Philosophy Now Forum

The most important things in life are what's essential for survival, health and well-being, in that order, for yourself, friends and neighbors, in that order.
What's essential shouldn't be risked or sacrificed for what's inessential.

For example, essential foods are meats (includes fish), eggs, fruits, vegetables, dairy and whole grains (includes nuts/seeds), probably in that order.
What's inessential is everything else: honey, herbs, spices, juice, refined fat, salt and sugar, supplements, chemicals and preservatives, in that order.
Essential foods should always be consumed everyday.
Inessential foods should occasionally, rarely or never be consumed, depending on the health of the person, which depends on their nature, how they've been nurtured, how they've nurtured themselves and their current diet and lifestyle, a healthy person can handle a little-some without essentially compromising their health, an unhealthy person cannot.
It's not that what's inessential is bad, only what's bad is bad, it's that what's inessential is of lesser value, and can very easily become of negative value when overindulged in.
Now, not all our needs are exactly the same, nor can following any single system account for everyone's needs, in all places and at all times, but some systems are better than others.
For example men, particularly endomorphic men, should eat more meat and eggs than gracile men or voluptuous women and especially gracile women, who should eat more fruits and vegetables.

Another example: when should government get involved in the economy or our personal lives?
Answer: Only when it's necessary to do so, when people who're essential to the survival, health and well-being of the state (by state I mean both the government and the society it belongs to), which should probably be a lot smaller than it is today BTW, are jeopardizing their own survival, health and well-being, or their survival, health and well-being is being jeopardized by others.
This is a radical new position, that is neither anarchist, libertarian or authoritarian, egalitarian or elitist, but a synthesis of the aforementioned ideologies.

How is essentialist politics different from other sorts of politics?
I'm stilling working on that, but an essentialist state might divide people into three groups, who is essential, who isn't, and who's detrimental.
People would be treated by the state very different based on which group they fell into.
An essentialist society wouldn't be a plutocracy ideally, because people who make a lot of money either lying, cheating and stealing on the one hand, or producing things of little, no or negative value on the other, might be placed in the inessential or detrimental camp.

Only people who're in the essential group would have rights, inessential people wouldn't have any, or at least fewer, detrimental people would be imprisoned, and if they couldn't be rehabilitated, branded and exiled, as permanent imprisonment wastes valuable resources, or executed for the most heinous acts (mass/serial murder and so on).
If you're an inessential person, for example, another person could harm you, and it wouldn't be the duty of an officer or citizen (essential person) to come to your aid.
They could come to your aid, but only if they didn't pose a significant risk to their own survival, health and well-being of essential people in the process.

If an essential person were to harm an inessential person, an officer, citizen or even another inessential person could protect them, but they'd have to do so in such a way so as to minimize harm to the essential person.
If an essential person were to kill an inessential person, depending on the particulars, he might face minimal charges, or he might not be charged, simply fined, or nothing at all.
Inessential people could be anyone, it could be a rich person who owns casinos, fast food restaurants and drugstores, or it could be a homeless person.
What these people have in common is at best they're not contributing anything of real value to society, and at worse they're harming it, and if it's been deemed they're harming society too much, they'll be put in the detrimental camp.

Such a state wouldn't make you do anything...unless it were absolutely necessary to make people do things, which generally speaking, I don't think it is, after all, you can lead a horse to water...and therein lies the synthesis of anarchism, libertarianism and authoritarianism I was speaking of, a state founded on essentialist principles, doesn't punish people for being not good or bad, which's defined in an essentialist state as just not contributing anything to the survival, health and well-being of the state or harming it, it just stops caring about you, or your property for that matter, unless it's been determined you're both willing, and able to change, and if you commit violence against others, you may be exiled, or executed, depending on the severity of the violence.
And just because you're making money, doesn't mean you're contributing anything.

Although there may or may not be some government programs available for people who're both willing, and able to help themselves, to go from being detrimental and inessential people to being essential ones, or to remain essential, society wouldn't force you, it would simply reevaluate your worth.
Those who're essential have rights, those who aren't have fewer or no rights, depending, and those who're detrimental must change immediately or begone.
It's sort of a passive aggressive way of reforming society, this way precious resources are saved, and some freedom is preserved.
As for children and the elderly, they would be in special, protected groups.

Gloominary wrote: ↑Sun Aug 20, 2017 3:54 am
As for children and the elderly, they would be in special, protected groups.

That is probably reassuring to know for both of us, as I am getting rather close to being in the latter group and you sound as if you are still in the former.

Harbal wrote: ↑Sun Aug 20, 2017 7:55 am

Gloominary wrote: ↑Sun Aug 20, 2017 3:54 am
As for children and the elderly, they would be in special, protected groups.

That is probably reassuring to know for both of us, as I am getting rather close to being in the latter group and you sound as if you are still in the former.

Mmm, nice one.

Harbal wrote: ↑Sun Aug 20, 2017 7:55 am

Gloominary wrote: ↑Sun Aug 20, 2017 3:54 am
As for children and the elderly, they would be in special, protected groups.

That is probably reassuring to know for both of us, as I am getting rather close to being in the latter group and you sound as if you are still in the former.

If you have nothing constructive to add to my threads, stay out of them.

Furthermore, only people who're in the essentialist class could vote and participate in politics.
So such a state would be a mix of representative and direct oligarchy.
There wouldn't be universal suffrage or equality under the law.
People who've been determined by the constitution, citizens and their elected representatives, ideally in that order, to be essential to the economy, because they provide essential goods and services, and little else, would be granted citizenship, suffrage and protection under the law, people who were determined to be inessential or detrimental, because they didn't provide essential goods and services and/or provided a lot of inessential and/or detrimental ones, wouldn't be granted citizenship, suffrage or much protection under the law, if any, and people who were violent towards citizens, would be temporarily incarcerated and either released, branded and exiled, or executed,
depending on the severity of their violence.

Gloominary wrote: ↑Sun Aug 20, 2017 12:27 pm If you have nothing constructive to add to my threads, stay out of them.

You obviously regard my contribution as inessential to your thread, so, not wanting to be incarcerated, branded and exiled or executed, I'll do as you ask.

Gloominary wrote: ↑Sun Aug 20, 2017 2:05 am The most important things in life are what's essential for survival, health and well-being, in that order, for yourself, friends and neighbors, in that order.
What's essential shouldn't be risked or sacrificed for what's inessential.

I can understand that's how you approach your own life. That's what you regard as essential. But on what basis should others take as essential to their own lives your priorities?

Gloominary wrote: For example, essential foods are meats (includes fish), eggs, fruits, vegetables, dairy and whole grains (includes nuts/seeds), probably in that order.
What's inessential is everything else: honey, herbs, spices, juice, refined fat, salt and sugar, supplements, chemicals and preservatives, in that order.
Essential foods should always be consumed everyday.

Your division of essential and non-essential foods is questionable. Eggs and dairy imply farming and domestication of animals, but the history of agriculture started around 15K years ago, while homo sapiens has been around 300K years. That makes some of your essential foods out of the picture for a long time. So, how can they be essential?

Gloominary wrote: Inessential foods should occasionally, rarely or never be consumed, depending on the health of the person, which depends on their nature, how they've been nurtured, how they've nurtured themselves and their current diet and lifestyle, a healthy person can handle a little-some without essentially compromising their health, an unhealthy person cannot.

Where's the science of what you call inessential foods being harmful to people? By contrast, it's well known that people eating only fish will develop Scorbutus, because of lack of vitamin C. Then, it's more appropriate to talk about the specific nutrients in our foods and what functions in our bodies are dependent of them, rather than dealing with general categories of foods.

Gloominary wrote:It's not that what's inessential is bad, only what's bad is bad, it's that what's inessential is of lesser value, and can very easily become of negative value when overindulged in.

Assuming there's that category of foods of lesser value, and therefore one of foods of higher value, it's not a secret that getting too much (overindulging) of those "good foods" will most likely harm you. Eating tons of vitamins will give you hypervitaminosis and you will die. We can conclude then that it's not the value of the food itself alone that determines the positive or negative health outcomes, but the overall balance of nutritional qualities and quantities.

Gloominary wrote:Now, not all our needs are exactly the same, nor can following any single system account for everyone's needs, in all places and at all times, but some systems are better than others.
For example men, particularly endomorphic men, should eat more meat and eggs than gracile men or voluptuous women and especially gracile women, who should eat more fruits and vegetables.

Where's the science of that?

Gloominary wrote:Another example: when should government get involved in the economy or our personal lives?
Answer: Only when it's necessary to do so, when people who're essential to the survival, health and well-being of the state (by state I mean both the government and the society it belongs to), which should probably be a lot smaller than it is today BTW, are jeopardizing their own survival, health and well-being, or their survival, health and well-being is being jeopardized by others.
This is a radical new position, that is neither anarchist, libertarian or authoritarian, egalitarian or elitist, but a synthesis of the aforementioned ideologies.

Quite a shift from the subject. Anarchists and libertarians despise the state, so I don't see how they can come up in that synthesis.

Conde Lucanor wrote: ↑Sun Aug 20, 2017 6:03 pm I can understand that's how you approach your own life. That's what you regard as essential. But on what basis should others take as essential to their own lives your priorities?

It would appear so, unless they don't mind being incarcerated, or worse.

Harbal wrote: ↑Sun Aug 20, 2017 5:28 pm

Gloominary wrote: ↑Sun Aug 20, 2017 12:27 pm If you have nothing constructive to add to my threads, stay out of them.

You obviously regard my contribution as inessential to your thread, so, not wanting to be incarcerated, branded and exiled or executed, I'll do as you ask.

If you were paying much attention, you would've noted that I really only talked about incarcerating and exiling people for violent offences, and executing people for the most severe violent offences.
Temporarily or permanently exiling people is a lot more economical and lenient than what we do today, detaining people for 5, 10, 20 years or life.
Branding isn't really that big of a deal, it's just like getting a tattoo on your ass, people love tattoos.

@Lucanor

I can understand that's how you approach your own life. That's what you regard as essential. But on what basis should others take as essential to their own lives your priorities?

It's as fact as fact can be that eating the things I listed as essential will not only be pleasurable for the vast majority of people, especially once their palettes have been cleansed and renewed from years of abuse, but it'll also help them to survive and attain health and well being, where as the things I listed as inessential, while sometimes just as much or more pleasurable than the things I listed as inessential, won't help them to survive and attain health and well-being, in fact, they'll subtract years from their life, and ruin their health, especially when overindulged in.
That's not to say people should never eat them, just that they should be eaten sparingly, if at all.

Now ordinarily people want to live and be healthy and feel good, unless there's something wrong with them, they're physically and mentally ill, so inter-subjectively, we should all be able to agree what I listed as essential is just that.
Fleeting, frivolous pleasures are just that, they're not deeply satiating, and often followed by pain and suffering at best and by death at worse.

Ultimately, moreover, only that which has the potential to last forever can have objective value.
A lifestyle that's not sustainable will die with the person/people practicing it, making that lifestyle irrational and self-defeating in a sense, where as a lifestyle that's sustainable has the potential to be enjoyed forever.
Now things are always mutating, (d)evolving, but if we live well today, than something like us could go on living well tomorrow, maybe even for eternity.
Only that which lasts forever could be said to have objective value, what's doomed to temporarily, fleetingness, is next to nonexistent.

Now I'm not saying people can, or even should always live for what could potentially last forever, but I think we can, and should keep it in mind more than we're doing today, which's scarcely at all, apparently, or disaster is soon and sure to follow, individually and collectively, now so more than ever.

Your division of essential and non-essential foods is questionable. Eggs and dairy imply farming and domestication of animals, but the history of agriculture started around 15K years ago, while homo sapiens has been around 300K years. That makes some of your essential foods out of the picture for a long time. So, how can they be essential?

Eggs doesn't imply the domestication and farming of animals, lots of wild animals eat eggs.
As for dairy, there's a reason why it's listed near the end of my essential list, it's because it's the least essential on the list.
It's a whole food, and you can subsist on it and little else for a long time, unlike the items in the inessential list, but it's probably the least essential and most harmful for many individuals/races, as many are lactose sensitive or intolerant, or just plain dairy sensitive or intolerant.
That being said, dairy can assist us in attaining calcium and some other nutrients that're difficult to get without it.
I think it's good to have a little of it each day for those who're immune to some of its more adverse effects.

Where's the science of what you call inessential foods being harmful to people? By contrast, it's well known that people eating only fish will develop Scorbutus, because of lack of vitamin C. Then, it's more appropriate to talk about the specific nutrients in our foods and what functions in our bodies are dependent of them, rather than dealing with general categories of foods.

It's essential to eat a variety of whole foods.
Everything in moderation.
Everything, even essential things can kill you if consumed immoderately/inordinately, that doesn't make them inessential.
Quantity is important too, but it doesn't negate quality.
If you only eat fish you may die in a few years, but if you eat fish with some sweet potatoes and cheese you may live a long life, where as if you only eat refined flour and sugar, or refined flour and sugar with some herbs and spices, you will die in a few weeks, in fact you will probably die sooner than you would if you had, nothing.

Assuming there's that category of foods of lesser value, and therefore one of foods of higher value, it's not a secret that getting too much (overindulging) of those "good foods" will most likely harm you. Eating tons of vitamins will give you hypervitaminosis and you will die. We can conclude then that it's not the value of the food itself alone that determines the positive or negative health outcomes, but the overall balance of nutritional qualities and quantities.

Yes of course I didn't mention quantity, but it's just as essential as quality.
People eat far too much.

Where's the science of that?

As far as I know there is none, I made some inferences on my own.
Especially men, but also women who're naturally muscular or voluptuous, broad build, probably need to have more fat, protein, animal foods in their diets, they're probably designed to prosper on such diets as opposed to gracile types.

Quite a shift from the subject. Anarchists and libertarians despise the state, so I don't see how they can come up in that synthesis.

Well the subject is essentialism, as it applies to everything from food to politics and everything in between and outside.
My synthesis of authoritarianism, libertarianism and anarchism, is that rather than forcing people to be more ascetic, minimalist, the way they probably ought to be, the state decreases their negative rights, so it's considered less of a crime to harm them than ascetics and minimalists who contribute to survival and health of the state, rather than to the destruction of the environment, the way hedonists and materialists do.
Now I'm not sure any anarchist, libertarian or authoritarian would like my idea, they probably wouldn't, but my goal wasn't to get them on board really, it was just an attempt to get people to do what you want them to do, with as little intervention as possible, keeping in line with my essentialist, minimalist, austere philosophy.

Gloominary wrote: ↑Sun Aug 20, 2017 3:54 am
Only people who're in the essential group would have rights, inessential people wouldn't have any, or at least fewer, detrimental people would be imprisoned, and if they couldn't be rehabilitated, branded and exiled, as permanent imprisonment wastes valuable resources, or executed for the most heinous acts (mass/serial murder and so on).

As for children and the elderly, they would be in special, protected groups.

You're an elitist. I always thought it was funny when some person talked about how wonderful it would be to live in the age of chivalry with all the lords and ladies of the court. What they failed to realize is that they would probably be among the peasants scratching in the dirt to find something to eat. And like them your idea of essentials would not include you, but you would probably be imprisoned or exiled while the essentials looked down on you.

Gloominary wrote: ↑Mon Aug 21, 2017 2:30 am It's as fact as fact can be that eating the things I listed as essential will not only be pleasurable for the vast majority of people, especially once their palettes have been cleansed and renewed from years of abuse, but it'll also help them to survive and attain health and well being, where as the things I listed as inessential, while sometimes just as much or more pleasurable than the things I listed as inessential, won't help them to survive and attain health and well-being, in fact, they'll subtract years from their life, and ruin their health, especially when overindulged in.
That's not to say people should never eat them, just that they should be eaten sparingly, if at all.

If all of this were a fact, it would be supported by science, but that's unlikely. Eating honey will not ruin your health, unless you only had honey for your whole diet, but that will be pretty much the same outcome if you only eat one of the products deemed as "essential". The fact is humans are omnivorous and what was a sound advice before, hasn't changed much: it's better to eat food from all food groups.

Gloominary wrote:Eggs doesn't imply the domestication and farming of animals, lots of wild animals eat eggs.

But just taking away eggs from nests found in the wild will unlikely produce enough of them as to be a regular part of a diet in a group with some reproductive success. It requires a higher degree of control of nature's resources.

Gloominary wrote: My synthesis of authoritarianism, libertarianism and anarchism, is that rather than forcing people to be more ascetic, minimalist, the way they probably ought to be, the state decreases their negative rights, so it's considered less of a crime to harm them than ascetics and minimalists who contribute to survival and health of the state, rather than to the destruction of the environment, the way hedonists and materialists do.
Now I'm not sure any anarchist, libertarian or authoritarian would like my idea, they probably wouldn't, but my goal wasn't to get them on board really, it was just an attempt to get people to do what you want them to do, with as little intervention as possible, keeping in line with my essentialist, minimalist, austere philosophy.

That's how it was before Capitalism arose. And it was a mediocre state of society, praised only by friars and other clerics.

This thread is basically a rehash of the bit in Restaurant at the End of the Universe with the Enormous Mutant Star Goat

But not written by Douglas Adams, so not actually amusing.

thedoc wrote: ↑Mon Aug 21, 2017 3:42 pm

Gloominary wrote: ↑Sun Aug 20, 2017 3:54 am
Only people who're in the essential group would have rights, inessential people wouldn't have any, or at least fewer, detrimental people would be imprisoned, and if they couldn't be rehabilitated, branded and exiled, as permanent imprisonment wastes valuable resources, or executed for the most heinous acts (mass/serial murder and so on).

As for children and the elderly, they would be in special, protected groups.

You're an elitist. I always thought it was funny when some person talked about how wonderful it would be to live in the age of chivalry with all the lords and ladies of the court. What they failed to realize is that they would probably be among the peasants scratching in the dirt to find something to eat. And like them your idea of essentials would not include you, but you would probably be imprisoned or exiled while the essentials looked down on you.

I'm not necessarily an elitist, just toying with some ideas.
What I'm proposing here is a different sort of elite than you're used to.
It's not a government by the wealthy, but by ascetics and minimalists.
People who only consume/produce what they/others need, and little else, only they can vote, run for office, and perhaps carry arms, be drafted into the military.
It's also not an authoritarian government, because rather than forcing people to do what we want them to do, we just keep reducing their positive and negative rights (like the right to healthcare if you've fallen on hard times and can't afford it, or the right not to have your things stolen), until you either change, or leave the society.
The more of a burden on nature and society you are, the less rights you have.

There might be state, tax funded programs to help people evolve, or keep from devolving, or they may be privately funded.

I think this might be a cheaper, more efficient way of getting people to do what you want them to do, rather than beating them over the head with a stick.
There may be annual or monthly inspections, in order to determine, who's over-consuming/producing, or under-producing.
I think that if anyone doesn't like the society they live in, they should be able to leave for another one, or an autonomous zone.
There should be autonomous zones all over the place, but alas, governments are just as greedy as their citizens.