(1) If idea X is the negation of idea Y, then idea X exists only if idea Y is a credible idea.
(2) Atheism is the negation of theism.
(3) Therefore, atheism exists only if theism exists. — Isabel Hu

This is complete and utter nonsense, what no one on this thread can see is that this is mere formalism, the term existence does not refer to actual existence, but empty, abstract concepts. Refutation: A-Snarkism can only exist if Snarkism exists. This is a waste of time, it is sophistry, the creator of this argument is simply trying to prove a formality and pass it off as a concrete reality. Yes, there are people in the world who believe in make-believe phantoms, there are also people who refute their delusions. In what sense then can theism be said to exist? The discourse should never be carried out at this level, the originator of this argument should have his bottom paddled until he admits that Snarkism is an idea without substance.

jorndoe provided a validate rebuttal to your claims. For my part your insistence on religion is just bizarre, it displays uncritical allegiance to shallow platitudes that circulate through apologetic domains.

"Stalin killed around 1 million of his own citizens in the span of a year or two during the purges of the late 30s. There were other purges too. We're talking in the tens of millions killed by both Stalin and Mao..."

Because this is a very serious humanitarian issue, the question for you is, how were they able to accomplish this?

Discoursing on the Law of Identity:

Quoting you: "Any difference of form constitutes a different form."

"The material thing has a new form at each passing moment, yet it maintains its identity as the same thing." -- Metaphysician Undercover

If its form has changed, then according to your logic, how can you say "it maintains its identity as the same?" For you have said that any difference constitutes a new form. "New" is not the same as "same."

"I recognize that objects exist outside my mind..." This premise serves as the absolute negation of your idealism, insofar as it must give way to the authority of the material form. This is why consistent idealists must deny the existence of the material world, the admission of the premise ends up nullifying the authority of their abstraction. After this admission abstraction is sublated to the concretion of the object. As soon as one posits a world beyond the mind, one has deferred to an authority beyond the mind.        

Is identity different from itself? Identity is saying that it is not different from itself, this is the negative side of the determination of identity. The positive side says that everything is identical to itself. One cannot posit identity without equally positing difference (because one cannot make a determination without negation) there is no such thing as identity without difference, and this is because identity is saying that it is not difference, unless you claim that identity is different from itself? Here it will not work merely to reassert the positive side of identity, because you are already, in the same instance as you posit identity, saying that it is not different from itself, you just don't realize it.

This is why Hegel says, "a determinateness of being is essentially a transition into its opposite..." What you are trying to do is retain a determination, while rejecting the inescapable transition which casts identity into its negation. You have exactly manifested and proven Hegel's point. 

"Identity does not presuppose any attributes. The only presuppositions are "a thing", and "same", neither of which is an attribute." -- Metaphysician Undercover

A thing is itself, this is the positive side. A thing is not different from itself, this is the negative side. You do not have identity with only one side of the determination. Both sides taken together, equal unity; identity contains itself as well as unity and difference. The mere positive formation is simply ignorant of itself.           
"If Hegel introduces "the movement of its own being" here, then he is talking about attributes which are negated, not the thing nor its identity." -- Metaphysician Undercover

Hegel does not show that identity has contradiction outside itself, but that this contradiction is contained within the nature of identity itself. All of the determinations brought forth by Hegel are instances of the same identity. This thinking is exceedingly difficult for Aristotelians to grasp, precisely because their comprehension has been deluded by idealistic premises which artificially divide and distort the objects of being. Instead of allowing the object to dictate and unfold its properties and attributes, the Aristotelian logic dictates axiomatically how the object should be viewed and divided. This leads to a narrow distortion of reality. "…identificational thinking itself is a tremendous abstraction. We have recently begun to become painfully aware of the artificial world man has constructed and imposed on the natural immediacy of the planet earth by force of identificational thinking in its abstractness and its nihilism— for everything built by reflection is built on negation." "Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, A Propaedeutic,” pg.251, Thomas Hoffmann, translated by David Healan, Brill 2015

"Any difference of form constitutes a different form. If the form of that chair in my mind is not exactly as the form within the material object (chair in this case), I cannot say that the form comes from the object." -- Metaphysician Undercover

It seems to me, and I could be wrong, that there is a kind of strawman posited here. You say, "if the form of the chair is not exact..." this seems problematic, why the criteria of exactitude? The answer you give is because of the first part of the syllogism. "Any difference, new form." What I don't understand is why the movement and transition of an object should preclude its influence on our comprehension of it? It is merely your authoritarian and idealistic assumption that perceptual information taken from the chair must equal exactitude. I do not believe you can sustain this, but I am open to your defense. 

Isn't the actual conclusion simply that you could not say your ideas of the chair were exact, and not that the information you assess from the physical object, has no bearing on your formation of it?  

I confess that the question of subject and object is one of the most difficult areas in all of philosophy. I do not believe you have conquered it with this simple, idealistic syllogism. The latest discoveries in neuroscience are actually informing us that our perception is the result of our social interaction, it is both mind and the world, what amounts to a most astounding discovery, "action comes before perception." But this is not a dualism, to posit such would be to reduce the plurality of mind and world to idealistic categories.  

the only absolute thing that existed was God — Gus Lamarch

I wasn't aware of this? You mean a real, concrete absolute, verifiable just like the moon? Or do you mean that humans believed that God was absolute?

the point is that with secularization, decadence arises and with it, nihilism. — Gus Lamarch

Preconditioned by what? Every cult projects nihilism in the absence of its values, this is all part of the original conditioning. You are speaking of a symptom caused by the very thing you defend.

they practically built what you live in today. — Gus Lamarch

Thank you for clarifying, I was wondering what infinite stupidity was responsible for the incompetence in which we live.

"What happens after you no longer fear death? What comes next?"

This is merely one aspect of coming to terms with reality. However, release from this fear gives one the ability to move beyond the false enticements of idealism's abstractions. In their crudest expressions these take the form of celestial utopias, heaven, eternal rewards, new worlds, end of suffering etc. In more sophisticated expressions idealism takes the form of universal logical structures, private property, social hierarchy based on wealth or power.

I believe it was Mark Twain who said, 'it's a strange thing that people who have had to live should be afraid to die.'

What you are speaking of is only the smallest beginning of existential orientation. There are other things of which you must become aware, like the fact that your life is processed through a social structure, this structure accounts for and determines the nature of your social being. It is not enough to be a hedonist, this merely manifests that one is a nihilist, even if they don't confess to the term. Intellectuals have a social responsibility in society, it is not good enough to merely pursue one's own interest.

Both myself and G. E. Moore know that you will not submerge your naked hand into a pot of boiling oil. This is because it would severely burn your hand. I know this for sure. You are free to prove me wrong.

"…all progress in capitalistic agriculture is a progress in the art, not only of robbing the labourer, but of robbing the soil; all progress in increasing the fertility of the soil for a given time, is a progress towards ruining the lasting sources of that fertility." Karl Marx, Capital vol 1

"The life of the species, both in man and in animals, consists physically in the fact that man (like the animal) lives on organic nature; and the more universal man (or the animal) is, the more universal is the sphere of inorganic nature on which he lives. Just as plants, animals, stones, air, light, etc., constitute theoretically a part of human consciousness, partly as objects of natural science, partly as objects of art – his spiritual inorganic nature, spiritual nourishment which he must first prepare to make palatable and digestible – so also in the realm of practice they constitute a part of human life and human activity. Physically man lives only on these products of nature, whether they appear in the form of food, heating, clothes, a dwelling, etc. The universality of man appears in practice precisely in the universality which makes all nature his inorganic body – both inasmuch as nature is (1) his direct means of life, and (2) the material, the object, and the instrument of his life activity. Nature is man’s inorganic body – nature, that is, insofar as it is not itself human body. Man lives on nature – means that nature is his body, with which he must remain in continuous interchange if he is not to die. That man’s physical and spiritual life is linked to nature means simply that nature is linked to itself, for man is a part of nature." Karl Marx, Economic and Philosophical Manuscripts of 1844, from First Manuscript, Estranged Labour

The reason Marx was able to have this consciousness in 1844, which is truly astounding, is because he escaped the errors of idealism, which allowed him to comprehend reality in concrete terms.

Seriously, it is very different to say "I think X is right" than to say "X is infallible in everything he says or does". — David Mo

:up:

Come on, let's be honest here. ssu, you are something of an anti-Marx fanatic, and you don't comprehend the first thing about his philosophy. Even professors who disagree with Marx recognize his genius. With you it's all poison of the well.

What's this? I think you mean why do humans have sexual attraction to their own gender? Homosexuals exist for the same reason that heterosexuals exist, earth's environment contains the resources to nourish the kind of life we are. Why do people fuck silicone objects?

The need to even ask such a question is strange. Would be hard for me to imagine the Greeks or Romans asking this kind of question, as though there were something abnormal here (see silicone question for abnormality). It's a matter of sexual preference in attraction.

Are you OK with being insulted? — EricH

I don't mind just as long as they're making a point somewhere in the flurry of their emotion. It is a challenge to clash with a skilled thinker, and many people do not have the ability to do it (this is not because they are inferior, but because their social process was lacking the intellectual nourishment which creates such ability). Skilled thinkers need to be humble, they are leveraging their privilege not their own individual, autonomous superiority. Intellectuals do not exist without society, where you find an intellectual there you can be guaranteed that he passed through a qualitative social process. It's probably best to reply to this on the thread I specifically made for the topic: Knowledge is a Privileged Enterprise

I should here like to concede. The refutation of error, resistance to tyranny, these things are of vital importance to the quality of our species. The refutation of the error of God is exceedingly important, one of the most pressing counter-acts of ideology in the history of our species.

The destructive harm I was referring to was caused by following this quote as a creed and acting on it. What if by trying to remedy the evil I see actually makes things worse? — Legato

I wish I had time to give this the response it deserves. This is surely an important question. However, I find it to also be a praxis reducing question... look for qualitative actions that have obtained positive results and try to replicate them. There is a real danger of paralysis, where the abstraction of the question ends up negating the actual world. Intellectuals do this all the time, though I think it is probably a subconscious attempt to evade responsibility. Those that are aware that it's an evasion are truly despicable.

But can we truly use it as a creed to live by? Can we really trust our own moral compass? — Legato

Though there is value in these questions, you already admit to the existence of destructive harm, so you can keep on playing the abstract game or you can decide how to act to remedy the evil you see. The nature of this thread is a validation of my position. 'I have watched intellectuals play abstract games with each other while the civil world burns. They will not take responsibility...' At what point does this apply to us?

A similar quote is attributed to Einstein: "The world is a dangerous place, not because of those who do evil, but because of those who look on and do nothing."

There is much wisdom in these quotes. They tell us about people and society. Why don't we take more responsibility in standing up to that which causes harm? This is one of the heaviest burdens on my own heart. I have watched intellectuals play abstract games with each other while the civil world burns. They will not take responsibility, they live in a kind of academic utopia of private journals and social clubs. Perhaps the most important contribution of Arendt was her exhortation to intellectuals, their lack of social responsibility leads to the breakdown of democracy and freedom. It's common sense. The masses get hi-jacked by propaganda that they have no defense against. This is not their fault, they don't have the critical education to be able to resist it. Meanwhile the intellectuals, from their Ivory Towers, look down with contempt and the charge of ignorance, which is really nothing more than boasting in their privilege. They are not better, they have just received more benefits from the very society they look down on with contempt. This makes them more responsible, but one almost never sees it, instead intellectuals often use their social benefits to gain a higher standing in society for themselves. I believe this is a new kind of class awareness that has not yet entered into the consciousness of the species. We make many false assumptions about educated people.

If we consider capitalism a form of violence, surely governments that take the belongings of their subjects as a means of achieving their goals can be considered violent, no? — Tzeentch

In your anarchy-land why will people form governments?

I think you are simply correct here and my use is inappropriate. — Judaka

This is the very foundation of high level thought. What it manifests, above all else, is that one is overcoming the limitations imposed by the psychological self. It stands as a far greater challenge than any syllogism.

the belief in god is an evolutionary stable strategy that codifies a heuristic for living life in a way that is beneficial to the community in general. — Malcolm Lett

???

Belief in God is most intelligently traced to denial. See Ernest Becker, The Denial of Death. The question is what really explains it? The word God is a psychologically motivated and informed ideal.

As I see it, the only reason this kind of topic even makes sense to pursue, is to more intelligently figure out how to get beyond the primitive nature of such psychology.

Yes, I agree with you. I was replying to Malcom Lett's generalizations. :smile:

I am sorry to hear this. He cut against the academic grain. He tried his best to increase class awareness in the species, as well as many other things. This is certainly a loss.

Yes, I did hear the Greeks were fond of discoursing on Zeus.

The discussions on this forum seem to take on a life of their own. You are right that one should try not to derail a thread, but information is almost always introduced that inevitably leads to this conclusion. Even with the most intelligent people I have discoursed with on this forum this is the case.

You made the charge of "ego stroking," which is not an articulation I would use, but to each their own. In order for this to be the case, as I understand it, one must be driven, not by the desire to get at truth, but to prove something about themselves. I have consciously tried to strike out against this in my life as a thinker. One must not confuse vigor of dialogue for insecurity of ego.

"Whatever is started two hotshots take over the discussion." This is exceedingly generalized. You cannot mean that every time two people have repetition of conversation between themselves on a thread that this automatically proves they are doing something wrong? I am not sure what you mean by "take over?" I am open to being corrected if I am doing something wrong on a thread, but you will not simply be able to stick it to me through authority or your wounded feelings. I am not a moralist and don't much care for them.

These seem like cheap shot generalizations, poisoning of the well. If you disagree with something I say or am doing then confront me on it, not passive aggressive stuff like this.

How could it not be? — 180 Proof

That is, the word, "God," means what?

And why should anyone assume "reality" is g/G-less on your say-so (without even addressing such an assumption as an aporia) just in order to have a "serious" (philosophical) conversation with you? — 180 Proof

Here you make my point as I have no desire to engage with thinkers on the topic of God. That is, a building has a vetting process to keep certain people out, in my case it's simply a matter of not wasting my time. Though this does draw my curiosity, are you claiming that the topic of God is of utmost importance?

The real is that which hurts you badly, often fatally, when you don't respect it, and is as unavoidable as it is whatever preceeds-resists-exceeds all[ (of our) rational categories and techniques of control. — 180 Proof

Concrete stuff here, not abstract games. :up:

So as to remove my own errors from this exchange and promote a healthy environment of discourse. When I said, "there is too much sophistry in your reply." Even if this is true it is not the way to approach the topic. I should not have said this. I will do my best from this point on to respond accordingly.

"You interpret from a perspective completely different from mine, then instead of trying to understand what I am saying, you create a straw man from your faulty interpretation, to knock down." -- Metaphysician Undercover

I am trying to think in terms of your own premises, I am just trying to do it critically as opposed to affirmatively. I am not trying to invent premises to attack.  

You said, "The essence of a thing is not concealed at all, nor does it abide in the thing, it is the form which exists within the human abstraction, what the human mind apprehends and determines as the essential properties of the thing." -- Metaphysician Undercover

I asked you, 'How can you say the essence of a thing "does not abide in the thing," and then claim to "apprehend" and "determine" it from the thing?'

You then said, "I didn't say "from the thing"."

This is correct, you said, "of the thing."

The question still remains, from what then are you apprehending and determining properties? If the mind constructs the form of a Snark would this mean a Snark has existence? Further, where does the mind even get the properties to construct the idea of a Snark?

"...the image of the chair in my mind when I see a chair "comes from the chair". It does not. It is created by, and therefore caused by, my mind." -- Metaphysician Undercover

Do you then say that the chair has no existence beyond your mind?

(And I should like to make it clear, this is exactly the position of idealism, of which you are indeed proving yourself to be most consistent. Idealism states that there is no reality beyond the mind, which is to say, even though it tries to posture away from this and violates it repeatedly in the course of action, it is the actual conclusion and solipsism of the position).

Now this seems like a direct contradiction of what is stated above, an example of the posturing I alluded to:

"Do you recognize two distinct types of forms, the form which the object called "chair" has, within itself, and the form of it which exists in my mind when I see it?" -- Metaphysician Undercover

I recognize that objects exist outside my mind. Chairs exist regardless of whether or not I call them chairs. A chair has a form that exists independent of my mind. My mind interacts with my environment in order to comprehend it. Without a concrete, objective world, my mind would not be able to form concepts. If I were to say, "stones have no existence outside my mind," and Socrates decides to pelt me in the head with one, this would be an immediate refutation of my idealism.    

"If the form in my mind came from the chair, it could not be mistaken." -- Metaphysician Undercover

I do not understand how you arrived at this conclusion?

"It would be taken necessarily from the chair, and therefore could not be anything but a correct representation of the chair." -- Metaphysician Undercover

Why do you here assume that your act of "taking" would be (and must be) one of perfection?

(It is clear to me that this demonstrates the superiority of Hegel's approach over that of Aristotle, because Hegel did not see this process as an automatic transference of perfection, but that it is mediated by thought, hence, the logic by which thought mediates must be more comprehensive than the narrow categories provided by Aristotle. Further, Hegel saw that an unmediated understanding leads to a distortion of reality).

"However, this is not the case, mistakes abound, because the form in the mind is created by my mind, not taken from the chair. And that is why the form in my mind must be understood as distinct from the form in the material object." -- Metaphysician Undercover

I see a serious dilemma here. If the form of the mind is created by the mind then what is the chair? How can the mind create the form of a chair without the concrete existence of a chair to "apprehend" and "determine" its content? How do you know that it (the chair) doesn't play a role in this process?

Your argument seems to be that the existence of "mistakes" is proof that your idealism is true? This seems very much like a non-sequitur. How can you even determine when something is a "mistake" if there is no difference between your mind's idea of a chair and an actual chair?

It seems to me that by speaking this way you are going beyond your idealist position: "I have, for days now been trying to get Jersey to recognize the distinction between the form in the mind, and the form of the material object."

I do not see how there can be "material objects" from the basis of your position? If you are referring to "forms" your mind produces, then you are neither referring to "material" or "objects" but mental abstractions. You then have no right to use the term, material objects.     

It seems very much like you are just asserting these sweeping metaphysical premises into being without a way to substantiate them, like you are constructing your own imaginary world out of abstract premises. If everything is reduced to your mind and objects have no independent being, then wouldn't that leave you trapped in your own mind? If you can't make a distinction between what your "mind creates" and what actually exists, then it seems to me you cannot escape the conclusion that this entire discourse is just a "creation" of your mind. 


BACK TO THE ACTUAL TOPIC: THE LAW OF IDENTITY:


I said, 'Perhaps the clearest formation of the refutation of the principle of identity presented by Hegel, is when he notes that A=A requires three different symbols linked in unity to even form the syllogism. Merely within the symbolic logic you have the diversity of Unity, Difference and Identity, which are all required and presupposed in order to make sense of identity. There is no identity without them, where there is identity, there you already have the negation of Unity and Difference.'

You replied,

"This really does not make sense to me. "Difference and identity... [are required to make sense of]... identity"? If your wish is to put this forward as an argument against the law of identity, you need to formulate it in a coherent way. The law of identity states that a thing is the same as itself. One might represent this as A=A, but you need to bear in mind that this is what A=A represents in this instance. So I have no idea how you infer "diversity", "unity", and "difference" from "a thing is the same as itself"." 

The symbolic form is, as a matter of fact, made up of three different symbols. The A to the left is not the same as the A to the right and the = is required to form the concept of the "tautology." Hegel's point is not that the law of identity specifically states these attributes (unity and difference) but that the law not only presupposes them, but makes use of them within the movement of its own being. What Hegel is pointing out in the law of identity is "the lack of awareness of the negative movement..." When you say this "doesn't make sense to you," that is correct, because you're not considering the law of identity as it is in the actual movement of its being, hence you are oblivious to its negation. Dialectic comprehends contradiction as it emerges from the object, it does not try to bring it from the outside, and neither does it see it as coming from the outside. This is how Hegel was able to comprehend the contradictory nature of the law of identity.     

What's most interesting is that you have actually validated Hegel's position throughout this exchange because you have admitted that the law is too narrow to deduce content. Hegel says, "This proposition in its positive expression A = A is, in the first instance, nothing more than the expression of an empty tautology. It has therefore been rightly remarked that this law of thought has no content and leads no further."

I suspect many of us were able to follow your argument and clear refutation of Tzeentch's position. My point in raising this question to Tzeentch, is to get him to move beyond the ignorance you reference by having him more carefully consider your position. He is continuing to argue a position that has been clearly refuted using the postion's own premises.

-

I wonder, was Banno's assertion regarding your ignorance accurate? His claim was that you could not see the fact that you had been refuted. How could we prove whether this was the case?

If I'm following correctly you're saying that we can't blame people for not being intelligent because intelligence is a privilege. I get that but I don't get how this realization empowers the promotion of not making it a privilege. — praxis

Because we don't think of intelligence in terms of social process, because we think of it in terms of individual effort, therefore as a society we focus on the individual as though his intelligence were a product of chance or predestined genetics. This is materially false. If we don't possess the correct ontology of knowledge's formation, then we will not be able to focus on its replication. Knowing that intelligence is the material result of a social process provides us with the accurate information to begin its replication. The world is still living in the dark ages here.

I'm not sure that figuring is going to do much without some action. — unenlightened

I raised this issue in the course of this thread: 'I can put it in simpler terms, is it even a matter of asking questions, or is it a matter of action at this point? We have completed so much theory, there is no point in reinventing the wheel. This is one reason I would never write a text on Critical Thinking, it would be useless, I know of several masterpieces in this area. What this allows us to do is use this material to better society.'

The real point from all of this is that intelligence takes us in the direction of trying to figure out how to increase knowledge in society. Philosophy takes us in the direction of society! My exposition is both a rebuke and plea. Philosophers are lost in a world of theory, and many intellectuals posture away from their responsibility by fallaciously deferring to abstraction. This is because they feel safe in the realm of theory. But we do not get to pick and choose where thought drives us.

If you read my exchanges with apokrisis in this thread you will see that I was exposing and combating this elitism. Where praxis is logically concluded there the elitist intellectual tries to subvert it, he tries to force praxis back into the domain of theory. This makes him feel that he is engaged in a hierarchy of relevance and that his responsibility is nothing other than theory.

"That it may or may not have existed", this sentence is ambiguous on purpose — Gus Lamarch

You are correct. Unlike you, I am aware that there is an intricate debate here. Your claim is that I should have either confessed that Jesus existed or that he did not. I am not versed enough in this material to speak with authority on the topic, that is why I left it open.

when people like me, come to ask you about this same sentence — Gus Lamarch

This is a good idea. You should try asking me about it next time.

Here you speak as if the reader were obliged to have prior knowledge that you - as you claim to have - are aware of these arguments by Carrier and Ehrman — Gus Lamarch

Yes, if you are going to speak authoritatively as you did and simply say Jesus existed, then you should have read the relevant materials on both sides of the debate. I do not care whether or not Jesus existed, just like I do not care whether Muhammad existed. If you want to spend your time researching it you are free to do it, but I will admonish you that there are far more important things to study.

At no time was it said that Carrier supports his lines on the basis of nihilism — Gus Lamarch

Is contradicted by:

Doubting that Jesus had any divine power is acceptable, but doubting his physical and historical existence is the result of the nihilistic mentality — Gus Lamarch

Carrier does doubt that Jesus existed. What you have to do is revise your false premise.

It is noticeable that when the argument, assumption, opinion, vision, etc ... suits you to come out on top in the discussion, you use them, but when it also suits you to disprove your previous statements, you also do it. — Gus Lamarch

I do not evaluate arguments on the basis of my feelings, or whether or not the argument is favorable to my position, nor do I do it based on personal preference, I try my best to do it based on relevance. If you can show me why the topic of Jesus' existence is more important to study than say, economics, it is likely I will give my time to Jesus.

However, this is not an exchange of value because the topic is itself lacking in value. It would be advisable for you to try to focus on things that have more value.

"Knowing that knowledge is a privileged enterprise empowers us to create a more intelligent species.

I don’t follow this reasoning and skimming through the responses to date doesn’t help. — praxis

We don't think of knowledge as something privileged, we think of it as something either given through genetics or something that is the result of will power, but we do not think of it as it is in reality, that it is the result of social beneficence. Knowing this is important because it allows us to stop focusing on the error of individual will power, and instead focus on the cultivation of the social conditions that produce knowledge. It means we are no longer shooting in the dark, but can begin to direct our course. As I said, this knowledge empowers us to create a more intelligent species. Exactly how we do this has to be worked out through intelligence, but knowing that this is the direction we must go is the important thing, and that is my point.

I don't like to talk about knowledge as a possession. — unenlightened

But some people have it and others don't. We cannot be indifferent to this.

I give freely what knowledge — unenlightened

Yes, my friend, this is the point. To figure out a way to expand knowledge freely.

Ram, Michael is trying to reason with you but you are evading his discourse. It is obvious that you're afraid to answer his questions, and this is dishonest. It's difficult but thinkers have to go in the direction of refutation, it's one of the ways we grow. He has in fact pulled your card. If you're serious and you honestly think you have a strong position then you shouldn't be trying to evade him.

As per my claim about Objective Morality, what you don't understand is that there is nothing in the universe like your definition of Objective Morality. The way you define Objective Morality ends up excluding it from existence. So, by all means, prove that Object Morality exists as you define the term.

You were refuted. You just can't see it. — Banno

I didn't expect that. :lol: :lol: :rofl:

Ouch.

Doubtless there are those who will deny that they have an ideology. I'd consider that an inability to see themselves as embedded in a society. My critique of Tzeentch follows that line. — Banno

:rofl: :rofl:

Well done.

I am struggling to understand your thesis in this thread. — unenlightened

How does a person come to possess knowledge? Is it a matter of will power?

Perhaps what we might more agree on is that we are now at a stage of social transition, where we have the economic capacity to invest in universal education, but we have yet to adjust our societies from a graduated privilege based one to a fully universal one. — unenlightened

I agree with this, and it is implied by my post.

Two points of order are required here.

Quoting you: "And the context provided by your OP suggested you hadn’t thought about the matter with sufficient depth to give a useful answer. Generally all your replies in this thread have been irrational and emotional."

These are actually poisoning of the well fallacies. Your replies are littered with them. "Poisoning the well (or attempting to poison the well) is a type of informal fallacy where adverse information about a target is preemptively presented to an audience, with the intention of discrediting or ridiculing something that the target person is about to say." You are attempting to characterize my position in a negative light so that you don't actually have to engage it. And I must say, you are exceedingly good at doing this, which is not a compliment, I don't think I've ever encountered a person more skilled at administering this fallacy.

The second point is that a claim has been resolved. I said, 'you are ignoring the concrete fact that the positive fruit of these categories already exists...'

You said:

"You call the fruits positive. That is the presumption I have challenged you to justify."

My point was exactly that you must confess to the existence of quality educated people in the world. This validates the category.

This claim has been justified. But it is not worth it to discourse with you. One hardly gets anywhere. I had to reason much just to get to the point that quality educated people exist. And maybe we are not even there, maybe your ego still wants to deny it? I am content to leave you to it. This is not, and cannot be, a sign of high intelligence. An exchange with you isn't worth the effort or time. Maybe others can get more from your discourse, but I find it to be dishonest, dodgy and riddled with fallacies.

Dang. He didn't last long. So much for Objective Morality Apologetic Technique 101.

I asked what would be your criteria? — apokrisis

Don't you think we first need to establish as to whether or not such a thing even exists? My argument, again, is based on the fact that educated people do exist. There are real people that have knowledge and they can be distinguished from those who don't. The simple point is that this quality needs to be extended. This is neither a sophistical argument or a false one. I am happy to discuss criteria, but I would never do it without looking at people who already possessed high ability in this area (that is why I spoke of reverse engineering the process). That is also why I referenced psychological development. However, what we know is that this does exist and that it is possible, we just have to figure out how to expand it.