Yeah, and I would attempt to convey–if I’d even bother–the manner in which I saw all of common sense–i.e., not just regarding values but also regarding facts (which I consider a special kind of values)–as rooted in dasein.
There are none and can be none, precisely because of the sets of assumptions the two sides start out with. In order to provide the most rational argument, one would have to start out with the most rational assumptions. Such assumptions would have to be meta-assumptions: assumptions about the nature of rationality itself. They would have to be part of what Fixed Cross has called a “self-valuing logic”.
I don’t see how this is on the contrary of what I said. No less than what? Rationality, pure rationality, would not be rooted in dasein at all.
I’m not at all saying it isn’t; on the contrary…
Philosophy has always been the quest for the truly rational, the natural as opposed to the positive. But since Nietzsche, this quest for the absolute has been moderated to a quest for the relative, for “the more rational” (Lampert, Nietzsche’s Task, page 1, emphasis mine).
“Might revolve around the assumption”? “More reasonable”? I’m reminded of this:
“You have to imagine, as a rather good Scripps student once put it, Socrates talking to Oedipus. Tragic Oedipus. Not Agathon’s tragedy (Agathon wrote a tragedy according to Aristotle whose title was The Flower).
Socrates talking to Oedipus and trying to persuade him: ‘Look here, Oedipus–it wasn’t your fault. And after all, why is incest bad?’” (Harry Neumann, seminar on Plato’s Symposium, May 2003.)
Common sense is the thing that might well burn people at the stake for teaching that the earth revolves around the sun…
Is this some “serious philosopher” thing? You respond to the points/objections others raise by simply noting that you have already solved the problem.
How is this even close to a substantive response to the points I made above regarding an objectivist frame of mind?
Again, he seems merely to assert that his argument is the optimal way to think about these things.
Consider:
So, if I understand you, folks on both sides of the abortion wars can claim not to be ashamed of being human, of accepting that they are human and exists. Then what?
In terms of how you understand the meaning of the words “value” and “ontology”, is it okay or not okay to kill the baby? And is this able to be derived universally or is each and every individual abortion subject to its own particular objective moral truth?
Also, are we to just assume that all reasonable men and women are obligated to accept the premises in your argument regarding the two month old baby baby in the yahoo link above?
Finally, what on earth do you mean by accusing me of being confused only by metaphysics? It is either moral or immoral to kill a particular unborn human baby in a particular context. Unless, instead, this is rooted more in dasein, conflicting goods and political economy. How have you managed to demonstrate to us that this is not the case at all?
Look, you will either integrate what you think you mean “in your head” by…
To ‘problematize’ “value”.
…out in the world of actual human behaviors that come into conflict over value judgments or you won’t.
In other words, in a manner in which I am able to understand. Or even perhaps to agree with.
Now, if you believe that you already have…that you’ve “solved” this…that’s your perogative.
But you have not demonstrated this at all from my point of view. Instead, VO [to me] is just one more objectivist rendition of this: viewtopic.php?f=15&t=185296
As I see it, it is a psychological crutch that you need in order to anchor “I” to something [to anything] that is not embodied in an essentially absurd and meaningless world. You are just one more Satyr/Lyssa to me. Offering up your own Kingdom of Ends.
Okay, how is human passion [human emotion] attached to or detached from dasein, conflicting goods and political economy?
On the contrary, over and again I note how, over the years, I have embraced any number conflicting assumptions regarding these relationships.
And, in turn, I readily acknowledge that in a world teeming with contingency, chance and change, a new experience, relationship, encounter with new information/knowledge etc. can nudge me in yet another direction.
All I do is to suggest that this is also true of you.
Note to others:
Again, how is this ambiguous, abstract observation – so similar to the sort of “general observations” we get in Satyr/Lyssa’s scholastic lectures at KT – relevant to actual existential contexts that we encounter when our values come to clash with others.
Just imagine Fixed outside that abortion clinic or outside a prison where an execution is about to take place or at a Trump or Clinton political rally, and confronting folks embracing conflicting goods with that?!!!
First of all learn some fucking manners, you boor.
Talk to me when you address my words.
Not to the groupies you imagine having.
Learn some manners and I might acknowledge your petty scrambling for some status as an attempt at philosophy, which it certainly isnt.
But Im a generous man, and I know a lot of people are struggling to get out of the same doofussy cognitive loops as you.
Honor is the first standard for anyone to approach me. Since you havent even thanked me for solving your little conundrum, that would be the first thing for you to do now.
But you have no honor, no intellectual conscience, and dont actually believe in your little problem - it is only a way, as is clear from your hollow threads, to get as many views as mr Reasonable.
I will respond to a polite PM from you. Your trolling will be ignored by me from now on. Sauwelios is at least sable to pretend that you are a serious person, which seems to almost tempt you into considering becoming one.
I can’t be bothered to unravel silly little linguistic conundrum for the fourth time. You have proven that you dont care. I guess maybe you are slightly more intelligent than you let on.
Well, given the manner in which it is expressed, how on earth would we go about determinning it?
In other other words, it’s just one more of Satyr’s “general descriptions” of the human condition.
What I am curious about, however, is the the extent to which Fixed Cross is willing and able to integrate it into a particular existential context in which human behaviors come into conflct over value judgments.
Also, I tend to eschew the exploration of Dasein with a capital D. Once you capitalize it, it becomes this scholastic Thing that Heidegger set out to describe [to encompass, to capture] as a “serious philosopher” in a tome. It becomes an intellectual contraption stuffed into an Analysis of Being and Time.
Or so it seems to me.
I am only interested in the individual dasein. A particular man or woman who is thrown adventitiously at birth into a particular world. And, in being thrown there and not here, in being thrown then and not how, how is that a factor in exploring the values of individuals?
And, of particular importance, this: How are philosophers able to reconcile that with the intellectual contraptions that have come to revolve around one or another deontological morality?
Or a morality that is predicated on one or another rendition of this:
1] I am rational
2] I am rational because I have access to the ideal
3] I have access to the ideal because I grasp the one true nature of the objective world
4] I grasp the one true nature of the objective world because I am rational
As Fixed Cross has repeatedly pointed out to you, all nouns (with a couple of possible exceptions, like “nothing”) are capitalized in German. And Dasein had long been a very basic word (meaning simply “existence”) before Heidegger, and has remained so in most contexts since Heidegger. It would make no sense to use it the way you do, with or without a capital, if it wasn’t for Heidegger.
Don’t italicize it if you’re not capitalizing it–unless you mean to emphasize it (which I don’t think you do here–no more than “individual”, at least).
But your problem–or the problem with your problem; your meta-problem–is precisely the problem of universals. If we’re talking strictly about particulars, then it makes no sense to speak of “a man or woman”. There is then nothing to connect particular beings–for example your precious people gathered outside abortion clinics. They share “facts” no more than “values”:
“The spirit of national socialism was not so much concerned with the national and the social but much more with that radically private resoluteness which rejects any discussion or mutual understanding because it relies wholly and only on itself … At bottom all its concepts and words are the expression of the bitter and hard resoluteness of a will asserting itself in the face of its own nothingness, a will proud of its loathing for happiness, reason and compassion.” (Found in Harry Neumann, Liberalism, “Politics or Nothing! Nazism’s Origin in Scientific Contempt for Politics”, where it is sourced as: K. Löwith, “Der Okkasionelle Dezisionismus von C. Schmitt,” Gesammalte Abhandlungen (Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, 1960) pp. 122- 123. [sic])
Again, if you choose not to go there – and it certainly appears to me that this is the case – all I can note is the extent to which the distinction you make is something that, to me, is encompassed only in an argument.
From my perspective, there are…
1] facts that either can or cannot be established in the video above and…
2] our reactions [emotional and otherwise] to abortion expressed as individual value judgments
Objective truth or subjective opinion? That’s the most crucial distinction to be made once we leave the domain of either/or and enter the domain of is/ought.
Yes, that is more or less my own set of assumptions here.
But: How then is Fixed Cross’s “self-valuing logic” then made applicable outside that abortion clinic, or that execution chamber, or those political rallies attended by supporters of Clinton or Trump?
How in other words does his “self-valuing logic” enable him to extricate himself from my dilemma above?
How, finally, is it made applicable to the manner in which I consture conflicting human interactions here re the components of my own argument: dasein, conflicting goods and political economy?
To moral and political objectivists, I issue the same challenge: Let’s situate this “out in the world” existentially and explore it.
If by “purely rational” you mean that which we believe to be true “in our head” is able to be demonstrated as in fact in sync with the objective world around us – re physics, chemistry, geology, meteorology etc – then I would agree it transcends dasein.
But what can be spoken of as “purely rational” pertaining to conflicting value judgments?
It would be one thing if we were able to establish rationally that one side in the abortion wars was right and the other side was wrong.
But both sides are able to make entirely reasonable argument given a particular set of assumptions that the other side’s arguments don’t make go away.
And that’s before we get to the argument of the narcissist who asserts that morality for him or her revolves solely around self-gratification.
Which is precisely why I argue that to the extent you [u]do[/u] situate the values of any particular individual out in a particular world is the extent to which you bump into the limitations of philosophy in its pursuit of the truly rational.
But over and again I point out that just because I argue for these limitations doesn’t mean that they exist. It simply means that of late no one has managed to convince me that there are no limitations here. If, in fact, believing that your own values are the “natural” one enables you psychologically to ground “I” in a wholistic point of view, then that “works” for you.
After all, for all practice purposes, the behaviors you choose will be predicated on what you believe to be true. And that may or may not be in sync with what is in fact true.
I’m just arguing that to me it does not appear reasonable to suggest that, in using the tools of philosophy, one or another deontological morality can be established.
Exactly. How on earth would philosophers ever be able to actually establish that incest is necessarily immoral? How would one’s own attitude about it not be embedded existentially in dasein, in conflicting goods – debatepedia.idebate.org/en/index … ult_incest – and [ultimately] in politics?
Yes, but here common sense is able to be examined, explored and tested by science. It can be shown that in fact the earth does revolve around the sun. But: what of those who insist that it is common sense that God created both? Or of those who insist that it is common sense that billions and billions of dollars ought to be allocated for space exploration, while others insist it is common sense that these dollars be spent solving more pressing problems right here on earth?
Indeed what though?
How does this assumption manage to align itself with FC’s Grand Scheme when we are among those embracing conflicting value judgments in a world where behavior must either be prescribed or proscribed legally/politically?
“On earth” one could bring up birth-defects, pressure that would be brought onto the young and the weak to engage in relationships that they don’t want and the Westermarck effect.
In other words, are you actually mocking “serious philosophy” here by caricaturing it? It has even occurred to me that you are trying only to trick us into taking VO seriously.
Or, sure, maybe it’s all just meant to be comic relief.
Why not just put me on ignore like the Turds here?
Note to others:
I suspect that a reaction like this is a clear indication that I have begun to unravel his own carefully calibrated Intellectual Contraption. Indeed, I have been doing this with objectivists now for years.
And not just for entertainment.
Unless, of course, he is actually succeeding in unraveling mine.
I have been engaging objectivists for many years now. But few folks that I have come across virtually embody objectivism quite as flagrantly as he does.
He is practically a caricature of the genre.
On the other hand, he is also clearly 1] intelligent 2] articulate and 3] passionate about philosophy.
And the contempt that he levels at ILP for allowing discourse here to sink down to the level of fucking Kids hurling spitballs is right on the mark.
Well, when he is not himself in huff and puff mode.
Point taken. But the manner in which I construe the meaning of dasein is reflected considerbly more in, well, lower case. Here for example: viewtopic.php?f=1&t=176529
Sure, I will admit that you may well be pointing out something important here that I keep missing.
But I really don’t know what it is.
If Mary did have an abortion at that clinic then this is an objective fact that is true [and able to be shared] by everyone — inside or outside the clinic.
And there are actual facts that may or may not be demonstrable regarding the pregnancy itself.
And there are the biological facts embedded in performing an abortion as a medical procedure.
None of this comes down to subjective opinions. Not the facts themselves.
Sure, particular individuals [as “subjects”] may hold opinions that are not in sync with the facts. But the facts are either able to be demonstrated to all rational men and women or they are not. But once they have been demonstrated to in fact be true it would seem to be the obligation of all rational men and women to accept them.
Until we do come to the part where we react [reasonably, emotionally] to abortion as a value judgment.
But to claim that Nazis embody “a will proud of its loathing for happiness, reason and compassion” is just another political prejudice. In other words, the author imagines certain beliefs and behaviors as being in sync with happiness, reason and compassion. His own for example. And then he concludes that Nazis in choosing other beliefs and behaviors knows nothing of them.
Science ultimately rests on empirical verification.
One only needs to read Aristotle to find many common sense explanations for physical phenomena - most of which were subsequently shown by experiments, to be wrong.
For example :
“Hot water freezes faster than cold water.”
Is this true or false? How does common sense evaluate the statement?
No, not ultimately, as empiricism itself in turn rests on common sense–albeit on more basic common-sensical (mis)understandings than the (mis)understanding that the sun turn around the earth.
Phyllo (happy Thanksgiving) - what did you make of this thread viewtopic.php?f=1&t=175698&hilit=ontological+tyranny
It influenced me gigantically, I acquired a great focus on Nietzsche’s notion of science as prejudice.
Indeed science is qua method at bottom empirical, but that method is the result still of something; we select the line of empirical inquiry based on non-universal criteria; e.g. convenience, proximity, use, etc. What Sauwelios describes as common sense perhaps, what I might cynically call opportunism - basically it is the human, all too human that is the standard to the knowledge that science is designed to acquire.
Sure, those in opposition to incest can bring that up. But how does bringing it up make the arguments of those not opposed to incest go away?
And while it is biologically factual that incestuous sex can result in birth defects, it is also biologically factual that sex between sisters, sex between brothers, sex between family members that preclude the possibilty of pregnancy, obviate that factor.
So, where is the argument – the philosophical argument – able to establish that incest is necessarily irrational and lacking in virtue?
And how might this speculation [and the “Westermarck effect”] be made applicable to the Grand Scheme: To ‘problematize’ “value”.
And, in particular, how that might relate to the point I raised above:
Okay, how is to ‘problematize’ “value” different from to problematize value? And how is that different from to not problematize value?
Let’s focus in on behaviors that do come to clash over conflicting value judgments relating to issues like incest, homosexuality and abortion.
Once again I will acknowledge this: that, as a serious philosopher, you may well be making an extremely important point here that I am simply not able to – or subconsciously willing to – understand and accept.
To argue that science ultimately rests on common sense is merely to note the obvious: that common sense here is in sync with the laws of matter, the laws of nature.
In fact, I have always been curious as to why so many folks back then thought the earth was flat. After all, if you looked up into the sky, the moon and the sun were clearly round. Why should the earth be any different?
Instead, I recall that, as a child, “common sense” then revolved more around wondering how the folks “down under” didn’t fall off the earth. It seemed we were on the “top” part, and they weren’t.
“Common sense” here clashing with the laws of gravity.
And I await patiently your reaction to all of the other points I raised above.
In particular, the part where the Grand Scheme becomes applicable to is/ought conflagrations.
And that’s before we get to Hume driving a stake between correlation and cause and effect; or Descartes pondering if in fact ontological reality might be attributed to some demon that has but “dreamed” us into existence!
Or dreamed up God to dream up us.
As for who or what dreamed up the demon…
I’m sorry but here we are back again to this:
There are known knowns. These are things we know that we know. There are known unknowns. That is to say, there are things that we know we don’t know. But there are also unknown unknowns. There are things we don’t know we don’t know.
And that we are still grappling with this pertaining to the world of “either/or” speaks volumes regarding the extent to which the moral objectivists claim to have, in turn, grappled with the world of “is/ought”.
That is one of your strangest expectations … that an argument should make another argument go away. At least a half dozen posters have told you that arguments don’t work that way , including posters that you supposedly respect like OH and Faust. And still you repeat it.
Then one could present the argument that making homosexual incest acceptable and heterosexual incest unacceptable would be discrimination based on sexual orientation. Thus the preferred solution is to make all incest immoral.
(And in homosexual situations, the young and weak may be pressured into relationships that they don’t want.)
I just said that by bringing up specific consequences, philosophers can bring it down to earth.
Are you saying that referring to aspects such as birth defects and biological aversion as shown by the Westermarck effect are not part of a philosophical argument?
Then what is a legitimate philosophical argument?
It has nothing to do with the Grand Scheme or value. You asked how philosophers would establish something “on earth” and I responded directly to that.
I quoted you and replied to the content of the quote.
I just attempted to focus on incest and the consequences and natural aversions. Immediately your tried to shift to the abstractions of value and the Grand Scheme.
I don’t doubt that scientists pursue particular inquiries because of subjective, personal and biased reasons. However, the results of the research have to be objective and unbiased in order to be valid. Biased results will not be repeatable or useful except to people of the same bias.
Science attempts to remove subjective factors by emphasizing quantitative results, predictability and repeatability.
