War and Peace

[Don]

I'll read any reply but I'm through with this thread, and this forum.

Is that a promise, because I've heard this from you many times in the past.

[MishaK]

I don't hold with this 'advancement of human society' stuff- I think you've lived in the US for a bit too long and need a wider perspective.

Sean, cut it out. You know absolutely nothing about me. These sorts of comments are comical and only undermine your point further. Re: wider perspective, how many languages do you speak again? One? Thought so. When you've added four more we'll talk about perspective.

However we may be closer to an agreement here

I highly doubt that.

I've read your thoughts on alleged exoticism etc- your outlook I think is simplistically empirical, as indeed is that of English culture. I recommend the Bhagavad Gita to you with a good commentary (especially the one by Maharishi), rather than further persuasion. 'What is the beyond?' you ask. I'm working on a project around 220 000 words at the moment on the subject, and must be mad wasting time on this forum.

I take your points about the social values of the golden rule etc, but it doesn't work in terms of syllogistic logic. I am right on this on by the way. It wouldn't be a philosphical question if it wasn't.

You make the same error that all religious fanatics make: you seem to think that empricism and logic on the one side and mysticism/religion on the other are necessarily mutually exclusive. But unless you take the claims of mysticism/religion too literally, there is no reason why you cannot continue to derive personal spiritual benefit from it without denying the applicability of logic and reason. The later have withstood the test of time unfailingly and across cultural boundaries. Resistance is futile.

BTW, you further seem to think that only very simple issues can be resolved by reason and that complex issues cannot and that the existence of controversy is per se evidence for the inapplicability of reason. This is nonsense. As with all moral rules, there is conflict when two or more moral values collide. Standard examples: abortion, use of lethal force in self defense or defense of others. Where you draw the line on these is a balancing issue and how you decide that depends on how exactly you define the purpose of your actions. Reasonable people can disagree on these matters without having to resort to anything outside of reason for their analysis. That is why ethics is such a rich source of intellectual engagement. But the mere existence of some controversy over the details of this or that moral theorem doesn't negate the applicability of reason in the least. Even so, the golden rule remains the foundation of reciprocal social interaction across cultural boundaries, whether or not those cultures ever came into contact with Kantian philosophy or the Bible. It's quite basic human behavior.

As I've tried to say, some (most) people don't have all their minds underwritten by transcendental reference to provide moral insight. Hence the rest of their minds are open to conditioning by their situating culture, or inherent personality. You can get them to be nice to each other, as for instance most of the time in America with its strong civil society, or you can get them to build gas chambers: it's all the same to them.

What you are describing is an impressionable person with uncertain moral bearings. You still haven't substantiated your claim that people can be moral but behave immoraly. (The reason that you haven't is because you can't. It's a nonsensical argument, but you are too proud to admit that.)

It's not possible for such an immoral act to be committed.

That's a contradiction of what you said earlier. Let me remind you:

Well I've got better things to do here than explain all this, but I was quite clear that all people, indeed in my experience, have roughly the same inherent moral abilities. Morality I very much think is a fundamental mode of perception, but which is overlaid by psychological disposition- which is arbitrary. Hence people of similar moral insight will either torture and kill the bastard who's just defrauded them, or will think okay, maybe I'll just avoid them in future.

It's another typical example of your misuse of the word "hence" when in fact you haven't proven anything. But that aside, you've been beating about the bush over how morally equivalent people can exhibit divergently moral or immoral actions, i.e. you cannot show how this moral equivalency is to be determined. In other words, you just made up all this nonsense and put it into big words to sound impressive.

Your stuff on free will raises more complexity for me to wade through, which I'm not going to do. However, bondage and freedom are paradoxical things- bondage issues from the discursive thinking mind being free to get lost in itself- rather than being locked into the given thought and action of the intuitive (right brain functioning) mind. Freedom is actually bondage in a deep sense and there is no real ego or individuality.

Total non sequitur. You again confuse the issue. If I have no free will to decide my actions, then I cannot act morally, because I am not the cause of my actions. That distinction precisely lies at the root of the determination of criminal culpability: whether the individual is capable of comprehending the moral enormity of his or her decisions. So if you deny the existence of free will you should simply shut up about the morality of people, since unfree people cannot act morally.

There is indeed only one Self, one consciousness, one absolute. But when it's not expressed to the same extent, then the aspects of the mind it doesn't govern can cause our immoral action.

Sean, you keep trying to get out of your logical corner by other means. It doesn't work. If it is the same "Self" then it cannot be differently expressed. If it is differently expressed then it is per se different and not the same. You should have learned that by age 3. Do they not have Sesame Street in England?

[Sarastro]

Today my teacher mentioned that WWII was won by USA and GB. I'm a little surprised.

[M forever]

In other words "ontogeny recapitulates philogeny". I can agree with that.

What does that mean?

[Sarastro]

What does that mean?

It is a general biological law. Here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Recapitulation_theory

[Sean]

Thanks for that Mensch, you do me proud. You must be almost as mad as me though with this forum discussion stuff. It's a shame we can't talk about this over a drink because (as I've noticed with others actually) you don't quite understand again and again: what I'm saying is internally consistent though.

To be fair with your faith in reason, most philosophers also still cling to it, even though the same questions they ask haven't been answered by reason for thousands of years. That's why I got interested in the Vedic tradition of India. Hey you must get yourself a trip to India; black Africa and Thailand are also brain-changing desinations for the Westerner (I've made it to 68 countries)- you can evidently think and if you're sensitive you'd make some interesting observations.

[drogulus]

You make the same error that all religious fanatics make: you seem to think that empricism and logic on the one side and mysticism/religion on the other are necessarily mutually exclusive. But unless you take the claims of mysticism/religion too literally, there is no reason why you cannot continue to derive personal spiritual benefit from it without denying the applicability of logic and reason. The later have withstood the test of time unfailingly and across cultural boundaries. Resistance is futile.

     I think the error is to think that confusion is profound, and that the clarity of logic and reason is a form of shallowness. If you can understand something it must not be very important. It's the guiding principle of all mystics, hucksters and divines. The only question is whether the subject is in on it. Frequently they're not. They don't understand that they don't understand. That's the charitable explanation, anyway.

[karlhenning]

If you can understand something it must not be very important. It's the guiding principle of all mystics, hucksters and divines.

Well, another strawman.

[MishaK]

Well, another strawman.

Not really. I think drogulus got it spot on.

Thanks for that Mensch, you do me proud. You must be almost as mad as me though with this forum discussion stuff.

I consider it a sport.

It's a shame we can't talk about this over a drink because (as I've noticed with others actually) you don't quite understand again and again: what I'm saying is internally consistent though.

Your saying so doesn't make it so. Unless, of course, "consistent" means something else to you than the dictionary definition.

To be fair with your faith in reason, most philosophers also still cling to it, even though the same questions they ask haven't been answered by reason for thousands of years. That's why I got interested in the Vedic tradition of India. Hey you must get yourself a trip to India; black Africa and Thailand are also brain-changing desinations for the Westerner (I've made it to 68 countries)- you can evidently think and if you're sensitive you'd make some interesting observations.

There is no such thing as "faith in reason". The two are antithetical. Therein lies your problem. PS: I have been to "black" Africa. But unlike you I don't worship exoticism for exoticism's sake. PPS: I don't much give a damn to antiquated "traditions" that people like you glorify. They bring us female genital mutilation, needless extermination of rhinos, tigers and sharks and other abominations in the name of "traditional medicine". PPPS: by some definitions I am an "Easterner", but explaining that to you is too compllicated. You prefer to live with facile categorizations and judge arguments by the identity of the speaker.  PPPPS: As long as you remain monolingual your "experiences" abroad will remain very limited, indeed.

[karlhenning]

Not really. I think drogulus got it spot on.

Nah. Ernie was dismissing and insulting a whole class of fellow people, on the basis of a reprehensible (and probably not representative) minority.  If it were some other topic, Ernie's comment would be immediately dismissed as prejudice.

Mind you, I'm not saying that Sean's posts are not 97% drivel, at a conservative estimate.  But Ernie just folded that in to his customary rant against . . . you know all the rest.

[MN Dave]

I am an "Easterner", but explaining that to you is too compllicated.

You're from New Jersey?

[karlhenning]

You're from New Jersey?

Bayonne.

[MishaK]

Nah. Ernie was dismissing and insulting a whole class of fellow people, on the basis of a reprehensible (and probably not representative) minority.  If it were some other topic, Ernie's comment would be immediately dismissed as prejudice.

Not really. He narrowly defined the category of people by the characteristic he decries. The analysis is completely correct. Otherwise feel free to provide examples of people who would be undeservedly covered by Ernie's dismissal.

You're from New Jersey?

Ha!    Hardly.

[karlhenning]

Given the blanket phrase all mystics, hucksters and divines, you have a strange notion of "narrowly defined," Mensch 

[bwv 1080]

Today my teacher mentioned that WWII was won by USA and GB. I'm a little surprised.

That is true, although Germany was defeated by the Russians

[MishaK]

Given the blanket phrase all mystics, hucksters and divines, you have a strange notion of "narrowly defined," Mensch 

Show me a mystic, huckster or diviner who doesn't fit Ernie's complaint.

That is true, although Germany was defeated by the Russians

Except that the UK kinda lost its world power status as a result, not that it wasn't in inevitable decline already before.

[drogulus]

Nah. Ernie was dismissing and insulting a whole class of fellow people, on the basis of a reprehensible (and probably not representative) minority.  If it were some other topic, Ernie's comment would be immediately dismissed as prejudice.

Mind you, I'm not saying that Sean's posts are not 97% drivel, at a conservative estimate.  But Ernie just folded that in to his customary rant against . . . you know all the rest.

     

      I'm attacking nonsense where I find it. There's no protection for any ideology whether it calls itself religion or not. It just happens to be the case that when people want to believe this stuff they often shield it with the name of religion. Sean like to attack people who resort to Western pragmatism and empiricism. He doesn't like people making too much sense, so it's entirely appropriate for me to connect the dots and show how the attack on rationality brings together people with a common interest, like shielding their beliefs from criticism by claiming, for example, that I'm "insulting a whole class of fellow people". Now we're not talking about beliefs any more, we're just trading insults, right? That's how you protect a belief you don't wish to explain. You claim a person is being insulted, even when no such thing has happened.

      The point of my attack on these types is that they proclaim nonsense, intimate that what they say can't be understood, perhaps even by them, and expect to be believed as telling profound truths. If they know this is bullshit we call them hucksters. But if they don't know we call them mystics or divines, and make allowances for them. I would like to end this practice. We shouldn't say it's OK to deceive others if you've already deceived yourself.

[Ephemerid]

The point of my attack on these types is that they proclaim nonsense, intimate that what they say can't be understood, perhaps even by them, and expect to be believed as telling profound truths. If they know this is bullshit we call them hucksters. But if they don't know we call them mystics or divines, and make allowances for them. I would like to end this practice. We shouldn't say it's OK to deceive others if you've already deceived yourself.

If you haven't already done this, you should read Walter Kaufmann's Critique of Religion and Philosophy -- I think you'd like him.  (what you wrote sounds like something he would've written)  I should re-read that book myself...

[MishaK]

Sean like to attack people who resort to Western pragmatism and empiricism.

Just a small correction here because it pi$$es me off when Sean says it and I don't want you repeating the error needlessly since you are basically in agreement with me on the issue: The West didn't invent empiricism, nor is its applicability culturally limited. Every most basic trial and error type learning is empirical at its base and all cultures have used empiricism in some form or another. There is nothing peculiarly "Western" about it. That's precisely why it works so reliably.

[Haffner]

Just a small correction here because it pi$$es me off when Sean says it and I don't want you repeating the error needlessly since you are basically in agreement with me on the issue: The West didn't invent empiricism, nor is its applicability culturally limited. Every most basic trial and error type learning is empirical at its base and all cultures have used empiricism in some form or another. There is nothing peculiarly "Western" about it. That's precisely why it works so reliably.

It's fascinating to really study the influence that the East and Near East cultures had upon the type of thinking O. mentions above. I've read forums where too many young people assumed that the Moors were "barbarians" when they came to Europe spreading Islam. In reality, the Moors had easily as "sophisticated" (feel free to choose your own preferred term here) a culture as any in the world at that time.

I guess that ethno/cultural-centricism will abound wherever one is.