Philosophy Now Forum

Posted: **Thu Jul 04, 2024 1:56 pm**

K: as I have stated before, I don't hold to universal, overall, applicable
to everyone isms or ideologies..... thus the proper path of philosophy
is to connect prior philosophy with how it relates to me.... for I am the
subject of every post I make... just as you are the subject of every post you make....
its kinda what human beings do.... ''I hold that'' is basically the starting point
of every conversation ever...''I believe in''....is another starting point....
every human begins with ''how does it affect me''...

and Pyllo wrote:

A person can easily investigate how the ideas of Nietzsche, Plato or Hegel apply to everyone or to some specific group.
There is a difference between subjectivists and objectivists.
I'm certainly not the "subject of every post I make".

K: and look at the very sentence phyllo wrote:

I'm certainly not the ''subject of every post I make''

"I'm certainly'' the very language use betrays the fact that
we respond to things in terms of ''how does it affect me?"

we are the subject of every single post we make.....

I might say, ''I think that''... Or ""I believe that''... the very starting point
of this, ""how does it affect me'' begins with ''I think that'' or "I hold that'''
that is making us the subject of the post.... the very act of thinking
begins with, ''I''... it cannot be anything else..... ''You are wrong''
the very point of that ''you are wrong'' begins with ''I think'' you are wrong...

we are so ingrained into our own thinking that we can't even
separate it out....we can't even see it.... ''How does it affect me''
for example, a philosophical paragraph ''about'' Nietzsche....

What is Nietzsche's idea of eternal reoccurrence?
Well, Nietzsche believes that the idea of eternal
reoccurrence is a ''scientific'' fact... that there are only so many
atoms and they must, given their limited number, eventually
return to the same configuration time after time..... this tree
and this plant and these people will return to this point in time....

and that paragraph seems to be without any sort of reference to me,
but every word is about me..... the very choice in words says me...
I created that paragraph with my values, my knowledge, my own words....
the underlying aspect of that sentence is this is what I THINK, Nietzsche
believes to be his eternal reoccurrence..... every sentence, every
paragraph has to have a point of view and that point of view begins
with me.....for I am the creator of that point of view.....

and your sentences, your paragraphs begins with your own point of view....
the topic may be neutral or scientific, but the point of view is your own.....
this idea is so built into us, so inherent in us, that we can't even separate
ourselves from our own point of view.... we are the subject of every single
sentence and post... even if we cannot see it..... it's there.....

but as usual, the question becomes, what does this mean?
where does this knowledge lead us? What's next?

at this point in time, I can't tell..... but maybe later?

Kropotkin

Posted: **Thu Jul 04, 2024 2:11 pm**

Many people seem to think that because some particular person, a subject, is speaking/writing/posting that makes their statements subjective or "about him/her-self".

That's not the case.

If I write "Paris is the capital of France", that has nothing to do with me other than that I am the person posting it.

BTW, people often write "I think" or "I believe" in order not to come off as arrogant and god-like in their writing. It's a social convention.

Posted: **Thu Jul 04, 2024 2:15 pm**

Certainly my posts show things about me. But to say that because the words represent my views and my choice, I am 'the' subject, in all posts, is not correct. There is also what those views and words are about, often more so than the speaker as the topic of the post.

Or, else when PK tells a family member something he loves about them, he is really just telling them what he loves about himself.

And while he seems, in the OP, to be talking about Phyllo and the rests of us, he is actually only talking about what PK is doing in posts. It would mean that his posts are never about any of the philosophers he mentions or parts of life and the world. They are just about him.

So, if we read PK's posts we can only learn something about him and not about anything else.

He titled one thread 'our milieu'. Why didn't he title it 'My Milieu?' Or, well, actually, just 'Me'?

Another thread was called the nature of ethics/morals....
But that wasn't about the nature of ethics/morals...the subject was PK.

Posted: **Thu Jul 04, 2024 2:42 pm**

the point comes back to this: what is the value/point of philosophy?

Why do we engage in philosophy? I have said this time and time again,
I believe that philosophy ''value'' comes from being a ''way of life''
that is the ancient idea of philosophy... to use ''philosophy''
as a knowledge in which we use to act upon... How am I to live?
we use philosophy, what do I believe in? we use philosophy to
understand that.... what is the ''good'' life? again, we discover
this by philosophy....

and in using my own life, I am presenting my own life, as an example....
as a ''way of life''... which I hold is the exact reason we have for
philosophy...... to understand what it means to be human.... and I
use my life as an example of what it means to be human.......
and you can certainly disagree or deny that I am right.... I use
my own life as a means of understanding what it means to be human....
the path to understanding lies in comparison and contrast....
and you can compare/contrast your own life with mine, to see
where you stand in your own understanding of what ''it means to be human''....

so, of course every single post is about me... I am attempting
to show, by my own example, what it means to be human...
and it all begins with an understanding about what philosophy
actually is....an example to use to help us guide our way through life....

Why even bother with philosophy if you aren't even going to use it?

Kropotkin

Posted: **Thu Jul 04, 2024 3:01 pm**

and in using my own life, I am presenting my own life, as an example....
as a ''way of life''... which I hold is the exact reason we have for
philosophy...... to understand what it means to be human.... and I
use my life as an example of what it means to be human.......
and you can certainly disagree or deny that I am right.... I use
my own life as a means of understanding what it means to be human....
the path to understanding lies in comparison and contrast....
and you can compare/contrast your own life with mine, to see
where you stand in your own understanding of what ''it means to be human''....

So you use examples from your own life, but you think that these examples transcend your personal experience and they are applicable to 'everyone' in some way. You represent "what it means to be human" in some objective way.

That's your 'style'. Not everyone does that. I can't remember the last time I wrote something about my life.

Posted: **Thu Jul 04, 2024 3:10 pm**

Peter Kropotkin wrote: ↑Thu Jul 04, 2024 2:42 pm the point comes back to this: what is the value/point of philosophy?

If you are correct about your own posts, this is a confused question. It wouldn't be 'the value/point", you should have said 'my value/point of philosophy?'

Why do we engage in philosophy? I have said this time and time again,
I believe that philosophy ''value'' comes from being a ''way of life''

that is the ancient idea of philosophy...

You mean here you are talking about your ancient way of doing philosophy.

to use ''philosophy''
as a knowledge in which we use to act upon... How am I to live?
we use philosophy, what do I believe in? we use philosophy to
understand that.... what is the ''good'' life? again, we discover
this by philosophy....

and in using my own life, I am presenting my own life, as an example....
as a ''way of life''... which I hold is the exact reason we have for
philosophy...... to understand what it means to be human....

and isn't the subject here 'philosophy' and what we could use it for?
isn't the subject what it means to be human, not what it means to be PK?

and I
use my life as an example of what it means to be human.......
and you can certainly disagree or deny that I am right....

If the subject is you, what would we have to disagree with?

so, of course every single post is about me... I am attempting
to show, by my own example, what it means to be human...

So, what it means to be human is not the subject. You aren't using yourself as an example while the topic/subject is what it means to be human.
When you write about ethics/values, you aren't writing about ethics values.

You could have said one of the things that every post is about is each of use revealing ourselves.

and it all begins with an understanding about what philosophy
actually is

you mean 'what I actually am'

....an example to use to help us guide our way through life....

Why even bother with philosophy if you aren't even going to use it?

How could we not be using it?

For example, there are many patterns of communication and many ideas that lead to harm. If someone, myself for example, chooses to explore those patterns by questioning them, challenging them...to see what happens, that's philosophy. There are many ways of exploring and many subjects for that exploration. In my case one is not simply exploring what the other person is saying and doing. One is not simply exploring how people hold onto patterns that do harm. One is also learning how this happens. How do people become so embedded in a viewpoint that they cannot consider there might be a problem? How do people become so embedded in a habit of relating that they cannot consider there might be a problem in that?

And then to some degree one can see the ways that they avoid noticing things, the way they defend and dismiss, in a sense how they fool themselves.

Also, given that this pattern is in myself, if not always to the same degree and about the same things, I am also learning about myself.

I am also learning how the ways in which people hang onto patterns and ideas affect me. Here, in a forum, these patterns of interaction are in slow motion and also completely recorded. What happens IRL happens here in slo-mo.

Every day we deal with people with certain patterns of communication that are harmful and certain ideas that we think are harmful, but the interactions are fast, sometimes potentially dangerous, not so easy to track.

Here one can learn much more about what is going on between humans, in humans, in me.

So when someone says, essentially, you are doing what I am doing. You are talking about yourself, just as I am.

I can explore the hidden binary thinking in there and then also see what happens when I point out that even this other person is not doing quite what they are saying, nor even wishes others to take them to be doing this.

What happens? Can that person concede: yes, I was using hyperbole. We also have other subjects, even I do, in addition to showing who and what we are. For example.

Or will the person, for example, in dialogue with Phyllo, continue to pretend his position is wrong, without necessarily saying this explicitly. Because one thing we deal with in life is how people convey things implicitly. Another is people who cannot concede that any challegning point might have value. It certainly has value to say that our posts do show who we are and are to some extent about us. I acknowledge that has value.

Posted: **Thu Jul 04, 2024 3:16 pm**

phyllo wrote: ↑Thu Jul 04, 2024 3:01 pm
and in using my own life, I am presenting my own life, as an example....
as a ''way of life''... which I hold is the exact reason we have for
philosophy...... to understand what it means to be human.... and I
use my life as an example of what it means to be human.......
and you can certainly disagree or deny that I am right.... I use
my own life as a means of understanding what it means to be human....
the path to understanding lies in comparison and contrast....
and you can compare/contrast your own life with mine, to see
where you stand in your own understanding of what ''it means to be human''....

So you use examples from your own life, but you think that these examples transcend your personal experience and they are applicable to 'everyone' in some way. You represent "what it means to be human" in some objective way.

K: NO, not in an ''objective'' way... that is kinda the point... in a subjective
way because all we have is subjective.... there is no such thing as ''objective''

P: That's your 'style'. Not everyone does that. I can't remember the last time I wrote something about my life.

K: and that is both your loss and our loss... the path for becoming a better
human being is found within the examples set by others.... I see another acting
in a certain way, and I can use that, either for good or evil, to see what
it means to be human..... we use others as an example of what to do
or what not to do?.... think about literature.... the great novels like
''Crime and Punishment'' for example.... that is a how to novel...
if you do this, this might happen to you... it is an example novel...
show us the possibilities of what happens after we do something....
possibilities that we didn't see before.... showing us examples of
possibilities is a great way to read a novel.... we learn by
reading about examples set by fictional characters.... Anna Karenina,
for example...is a how not to novel.... what happens if one commits
adultery....and the different reactions to a man, as to committing
adultery.... compared to a women committing adultery... we are learning
from examples given in the novel about what may or may not happen
in committing adultery...

we learn by examples... by not given us your examples, we can't
learn anything....

Kropotkin

Posted: **Thu Jul 04, 2024 3:26 pm**

Peter Kropotkin wrote: ↑Thu Jul 04, 2024 3:16 pm
phyllo wrote: ↑Thu Jul 04, 2024 3:01 pm P: That's your 'style'. Not everyone does that. I can't remember the last time I wrote something about my life.
K: and that is both your loss and our loss... the path for becoming a better
human being is found within the examples set by others.... I see another acting
in a certain way, and I can use that, either for good or evil, to see what
it means to be human..... we use others as an example of what to do
or what not to do?.... think about literature.... the great novels like
''Crime and Punishment'' for example.... that is a how to novel...
if you do this, this might happen to you... it is an example novel...
show us the possibilities of what happens after we do something....
possibilities that we didn't see before.... showing us examples of
possibilities is a great way to read a novel.... we learn by
reading about examples set by fictional characters.... Anna Karenina,
for example...is a how not to novel.... what happens if one commits
adultery....and the different reactions to a man, as to committing
adultery.... compared to a women committing adultery... we are learning
from examples given in the novel about what may or may not happen
in committing adultery...

we learn by examples... by not given us your examples, we can't
learn anything....

It seems like you are saying you cannot learn from Phyllo's style. But how could that be since you have already said his posts are about him, he is the subject of his posts?

As far as I can tell the only loss, if you cannot learn about yourself and life and what it could be to be a human from Phyllo's posts, is your loss.

View posting here like I do, or no one can learn from your posts, not even you.

apart from flat out contradicting yourself.

Posted: **Thu Jul 04, 2024 3:36 pm**

K: NO, not in an ''objective'' way... that is kinda the point... in a subjective
way because all we have is subjective.... there is no such thing as ''objective''

You contradict yourself by giving examples which are supposedly applicable to everyone.

K: and that is both your loss and our loss... the path for becoming a better
human being is found within the examples set by others.... I see another acting
in a certain way, and I can use that, either for good or evil, to see what
it means to be human..... we use others as an example of what to do
or what not to do?.... think about literature.... the great novels like
''Crime and Punishment'' for example.... that is a how to novel...
if you do this, this might happen to you... it is an example novel...
show us the possibilities of what happens after we do something....
possibilities that we didn't see before.... showing us examples of
possibilities is a great way to read a novel.... we learn by
reading about examples set by fictional characters.... Anna Karenina,
for example...is a how not to novel.... what happens if one commits
adultery....and the different reactions to a man, as to committing
adultery.... compared to a women committing adultery... we are learning
from examples given in the novel about what may or may not happen
in committing adultery...

we learn by examples... by not given us your examples, we can't
learn anything....

That's a way of presenting the author's ideas.

They could have written self-help books or philosophical papers.

They probably thought that a novel would get a wider audience and the readers would be more receptive to the ideas. The ideas being hidden behind a screen of entertainment has some advantages.

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