So you really would think that the Biden administration would think that maternity flight suits are more important than the threat of Chinese hypersonic missiles are designed to destroy US aircraft carriers? — ssu

Of course not, but I think some people, including active service members, might think that those things are indeed indicative of pervasive wokeness in the military that needs to be fought and eliminated. And I think people like Milley give those people ammunition by saying that "white rage" caused the January 6th insurrection, for example - which I think was just a bunch of idiotic Trump supporters being idiots; as far as I can tell it wasn't racially motivated.

One is an idiot, if someone thinks the below argument will float:

Perino’s Fox News colleague Tucker Carlson brought the issue of wokeness in the military to the forefront when he mocked President Joe Biden for prioritizing things like maternity flight suits and hairstyle regulations for female service members while China was focusing on developing masculinity, building new islands and developing hypersonic missile technology. — ssu

Then maybe I'm an idiot. It sounds like exactly the kind of thing that will float to me, quite frankly.

Lead by reason instead of sociopathy. — NOS4A2

Sweet Jesus, wanting to tax people to provide for those who cannot provide for themselves is sociopathy?

I can give you the right to borrow my lawnmower whenever you require it. Rights are bestowed by men, and not all men are legislators. — NOS4A2

Yes, but we need an arrangement that will guarantee that the rights bestowed by citizens to other citizens and the private arrangements that they make are protected and honored, do we not? Don't we need some sort of basic legislation to do this?

Make a new thread if you want to keep talking about this, please. It is far from the intended discussion topic.

Unless you can relate it to the growing noise about supposed wokeness in our military. I feel like these people are testing the waters to see if it will *float. Hopefully it won't.

But if you believe everyone has a right to be provided with a minimum standard of living, why won’t you provide it to them? — NOS4A2

I 100% would if I could. But I'm not super rich or a politician. But there are those who could that refuse to do so. So we tax them.

Look, NOS, this makes sense to just about everybody; I've met children that understand this. You take care of the people who can't take care of themselves because fundamentally human nature is a mixed bag.

We know that without regulations or laws power structures and disparities form that harm the average person. The rich don't usually care about those at the bottom or near the bottom, except to exploit them for labor, and they have a disproportionate amount of influence over the power structures in place. This is a well-documented trend. Ideally, we could just use democratic means to empower the average person, but the super-rich have already rigged it, and even have people like you, NOS, explaining away the suffering they are complicit to as a function of their rights.

Ready-made identities suit us perfectly. We don’t need to consider a person on his own when we need only apply an identity and be done with it. Of course, this is to misidentify rather than identify, but who cares at this point? — NOS4A2

I think we can find a happy middle-ground between understanding power dynamics and the fact that, ideally, everyone should be considered as an individual with their own merits, when all other things are adjusted for.

I thought it was obvious I wasn’t speaking of some “general individual happiness”, which sounds to me incoherent. Sorry, I should have been more clear. By “individual happiness”, I mean the happiness as determined by each individual. — NOS4A2

I understand you now; I was searching for those words when I said "general" individual happiness. I admit I could have said it better.

the arrangement, if one is required, — NOS4A2

lmao, "if one is required". I think one is required, NOS. Even libertarians think we need a few arrangements, if only to protect our individual rights from being infringed upon.

the arrangement, if one is required, should allow individuals to pursuit their own happiness instead of providing happiness to whichever group of individuals hold a majority. — NOS4A2

I think some sacrifices for the greater good are okay, such as taxes. We get a very large utility margin from taxing the super-rich, for instance, something that I believe is necessary because they won't willingly give enough on their own. They don't even suffer for it, really.

If you want to talk about a bad arrangement, how about being exploited by corporations, which are fundamentally amoral, for the maximum gain of a few who couldn't care less about your aspirations and desires. We have genuine wage-slaves that have no time to pursue anything other than their next paycheck, let alone meaningful happiness. That's a genuinely shitty arrangement, not the rich and super-rich being taxed.

And if you want to make it about rights: everyone should have a right to a decent minimum standard of living, full-stop. If people can't support themselves or their families or their spouses working multiple jobs, it's time to supplement their income.

I think I misunderstood you, you are indeed making a theoretical argument, but I don't find it compelling because the terms you are using are too vague and could mean "the happiness of a few individuals" or "the happiness of the individual". Furthermore, I don't know what the "collective" is now.

From that I gather that you weren't originally talking about the general individual happiness, you were talking about sacrificing the happiness of a few in order to make the majority, not collective, happy. You should use those words, not "individual happiness" and "collective". You made it sound like you were making a more theoretical argument, not a practical, or even mathematical, one.

Yes, it can be wrong to sacrifice the happiness of an individual to make the collective happy, I agree, but I would also analyze it on a case-by-case basis. It might be unjust, it might not. If, for instance, the amount of suffering reduced by torturing somebody causes an amount of happiness that exceeds the suffering by a huge amount elsewhere...it still shouldn't be done. Everyone should have the right to not be tortured as a rule, else we live in constant fear of being sacrificed for the majority's happiness.

So yeah, I actually agree with you, N0S.

But the happy collective is composed of happy individuals; if the collective is happy in general so are the individuals making it up. If you think that there is a literal manifestation of the collective that is an entity that is happy to the detriment of the individuals making it up...I don't know what to say.

I guess I agree with some of that. But why not model our government after what we know works and results in the most happiness (social democracy)?

As an aside: it's starting to feel like everyone who is commenting feels the need to flex:

Avoid methodological collectivism because it leads right back into authoritarianism. — NOS4A2

I consider myself a libertarian socialist, so I agree that "neo-marxist" or "socialist" shouldn't be treated like swearwords, but actual neo-Marxists are few and far between, and I don't think that they have any clout, so we should just disavow them imo; their ideas, and the ideas of many on the left in the upper academic echelons, have no chance at finding purchase with the average person and just weigh us down. They are dead weight.

like SSU noted, in the context of political moments that drive people to vote, a Trumpian view captures the attention more than healthcare. — Philosophim

Do notice that many Americans don't know how terribly expensive their health care system is (compared to any other system in the World) and assume that everything the government does, will end it up in an even more fucked up system. So better to have the present system, at least. — ssu

So, what? We just play the game on their terms? That'll be a loss every time; the right is overwhelmingly willing to sacrifice just about anything to win. They see what works and exploit that until they win - with no thought to decency. That was Trump's strategy, and if Trump had been even remotely intelligent we would soon have seen someone taking a third term in the white house.

This study done by Pew, and this study done by Pew, demonstrate that single payer healthcare has significantly more bipartisan support than, say, the agenda of Black Lives Matter. Assuming that the relevant politicians elected actually represent their constituents with respect to these two issues, there is good reason to believe that bipartisan support for landmark legislation is still important for getting said legislation passed even with today's more cohesive parties. In fact, even if the left is mostly homogenous with respect to supporting something like BLM, they have more of an advantage with the socialized health issue, being as it would be a landmark law, which typically require more minority votes. If we wanted to pass a landmark law about, say, reigning in the militarization of police, that would be more difficult due to the necessity of bipartisan support.

Not to mention BLM's agenda is a little vague, so it's difficult to know what we're getting behind.

This is more accurate. I believe this is mostly because its what people care about more. When people vote, you need them impassioned and willing to come to the booth. Not enough people are excited over socialized medicine. — Philosophim

I think that that is wrong. People don't need to be wrapped up in critical race studies debates, for instance, to be incentivized to vote in their own self-interest.

No, it wasn't. L'elephant is a person who is within more of the far right culture, so he's probably heard something similar to what you were stating. For a person who is unfamiliar with that culture, it was hard to decipher. When we speak within a culture, we can say much while saying little. When outside of that culture, we have to say much to say little. — Philosophim

I am not inside far-right culture and never will be, but I suppose I can't expect everyone to be as familiar with this kind of stuff as I am; I watched John Lovell so the rest of us wouldn't have to - and I think the guy is either an idiot or a troll.

Sometimes government do this, but I don't see any evidence of this within the last 15 years. Trump, Obama, and Biden despite what you personally think of them, were not war mongers. — Philosophim

But they kind of were (and are).

I mean, Biden's administration wouldn't even condemn the killing of children in Palestine. And we gave weapons to Saudi Arabia to bomb Yemen. And all three droned the shit out of civilians. At the very least the last three presidents were outright criminal when not given to incompetence - incompetence that might itself be considered criminal.

Btw, this whole "the military has gone woke" thing is not contained to YouTube. It seems to me that this could only get worse, but I will be pleasantly surprised if it doesn't catch on.

So I'm not fucking crazy; my point is indeed obvious. Thanks.

What are you even trying to contribute other than the very trite kind of attitude so commonly fostered by these types of forums - which is to say condescending, pedantic, and unwilling to be even remotely gracious towards someone making a genuine attempt at starting a conversation. I put myself out there, you could at least try to understand what I wrote.

I didn't say anything even remotely like that, and I don't understand why I'm being misrepresented.

Same goes for you,

"I am also against attempting to appease the kind of people that push for the more radical leftist social ideas. One of these ideas is that the January 6th Insurrection was caused by white rage. When people go along with these claims, they give ammunition to people like Gorka. I think we need to fight
them brutally (violence?) and that social wins will just come elsewhere." — Philosophim

I didn't even say that, you didn't even quote me, you just made that up.

I actually agree with you. I must have really fucked up the delivery of my ideas.

I think I wrote clearly enough, but I'll further explain. I am against the people using the term "neo-marxist" to tar other people in the military, and think that attempting to appease the kind of people that push for the more radical leftist social ideas, such as that the January 6th Insurrection was caused by white rage, give people like Gorka ammunition - because the right has an inherent advantage when it comes to the culture war. I think we need to fight them on their more brutal terms and that the social justices will come naturally with wins elsewhere. I hope that is clearer.

Sorry for that response. Can I help you understand better what I wrote?

You obviously have no reading comprehension skills or elected not to read what I wrote. Nowhere did I say there were neo-marxists in the military. I said why not totally disavow neo-marxism (something I think everyone on the left should do).

Even if the mind is indeed deterministic, there is no reason to think that our decisions are solely governed by the pursuit of predicted pleasures, unless every decision we make fits into a calculus - the outcome of which is to designate which pleasures to pursue. That sounds ridiculous to me; people consciously trade greater pleasures for smaller, and also make decisions impulsively; no single calculus governs every decision.

If the mind is deterministic because we are programmed to seek predicted pleasures exclusively, then how is it that people can make erroneous decisions that cause things to end horribly even when enough factors are known to make a decision that will result in a predicted pleasure? If the calculus is wrong even with enough information, then the deterministic nature of said calculus can be disputed. In fact, I would say that it cannot be deterministic - or maybe just not all of the time.

Is the mind deterministic because it moves towards its predictions of pleasure or does it move towards its predictions of pleasure because it is deterministic? Those two things sound different to me.

free will is an illusion. the mind is deterministic and moves towards its predictions of pleasure — Miller

You can't just lay that on someone. What is your reasoning? Do you believe that the mind is housed in the brain?

Damn dude, did you even think about your response?

useless and impossible. you are simply expanding your mind — Miller

What do you mean "impossible"? I'm not saying something about merging with some higher supernatural power or something, but rather just realizing that sometimes you need to accept the bad and the even worse, and that pain and application can make you better.

no it doesnt. it requires you predict a greater pleasure on the other side. you go to work all week then you get a paycheck. if you dont know about the paycheck you wont do the work — Miller

The paycheck, to me, is the heightened insight, which can only be achieved through acceptance of pain and hard work. Predicting the reward does not circumvent the difficulties in achieving said insight.

What if you worked for a vet school and had to kill fifty chickens for dissection. You will be rewarded with one thousand dollars for completing the job. Being an intelligent person such as yourself, Miller, you decide to stuff them into bags and gas them. You dump them out and they appear to be dead.

They aren't.

Soon they all wake up and start clucking and strutting around. Do you proceed to break the necks of all fifty chickens, or do you give up? I would hazard to guess that you would give up, despite the sizeable reward. Mostly because to those who aren't starving, in serious debt, etc. it wouldn't be worth it.

you can go through pain if you are predicting a greater pleasure on the other side

therefore its still hedonism — Miller

I'm not saying you achieve a greater pleasure out the other side of self-reflection, but rather that you gain a heightened insight into existence and, more specifically, the application of pain as involved in achieving said insight. But even if one did look at it so cynically, trading pain for greater pleasures necessitates a certain self-discipline that could only be achieved through accepting pain and rigor, like I said in the OP. Either way, it seems to be enlightenment to me.

How do you define "enlightenment"? How would you know that you were "enlightened"? Would anyone else recognize your "enlightenment"? — Bitter Crank

I define it vaguely as a sort of heightened insight achieved through rigorous self-reflection.

As for knowing when it has been reached: idk, I myself just started thinking about this whole enlightenment thing a day ago.

Question: Is knowing how many kicks, miles, pounds, laps, etc. one can perform. It's certainly useful information. The first 100 mile a day bike ride I did was tiring (I had worked up to it) but it wasn't enlightening. It was just nice to know I could do it. Would I have been enlightened if I had gone 200 miles in 1 day? — Bitter Crank

I'm trying to say that the attitude fostered by the type of enlightenment I'm talking about is the type of attitude that gets things done - even if it's hard. Being ready to push the limits of one's own abilities regularly is not typical among most of the people I have met outside of martial arts. Not that they are unenlightened or anything, but rather they just don't have that kind of drive necessary for what I'm talking about. And I'm not just referring to the application involved in martial arts.

There are probably numerous routes to enlightenment (whatever that is) and none of them are probably reliable. — Bitter Crank

I agree. One's person's path to enlightenment will almost certainly be different from another's.

It's probably useful to discover one's actual performance limits, provided one is healthy enough to test the limit. Most of the time we aren't asked to do anything like that in a situation where much is at stake. — Bitter Crank

Another good point. I haven't had to actually defend myself against anything with my limited martial arts abilities, whereas someone like Jocko has actually been shot before (I think).

Great responses!

I am and never have been anywhere near an athlete, but I did play football and wrestled in high school. If you play sports, there is a phrase you will hear all the time, at least you would have when I was a kid. I have always liked it a lot - Suck it up. Don't cry. Don't complain. Get off your ass. Get back to work. It's a very male thing to say, which is one of the reasons I like it. I think it highlights better than almost anything else the good and bad things about being a man. It makes me laugh. — T Clark

Couldn't agree more; I have also heard from one of my coaches that pain is illusory, which is equally funny - because it obviously isn't - but it can often times be compartmentalized, which is what I think he was trying to say. One time when I couldn't finish my body-kick reps at the end of the class I said I couldn't do it, which prompted one of the other students to say: "you shouldn't be able to breathe right now."

I mean, what the fuck, I was trying my hardest, literally couldn't do another kick, and I get told that I should kick until I am so out of breath I can't talk. But that kind of mentality is what gets the job done, I guess, because I ended up finishing the reps and felt like I was going to pass out.

Call it what you will - and maybe it's a little toxic, but I think it is not such a bad thing if tempered with the kind of thoughtfulness displayed by you and Jack.

I wouldn't necessarily trust a Navy seal to be able to understand the significance of that. — T Clark

Yeah, he probably doesn't, but I still like what the guy has to say with regards to how to conduct oneself.

many people have difficult life experiences and trauma. It can be damaging and even lead to mental health problems, stress and PTSD among other difficulties. On the other hand, it may be that suffering does lead to some increased awareness, whether it is strictly called 'enlightenment' as such. Most of us try to avoid too much suffering, but may be it ushers in some kind of wisdom through the back door, it is possible not to be broken by it too greatly. But it may be more about psychological kicks rather than necessarily in the form of physical kicks. — Jack Cummins

Yeah, I'm not saying all, or even most, pain is good, but rather that pain that makes us tougher or better in some way is good. Sparring, although potentially painful, will make you a better fighter, whereas whipping yourself with a leather belt, which is also potentially painful, will not. So it is that it is worth incurring some pain to better oneself by sparring, and desirable to avoid the whipping.

And yeah, pain that breaks someone or causes maladaptation is really not so good.

what if human injustices are not seen as injustices by God because God knows things we do not? Etc. — Tom Storm

The existence of unknown reasons or facts does not imply that even if one knows the relevant facts or reasons, the relevant facts or reasons do not determine if some course of action or conclusion is justified or not justified. Just because Bill has not told me he is a hockey player doesn't mean I cannot draw the conclusion that if he ice skates there is a good chance he plays hockey. The same goes for a sense of justice.

Would it not be better stated as "If god is just and omnipotent they would not allow injustices to occur." (using gender neutral pronouns) — Tom Storm

I was assuming that god is omnipotent; I'm carrying this argument over from Bartricks' problem of evil thread. Might want to give that a read first if you want to understand exactly why I formed this argument.

My other reservation with this point is that it presumes to know how God would view human injustice. There are assumptions baked into the premise and frankly there are too many unknowns to justify the claim. For one, what if human injustices are not seen as injustices by God because God knows things we do not? Etc. — Tom Storm

This matters little for my argument. Even if we are indeed living out god's idea of justice, that's an idea of justice that is absolutely repulsive. A child murderer can walk free and healthy while a devoted humanist slowly loses his cognitive functions from developing Huntington's. That fact is, to me, unacceptable, and requires no more knowledge than that gained from glancing at a newspaper.

As I see it, your syllogism is willingly accepting claims that have not been sufficiently justified. — Tom Storm

Then, once again, check out the argument I had with Bartricks. If you can find an issue with their solution to the problem of evil my argument is not necessary.

Deleted.

That does not seem true to me. Rather, it seems that people believe that a human-benevolent god exists.

If we are to assume an omnibenevolent god and we are to assume that god is the creator of all, then god must show unlimited good will to all creation, not just humanity. The very idea of injustice is entirely human. It is not a moral dilemma (for most) to eat an animal - but to feed a human to an animal is considered evil. To god, kind to all, both must be of equal magnitude. — Hermeticus

It seems to me you are conflating justice, which I agree is a decidedly human idea, with benevolence. And I think people do believe god is omnibenevolent, or at least approaching omnibenevolent. Someone can hold the concept of god's omnibenevolence and the fact that other creatures they believe to be created by god in one way or another are expendable: it is just part of god's omnibenevolence, as the creatures we slaughter serve a purpose in god's all encompassing goodness, and it is a good for humans to be front and center. It's bordering on fallacious to stuff all of those things into the idea of "omnibenevolence", but people seem to do it.

I have heard no reason to hold a belief in any kind of deity, so arguably this entire argument can be swept away. But I like arguments and I don't see how the first premise is justified — Tom Storm

I will make a new, more direct argument - since you aren't the only one getting hung up on that:

(1) If god is just he does not allow injustices to occur.
(2) God allows injustices to occur.
(3) Therefore, god is not just.

Even as an atheist I ask myself, theoretically, who are we to know what a god would want? All we have are claims and a few dubious old books that are written by humans. Gods remains silent on all matters and leaves all communication to human spokespeople. (How could this possibly go wrong?) For all we know any hypothetical god is a cunt and why would it not be? Just pinning some 'omni' words onto some image of any kind of deity accomplishes nothing. — Tom Storm

But people do believe god is all of those things you say he likely is not. Thus I'm making the argument I'm making: I'm trying to use the contradictions inherent in people's idea of god to show that he cannot be what they think he is, that he must be a "cunt". And yeah, I agree with everything you are saying, but I think you are missing the point.

Justice itself requires a choice between good and evil. You cannot punish someone who has no faculty of choice/ decision making. That’s why one can be “not guilty by insanity”. — Benj96

I know. Thus I would expect a just god to take that into account when meting out punishments - and it appears as if he doesn't. All the more reason to think he isn't just.

Even the concept of “good” itself necessitates the existence of evil. Otherwise goodness would be meaningless. — Benj96

I disagree; I think goodness only necessitates a choice between good and evil, not actual evil. Does not breaking a law require that criminals exist? I think not.

So in the case of an omnibenevolent god an antithesis is required - an omnimalevolence. Otherwise how would such benevolence be practised and how could we ever “right” the injustices if said injustices never existed. — Benj96

I don't understand this at all. Could you explain why an omnimalevolence is required? I agree that justice necessitates evil, but why does omnibenevolence require omnimalevolence? Just so that it has meaning?

It’s just like saying can something be completely white? But is white white without black? Without any semblance of contrast to give it its unique definition it cannot exist in that way. — Benj96

That seems like a specious analogy; we have gradations of good and evil without omnimalevolence. People do evil things all the time and good things all the time and, thus, we know what bad is and what good is without a purely evil being. Furthermore, we have an objective criterion for what omnibenevolence is under DCT: an adherence to all of the laws god creates. You might make the argument that DCT doesn't allow for a truly omnibenevolent god because morality's content could change according to god's whims, but that is not really relevant atm as you can just take the other horn of the dilemma.

Furthermore, there may be no scientific way of proving that god doesn't exist, so if one can find an argument that operates from within people's beliefs that can leverage some sort of conclusion that is ideal - and perhaps the only way to prove them wrong definitively. Otherwise the god question is open.

Existence or not of God says nothing about good on evil. Good and evil are just what religions added to "God's concept". — dimosthenis9

I agree. But I'm not really arguing about god's existence or non-existence, but rather about his characteristics given the problem of his potential unjustness.

People who believe in God in all these arguments against them, just say "it's God plan" and end of story.
So if your goal is to prove them wrong you won't achieve much. — dimosthenis9

Yeah, maybe, but I can at least make an argument that makes people like Bartricks think a little. I mean, do you really think it is that futile?

false premise — dimosthenis9

You really love writing that.

Oh I understand now, my bad.

I don't understand what you are agreeing with. I thought you were agreeing with @dimosthenis9

Same it is a true premise if only you can verify it's true. And you can't. So it is unknown what God would be ("good" or "bad") if he exists. — dimosthenis9

Yes, but people believe that an omnibenevolent god exists - most people in fact, or so it would seem. The purpose of the argument contained in the problem of evil and my argument is to show that god cannot be what they think he is; their very idea of god is contradictory. If no one believed in an omnibenevolent/omniscient/omnipresent/omnipotent being with free will I wouldn't make this argument.

You are really missing the point of this.

I get what you are doing, but you are not engaging with the OP. I'm assuming certain premises to make a counterargument against the viable solution to the problem of evil that Bartricks provided.

Says who? If there is God why he should be a "good" one? It's a false premise where you built your argument on. Same Bartricks did at his own thread. — dimosthenis9

It is only a false premise if you can verify that it is not true. I think that you mean that it is unsupported, and it definitely is, and, thus, my argument applies in very specific (but possible) conditions. You wouldn't claim that every thought experiment or counterargument is false merely because it assumes certain premises - which are often derived from another's arguments - would you?

Honestly, it seems to me you have no understanding of what compels people to believe what they believe, or any connection to humanity at all. It's a little sad, whoever you are right now, Bartricks.