Sweet Jesus, no! If you think "liking" is the sine qua non of aesthetic experience, then you're living one (or two)-dimensionally in a multi-dimensional world.

Liking helps. It may even be the price of admission. But it's not the thing itself. — tim wood

Indeed. My teachers always frowned upon liking.

I don't think that aesthetic experience is something that you consciously decide to have or not have. Education and knowledge contribute to shaping our own experiences, of course. — praxis

Education can also systematically destroy a person's trust in their own experience.

when it comes to art I can tell if I like something, and no authority on earth can know what may offer an aesthetic experience, though they may know general principles. I'm the best authority on my own sensibilities. — praxis

This is what they make a point of beating out of a person in the course of education. Of course, this can also happen subversively in that the person is taught a certain system of values and then made to believe it is their own.

As far as art is concerned, if there is one thing that I have learned best in my course of education is to dismiss my own sense of what would make an aesthetic experience for me.

While I do have certain thoughts and feelings coming up when beholding a work of art, my first impulse after that is insecurity, and the thought "Wait, but what would my betters, the authorities say about this -- do they consider this piece of work good or not, do they consider it art or not?"

... if we had a definition of art, then our understanding of art would self-organize around the definition.
— Pop

That's not how labels or signs and meaning work, is it? — praxis

They do work that way, when it comes to things like art, culture, society, religion. These terms don't work the way a term like "table" or "astronaut" do.

I don't think it reflects anything pathological. I'm a really verbal person, not particularly visual. I'm pretty good at explaining my decisions, feelings, imaginings, etc... There are a lot of people who are just not that way. I would imagine that many visual artists and musicians are not very self-aware in a verbal way. Many of them are probably also not good with words. On the other hand, they see and hear things I never do. — T Clark

I see many art works as actually dealing with philosophical problems, but the artists themselves and their audience often don't see it that way.

In many ways, art is a kind of indirect, intuitive way of addressing philosophical (existential) problems.

Of course, there are artists who are specifically interested in philosophical problems and are able to formulate them in philosophical terms, but they also produce art works on those same themes, given that art works can sometimes allow for a succint handling of a philosophical problem the way a text/syllogism cannot.

But I do think people's life experiences and childhoods (awful or otherwise) play a bigger role in artistic choices than we often think. — Tom Storm

I had a literature teacher who said that a happy person cannot make art.

While discussing SARS-CoV-2/pandemic, ...

people first need to be in the clear about "the big existential issues" and have a definitive answer to the meaning of life question.
— baker

... kind of reminded me of ...

If you wish to make an apple pie from scratch, you must first invent the universe.
— Sagan — jorndoe

People are getting strokes from the covid vaccines, they are dying from the covid vaccines.

What do you have to offer to the survivors and their close ones?

...just becomes nothing more than a stick to beat one's enemies with - "see, it's they who are not committed to the truth,
not like us, who care for nothing more..." — Isaac

There is a striking similarity between zealous religious preachers and the vocal pro-vaccers.

What's an argument that doesn't need to be understood rationally? How's that still an argument? — Benkei

For example, those that are based on appeal to conscience or common decency.

Say, if my neighbor was an anti-vaxxer — jorndoe

Is he really an "anti-vaxxer", or is it just your projection that he is?

You yourself have implicitly accused another poster of being an "anti-vaxxer". I pointed this out to you. You quoted a post of his, and you omitted from your attention the sentence where he clearly said that he was vaccinated and that he wears a mask. That sentence of his post was just before the one you quoted. Yet you talked to him as if he was an anti-vaccer.


And this kind of thing just keeps happening. Vocal pro-vaccers often don't read what people are actually saying. They jump to conclusions. They project. They attack. As if all of that was justified, in the name of a "good cause".

When you mistreat people like that, don't be surprised if some actually do become anti-vaccers.

I support and respect their right to choose for themselves.
— Merkwurdichliebe

Where we may disagree here is that choices are never just for the self. — Janus

No, this is taking the discussion in the wrong direction.

There actually exist laws about issues of public health. The matter is largely settled, legally.

What is not legally settled are things specifically pertaining to covid, with its specifics. But many people act as if this was settled.

There are aspects in which covid is like other infectuous diseases endangering public health.
There are aspects in which covid is not like other infectuous diseases endangering public health.

These differences need to be taken into account. It is wrong to fearmonger by presenting covid as if it were as bad as smallpox. It is also wrong to try to instil a false sense of security by presenting covid as if it were no worse than a cold.

Covid has a wide range of potential symptoms, ranging from nothing to death and everything inbetween. This makes it a complex disease and our response to it should reflect that responsibly both on the part of individual citizens as well as on the part of the government.

If someone who has a phobia about injecting anything at all into themselves, would that count as grounds for exemption? /.../ If someone is paranoid and has an overwhelming and insurmountable fear and distrust of the vaccine would that count? — Janus

I doubt that there's anyone who has that kind of phobia (or it's extremely rare).


But people generally do have an overwhelming and insurmountable fear and distrust of being abused and taken advantage of. They're just not always able to put it into exact words.

What might a valid exemption be anyway? — jorndoe

There are contraindications for vaccination.

Here the list from a Slovenian hospital -- https://www.zd-ms.si/
I can't translate the whole list, but it includes:
people who are allergic to substances in the vaccines or who have had severe reactions to the first dose of a vaccine,
people with transplanted organs, including those waiting for a transplantation,
some people with cancer,
people on dialysis or stage 5 kidney disease,
people with severe lung diseases,
people with Down syndrome,
people who are HIV positive (there is a specification for the number of white cells etc.),
people with congential immunity diseases,
people receiving immunosuppresive therapy,
people with multiple chronic diseases who are deemed too vulnerable for vaccination by their doctor.

Life is what you make of it, so make it a good one.
— paraphrasing the good Doc Emmett Brown

If anything in particular, the "purpose of life" is living (it). Enjoy. :up:

"Back to the regularly scheduled program." ? — jorndoe

Yesterday in Slovenia, a 20-year old woman died after complications from getting vaccinated with the Janssen vaccine. The government temporarily stopped offering this vaccine.
And now some very ugly things are coming to the fore:

Since vaccination is merely recommended, not mandatory, the government is not liable and cannot and will not pay any restitution to those damaged by the vaccine. People damaged by the vaccine have no grounds for a lawsuit. It's still not clear whether insurance covers the costs of the medical treatment for the side effects of the vaccine or not.

"Vaccination is recommended but not mandatory" is the line that a member of the government's covid task force used when commenting on the case of the dead young woman.


One would think that if the vaccines are so safe and effective as the government loves to say that they are that the government would put their money where their mouth is and boldly declare to pay restitution for anyone damaged by the vaccine (resting safely in the assumption that it will never actually come to that, given that the vaccines are so safe and effective). But no. When push comes to shove, like when people get permanent health damage from the vaccine or even die from it, the government calls on the "Vaccination is recommended but not mandatory" line.

This is what is so disgustingly subversive and underhanded in the whole matter.

We’ve been down this road before. Whenever faced with some mandate imposed in the interest of the common good, some of us act like they just woke up on the wrong side of the Berlin Wall. “
/.../
The difference is, your anger is dumb, and ours is not. Yours is about being coerced to do something you don’t want to do.

But we are not actually being legally coerced into anything.

The pressure to get vaccinated against covid is informal; there is no legal foundation for it, or it's questionable. The governments have let the pressure trickle down into interpersonal relationships and into the relationship between employer and employee.

Legally, we are merely recommended to get vaccinated. Nothing more. The state is protecting itself and pharmaceutical companies from liability issues.


If the covid crisis really is as bad as the government etc. are wanting us to believe that it is, then why aren't they passing laws commensurate to it?

In that respect I consider mandatory vaccinations for specific services/industries a curious hill to want to die on. — Benkei

But the covid vaccines are not actually being made mandatory, in the actual legal sense of the word.

On principle, a medication that legally has the status of merely an experimental medication cannot be made mandatory. A medication has to pass a long vetting process before it can move up from being merely an experimental medication, and again there is a vetting process before it can be made mandatory by law.

Do you know, for a fact, what the legal status of the covid vaccinations is in countries that are reported to have made it mandatory for some professions?

Do you know, for a fact, that the US, France, Greece, and some others have actually passed a law according to which covid vaccinations are mandatory (for some professions)?

Or is it the case that in those countries, covid vaccinations are demanded by government decree (which is less than a law), or they found a roundabout way to enforce covid vaccinations?

To the best of my knowledge, people who were fired or suspended for not getting a covid vaccination were fired or suspended _not_ on account of violating a health law, but on account of a much more general principle (failure to comply with the demands of the employer).


The problem is that we are not living under the rule of law, but under the rule of quasi-legal misnomers and legal loopholes.

The governments are actually encouraging us to be ignorant of the law, and it is to our harm.

So bodily integrity is only a right that can be granted by governments? Interesting. — Benkei

As things stand, every human on the planet is subject to some government, so, yes. (Even those people who don't have citizenship; and there is, on principle, no no-man's land, so that wherever on planet Earth someone is, one is always under someone's jurisdiction.)

If you don't get caught, who can say that you didn't have the freedom to do those things?
— baker

You're always free to break the law. But we generally agree it is opportunistic to do so as those breaking the law are only too happy to get all the protections a well organised state offers. This is why ndividuals generally cannot be the arbiter of law (only state sanctioned individuals, e.g. judges) even though there are extreme cases where norms ought to precede laws and therefore require civil disobedience.

If the State truly is as powerful and as authoritative as it says it is, then why does it catch only some of those who break the law?

It's this discrepancy between the proposed authority of the State and its actual effectiveness that gives reason to doubt its authority.

There is an unwritten social norm that we shall all respect the State and consider it authoritative, even though it quite frequently fails to deliver. This is the weakest link in the system. Whose fault is it when this weakest link is exploited? The State's or the individual person's?

If everything was determined by the past, then how could there be freedom? — Wayfarer

You'll need to ask those who claim that everything is determined by the past. Such as the contemplatives & brahmans who hold such a view:

“Having approached the contemplatives & brahmans who hold that… ‘Whatever a person experiences… is all caused by what was done in the past,’ I said to them: ‘Is it true that you hold that… whatever a person experiences… is all caused by what was done in the past?’ Thus asked by me, they admitted, ‘Yes.’ Then I said to them, ‘Then in that case, a person is a killer of living beings because of what was done in the past. A person is a thief… uncelibate… a liar… a divisive speaker… a harsh speaker… an idle chatterer… greedy… malicious… a holder of wrong views because of what was done in the past.’ When one falls back on what was done in the past as being essential, monks, there is no desire, no effort (at the thought), ‘This should be done. This shouldn’t be done.’ When one can’t pin down as a truth or reality what should & shouldn’t be done, one dwells bewildered & unprotected. One cannot righteously refer to oneself as a contemplative. This was my first righteous refutation of those contemplatives & brahmans who hold to such teachings, such views.
https://www.dhammatalks.org/suttas/AN/AN3_62.html

Thus such sectarians remain stuck in (a doctrine of) inaction. Another group of sectarians who are similarly stuck in (a doctrine of) inaction are those who believe in a creator god and those who believe in luck ("all is without cause, without condition").


You seem to be suggesting that the valid dichotomy to work with is as follows:
either everything is determined by the past
or there are things that are determined by the past but there is also luck.

It seems you're saying that the only way to overcome "hard karmic determinism" is through luck.

Also: What do you think is the relationship between free will and luck, within the Early Buddhist framework?

Rather, I nailed you, reason for which you are now speechless... — Olivier5

And things like this are the reason why mankind doesn't deserve to be saved.

We'll see who's first to become enlightened!

See this source, under the heading ‘karma doesn’t explain everything’. Provides citations. — Wayfarer

Do you think that those passages are evidence that there is luck?

Here the Buddha explicitly denies that everything that occurs to one is a consequence solely of past actions. And I can see why: because to assert that is to be dogmatic.

By "dogmatic", do you refer to "going beyond what one knows by oneself and what is accepted as true by the world"?

Dan Lusthaus comments

No one, except perhaps a few 'extremists' at that tiime in India thought that all of one's experiences were determined by past experiences. No one, including Buddha, thought that karma was all-determining, Karma did not denote an all-encompassing model of human behaviour. — Wayfarer

See Thanissaro Bhikkhu's more recent comment on the Sivaka Sutta (probably in reply to Mr. Lusthaus):

Some people have interpreted this sutta as stating that there are many experiences that cannot be explained by the principle of kamma. A casual glance of the alternative factors here—drawn from the various causes for pain that were recognized in the medical treatises of his time—would seem to support this conclusion. However, if we compare this list with his definition of old kamma in SN 35:145, we see that many of the alternative causes are actually the results of past actions. Those that aren’t are the result of new kamma. For instance, MN 101 counts asceticism—which produces pain in the immediate present—under the factor harsh treatment. The point here is that old and new kamma do not override other causal factors operating in the universe—such as those recognized by the physical sciences—but instead find expression within them. A second point is that some of the influences of past kamma can be mitigated in the present—a disease caused by bile, for instance, can be cured by medicine that brings the bile back to normal. Similarly with the mind: Mental suffering caused by physical pain can be ended by understanding and abandoning the attachment that led to that suffering. In this way, the Buddha’s teaching on kamma avoids determinism and opens the way for a path of practice focused on eliminating the causes of suffering in the here and now.

https://www.dhammatalks.org/suttas/SN/SN36_21.html

So truth for you has become either authoritarian or idealistic.

You've forgotten so much? — Banno

Prospective truth lover, heal thyself!


I have not forgotten how hastily you assigned me to the anti-vaccer camp. You've displayed there an amazing lack of critical thinking, empathy, and common decency. And you cry foul when Christians do the same thing?

↪baker :rofl: — TheMadFool

You think that's funny???????

Good that you brought that issue -epistemic autonomy - up; it (epistemic autonomy) is, to me, basically the idea that one must reserve one's belief only for those claims/theories that has oneself studied and thought through. Buddha was a staunch advocate. — TheMadFool

Compare what the Buddha has actually said (or at least what is generally accepted in Buddhism to be the word of the Buddha):

"So, as I said, Kalamas: 'Don't go by reports, by legends, by traditions, by scripture, by logical conjecture, by inference, by analogies, by agreement through pondering views, by probability, or by the thought, "This contemplative is our teacher." When you know for yourselves that, "These qualities are unskillful; these qualities are blameworthy; these qualities are criticized by the wise; these qualities, when adopted & carried out, lead to harm & to suffering" — then you should abandon them.' Thus was it said. And in reference to this was it said.

"Now, Kalamas, don't go by reports, by legends, by traditions, by scripture, by logical conjecture, by inference, by analogies, by agreement through pondering views, by probability, or by the thought, 'This contemplative is our teacher.' When you know for yourselves that, 'These qualities are skillful; these qualities are blameless; these qualities are praised by the wise; these qualities, when adopted & carried out, lead to welfare & to happiness' — then you should enter & remain in them.

https://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/an/an03/an03.065.than.html

The popular rendition of this is like this (similar to what you've been saying):

“Believe nothing, no matter where you read it, no matter if I have said it, unless it agrees with your own reason and common sense.”

Clearly, a lot has been lost in translation/transition.

I never implied that Buddhism is a DIY hobby. Straw man. — TheMadFool

You give me the credit you think I deserve, obviously.

The Buddha doesn't have to to, like some people, spell out everything he wished to convey. You have to, like a rational person, infer some things from what he did say. — TheMadFool

"Monks, these two slander the Tathagata. Which two? He who explains what was not said or spoken by the Tathagata as said or spoken by the Tathagata. And he who explains what was said or spoken by the Tathagata as not said or spoken by the Tathagata. These are two who slander the Tathagata."

https://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/an/an02/an02.023.than.html

"Monks, these two slander the Tathagata. Which two? He who explains a discourse whose meaning needs to be inferred as one whose meaning has already been fully drawn out. And he who explains a discourse whose meaning has already been fully drawn out as one whose meaning needs to be inferred. These are two who slander the Tathagata."

https://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/an/an02/an02.025.than.html

When making decisions about one's own body, there isn't a need for one's arguments to be understood as rational anyway. — Tzeentch

Indeed, because according to the constitutions of many countries, one's body is by default considered private and granted the right to exist.

Obviously decisions about your body need to be weighed against the interest of others if those decisions have consequences for others and once you reached a conclusion you'll have to argue for it. — Benkei

Legally, this is actually quite a tricky area. Because in order to argue for or against, one has to take into account what the constitution and the laws of one's country say. This way, one quickly ends up in problems that even professional constitutional lawyers have difficulty to be unanimous about.

And your decisions can also have consequences. You're free to drink, but you don't get to drive. You're welcome to walk around naked, just not in public.

If you don't get caught, who can say that you didn't have the freedom to do those things?

You take yourself very seriously, that's for sure, and you're a hero in your own mind, but to me you're just another coward running away from a needle, and rationalizing his fears. — Olivier5

Will the irony never end!

You're so far off the mark that I'm at a loss what else to say.

I feel really awkward having this discussion with you.

you’re splitting hairs now. — Wayfarer

Sadly, no.
I'll get back to you, I need a chunk of time to compose a reply to you.

On the contrary, you're not taking it seriously enough.

I'm talking about life always being a matter of life and death anyway. It's a fact that people typically close their eyes to and behave as if all was well and as if life wasn't a matter of life and death. So that when push comes to shove, like in a health or economic crisis, people are caught off guard.

Like literature, yes? Like this?

"Good writing, good books, literature, just must -- must -- have an element of snobism to it. Trying to make it seem like something that can be accessible to plebeians -- that just misses the point." — tim wood

Of course.

Aspirational achievement lies within the capacity of everyone, and the appreciation of it I'd call taste and discernment, which anyone can learn and do.

No. If you would be born and raised in an old-fashioned European culture, one of the things that the educational system (even a public educational system) would make sure that you learn is that not everyone was born equal, and that there is a very clear limit to what a person of a particular background can do, in all areas of life, and also in terms of ability to properly appreciate art (where one's disadvatange becomes most apparent).

The elite has always had a "pearls before swine" attitude toward the commoners.

And high achievement and the appreciation of it does have some element. But not snobism, which is essentially ignorance's preening dance to compensate for itself.

The value of the classical is proved most simply by its endurance, that it touches and awakens something of value. And only a fool, an ignorant one, mocks it with the name of snobbery.

Why, indeed, the European elites agree with you on that. They surely don't consider themselves "snobs", but as possessing that "something" that cannot be learned, but which one must be born and bred with. And people born in rural areas and of low socio-economic backgrounds are by default exempt from having that "something" or ever attaining it.

Indeed, in more recent times, a part of the elite has been trying to popularize art and to "raise the spirit of the masses". But the condescension with which they do it! "You are a swine and you will always be a swine, you must never forget that. And know that we are so kind as to throw some of our pearls before you, swine." These people would pat you on the head, as if you were an imbecile, if only they wouldn't be too disgusted to touch you.

You should read The Elegance of the Hedgehog which also touches on this elitism.

"Determined by the past" and "kamma" are not synonyms in Early Buddhist doctrine. Even though in popular parlance, they tend to be treated that way.

Stories like that do not illustrate chance. They illustrate the standard doctrinal point that indulging in sense pleasures leads to a rebirth in the animal womb.
— baker

Yes, I think you're right. Badly chosen on my part. — Wayfarer

Not "badly chosen". I dare you to find a Buddhist story that actually illustrates luck. You can choose from any Buddhist tradition you like, including the modernists.

(The Chiggala Sutta is specifically about the appearance of a Tathagata and his dispensation, not about the ordinary person.)

What do you expect me to say? You make a claim about the Buddha, and I ask for a canonical reference for said claim. You don't provide it. You see no problem with not providing it.

*sigh*
— baker

There's no point in providing a reference, canonical or otherwise because, unlike other religions, buddhism isn't what philosophers refer to as arguementum ad verecundiam. — TheMadFool

Indeed, it isn't. But that doesn't make it a DIY hobby either.

If you say that the Buddha claimed something, you need to provide a canonical reference.

people first need to be in the clear about "the big existential issues" and have a definitive answer to the meaning of life question.
— baker

That's ... aiming rather high (unless I misunderstand, which is entirely possible). — jorndoe

A "high aim"? No, a most basic one.

There are historical/textbook case studies, and (cumulative) evidence, all that stuff, that we can learn from

So we can do what? Remain on autopilot? Eat, drink, and make merry? This is supposed to be the whole point of life?

Seems relevant for a functional society where all kinds of different people interact, yes?

No. Truth trumps diversity.

That doesn't answer my questions.

Why do the vocal pro-vaccers complain about having empathy or compassion for the unvaccinated?
Why do they complain about having to go to some lengths to help them, medically?

If the matter is really so simple and so black-and-white and so true and so obvious as the vocal pro-vaccers claim it is ("Just get vaccinated and all will be well"), then why not make it into laws?

What does the right thing consist of anyway...? — jorndoe

Given the hatred and contempt that some vocal pro-vaccers show for the unvaccinated and everyone else who isn't particularly enthusiastic about vaccination, I surmise that those vocal pro-vaccers are completely inthe clear about what "the right thing" is. So it shouldn't be hard for them to explicate it and to take according action against those who differ.

Don't assume that this is your usual 'Mary's room' amateur philo discussion. It's a matter of life and death for people. — Olivier5

It's always a matter of life and death anyway. Where some people go wrong is in assuming that this covid crisis is something special, rare, extraordinary.

A start to at least get a meaningful conversation going is that both sides realise they've not rationally arrived at their position, unless they're expert epidemiologists or virologists and some doctors, and stop assuming only the other is irrational. — Benkei

The pleasure that people get from accusing another to be irrational, evil, bad, weak, etc. should not be underestimated.

To ask them to give up that pleasure, you'd need to offer them something in return. What do you have in mind?

Classical music just must -- must -- have an element of snobism to it. Trying to make it seem like something that can be accessible to plebeians -- that just misses the point.

What happened? — TheMadFool

What do you expect me to say? You make a claim about the Buddha, and I ask for a canonical reference for said claim. You don't provide it. You see no problem with not providing it.

*sigh*