the source of much of modern philosophy...

we have since, Marx, really two questions…

One: is man going to “fix” himself via method like seeking old traditional means,
religion or reliance on other ism’s… so we hold that what is wrong, whatever that is,
with modern man can be fixed… we don’t need to overhaul or change our
basic fundamental selves…with a few tweaks, we can fix what is wrong with
the soul of man…the basics of human nature is good, we just need to make
some minor changes

two: the fundamentals of human beings is just wrong… and we cannot, cannot
by a few tweaks, fix human beings… we need to make a radical, readjustment
of what it means to be human to make human beings right…

Marx held the second view… that a few tweaks isn’t going to repair modern man,
we are irrevocable broken as human beings… and given the events of the last 200
years, the Holocaust, the two World Wars, the Cold war, the dropping of nuclear bombs,
the ever increasing disconnect of human beings from each other, seems to suggest
that Marx is right… that unless we remake, remodel what it means to be human,
we are simply rearranging the deck chairs of the sinking ship…

Conservatives hold that in the essential aspect of being human, human beings
are who they are and they are unable to change their basic nature…
it was Machiavelli who wrote that human beings are like Tigers who spots
cannot change…we are who we are at birth and we cannot change those “spots”
but we know from our own experience, that the human experience is full of changes…
we change when we from a toddler to a child and from a toddler to a pre-teen to
changes in a teenager and in changes from a teenager to an young adult to an adult…
at every step of human existence, we change… either from the experiences we
engage with or our simple growing older…

because I am now 62, I am a different person then I was at 52…
even though my circumstances hasn’t really changed much… I was working at
the same job, with having the same wife living in the same condo…
but I am now 62, a senior citizen, which changes everything because
I am that much closer to that “undiscovered country”…
my understanding that death isn’t some distant event… it is a’coming for me…
maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow but at some point I will die…
and that understanding changes everything…

but the question lies in how my changes occurred…
where they fast and sudden, or did I gradually over time
change? clearly the answer is a gradually change over time…

but let us return to the question at hand…

are we in need of some tweaks to become better human beings or
are we as Marx and others saw, we must remake human beings completely?

I hold that it depends on the goal, the destination…what are we trying to do?
what is the point of existence?
and that decides what is the means we need to achieve to reach our goals…

in this problem of tweaks or entire remakes, lies much of the last 200 years
of philosophy, history, science, economics, and political theory…

the conservative that just tweaks, at most is what is needed,
whereas the liberal holds that more then tweaks, indeed wholesale
changes are needed in human beings to ‘‘right’’ the ship…

will tweaks solve the problem whereby people hold it is ok to
torture people if our ‘‘national defense’’ requires it?

no, to allow people to be tortured under any circumstances requires more
the just tweaks, it requires an entire rewrite of what it means to be human…

that is just one example of actions that lead us to think about whether we
need tweaks or an major overhaul to recover our being human…

if you think the answer to any question is to torture people, then
you need something more then just a tweak…

so the question that lies before us is this…
do we need just tweaks to recover us becoming human or
do we need a major overhaul of what it means to be human?

I am coming to the realization that making tweaks just isn’t enough to
return us to being human beings… that a major overhaul is necessary for
us to realize values that make us human… as allowing or justifying torture
isn’t a value that is human…and so I say, a major overhaul is necessary…

what say you?

Kropotkin

as the situation dictates the answer, much like situational ethics,
where the situations dictates the ethics, situational philosophy is where
the situation dictates the philosophy… an “ad hoc” form of philosophy as it were…
and the the question becomes, what is our situation?
do we need to form an “Ad hoc” form of philosophy, do we need to
allow the situation to dictate the philosophy we use or do we
form the philosophy and then force the situation into that philosophy?

an example of “formal” philosophy being used instead of “situational philosophy”
is Kant and Hegel and Descartes… we are to apply the formulas that those
philosophy presented us to understand or form the situation…

but the best example of situational philosophy is Nietzsche…
the situation tells us what philosophy we must engage with in
that situation…

right now, philosophy is trying to use “formal philosophy” to engage with
our modern times, when I might suggest that “situational philosophy”
might be the best way to go… allow the situation to dictate the
philosophy we use…thus given our current situation, we need to
understand that minor tweaks to the system isn’t going to hold the
“barbarians” at the gate…we must see, recognize that what we are currently
doing right now isn’t getting us to some stable, fixed situation, politically,
philosophically or culturally…
but the question must be asked, do we really even want a stable, fixed situation
for us, both individually or collectively?

part of the modern problem has been we are trying to used fixed, set solutions,
to problems that require much different solutions… we use an fixed and set ism,
say, catholicism to solve the problem of our unease, our disconnection to the society
and life and to each other, when, perhaps a more 'ad hoc" solution may be a better
solution to the disconnection we have with society and each other…

to say it another way, we used a set, fixed solution like an ism or an ideology to
solve a problem where a fixed and set solution isn’t going to work…
here we come back to the conservative constant “Culture wars” as an example…
conservative see a “problem” which isn’t, to make political and social points,
whereas if they would focused on a real problem like poverty or racial,
income inequality… they would accomplish far more that way…
if they focused on a real problem instead of an “Made up” problems like
CRT or sex education or LGBT hatred… let us engage in a problem which
isn’t about scoring points… which isn’t driving the flames of hate, anger,
bigotry or prejudice… as the cultural wars of the last 40 years have done…
the creation of political driven culture war crap isn’t helping anyone…

we can begin to cure our ills, of which there are many, if we actually
engaged in those problems, as real problems, not just left-right problems…
but human problems…as racial inequality and income inequality and
systematic racism are real sociality problems… so how are we to engage with
those real problems? by using situational philosophy, letting the situation dictates
the philosophy or do we use set, fixed solutions as encountered by ism’s
like capitalism or catholicism? use the ism to solve the problem without
regard to if that ism is really the right tool to solve that problem?
to use the tool of ism to solve a problem is the conservative way,
even if that ism isn’t the right tool…
so we must react to each situation, each problem fresh and ready
to make an judgment as to if this situation requires an “ad hoc” solution
or does this situation requires a fix, set solution as offered by
the ism’s as communism and dictatorship?

we must renew our problem solving understanding by some engagement
with do we define a problem and how do we engage in some solution to that
problem?

Kropotkin

a fixed and set solution often proscribed by conservatives is
a “return to god” or to religious solutions… want to solve crime?
god is the answer… want to end divorce, god is the answer?
want to end child poverty? god is the answer…

well, to my way of thinking, the fact is I see god as being part of the
problem… the believe in god being part of the problem in our modern world…
we are to focused on there being a god instead of being focused on possible
solutions that don’t involved fixed and set solutions like a return to god…

the solution to child violence isn’t a return to god, that belief in
god is part of the problem… how can part of the problem be part
of the solution?

you say, Kropotkin, god is always the answer… let me present you with one
possible rejection of that viewpoint… a while ago, a young man, in Atlanta,
went from one place of Asian massages to another place and killed several
women… he grew up in a "religious’ household and this conflict between
holding to a religious belief and the desire for the flesh, drove
this young man into seeking a solution and his solution, was to kill
several women… I will be willing to bet that quite a few of mass killers
or even those who kill one or two women were born into a religious family…
and the reason for their violence was this conflict between the ism
of religion and their desires… god didn’t solve their problem,
the belief in god created the problem… because the people in
question couldn’t resolve the conflict between what they were taught,
their indoctrinations and what they are currently feeling…
if sin is a crime and one commits sin, and thus feels guilt
and immense amount of guilt due to the childhood indoctrinations,
then how are suppose to work out this conflict between the ism,
religion and the human desires of the flesh?
must blood shed has been done in this conflict between the indoctrinations
of the childhood and the desires of the flesh…
so god can’t always be the answer because belief in god created the problem…

so do we hold to the asceticism of religions or do we answer the call of
the flesh and thus avoiding the crisis that sometime brings about the violence
that kills innocent people?

what is the solution?

Kropotkin

if god is really dead, then what should we believe in?

Kropotkin