The question of whether or not something exists is always an uninteresting question, and predicated on a misunderstanding of what existence even is in my view. The only interesting ontological question is "what kind of thing is it?"

What kind of thing is God? God is a character in a book. That's what kind of thing God is.

That's right, as to exist is to merely occupy space and time, within the universal spacetime manifold, but the FSM isn't a thing like that at all, it transcends material physical spacial temporal and even quantum constraints, and occupies a higher realm where it super duper exists!

Excuse me if I don't want to respond seriously to the buddhist concretizing mystical nothingness, I get it, we've all seen the never ending story, but "lack of ketchup" isn't something that exists in it's own right, or "doesn't exist", but really does *wink wink*. That kind of depth is too unsanitary to wade into, I'll happily remain in the shallows.

It means whatever you want, brother... and nothing else. A person didn't make the universe, sorry.

relevant video to my post just came out!

I think that right now in history kicks a lot of ass. We're at the pinnacle of technological evolution, with all of the sweet benefits, and luxuries, just before things start turning shitty again. They were pretty shitty and lame for most of human history, got pretty awesome for like a century, and then will probably go back to shit.

Right now's where it's at.

God Nirvana and all that jazz doesn't really stand for anything. we're agreed about that much. :D

The etymology for "existence" suggests that it means "to stand out" to be distinct from other things. So that, if something truly doesn't exist, then there never was anything there in the first place to not exist. I favor this way of looking at it.

You know, after 9/11 people became more afraid to fly, and more people started to drive long distances rather than fly, increasing the annual car accident death rates by the equivalent of four fully loaded boeing 737s crashing every year. Even if 9/11 happened like every three or four years, it would still probably be safer to fly than drive. In reality, the risk level of terrorists compared to the real everyday dangers we shrug off is insignificant. Yeah, it's awful that that stuff happens, but it isn't really something we need to worry about, no more so than being struck by lighting while being devoured by a shark.

:D

Yeah, Schop must have had it all figured out, clearly his mind was perpetually being blown.

Should probably stop giving them money? Is that an option? No...? Well... more security theater then, that's sure to give the impression of greater safety.

Yeah, and todays economy is all about lifting, throwing and smashing... thankfully my occupation is...

Back in the day, when most everyone were rural, and actually owned things of value, they used to say that city folk talked for a living. More and more people are city folk, and communication is more versatile than being a beast is these days.

I see that you have solved this crisis though... I'll go off and spread the word.

Sometimes angst is appropriate, but there's other shit to feel too. If that one's your favorite then to each their own, but I like diversity.

If nothing matters then it doesn't matter that nothing matters. Things continue as before entirely unperturbed by such oxymoronic statements.

"You can't be chasing 15 rabbits. Otherwise, the public mind cannot follow you." Brian Mulroney

I mean, right? He really gets it. Gotta limit it to like five or six, but wisdom often comes far too late.

X-)

The concavity where he squatted for the release of ordure, physically and spiritually was part of someone's driveway, carved out of the earth, and molded just so by daily use was quite conspicuously situated, hidden only by the morning hours. The wind eased through the weeds, pressing on both sides of the track, died, and then came up again hinting of burritos -- the burrito shop, miles away now, will open up in this great desert Las Vegas in a couple hours. The burrito, urged by the Earth's gravity up the Hudson, that deep unyielding orifice, and arriving as a hint of garlic in the air, against his face... queef, queef, queef.

Pulitzer please.

There's definitely higher risk involved, thankfully the most villainous seem to be the least risk averse. The goodie goodies are the most risk averse. Just as you listed all of the horrible consequences that follow from behaving in such ways, it may indeed not be prudent future planning. Since none of us are saints, we must judge some degree of all of those unscrupulous things to be worth the involved risk.

Let me put it to you this way, the unscrupulous have all of the options available to those with scruples, plus dishonesty. misinformation, misdirection, relevant omissions, and spin.

Can't anybody argue using honest information??? — Bitter Crank

Sure you can! If you don't mind losing.

When Stephen Dion ran for prime minister I voted for his party, and it was the first and last time that I voted. I voted for him because I thought that he was a good decent guy. He took severe risks, releasing his economic plan during the election campaign. I heard him on a Christian radio station, and he mentioned God a couple of times, so the interviewer asked him if he was doing that because it was a Christian radio station. So he paused for a moment, and said that's why he was doing it, his people told him it would be a good idea. His wife claimed to have been largely kept silent by the party, because they thought she'd just say whatever she liked, and not try to toe party lines. She even refused to introduce Dion at a women's event because she didn't want to read a pre-prepared speech.

He had a record breaking lose, was completely devastated. Are good leaders the one's we want to have a beer with? The saint? The genius? The soldier? The megalomaniac? The one with just the right blind spot, or with the sharpest sight?

I looked up some lists of great leadership traits, but I didn't see any examples, or samples from which they derived those traits, and correlated them with particular leadership successes.

I know that's my modus operandi at least.

"Feminism is a socialist, anti-family, political movement that encourages women to leave their husbands, kill their children, practice witchcraft, destroy capitalism and become lesbians." - Pat Robertson

Aesthetics eh? I've heard that there's no accounting for those.

First there were "transsexuals" (back in the 1960-1980s) then there were "transgendered". "Gender, gendered, gendering, transgendered" and so on reflect post-modernism which views sexual behavior as socially constructed and fluid. Post-modernists like turgid language which obscures more than reveals. Post-modernist thinkers don't see an essentially binary set up in nature (roosters and hens are just engaging in pointless performances, apparently). They see a continuum which ranges from god-knows-what on one end to archaic, oppressive, colonialist, all-powerful White Males on the other end (he said, sarcastically). — Bitter Crank

A transsexual is someone that has, or is in the process of medical transition, whereas transgender is internal identity.

You have no more scientific props for yours than I have for mine. The facts are that there are just some things that you want, and have probably always wanted, and you can either be a sinful, unnatural, insane person for that, or it can be okay. No scientific anything convinced people that homosexuality maybe isn't such a big deal, lack of actual significant consequences, and yes, the idea that freedom for you, is freedom for me, is what did that. People only start coming up with the science stuff after they've already become sympathetic, and open. They just weren't looking for it, didn't interpret things that way, didn't look for alternatives besides mental health, or satan. People that support conversion therapy, and claim to have prevented trangenderism in children make this claim on the notion of the escalation of perversion, by imagining homosexuality, and trangenderism to be a scale of perversion, and when the kids grow up to be gay, they at least prevented the worst of it. Win!

It's funny how, you also suggest that it is both unreasonable to live your life in a way that is nonsensical to others, and also it is unreasonable to project your dispositions, attitudes, and feelings "that deviation from the norm on to everyone." (and there being a spectrum somehow implies that everyone exists at every single point on the spectrum, so that if there is spectrum of sexuality, that means that everyone is actually bisexual, and at least somewhat attracted to everything that it is possible for anyone to be attracted to...), but that's precisely how we understand each other. We have no other options, when people are too different, we simply can't understand them. Wittgenstein's English speaking lion.

Gender or sex definitely isn't binary in every species except ours http://www.pinknews.co.uk/2015/12/23/scientists-discover-genderfluid-lioness-who-looks-acts-and-roars-like-a-male/

You know what the other lions probably aren't doing though? Engaging in prejudiced righteous indignation, attacks on competence or sanity and delionization.

More importantly, there are no dogmas, or tenets which tie transgender people together. I've come across a a number of very different theories, explanations, positions. No theoretical, linguistic theories ties trans people together. No surprise, but post-modernism is just as poorly understood, and ridiculed in the trans community as anywhere else people reject engaging with things they'd need more than a cursory understanding of.

There is no universal beliefs. Plenty of trans people will not go as far as to claim themselves to be women, like natal women are women, but since they aren't trying to eat anyone's babies, what's the big deal with letting people live their lives as they want?

Bathroom bills only really matter to those you can pick out of a crowd, pretty much all early transitioners, and a portion of the community. No one notices the rest, that's the point. Such anti-discrimination laws apply to a group that is already at high risk of danger, harassment, discrimination, and are probably going through quite a bit in their personal lives.

All your base are belong to us.

That's not my understanding of the deal with the archefossil. My understanding is that it is supposed to demonstrate that we can think in non-phenomenological terms. Highlighting a distinction between the manifest, and scientific image. Brassier's criticism was that the archefossil grants far more than it should to phenomenology, in that it implies a special status, or significance to pre-phenomenological states, as if science doesn't offer equally phenomonologically problematic descriptions of current events.

So, I don't think that an idealist, or phenomenologist has to actually suggest that past events, or pre-perceiving/thinking things events never occurred at all, they must simply hold that the possibility of their thought, comprehension, inference lies in analogy to our experienced events, and world.

"Lord, what fools these mortals be!" - William Shakespeare

I know, right? But there's no need to fear me.

What is Genius? I think that when we talk about Genius, we talk about a certain kind of success, drive, and insight. If I view history, or human competition as a Darwinian process, of many people trying vastly different things, and only some of them working, being influential, or leading to success, then there really needn't be anything substantially different between those that succeed, and those that fail. We have a tendency to diverge, try different things, operate in opposition to, or test the boundaries of normalcy, appropriateness, convention, and the things that we get involved with. To always view things in term of success, or in retrospect simply makes some appear special, I think. Unfortunately I really don't think that you can predict, or identify specific traits, or aptitudes which are going to result in that sort of thing. Maybe, as has been mentioned, those that do things their own ways, are bold, test boundaries, rebel against convention and orthodoxy are the kinds of people that are going to shake things up, but I think the overwhelming majority of such people are actually never going to achieve anything noteworthy, and be considered assholes and lunatics.

All depends on who believes it, and what they're willing to do about it.