionality in the sense of "aboutness": the awareness is utterly reflexive without any differentiation between awareness and that which it is aware of. Nor will there be any intention upon any intent. Instead, there will be a pure awareness that holds absolute understanding of what it as pure awareness is - again, without any differentiation between that which understands and that which is understood.

Though others have disagreed with this interpretation and will in all likelihood continue to do so, I so far do not find any logical reason to discard it outright. And I likewise can so far find no logical inconsistency in it - this in a non-physicalist cosmos. At any rate, it's the perspective I hold with which I'd answer the question you've raised: namely, regarding "the problem of reflexivity in transcendental knowledge - how the self can know the self". And this subject to me in many a way parallels the Kantian notion of the transcendental ego ... but I've probably written enough as it is.

I'll also add in far more poetic verse - per my best interpretations of Plotinus's perspectives (which, I again should mention, I don't take to be infallible) - for anyone to fully and truly "know thyself" is for that psyche to engage in a complete henosis whereby it becomes one with the One in perfect Unity, thereby gaining a full and perfect cognizance of that upon which all Being is contingent. Which to my mind, when thus interpreted, can parallel at least certain Eastern teachings, such as that of Moksha: the obtainment of absolute liberation and, hence, absolute freedom (from any and all constraints).

Not that this is anything but a perspective, one I so far deem to be philosophically cogent within its own contexts.

The One wills itself, it isn't devoid of intentionality. How do you have thought devoid of all intentionality? — Count Timothy von Icarus

This questioning fully ignores that which I repeatedly have asked of you. This doesn't at this point come as a surprise. But, since you've asked as an open question, in non-metaphorical and what I take to be far more up to date terminology: by strictly consisting of literally pure, limitless, and absolute understanding (with strong emphasis on all three terms).

Understanding does not logically require intentioning - this, for example, in the way intentioning requires intent(s) - and yet is a rather pivotal aspect of what is termed "thought" in all cases.

This, then, would render "the One thinks itself in manners utterly devoid of any separateness/division between thinker and the thought(s) it thinks - for it is absolute Unity" into the logically valid "the One understands (which is one validly possible semantic of the term " to know") itself in manners utterly devoid of any separateness/division between understand-er and that which is understood - this in an absolute Unity". [Although, given common interpretations of the word, you might note that the term "itself" can here only be fully metaphorical - an inescapable aspect of communicating via the limitations of the English language as it currently stands.]

The problem here is perhaps partly the analogia. You seem to be insisting on what holds for finite creatures for the One, particularly temporality. — Count Timothy von Icarus

As facts go, I don't. The exact opposite.

But, as others before me, I do not interpret Neoplatonism to be its own form, or else brand, of Creationism. Via which I mean that, in my interpretations of Plotinus' writing, Neoplatonism is not about a Creator and his/her/its creation.

I've by now come to believe that we will staunchly disagree on this point of Neoplatonism not being a form of Creationism. To which I cannot help but shrug and move on.

Although I don’t in principle have any disagreement with the Analogia Entis, it then seems you’ll nevertheless likewise find disagreement with these passages as well, for they parallel my own statements (boldface, underlines, and brackets are mine):

Hearkening back, whether consciously or not, to the doctrine of Speusippus (Plato’s successor in the Academy) that the One is utterly transcendent and “beyond being,” and that the Dyad is the true first principle (Dillon 1977, p. 12), Plotinus declares that the One is “alone with itself” and ineffable (cf. Enneads VI.9.6 and V.2.1). The One does not act to produce a cosmos or a spiritual order, but simply generates from itself, effortlessly, a power (dunamis) which is at once the Intellect (nous) and the object of contemplation (theôria) of this Intellect. While Plotinus suggests that the One subsists by thinking itself as itself, the Intellect subsists through thinking itself as other, and therefore becomes divided within itself: this act of division within the Intellect is the production of Being, which is the very principle of expression or discursivity (Ennead V.1.7). — https://iep.utm.edu/neoplato/#SH2a

As regards the very first principle of reality [i.e., the One], conceived of as an entity that is beyond Being, transcending all physical reality, very little can actually be said, except that it is absolute Unity [rather than either Being with a capital “B”, which it is beyond, or else nihility/nothingness]. — https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/neoplatonism/#One

I do acknowledge that Plotinus makes ample use of metaphor in his writing, as well as using terms in a context that is often foreign to us moderners (with his use of "Being", again with a capital "B", as one possible example of such)—which can lead to numerous interpretations of what was in fact meant by him. Still, in assuming this is a forum of philosophy rather than a forum of Christian faith and various apologetics for it:

In the absence of any evidence to the contrary, I’ll conclude that to you “intentional activity (or else acts) that is fully devoid of any intent” makes sense—here even tentatively indulging the belief that this is what Plotinus in fact intended to entail in the notion of the One. To me, on the other hand, this proposition as of yet doesn’t make any sense whatsoever—but is instead logically contradictory in a priori fashion (this as might be “a married bachelor”). And since you’ve made no effort to provide a rationally consistent explanation of how this stipulation of “intent-less intentions” could make sense—but have so far affirmed that this is what so and so in fact affirmed—I find no reason to continue in my attempts to ask you how this might rationally be. Faith that contradicts logical possibility (or experience, for that matter) is not my strong-suit—and this includes faith in notions of "the One" being that which intentions in manners devoid of any and all intents.

You're reply, though in no way addressing the questions I've asked regarding what "will" / "intentioning" could possibly mean in absence of an intent/end/purpose sought, might be cogent save for what clearly seems to be its direct contradiction to passages such as this:

It is precisely because that is nothing within the One that all things are from it: in order that Being may be brought about, the source must be no Being but Being's generator, in what is to be thought of as the primal act of generation. Seeking nothing, possessing nothing, lacking nothing, the One is perfect and, in our metaphor, has overflowed, and its exuberance has produced the new: this product has turned again to its begetter and been filled and has become its contemplator and so an Intellectual-Principle. — from Enniads 5.3.1.

As I've previously quoted (were it to have been read) in Plotinus's terminology, the One is not Being but the source of Being. That Act and Being are united, as per 6.8.7, then speaks not of the One but of the Intellectual Principle which, via metaphor, is said to "overflow" from the One.

But this is profoundly misunderstanding the classical tradition — Count Timothy von Icarus

I'm not here arguing for (nor for that matter against) "classical tradition". I'm simply arguing for lucidity in thought via cogent reasoning and, if provided, accurate references (see below).

If anything, it is Plotinus' whose views trend closer to the voluntarism that would come to dominate some strands of Protestant theology after the Reformation. — Count Timothy von Icarus

Hmm, Plotinus states verbatim in the Enneads that (all underlines and boldface are mine):

1. The One is all things and no one of them; the source of all things is not all things; all things are its possession- running back, so to speak, to it- or, more correctly, not yet so, they will be.

But a universe from an unbroken unity, in which there appears no diversity, not even duality?

It is precisely because that is nothing within the One that all things are from it: in order that Being may be brought about, the source must be no Being but Being's generator, in what is to be thought of as the primal act of generation. Seeking nothing, possessing nothing, lacking nothing, the One is perfect and, in our metaphor, has overflowed, and its exuberance has produced the new: this product has turned again to its begetter and been filled and has become its contemplator and so an Intellectual-Principle.

That station towards the one [the fact that something exists in presence of the One] establishes Being; that vision directed upon the One establishes the Intellectual-Principle; standing towards the One to the end of vision, it is simultaneously Intellectual-Principle and Being; and, attaining resemblance in virtue of this vision, it repeats the act of the One in pouring forth a vast power.

This second outflow is a Form or Idea representing the Divine Intellect as the Divine Intellect represented its own prior, The One. — from Enniads 5.3.1.

Firstly, the “Divine Intellect” is clearly not equivalent to the One.

And, as far as I can make out, the One’s “seeking nothing”—i.e., not being in search or in want of anything whatsoever—is at direct odds with the actuality of a will (cf., https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/will). One’s will or, more formally termed, volition is the sum of one's intentions (be the conscious or unconscious), with intentions necessarily holding an intent/end/purpose aimed at in order to so be intentioning. Because of this, to will is necessarily to seek the fulfilment of some telos or teloi. If there is no telos-fulfillment sought, there can be no will.

Is there some other sense of will you understanding wherein purpose is, at the very least, not a necessary condition of the will’s occurrence? (A purpose-devoid willing?)

But, because I so far can’t think of any such understanding of the term “will”, I can only then find the passage you’ve quoted to utterly misinterpret what Plotinus quite directly affirms (as per the above quote) in putting into Protinus's mouth terms such as (supposedly the One's, right?) "absolute self-will". The One (for that matter, this much like the typically understood Buddhist notion of Nirvana) is in want of nothing, hence devoid of any intent not yet fulfilled, and, thereby, fully devoid of volition, aka will, this as will can in any way apply to the "Intellectual-Principle".

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But please reference the translation of Plotinus you’ve quoted. I ask because it is utterly discordant to the translations I’m so far aware of. Contrast it, for example, with these two online translations here and here. So much so that your translation reads as though it’s from a different author’s different book.

In context:

Soul becomes free when it moves, through Intellectual-Principle, towards The Good; what it does in that spirit is its free act; Intellectual-Principle is free in its own right. That principle of Good is the sole object of desire and the source of self-disposal to the rest, to soul when it fully attains, to Intellectual-Principle by connate possession.

How then can the sovereign of all that august sequence- the first in place, that to which all else strives to mount, all dependent upon it and taking from it their powers even to this power of self-disposal- how can This be brought under the freedom belonging to you and me, a conception applicable only by violence to Intellectual-Principle itself?

It is rash thinking drawn from another order that would imagine a First Principle to be chance- made what it is, controlled by a manner of being imposed from without, void therefore of freedom or self-disposal, acting or refraining under compulsion. Such a statement is untrue to its subject and introduces much difficulty; it utterly annuls the principle of freewill with the very conception of our own voluntary action, so that there is no longer any sense in discussion upon these terms, empty names for the non-existent. Anyone upholding this opinion would be obliged to say not merely that free act exists nowhere but that the very word conveys nothing to him. To admit understanding the word is to be easily brought to confess that the conception of freedom does apply where it is denied. No doubt a concept leaves the reality untouched and unappropriated, for nothing can produce itself, bring itself into being; but thought insists upon distinguishing between what is subject to others and what is independent, bound under no allegiance, lord of its own act.

This state of freedom belongs in the absolute degree to the Eternals in right of that eternity and to other beings in so far as without hindrance they possess or pursue The Good which, standing above them all, must manifestly be the only good they can reasonably seek.

To say that The Good exists by chance must be false; chance belongs to the later, to the multiple; since the First has never come to be, we cannot speak of it either as coming by chance into being or as not master of its being. Absurd also the objection that it acts in accordance with its being if this is to suggest that freedom demands act or other expression against the nature. Neither does its nature as the unique annul its freedom when this is the result of no compulsion but means only that The Good is no other than itself, is self-complete and has no higher.

The objection would imply that where there is most good there is least freedom. If this is absurd, still more absurd to deny freedom to The Good on the ground that it is good and self-concentred, not needing to lean upon anything else but actually being the Term to which all tends, itself moving to none.

Where- since we must use such words- the essential act is identical with the being- and this identity must obtain in The Good since it holds even in Intellectual-Principle- there the act is no more determined by the Being than the Being by the Act. Thus "acting according to its nature" does not apply; the Act, the Life, so to speak, cannot be held to issue from the Being; the Being accompanies the Act in an eternal association: from the two [Being and Act] it forms itself into The Good, self-springing and unspringing. — Enniads 6.8.7.

BTW, to be clear, it is the last paragraph of the quoted section on which the previously mentioned divergences occur.

But again, the Good is again blatently not equivalent to the Intellectual Principle, but is instead that which the Intellectual Principle seeks as end/telos. Willing (freely or otherwise) is not done by the One / the Good (for the One seeks nothing whatsoever), but by the Intellectual Principle as it's here in part addressed, and this in its seeking of the Good.

Can you reference anything out of the Enniads directly that would, within its proper context, contradict what is here stated in the two quotes, or else in my own evaluations regarding the One?

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As to the notion of freedom in and of itself, the One is affirmed to be devoid of any and all limits—i.e., absolutely unbounded, else in no way constrained, by anything whatsoever (it is in-finite in this literal and non-mathematical sense). I know of no other more accurate or literal description of an absolute, hence perfect and complete, freedom. Do you?

But as to the Christian doctrine of divine freedom which affirms God to have free will – which Christ himself had about as much to say as he did the Trinity (Christian doctrine proper, with its Trinity included, being first introduced in the First Council of Nicaea, this 325 years after Christ’s death):

Please explain how the very notion of free will (however one might choose to interpret the term) can hold any cogency in the complete absence of intention, hence purpose, hence telos one seeks to fulfill.

Ps. I’m here asking for cogent reasoning, preferably yours, and not for the questionable opinions of others regarding the matter.

The very proposition of "there both a) is a self and b) is no self" has (a) and (b) addressing the exact same thing - irrespective of how the term "self" might be defined or understood as a concept, the exact same identity is addressed — javra


The point is that if there is no determinate entity that 'the self' refers to, if there is only the concept, and if there is no actual entity, then saying that we are speaking about the same thing is incoherent. On the other hand, if you stipulate that the self is, for example, the body, then what would A be in the proposition (A implies B) where B is 'there is a self' ? Let's say that A is 'the perception of the body': this would be 'the perception of the body implies that there is a self". 'The perception of the body implies that there is no self' would then be a contradiction to that. — Janus

I’ll offer that the commonsense notion of “self” necessarily pivots around what we westerners commonly term “consciousness” - "the self" here always entailing the subject of one’s own experience of phenomena (or, in for example the more philosophical jargon of Kant, the “empirical ego” (via which empirical knowledge is possible) - this as contrasted to what he specifies as the underlying “transcendental ego”). And, in this commonsense understanding of "the self", the body of which one is aware is then not the “self” which is in question - "the self" instead holding as referent that which is so aware. Nor does the notion you present in any way cohere with the descriptions of self as they are addressed in the Buddhist doctrine of anatta: this being the very metaphysical understanding of reality from which we obtain propositions along the lines of “neither is there a self nor is there not a self”. Which, on the surface, do at least at first appear to be contradictory (though, as I've previously argued, do not need to so necessarily be).

But, since, we each hold our own - sometimes more divergent than at other times - understandings of what terms signify, I’ll here say that were the term “self” to be devoid of any referent outside of the occurrence of empirically observable physical bodies (maybe needless to add, that are living and so normally endowed with a subject of awareness, this rather than being dead and decaying), then I might find agreement with your general reasoning here.

I’m however not one to find the term “self” - and, hence, terms such as “I”, “you”, “us” and “them” - devoid of referents, unempirical (imperceivable) though I take these referents as "subjects of experience" to be. All the same, this thread is not the place to engage in debates regarding what “the subject of one’s own experiences” might specify or else be - although I do agree that it is not "an entity" in the sense of being a thing.

Unfortunately, I think this is really misunderstanding the Christian tradition. It's premised on violations of God's eternal nature, divine simplicity, the Doctrine of Transcendentals, and really the Analogia Entis as well.

God can't be striving towards things "before and after." God is absolutely simple, not stretched out time. The whole of God is always present to God's self (divine simplicity implies eternal existence, "without begining or end," not simply "everlasting.") — Count Timothy von Icarus

I didn’t intend to here present that stringent of an argument but, yes, I at least so far find the notion of a Divinely Simple, etc., God who in any way intends (needless to add, this purposefully) any X whatsoever to be self-contradictory:

One can always fall back on “God is beyond all human notions of logic, including the basic laws of thought, and hence beyond all human comprehension”, but if God is nevertheless understood as having intended and/or intending anything whatsoever then there necessarily is some end/purpose not yet actualized which God strives toward in so intending - hence making God’s actions purposeful - and this will then be blatantly incongruous with the notion of Divine Simplicity, among others.

Divine Simplicity, however, is necessarily applicable to, as one example, the Neoplatonic notion of the One - which is not a god – although there’s nothing precluding the One from being appraised as the pinnacle of Divinity upon which all else is dependent and, in this sense alone, as G-d/God (such that the sometimes heard of aphorism of “God = Good” can here make rational sense).

As just one possible example, this one from Jewish tradition:

In Maimonides' work Guide to the Perplexed, he states:[10]

"If, however, you have a desire to rise to a higher state, viz., that of reflection, and truly to hold the conviction that God is One and possesses true unity, without admitting plurality or divisibility in any sense whatever, you must understand that God has no essential attribute in any form or in any sense whatever, and that the rejection of corporeality implies the rejection of essential attributes. Those who believe that God is One, and that He has many attributes, declare the unity with their lips, and assume plurality in their thoughts."

According to Maimonides, then, there can be no plurality of faculties, moral dispositions, or essential attributes in God. Even to say that God is all-knowing, all-powerful, and all-good is to introduce plurality, if one means thereby that these qualities are separate attributes. — https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Divine_simplicity#Jewish_thought

This is (or at least can be) in full rational accord with the notion of the One as described by Neoplatonism (the Neoplatonic descriptions of cosmology here placed aside) and, again, is fully discordant rationally to the notion of God as an intending superlative deity.

As to possible commonalities between diverse traditions - here primarily addressing the Neoplatonic notion of the One and some subspecies of Abrahamic thought - if there is a perennial philosophy, then this would account for different traditions' diverse interpretations of the same Divinely Simple, uncreated and imperishable, essence which, to here use Aristotle's terminology, is the unmoved/unmovable (i.e., changeless) mover (i.e., change-producer) of all that exists. Although, as I previously argued, this could not rationally be an intentioning God (e.g., God as described in the Torah/Bible, imv most especially as addressed in Genesis II onward).

I understand the proviso "in same time in all respects". But that proviso may be given more generally, upfront about all the statements under consideration:

(1) Caveat: We are considering only statements that are definite enough that they are unambiguous as to such things as time, aspects, etc. So we're covered in that regard.

Then we have:

(2) Law: For all statements A, it is not the case that both A and not-A.

Would (1) and (2) suffice for you as the law of non-contradiction? — TonesInDeepFreeze

How does your newly provided caveat (1) added to your previously made statement (2) not fully equate semantically to what I initially explicitly defined the law of noncontradiction to be in full?

If (2) and the now explicitly stated (1) do fully equate semantically to what I initially stated explicitly, then you have your answer. “Yes.”

if A and notA do not occur — javra


Is A a statement? — TonesInDeepFreeze

Quite obviously not when taken in proper given context. ("if a statement both does and does not occur [...]" ???)

If not, then what is A — TonesInDeepFreeze

Anything whatsoever that can be the object of one’s awareness. For example, be this object of awareness mental (such as the concept of “rock”), physical (such as a rock), or otherwise conceived as a universal (were such to be real) that is neither specific to one’s mind or to physical reality (such as the quantities specified by “1” and “0”, as these can for example describe the number of rocks present or else addressed).

and what does it mean for it to occur? — TonesInDeepFreeze

In all cases, it minimally means for it to be that logical identity, A=A, which one is at least momentarily aware of. Ranging from anything one might specify when saying, "it occurred to me that [...]" to anything that occurs physically which one is in any way aware of.

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I get the sense you might now ask further trivial questions devoid of any context regarding why they might be asked. I don't have as much leisure time as many others hereabout apparently have. If further questions are asked, please provide a context to your questions. I will choose to not further reply without a sufficiently meaningful context being provided.

BTW, general questions about Aristotelian notions of the principle of non-contradiction can be answered in this SEP article.

On second thought, so we don't continue going around in endless circles:

E.g.: this water can be green today and blue tomorrow (not a contradiction). Or, this water here can be green and that water there can be blue (again, not a contradiction).

However, if it's affirmed that:

"water can be green and water can be non-green (e.g., blue) at the same time and in the same respect [with "in the same respect" to include its spacial location]" — javra

Then logical contradiction does result.

Again, if A and notA do not occur at the same time and in the same respect, then no contradiction occurs. Only when A and notA do are affirmed to occur at the same time and in the same respect does contradiction obtain.

I understood you the first time. The reply I gave still holds as my answer.

I'll check back in tomorrow.

If I understand, you take

It is not the case that both water can be green and water can be not-green.

as an instance of the law of contradiction. (?) — TonesInDeepFreeze

No, the exact opposite. Hence the concluding sentence to you in my last post.

However, the statement "water can be green and water can be non-green (e.g., blue) at the same time and in the same respect" will be an instance of the law of noncontradiction.

I don't find that one can properly express the principle linguistically without "at the same time and in the same respect" - or this phrasing's semantic equivalent - being affirmed.

Would allow simplifying that to:

For any statement A, it is not the case that both A and not-A. — TonesInDeepFreeze

Is that a question or an affirmation?

Consider: The statement, "Water can be green", does not allow for "water can be green" and "water can be not-green (e.g., blue)".

So what I said does not simplify into what you've written.

In short, A and not-A cannot both occur at the same time and in the same respect.

The principle/law of thought which sometimes goes by the name of "the law of noncontradiction", this as articulated by Aristotle (with possible ambiguities as to whether the law applies only to epistemology or also to ontology at large here acknowledged).

As in the concept/meaning of self as "that which is purple and square" vs. "that which is orange and circular" or any some such? And this in relation to "there both is and is not a self"? — javra

This makes no sense to me. — Janus

In other words, the first question addresses this very affirmation which you more recently added:

That said, the self has no definitive definition, so introducing such a thing in the context of discussing whether anything could be the same in different contexts or thought under different perspectives seems incoherent from the get-go. — Janus

While the second question I asked addresses this:

The very proposition of "there both a) is a self and b) is no self" has (a) and (b) addressing the exact same thing - irrespective of how the term "self" might be defined or understood as a concept, the exact same identity is addressed The proposition has nothing whatsoever to do with two different interpretations of what "self" means and has everything to do with "the self" both occurring and not occurring at the same time.

So your critique completely misses the issue addressed regarding contradictions and the possible lack of such in the proposition "(the understanding of reality R entails that) there both is and is not a self". "Self" remains identical, but the usage of "is" can in principle be interpreted in two different ways - this, at least, within the context of certain Indian philosophies - thereby potentially equating to the more verbose proposition that "selfhood occurs from the vantage of mundane reality which is illusory but selfhood in no way occurs from the vantage of ultimate/genuine/non-illusory/nondual reality - for there can be no selfhood in the the complete absence of any duality with other - and both these actualities (in semi-Kantian terms, that actuality of the phenomenal world of maya and that nondual actuality/reality which can only be utterly non-phenomanal and, hence, purely noumenal) co-occur at the same time (again, this within certain Indian philosophies)". And such an affirmation would not be logically contradictory.

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Consider the following substitutions which do not suffer from such ambiguities: Render (A implies B) as "the presence of water implies the presences of oxygen" and (A implies notB) as " the presence of water implies the absence of oxygen": do the two statements not contradict one another? — Janus

Of course they do. Just as much as saying that "the car C is completely green and completely red at the same time and in the same respect* ". And this as I upheld in the post you initially replied to: again, most often, the proposition that A entails both B and notB will be logically contradictory.

* p.s., to be clearer, this with the understanding that any shade of brown is neither green nor red, but brown.

No, "two different perspectives and, hence, in two different respects" just is two different interpretations of the concept or meaning of 'self'. — Janus

As in the concept/meaning of self as "that which is purple and square" vs. "that which is orange and circular" or any some such? And this in relation to "there both is and is not a self"?

I don’t see how your answer can rationally follow. Nor have you put in any effort in justifying your contention via any reasoning or examples. Nor have you evidenced how the examples and reasoning I have repeatedly provided to support my own contention cannot feasibly, rationally, work.

But I’ll leave you to it.