Now I am really confused! If the joy I feel is not play, then what is play? — Athena

I like the way @bert1 said it:

play is non-goal directed activity. — bert1

All of the events you describe - the Steam Engine event, the archeological dig, etc. - could be play, but the events you were talking about previously:

Excuse me, but I love work parties. You know, where everyone shows up to accomplish a goal, building a barn, or stuffing envelopes, or feeding over 100 people a Thanksgiving dinner. I also don't understand why being happy and working together is not the goal even when we are paid to do something. — Athena

These are goal oriented and I don't think of them as play. Maybe that seems nitpicky, but I don't think it is. The distinction is important. On the other hand, both things are wonderful.

Im not taking the step Clarke is where he jumps to conclusions about your position or character. I would have told him to fuck off too. — DingoJones

No "e" on Clark. I jumped to no conclusions about his position. He was pretty clear on what he proposed - taking away people's assets and removing them from their positions in society. That's what we did to the Japanese-Americans during WW2. We sent them to concentration camps.

Also, I made no reference to @i like sushi's character. Now you are jumping to conclusions.

So then you would place a much higher value on the subjective aspect of experience, relative to the meaning of the objective aspect? — Pantagruel

I'm not sure what you mean in this context.

I don’t see any mention of concentration camps so fuck off. — I like sushi

Again. You just aren't willing to take responsibility for your own words. As I mentioned, the US had concentration camps for Japanese-Americans during World War 2. That's how they took away their assets and influence. So, tell me. What methods will you use to implement your program of unconstitutional actions?

If that’s what you get from what I wrote go away and bother someone else please. — I like sushi

You specifically and clearly propose taking away people's property and social position, apparently based on a half-baked judgement of whether or not you think they are stupid. If the fact that I pointed that out bothers you, well, it should. It bothers me too. You need to take responsibility for your words.

Material knowledge must be quantifiable in some subjectively meaningful sense. — Pantagruel

I don't really think so. I don't think that the average person living today understands how the world works better than Aristotle.

But in terms of cultural attitudes I do think there is something we can do to shift power/status/influence of Stupid people where it is clear Stupidity is ruling. In such a case recognising and logging outcomes that are both detrimental to everyone short term and long term would result in such citizens being stripped of any reasonable influence. I don’t mean ‘imprisoned’ or ‘blamed’ just remove their assets (gained through luck maybe?) and isolate them more from impacting negatively upon others. I am talking about this at the highest degrees of status/power/influence rather than across the entire social strata simply because those that are stupid and in possession of greater status/power/influence can cause untold damage to themselves and many others whilst remaining oblivious to the fact. — I like sushi

I don't find the definition of stupidity in your OP a very useful one. I don't have any additional comments about that, but I do about your prescription for dealing with the problem, as described in the quote, above.

In order to implement your program - stripping people of influence, removing assets, isolation - you will have to abandon property rights and the Bill of Rights. Which is ok, I guess. We've done it before - we sent Japanese-Americans to Manzanar during World War 2 and various American Indian tribes to reservations after taking away their property and rights. Yeah, that's what we need. Some concentration camps.

Is the mind in what is understood, or in the way in which it understands? — Pantagruel

When I read what people have written - 100 years ago, 500, 1,000, 2,500 - I'm usually amazed by how sophisticated they are. People in Athens, China, Alexandria, were just as smart, perceptive, skillful, wise as they are now. Their mastery of the technologies that were available to them were just as impressive and admirable. I like reading about sea battles during the Napoleonic wars. It took as much skill, knowledge, competence, and certainly courage to sail one of those ships as it does to sail a modern warship.

Sure, we know more stuff now than they did back then, but we aren't smarter or wiser. Today we use science. Those guys invented it.

Toljaso — Mww

One of my favorite philosophers.

It’s either true or false. That’s enough of a difference for me. — NOS4A2

Well argued.

One more thought - If you want to know what we can do to make things better, the answer is simple and obvious - vote Democratic.

Censure still has zero effect. — NOS4A2

That's what's known as a distinction without a difference.

Some things need collective action to do. In other words, I find the universal blame argument to be BS. — James Riley

I didn't see my response as blaming anyone, it's just not as simple as you make it out to be. I have a lot of respect for our environmental laws and the effort it has taken to pass, implement, and enforce them. This is especially true given the knee-jerk resistance from industry and their political friends. It's made a big difference. I've seen first hand how clunky the system is, but it has worked. It has made things better. That is collective action.

Or by Dupont and the private-for-profit corporations buying legislatures, and everyone looking the other way while dangerous chemicals are placed into the stream of commerce? — James Riley

Dangerous chemicals were placed in the stream of commerce from the beginning of humanity. People have been shitting in the river upstream from their neighbors since Og met Eep. It took thousands of years for restrictions to even try to catch up. The world used to be big enough you could dump stuff and nobody would notice. That doesn't work any more. It has also turned out that the hidden out of the way places we've been dumping stuff - wetlands, rivers, oceans - are just about the worst places to dump stuff.

So, did those people get their way through free market forces? After the public was honestly and openly informed? Or are our politicians part of the market, to be bought? — James Riley

The answer here is the same as for all other cases where there is conflict between what's right for people and what's right for them what's got. Sometimes the good guys win. Sometimes they lose. Usually a little bit of both.

Should there be compensation for bearing costs? Are taxes paid to help pick up the mess? Is Superfund part of that? Is that adequate for the kid with growths on his brain? — James Riley

The cleanup laws; federal, state, local; are theoretically set up to make the one that benefitted from contaminating the world pay. As always, the process machinery is creaky and sometimes breaks down.

To the extent it does do it badly, unfairly, or even corruptly, why is that? — James Riley

Because that's the way everything works. Laws and regulations are not a good substitute for good intentions, good neighbors, and stewardship of our world. This is especially true when the goals you are working for are controversial and cost money.

I'm sorry if I took your discussion somewhere different from what you intended.

spreading the waste around to those who did not agree to carry those costs; especially those who didn't even avail themselves of the user's product from which the byproduct resulted. — James Riley

There aren't many who "didn't even avail themselves." Almost everything we use in our technological society generates waste, some more toxic than others. Our food is grown with chemicals. We drive our cars using gasoline. Electronic stuff uses all sorts of toxic materials. Nobody really gets off the hook. I grew up in a Dupont family - Better things for better living through chemistry.

really didn't want to discuss RCRA or specifics. I was trying to get at the idea of society, needs, wants, cost externalization, who bears, who should bear, who (if anyone) should not bear? Should loss be compensated? Should compensation, if any, be off set by some perceived benefit? — James Riley

I recognized that you had a broader question in mind. I wasn't trying to be difficult in my response. I guess I was bothered by how simplistic you had made it by ignoring our society as it now exists. The hazardous waste management system was exactly set up to deal with "who bears, who should bear, who (if anyone) should not bear." You can say it doesn't do it very well and I won't disagree. The idea of including all the costs, even indirect ones, into the cost of products is controversial. People don't like it when you make it harder to make money.

If society is spreading a burden, shouldn't it at least say "Okay, we know this is bad, but we are going to do it anyway because we think the benefits outweigh the costs." — James Riley

Again, I guess I think it already does do that; perhaps badly, unfairly, even corruptly; with our environmental laws. You have had the misfortune to get involved in a discussion of environmental issues with a retired environmental engineer who hasn't had a chance to be a smarty-pants for a while.

Might they discover considering the happiness of the employees is a good policy? — Athena

I've been thinking that any long-term change will not be in the employers, but the employees. I think, maybe, a lot of people have seen that there is a better way to live. There's at least a 50% chance that's a pipe dream.

Excuse me, but I love work parties. You know, where everyone shows up to accomplish a goal, building a barn, or stuffing envelopes, or feeding over 100 people a Thanksgiving dinner. I also don't understand why being happy and working together is not the goal even when we are paid to do something. There isn't enough money in the world to pay for many of the jobs people do, so an employer needs to think of other ways to make the job enjoyable. Because they do not, I have volunteered most of my life instead of working for money. — Athena

Everything you say is true, except the things you identify are not play. They're something else, something good, but not play.

That’s the effect of their blind, censorial rage. Censure requires no compulsory action. — NOS4A2

You wrote:

Censure has zero effect beyond political finger-wagging, anyways. So, along with the press and woke social media CEOs, congress will make a big show of it, but that's about the end of it. — NOS4A2

I just pointed out that Gosar's punishment, justified or not, is more than just a "big show." It has a substantive impact on his role and effectiveness in Congress.

Perhaps, if work is goal-directed activity, play is non-goal directed activity. Any good? — bert1

Yes. I think this is a good way of thinking about it.

Thus, the manufacturer of the product is not liable for how the product he makes is actually used, nor for the by-product of the use (waste). — James Riley

The party that generates the waste is responsible for managing it. The product manufactured is not waste. A material doesn't become waste until it is thrown away. That seems like a reasonable way to handle it.

There is no doubt in the world that RCRA is a clunky, complicated set of laws and regulations, but it has made a difference in how chemical wastes are managed. When I was a cabinetmaker, we used to dump used solvent out on the railroad tracks behind our shop. I'm sure there are plenty of small companies that still do things like that, but DuPont and Monsanto generally don't.

The cost of legal disposal is so great that the barrel can be attached to the bottom of a semi-tractor trailer and dripped out, drip by drip, on an intra-continental trip. Or dumped in the New Jersey Pine Barrens. Or at sea. Or run through RVs into RV park dump stations. It's called "midnight dumping." — James Riley

Sure, it can, but it doesn't. At least not in the great majority of cases. If you're looking for a perfect set of laws and regulations with perfect enforcement, RCRA definitely isn't one although, as I've noted, it's made a big difference.

I guess the important point for me in relation to this particular discussion is that, when your Substance Y is generated as waste, it will likely be managed under solid or hazardous waste laws and regulations that already exist. There won't be a new policy. If you want to talk about the inadequacies of existing policy, that seems to me to be a different subject.

Censure has zero effect beyond political finger-wagging, anyways. So, along with the press and woke social media CEOs, congress will make a big show of it, but that's about the end of it. — NOS4A2

They also took away two of his more important committee memberships. That's not "zero effect."

This is serious business. — James Riley

Serious play. Probably the place where I am most playful is with words. Playful language can be very serious. From "Romeo and Juliet:"

No, ’tis not so deep as a well, nor so wide as a church door, but ’tis enough. ’Twill serve. Ask for me tomorrow, and you shall find me a grave man.

Your new statement seems to say that there cannot be evidence for what may be called "qualia".
Your previous statement seems to say that there can be evidence for what may be called "qualia" — RussellA

At the end of the statement you quoted it says "No, I don't believe that."

Assume we have needs on the left: Space, air, water, food, and to a variable extent, clothing, shelter and society. On the right we have wants. Assume there is something everyone wants. Call it X. Assume the creation of X results in an unavoidably necessary byproduct called Y. Let’s say Y is universally understood as bad. — James Riley

This OP badly needs an example — bert1

The US has a complex system of laws and regulations that deals with treatment and disposal of wastes from industrial operations. The goal is to force the inclusion of the waste management costs in the overall cost of the item. The whole need/want distinction doesn't apply. Whether it should is a different question.

ludic — 180 Proof

New word. Thanks.

What theories of play interest you and what exactly is it that you are talking about when you think about 'play'? Also, what is a 'best' way to play? — I like sushi

Whatever else play may be, it has to be completely spontaneous. It has to come from inside each in accordance with our true nature. If it's of "deadly importance" it's not play. If it can be classified as good, better, or best, it's not play.

Only where love and need are one,
And the work is play for mortal stakes,
Is the deed ever really done
For heaven and the future’s sakes.

Robert Frost. "Two Tramps at Mud Time"

Any property we think of is only a property if there is something that doesn't have it. "Orange" makes sense because you can take something orange, and something that is not orange, and point to the difference. If you couldn't, no one would be able to learn what "orange" means. Same with all the other properties. We understand them because there is something that doesn't have them, and something that does. — khaled

There is nothing wrong, or contradictory, or even difficult about the idea that something can be two things at the same time - diversity and unity. It's a matter of perspective and the situation at hand.

Now, who is most in the wrong here ? — Hello Human

This is a silly example. I don't know why you're trying so hard. You don't have to agree with me.

And how should the government, and law in general choose the way the conflict will be resolved ? — Hello Human

For us here in the US, it's called representative democracy corrupted by corporate influence. Not ideal, but that's what we've got.

The MRI scanner can make measurements of your brain when you look at the colour red, but can the MRI scanner determine that you are experiencing what Chalmers calls the "qualia" of the colour red and others call the subjective experience of the colour red ? — RussellA

I have two responses.

First, most people on the forum here don't accept personal experience as evidence. A good example is reported personal experience of God. Based on that, there is no evidence at all for qualia, so, yes, it is a metaphysical property or meaningless. No, I don't believe that.

Second, the whole "hard problem of consciousness" is a made up problem. Consciousness is a mental process. Mental processes grow, emerge I suppose, out of brain processes the way life emerges out of chemistry. What's the big deal? No, I don't want to get into a discussion of the hard problem of consciousness here.

I really like Dennis and I've tried to put into words what it is he does. I haven't to my satisfaction yet. I'm not really sure why your poem reminded me of it. Maybe they're both about what comes after disappointment.

Why not? They're not just comments, but arguments. — Bartricks

You gave your reasons why minimalist government is preferable. I disagree and gave my reasons why an activist government is needed.

Assume we have needs on the left: Space, air, water, food, and to a variable extent, clothing, shelter and society. On the right we have wants. Assume there is something everyone wants. Call it X. Assume the creation of X results in an unavoidably necessary byproduct called Y. Let’s say Y is universally understood as bad. — James Riley

In general, diluting chemical substances to meet toxicity standards is not allowed under US environmental law. I assume that's similar in most other countries. Requirements are even more stringent when it comes to putting something into food. I can't imagine a situation where putting toxic substances into the food supply would be acceptable. Right now it is common to discharge chemicals, after treatment, into the air and water. There are rigorous laws and regulations that would be applicable. That would be a natural way of dealing with the material.

Getting back to dilution - although you can't usually use dilution to meet standards, those standards themselves often take dilution into account along with other mitigation mechanisms such as chemical or biological degradation in the environment, absorption onto soil, and others.

As for "cost-effective," just being cheaper doesn't make it cost effective. You have to take into account the effective part too. As I noted, any technology that required discharge of toxic substances into the environment at concentrations above standards developed based on risk to humans would not be considered effective.

I won't give specific responses to your specific comments, I'll just lay out my general philosophy of government.

A society where a significant portion of it's citizens live unhappy lives of poverty, hardship, and despair; especially while another significant portion lives lives of luxury and overindulgence; is not a good society. When other institutions can't or don't work to overcome these conditions, a good government will step in and do what's needed and what's right.

I like this. It made me think a bit of a poet I like, Carl Dennis. A lot of his poetry has that same feeling of an ironic place between success and failure, of things not being what one might have hoped for, but still of value. Small victories in a life of gentle disappointment. Here's one:

Before dawn, while you’re still sleeping,
Playing the part of a dreamer whose house is an ark
Tossed about by a flood that will never subside,
Its dove doomed to return with no twig,
Your neighbor’s already up, pulling his boots on,
Playing the part of a fisherman,
Gathering gear and loading his truck
And driving to the river and wading in
As if fishing is all he’s ever wanted.

Three trout by the time you get up and wash
And come to breakfast served by a woman who smiles
As if you’re first on her short list of wonders,
And you greet her as if she’s first on yours.
Then you’re off to school to fulfill your promise
To lose yourself for once in your teaching
And forget the clock facing your desk. Time to behave
As if the sun’s standing still in a painted sky
And the day isn’t a page in a one-page notebook
To be filled by sundown or never filled,
First the lines and then the margins,
The words jammed in till no white shows.

And while you’re speaking as if everyone’s listening,
A mile from school, at the city hall,
The mayor is behaving as if it matters
That the blueprints drawn up for the low-rent housing
Include the extra windows he’s budgeted,
That the architects don’t transfer the funds
To shutters and grates as they did last year
But understand that brightness is no extravagance.

And when lunch interrupts him, it’s a business lunch
To plan the autumn parade, as if the fate of the nation
Hangs on keeping the floats of the poorer precincts
From looking skimpy and threadbare. The strollers out on the street today
Don’t have to believe all men are created equal,
All endowed by their creator with certain rights,
As long as they behave as if they do,
That the blueprints drawn up for the low-rent housing
Include the extra windows he’s budgeted,
That the architects don’t transfer the funds
To shutters and grates as they did last year
But understand that brightness is no extravagance.
And when lunch interrupts him, it’s a business lunch
To plan the autumn parade, as if the fate of the nation
Hangs on keeping the floats of the poorer precincts
From looking skimpy and threadbare.

The strollers out on the street today
Don’t have to believe all men are created equal,
All endowed by their creator with certain rights,
As long as they behave as if they do,
As if it’s wondering what the man is thinking,
Its gray eyes glinting like tin or glass.

Sorry, I won't be much help. The only current poet I read is Carl Dennis, and he definitely doesn't look like your cup of tea. If you find anything you do like, post it one one of the two poetry threads here in the Lounge - "Philosophical Poetry" and "Just Poems."

I don't really like this poem that much, but I love the way it feels in my mouth when I read it out loud.

Laughing Song - William Blake

When the green woods laugh with the voice of joy,
And the dimpling stream runs laughing by;
When the air does laugh with our merry wit,
And the green hill laughs with the noise of it;
When the meadows laugh with lively green,
And the grasshopper laughs in the merry scene,
When Mary and Susan and Emily
With their sweet round mouths sing "Ha, ha he!"
When the painted birds laugh in the shade,
Where our table with cherries and nuts is spread:
Come live, and be merry, and join with me,
To sing the sweet chorus of "Ha, ha, he!"

One funny association for me. The line "When painted birds laugh in the shade" made me think of "The Painted Bird" by Jerzy Kosiński, one of the bleakest novels I've ever read.

Also it is ironic that with the "Hitler doctrine" a super power doesn't necessarily win all or even most of the wars they fight. A super power just keep enough countries that "might" go to war or engage in aggressive behavior to think twice about doing it and/or not do as much of it as if they they were unopposed. The tactic is basically to keep any country or Axis of countries from getting too big for us to handle and the hope is by stalling them while trying to get bigger, it will buy us enough time for us to do something before they get to bigger -sort of like in WWII we were able to ramp up military manufacturing before Japan and Germany could become too much of a threat. — dclements

I agree with much of what you say, although not with the doctrine you describe above. The world has changed. We're not the only big fish in the pond anymore. There are more and more of them and there will continue to be more and more and more.

Back to the beginning. China is not acting like Germany in the 1930s. It is acting like the US has since the Monroe Doctrine. Throwing it's weight around. Interfering with other country's legitimate national interests.

World War II was worth what it cost, I guess. I suspect the Korean War was not, although I don't know enough to to say definitely. As for Vietnam, Iraq, Libya, Grenada, the Dominican Republic, the Bay of Pigs - I was alive for those. They were definitely not worth it. They were not in the US national interest. They hurt us more than helped.

Also, there are nuclear weapons now. That changes everything.

Unless their manner of pursuing happiness causes more suffering than happiness. — Hello Human

No. Unless their pursuit of happiness conflicts with someone else's life, liberty, or pursuit of happiness. If it does, something will have to be worked out. The Declaration goes on to say "... that to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men.." According to our values, the government should be set up to deal with the conflicts that will always arise.

I know that I have the subjective experience of colours. I believe that you also have the subjective experience of colours.

I can never know that you have, and I can never demonstrate that you have, but for me, the possibility that you have a subjective experience of colours has both a truth value and meaning.

The truth value is that the proposition "T Clark has the subjective experience of colours" is either true or false. — RussellA

Comparing the multiverse to the experience of color is not a good analogy. There is strong evidence that I experience the color red. When you hold up a card colored red, ask me what color it is, and then I say red. When my brain lights up in a red way on the MRI. That's all evidence, whether or not you want to say it is not absolute proof.

When I see someone cry out when they've been injured, crying and holding their arm, do you doubt they feel pain? They'll tell you they are. They'll act like they are. They act like I do when I experience pain. If you were to put someone in pain in an MRI, I think their brain would light up the same way mine does when I am in pain. We're built the same, mechanically, anatomically, physiologically, neurologically, psychologically.

Then you'll want to talk about P-zombies which... Well, no we won't go there.

I was watching a television news show a few years ago. They were showing how MRI technology was starting to be used to read minds. They would show someone pictures while in the device. After they had built up an MRI "vocabulary," they would show the same pictures to someone else. Based on their vocabulary, they could tell when they were looking at the same pictures as the previous subject.

I understand that, but my point is that you cannot make any progress in answering the question if you are not clear on the criteria that the answer should satisfy. Without that the question is effectively meaningless (as you like to say). — SophistiCat

Meaningless for you, because of the particular epistemic criteria that you set out for yourself in this case: if you can't put a proposition to an empirical test, then it is meaningless. (Not so for others, so they must be applying different criteria.) — SophistiCat

I think you are really saying the same thing I am, just using different language. I say "metaphysics" you say "different epistemic criteria." The epistemic criteria you use is what Collingwood would call an absolute presupposition. Different people in different times doing different work use different absolute presuppositions. I never claimed that my particular way of seeing things has some priority. I've said the opposite in fact.

Now, in the OP you want to turn the question onto that epistemic criterion itself. But that's clearly inapt: an epistemic criterion is not the sort of thing that you can test by the methods of science. — SophistiCat

Exactly. As I've said over and over, it's not science, it's metaphysics. It has no truth value. It's something we choose, usually unconsciously.

It doesn't matter anyway because either is imaginable as a possibility, but both would seem to be impossible to confirm or dis-confirm. — Janus

I was reading somewhere recently that some astronomers think it may be possible to look for evidence of multiverses associated with cosmic inflation by looking at anomalies in the cosmic microwave background. Can't remember where I saw that.