Thread for mundane ironists

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1142

Butterfly Effect

“For the want of a nail the shoe was lost,
For the want of a shoe the horse was lost,
For the want of a horse the rider was lost,
For the want of a rider the battle was lost,
For the want of a battle the kingdom was lost,
And all for the want of a horseshoe-nail.” Benjamin Franklin

Someone run this by Benjamin Button.

“The fact that a cloud from a minor volcanic eruption in Iceland—a small disturbance in the complex mechanism of life on the Earth—can bring to a standstill the aerial traffic over an entire continent is a reminder of how, with all its power to transform nature, humankind remains just another species on the planet Earth.” Slavoj Žižek

Let me explain this to you. Or, sure, you can explain it to me.

"Small shifts in your thinking, and small changes in your energy, can lead to massive alterations of your end result.” Kevin Michel

See, I told you. Over and over and over again.

“It used to be thought that the events that changed the world were things like big bombs, maniac politicians, huge earthquakes, or vast population movements, but it has now been realized that this is a very old-fashioned view held by people totally out of touch with modern thought. The things that really change the world, according to Chaos theory, are the tiny things. A butterfly flaps its wings in the Amazonian jungle, and subsequently a storm ravages half of Europe.” Neil Gaiman

Let’s bring this down out of the philosophical clouds.

“I am a believer of the butterfly effect. A small positive vibration can change the entire cosmos.” Amit Ray

Does anyone here know how small that might be? For all practical purposes, in other words.

“Is there any sort of situation where you can say with certainty that a single person is responsible for what happens? Everything in life is dependent on so many different factors that interact in so many different ways.” M.T. Edvardsson

Try to grasp the existential consequences of this. Or is this sort of thinking just too problematic and precarious – too scary – for you?

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Probably. But all I know of this universe is through this interface. The human one.

15 characters,

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Infinity

“Does there exist an Infinity outside ourselves? Is that infinity One, immanent and permanent, necessarily having substance, since He is infinite and if He lacked matter He would be limited, necessarily possessing intelligence since He is infinite and, lacking intelligence, He would be in that sense finite. Does this Infinity inspire in us the idea of essence, while to ourselves we can only attribute the idea of existence? In other words, is He not the whole of which we are but the part?” Victor Hugo

Well, if objective morality, immortality and salvation are crucial to you, He better be important.

“If you fell outward to the limit of the universe, would you find a board fence and signs reading DEAD END? No. You might find something hard and rounded, as the chick must see the egg from the inside. And if you should peck through that shell (or find a door), what great and torrential light might shine through your opening at the end of space? Might you look through and discover our entire universe is but part of one atom on a blade of grass? Might you be forced to think that by burning a twig you incinerate an eternity of eternities? That existence rises not to one infinite but to an infinity of them?” Stephen King

Uh, let’s not go there. For now, anyway.

“Chair or no chair: a binary relation. But the vicissitudes of moving the body around are infinite. You never know what a person in a chair can do.” Sarah Manguso

Let alone what they are obligated to do…morally?

Nothing is immune to Time. Not even eternity.” Mike Carey

A stab in the dark, let’s call this.

“Paranormal events are just edges of the infinite we ‘happen’ to encounter.” Doug Dillon

Spooky enough for you?

“Infinity isn’t on Earth and it isn’t in Heaven. The infinite dwells in each of us.” Irene Solà

Subjectively, as it were

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1145

Stupidity

“We are set irrevocably, I believe, on a path that will take us to the stars - unless in some monstrous capitulation to stupidity and greed, we destroy ourselves first.” Carl Sagan

Or, sure, we’ll settle for Mars.

“A person who questions the value of living has endured a worthless life committed to trivial pursuits. A disoriented person constantly asks who they are and where must they go. A stupid person fails to realize basic truths and flees from reality.” Kilroy J. Oldster

On the other hand, there’s still this part: https://youtu.be/zWD5NXPIRuo?si=Cnh0eGyfK2eopvek

“There is no stupid question. Stupid people don’t ask questions.” Sophia Skaalerud

Next up: their really, really stupid answers.

“Marriage is a religious concept. That is the main reason people oppose same sex marriages. I am not, and have never been religious.” Robert Black

Me? A shotgun marriage…as I recall.

“Without exaggerating the point, the difference between ‘what I should do’ versus ‘what I want to do’ is quite frankly the difference between success and failure.” Craig D. Lounsbrough

You gotta love the cynicism.

Never underestimate the appeal of stupidity said with conviction.” Kevin Focke

And objectively to boot.

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Communism

“All the governments on our planet are failing because they’re run by people who don’t have the best intentions in mind for the population, not because they’re capitalistic, socialistic, etc. At some point people will realize that these labels stand for nothing, and it will be like waking up from a dream. A bad dream where label-maker devices are running after people like monsters.” Jasun Ether

Well, they stand for something, of course. But then the part where “different strokes for different folks” kicks in.

“Fascism is the stage reached after communism has proved an illusion.” Friedrich von Hayek

On the other hand: Amazon.com: Fascism and Big Business: 9780873488785: Daniel Guerin, Francis Merrill, Mason Merrill: Books

"Genuine equality means not treating everyone the same, but attending equally to everyone’s different needs.” Terry Eagleton

Vague enough for you?

“It is only when we have renounced our preoccupation with ‘I,’ ‘me,’ ‘mine,’ that we can truly possess the world in which we live. Everything, provided that we regard nothing as property. And not only is everything ours; it is also everybody else’s.” Aldous Huxley

Let’s run this by the ruling class.

“Fear of the mob is a superstitious fear. It is based on the idea that there is some mysterious, fundamental difference between rich and poor, as though they were two different races, like Negroes and white men. But in reality there is no such difference." George Orwell

Let’s run this by the masses.

“Everything is relative in this world, where change alone endures.” Leon Trotsky

Well, so much for political ideology then?

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Determinism

“No, free will is not an ‘extra’; it is part and parcel of the very essence of consciousness. A conscious being without free will is simply a metaphysical absurdity.” Raymond Smullyan

Over and over again things like this are noted as though merely noting them is what makes them true.

“Not that chance dominated events in the early Solar System, for scientific determinism was also functioning. But chance is an essential factor in all evolutionary events, and the birth and development of our planetary system were not exceptions.” Eric Chaisson

Over and over again things like this are noted as though merely noting them is what makes them true.

“Is not an event in fact more significant and noteworthy the greater the number of fortuities necessary to bring it about? … Everything that occurs out of necessity, everything expected, repeated day in and day out, is mute. Only chance can speak to us.” Milan Kundera

After all, what’s one more fortuity going all the way back to the beginning of time? If not beyond that?

“In fact, if you are faced with the prospect of running across an open field in which lightning bolts are going to be a problem, you are much better off if their timing and location are determined by something, since then they may be predictable by you, and hence avoidable. Determinism is the friend, not the foe, of those who dislike inevitability.” Daniel C. Dennett

Of course: click.

“I have had my mother’s wing of my genetic ancestry analyzed by the National Geographic tracing service and there it all is: the arrow moving northward from the African savannah, skirting the Mediterranean by way of the Levant, and passing through Eastern and Central Europe before crossing to the British Isles. And all of this knowable by an analysis of the cells on the inside of my mouth. I almost prefer the more rambling and indirect and journalistic investigation, which seems somehow less… deterministic.” Christopher Hitchens

New thread?

“If you make yourself really small, you can externalize virtually everything.” Daniel C. Dennett

Smaller than a breadbox for sure.

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It’s from a book on those topics. He didn’t publish a quote.

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Revenge

“An eye for an eye will only make the whole world blind.” Mahatma Gandhi

Next up: an ear for an ear. As, perhaps, Maia might suggest? :wink:

“I will hurt you for this. I don’t know how yet, but give me time. A day will come when you think yourself safe and happy, and suddenly your joy will turn to ashes in your mouth, and you’ll know the debt is paid.” George R.R. Martin

He’ll sic the dragons on them.

“If you spend your time hoping someone will suffer the consequences for what they did to your heart, then you’re allowing them to hurt you a second time in your mind.” Shannon L. Alder

Some, of course, will still take their chances.

“Karma comes after everyone eventually. You can’t get away with screwing people over your whole life, I don’t care who you are. What goes around comes around. That’s how it works. Sooner or later the universe will serve you the revenge that you deserve.” Jessica Brody

Let’s run this by the folks who own and operate, say, the global economy.

“We should forgive our enemies, but not before they are hanged” Heinrich Heine

Now, you’re squawking.

“Not forgiving is like drinking rat poison and then waiting for the rat to die.” Anne Lamott

Not forgiving what though?

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She probably wanted to help people, but this could hurt someone. Not forgiving is not an act. It’s a description of what has not yet happened and need never happen. Let’s say you’ve been sexually abused and the abuser isn’t even asking for forgiveness. Perhaps they’d do it all again. Perhaps they pretend it never happened. Telling someone their lack of forgiveness is a kind of self-harm ends up being a kind of shaming or guilt trip. If forgiveness comes, it comes. If not, not. There can be all kinds of reasons for this. There may be situations where a person keeps consciously stoking their hatred of someone who wronged them. And this forms some kind of avoidance. There could be situations where a person could stop focusing on whatever happened and fantasizing revenge where all this is stuck in some kind of loop, and this would be a good thing. That stopping might lead to a kind of forgiveness or a moving on. It might not. But this universal judgment is probably the last thing that many victims of abuse need to hear.

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Quantum Physics

“Your Power is beneath your Inner Higgs Boson. Try Hard to Discover it, & you will be shocked by the Good Results you will Gain.” Hemdan M. Aly

Let’s translate this into philosophy.

"While humanity may be far from the best representation of the cosmic unity to which all belongs, we do embody a certain struggle by which the whole of consciousness seeks not only to persist, but to appreciate itself.” Casey Fisher

Obviously?

“Quantum physics, the study of the universe at its most minute level, unveils a startlingly different picture from what today’s hyper-materialist humans so glibly dub reality.” Sol Luckman

A new religion, perhaps?

“This world is nothing more or less than an intricate dance of energy, a sea of swirling possibilities where everything is constantly in flux.” Sol Luckman

So, which is it, more or less?

“Contrary to the dogma downloaded from our many cult-like institutions of higher (actually lower) learning, we’re not in any way separate from the quantum dance of the imagination; we’re inextricably bound up in it. In a mind-melting paradox, we somehow manage to give rise to the quantum dance … even as it dances us!” Sol Luckman

How’s that working out for you?

“There is only one ‘actor’ in the play of physical reality, repeating roles across infinite scenes.” Timur Naimat

On the other hand, what if it’s true?

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Mitchell Heisman

There is a very popular opinion that choosing life is inherently superior to choosing death. This belief that life is inherently preferable to death is one of the most widespread superstitions. This bias constitutes one of the most obstinate mythologies of the human species.

Still does.

What does despair mean to someone who interprets that emotion as a chemical reaction in the brain? Mitchell Heisman

Not that we can entirely rule that out.

Uncertain of uncertainty, skeptical of skepticism, it seems that the most important question is whether there is an important question.

On the other hand, come on, important to whom in particular?

If there is no extant God and no extant gods, no good and no evil, no right and no wrong, no meaning and no purpose: if there are no values that are inherently valuable; no justice that is ultimately justifiable; no reasoning that is fundamentally rational, then there is no sane way to choose between science, religion, racism, philosophy, nationalism, art, conservatism, nihilism, liberalism, surrealism, fascism, asceticism, egalitarianism, subjectivism, elitism, ismism.

See, I told you.

I might be a nihilist except that I don’t believe in anything.

Which, of course, is just another belief.

To be serious about an idea, one must push it to its most extreme consequence and conclusion. Are moderns serious about the idea that biology does not matter? Are moderns willing to push economic materialism to its logical conclusion?

Next up: postmodernists weigh in.

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What if a person is deserving of forgiveness? Maybe that is the implied context.

I agree that if someone doesn’t care who they hurt then they deserve no forgiveness, but if someone shows remorse and a real incentive to change their ways, then not forgiving them is antithetical to one’s own frame of moral reference, is it not?

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Then it could be a good thing.

Maybe, but there are many with such rules, regardless of what the other person has admitted to, and also regardless of where the potential forgiver is at.

I’m not anti-forgiveness at all. If it flows it flows. But telling people not forgiving is poison is problematic. And heck, if you forgive someone who can’t admit they even did X, as long as that feels fine to you, I think it’s fine. I didn’t like the rule. It’s been a long time since I read Lamott’s memoir and I think it is her general rule. You oughta do it. I don’t think it’s an oughta.

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I do agree with this. One can’t just blindly forgive, there certainly has to be a reason. I haven’t read it myself, so I’m approaching from a position of ignorance with regards to what she wrote.

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Well, it’s a long time ago, so me too. But the ideas are still there for us, even if we misinterpret her. Should one always forgive? And forgiving doesn’t necessarily mean going to the person and saying it. If you want to forgive your rapist who’s in prison, I don’t think you need to send a letter or show up. It can just be in your own heart, if that feels right to you. Should one only forgive those who have apologized and get it? Should one try to fit with an ideal? Could it be ok to never forgive, regardless of what the other does/admits/says or does not?

I think also one can convince oneself that one forgave, but never really did. It can seem loving. It can seem like the best thing for oneself. It can seem like it is good for everyone. Or someone tells you it is like poison not to. So, you do. But did you really or did you conform to an idea? I think we can fool ourselves. But then I am not ruling out, at all, that one hears the idea that it might help you and you do it and you really did it.

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I get what you’re saying, it’s not something that can be directed, only something someone can realise for themselves.

It’s like when Jesus says “turn the other cheek.” I think that put a lot of people off Christianity because it’s practically an impossible thing to always live up to.

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Chaos

“It is a matter of common experience that disorder will tend to increase if things are left to themselves…" Stephen Hawking

And then, he suspected, it is disorder all the way down.

“Chaos swirls within me and it has taught me how to dance to its tune.” Laurie Newton

On the other hand, look at what it’s taught me.

“Nirvana is the moment chaos finds a hiding place.” Wyatt B. Pringle, Jr

Objectively.

“Zombies personify chaos and death. People want to know that they can defend against the unknown and death… In today’s uncertain world, people feel powerless. Zombies are a way for them to cope.” Don Roff

Next up: virtual zombies.

“By succumbing to external conditioning and looking outside ourselves for answers, thus denying the power of our imagination and ignoring the only viable path forward into the future… we’re bound to just keep pouring gasoline on a world already on fire.” Sol Luckman

I do what I can, of course.

“We held each other for a time in that hideaway, that unexpected sanctuary, while the city smoldered and the world went on changing without us.” Jeff VanderMeer

Like posting here almost.

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Then why do we live in an ordered universe? Depends what you call “disorder” I suppose.

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Yes, I don’t think it can be directed. And if your not there (yet or otherwise) being implicitly judged isn’t helpful.

Well, for me that’s another bad rule.

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1161

Solitude

“In spite of language, in spite of intelligence and intuition and sympathy, one can never really communicate anything to anybody. The essential substance of every thought and feeling remains incommunicable, locked up in the impenetrable strong-room of the individual soul and body. Our life is a sentence of perpetual solitary confinement.” Aldous Huxley

Yeah, something like that. Or, sure, something entirely different.

“The secret of a good old age is simply an honorable pact with solitude.” Gabriel García Márquez

Philosophically, as it were.

“Solitude is the soil in which genius is planted, creativity grows, and legends bloom…” Mike Norton

Next up: the weeds.

“Solitude produces originality, bold and astonishing beauty, poetry. But solitude also produces perverseness, the disproportionate, the absurd and the forbidden.” Thomas Mann

Bummer.

“It is in your power to withdraw yourself whenever you desire. Perfect tranquility within consists in the good ordering of the mind, the realm of your own.” Marcus Aurelius

Well, maybe back then.

“There is no doubt that solitude is a challenge and to maintain balance within it is a precarious business. But I must not forget that, for me, being with people or even with one beloved person for any length of time without solitude is even worse. I lose my center. I feel dispersed, scattered, in pieces. I must have time alone in which to mull over my encounter, and to extract its juice, its essence, to understand what has really happened to me as a consequence of it.” May Sarton

I’m in there myself. Whatever that means, of course.