Philosophy Now Forum

Belinda wrote: ↑Wed Aug 23, 2017 11:44 pm Immanuel Can wrote:

Oh. So that's how you do it...you just reclassify everyone who doesn't agree with you as "criminal" and "deranged," and then "deal with" them?

To some degree, yes. Any organised group of people needs a moral consensus.

So you'll be rolling out the gulags shortly, I expect? Because that is precisely what the USSR did...classify any disagreement as "criminal" and "deranged." Then they could "deal with" them in any way they saw fit.

You're okay with that strategy?

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Thu Aug 24, 2017 1:20 am

Belinda wrote: ↑Wed Aug 23, 2017 11:44 pm Immanuel Can wrote:

Oh. So that's how you do it...you just reclassify everyone who doesn't agree with you as "criminal" and "deranged," and then "deal with" them?

To some degree, yes. Any organised group of people needs a moral consensus.

So you'll be rolling out the gulags shortly, I expect? Because that is precisely what the USSR did...classify any disagreement as "criminal" and "deranged." Then they could "deal with" them in any way they saw fit.

You're okay with that strategy?

This is indeed a wicked and unfair world, Immanuel. I expect you will agree that free democracies for all their faults are more just than the Stalinist USSR.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Thu Aug 24, 2017 1:17 am

Greta wrote: ↑Thu Aug 24, 2017 12:19 am Immanuel, morality is not restricted to the "west".

THAT"S what you got out of what I said?

Oy...frickin'...vey.

THAT"S what you got out of what I said?

Oy...frickin'...vey.

Belinda wrote: ↑Thu Aug 24, 2017 2:11 am

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Thu Aug 24, 2017 1:20 am

Belinda wrote: ↑Wed Aug 23, 2017 11:44 pm Immanuel Can wrote:

To some degree, yes. Any organised group of people needs a moral consensus.

So you'll be rolling out the gulags shortly, I expect? Because that is precisely what the USSR did...classify any disagreement as "criminal" and "deranged." Then they could "deal with" them in any way they saw fit.

You're okay with that strategy?

This is indeed a wicked and unfair world, Immanuel. I expect you will agree that free democracies for all their faults are more just than the Stalinist USSR.

I'm not accusing you, nor denigrating real democracy. But do you not know that what you are saying is exactly how it all starts?

The Leftists start believing their utopia is at hand...they will make it happen, through political reform. A Leftist revolution is necessary first: overthrow the oppressor, and take control of the government in the name of all that is fair, decent and humane, and finally we'll all get the justice we deserve. The world will be a better place (sing it, John Lennon).

But then, it doesn't come; and they look for reasons. They quickly decide that certain regressive elements are responsible: non-Leftists, the Jews, the Christians, political dissenters, the bourgeoisie, saboteurs, or all of the above. Because these regressive elements are holding back utopia, it is decided that they must be very wicked indeed. And because they are so wicked, they must be "criminal" or "deranged." Until this criminal / deranged element is "dealt with," utopia is prevented.

Since a literal heaven-on-earth is what's at stake, the Left feels justified in doing whatever they have to do to produce the "consensus" of the population: and that means the elimination by suppression, coercion, reprogramming, dispossessing, incarceration and, if necessary, killing of the allegedly regressive element. And since this element is manifestly so "wicked," there is no longer any conscience about what is done to them: in fact, the more vicious and thorough the Leftists are, the more righteous they feel, revelling in the thoroughness of their own dedication to their cause.

The longer their utopia does not appear, the more the Leftists are induced to think they have not been ruthless enough. The regressive element hasn't been weeded out. It's still holding things back. So more draconian methods are required. (All in the interests of humanity, of course. But one must break a few eggs to make omelettes, no? It's temporary, and we can soon get to better times. Only now we must do the dirty work to bring that about. Or so they reason.)

You might want to read The Gulag Archipelago. It maps this out perfectly. Essentially, if we take you literally, your rationale is the classic Leftist excuse for things like purges, re-education camps, gulags and executions.

I'm not calling you evil...I'm saying, "Be careful what you ask for. One day, you might get it."

"Those who do not remember history," said Santayana...

Immanuel, does any thinker believe in Utopia? Can you name just one intellectual who believes in Utopia? You confuse communist totalitarianism with welfare state.

You sound as if you are marooned with Senator McCarthy on some sterile island. He's dead but does his spirit live on in America?

Belinda wrote: ↑Thu Aug 24, 2017 8:19 pm Immanuel, does any thinker believe in Utopia? Can you name just one intellectual who believes in Utopia? You confuse communist totalitarianism with welfare state.

You sound as if you are marooned with Senator McCarthy on some sterile island. He's dead but does his spirit live on in America?

You are wasting your time with IC. Like all right-wing fundies, they fly against just about everything Jesus said. IC is controlling. repressive and regressive. Were it up to him we'd all be monks praying the the state, giving all and receiving nothing back, working for the moral machine. God for him is Big Brother and we should be slaves to IC's twisted notion of christianity.

Belinda wrote: ↑Thu Aug 24, 2017 8:19 pm Immanuel, does any thinker believe in Utopia?

Of course. Every Communist does. They call it, "The Triumph of the Proletariat." Western liberals just call it, "the just society," which is more modest: but they're both passionate about producing it, convinced they can and must, and both quickly come to believe that all that they do in service of this end is righteous. If you think the Western Left is less toxic, just look at the Berkeley riots. It's clear that step 1 in the Left becoming violent is already upon us.

That's how people get killed in the modern world, statistically. Over 100 million bodies say, "Don't trust the Left." Human beings cannot produce utopia, the Triumph of the Proletariat, the just society, or any other such dream world; and when they try, people die.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Fri Aug 25, 2017 12:44 am

Belinda wrote: ↑Thu Aug 24, 2017 8:19 pm Immanuel, does any thinker believe in Utopia?

Of course. Every Communist does.

Mr Can, it is only people who have no idea how the world actually works, who believe in any sort of Utopia. That applies to lunatics on the right, just as much as it applies to lunatics on the left.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Fri Aug 25, 2017 12:44 am They call it, "The Triumph of the Proletariat."

That's what some people have called it. What you clearly do not understand, is that the vast majority of people do not divide the world into good and evil. Even fewer equate those with right and left.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Fri Aug 25, 2017 12:44 amWestern liberals just call it, "the just society," which is more modest: but they're both passionate about producing it, convinced they can and must, and both quickly come to believe that all that they do in service of this end is righteous.

Again you are failing to recognise the vast majority of humankind who don't see the world as black and white. 'Western liberals' are not all Stalinists.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Fri Aug 25, 2017 12:44 am If you think the Western Left is less toxic, just look at the Berkeley riots. It's clear that step 1 in the Left becoming violent is already upon us.

There are nutjobs on both sides. Most of us are doing our best to keep them from fucking everything up.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Fri Aug 25, 2017 12:44 amThat's how people get killed in the modern world, statistically. Over 100 million bodies say, "Don't trust the Left." Human beings cannot produce utopia, the Triumph of the Proletariat, the just society, or any other such dream world; and when they try, people die.

How many lives do you suppose have been saved by the NHS, for example?
What most liberals want is simply to create conditions in which everyone gets a good education and decent health care, in which there are some checks and balances, so that economic, political or religious elites don't hoover up all the resources and the ordinary people can support themselves with dignity, rather than being dependent on the 'charity' of those who have taken everything of value for themselves. Apparently, you believe that this is an agenda for which your god will torture us.

Immanuel can't and McCarthy couldn't.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Fri Aug 25, 2017 12:44 am That's how people get killed in the modern world, statistically. Over 100 million bodies say, "Don't trust the Left." Human beings cannot produce utopia, the Triumph of the Proletariat, the just society, or any other such dream world; and when they try, people die.

I think you have allowed rhetoric to triumph over reason.

Nobody, left or right, thinks of themselves as bad. Everybody, would claim they act with good motives. But as you say, the results of some actions are death.

Therefore, should we conclude that death is caused because people act with good motives?

This applies to your own post and creates a version of the Liar Paradox.. You say it is bad to attempt to create a just society, so what are you doing when you find fault with the left? If your post was motivated by a desire to do good, then from what you say we know it will have bad effects, so we should ignore it. But alternatively, if you were not motivated by a desire to do good, then the intention of your post must have been to mislead or harm us, so we should ignore it. So either way you are advising us to disregard your post.

Londoner wrote: ↑Fri Aug 25, 2017 11:50 am

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Fri Aug 25, 2017 12:44 am That's how people get killed in the modern world, statistically. Over 100 million bodies say, "Don't trust the Left." Human beings cannot produce utopia, the Triumph of the Proletariat, the just society, or any other such dream world; and when they try, people die.

Nobody, left or right, thinks of themselves as bad. Everybody, would claim they act with good motives. But as you say, the results of some actions are death.

This is exactly the point. To "think oneself" good means nothing: any ideologue thinks that. If he did not, he'd be a different kind of ideologue instead of the one he is, is that not so? He'd go to a different ideology.

Therefore, should we conclude that death is caused because people act with good motives?

Often it is. The people who liquidate others often do so in the name of a higher good. Why do you think, for example, the Maoists spoke of, "The Great Leap Forward"? That one killed tens of millions, by cautious estimates.

Now, obviously, that's not to say that "good motives kill people." It just means that nothing about one's motives seeming "good" to one prevents one from killing people...even millions.

This applies to your own post and creates a version of the Liar Paradox..

You've shot very wide of my point.

You say it is bad to attempt to create a just society, so what are you doing when you find fault with the left?

Not advocating some new version of "the Good Society." Instead, I'm advocating humility with regard to what human nature is capable of achieving, and that we turn a very suspicious eye on anyone who claims they are going to produce some ideal human community on earth through their own vision and social reform efforts. They are very likely to start advocating something immoral soon, in the name of getting that job done.

If your post was motivated by a desire to do good, then from what you say we know it will have bad effects, so we should ignore it.

Non-sequitur. I neither said nor implied what you attribute to me.

You wrongly assumed I was advocating the position that people desiring good was a cause of death. I said no such thing. Moreover, I do not advocate a right-wing utopianism in place of the Leftist one. I say with that great theologian, Sting, "There is no political solution / To our troubled evolution..."

Politics will not save us. At best, politics is a provisional attempt to deal with the corruption that is in every one of us, and which affects all our political aspirations, no matter how noble they may sound to us. What we need is minimal political authority, with checks and balances in place to strictly limit the political sphere's ability to create disaster.

What we've really got to watch out for is the person who advocates expanding the power and range of government as a strategy to producing the utopian vision. That's step one to Leftist totalitarianism: "Leftist," because big government is traditionally a Leftists cause; but it's fair to say that it wouldn't be better if the Right did it.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Fri Aug 25, 2017 2:00 pm
Me: Therefore, should we conclude that death is caused because people act with good motives?
Often it is. The people who liquidate others often do so in the name of a higher good. Why do you think, for example, the Maoists spoke of, "The Great Leap Forward"? That one killed tens of millions, by cautious estimates.

But I did not write that and it doesn't follow from your arguement. There is a big difference between 'often' and 'always'. If it is only 'often', it means that we are claiming to be able to distinguish between some do-gooders (who are mistaken) and others who are not.

In that case it cannot be that the desire to do-good is the cause, which was your original contention, since they all share that desire.

Me: You say it is bad to attempt to create a just society, so what are you doing when you find fault with the left?

Not advocating some new version of "the Good Society." Instead, I'm advocating humility with regard to what human nature is capable of achieving, and that we turn a very suspicious eye on anyone who claims they are going to produce some ideal human community on earth through their own vision and social reform efforts. They are very likely to start advocating something immoral soon, in the name of getting that job done.

And so you would not find fault with the state of society during the Maoist 'Great Leap Forward'? After all, that was the state of that society at that time - and you are suspicious of anyone who attempts to reform the status quo. If we are against reform, then that is like saying; 'whatever is, is good'. To advocate changing 'what is' would be to impose our own ideas of what would be desirable reform - which you say will always lead to immoral results.

You wrongly assumed I was advocating the position that people desiring good was a cause of death. I said no such thing. Moreover, I do not advocate a right-wing utopianism in place of the Leftist one. I say with that great theologian, Sting, "There is no political solution / To our troubled evolution..."

But we have no choice. Our present situation is also the expression of a political ideology. So 'not doing anything' is also a political act.

Londoner wrote: ↑Fri Aug 25, 2017 6:08 pm If it is only 'often', it means that we are claiming to be able to distinguish between some do-gooders (who are mistaken) and others who are not.

Of course, it's quite true to say that there are good people who are really good, and bad people who only think or say they're good. That's a commonplace. But whether we are rightly distinguishing the two is a vexed point at the moment.

The key issue really is that being self-convinced that one is "good" is no assurance that one has got the situation right. Many people who are very evil have also believed themselves to be serving nobly in what they regarded as the "best" sorts of causes...usually the improvement of the human lot, or the triumph of the collective good, the advancement of social evolution, "the right side of history," or even the production of a master-race. These are all cases where government was empowered in the name of the collective good...and you know how that all worked out.

In that case it cannot be that the desire to do-good is the cause,...

Just as I said. There's nothing wrong with the desire to do good, in itself. But having the desire to do good is no insurance that one is actually about to do good. Many bad causes have been called "good."

...which was your original contention.

That was never my contention. You've misread, I'm afraid.

Me: You say it is bad to attempt to create a just society, so what are you doing when you find fault with the left?

Not advocating some new version of "the Good Society." Instead, I'm advocating humility with regard to what human nature is capable of achieving, and that we turn a very suspicious eye on anyone who claims they are going to produce some ideal human community on earth through their own vision and social reform efforts. They are very likely to start advocating something immoral soon, in the name of getting that job done.

And so you would not find fault with the state of society during the Maoist 'Great Leap Forward'?

No, no: did I not say that the GLF had killed millions? Did you think I meant to recommend it? The GLF had no modicum of humility about it. The Maoists were quite certain they had both the knowledge and means to take people "forward": it just meant they had to kill a bunch of dissenters to get there.

Of course, the GLF was, from start to finish, a project of madness and evil. But we must never forget that it was allegedly done in the name of "the collective good."

...you are suspicious of anyone who attempts to reform the status quo.

Incorrect. I'm very much for reform. But not by those means.

I'm merely advocating suspicion of people who try to reform it through the expansion of governmental powers and by political collectivism. That the status quo needs changing, I do not doubt: but that the means of change will be collectivism and governmental fiat, well, that I doubt completely.

If we are against reform,...

'We" aren't. We ought to be against handing over the moral compass of the individual to the collective, though, and against any hope of looking to large-scale governmental solutions to purge us of our social ills. That hope has piled up the corpses; the sooner it's given up, the better for us all.

You wrongly assumed I was advocating the position that people desiring good was a cause of death. I said no such thing. Moreover, I do not advocate a right-wing utopianism in place of the Leftist one. I say with that great theologian, Sting, "There is no political solution / To our troubled evolution..."

But we have no choice. Our present situation is also the expression of a political ideology. So 'not doing anything' is also a political act.

We do have a choice. Political ideology is not our only recourse. It's just the most obvious refuge for those who don't want to address the problem at its root. For ultimately, the problem is inside you and me.

From whence come bad political "solutions"? I think you can see. They come, ultimately, from the human heart. We dreamed them up, and we made them happen. Human beings do those things. And until the faults of the human heart are addressed, we need not expect that giving those faults power (through collectivism, or through the instrumentality of government power) will result in anything but more failures, and more corpses.

Immanuel Can wrote:

'We" aren't. We ought to be against handing over the moral compass of the individual to the collective, though, and against any hope of looking to large-scale governmental solutions to purge us of our social ills. That hope has piled up the corpses; the sooner it's given up, the better for us all.

Each individual in a democracy has the right and responsibility to evaluate collectives , their moral systems, and individuals.

When there are individuals in theocracies those individuals who have not been brainwashed have the right and the responsibility to evaluate the theocracy within which they are oppressed.

The moral compass of theists can be the same as the moral compass of atheists and secularists. The supernatural narrative of theists does not have to involve God in punitive responses to human frailty, but can posit a God of mercy, reason, and knowledge.

Belinda wrote: ↑Fri Aug 25, 2017 6:53 pm Immanuel Can wrote:

'We" aren't. We ought to be against handing over the moral compass of the individual to the collective, though, and against any hope of looking to large-scale governmental solutions to purge us of our social ills. That hope has piled up the corpses; the sooner it's given up, the better for us all.

Each individual in a democracy has the right and responsibility to evaluate collectives , their moral systems, and individuals.

When there are individuals in theocracies those individuals who have not been brainwashed have the right and the responsibility to evaluate the theocracy within which they are oppressed.

The moral compass of theists can be the same as the moral compass of atheists and secularists. The supernatural narrative of theists does not have to involve God in punitive responses to human frailty, but can posit a God of mercy, reason, and knowledge.

I told you that you were wasting your time with him.
Such a person can never recognise the fact that the collective consists individuals. No, for Mr Can, only God can impose the moral system and only Mr Can can tell you what is the master plan. He thinks that God is the morally objective font of all wisdom and that people such as Mr Can is the conduit of those moral rules.