Come on, you don’t even understand what my point is.
Yep, forgotten.
What, for you to be right?
Which is not understanding shit. You first have to understand it from my point of view before you can accept or reject it. You’re like a child deciding he doesn’t like his food before he’s even tried it.
It’s all written in these pages, Bigs, in excruciating detail. Your dismissal of it all is my primary reason for saying you don’t want to understand it.
Again, it’s all above.
Oh God.
Let’s just start with the example I gave in my last post: being loathed to do something you know is right. Have you ever had this experience? There was something you knew you had to do, something it was morally right to do, but you just didn’t want to do it? Tell a spouse you cheated on them; cancel a night out because a friend needed your help; took the higher road even though someone was being really insulting to you; any one of these examples would suffice. Do you have anything from your own life, something that actually happened to you, that would fit into this list?
I often have the impression that iambiguous does not understand the difference between understanding what is being said and agreeing with what is being said. At the same time, it’s possible that he does and that he merely uses ambiguous language. Either way, whenever he’s told that he’s misunderstanding what’s being said, his response is to declare, without opening it up for the discussion, that the other person is demanding agreement. How exactly is that fruitful? It is fruitful if your goal is to paint a negative picture of people who don’t embrace your views. But if your goal is to find someone who will show you a way to solve moral disagreements, it strikes me as self-defeating.
No doubt. Lots and lots of us here would be banned playing by your rules. Think for example playing by Satyr’s rules over at Know Thyself.
On the other hand, no comment regarding the rest of my points above?
Okay, but, on the other hand, what it seemed to you was this…
I don’t immediately proceed to accuse them of anything…I merely extrapolated a particular personal supposition [rooted subjectively, existentially in dasein] from the reactions I have gotten over the years from the objectivists. And I have never argued that there are no moral truths, only that given the assumptions I make in my signature threads regarding “I” in the is/ought world, it seems reasonable to me “here and now” to think that.
Thus…
Right. It makes no difference to you. Therefore, if it does make a difference to myself and others…so what?
On the contrary, I often note a positive consequence of rejecting objectivism: increased options in one’s life.
The objectivists all have to abide by their own rendition of “What Would Jesus Do”. They are, for all practical purposes, in a moral/political/spiritual straitjacket. Do the Right Thing…or else. And, for some, that “or else” can even mean “eternal damnation” in Hell.
Again, the assumption that your own take on me need be as far as it goes. You’ve nailed me here.
But…
In however I respond to others, no one was ever required to read my posts here, let alone to trigger an exchange with me. If others come to think as you do, let them make their accusations and then continue the exchange given a particular context like the trucker protest or move on to others.
Or, sure, with you in charge here, risk being banned.
Okay, then, as I proposed above, focus in on something that does interest you, something that you do care about.
Forget my mind. Forget satisfying me. Propose a demonstrable argument that objective morality is the real deal. Either by demonstrating that an omniscient/omnipotent God – yours – does exist as Kant’s “transcending font”, or that, sans God, a particular Humanism is around able to provide us with a deontological assessment of right and wrong, good and evil…as that pertains to a particular set of circumstances.
And, from time to time, I acknowledge there may well exist such a demonstrable [secular] assessment of morality. But that the reason I still doubt it is because if such a demonstrable argument did in fact exist, it would certainly be the talk of the entire world.
And certainly the number one topic in philosophy venues.
Right?
Sigh…
Who here hasn’t come across a post of mine where I make it clear that for those who wish to pursue a discussion of human morality, I am more than willing to play it straight. No huffing and puffing. No name-calling. No mud.
Just an intelligent and civil exchange of our respective assessments. I can assure you it won’t be me who starts in on the personal attacks.
On this thread though, gib likes to mix it up. Straight and crooked. And that’s fine with me because philosophically I am definitely a switch-hitter.
Oh, and someone who is intent on banning me here…if not [at first] permanently.
No, I’m noting that I will “play it straight” if they wish to go that route, or “sling mud” if that’s what they prefer.
I mean, come on, note for me a fulminating fanatic objectivist here who is not incessantly being contemptuous of all those who dare not to think – and feel? – exactly as they do?
The good news [for you] as that I have decided not to engage them here anymore. I have basically moved on to the PN forum where the fulminating fanatic objectivists there are of a higher intellectual caliber. And more worthy of my polemicist inclinations.
You might be right. When one disagrees, one is taking a position which is more or less to agree with an objective statement supporting the truth of that position. In order for Biggy to remain indecisive and ambivalent, he can’t officially disagree but must “misunderstand” instead. And why not? If you disagree with someone, it’s always possible that you’re really just misunderstanding them.
But how is that different from what I’m saying? Your extrapolations are generally negative. You often extrapolate, and most importantly express, that your interlocutors are objectivists, which is a negative label, describing people who are closed-minded and authoritarian. You also often extrapolate, as well as express, that they employ circular reasoning, that they are afraid of facing the truth, etc. All of these extrapolations are (1) negative, and (2) stated openly by you. That makes them accusations. I wouldn’t say it matters how you formed those beliefs. The only thing that matters is that you’re expressing them.
What’s the difference between the two? What’s the difference between “arguing that there are no moral truths” and “stating that, given the assumptions that you make in your signature threads regarding ‘I’ in the is/ought world, it seems reasonable to you ‘here and now’ to think that there are no moral truths”? The latter is an instance of arguing that there are no moral truths. It does not matter WHY you believe that there are no moral truths. I does not matter how confident you are. The point is that you hold that belief and that you talk about it.
That’s not what I said. I said that your attempt to make your accusations more pleasant does not work at all i.e. it does not matter who the other person is. It’s similar to, but not the same as, someone saying “This is merely predicated only on my subjective assumptions but you are an idiot”. Of course, you don’t say that people are idiots but you do say that they are objectivists, authoritarians, pinheads, kids, etc. Whoever fails to teach you how to resolve moral disagreements is automatically accused of being one of those things, most commonly an objectivist. Such things are known as personal attacks, ad homs, insults, etc. You softening those statements by adding “This is merely my personal opinion” does nothing to change that fact.
I am talking about the consequence of you softening your accusations. I am NOT talking about the consequences of rejecting objectivism. You either knew that, but intentionally chose to redirect my attention to something else, or you didn’t, in which case you didn’t pay enough attention. I hope it’s the latter.
You know very well that I am not in charge.
When someone in real life responds to you with a “No”, do you keep nagging them or do you ask them if they are willing to explain to you the reasons behind their rejection and if there is anything you can do to change their mind?
That would be a pretty stupid thing to do considering that you’re asking for a favor. You want me to show you a way to resolve moral disagreements in real life and now you’re telling me to forget about that?
That moral truths exist is a fairly easy to demonstrate. But on the other hand, what’s easy to demonstrate to oen is not necessarily easy to demonstrate to another. I have presented such an argument in the past, I believe, but you weren’t convinced. Maybe we should go through it again? I am not sure because you complained about it not being “down to earth”.
If you’re asking me to show you how to resolve real-life moral disagremeents, that’s a different thing. But if that’s what you want, you should seriously try avoiding using philosophical terms such as “objective morality”. That’s what I think you should do but I don’t think I can convince you of that.
I seriously – very seriously – believe that you should stop using philosophical jargon and instead stick to simple, concrete, everyday, layman terms. Because when you start using philsophical terms, which you do all the time, it becomes hell of a difficult to understand you, and given all I know about you, you really aren’t interested in doing philosophy as much as you’re interested in using its products in everyday life.
You’re starting with the belief that good things always and immediately become popular. As soon as someone discovers truth, it becomes widely known. As simple as that. That’s one of your premises.
You SAY that you are more than willing to “play it straight” but is that TRUE?
Not to argue a point, but to reassert a belief in some minds of not acknowledging a difference between short cut and short gutted seasoning, behind the attempt to justify the reasons for their arguments. The two felt effect of a deontological moralized truth ( in the is/ ought world) can be expressed analogously with the evolutionary meaning of that concept within Heidegger’s earliest to his more advanced, matured conception.
This is no ‘kids’ stuff, but a real struggle to try to understand how to raise one’s self from literally down to earth, personal observation, to the point ( again , no contendere) where such elevation can begin to be understood as coming from Outhers’ who similarly incline to understand, without direct one to one correspondence.
This is how effects become futile rationalization of inordinate gaps, where all interlocutors become suspect to directly cut off authoritarian and biased , unrealized objection- without apparent basis.
Therefore, all of simulated correspondence automatically reject any source which evolves simultaneously out of ‘super-real’ or super ; supra natural sources.
This assertion can be relied on by descriptions of personal
anecdotes, and , or more simple reliance on others, such as those that prevail in the mystical schools of philosophy and science
.
That such psychic short cuts are still , even to this day, automatically raise red flags of suspicions, which at times unrealize the assumptions underlying the dubious nature of the supposed superiority of the immediacy of roots of factual traces of the earliest suppositions to the contrary: that science is not invented but discovered , using already available ‘matter’.
That is important to remember, when thinking about the importance of a priority of the aesthetic organization of reality, as some people especially kids, are most attuned to recognize it.
We all grow up disillusioned thinking we have to leave all that behind.
At the same time, we should not feel guilt over rising above reality into what may be an objectionable place in another, alternative ground if reality, thinking, my gid, do I have to repeat this eternally, recurring fir ever, as civilizations morph into seeming oblivion, as our memory fades into other ‘machine-ages’?
Must we fear our regress into faux religious worship into childish behavior? A philosophy must not become a copy of a virtual game show: dare or don’t dare, ; for all languages are code.
Yes, and that’s the whole point of forums like this. We do think about these things differently. Why my frame of mind and not yours? Yet my main interest is not in noting the conflicting opinions themselves but in exploring how, subjectively, as individuals, we come to acquire frames of mind that do come into conflict. The existential parameters of identity itself in the is/ought world.
If it was a belief, you would more or less agree with me that had your life been other than what it turned out to be, you might well believe the opposite about Paganism. So, all I can do is to grapple with that aspect of your own “sense of self” that seems to anchor you in a more stable and substantial Self instead.
On the other hand, because of the sheer complexity of 1] all these intertwined variables in a world bursting at the seams with contingency chance and change and 2] the fact that our actual lived lives were and are very, very different, I accept that the odds of our really closing this gap are slim.
Well, perhaps the difference between us then is that over the years there have been many isms that worked for me. Until, given new experiences, relationships and ideas, one ism stopped working and another one did. And then one day it occurred to me that it wasn’t really this or that ism that mattered…only that I could anchor my Self in or around one of them.
And that may or may not happen with you. It always depends on how your life actually unfolds…and how much it changes.
So, it just comes down then to how we think about this…for all practical purposes. And, again, in no way, shape or form am I arguing that the way I think about is more reasonable than how you think about. I can only note the assumptions I make about human identity in a No God world. And for you the assumptions you make about spirituality in the world that you live in. And then one day given new arguments or new experiences, we may or may not bridge the communication gap between us.
Same with myself and gib. I think he is articulating a frame of mind that might encompass a way of looking at things that might, in turn, make my own perspective more effable. Or maybe not.
But then the part I am unable to shake…
Well, for me, it’s the whole issue. And that’s because unlike with you and gib and the moral/political/spiritual objectivists, I don’t have access to a more substantial “sense of self” that I can anchor my own identity to in the is/ought world. Instead, what I think, what I feel, what I want are considerably more fractured and fragmented.
And, for me, it makes sense to believe this philosophically.
Well, in that case, you seem to be suggesting – to yourself? – that if things change in your life, not only how you think about Paganism, the Goddess and issues like abortion, but how you feel and what you want in regard to them, can result in a completely different Maia “down the road”.
And I don’t see why that can’t eventually reach the point where you too become fractured and fragmented in regard to conflicting goods. In other words, if there isn’t some spiritual Maia deep down inside able to obviate that.
Okay, but let me know if that ever changes.
True. But one way or another we all have to come to grips with at least the possibility of oblivion. And I’ve always believed that religious and spiritual paths revolved around the most sure-fire way in which to make that go away.
Okay, I can certainly respect that. And, on this side of the grave, there are fewer things more important.
+++Yes, and that’s the whole point of forums like this. We do think about these things differently. Why my frame of mind and not yours? Yet my main interest is not in noting the conflicting opinions themselves but in exploring how, subjectively, as individuals, we come to acquire frames of mind that do come into conflict. The existential parameters of identity itself in the is/ought world.+++
True, but we do seem to be going round in circles.
+++If it was a belief, you would more or less agree with me that had your life been other than what it turned out to be, you might well believe the opposite about Paganism. So, all I can do is to grapple with that aspect of your own “sense of self” that seems to anchor you in a more stable and substantial Self instead.+++
Maybe I would, who knows? The only things I believe are what my own senses tell me. Or sources I trust, I suppose.
+++Well, perhaps the difference between us then is that over the years there have been many isms that worked for me. Until, given new experiences, relationships and ideas, one ism stopped working and another one did. And then one day it occurred to me that it wasn’t really this or that ism that mattered…only that I could anchor my Self in or around one of them.
And that may or may not happen with you. It always depends on how your life actually unfolds…and how much it changes.+++
The trouble with isms is that they can so easily becomes wasms. I’m not a fan of isms, at least in the sense that you mean. Obviously, Paganism has ism in it, but it’s not an ideology or belief system.
+++Well, in that case, you seem to be suggesting – to yourself? – that if things change in your life, not only how you think about Paganism, the Goddess and issues like abortion, but how you feel and what you want in regard to them, can result in a completely different Maia “down the road”.
And I don’t see why that can’t eventually reach the point where you too become fractured and fragmented in regard to conflicting goods. In other words, if there isn’t some spiritual Maia deep down inside able to obviate that.+++
I don’t think it’s possible to become completely different. That would imply a complete wiping of memory and personality.
+++True. But one way or another we all have to come to grips with at least the possibility of oblivion. And I’ve always believed that religious and spiritual paths revolved around the most sure-fire way in which to make that go away.+++
That’s probably true of the monotheistic, revealed religions. But it’s clearly not true of ancient Paganism, nor its modern revival.
But that’s my point, of course. To understand something basically revolves around what we think we know about it. And, in the either/or world, certainty abounds. Just not so much in the is/ought world. In regard to the trucker protest, there are any number of empirical facts/objective truths that all sides can agree on. But in reacting to those facts/truths in terms of what we feel about them…what we want to be done about them? Where’s the certainty there?
Or because from your frame of mind – the goalposts and all – it’s always what you insist we are talking about.
Let’s try this…
Whenever we devolve into abstract contention such as this, we make an effort to bring the point we are making back around to the trucker protest…the context.
Certainty and uncertainty there.
Note to others:
What’s forgotten? What do you think he means by this?
Sigh…
Whether we think the truckers are right or wrong, the goalpost here pertains to dasein. And [each in our own way] says me and you and Maia. But in regard to how we feel about them, what we want for them, how we respond to them spiritually…where is the goalpost to be placed there and then?
But from your point of view, you share my point of view about our moral and political reaction to the tuckers. The “shit” revolves instead around the gap between my equally fractured and fragmented emotions and wants and your own seemingly more substantial emotions and wants in regard to conflicting goods like the trucker protest.
So, in regard to the “shit”, please keep the discussion focused on the truckers.
As for you being the adult and me being the child here, that [from my frame of mind] is me reducing you down to a pinhead. It’s what I’d expect from them.
Now back to the bottom line [mine]:
I don’t dismiss it all. I continue to grapple with how you can share my perspective on dasein in a way that Mr. Chickenshit and the pinheads here will almost certainly never grasp.
And of course I want to understand it!!!
Why? Because, unlike me, there is a part of you that is able to feel connected to the truckers emotionally…and in wanting them to win. And in regard to other conflicting goods that “I” am drawn and quartered regarding.
You may or may not be “fractured and fragmented” as “I” am in regard to your moral and political convictions. But: you can sustain some measure of “comfort and consolation” in regard to your emotional Self.
Me, I’m in pieces [morally and emotionally] with respect to all of the political conflagrations “in the news”.
Note to others:
Again, it may well be “all above”. It may well be me who is simply unable to grasp it. But how on earth can someone claim that their emotional self is in turn “hugely” embedded in dasein, and still feel the sort of commitment that he does to the truckers.
And, really, does posting “it’s all above” really qualify as a sufficient response to the point I raise here?
Instead, I suspect that, perhaps, there is a part of him getting a bit more unnerved by my argument. He may well be coming closer to being fractured and fragmented himself. And it’s because I respect his intelligence so much more than Mr. Chickenshit and the pinheads that I recognize that if anyone might tumble down into the “hole” with me, it’s gib.
Between recognizing that your thoughts about them can never really be certain because they are the embodiment of dasein – past, present and future – and how your feelings about them are on more solid ground. Despite the fact that like your thoughts, your emotions too are “hugely” embedded in dasein.
For me, in concluding as well that my feelings are hugely embedded in dasein, I recognize that had my life unfolded along a very different path, I might feel differently about things [in the is/ought world] as well.
In my view, that’s a relevant question. Something occured in your life that prompted your feelings about the government and healthcare policy to shift in the direction of the trucker protest. So, how certain are your feelings about them being right? And there must be something in your life that allowed you to set aside the belief that your emotions as well are derived subjectively from dasein. So a part of you grasps that your feelings are much like your thoughts…but you are still able to take that existential leap to the truckers being right. And in wanting them to win.
Here’s what you posted above:
To which I responded:
Yes, but, for me, that revolves more around the “for all practical purposes” consequences of what we do.
But…
Where I differentiate myself from the objectivists is in regard to “knowing that something is right”. Here I am drawn and quartered in terms of my thoughts and my emotions and my wants. At best I can recognize that given all the years I spent as a far left political activist, I have accumulated moral and political prejudices. Subjective assessments rooted in dasein.
So, it’s not things I have to do because they are “morally right” but things I might do even if I don’t want to [or things I won’t do even in I want to] because the consequences are perceived by me in “in the moment” as conveniently reflecting the best of all possible worlds.
Okay, let’s explore this in regard to the trucker protest…or in regard to an issue that is of particular importance to Magnus.
What can be said about it regarding the either/or world such that all rational men and women can clearly understand what is being said. And what can be said about it regarding the is/ought world such that all rational men and women can clearly agree about what is being said.
“Abortion is rational because women must have the option to choose it if there is ever to be true equality between men and women.”
“Abortion is irrational because it is the murder of a human being.”
Now, someone here provide us with the most unambiguously clear manner in which to address these “conflicting goods”.
Again, Magnus keeps accusations of this sort up in the clouds.
Let him choose a moral issue most near and dear to him. Let us commence an exchange in which we note our respective moral philosophies. Then as the exchange unfolds between us, others can participate. And every time I post something in sync with his accusations above, they can be pointed out then and there.
Can you cite a single person, here or elsewhere, who does not agree with the above?
What you’re doing here is called “nagging”.
It looks sort of like this:
And it’s described by Wikipedia like so:
I’ve told you many times in the past that it isn’t sufficiently clear to me what is it that you’re looking from me, and that, until this is sufficiently clarified, it makes no sense for me to proceed any further. Once you clarify what is it that you’re looking for, I may or may not proceed, all depending on a number of factors, one of which is whether or not it’s something I can do.
Right now, all I am doing is responding to what you’re saying. I am addressing your claims. In fact, I am mostly responding to Gib’s, rather than your, claims.
I told you, I can’t. I have no idea how to tie the point I was making to the trucker protest. You’ll have to show me how it’s done.
If it’s concrete contexts you want, what I can do is tie it to this thread. It exists in the either/or world, right? We definitely are having a discussion in this thread, right? That’s what my point is relevant to. I was making a comment about your style of debate in threads like this–the concrete examples abound in this thread, not the trucker protest. And while you are too lazy to go back and find the context to which my point can be tied to, I will repeat the point itself:
You zeroed in on this: “Oh sure, you disavow all certainty…” and presented that as my point… as if the rest of the paragraph just disappeared from your screen and all I was concerned about noting was that you disavow all certainty. So sure, maybe you don’t disavow all certainty, but there was a whole paragraph that little snippet was couched in. Did you process that?
I then pointed out that it makes no difference to my point whether you disavow all certainty or just certainty in the is/ought world as my point still stands.
Observe:
^ There, that’s better. Care to address it now?
Or do you need a context? If you do, the context you need is this very thread–specifically, examples from this thread where you go to ridiculous lengths to avoid admitting you made a mistake, or that your contender actually made a good point. One would think that if you’re so open to being uncertain (in the is/ought world), admitting mistakes or that your contender made a good point would occur at least a few times in this thread or any other in which you engaged in debate. But I don’t think I remember a single time when you’ve done this. So I can bring in contexts where you went to these ridiculous extremes, and your challenge would be to bring in contexts in which you admitted to being mistaken or that your contender made a good point.
There is the overall goalpost of the thread and then there are mini-goalposts along the way. The mini-goalposts aren’t always irrelevant. They are sometimes tangents we go on in order to make a side-point that we can then tie back into the main point of the thread. But if you continuously skirt around these side-points, these mini-goalpost, by switching back to the main goalpost of the thread, we can’t make the side-points we want to make that (supposedly) can be tied back to the main point. Conveniently, you seem to do this every time a side-point I or someone else is attempting to make almost succeeds (which is the point at which you have to decide whether to concede that we’re making a good point or goalpost shift back to the main point of the thread in order to avoid doing so, the latter meaning we have to start over).
I don’t know how anything can get resolved that way. As I said above, we sometimes have to go on tangents (like what we’re doing now), go into the abstract and seemingly unrelated in order to make points there that can then be brought back to the discussion about the truckers (or whatever the topic happens to be in any given discussion). If you don’t allow that, we end up at a stand-still every time.
The point wasn’t to compare you to a child, it was to bring in an analogy that I figured we are all familiar with. If certain types of adults did it, I’d use them.
Ok, Biggy, fair enough. There’s a lot to be said here and I won’t unpack it in a single response right now. I’ll just say it’s psychodynamic (the way I see it). On a conscious level, I have no doubt you want to understand, but I think there’s some kind of unconscious resistance to understanding going on in your head. Obviously, this is just the way it comes across to me half a continent away over the internet based only on a collection of texts you wrote, so, you know… I could be wrong.
If you’re serious about remedying the confusion and getting to some modicum of understanding, I would like to start with clearing up some of the misconceptions you’ve expressed about me. But I need you to work with me and give me what I need.
This is one of the things I want to clear up. I never said I anchor my sense of self on my emotions–you projected that. I don’t know what you mean by my “emotional self”. Given that–given that I never said I anchor my self into my emotions and you projected it (or assumed it)–you have to ask yourself whether acknowledging this (to yourself) might be useful in resolving your confusion about how my “emotional self” can be embedded in dasein. Think about it. If you take that term out of the equation, it’s not the same equation, is it? And you have to rethink the equation. I’m willing to work with you on this, but you can’t be dismissing it. You have to acknowledge it (and let me know you’re acknowledging it), adjust your mental model of me accordingly, and then we can work from there.
The above does. The point is that I don’t want to endlessly repeat what has already addressed the point you raise, and to make you aware that you can find a sufficient response above.
It’s not a matter of where I draw the line. To me, emotions aren’t the kind of things that “certainty” applies to at all (absolute 100% certainty or hopeless confusion). Emotions are things you feel; thoughts are things you know (or believe, or think). You can be certain about the things you (think you) know or you can be uncertain. With emotions, you just feel them regardless of how “certain” about them you are (whatever that means–I don’t even know). Sure, emotions are hugely influenced by dasein, but for me they aren’t the grounds for being certain about anything (unless, like many-a-pinhead, you let them drive your thoughts–Satyr being a prime example).
The “Oh God” was a cheeky way of saying “you did it again”–that is, you’re questions and assumptions are based on a misconception I (tired to) corrected a thousand times over.
Yes, but later I said:
^ That was just before I quit the discussion.
I’m not quite sure what you mean by this (the bold part in particular) so you might have to unpack it. But first, I want to be sure you understand my point. I want to be sure you grasp that there can be a schism between one’s emotions (not wanting to tell your spouse you cheated) and one’s thoughts on the morality of the situation (“I should tell my spouse I cheated”). You answered “Yes, but…” which is a “yes”–so is it fair to assume you understand the schism I’m talking about–at least in these examples? If yes, we can use these examples as a springboard from which to get into the schism in my mind between my emotions and my thoughts on the trucker protest (which is significantly more complex and needs further elucidation). But I want to make sure the basics are rock solid first (or sufficiently rock solid to move forward).
What position in regard to what particular context in which moral and political conflicts occur? I’d suggest you steer clear of Magnus though if the discussion is ever to get around to the reality of actual human interactions.
He has no interest in the trucker strike. But perhaps you and he can focus in on a moral conflagration that he is interested in.
Good luck.
No, I suggest that there does not appear to be a way in a No God world for “soft scientists” like philosophers and ethicists and political scientists and sociologists and anthropologists and psychologists to come up with a definitive, objective understanding of conflicting goods such that indecisiveness and ambivalence can be dispensed with altogether.
And that misunderstandings themselves are often the rule in discussions like this because we often live lives that, in many crucial respects, are very much at odds. Different experiences out in different worlds understood in different ways historically, culturally and interpersonally.
And then the Benjamin Buttons interactions involving variables that are often far beyond our fully understanding or controlling.
Isn’t making all that go away what basically motivates the objectivists among us? For them misunderstandings are straight and to the point…I understand it and you don’t.
Only they are more familiar with tackling other objectivists, aren’t they? Liberals vs. conservatives here by and large. With me however the discussion revolves more around examining how we come to acquire the value judgments that we do…existentially as the embodiment of dasein. Their authoritarian dogmas vs my idiosyncratic prejudices.
In other words, their precious “my way or the highway” Self is what I challenge.
So, the question between you and Magnus is, perhaps, this: Is he an “anomaly” too?
I note what “I” subjectively construe an objectivist to be: “someone convinced that they are wholly in sync with the Real Me wholly in sync further with The Right Thing To Do”.
This pertaining to moral and political value judgments.
Then, based on what individuals post here I react – again subjectively – in deeming them to be objectivists given my own “rooted existentially in dasein” assessment.
Then all I can do given a thread like this…one that pertains to a particular context…is to explore the existential parameters of our respective moral assessments.
Ask gib about that. We’ve been grappling now to close the gap between us here for 15 pages.
And, when you do get around to proposing an issue that is important to you, we can commence our own exchange. That way, whenever I post something that [to you] demonstrates the accusations you make against me, you can point it out as the exchange unfolds.
If someone insists that there are no moral truths, how exactly would they go about demonstrating that? What definitive proof could they provide such that all rational men and women are obligated to think the same?
Is there anyone here able to provide us with that argument and evidence?
Only for me, I’m looking for demonstrable arguments from the moral objectivists that there is overwhelming proof that their own moral convictions reflect the optimal or the only rational conclusion.
Is there anyone here able to provide us with that argument and evidence?
And, again, this thread exists because gib has given us that crucial context I keep yakking about. Though, sure, not interested in that one? Then one of your own.
And to argue that it does not matter matter “WHY you believe that there are no moral truths”?!
I’m sorry but how ludicrous is that?
My whole point is this: that the reason why we believe what we do about right and wrong/good and evil behavior is embedded and embodied in subjective reasoning rooted existentially in dasein. Which I then delve into more fully in my signature threads.
Then all I can do is to ask how, in regard to things like the trucker protest, others either do or do not share my own set of assumptions.
Look, you can twist my admittance that my own value judgments here are no less existential contraptions rooted subjectively in dasein than gibs or yours…twist that into your own subjective “take” on me. You can insist to others that your version of me is closer to, what, the objective truth, than mine?
But what doesn’t change is that, from my frame of mind, it makes all the difference in the world whether, pejoratively, one is accusing someone of being a fulminating fanatic objectivist or a pinhead and then demands that everyone must share his own belief…and someone who flat out acknowledges that his own assessment is no less but a “personal opinion” rooted existentially in dasein.
That way someone like me can accept that, from the perspective of others, I too can be thought to be no less a fulminating fanatic objectivist or a pinhead.
Only on this thread, gib and I seem to be of the same opinion regarding what we think about the trucker protest…that it can’t really be trusted because it is rooted existentially in dasein.
On the other hand, what we feel about it? There, for now, we are stuck.
And, hopefully, when you note your own moral and political assumptions regarding an issue near and dear to you, we can explore what you think and feel about it. How you came to acquire your convictions either as a moral objectivist or as a moral relativist.
Oh, indeed. Were you in charge here I would no doubt be long gone. Not to mention almost everyone else in The New LP.
Again…
We can add that to the list of things we talk about. Given a particular set of circumstances revolving around a conflicting good where some are in fact moral objectivists and others are not.
Again, you offer us your own subjective “take” on what I am doing in these exchanges. But what I am far more intrigued by is how existentially we come to acquire one frame of mind rather than another in regard to “I” in the is/ought world.
And all I want from others here is that, for those who are willing, they take note of the points I raise in the OPs of my signature threads regarding their own sense of self at the existential intersection of “identity, value judgments, conflicting goods and political economy”.
Then, given a context such as the one this thread revolves around, note why they do or do not construe their own sense of identity the same way.
Yeah, let’s go through it again. Anything to ferret out just what your argument would be in regard to demonstrating that moral truths is easy.
Here or on a new thread.
What I’m asking of you is that, as with gib and I, we focus in on a particular context and examine our respective moral philosophies. In other words, bringing “philosophical terms” down out of the didactic, epistemological clouds.
Again, we can iron all of this out in our own exchange. One in which you can choose the moral conflagration that ever and always pops up “in the news”. One which most here will be familiar with.
I don’t think that’s incompatible with what I said.
I don’t know, what are we saying he’s anomalous in comparison to?
I said this (thanks to you for bringing it back):
Does Magnus not know what to think about the trucker protest? Does he feel strongly in way or the other? Are his thoughts and emotions about the trucker protest aligned? Or do they tug him in different directions? If the latter, is it in opposite directions (thinks left-wing but feels right-wing, or visa-versa) or more like 90 degrees from each other (indecisive about what to think but feels strongly in one or the other direction)? Magnus, only you can chime in and let us know. Are you the same kind of anomaly as me? A different kind? Or not at all?
