You don't understand do you?

It takes courage to stand up for what is right.

Your flippancy and excuses express your character. — Protagoras

It's just a forum, and one you don't seem to like very much. The worst that can happen is that you get banned. It's not courage if you risk being mauled by an arthritic, toothless dog.

The irony of a forum full of people debating and talking about ethics, empathy and human rights,and then only two people showing any courage to say," hey this is not right. We can see he wasn't an emotional poster".

Or are all your ethics abstract?
It's how you treat issues like this that expresses your character. Otherwise you are just talkers and echo chamber partisans. — Protagoras

What courage does it take to speak up for someone banned? Answer - none. People do it all the time. Actually, I'm a bit jealous that you're going at it so hard. That's usually my gig.

With respect,that doesn't make sense. How can someone be on the radar for two years? — Protagoras

By the way, you are on their radar now. Seriously.

So the lil shit finally wore-out his welcome? Good riddance. Like a stubborn STD, that self-fellating troll will be back soon with a new handle and the same old schtick. Only Protagoras can stand 3017 and ass-licking like P's is very hard to find online or off, so he'll have to come back. Btw, ignoring them has amused me to no end from thread to thread. Fuckin' douches. :smirk: — 180 Proof

I'm not really surprised that @3017amen was banned. His posts were generally not very good and were rarely responsive. On the other hand, his contributions are as good or better than lots of other more popular members.

As for his civility, or trollishness, or whatever, he treated people at least as well as you do. And no, I'm not proposing you be banned. You are a valuable and entertaining contributor to the forum. And the little kid is cute.

This is probably most evident in idioms, as it is often misleading to translate them word-for-word. — baker

My favorite is "tout le monde," which, in French, literally means "all the world." Idiomatically, it means "everybody," even if I only mean everybody in the room.

I am 40 years old and I am certain at this point that if I stayed 40 years old for 20 years I would get less done than if I were 20 years old for 10 years. It just seems like a waste of resources to live after the body feels half dead already. Lol. Any thoughts? — TiredThinker

I am 69 and I've been retired for two years. When I was still working as an engineer, I was much better at what I did than when I was 20, 30, or 40. I was also paid a lot more. That's the fight - to keep your effectiveness balanced with your cost. I think when I was 66 I was often more productive than people half my age, even taking into account my pay scale.

I'm just as smart as I was when I was 30. I'm much more experienced. I've seen everything before five times. Perspective makes you better at what you do, unless it's something physical that requires a young body. My body can't do the things it used to. I made an appointment with a physiotherapist today to deal with hip pain. But I don't feel "half dead."

I'd go along with that too, but don't downplay it on that account. Don't forget 'esctacy' (not the drug!) stands for ex- outside of 'stasis', normal state. So the normal state, or the default condition, is colored by shall we say many less-than-optimal mind-states and inclinations. But 'were the doors of perception cleansed, then we should see everything as it is, infinite', said Blake. — Wayfarer

It was not my intention to downplay it. The kind of awareness I'm discussing is something I value very much. At the same time, it is important to me that it be seen as continuous with everyday experience, not off somewhere in the clouds. The metaphor I use is that it is right here, now, just above my shoulder. I can only see it in my peripheral vision. If I try to look directly, it disappears.

In Yogic logic, increasing one's self awareness to encompass the universe is a way to reach a higher reality. One can do this by identifying with the universe.

Might sound crazy to some, but then who in their right mind would argue that they are not an element of the universe? — Pop

I see the experience you describe not as a view of a higher reality, but as increased awareness of the reality we live with every day.

This is a really good post. It made me think about lots of things.

In his essay "The Task of the Translator", Walter Benjamin makes a fascinating distinction between what a word means, and how a word means. — StreetlightX

The idea of translation has always been interesting to me. It seems that translating a document, especially fiction or poetry, would be harder than writing it. And yes, the difference comes down to how meaning is expressed, but it's more than that. Maybe getting the literal meaning would be relatively easy, but how to get that to match the rhythm, tone, connotation, and feeling of the text seems impossible. Then again, I guess all that is the meaning.

I think this is relevant, not sure - my children were involved in a French immersion program in elementary school. From kindergarten through third grade, they were taught entirely in French so that they became fluent quickly. We went to France when my daughter was seven and people thought we were from Quebec. What struck me then and still fascinates me now is that it feels like when you get two languages, you get two minds.

For Benjamin, the differences between languages are, at base, differences between how words mean. That is, what any one expression means can remain identical between languages, but what differs between them is 'how' a particular language goes about "meaning" (taken as a verb). — StreetlightX

I'm not sure if I agree with this. Maybe I don't get it. Maybe it's this:

if we take language as a way of meaning, rather than as that which 'has' meaning. Wittgenstein himself says as much: "What expresses itself in language, we cannot express by means of language" (4.121): sense or meaning is always anterior to language, even as it is expressed 'in' it. Hence the famous mutual exclusivity of 'showing' and 'saying': "What can be shown, cannot be said" — StreetlightX

I've been thinking about what "meaning" means for a while, especially in the context of what art means. I've come to the conclusion that art doesn't really mean anything. It's one of a class of things the experience of which is their only meaning. Music is another. This is a (long) quote from "October Light," a book by John Gardner. I've used it before. I'll hide it so I won't scare people away.



My conclusion - "meaning" means putting things into words. There are many experiences, communications, that don't mean anything. For me, this is the essence of Taoism.

But if language itself is a way of meaning, then languages - in the plural - are similarly varying ways of meaning. — StreetlightX

I think this is what I meant when I said having two languages is like having two minds.

I may have gone a bit off topic. If so, sorry.

This is a really good post. You took my complaints about theism arguments and opened them up, broadened them in a way that's really helpful. You also put into words things about these types of arguments I have thought a lot about but haven't been able to articulate.

Have you seen the "Can God Make Mistakes?" thread?

I wasn't proposing it was an argument against God's existence, just a paradox/contradiction. — Tom Storm

It's something of a pet peeve with me. Anti-religion activists like Dawkins and Hitchens use it to cast doubt on the existence of God. They claim their arguments provide a rational case against God's existence, but, as I noted, it says nothing about it.

I can understand why the existence of evil or hell could lead someone to reject religious beliefs. Since this is a philosophy forum, I just wanted to be clear what it does or does not demonstrate.

You're right, I was only talking about the God of Abrahamic religions, where goodness is a trait of God. — elucid

If you're saying if God is not good then God does not exist, that doesn't make sense to me.

My first question at religious education class when I was 8 - If God is good and ever forgiving why is there a hell? — Tom Storm

How can a good god condemn people to infinite suffering in hell for finite offence/s. Infinite punishment will always exceed just punishment for finite offence/s. — Down The Rabbit Hole

Out of all the arguments I have come across, this one makes the most sense. — elucid

This is not an argument that God doesn't exist. This is an argument that God is not good.

D) one has not formed an opinion because one has not considered the issue (lack of belief)

Position A is (amongst other things), theism. B is atheism. C is agnosticism, and D pig ignorance, which for the remainder of this post, I’ll ignore. — Banno

I'll give an upvote for including not having an opinion as one of the ways of addressing the existence of God, even though you don't include it in your further evaluation. That's not an option normally considered.

Preferred pronouns are in the latter category. Not worth an inch of column space whilst children are starving. — Isaac

Yes. I agree. I also think if you take care of financial, security, and opportunity issues, the rest will take care of itself.

Do you think there'd still be such a need to facilitate social change if we actually addressed disparities in education, resources, opportunity and wealth? — Isaac

I still believe these must be tackled, perhaps in bold new ways. It's not likely to be readily achievable for a range of reasons. — Tom Storm

What more would be needed, what more could possibly be achieved, beyond addressing "disparities in education, resources, opportunity and wealth?" That is the problem, the whole problem, and nothing but the problem. Or am I misunderstanding what you're saying.

Boy, I'm pretty disappointed with the debate so far. No one has just sat down and stated what their position is and why they think it is a good way of looking at things. Absent that, all their comments just feel like ideas floating in space like grapes in a Jello salad.

From remarks like that, the Vienna Circle arrived at the conclusion that metaphysics is meaningless nonsense. — Wayfarer

And yet "The sense of the world must lie outside the world," is a metaphysical statement.

Just as well, because goats are notoriously bad at racing. — Wayfarer

This is a misconception. A goat, Zev, won the Kentucky Derby in 1923, admittedly in the slowest time ever of 4 minutes and 7 seconds. Before the 1924 derby, Churchill Downs changed the rules so that only horses could run.

Following up on @Wayfarer in trying to set the meanings of some of the terms in the debate, these come from Wikipedia:

Substance dualism, or Cartesian dualism, most famously defended by René Descartes, argues that there are two kinds of foundation: mental and physical.[8] This philosophy states that the mental can exist outside of the body, and the body cannot think. Substance dualism is important historically for having given rise to much thought regarding the famous mind–body problem.

Property dualism asserts that an ontological distinction lies in the differences between properties of mind and matter, and that consciousness is ontologically irreducible to neurobiology and physics. It asserts that when matter is organized in the appropriate way (i.e., in the way that living human bodies are organized), mental properties emerge. Hence, it is a sub-branch of emergent materialism. What views properly fall under the property dualism rubric is itself a matter of dispute. There are different versions of property dualism, some of which claim independent categorisation.

Here is Hanover's explanation of property dualism::

there being a single thing and it will be called “matter” I presume, but whatever it might be called does not matter. It is a monistic goo that offers the underlying substance of everything, much like that flat white paint you buy that is then taken to the counter after hours of bickering to have just the right color mixed in. The property dualist explains there are two main colors in the world, not surprisingly called (1) minds and (2) bodies. So you see what has happened is that the substance dualist claims to have two different buckets of goo, yet the property dualist claims to have two different buckets of the same goo, just with different coloring in each.

Hanover hasn't defined substance dualism yet. He doesn't speak of it highly, given that it's his job to defend it. He says it "succeeds where property dualism fails to account for the conceptual coincidence, or interaction, of ideality (mind) and reality (body)." but he also says it's "anachronistic."

As an enlightened follower of Lao Tzu, I am clearly a monist, which isn't on the table, so I don't have a goat in this race. I will say, just because I always say it, both substance dualism and property dualism, and monism for that matter, are metaphysical concepts. As such, they are neither right nor wrong, only more or less useful in a specific situation.

If they are successful in their career and happy, how can this possibly be classified as ill mental health? — baker

I was successful in my career and I've lived a good, if not always happy, life. I was also diagnosed with a mental illness - bipolar disorder. Having a mental illness doesn't make you less human and doesn't necessarily take away a desire for happiness. It also doesn't mean you aren't responsible for your actions in the same way anyone else is.

Oh come on, do you really believe that your average Wisconsin Christian is examining their beliefs and studying the philosophy underpinning them more rigorously? This is not an "atheist" or "scientist" thing: most people don't have a solid philosophical foundation for what they believe, and probably shouldn't tbh. — Kenosha Kid

This makes sense. It's silly for us to expect most people to live with a need to examine everything in themselves and their world just because we do.

This is a needlessly hostile and condescending post and discussion. You should remove it.

T Clark may be right that metaphysics can be thought of as what is useful. I only add that if something is useful then an aspect of your belief must have some tenuous connection to the nature of the world, as in existentialism, Daosim and different traditions say something about the world which is not captured by our physics or other sciences. It just can't be proven. — Manuel

That's not what I said. I said particular metaphysical concepts can be judged based on their usefulness in particular situations. "Visions of the world" are such metaphysical concepts. It's true, Taoism is a vision of the world and a metaphysical concept, but so are objective reality and the scientific method.

This tangent could go on for a long time and it's off topic. We should leave it here.

so there's no categorical "denial" of anything in my anecdotal observation. — 180 Proof

Thanks for the correction to my assumptions.

Never heard of him. Looked him up.

Which "this" do you disagree with? — 180 Proof

The whole thing. Your denial that religious sentiment could be more than aesthetics of custom, Dixie or elsewhere.

I would have thought in numbers too numerous to count. — Tom Storm

It's the same here in the US and I'm sure elsewhere. Good post.

"We need jobs and housing, not gender neutral pronouns." — Tom Storm

Exactly right.

Human embodiment brings to my mind an image of a man juggling, while navigating a tightrope. — Inyenzi

I assume by "embodiment," you mean being born. Is that correct? If so, you're just making the antinatalism argument that gets rehashed every few weeks here on the forum. Which is no reason for you not to have at it again.

You live in more 'civilized' parts than i do. Religious belief is the aesthetics of custom around these parts (US southeast). No matter how fashionable youtube & Dawkins have made it, "atheism" is still rejected outright, I observe, as an aestheic reflex rather than for reasoned objections. "Something is up there, I feel it. This life isn't all there is." That's the usual ... and the occasional old timey "If you believe in nothing, then you'll fall for anything." Mindless anti-atheism. I suppose this says more about people than about either 'believing' or 'unbelieving'. — 180 Proof

I really disagree with this, but it's a metaphysical argument that will not be satisfying to atheists or believers, so I've avoided jumping in the pot.

1) If we assume that reality exist, we are forced to assume the existence of something opposed to reality: it is logically impossible to think of anything without assuming the existence of something that is not-that-thing. For example, you can’t think of number 10 without assuming the existence of something that is not number 10. We can’t think of stones without assuming the existence of something different from a stone. — Angelo

This is just the pointless why is there something rather than nothing argument. Not much of a foundation for a broad ontological understanding.

2) ...If something is non-real, then it exists only in our brain... — Angelo

The simulation hypothesis does not propose something non-real. It only proposes something beyond our normally perceived "reality." If there is a computer somewhere running the T Clark's Universe Program, it is part of reality, just beyond our ability to detect it.

3) So, if we want to consider reality in a honest way, we can’t ignore the involvement of our brain in this consideration. So, this is the cage we can’t escape: our brain. It is humanly impossible to think without using our brain and this is exactly the problem. — Angelo

I don't disagree with this, but I don't see how it's relevant to the simulation theory.

4) This means that the assumption of the existence of reality leads us to the necessary conclusion that we have no way to think about it, because, as soon as we think about it, we must realize that we are doing it from inside the cage that is our brain. — Angelo

I'm thinking about it right now. I'm doing it from inside the cage that is my mind. Ok, ok, sorry. Let's not get into the whole mind/brain kerfuffle.

5) If we have no way to think about reality, than it doesn’t exist; the only way it can exist is as an illusion of our brain. — Angelo

See response to your Item 4.

6) As an obvious consequence, I need to apply what I said to itself. The consequence is that what I have said hasn’t any realiability, can’t be considered something true... — Angelo

I don't understand this argument at all.

This just means that we live in an illusion and we don’t know what it is. — Angelo

Again, I agree but it's not relevant to the simulation issue.

8) If anybody would like to refute what I have said, they can’t do it without using their brain, so, I and they are in the same condition. — Angelo

Ditto.

There. [irony] I'm sure I convinced you that I'm correct, so we can move on to something else. [/irony]

"I know this: if life is illusion, then I am no less an illusion, and being thus, the illusion is real to me. I live, I burn with life, I love, I slay, and am content." ~Conan of Cimmeria — Queen of the Black Coast, 1934

Conan the Barbarian Philosopher

Yes. I agree.

If existence is a simulation how would that change how we see the laws of physics and how we interpret scientific discovery. Will that mean metaphysics science bare more relevance than physical science? — SteveMinjares

It all comes down to whether or not we can, even in theory, become aware of and demonstrate that our reality is a simulation created by someone else's technology. If we can't, then it wouldn't change anything. A simulation that is completely consistent and indistinguishable from our everyday reality is that everyday reality. If we can show we live in a simulated reality, we've just opened up a new scientific discipline. Or religion maybe.

without grounds to doubt, tacit belief suffices. — 180 Proof

Except when there are serious consequences for being wrong.

A civil engineer of course. — unenlightened

Of course.

Now who here broke that mutual social relation? I'm sure that for the new neighbors and the engineer, it was us, because we were the ones interfering with their work.

And just so you know, the terrain is slowly sliding, it's evident. — baker

You need to, very civilly, call your attorney and, probably, your own engineer. And the town engineer and building inspector.

All this is just a way of asking, what more-or-less technical aspect in philosophy shows up in your personal life? — Manuel

Two things I guess:

I'm retired now, but I worked as an engineer for 30 years. In that job, the most important decisions I had to make hinged on what I knew, how I knew it, how certain I was, and what would be the consequences if I were wrong. So, I take epistemology very seriously. It's hard to tell which came first, my interest in knowledge or my decision to become an engineer.

Here's a song I sing over and over again. There are many ways of looking at reality. These different views are metaphysical constructs. Metaphysical beliefs are not true or false, they are more or less useful in specific situations. This way of seeing things makes it much easier for me to understand, if not necessarily to agree with, other people's beliefs and values.

people tend to conflate the question “what is art?” with the question “what is good art?” — Pfhorrest

Robert Pirsig, author of "Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance," solved this problem by defining art as "high quality endeavor." The example he gave was the very skilled welder who fixed the fender on his motorcycle. I've come to think this is not a very useful definition. In a previous discussion, someone, was it you @praxis? said that art is anything created with an aesthetic purpose, i.e. intended to be judged by aesthetic standards. I find that a really helpful way of looking at things. It also deals with the good art vs. bad art question.

What does that say about the broader question raised in the OP? To me it says define first, judge later. A man is an adult male human. Of course, these days we have to describe what a male is too, but let's not get into that here.

If the success of MLK’s movement is to be judged by its popularity, then by that standard blm and crt are wildly successful , given that only 30 years ago a tiny handful of scholars were advocating its theoretical foundations and now it has become standard rhetoric in most universities and in many large corporations . I don’t think its languaged of incivility will persuade the opposition any more than MLK’s appeal to reason , but like that prior movement , it will grow. of its own accord among the like-minded. — Joshs

I've tried to be clear, I think the correct measure by which King or BLM should be judged is effectiveness. I'm saying BLM's methods won't work in the only way that matters - by making the US a safer and more secure place for black people. Apparently you disagree. Or maybe you don't care. Many BLM supporters just want to vent their rage and resentment against white people. Knock yourselves out.