Ramification in Causality is meaningless lie of the human

Serendipper prioritizes fun.
Iambiguous prioritizes trying to find out if there is a solution to conflicting goods.

This leads them to interact with people in certain ways.

Iambiguous thinks he, currently, has no way to know if either of these prioritizations is damaging or good, etc.

Yet his dialogue with Serendippier looks just like any conflicting goods dialogue.
You think you know something and I think that’s bad but can’t prove it. It might be just another contraption on my part. But then I’ll keep conflicting with your position.

for some reason.

Well, if someone’s idea of having fun results in a set of priorities aimed at making your own life a miserable fucking hell, does that or does that not generally revolve around conflicting goods?

No, he speculates that the priorities subscribed to by the guy who makes your life a miserable fucking hell are deemed good precisely because they result in making your life a miserable fucking hell.

So, cue the philosophers/ethicists to straighten it all out?

Or maybe the “pragmatists”? :wink:

Or bringing this down to earth:

“You think you know something about abortion and I think that’s bad but can’t prove it. It might be just another contraption on my part. But then I’ll keep conflicting with your position.”

No, I don’t keep conflicting with what he thinks he knows about abortion just for the sake of sustaining the conflict. I conflict with it because what he thinks he knows about abortion [the morality of it] is not at all what others think.

Their idea of priorities here might revolve entirely around bringing the fetus out of the womb and into the world with the rest of us. While the priorities of others revolve entirely around allowing women to choose to abort it instead.

So, I ponder, how are these conflicting priorities not embedded existentially in dasein out in a world of conflicting goods ultimately resolved by who has the actual power to enforce one set of behaviors over another.

Sigh, not relevent. Neither you nor Seredipper can demonstrate objectively that what you prioritize is not evil. Yet, you seem to think his prioritization is problematic, but yours is not.

You said no, but then said something that seems irrelevent. It also seems like an appeal to what you think are obvious bad consequences. But you have no idea if they are.

You seem to be a hammer seeing nails. Try to respond to what I post.

Bringing this down to earth? what are you talking about. I responded to a specific interaction between two humans, you and Serendipper. You judged his prioritization of fun as bad, though not in those words, and ‘demonstrated’ this by pointing out that somebody’s idea of fun could be sadistic. My post was as down to earth as possible, a direct reference to a concrete interaction between two people where you judged the other, not seeming to realize the beam in your own eye, nor that you were appealing to moral judgments about the bad possiblities of having fun, which a nihilist cannot do and not be a hypocrite.

You are bringing in abortion. I responded to your judgment of his prioritization of fun.

This may seem obvious to you, but when people have discussions like this, in philosophy forums, just because they challenge one thread of your argument, it does not mean that your entire position is the focus and relevent in your response. The specific point being responded to is the issue.

This has absolutely nothing to do with the act of judgment on your part that I specifically and clearly responded to. Everyone’s posts remind you of your main thesis and it is as if the entire structure must be proven wrong if one criticizes a portion of your arguments or your interactions.

You are a living person in interaction with other people, saying specific things, making specific arguments. Your acts and statements and judgements can be looked at in relation to your nihilism, for example, and be found wanting. You react to these criticisms, often, as if they are failures to demonstrate objective morals. That is confused. You can have been hypocritical, made poor arguments, judged in ways that are not consistent with your nihilism, not responded to points made etc.

Despite all your talk about your potential to be wrong, how your judgments are affected by dasein, how you may have existential contraptions

not once have I seen you admit that an argument you made was hypocritical or fallacious.

Not once.

So you are willing to admit that you might be wrong about anything, but you never manage to notice that you yourself can see you made a logical error or a hypocritical statement or responded not to the point being made.

That seems very odd.

My point basically revolves around a context in which those unable to believe that philosophers are able to construct an argument that allows rational human beings to choose behaviors in sync with either vice or virtue, bump into those who insist that they have already accomplished this. In other words, citing one or another God, ideology, intellectual contraption or assessment of “natural” behavior.

How could I not construe my own argument here as problematic given that I readily acknowledge it is but one more existential contraption being posted on this thread?

I must be missing your point.

Again, my point is that the idea we think we have “in our head” about good or bad consequences is an existential contraption. But how on earth do mere mortals [in a No God world] demonstrate this?

I’m down in my hole, you take your “pragmatic” leap and the objectivists insist that any actual consequences are either inherently good or bad.

As I see it, this is just one more “general description” assessment.

From my frame of mind, reactions to abortion and to fun are the same thing — value judgments derived from daseins interacting in a world of conflicting goods. What in particular does someone think is fun? And fun in what context? And what happens when his or her idea of having fun precipitates consequences that others don’t see as fun at all?

Two strangers come together in a particular context. They may or may not share the same priorities with regard to abortion or to fun or to any other human behaviors that generate conflicts.

My own generic argument is applicable to all such interactuons. And the focus I zoom in on with the objectivists is the extent to which they have even considered the three components of my own existentual contraption.

How do they justify what they choose to do given the extent to which they are convinced that, using the tools of philosophy, ethicists can arrive at a conclusion in or around the vicinity of a moral obligation?

Of course this is your rendition of me here:

And all I can do here is to note yet again how abstract this assessment is.

Invite us inside your head the next time you encounter someone who challenges one of your own value judgments. Or pick something from the news. Either way note for us how you engage challenges as a “pragmatist”. Just how fractured and fragmented are you then? Just how comforted and consoled are you with the leap that you finally make? And how is this all less embedded in the manner in which I construe the meaning of dasein here: viewtopic.php?f=1&t=176529

Note to others:

What am I missing here? To admit that my argument is hypocritical would seem to suggest there is an argument that can be made by me about conflicting goods. An argument which I then refuse to honor.

To admit that my argument is fallacious would seem to suggest that I am aware of an optimal rational truth here — yet continue to argue for something that is clearly out of sync with it.

Or is he suggesting something else instead?

In any event, let’s intertwine the discussion here in an actual existential context.

Cite some actual instances of this relating to things that I post here at ILP. I am honestly unsure about the point that you are making.

Sure, in discussing contraptions we will employ contraptions to do so, but the goal is not itself a contraption if there is no goal to the discussion because it’s simply fun to be discussing something novel. We could say the goal of this discussion is ultimately to define what we ought to do, but what is the purpose of that? What is the purpose of knowing what we ought to do if what we ought to do isn’t what we want to do? And if it is what we want to do, then what’s the relevancy of knowing it is also what we ought to do? So knowing what we ought to do is irrelevant to what we will do because we always do what we want to do.

If we ask Jack why he is torturing animals his answer could only be “I don’t know” because all fun activities have that answer, and if they didn’t have that answer, then the activity would be purposeful instead of purposeless.

I suspect that you’re presupposing that there must be a rule to live by even if that rule is not to have rules. You’re looking at it from the state of already having the knowledge of this dilemma and working backwards, but this isn’t so from the point of view of a stupid animal that never gives thought to whether anything ought to be and yet coexists harmoniously with nature. The answer is to not consider the question.

The Rush song called Freewill says

You can choose a ready guide
In some celestial voice
If you choose not to decide
You still have made a choice

I think there is a 3rd possibility. If there a god? Yes? No? Idk. I’m not choosing to not decide because I’ve recognized that deciding is not anything I’m capable of doing.

So dasein is the feeling of being a particular me?

One cannot understand what is fun because it’s trying to understand the nonexistence of something.

I don’t obligate anyone to believe, say, 1+1=2, but the purposeless is purposeless regardless of proclivities to hold otherwise beliefs.

That’s false from many perspectives: 1) I can’t prove it, but the first thing that comes to mind is the impossibility of a feeling of dasein if the universe is a series of mechanistic dominoes determining outcomes. 2) That’s inconsistent with QM experiements, which underpin the most substantiated theory in all of science. 3) What would be the purpose to this if everything were able to be known from the start? 4) There is just the one thing (universe) and so any self-inspection of the universe upon the universe will always yield randomness since the subject cannot be object to itself. Whatever the fundamental thing is will always be a mystery to us because there would be nothing to contrast it to, and if there were something to provide contrast, then it wouldn’t be the fundamental thing.

I don’t know what you mean by “rooted in dasein”.

You know that’s not a fair way to conduct an assessment of odds. If I flip a coin 100 times and get heads each time, what are the odds I will get tails next time? 50%. The odds will always be 50% because each event is it’s own event which doesn’t depend upon previous events. Likewise what the scholars do is independent from what I do and although there may be merit in standing on the shoulders of giants, I also don’t need a lot of rubbish tossed in my paradigm box. We can’t solve our problems using the same thinking as when we created them.

Let’s not forget that 1000 Phds embarrassed themselves with the Monty Hall Problem en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monty_Hall_problem

Many readers of vos Savant’s column refused to believe switching is beneficial despite her explanation. After the problem appeared in Parade, approximately 10,000 readers, including nearly 1,000 with PhDs, wrote to the magazine, most of them claiming vos Savant was wrong (Tierney 1991). Even when given explanations, simulations, and formal mathematical proofs, many people still do not accept that switching is the best strategy (vos Savant 1991a). Paul Erdős, one of the most prolific mathematicians in history, remained unconvinced until he was shown a computer simulation demonstrating the predicted result (Vazsonyi 1999).

And then we have the fact that most published research is wrong journals.plos.org/plosmedicine/ … ed.0020124

Which is published, so I’m not sure what to make of that lol

You’re right that all purposefulness is ultimately without purpose, though we may not realize that.

It means to function mindlessly, like your heart.

Chance favors the prepared mind. You can arrange things to favor an outcome, but you cannot control which outcome you favor because the you that you think you are, does not exist (as evidenced by the lack of control over what you want). There is no hole because there is no one to be in a hole. There is no determinism because there is no one being determined.

Futility is an awesome teacher. The way to know something for sure is persistence. The fool who persists in his folly will become wise. The key is the persistence, for if you abandon the quest halfway, then you’ve concluded nothing. You must take it all the way until futility is realized and only then will you know for sure.

And not knowing how it will turnout is fun. If your reply could be known, there would be no point. So it is only the purposelessness that gives purpose to the whole thing.

Something sapient, anyway.

You could pick any goal to become attached to. Suppose you’re frustrated that you cannot fly despite flapping your arms maddeningly. Anything could be a goal; it’s completely arbitrary.

If we define words, with what words are we going to define the words that define the words?

[i]In the game of Vish (short for vicious circle), players compete to find circularity in dictionary definitions.[1] Irish mathematician and physicist, John Lighton Synge, invented the multi-player, refereed game to emphasize the circular reasoning implicit in the defining process of any standard dictionary.

Procedure
Each of the players is given a copy of the same standard dictionary;
The referee gives each a slip of paper with the same word (found in this dictionary) written on each slip—word chosen so that it has synonyms in its definition, but (preferably) the definition of any synonym does not (in that dictionary) list a synonym which is the originally assigned word;
At “Go!”, each looks up the assigned word, finds a synonym, looks that up, finds a synonym, etc.;
The first player to be led, by this synonymous process, back to the originally assigned word cries “Vish!” and wins the game (unless his opponent successfully challenges the procedure of the alleged winner).[/i]

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vish_(game

What’s wrong with positing?

Claim: If there is a god, it is continuous with this universe.

Proof: There is only one thing because if there were two things, then we’d have to propose a mechanism by which the one thing could exist relative to the other thing, and by doing so, we will have joined the two things back into one thing and we’re back to square one. So there can only be one thing and if there is a god, he is part of the one thing.

Claim: Things that exist relative to us cannot exist outside this universe.

Proof: There is no outside the universe.

Claim: Things outside this universe could not be things we could interact with or have knowledge of; if we could, those things would not be outside our universe.

Proof: See the two-things proof above.

Claim: I posit that if the universe were rewound and begun again, this conversation would have very little chance of being as it is.

Proof: Randomness exists. If many Graham’s numbers of random events determined what we see today, then you’d need an eternity to reproduce it by rewinding and starting over (not really an eternity, but a number so big I don’t want to risk understating it by naming it).

You could have just asked for me to substantiate my claims instead of making a thing of it lol

If you call me on conjecture, I’ll own up to it or substantiate it. This is just fun, so there’s nothing at stake.

Let’s go with this.

The sequence should be :

You make an argument.

Someone points out an error with it. (He/she points out a rational truth. It need not be “optimal”.)

You acknowledge that your argument was faulty and change it in future or you stop using it. (You become aware of the rational truth. You react appropriately.)

Instead, this is what happens:

You make an argument.

Someone points out an error with it.

You dismiss it as an existential contraption.
or
You claim not to understand the post.
or
You claim the post does not address your points.
or
You claim that the post confirms what you have been saying.
or
You ask for a specific context. (Even when the post referred to a specific context.)
or
You post your personal timeline. (Yet again)
or
You post your interests. (Yet again.)

Then you continue to use the same argument. Because there is never anything wrong with anything that you write. :-"

My purpose for being here is: I don’t know; it’s fun. (Not quite true as I have ulterior motives, but fulfilling those purposes that I’ve created for myself is fun).

I don’t know why it’s fun, but this is what I like to do. Why would I do something that I don’t like to do? The only way is if I had a purpose for this that led to fun on a more macro scale. Like, maybe I could learn some things to impress people and impressing people is fun. It seems hollow though, since people don’t care and learning is a lot of work. The more I know, the more likely I am to alienate myself from the herd anyway. Ignorance is bliss!

People ask why they should study philosophy and I say “you shouldn’t!” because if it’s fun, then what I think wouldn’t be of consequence anyway and if you have to ask, then apparently it’s not fun.

The concept of good and bad are foreign concepts to someone who doesn’t see things in terms of good and bad like UV light is a foreign concept to nonavian beings who can’t see the color ultra-orange.

Debating whether good and bad exist is a nonsensical debate since good and bad have to be presupposed to be true before consideration could be given to the notion of whether good and bad exist. So good and bad must be axiomized, taken on faith, in order to have the debate, which is silly.

Good and bad are nothing more than desires in relation to arbitrary goals: if goals are attained, then that’s good; if not, then that’s bad.

The nonexistence of good and bad is not an existential contraption anymore than the nonexistence of visual receptors and neurological architecture to see UV light is a contraption. Things that do not exist are not contraptions.

Fun is not a thing, but the absence of a thing (purpose).

Fun is not value judgements, but absence of judgement.

Much like presupposing good and bad in order to debate good and bad, we cannot presuppose purpose in order to debate purpose. You’re stuck on making a rule of no-rules, but that’s only because you’re considering the question from a top-down perspective, which is a presupposition of purpose. It’s teleology like asking what is the purpose of a butterfly having an “eye” on it’s wing, then saying because predators don’t eat them, as if it were designed to do just that, but that’s isn’t what happened. What happened was nature just did whatever (fun), with no purpose in mind, and some butterflies happened to survive.

If the whole thing were designed and everything had a purpose to fulfill, then there would be no purpose to it. Why watch a show that you know how it ends? There is no purpose to that. So the lack of purpose gives everything a purpose.

Yes, that is precisely my point. But if we look at your behavior, we see you treating his prioritization of fun as problematic AND YOU DO THIS BY SHOWING how it could be problematic. You use an argument which is a kind of appeal to the what most people would think are horrible consequences - in other words an appeal to what most people think is EVIL and this is ironic given you are a nihilist. But more importantly, you never show precisely how YOUR POSITION and behavior might lead to bad or evil consequences.

So you (as a rule!) make a disclaimer about yours, but you get into specific demonstrations and arguments about ALL OTHER POSITIONS you encounter. IOW you treat other people’s priorities differently, often using charged specific examples of the bad consequences they might or will lead to. You never show how your prioritization might lead to specific bad consequences. You treat your values very differently from other people’s values. All the while claiming you have no idea are so conflicted and fragmented. And yet the same values, for example compromise, negotiation and moderation keep coming up. Not others, despite your fragmentation. And demonstrate what bad consequences they might lead to.

A pro forma abstract disclaimer is not the same as what you did with fun, and with other people’s priorities. SAying: Of course I might be wrong. Of course my ideas are affected by Dasein. is not the same treatment you give to other ideas.

You have a sense of The Good, it’s just, like many objectivists, consider it open to revision. A fragmented person does not keep repeating the same goods. A fragmented person would see the potential problems of negotiation and compromise also. And so on. A nihilist does not think there is a good, or something we ought to do. A nihilist does not have the ‘I think this is good’ contraption. But you do. A nihilist does not say, I think this is good, but it’s a contraption. The nihilist does not think this is good and that is bad. The nihilist obviously will have preferences, unless he or she is extremely depressed. But not notions of the good with disclaimers. You never seem to notice this contradiction between your behavior and your philosophy, even when it is pointed out using different approaches by different posters.

So then why do you do this with his fun prioritization as if it is obvious that this fun priortization could lead to bad consequences.

I don’t take any fucking leap. I do not add on all the problematic tasks and self-relations you add on. As explained elsewhere.

No, sorry, you are out in the clouds. I always refer to specific actions on your part, ones that are easy to document and find, since they are posted here. Specific interpersonal acts. At best most of your examples are universal (say, abortion) not dealing with specific cases and having nothing to do with any of us here. At worst you speak in the most abstract terms in paragraphs you have rewritten thousands of times.

Why don’t you actually come down to earth, tell us about a specific situation in your life where you encountered conflicting goods. Not in the newspaper, not out of your head, not with Trump and his opponents, but with you actually involved. I can’t remember you actually presenting a real life example, and yet you have the nerve to constantly accuse others of being abstract and not doing this. I know. I have and yet you keep asking me to do this as if I haven’t.

which, if it were true, would be the same as what you do as a rule. But it is not true since it had to do with a specific act, you critique of his fun idea, in a specific post. IOW a single example of a real life intereraction between you are another perosn here.

Sure, but I gave a specific example as described above. I could give others from interactions with me or Phyllo etc. But when you respond to these, and generally you do not, you simply restate your position, you call them abstract, when in fact they are much more concrete than your abortion issue.

I’ve done this. I wrote a specific case where I defended another man in a group. I described the conflicting values and how I coming from my preferences tried to affect change. It made absolutely no difference to you. You started talking about my leaps not long after that. At first somewhat dismissively, then it seems with almost an apology. But it did not make the slightest difference. SO STOP ASKING ME TO DO THIS. I did this, with a concrete situation, the day after it happened in my life. And stop telling me I make leaps. I make less leaps than you do. I do not make the leap that I somehow must come up with a rational argument that is also objectively true to convince the world of what the good is, if this is possible. I do notmake the leap that I can only act in the world in a wide set of contexts if I know what I ought to do. I do not make the leap that your entire project (which your own nihilism should make seem most likely futile) is something I must carry out.

You seem to think having wants and feeling things that lead to actions and choices requires leaps. Dogs manage without philosophies and leaps. Now, sure, I sometimes feel torn, sometimes I am confused, but it is only through abstract thinking that one, as a rule, cannot takes steps to make things more like one wants. To try at least. For you it is a leap, some mental contraption. But animals, lacking our vast array of mental gadgetry, manage to do this. Your hole is due to an excess of contraptions, not a lack of them. And just to repeat: of course, I get confused. Of course I can feel conflicted both about means and goals. But unlike you I do not think I must solve enormous epistemological and universal moral behavior issues to live my life. You have nearly killed the animal in you with all your contraptions.

Without this strangely moral looking huge project, I handle things much more as you like handle your shopping. I try to achieve what I want for myself and those I care about and for what I care about.

Amazing. Imabiguous: One can be hypocritical by acting in contradiction with one’s philosophy. You often say that objectivist run from you because you might upset the comfort and consolation offered by their objectivism. Look at what you wrote above. In the category of hypocrisy it did not, oddly, occur to you that hypocrisy is OFTEN, IN FACT USUALLY, brought up when someone’s behavior does not align with their philosophy. While expressing your incredulity you did not even consider this kind of hypocrisy. And this in a context where I was criticizing a specific communicative act in relation to Serendipper.

Is it possible that for emotional reasons you avoid really noticing what I am saying. You often criticize the objectivists by saying that they run from you for emotional reasons. Well, I think that has to be the case here with you. I know you will say, yes, this is possible. But can you actually look at and see what you are running from, why you often to not notice things? Why you keep asking for me to give a concrete example in the world of conflicting goods what I do. Even though I have done this. You say below that you honestly do not understand. I believe you. I don’t think you are fucking with me. I think there are things you do not want to look at. I don’t know for sure this is based on fear. That seems most likley. But I do know that as a rule you just do not notice certain things.

I believe you. You cannot see what might be problematic even if Phyllo and I place specific concrete examples right in front of you. I did it again in this post. I have done this many times. Most of the time you are not willing to even look at your own behavior. I mention it and you repeat your general position on dasein conflicting values, without ever responding to the critique of specfiic instances of your behavior that are hypocritical int he context of your nihilism. Other times when a specific act is pointed out you say that you have also said your conclusions are existential contraptions. But when it is pointed out that you relate differently to the existential contraptions of others, you do not respond or repeat your general position. When you conclude that something is good, you cannot seem to notice that you are no longer a nihilist, since for you an objectivist is only someone who believes their values are 100% correct. But this is not the case. A nihilist cannot draw a conclusion about the good, even a tentative one. He does no believe the good exists. And this was pointed out as a specific instance, an act in your posting. A down to earth example, first pointed out by Phyllo, where you obviously and clearly think that comprimise and negotiation are good. When it is pointed out this is a contradiction, you say that it may be a contraption on your part. Fine, but you are no longer a nihilist if you draw conclusions about what is good. You just open to revision. Scientists are objectivists about scientific knowledge, but they consider ALL conclusions open to revision, it is part and parcel with scientific epistemology.

And yes, the above includes abstract language, but I am also referring to specific concrete cases involved your interaction with specific people here, as I did in the first example at the beginning of this post. I HAVE ALSO DONE WHAT SINCE DOING IT YOU HAVE CONTINUED TO ASK ME TO DO OVER AND OVER given a specific example of how I navigate the world of conflicting goods.

YET OVER AND AND OVER YOU ASK ME TO DO THIS as if I haven’t.
YET OVER AND OVER YOU ACCUSE ME OF BEING ABSTRACT when over and over I build posts around specific concrete examples involving you here interacting with other people, which is much more concrete than your abortion issue.

I think the fascination with all this and I’ll have to check with Phyllo for his take
is that you are obviously intelligent but cannot see the nose on your face even when I hold up a mirror.
I shouldn’t be surprised. But I am.

In any particular community of human beings, wants and needs come into conflict. As a consequence, there are always going to be instances in which what you want to do becomes entangled in that which others insist you ought to do. Why? Because if you do what you want to do [for “fun” or not] it can piss the others off. So, folkways, mores, laws – rules of behavior – are established to sustain the least dsyfunctional set of interactions. Or [perhaps] to sustain what some insist are the must “just” interactions.

Predicated either on one or another variation of might makes right, right makes might or democracy and the rule of law.

My point then is only to suggest that these rules of behavior are largely social constructs rooted in history, culture, and individual experiences. Rooted in dasein, conflicting goods and political economy.

As opposed to one or another religious, ideological, deontological or natural assessment of the is/ought world.

Maybe, but Jack’s answer is still embedded in dasein out in a world where some are able to rationalize torturing animals while others insist that it is necessarily immoral to do so.

Okay, Mr. Philosopher, settle this for us.

On the other hand, what does this really have to do with the point that I’m making? Rules of behavior are either existential contraptions [more rather than less] or are derived from one or another assessment of moral obligation derived from one or another philosophical argument. Kant et al.

Or, sure, it might all be derived from a God, the God, my God.

As for “fun” here, something in particular is deemed to be fun by a particular individual in a particular context. She tells us why this is fun to her and we react. And this in my view revolves more around “I” as an existential contraption; rather than the “real me” said to be in sync with the “right way” to have fun.

You can’t prove it. Exactly. We simply do not know where the idea of human autonomy fits [wholly] into whatever it is that is “behind” the existence of existence itself.

But if human consciouness is but more matter inherently in sync with the mechanistic rules of matter, who is to say what is possible or impossible here?

Then [for me] back to this:

I have these absolutely extraordinary dreams in which whole worlds play out in my head. All manufactured by my brain even though “in the dream” I seem as real as I do during the hours that I am awake.

QM is a world that we have just barely begun to explore. Or are you speculating that a 1,000 years from know we will understand it in the same way?

What’s that got to do with the illusion of purpose in a wholly determined universe? The mystery is still the nature of human consciousness itself. Surely, the most extraordinary matter so far. Then the part about God and sim worlds and solipsism and the multiverse.

What always boggles my mind here is how folks can actually say – believe – things like this: as though they did have access to all that would need to be known about the universe in order to fully explain it.

Yours [like mine] is still largely a “world of words”. As you noted above, you can’t “prove” any of it. So, lets just stick to the part about how, ontologically and teleologically, it is still largely all a “mystery” to us.

Though, by all means, we can have “fun” speculating about it. After all, it is all inherently fascinating. Or, sure, we can assign a purpose to it. Like mine: connecting the dots between what the universe is and how we ought to behave in it.

Assumming this is something that we can do “freely”.

And as Rush noted above even not to choose is a choice. Only Rush was construed by many to be advocates of Ayn Rand. And with her each individual was free to think about everything in exactly the same manner that she did. The objective individual as it were.

Start here: viewtopic.php?f=1&t=176529

Then ask yourself: which part of my life is this most applicable to?

As for flipping coins and Monty Hall and PHDs and Marilyn vos Savant, all of these interactions either unfolded with some measure of human autonomy, or “free will” here is merely an illusion embedded in the mechanical fact that all of it was only ever going to or able to unfold exactly as it did.

But I have no way of knowing if this exchange itself is not just more dominos toppling over onto each other. Dominos set up by God? Dominois set up by whatever brought into existence – out of nothing at all? – everything that there is?

Even feelings of “futility” – or Vish – may just be another manifestation of the beating heart.

Nothing. But my point is still the same: the extent to which what one posits is able to be demonstrated as that which all rational men and women are obligated to posit in turn.

And then the extent to which positing itself is or is not autonomous. Or, instead, autonomic. Like the beating heart.

More words defining and defending more words. What God? In what particular universe? Impacting the things that I do in what particular way?

The claim and the proof going around and around in circles. Like the dog chasing its tail.

Same with all the other claims. Worlds consisting entirely of words yanked out of your head.

And here they revolve basically around relationships in the either/or world. Whereas from my frame of mind things like dasein and conflicting goods are relevant more in the is/ought world.

But: In a wholly determined universe this distinction in and of itself is just another illusion.

For example:

That our reactions to Communism are largely existential contraptions rooted subjectively and subjunctively in dasein, conflicting goods and political economy.

Makes an argument like you do in order to “demonstrate” the errors in it.

I acknowledge that my argument is just another existential contraption rooted in the components of my own moral philosophy: nihilism in a No God world. But that others are able to provide me with what they construe to be objective facts/truths that may or may not prompt me to change my mind.

That may or may not happen. It depends on what they actually post about Communism. And the extent to which they are able to demonstrate that all rational men and women are obligated to think as they do about it.

No, I point out that I was once a Communist myself. I once believed that “scientific socialism” was the most rational explanation for the evolution of political economy on planet earth. I measured other reactions to it ever and always from atop my objectivist perch.

Then all that began to crumble out from under me.

I came to embrace the components of moral nihilism. But I certainly do not argue that my “I” – “here and now” – offers arguments that never have anything wrong with them. That’s your own existential rendition of me.

Meanwhile you sustain a considerably less fractured and fragmented sense of identity. And out in a world in which there is considerably more comfort and consolation to be had in believing in an objective morality that is more or less linked to one or another God.

No existential holes for you.

Or, rather, not yet. :wink:

Defending concepts of good and bad is one thing, demonstrating that actual behaviors are either good or bad another thing altogether.

However nonsensical or silly the debate might be, there is no getting around rules of behavior in any particular human community.

And here others are either in the hole that “I” am in, or they are able to rationalize the choices that they make as in sync with the real me in sync with the right thing to do.

Then noting their particular font of choice.

But not entirely arbitrary. Instead, “I” is rooted for each individual in being “thrown” out into a particular world historically, culturally and experientially. Then being indoictrinated as a child to embody one particular sense of reality rather then another. And then accumulaing a particular set of experiences in a world awash in contingency, chance and change. All the way to the grave.

Again, you would have to bring this down to earth. Biological architecture is one thing, the architecture of value judgments another thing altogether.

Or, rather, they are intertwined in a particular sequence of genes and memes understood from a particular point of view but able to be evaluated only subjectively and subjunctively.

That’s not actually an acknowledgement of anything. It simply restates and reinforces your idea that you’re right based on your assumptions and experiences and others are right based on their assumptions and experiences.

It can be summed up as : “I’m always right. I’m never wrong.”

And it also means : “I don’t care what you think or say. Nothing to do with me.”

It’s interesting that you don’t say that our reactions are entirely existential contraptions.

That’s probably because you recognize that biology determines some of our reactions. That would be the objective aspect of morality and ethics. Which is why similar morality and themes occur throughout the world.

One never actually gets around to discussing it.

It gets lost in “optimum”, “obligations”, “demonstrations”, “dasein” and “existential contraptions”.

Too bad.

Right, keep on trying to convince yourself of this.

After all, what’s the alternative?

You know, other than your own rendition of “the hole”.

And that would mean saying bye-bye to your own rendition of the real me in sync with the right thing to do. And, who knows, maybe even to God as well.

And there is surely not much comfort and consolation in that frame of mind.

Trust me on this, okay? :evilfun:

Okay buddy. Take care.

How could I? There is clearly a historical record containing any number of historical facts relating to historical events like the rise of Communism or fascism. My focus is always on how we react to those facts from within a particular set of assumptions attached to a particular set of moral and political prejudices.

Or, in your case, religious prejudices?

Or why stop there? One could argue that biological imperatives are rooted in a wholly determined universe.

Or one could argue as Satyr’s clique/claque does over at KT, that they and only they have come to grasp the one true nature of these biological imperatives. As, for example, they relate to such things as gender and race and sexual orientation and being Jewish.

Fun is what any particular individual in any particular context says that they feel while behaving in a particular manner or in experiencing something in a particular way.

Then there are the reactions of others to this.

They may or may not be able to imagine describing this behavior or experience as a “fun” thing to do. They may note that this person’s idea of fun is at the expense of another person who is experiencing anything but fun.

Fun: “enjoyment, amusement, or lighthearted pleasure.”

We come into the world hard-wired biologically to embody this mental, emotional, psychological and/or physical sensation in reacting to the world around us. Whether you want to call it a “thing” or “the absense of a thing.” And whether it is embedded in a set of value judgments or not.

A “purpose” too is always understood in a particular context that is understood in a particular way. What do we tell others when they ask us why we are doing what we do? When they ask for the reason or the purpose behind it? And here dasein is marbled through and through our answers. Just as “conflicting goods” are when my purpose for doing something results in a set of behaviors that others construe to be bad.

Are some purposes inherently/essentially/necessarily more rational than others? Are they in turn inherently/essentially/necessarily more virtuous than others?

Says who? Based on what set of assumption regarding human interactions?

The purpose of things like the eye on the butterfly wing is embedded in the either/or world. Unless of course it can be demonstrated that God exists and intended it to be that way. It’s all embedded in random mutations. And we have no way in which to determine if teleology plays a part in this or not. In Nature.

At least to the best of my knowledge.

But what of the reaction of those of our own species to others who go out and capture butterflies, kill them, and then mount them in a display case? And then when asked why they do this, they say, “it’s fun”.

There would appear to be no purpose in a No God world. Purpose [to me] implies a conscious mind aiming to do one thing rather than another for one reason rather than another. Imagine for example that the human species here on earth are the only species of animal in the entire universe able to think and to talk about purpose in this way. Then next month the really big one – asteroid, comet, super nova, gamma ray burst etc – takes out all human life on earth.

What then of “purpose” in a universe in which there are no conscious minds [self-conscious minds] around to discuss and debate it?

Can fun or purpose even exist in a mindless universe?

Thanks old friend. I’ll see you in the next round. :wink: