The Philosophy Discussion Forum

This is the relevant part for your readers to understand how you conceive of ‘evil’:

AJ wrote:Christian theology is problematic because the concepts are rooted in a very different ‘world picture’. And that picture is that ‘the world was good’ until the Fateful Error of the First People. Then, the World was affected, afflicted, damaged, plagued really, by the consequences of that choice. But that view (in my view) is a child’s view. The world was the world for billions of years and, therefore, “evil” had to have been in it all along.

Alexis Jacobi wrote: ↑Sat Jul 18, 2026 1:35 am ...it is necessary that that shark kill in order to live. Same for the seal: it has no choice but to eat fish and crabs in exactly the same paradigm that you presented with the video of the shark.

That's not really the question.

The question is whether or not human beings are in the same moral position as sharks.

Alexis Jacobi wrote: ↑Sat Jul 18, 2026 1:49 am

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Fri Jul 17, 2026 10:34 pm So if I understand you correctly, you're now saying that you don't see man as simply another animal, or as simply another feature of the natural world.

...man is very much and distinctively unique...

How so? You say "because he lives with metaphysics." But cannot a Naturalist say, "Well, that's just a delusion, and he should stop it?" What would your reply to him be?

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Sat Jul 18, 2026 4:17 am

Alexis Jacobi wrote: ↑Sat Jul 18, 2026 1:35 am ...it is necessary that that shark kill in order to live. Same for the seal: it has no choice but to eat fish and crabs in exactly the same paradigm that you presented with the video of the shark.

That's not really the question.

The question is whether or not human beings are in the same moral position as sharks.

Sharks are not in any “moral position”, IC. Just as no seal, insect or orca is in some sort of ‘moral quandary’. So, we have that established. Let’s move on.

Human beings — this should be thoroughly obvious — arise in and arise out of exactly the same matrix. This is crucial to see and understand. We are creatures, and we too must kill and eat other creatures. And all of human life and all relationships can be looked at, can be understood, as similar to predator/prey. And we are now, and in the future we will still be, creatures that must cultivate other life forms so that we can maintain ourselves.

I struggle to comprehend why this extremely simple and obvious picture of our situation is so very hard for you to grasp.

What is the purpose of my attempt to set the ground for a discussion of “evil”? I think that is obvious: we humans refer to, conceive of, long for, and also believe that we can receive and assimilate ‘higher orders’ of commands or systems of behavior that are ‘metaphysical to the world and the world of Nature’.

And the term ‘evil’ is (as far as I can tell) completely bound up in such metaphysics.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Sat Jul 18, 2026 4:19 am How so? You say "because he lives with metaphysics." But cannot a Naturalist say, "Well, that's just a delusion, and he should stop it?" What would your reply to him be?

You have used up your complimentary questions, IC.

Best if you respond to the gist of the “picture” of our human situation. Do you agree? If not, why?

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Sat Jul 18, 2026 4:19 am How so? You say "because he lives with metaphysics." But cannot a Naturalist say, "Well, that's just a delusion, and he should stop it?" What would your reply to him be?

That is, in fact, what most of your “local antagonists” do say! And that is precisely why you cannot gain the ground you desire to gain!

I am come, Immanuel. I will put everything in order! I will explain you to you, and you to them!

The Teaching that I offer, its purpose, is to help humanity reorient itself to the ‘facts’, as it were, of our shared human situation. Today, and more and more, the realities of “strict power principles” are made painfully clear to all. And as computer systems are widely installed, and the net of control closes, we will all better realize the degree to which we are ‘trapped’ in mechanized systems that mirror nature’s mechanics. I guess I would say that the degree to which man “abandons belief in metaphysics’ (to amend Weaver who said “abandons Universals”) is the degree we all wind up in the dark world of extreme forms of control. In any event, my view is that this, in essence, is a notable feature of our present.

So, now we are in a better position to think about “evil”, don’t you think?

I wish to call Gary as my first witness. Gary, will you please take the stand?

Alexis Jacobi wrote: ↑Sat Jul 18, 2026 2:58 pm

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Sat Jul 18, 2026 4:19 am How so? You say "because he lives with metaphysics." But cannot a Naturalist say, "Well, that's just a delusion, and he should stop it?" What would your reply to him be?

I guess I would say that the degree to which man “abandons belief in metaphysics’ (to amend Weaver who said “abandons Universals”) is the degree we all wind up in the dark world of extreme forms of control.

That's probably the case. But it doesn't justify the recourse to metaphysics. It could be that recourse to a false metaphysics would have exactly the same outcome...that we would end up being controlled by a metaphysical false teacher, which is not better than being controlled by a secular despot. In fact, in many ways, it's more serious: for while the secular despot will satisfy himself with controlling your body, the metaphysical false teacher aims at distorting the mind, so that even conceiving of disobeying him becomes undoable.

Man does metaphysics. On that, we agree. But bad metaphysics are very bad. And the right metaphysics, even if it yields an outcome we like, has to be justified by more than its outcome. It has to reflect reality, or its just a convenient delusion.

So again we return to the issue: how do we prevent our metaphysical beliefs from becoming delusions or offering to false teachers the opportunity to enslave us through poisoning our minds?

I have not yet brought out what metaphysics are coherent, or perhaps “the more real” (?) but by and by it is possible to make some propositions.

IC wrote:So again we return to the issue: how do we prevent our metaphysical beliefs from becoming delusions or offering to false teachers the opportunity to enslave us through poisoning our minds?

Alexis Jacobi wrote: ↑Sat Jul 18, 2026 5:03 pm I have not yet brought out what metaphysics are coherent, or perhaps “the more real” (?) but by and by it is possible to make some propositions.

IC wrote:So again we return to the issue: how do we prevent our metaphysical beliefs from becoming delusions or offering to false teachers the opportunity to enslave us through poisoning our minds?

Well, I'm interested.

But we've really got two problems now: the first one is how we justify imposing ANY metaphysics on what others insist is mere "nature." Then, what follows up is this: given the possibility of delusion and lies, what cognitive strategy would you recommend in order to locate the right or truthful metaphysic?

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Sat Jul 18, 2026 5:37 pm But we've really got two problems now: the first one is how we justify imposing ANY metaphysics on what others insist is mere "nature." Then, what follows up is this: given the possibility of delusion and lies, what cognitive strategy would you recommend in order to locate the right or truthful metaphysic?

In my view, the ‘problem’ in the largest sense is what definition of “world” we privilege. So, between you and I — we have been communicating with varying levels of success for years — we must start by realizing that we conceive of “world” differently. Not completely or thoroughly differently — there are similarities that can be built upon — but differently enough that we will not ever be able to agree.

And the readership here — take Gary as an example — subscribe to no foundation that you and I might share. So, we might continue conversing abstractly about our differing metaphysical concepts, but can’t lose sight of the fact that on this forum, and within our civilization, ‘agreements’ have broken down. And as the poet said, in such a time and situation “the center cannot hold”.

We can, naturally, continue in the polemics and the arguments, but my view is that we are better served by establishing the different perspectives, by explaining them, and also in understanding that reconciliation and “agreement” is impossible. Thus, the nature of the time we are in is not one of a tendency toward unity of perspective, but moreover the opposite.

As far as “problems” go, myself I see the issues we discuss on two separate levels. One is social, cultural and civilizational. The other personal, interior and, if you will, subjective. To clarify: by personal and interior I mean essentially the spiritual: i.e. what you and I and anyone else ‘does’ on internal levels to ensure psychological and spiritual well-being, but more importantly the strengthening of ‘the soul’s commitments’.

So, we know (or at least I know) what an Evangelical Christian does to strengthen his soul’s commitments. Same for an Orthodox Jew. But I am also aware of what a Buddhist does and what a Hindu might do and, at least in my own case, I can compare them but I refrain from over-privileging my perspectives on each. And yes, I have logical as well as ethical and moral reasons why I do refrain from such judgments. But in no sense does this mean that I refrain from understanding the differences between them, and especially in their effects and consequences in the world.

IC wrote:But we've really got two problems now: the first one is how we justify imposing ANY metaphysics on what others insist is mere "nature."

My view is that the most acute and realistic view is the one that I suppose is the most powerful in our present, and that is the scientific-materialistic view of “world” “existence” and “reality”. That view is both dominant and dominating even among those with traces, vestiges and shadows of the ‘former metaphysical worldviews’ of former times.

Remember Big Mike? He really made his commitments to the materialistic view I just described, so much so that it took on a fired-up zealousness that looked religious, if I can use that word in his context. How could one ever propose to him ideas or possibilities that included unverifiable metaphysical notions? I do not think it possible.

Similarly, though differently, I gathered that our own Gary is a ‘non-metaphysical thinker’. Overt metaphysical ideas are absent from his philosophical expressions, and what are, in their essence, lamentations over the injustices of world-level power-politics.

Oddly, Gary is really & truly informed by a Christian moral worldview, otherwise he’d have no basis to lament those ‘injustices’ that are part-and-parcel of natural processes, of Nature in its cruelty and rapaciousness. And, bizarrely, I think that was also the case for Big Mike.

It seems to me that we (humans, especially Occidentals) have been so infused with principles derived from Chtistian metaphysics that even those who have formally abandoned religious viewpoints and practice, still express the value-system which is, as I propose, no part of Nature when Nature is really understood.

Alexis Jacobi wrote: ↑Sun Jul 19, 2026 4:31 pm

IC wrote:But we've really got two problems now: the first one is how we justify imposing ANY metaphysics on what others insist is mere "nature."

My view is that the most acute and realistic view is the one that I suppose is the most powerful in our present, and that is the scientific-materialistic view of “world” “existence” and “reality”.

There's no place in that ideology for metaphysics, though. Materialism does not acknowledge the real existence of anything but "materials:" physics, okay...but no metaphysics.

isn't thought itself metaphysical?

-Imp

Impenitent wrote: ↑Sun Jul 19, 2026 9:02 pm isn't thought itself metaphysical?

-Imp

The extremes of idealism and physicalism both say no for opposite reasons. I think the answer is somewhere in between, on the spectrum of maybe, probably and yes.

Metaphysics depends on physics. Everything in nature is layered just like quantum physics is responsible for the entire hierarchy of classical physics. Metaphysics without physics as prerequisite is a complete non-sequitur.