Philosophy Now Forum

iambiguous wrote: ↑Wed Jan 04, 2023 6:57 pm ...do you or do you not believe as a Christian, that if there is no Christian God, no Judgement Day, no afterlife, no immortality and salvation, that mere mortals on this side of the grave would end up rationalizing any and all behaviors?

No. I think that's unlikely. Like Nietzsche said, they're not courageous enough to be bravely bad. And being too public with their badness would surely cause them trouble with the "weak" types who continue to believe in morality even though the rationale for it is dead with God. That's how NIetzsche saw it.

So some people would continue to be good. And Nietzsche saw them as the fearful sheep. But some would be ubermenschen, and those are the ones brave and "heroic" enough to seize Nietzsche's own logic, and do whatever they wanted to increase their own "power" and express their "life force."

Deontology is still a bust, right?

Secular ethics, as a discipline, is a total bust, if you ask your ethics to have a legitimative basis.

And the bottom line in any community, whether as a result of courage or cunning is this: which behaviors are prescribed and which are proscribed. Whether you call this morality or something else.

Nietzsche just called it "power." For him, it had nothing to do with morality. And it was the ubermenschen who alone had the courage to subvert and elude it all.

Just ask the folks living in theocracies.

There's no such thing.

The closest to such a thing you could suggest might be Islam. But Islam is not Hinduism, Zoroastrianism, Judaism, Christianity, Catholicism...

Islam has its own account to give. You can't tar all the rest with the same brush.

Nietzsche doesn't connect the dots between duty and the afterlife. Unless you count eternal recurrence.

Irrelevant. It was a dumb theory, with a glaring mathematical fallacy entailed.

But you do. And with burning in Hell for all the eternity literally on the line here, are you or are you not connecting those dots yourself? Is there an afterlife without Judgment Day? Is there a Judgment Day without the Christian God?[/quote]

I know, I know: Did Nietzsche himself ever demonstrate ontologically and teleologically that the Christian God did not exist? No? Then the Christian God does exist.

Nope. You imagined that argument. I never made it.

...without an actual accumulation of hard evidence, most mere mortals do believe in an afterlife "in their head" -- a leap of faith, a wager -- that puts the burden of proof on atheists?!!!

The duty to show evidence is on both sides. But whereas the Theist can show some that at least indicatively warrants belief in God (watch the videos, if you doubt, or don't, if you're scared) the Atheist can show none.

And even here, connecting the dots between an afterlife and the Christian God revolves entirely around automatically dismissing all of the One True Paths here of these folks: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_r ... traditions

So?

Having the right answer to 2+2 involves "automatically dismissing" all answers but "4". What's your point?

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jan 04, 2023 3:58 amI've said this before, but I guess you couldn't understand. I'l make it as simple for you as I can.

The number of "answers" to any question does not argue for there being no right answer. It suggests, instead, that there are a lot of wrong answers. One may be right.

Absolutely shameless!!!

I'm sorry I can't make it simple enough for you. I guess I'm wasting my time.

Alexis Jacobi wrote: ↑Wed Jan 04, 2023 7:59 pm

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jan 04, 2023 6:53 pmIt really looks like you've mistaken me for the Papacy, or for Orthodoxy -- or both -- or for some other human system you find "oppressive." And I can't help you with any of that, because I've got nothing whatsoever to do with any of it.

The RC's you mean? Or Judaism?

But I’d not explain either Catholicism, Evangelism or Judaism as ‘oppressive’. They are systems with layers of complexity.

Well, none of your "oppressive" structures or arguments hit the mark. I have no attachment to whatever it is you're talking about there.

You are completely but completely invested in a religious mode of thinking and seeing.

Aaaaad hominem.

You really can't help yourself, can you? You're as incontinent as a puppy. The minute you run out of logic, you have to go ad hom.

Try to grow beyond that. Personally, I can't be bothered with a response to such a puerilities.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jan 04, 2023 7:56 pm
We have doctors: why concern oneself with God for healing? We have grocery stores: why ask God for food? We have scientists: why look to God for answers? We have government officials: why ask God to sanctify our marriages and births? We have pension plans: why look to Him in old age? We have cyberspace: why look to God

You've taken the wind out of my sails good and proper, IC. Perhaps I've misjudged you.

When one has adopted a pattern of life in which God forms no part of one's consideration, one may well have no suspicion of what difference belief in God could ever make...

Yes, IC, that's it exactly: I don't suspect God of being of any use to me.

However, presuppositions are not all the same. For the rich, urban city-dweller in the West, having lived a whole life without reference to God may make him oblivious to His importance -- it doesn't make Him unimportant. It seems that the rural peasant, the average tradesman, the farmer, the adventurer, the philospher, the new mother and father, the child gazing at the stars, and the scientist with a telescope, and a host of other types DO feel the need to discuss God, either in positive or negative terms.

And what keeps you here, if you don't?

Gravity, mostly.

That's really a stunning question

Thank you, I do like to think I make an effort.

It does amuse me, though, how quickly some debaters seem to want to slide into the ad hominem.

Oh i do so agree. It can be fun, can't it?

I'll accept your comments about my personal moral hygiene as your preferred opinion, without taking offence.

And no offence meant to yer good self, squire, I'm sure. I tips me hat to yer.

That's my cockney impression, IC.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jan 04, 2023 8:17 pm You really can't help yourself, can you? You're as incontinent as a puppy. The minute you run out of logic, you have to go ad hom.

Try to grow beyond that. Personally, I can't be bothered with a response to such a puerilities.

Don't let him off so lightly, IC, his sort need to be taught a lesson. You go and give the scoundrel what for.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jan 04, 2023 8:17 pm
You really can't help yourself, can you? You're as incontinent as a puppy.

Surely you're not going to let him get away with that, Alexis. You need to go and sort him out.

iambiguous wrote: ↑Wed Jan 04, 2023 7:46 pm Yo, AJ! You're up!

Iambiguous wrote: But according to Wiki...

"Renaud Camus born Jean Renaud Gabriel Camus on 10 August 1946) is a French novelist, conspiracy theorist and white nationalist writer. He is the inventor of the 'Great Replacement', a far-right conspiracy theory that claims that a 'global elite' is colluding against the white population of Europe to replace them with non-European peoples.

"Camus's 'Great Replacement' theory has been translated on far-right websites and adopted by far-right groups to reinforce the white genocide conspiracy theory. Although Camus has repeatedly condemned and disavowed the use of violence,[5][6][7][8] his theory has nevertheless influenced several mass shootings, including in Christchurch, El Paso, and Buffalo."

And some might be convinced that this frame of mind revolves around the racist assumption that white folks are superior to other races. Though I've come across white folks who argue that the yellow race is actually intellectually superior to the white race. But never the black or brown skinned folks.

Where do your views fit in here?

What other people think is not much concern to me. Nor should it be to you. Other people have their own ideas and objectives.

To link him with mass shootings is the ultimate use of spin, don't you think? This is typical today: if you do not think politically correctly you will be associated with Adolf Hitler. You know how this works, don't you?

I do not see things in terms of superior and inferior. I would rather examine a culture and try to see what they value and try to see that as fine and good. Do you mean to ask me if I think that our Occidental culture or cultures are *superior* to others? I might say that "It appears to me to be the case". Or I might say it does not matter except that for me my own culture is the one I value. But it would not mean, necessarily, that I would stand in judgment of other cultures and try to send agents in to disrupt their own processes or change them.

It is true that in terms of IQ that on average the Asians have higher IQs -- but is IQ the only measure? I do not think so.

AJ wrote: In terms of America? I would be concerned, and with good reasons, if the super-majority demographic status of European-derived Americans was lost. In about 50 years (since 1965) this has been happening (eroding demographics). It is leading and will lead to all sorts os social problems.

Iambiguous wrote:: Okay, how concerned? Politically, how far would you go to prevent this? If you had political power in any particular community, what behaviors would you yourself proscribe in regard to the races?

My position is quite similar to Ann Coulter's. All immigration *should be* put on moratorium until all those who have arrived in the last few decades as 'assimilated'. Those who arrived illegally should be deported. But that could only take place if there was a general will that to have entered illegally is a 'bad thing'. Otherwise, it would be and it will be impossible to remove those who arrived this way.

But this opens whole other sets of social problems (not being able to take any action at all).

The example I have referred to recently is that of France. Because it is a smaller nation I suppose and it is easier to see the perspective that Camus has. Also there is an existing political movement going on in France which has an articulated position. Other nations such as Denmark and Sweden have or are in a process of confronting problematic demographic issues. Eastern Europe is also I'd say *on alert*.

My core interest is in the examination of these issues, and I do not have an activist's orientation.

Alexis Jacobi wrote: ↑Mon Jan 02, 2023 8:32 pmDo I stake my life as an activist to reverse this trend? No. I am simply very interested in what is going on. And I am aware of two quite distinct poles of thought on the issue.

Iambiguous wrote: That might be deemed rather pathetic by some.

And?

Also, what of those like the Jews? White Jews, say. Or white Muslims. Or white Hindus. Where does god and religion factor in here for you?

All I can say is that in my view the United States is headed into various different types and levels of social catastrophe. We have seen the beginnings. These arise not out of the nada but for causal reasons. There are quite a number of speculations about where this is going and what it will lead to. I am aware of many of them. I do not myself have a position. I have the luxury of an independent position. And I prefer intellectual approach.

If I say such things it is not my words that produce it, it is causes that are already in motion.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jan 04, 2023 8:17 pm You really can't help yourself, can you? You're as incontinent as a puppy. The minute you run out of logic, you have to go ad hom.

Try to grow beyond that. Personally, I can't be bothered with a response to such a puerilities.

You cannot respond to anyone's inquiries when they become pointed. So I only write in relation to you. I do not expect you to engage. You cannot. Others can draw their own conclusions from these exchanges.

Alexis Jacobi wrote: ↑Wed Jan 04, 2023 8:47 pm What other people think is not much concern to me. Nor should it be to you. Other people have their own ideas and objectives.

I just thought you should know, Alexis, that IC has been spreading rumours that you have a small penis and wear corduroy trowsers. Don't let him know you heard it from me.

Harbal wrote: ↑Wed Jan 04, 2023 8:38 pm

And what keeps you here, if you don't?

Gravity, mostly.

Yes, of course.

I tips me hat to yer.

That's my cockney impression, IC.

My father was, technically, one of those, though he never did nutting what got no aggro from awld Bill.

Back atcha. Yer a decent bloke.

Harbal wrote: ↑Wed Jan 04, 2023 8:53 pm

Alexis Jacobi wrote: ↑Wed Jan 04, 2023 8:47 pm What other people think is not much concern to me. Nor should it be to you. Other people have their own ideas and objectives.

I just thought you should know, Alexis, that IC has been spreading rumours that you have a small penis and wear corduroy trowsers. Don't let him know you heard it from me.

Corduroy? The villain! I shall be avenged.

Harbal wrote: ↑Wed Jan 04, 2023 8:44 pm

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jan 04, 2023 8:17 pm
You really can't help yourself, can you? You're as incontinent as a puppy.

Surely you're not going to let him get away with that, Alexis. You need to go and sort him out.

Now, now...you're just stirring the pot, H.

Am I not offensive enough as I am?

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jan 04, 2023 9:39 pm Now, now...you're just stirring the pot, H.

Who, me?

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jan 04, 2023 9:37 pm Yer a decent bloke.

And an inspiration, Harbal. An INSPIRATION.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jan 04, 2023 2:21 am

Gary Childress wrote: ↑Tue Jan 03, 2023 9:43 pmI'm curious why you think anything will change by me no longer complaining about my aches.

I never suggested it did.

But if you'll forgive me, I see a lot more than "ouching" going on in your posts. "Ouch" is, after all, just an inarticulate expression of pain. But you're not inarticulate. You say quite a lot, and much of it quite specific. You're brooding over the aches and pains you've had, circling on the hurts of the past, and emoting resentment...as if you are somehow convinced somebody's "done you wrong."

But Gary, if there's no God, nobody's "done you wrong." There's no "wrong." Whatever your lot, and whatever happened to you, it was all just the random toss of the dice in an indifferent universe. Chance dealt you a hand you don't like: well, that's what you should expect from a universe that has no care for you, no justice in it, and no promise of any. So why the resentment? Why the bitterness? And why the desire to complain about something that was just fated to be, anyway? To whom do you complain? On what principle?

But here's what I see: I see you feel you deserved better. And I see you think you (in some sense) should have been allowed to get it. You feel a sense of injustice, aggrievance, unfairness, and cruelty in it all, and you seem to want somebody to know about that.

May I ask you why?

It's either a random roll of the dice that I developed mental illness or there's a God who allowed it to happen. From my perspective it makes more sense as a random chance occurance because if there's a God then it doesn't say much flattering of God to go around fucking up people's lives endowing us with mental illness. However that seems to be the sticking point between us. You want there to be a God who created everything and at the same time did not create evils that befall us. My point is that if there's a God then that God is responsible for a lot of evil. If there's not a God or if God is not a good God, then that would tend to explain the presence of evil better than the notion of a loving God having created the world.

Gary Childress wrote: ↑Wed Jan 04, 2023 10:11 pm

But here's what I see: I see you feel you deserved better. And I see you think you (in some sense) should have been allowed to get it. You feel a sense of injustice, aggrievance, unfairness, and cruelty in it all, and you seem to want somebody to know about that.

May I ask you why?

It's either a random roll of the dice that I developed mental illness or there's a God who allowed it to happen.

Right. Obviously.

From my perspective it makes more sense as a random chance occurance

No problem. If that's what makes more sense to you, that's what makes more sense to you. But what no longer makes sense is you complaining as if you've been "done dirt." Nobody's done you wrong. There is no "wrong." So why are you still complaining?

I'm not trying to insult you, Gary; I'm showing you what the logic of that decision entails. If you think there's no God, then there's nobody to blame, and nobody to care about the fact that you've got mental illness, and nothing else that could possibly have been your lot. You're totally out of excuses and places to send the blame.

if there's a God then it doesn't say much flattering of God

What reason have you to suppose that the God you have decided doesn't exist has done anything to you?

But I take your point: there needs to be some explanation of why bad things happen in this world. I don't say "needs" as in "I need," though we all do, but rather that something is missing from any description of the world that doesn't address the fact that a lot of what goes on is, to coin a simplistic phrase, "not-good" stuff. We all feel the urgency of that question, I would say...even if not all of us are dealing with mental illness.

You want there to be a God who created everything and at the same time did not create evils that befall us.

No, I don't, Gary. I believe there is a God, AND He has knowledge of the reasons why particular evils befall us. Nobody here is asking for a "pass" for God on that question...certainly not I.

My point is that if there's a God then that God is responsible for a lot of evil.

Only if God were the only active agency on the Earth. Otherwise, any blame we accord has to be at least split: human's do some evil thing, and some evil things "just happen." And we need an understanding of both, if we want a complete picture of how the world is.

If there's not a God or if God is not a good God, then that would tend to explain the presence of evil better than the notion of a loving God.

Unless God had some sufficient reason for allowing at least some occasions of the phenomena and actions we are speaking of as "evil." And if that were the case, we'd have to think a lot more carefully than if we just take our anger out on Him by deciding to act as if He doesn't exist...as if trying to punish God by refusing to believe in Him...which would mean we actually would believe in Him, but hate Him.