Ah, you missed the sore arse and lifelong psychological damage. Good. — Banno

Well, the sore ass, at least. I represented a sufferer of priestly abuse, though.

Holy Mother Church gave me a great deal. A love of reading, learning, tradition; a fascination with the Roman Empire, of which it is a kind of ghost; an interest in the ancient pagan religions and philosophers it borrowed from so freely. So, I'm not ungrateful, but haven't been a son for many years.

I made my bones, so to speak, in a Church where the mass was said in Latin. I was a wine-pouring, patin-holding participant in the great Latin rite, and chanted away in that language with the best of them. I refer to the pallid, monotonous, grotesquely banal ceremony and liturgy which replaced it.

When believing in a doctrine comes to require not only an effort, but one that demands acceptance of unsubstantiated assumptions and the repeated performance of uninspiring ceremonies, it's hard to remain a believer. I'm just saying.

An aboriginal, who is referred to as a "redskin."

To me it evokes a brave warrior. — NOS4A2

Who is a Redskin.

I once read a book about the Amos n' Andy radio show. In its earliest days, the white actors who portrayed (racially stereotypical) black characters were popular and respected among the black community. The acceptance of status quo is pretty common, but that doesn't mean the status quo should be perpetuated. — Relativist

Yes. But it may be no argument was intended, and the poster merely wanted to express disapproval of the change of name from "Redskins" in some inoffensive manner--trying to be politically incorrect in a politically correct way, perhaps. I think the reaction against being "politically correct" is sometimes merely a half-assed way of justifying loutishness. If you think the name shouldn't be changed, say so and honestly say why--no doubt there are those who think "Redskins" is a perfectly acceptable name.

9 out of 10 Native Americans are not offended by the Washington Redskins name, and in fact many express admiration for it,

88% of Native Americans oppose political correctness.
— NOS4A2

Let's assume that's true. Do you think the name should not be changed? If so, why do you want the name to remain "Redskins"? If you think it should be changed, what is your complaint? If you don't care, why make an issue of it?

Yes. Though I'd maintain that we readily distinguish between dreaming of doing something and doing it, and have no reason confuse one from another.

Hygienics of your example aside, Descartes' conception of doubt is as radical as it gets. Radical metaphysical doubt was how our professor characterized it back in the day. So you may doubt what Rene meant by doubt, but it's a minority view. — Pantagruel

We doubt something when we're uncertain of it. That's not a minority view, as you'll find if you consult any dictionary. Uncertainty isn't something we generate when we're feeling philosophical, there are reasons why we are uncertain. In what sense was Descartes uncertain of his existence, and what was the reason for his uncertainty? Was he, sitting in his chair, writing, wearing clothes, etc., suddenly struck by the fact he might not exist? Was he consumed with uncertainty whether he truly was sitting in his chair, writing, wearing clothes, or think that fact he was doing so wasn't pertinent to whether he existed--although he obviously persisted in writing, etc., though he claimed he was uncertain he did?

I don't thing there is any doubt that Descartes did not feel he was indulging in "faux doubt"..... — Pantagruel

How do you know, though? How, or what, would he doubt in order to truly doubt? Something more would be required than the mere statement "I doubt." One has to doubt something. Have you ever tried to doubt you were taking a piss while doing so? When you continued pissing, was your doubt resolved--in which case we must ask why continuing to piss was persuasive--or did you continue to doubt despite continuing to piss--in which case we must ask what would be required in order to convince you that you were pissing?

God's teeth. Does anyone really think that Descartes "doubted" in any serious sense his own existence or that of the rest of the world? That, while pissing for example, he doubted that he really pissed? Why bother treating the response to this indulgence in faux doubt as significant in any way? It seems an oddly futile thing to do, ruminating on the efforts made by a person to establish that what he never really doubted is the case is, indeed, the case.

I think he's calling you a damn Nazi. — praxis

Like Heidegger, you mean? (The response which should be made whenever one is accused of being a Nazi in a philosophy forum--copyright Ciceronianus the White, 2020).

Yet, I feel that it is wrong for me to make decisions that cause self-harm.

I wonder if anyone knows of a philosophical position that suggests self-harm is wrong? — Wheatley

Well, you're clearly not referring to suicide, so arguments that suicide is immoral clearly are inapplicable. You seem to be referring to living in a not very healthy way. I'm not sure, though, just what you mean by "bohemian" as that normally is used to describe someone socially unconventional and, in the old days, a beatnik. But I assume you're not referring to wearing a beret, smoking, playing bongos and hanging out in coffee houses or jazz clubs listening to Charlie Parker or reading Allen Ginsburg and such.

Provided no one else is harmed, though, I think it would be difficult to maintain it's wrong to be unhealthy.

A very fine, very inventive player.

Such a discussion. It makes one long, almost, for the simpler explanations accepted in the past. Certainty has its benefits, especially when its founded in the kind of thinking that came so easily to so many after Darwin (A.D.). Certainly women differ from men, and certainly that's because their purpose is certain, and easily determined by science itself. So says Rudy K., though you have to wonder what men, and what women, he knew well:


Man, a bear in most relations -- worm and savage otherwise, --
Man propounds negotiations, Man accepts the compromise.
Very rarely will he squarely push the logic of a fact
To its ultimate conclusion in unmitigated act.

Fear, or foolishness, impels him, ere he lay the wicked low,
To concede some form of trial even to his fiercest foe.
Mirth obscene diverts his anger --- Doubt and Pity oft perplex
Him in dealing with an issue -- to the scandal of The Sex!

But the Woman that God gave him, every fibre of her frame
Proves her launched for one sole issue, armed and engined for the same,
And to serve that single issue, lest the generations fail,
The female of the species must be deadlier than the male.

Has anyone quoted Oscar Wilde on our Great Republic yet? Old Oscar was a clever fellow. The only country to go from barbarism to decadence without civilization in between, or words to that effect. And he lived in the 19th century. Now, perhaps he'd note there can be no culture without civilization. No culture, no culture wars.

what key ideas have you been exposed to that have completely changed your viewpoint on a belief you previously held? — Risk

None whatsoever, alas. And I so hoped to be convinced, somehow, that I alone exist, that there are no material things, that nobody should be born, that monads exist, that artists should be banned, that everything is composed of water, and so much else. Most of all, of course, I hoped to encounter The Nothing. But no. Sigh.

You'd think it should be clear that the phrase "Black Lives Matter" doesn't mean, nor can it be inferred to mean "Only Black Lives Matter" or "Black Lives Matter More than Other Lives." Apparently not, though it's not unlikely that some are well aware of this but nevertheless claim it does. I continue to think that a course in elementary logic and rhetoric should be required at the high school level, but that's one of the things that won't happen.

I think history teaches us that oppressed people have always protested that their lives matter, with good reason as they're treated as if their lives did not. I tend to agree with @180Proof that willful ignorance plays a part in the outrage against the phrase.

Ah. Thank you. Perhaps I don't miss him that much after all.

The way I see it, Stoicism in the philosophical sense isn’t so much about a ‘stiff upper lip’ or enduring pain without expressing feelings at all (that’s a limited view), but about learning to be aware of feelings BEFORE we express them, rather than after, and evaluating the effectiveness of options for expression in terms of the timing, language, situation, target, etc of our interaction. It’s an awareness that there is more going on than simply stimulus-response, and that we can always strive to see the bigger picture and understand why people are motivated towards judgement, desire or inclination. — Possibility

Yes. Critics of Stoicism of course claim that we can't control our emotions, and that no real distinction can be drawn between things in our control and those outside our control. Stoicism is a discipline, though, and requires study of our emotions/feelings, the reasons for them and their consequences, and the development of judgment and perspective. So, Marcus Aurelius' so-called Meditations are properly considered a part of that discipline, a practice (as Hadot says); a sort of training. Thinking, reasoning, practicing, one does what one can.

I confess I miss Chomskybot. Now, was Chomskybot postmodernist, if Chomsky was not?

While I agree that part of what was also taught, was that one cannot fret over things they cannot control, and thus 'repression' of emotions per say wasn't the intention, I also submit it became an unintended consequence nonetheless. — 3017amen

It became a kind of caricature, useful to opponents of the school and, much more recently, accepted by those who came to think of Stoics as being Vulcans of a sort. But yes, the common definition of "stoic" came to be a person who can endure pain and injury without showing any feeling. Rather like the word "epicurean" came to be associated with "hedonist."

My position is that the traditional proofs constitute efforts to provide a reasonable basis for a conclusion arrived at largely without a reasonable basis and already accepted to be true.

"Good God, y'all!"

Take stoicism for example. We know that basically during the fall of Roman empire it was used a philosophy of coping; physiological coping skills, in order to get through harsh/tough/difficult times. — 3017amen

The great Roman Stoics lived during the ascent of the Empire, actually. Seneca, Musonius Rufus, Epictetus and Marcus Aurelius lived in the first and second centuries A.C. or C.E. Marcus, the last of them, died in 180. That's not to say there were no Stoics during the long fall of the Western Empire or subsequently in antiquity. There were plenty I would think, as Stoicism and Epicureanism were the dominant philosophical viewpoints during the Empire, until neo-platonism started to spread and the Christian emperors began the relentless extinguishment of pagan philosophy along with pagan religions. The Stoics, though, didn't teach the repression of emotions. Instead, stoic practice involved (and still involves) methods by which to lessen the influence and effect of negative emotions (such as fear and anger) and promote tranquility.

Let's not lump together Wittgenstein and Power-mad Paul-Michel Foucault.

Long ago, they made students at the college I attended read The Structure of Scientific Revolutions. Thus they perpetuated the annoying use of "paradigm" and "paradigm-shift" as buzz words. They also made us read Plato's Republic. Damn them!

Kuhn seemed intent on proclaiming that science is subject to all sorts of un-scientific things, and great scientific discoveries or profound changes in science weren't really the result of (you guessed it) the acclaimed scientific method. I think. It's been awhile.

Anyhow, I view it and postmodernism (to the extent I know anything about it) as a kind of reaction to the worst excesses of the Enlightenment and the faith in the scientific method and reason as methods by which we may obtain a better world. Because it flourished in the Academy, where all is seemingly incubated, the postmodern point of view came to be applied helter-skelter, and I think got out of hand to the point that the use of reason and science was discouraged, even thought declasse in a sense; not done by those in the know.

I wonder at the presumption (as in temerity, audacity) of those who, like Jung, make sweeping declarations regarding our essential nature. What was it about him and his contemporaries (like Freud and Wells, for example) that led them to believe they could proclaim with such assurance? Wells' A Short History of the World is so blithely judgmental of people, so patronizing and dismissive of some and so admiring of others, that it's arrogance inspires a kind of awe.

Rudyard Kipling was inclined to pontificate boldly about the differences between men and women as well--just read The Female of the Species. Notably, Rudy even seems to make a similar distinction between them in that poem as Jung does with his logos and eros. Did it occur to them that what they thought the distinction was merely reflected what those of their time of a certain status thought it was, what they were used to, and so what they thought it should be? Great Proclaimers have few doubts.

Well, not pantheists (every theist, get it? I'm shameless).

Thank you. One does what one can.

Thank you.

Thank you.

He's incorrigible. Can't stop talking, even now. Well, he was a lawyer.

How good to know there are some others who aren't thrilled with Heidegger. You know, I wrote a little poem about Heidegger once. It went something like this:

Mystical Martin Heidegger
Whom some have said wrote trash,
Used to worship Der Fuhrer
Right down to his mustache.
While exhorting German youth
To follow Hitler's lead
He managed to remove the Jews
From Frieberg with all speed.
It's not that he despised those folk
He merely thought it prudent--
He even was inspired to poke at
One who was his student.
One day he said the Nazis failed
But not due to their dealings
It wasn't all the folk they killed...
They had no sense of Being!

Can you give me a synopsis? — 3017amen

Not an easy task, but I'll try. This is just my interpretation.

First, note that in the title Pierce refers to proof of the reality of God, not God's existence.

Pierce maintains that the hypothesis of God necessarily, or inevitably, comes to mind through a form of abductive reasoning. Pierce was a logician and abductive reasoning, which starts with observations and then seeks to find the simplest and most likely conclusion from the observations, was his creation. The earliest stage of abduction is something Pierce calls "musement" or "pure play." This is the unfettered consideration of the universe, consideration without being subject to any limiting rules.

Pierce thought of the universe we normally speak of as consisting in a manner of speaking of three universes. One represents our experience of the possible, one is the universe of our experience of facts, one is our experience of laws which govern the other universes. Through "musement" on the interconnectedness of these universes and the fact that growth is a factor in all of them, and that the universal feature of growth is preparation in earlier stages for later stages, we come, inexorably, to posit the reality of God as simplest explanation for the universe(s).

This is a very simple summary.

. Because when we naturally use our sense of wonder (the Kantian 'all events must have a cause') axiom, then we naturally default to regressive reasons that invoke Anthropology, and the other way around. Causation leads us to inferences about ourselves, our self-awareness, our existence, our consciousness, and other Anthropic theories of existence, etc.. — 3017amen

I'm not sure that suffices to make a reasonable inference, but I think I understand what you're saying and acknowledge its persuasiveness. I would say it's more an evocation than an inference; nothing magical, but like a great work of art, poem or music. Something evokes a kind of conclusion.

Have you ever read C.S. Pierce's article A Neglected Argument for the Reality of God? He can be difficult to read sometimes, but his concept of "musement" fascinates me.

If part of your own conscious existence (intelligence) is both physical and metaphysical, and the idea of intelligence is both physical and metaphysical, then could it be reasonably inferred that intelligence is behind the cause of the universe including your own conscious existence?

In other words, explain how consciousness emerges from complete chaos? — 3017amen

Intelligence is part of the universe (there are intelligent beings in the universe--sometimes, anyway). We may not fully understand it, but it's here, like we are. How can we reasonably infer from the fact that intelligence is in the universe that it is also "someplace" outside of the universe?

I think that if we're inclined to pontificate (it seems an appropriate word) on the subject of the existence of God, and intend to come to any conclusion which might be described as based on a proof, we must content ourselves with "proving" nothing at all, or at most very little.

As is so often the case, definition is essential to any argument. If you want to prove that something exists, it's useful to define that something in the simplest, most abstract manner possible. The less to prove, the better. A creator God must, at the least, have caused the universe to exist. So, it's necessary, at the least, that there must have been something that caused the universe to exist.

Proof of that, according to some, is achieved by one of "Fat Tommy" Aquinas' "proofs" which is mentioned in the OP. That proof he borrowed like so much else from Aristotle.

However, if that "proof" is, in fact, a proof, all it establishes is a "cause" of the universe. But it seems that we can't know anything significant or even meaningful about that cause. It might be argued that such a cause must have existed before the universe did. That could be problematic, though, as "existence" as we know it as concept we define based on characteristics and events which take place in the universe. So, for that matter, is "cause." In fact, anything we know, anything we think, feel, speak of, observe, describe, or do, is based on what takes place in the universe.

So, we can't prove or infer that this "cause" has any of the characteristics we normally attribute to God.
We can't say that it is within us and everything else. We can't say that it's wise, loving, all-knowing, all-powerful, that it is Jesus (or whatever), that it listens to and answers prayers, that it requires we perform certain rituals, that it regulates our sexual conduct or other conduct, etc.

To prove such things about the "first cause" requires much more in the way of proof. I can't understand why the "proofs" of God's existence are of significance to anyone as a result. Believers in God as we normally think of God are reduced to the sad tactic which has been employed by Christian apologists for so long, which is merely to claim that the presumed first cause is Jesus and has all the traits we want it to have, consistent (sometimes) with what we think of Jesus.

It's nice of you to say so. I wander about vaguely here and there.

I sincerely hope you're kidding. — Outlander

If only I had a dollar for all the times Cicero's said that to me.