Philosophy Now Forum

TimeSeeker wrote: ↑Thu Sep 20, 2018 7:26 pm

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Thu Sep 20, 2018 7:19 pm But you have no proof the world is anything but a figment of that mind. There may be nothing for you to "be a part" of. That's the point Descartes takes us to.

Cool! If my mind can do all that - that's pretty awesome.

Maybe. But it plays havoc with any claims you make about ontology and epistemology. You don't really know what exists, except perhaps for something called your "self": and some would even call that into question.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Thu Sep 20, 2018 7:19 pm Do you not believe your eyes?

The eyes can be fooled. That's one of Descartes first points.

Can you not tell your left arm from your right? Does it not hurt when you burn yourself?

As Descartes points out, the fact that these things "appear" to be does not prove they are.

I have (arbitrarily) decided to draw a distinction between that which I have most control over and that over which I do not.

Yes. "Arbitrarily." Quite. I believe you. It's very comforting to believe one is in control. Unfortunately, it's often just a comforting belief.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Thu Sep 20, 2018 7:19 pm You can't trust your own epistemology. Remember?

Maybe you can't? I trust mine just fine.

Oh, you can "arbitrarily" choose to trust it, of course. You have that right.

But good luck. I fear you are clearly going to need it. "Arbitrary" is notoriously a low-percentage, irrational and unphilosophical way to do business. But if it's your choice, it's your choice.

However, this makes our conversation a bit futile. Since your position is merely "arbitrarily" asserted, there are no rational counterarguments possible: not because they don't exist, but because there are no terms on which someone who is using "arbitrariness" as his criterion has to listen to them.

So be well, I guess. Thanks for the chat.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Thu Sep 20, 2018 7:39 pm Maybe. But it plays havoc with any claims you make about ontology and epistemology. You don't really know what exists, except perhaps for something called your "self": and some would even call that into question.

Again. You are the one who's terribly bothered by the "existence" and "non-existence" distinction. The difference is rather inconsequential to me.
And if you pay careful attention I make almost no claims about ontology and epistemology. I make bets about the future. Prediction based on evidence.

If I am right - I win.
If I am wrong - I lose.

You either learn to stop being wrong very quickly, or you go broke. Unlike philosophers who have been talking bullshit for 3000 years without catching on.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Thu Sep 20, 2018 7:19 pm The eyes can be fooled. That's one of Descartes first points.

So can a brain in a digital simulation. Even more so than the eyes.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Thu Sep 20, 2018 7:39 pm As Descartes points out, the fact that these things "appear" to be does not prove they are.

Again. If I none of us can tell the difference between appearance and reality - I am far less bothered by this than you are.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Thu Sep 20, 2018 7:39 pm Yes. "Arbitrarily." Quite. I believe you. It's very comforting to believe one is in control. Unfortunately, it's often just a comforting belief.

Well. Sure. AIrplanes fly. Computers computer. Internet internets. Medicine heals. It's comforting. It's even more comforting that this illusionary science-belief is so useful to the imaginary humans in my head that they pay me a lots of money for building all this stuff *shrug*

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Thu Sep 20, 2018 7:39 pm But good luck. I fear you are clearly going to need it. "Arbitrary" is notoriously a low-percentage, irrational and unphilosophical way to do business.

By what standard of rationality? And it's very strange to me that you think philosophy (constantly disagreeing with people) IS a way to do actual business. I thought win-win negotiations are?
I fear you are going to need luck far more than me. I am financially independent and I just turned 35, having trusted my "arbitrary" intuition, arbitrary desires, mathematics, statistics and computer science, and some stupid abstract models to predict what happens in this imaginary (but somewhat predictable) place

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Thu Sep 20, 2018 7:39 pm However, this makes our conversation a bit futile. Since your position is merely "arbitrarily" asserted, there are no rational counterarguments

Well, I asked right at the beginning what you are optimising for. If counter-arguing is what you are here for. I don't really care.
If I am not mistaken, there aren't a whole lot of job opportunities for philosophers. I wonder why that is. So.... good luck

I am here for consensus-building. If you could just tell me what it is that you want - we could actually make some progress.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Thu Sep 20, 2018 7:39 pm
possible: not because they don't exist, but because there are no terms on which someone who is using "arbitrariness" as his criterion has to listen to them.

Now that IS an interesting position. What criterion do YOU use to decide who you should and shouldn't listen to?

Try this for a non-philosophical perspective: https://fs.blog/2016/11/green-lumber-fallacy/
And maybe consider consequentialism as an ethical stance before you lose your mind trying to work your way up from first principles...

TimeSeeker wrote: ↑Thu Sep 20, 2018 7:50 pm And maybe consider consequentialism as an ethical stance before you lose your mind trying to work your way up from first principles...

Oh...Consequentialism.

It's question-begging. It requires a teleology. In a Materialist world, there are no teleologies...only arbitrary stances based on power.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Thu Sep 20, 2018 8:36 pm It's question-begging. It requires a teleology. In a Materialist world, there are no teleologies...only arbitrary stances based on power.

Teleology indeed! What do you WANT?
Power indeed! Can you bring your WANTS to fruition?

Creationism wasn't about being created. It's about humans becoming creators. Becoming Gods before this "world" does to us what it did to the dinosaurs.

The truth is what works Everything else is stupid what-if word games.

Immanuel Can wrote:

In a Materialist world, there are no teleologies...only arbitrary stances based on power.

The ground of morality is neither final cause nor selfish genes. Humans evolve by way of culture more than by way of genes. Evolved morality is largely Christian morality.This is not me saying that we are home and dry. Christian morality needs to be constantly nurtured and fought for.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Thu Sep 20, 2018 7:39 pm It's very comforting to believe one is in control. Unfortunately, it's often just a comforting belief.

You need to put the notion of "control" on a continuum - much like the notion of "belief".
There are many things you have very little control over, and many things you have direct control over.
And many things you could acquire control over if you cared to try.

The serenity prayer is rather appropriate. And ironic - coming from an agnostic.

There is (I think) only one variable that we don't have ANY clue how to control. Time. We don't even know what it is.

That (to me) is a far more interesting question than "what's real and not real".

TimeSeeker wrote: ↑Thu Sep 20, 2018 8:37 pm

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Thu Sep 20, 2018 8:36 pm It's question-begging. It requires a teleology. In a Materialist world, there are no teleologies...only arbitrary stances based on power.

Teleology indeed! What do you WANT?

That's a pretty egocentric way to live, but not very smart in the long run.

In any society, our "wants" come into conflict with the "wants" of others. And then, what, other than power, can settle that conflict? That's the problem.

The "I get what I want" philosophy only works when a) nobody else matters, and b) you can figure out how sleep with one eye open.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Thu Sep 20, 2018 9:46 pm That's a pretty egocentric way to live, but not very smart in the long run.

Where did you read egocentricity OR short-term thinking in any of that? I have my wants. I recognise your wants. I recognise our wants.

If you pay close attention many of our "wants" align. That is why we have built societies. That is why we are the dominant species on the planet - cooperation.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Thu Sep 20, 2018 9:46 pm In any society, our "wants" come into conflict with the "wants" of others. And then, what, other than power, can settle that conflict? That's the problem.

On the contrary. Those who know war prefer to settle conflicts peacefully. And you are over-simplifying the matter. WHY do our wants clash? Is there not enough X for everyone? Can we make more X?

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Thu Sep 20, 2018 9:46 pm The "I get what I want" philosophy only works when a) nobody else matters, and b) you can figure out how sleep with one eye open.

You sound like a very paranoid person. Also the "nobody else matters" seems to be your own projection. I am incredibly selfish! The most selfish person you will ever meet. And do you know what I want? The well-being of 7.5 billion people AND avoiding human extinction. You mistake selfishness (desire, I WANT!) with egocentricity (I am the only one that matters). Sure - some people think like that. They are mostly harmless, if very loud.

Lastly - you are still focused on the small stuff. War, conflict. Disagreements. We have jurisprudence and social institutions to deal with that stuff. The dinosaurs had it much worse than us and they survived for 180 million years. "Immorality and conflict" is not what killed them.

Statistically you are way more likely to go by heart attack, cancer, disease or car accident than by the hand of another human. Malaria alone kills a million people a year!

You are focusing all your attention and energy on the wrong threat.

Humans are not your enemy. Entropy is. Time.

TimeSeeker wrote: ↑Thu Sep 20, 2018 9:39 pm

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Thu Sep 20, 2018 7:39 pm It's very comforting to believe one is in control. Unfortunately, it's often just a comforting belief.

You need to put the notion of "control" on a continuum...

Ha. There is no "control." There is only the delusion of it. Nobody is wise who thinks his money, or his strength, or his wits will preserve him from the vagaries of life and the ravages of time.

On that note, W.E. Henley once bravely intoned, "I am the master of my fate / I am the captain of my soul." Never were more stupid words penned. It's simply obviously not true. We don't actually have control of whether or not we wake up tomorrow morning, or even get to draw the next breath, much less of what fate will come and what will happen to our souls when it does.

The truth is that nobody's actually in control. We are mortal and transient: "dust in the wind," to quote those intrepid theologians, the rock group "Boston."

As the saying goes, "Time may be the best teacher, but it kills all its pupils."

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Thu Sep 20, 2018 10:17 pm Ha. There is no "control." There is only the delusion of it. Nobody is wise who thinks his money, or his strength, or his wits will preserve him from the vagaries of life and the ravages of time.

Fallacy of Gray ( https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/dLJv2Co ... cy-of-gray )

Humans live at least twice as long now than they did 2000 years ago.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Thu Sep 20, 2018 10:17 pm On that note, W.E. Henley once bravely intoned, "I am the master of my fate / I am the captain of my soul." Never were more stupid words penned. It's simply obviously not true. We don't actually have control of whether or not we wake up tomorrow morning, or even get to draw the next breath, much less of what fate will come and what will happen to our souls when it does.

More absolutist thinking.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Thu Sep 20, 2018 10:17 pm The truth is that nobody's actually in control. We are mortal and transient: "dust in the wind," to quote those intrepid theologians, the rock group "Boston."

And more. You completely ignored my "control on a continuum" comment.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Thu Sep 20, 2018 10:17 pm As the saying goes, "Time may be the best teacher, but it kills all its pupils."

And yet you disagreed with my "avoiding extinction" objective moral goal. Probably because YOU want to avoid death (and fuck all the rest of you)

TimeSeeker wrote: ↑Thu Sep 20, 2018 9:53 pm WHY do our wants clash? Is there not enough X for everyone? Can we make more X?

You want your partner to be faithful. Your neighbour does not. Your partner...maybe she does, maybe she doesn't.

Sometimes there's no more X to be made. Sometimes people just want to make a go with your X.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Thu Sep 20, 2018 10:21 pm

TimeSeeker wrote: ↑Thu Sep 20, 2018 9:53 pm WHY do our wants clash? Is there not enough X for everyone? Can we make more X?

You want your partner to be faithful. Your neighbour does not. Your partner...maybe she does, maybe she doesn't.

Sometimes there's no more X to be made. Sometimes people just want to make a go with your X.

And then you find another partner. And introspect as to why your previous one went somewhere else to have their NEEDS met

Perfect is the enemy of good enough.

TimeSeeker wrote: ↑Thu Sep 20, 2018 10:20 pm And yet you disagreed with my "avoiding extinction" objective moral goal.

Son, you're not going to avoid extinction. Not even your own.

Death and taxes. (The taxes part is the joke.)

TimeSeeker wrote: ↑Thu Sep 20, 2018 10:22 pm And then you find another partner.

Perfect is the enemy of good enough.

See if it plays out that way with you when the time comes.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Thu Sep 20, 2018 10:22 pm Son, you're not going to avoid extinction. Not even your own.

Death and taxes. (The taxes part is the joke.)

Not EVEN my own
That's the person whose extinction I LEAST care to prevent.

Humanity matters. I don't.