To be clear, I'm not saying the claim is false, I just wonder to what extend it was European Culture in particular that was the driver behind what happened historically. — ChatteringMonkey

And what does she have to say about China and Japan?

And Peterson concludes things from it that do not follow from the study. — Benkei

Such as?

Quite right, the prevalence of a narrower jaw did not arise after the invention of the contraceptive pill: — Kenosha Kid

No, the point is that even the same woman can have different preferences in men, depending on whether she uses hormonal contraceptives or not.
Hormonal contraceptives don't only have physical side-effects, but also psychological ones.

The link between jaw width and aggression is totally spurious — Benkei

Peterson and the study I linked to are talking about changed preferences about men in women who use hormonal contraceptives.

Peterson is a nazi, white supremacist, racist, sexist, evil, bitter professor — deusidex

Heh, maybe that's the scurvy talking out of his mouth!

Or this stuff: "You can test a woman's preference in men. You can show them pictures of men and change the jaw width, and what you find is that women who aren't on the pill like wide-jawed men when they're ovulation, and they like narrow-jawed men when they're not, and the narrow-jawed men are less aggressive. Well, all women on the pill are as if they're not ovulating — Benkei

Studies support this, though, e.g. Oral contraceptive use in women changes preferences for malefacial masculinity and is associated with partner facial masculinity


As for the rest of what he says about women ... I think he's an example of a male martyr.

How can we call anyone right or wrong when our justifications reach a dead end? — Darkneos

Obviously, one does not simply carry on with life when someone is wrong.

I think Nietzsche explains this perfectly:

I do not want to believe it although it is palpable: the great majority of people lacks an intellectual conscience. … I mean: the great majority of people does not consider it contemptible to believe this or that and live accordingly, without having first given themselves an account of the final and most certain reasons pro and con, and without even troubling themselves about such reasons afterward. — deusidex

But they're happy ...

What does believing that a meat diet cured their problems say about their critical ability? — Banno

Well, the placebo effect is real.
Someone who is eager to see themselves superior to others will reflect this in their eating habits as well.
Eating cows is somewhere at the top of the hierachy. Chicken, pigs, fish are lowlier, so there isn't much superiority in eating those.

Here's rooting he gets scurvy, at least that!

In the beginning of "The unbearable lightness of being", Kundera writes:

The idea of eternal return is a mysterious one, and Nietzsche has often perplexed other
philosophers with it: to think that everything recurs as we once experienced it, and that
the recurrence itself recurs ad infinitum! What does this mad myth signify?

Putting it negatively, the myth of eternal return states that a life which disappears once
and for all, which does not return, is like a shadow, without weight, dead in advance,
and whether it was horrible, beautiful, or sublime, its horror, sublimity, and beauty mean
nothing. We need take no more note of it than of a war between two African kingdoms
in the fourteenth century, a war that altered nothing in the destiny of the world, even if a
hundred thousand blacks perished in excruciating torment.

Will the war between two African kingdoms in the fourteenth century itself be altered if it
recurs again and again, in eternal return?

It will: it will become a solid mass, permanently protuberant, its inanity irreparable.
If the French Revolution were to recur eternally, French historians would be less proud
of Robespierre. But because they deal with something that will not return, the bloody
years of the Revolution have turned into mere words, theories, and discussions, have
become lighter than feathers, frightening no one. There is an infinite difference between
a Robespierre who occurs only once in history and a Robespierre who eternally returns,
chopping off French heads.

Let us therefore agree that the idea of eternal return implies a perspective from which
things appear other than as we know them: they appear without the mitigating
circumstance of their transitory nature. This mitigating circumstance prevents us from
coming to a verdict. For how can we condemn something that is ephemeral, in transit?
In the sunset of dissolution, everything is illuminated by the aura of nostalgia, even the
guillotine.

https://www.amazon.com/Unbearable-Lightness-Being-Twentieth-Anniversary/dp/0060597186/ref=tmm_hrd_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=&sr=

In the absence of some idea of the possibility of transcending the round of repetition, it becomes unbearable. On the other hand, believing that each person and each event are unique makes them lose value.

Does she propose that it is possible to have a technologically advanced society (and to arrive at it) in some other way than the Europeans did?

You don't believe natural tendencies can be repressed? Whatever the case may be, you would have a beef with Peterson. — Pierre-Normand

It's like when Christians complain how they are not allowed to express their religosity and how they are victims etc. etc.
Well, if God is with them, who could possibly be against them?!

If someone truly is, by their nature, inherently, superior, dominant, surely then this will show on its own and nothing can stop it.

It's all about 'reading age'. My young nephews have curious minds and are open to ideas, but there's no way they would fathom Kant or Hegel, neither of them have a university education. — Wayfarer

"There are two novels that can change a bookish fourteen-year old’s life: The Lord of the Rings and Atlas Shrugged. One is a childish fantasy that often engenders a lifelong obsession with its unbelievable heroes, leading to an emotionally stunted, socially crippled adulthood, unable to deal with the real world. The other, of course, involves orcs."

[Kung Fu Monkey -- Ephemera, blog post, March 19, 2009]”
― John Rogers


source

he often blames the despair of young men as resulting from the toxic influence of feminism that represses their natural tendency to flourish through striving to assert themselves in the human "hierarchy of dominance". — Pierre-Normand

That's a contradiction! How can feminism repress "their natural tendency to flourish through striving to assert themselves in the human "hierarchy of dominance""? Shouldn't this natural tendency of young men naturally assert itself over feminism??

I mean -- should the world get out of the way so that young men can assert themselves in the human "hierarchy of dominance"?

Says Rilke:
Solang du Selbstgeworfnes fängst, ist alles
Geschicklichkeit und läßlicher Gewinn

This is what engaging with a religion on one's own terms is like: easy and with success that isn't worth much. It's like catching a ball that one has thrown.
It's only in interaction with others who are also pursuing that religion that one has to make an effort, new kinds of efforts and cultivate qualities that one could not on one's own.

I see ancient, original texts as openings for new disclosure, and therein lies their greatness. There are no definitive texts, only movement toward greater intimacy with truth at the level of basic questions. What is so important about Hinduism and Buddhism is that they presented an extraordinary efficient method for disclosing revelatory, intuitive understanding at this level. They presented a new intuitive horizon! And I believe it to be philosophy's sole remaining mission to talk about this, learn what it is. — Constance

Oh dear, that's ambitious for philosophy!

If i were putting forward something to replace Buddhism, this would be right. I just want to understand what it has to say. At the center is not a doctrine for me. It is an existential engagement.

That's just it: You want to understand and engage with Buddhism on your terms. You're ignoring or downplaying the importance of the living tradition, the living community of Buddhism, ie. the people who are actually working to preserve the teachings and make them accessible (from librarians to translators to those who pay for the upkeep of Buddhist websites to the monks who teach meditation and everyone needed for the system to function).

I just want to understand what it has to say.

And you think you can do that apart from committing yourself to an actual Buddhist community?

This is a vital point. Really think about it.

That about Kierkegaard and his inherited wealth seems like just an intentional ad hominem.

Not all ad hominems are fallacious:

/.../
Walton has argued that ad hominem reasoning is not always fallacious, and that in some instances, questions of personal conduct, character, motives, etc., are legitimate and relevant to the issue,[30] as when it directly involves hypocrisy, or actions contradicting the subject's words.

The philosopher Charles Taylor has argued that ad hominem reasoning (discussing facts about the speaker or author relative to the value of his statements) is essential to understanding certain moral issues due to the connection between individual persons and morality (or moral claims), and contrasts this sort of reasoning with the apodictic reasoning (involving facts beyond dispute or clearly established) of philosophical naturalism.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ad_hominem#Criticism_as_a_fallacy

Kierkegaard applied this to himself when he broke off his engagement because he thought he wasn't good enough to marry.
And I think that his lifestyle and his not integrating himself with an actual religious community disqualifies his opinion in religious matters. He was an armchair Christian.

He was not aspiritual at all, quite the opposite

I was talking about being areligious, not aspiritual.

But then, this here is certainly NOT about the errors of the Pali canon at all! I mean, it is an interpretative expansion, but exploring meaning not unlike what it is to explore Jesus' words, only here, we have the "event" that is center stage, much more available for objective study. To me, meditation is a practical metaphysics!

Sure. I'm saying it might have nothing more in common with Buddhism than the name.


From what you've said so far about Buddhism, you're like someone who says that the best way to learn a foreign language is to study the textbooks and to do the exercises in the textbooks. But never actually try to function in that language as a member of a community that are native speakers of that language.

Yes, young girls have been taught forever how to be pretty and submissive. — Pierre-Normand

I suggest you read some women's magazines, esp. those secular ones targeted for teenagers and younger women.
No trace of submissiveness there.

I shouldn't have to blow smoke up the arses of idiots to be heard. Or should I? — counterpunch

If you don't see the problem with your attitude ...


Dude, your default is that you don't care about people, esp. those you expect to listen to you. But you expect them to care about you??!


'm 'fraid no deva is around ...

I AM a philosopher. — counterpunch

Here's a didactic story for you:

The story goes that when the Buddha first became enlightened, he was enthusiastic to tell other people about it. So he walked down the road and to the first person he met, he said, "I am the Rightfully Self-awakened One!" The man shook his head and went his way. The same happened with a couple of other men. The Buddha was frustrated and concluded that humans are stupid and worthless and not worth bothering with. Then a deva (a godly being) appeared before the Buddha and pleaded with him, saying that some people have only little dust in their eyes and are worth to be taught, and that out of compassion for them, the Buddha should make an effort and teach them. So he did, and many of his students attained enlightenment under his guidance.

Young women, OTOH, appear to have their act together more so — synthesis

The advice market for young(ish) women has been filled to the brim with self-help magazines and self-help books for a long time. But there is no similar parallel for young men.

Begs the question" Buddhism?? This is my point. Read about what is said at all, and you will find not a closed system of thought, but an openness of possibilities. Those who try to contain religion and philosophy to a doctrine put up barriers to understanding. — Constance

To be clear: By doing what you suggest, one asserts one's supremacy over the text and the ideas it presents.
If this is what one is going to do, then why bother with the text at all? You might as well buy a blank notebook and write down your own ideas.

Read about what is said at all, and you will find not a closed system of thought, but an openness of possibilities.

I can see how it can be read that way, but I don't agree with it.

Those who try to contain religion and philosophy to a doctrine put up barriers to understanding.

Those who refuse to acknowledge the origins and the systemicity of (a) religion are forcefully superimposing themselves and their own ideas onto (the) religion, thus making (the) religion their subordinate.

What is Christianity? Kierkegaard claimed that what Jesus, "Christ," was actually talking about lay with an existential analysis of the self, not in Christendom, not in orthodoxy.

He was a Protestant living off a trust fund, flriting with Catholic ideas from a safe distance. Of course he could afford to fiddle and flirt this way, never actually committing to the religious community which produced him and to which he was indebted. Ungrateful brat.

In other words, I judge, I condemn the areligious, "spiritual" approach to religion. Religious texts were not written for just anyone to read them any way they like and to do with them whatever they like.
It's a matter of common decency to acknowledge that and the religious tradition of which they are part.

I think the line is ironic. We think of the caging to cage the bird, but the cage is a cage unto itself. If there's no bird in it, it's empty. — Dawnstorm

Like defiance, overcoming?
But that makes it a Pyrrhic victory: remove, undo the self, so that there's no one to cage.

Every now and then, I come across the words of someone (usually an American) who doesn't know European history, nor geography.

This person's complaint is that the division of the European continent into countries (many of which are relatively small) is, basically, idle and arbitrary. Nevermind the long history of many of these countries, and, of course, the multitude of languages that make unity difficult or impossible. This is why Europe is not a country. It's the name of a continent.

I've known Americans who believe that the difference between, for example, Germany and France is like the difference between, say, Michigan and Illinois, or any other two US states. Those Americans gravely underestimate the historical, cultural, national, and, of course, language differences.

The European Union is also not a country, because it's a kind of federal association of several countries in which individual countries still maintain their sovereignity.

What I find unacceptable is that some use the same type of language they accuse Trump of, insulting, calling people stupid for voting for policies that they do not agree with. — FreeEmotion

I used to have a problem with this too, but I have since changed my mind.

When one is dealing with someone who understands only one thing, one has to be willing to either resort to their language and fight with their kind of weapons, or concede defeat and leave the battlefield. One cannot choose one's opponents.

But you will have noticed that Biden has a wide range of ways of expressing himself, while Trump has a rather limited one.


I like to remember Peter Jackson's Hobbit films -- the way those beautiful elves nevertheless go and fight the ugly orcs.

Yeah, prevail at all costs, by any means necessary.

My fault with him is far less about his conclusions than his arguments. — Kenosha Kid

Yes. I began watching a debate between him and Žižek, but I stopped because I couldn't stomach the way JP was misrepresenting Žižek's position. It was lame. If a student did that on a test, he wouldn't pass.

But then again, perhaps that's the whole point, and JP and right-wingers know that they are misrepresenting the other side, but they do so deliberately, as a debate tactic, a la Die Kunst, immer Recht zu behalten.

For the bird, yes.
It's that theme -- "Jemand musste Josef K. verleumdet haben". That "they're going to get you, they're going to bring you down". And "Gib's auf!".

Both are highly devolved — Kenosha Kid

How is the EU devolved?

I see it as Kafka's usual theme of impending doom and helplessness in the face of it, and the cynical resignation toward this prospect.

I'm a psychology student and I'm curious about the reason(s) why so many people on the right feel aligned with Peterson. — deusidex

Look at him: that characteristic earnest face, the tense body, never really smiling, a certain coldness and distance in his demeanor. It's what right-wingers, esp. those who are more far out on the right tend to have in common.


If you're a psychology student, you should be able to have access to many studies of the psychology of right-wingers, and specifically of right-wing authoritarians.

E.g.
The relationship between emotional abilities and right-wing and prejudiced attitudes.

Egocentric victimhood is linked to support for Trump, study finds

I recently wrote an article about karma and I am curious about your thoughts on it. — Mind Dough

What is the source of your ideas about karma?

I see you mention Sadhguru and you spell "karma" (not the Pali "kamma").

No, the EU is not a country.

which do you favor — Pfhorrest

This assumes that one believes that one's preferences in political things somehow matter.
What about those people who have altogether lost hope in politics, and who therefore have no preferences about it?

And then there are those whose political preferences may be completely unrealistic/utopian/dystopian (and they know them to be such), but who refuse to settle for any of the options given in the poll?

That's a bizarre claim to make in relation to a religious text.
Religion is dogma to which one is supposed to align oneself. It's not something to discover, or verify.
— baker

Sorry, this is most emphatically wrong. — Constance

Fortunately or unfortunately, no. The system of religious beliefs and practices is a closed, self-referential system that works by the principle of self-confirmation: one starts off by taking for granted that what the religion teaches is true and that "it works", and then one does the practices, and then one comes out "convinced" that is is true and that "it works".

It's like the science "experiments" that children do in science classes in school: the children don't actually discover anything, don't learn anything "on their own". What they do is they internalize the scientific terms and processes and then they learn to see the world through the lens of those terms and processes.

Well, that was a short conversation. — Wayfarer

Why sugarcoat the Secondary Bodhisattva Vows?

A part of the Vows is about vowing to do things that are otherwise considered wrong or harmful, but still one should do them for the sake of the "spiritual wellbeing" of those who end up on the receiving end of those actions.

Would you like to be on the receiving end of those actions? A Mahayani coming along and beating you up and feeling justified to do so because he's sure that this will be to your benefit??

Buddhism realized this in its own way centuries ago, but phenomenology gave Buddhism its meta-discussion.
— Constance

Check this article out — Wayfarer

And this one:
Nascent speculative non-buddhism
(You don't have to fill in anything, just click download)

After all, the actuality of the world, the "presence" of being here, cannot be spoken, and if a person can realize this at the perceptual level, that is, in the plain apprehension of objects in the world, in the midst of implicit knowledge events there is the palpable mystery in all things, and one experiences an extraordinary intimation of depth and profundity, then one knows without a doubt s/he is in the proximity of enlightenment, though its consummation may be light years away. It is what inspires one to move forward, do the hard work endlessly looking. — Constance

Sure. But I don't see how you can do any of this in some relation to Buddhism. Neither the Buddha nor Buddhists would tolerate you doing that in their presence. What you describe is something they criticize severely.

I think you're assuming far more familiarity with and acceptance from the Buddha and the Buddhists than is warranted.

I don't think the Pali canon is the exclusive vehicle for this at all.

It's not a vehicle for what you're describing at all.

That's not what the Mahāyāna says of itself, although it is what the Theravada says about it. — Wayfarer

Sure. And let's not forget that Mahayana is the "Buddhist" tradition that came up with a "spiritual" justification for killing, raping, and pillaging. I'm talking about the Secondary Bodhisattva Vows, of course.

The Buddha of the Pali Canon is not like that. He's an aristocrat, authoritarian, dogmatic.
— baker

I think that's completely incorrect. Having renounced his family and household, he also renounced any aristocratic rank, and besides there are questions as to whether his lineage really was aristocratic. The Sangha was open to members of all castes, which is one of the reasons Buddhism died out in India. And he was not authoritarian, as anyone was free to join the Sangha - sure, they would be expelled for breaking the monastic code, but that is not 'authoritarianism'.

Really? The Buddha of the Pali Canon who in the beginning, after he attained enlightenment, didn't want to teach at all, because he concluded from his first post-enlightenment experiences with humans that humans are just too stupid and too worthless to be taught?
The Buddha of the Pali Canon who was very liberal with the use of the word "fool" for people?
The Buddha of the Pali Canon who decided who was good enough to be taught by him and who wasn't?
The Buddha of the Pali Canon who is continually referred to with epithets like "the Blessed One", "the Rightfully Self-enlightened One"?

These strike you as not aristocratic, not authoritarian, not dogmatic?

Unrelated to that, my encounters with Buddhists from different schools support this.


Based on my reading of the Pali Canon, the Buddha is definitely not someone for whom I would say something like "I think if the Buddha were here with us now, he would agree: all of our endeavors are at the most basic level, a yearning for this extraordinary one thing."

I asked you about this:

I think if the Buddha were here with us now, he would agree: all of our endeavors are at the most basic level, a yearning for this extraordinary one thing. — Constance

Based on what do you think that??


I think you're looking at the Buddha in a very romantic, idealistic way. A modern re-imagining: egalitarian, politically correct, democratic. Non-sexist.
The Buddha of the Pali Canon is not like that. He's an aristocrat, authoritarian, dogmatic. Even when he goes for alms or sleeps in the forest covered with leaves.
The Buddha of the Pali Canon doesn't care how you're doing or what your "hopes and dreams" are. You think he would agree that all of our endeavors are at the most basic level, a yearning for this extraordinary one thing? No, he's not a New Ager.


There are many metadiscussions of Buddhism. Starting with the ones in traditionally Buddhist Asian cultures. Then the metadiscussions in the many Western imports/exports of Buddhism that try so hard to make Buddhism seem palatable to modern Western sensitivities, that try so hard to present it as the one religion that isn't really a religion, but a philosophy.

But as one reimagines the Buddha and Buddhism this way, selectively regarding old sources, keeping things one likes, discarding those one doesn't, making changes here and there, as one prefers: What is the result of that? Is that something that can be relied on as a path to liberation?

The old tradition (that can be traced back to the historical Buddha and his disciples) came with a declaration of a guarantee: Do things the way you're told, the way preserved by the tradition, and this is your best bet to become liberated.
One might accept that guarantee, or not; but at least it's there and has some historical validity.

But the new reimaginings can offer no such guarantee. This is free-style, anything-goes, reinventing-the-W/wheel kind of "Buddhism". An ivory tower populated mostly by youngish able-bodied males who told society to go suck on a lemon and escaped into their own minds. Are they enlightened? Are they liberated? Maybe they even are, but they sure can't teach others how to become liberated as well.

But I suspect most school age kids and young adults are healthy enough to take off their masks and immediately begin large scale socialization (activities). — Roger Gregoire

And then infect the vulnerable.