gib wrote: iambiguous wrote:Well, if you say so. But there are still millions upon millions of actual flesh and blood human beings around the globe who see the behaviors they choose "here and now" and the fate of their soul "there and then" as anything but a game. And not just in the theocracies.
Sure. But since I'm not talking to them, that's irrelevant.
Fine. But given my own interest in religion, the fact that the overwhelming preponderance of religious adherents around the globe clearly are intent on connecting these dots existentially...? This [to me] speaks volumes regarding the nature of religion itself. It's not a game to them and the manner in which you presume this is all a game to me encompasses only the gap between us.
I'm not suggesting I'm closer to the truth than you are, only that our motivation and intention seem to be trekking down different paths. And that, for any particular one of us, truth itself here is always subject to change given new experiences, new relationships and access to new information, knowledge and ideas.
iambiguous wrote:Okay, whatever that means. Though what are the odds it will mean the same thing for both of us? For me, philosophy is as much about what we seem unable to understand as what we can and do. Mostly regarding "I" in the is/ought world. And "I" going back to a complete understanding of existence itself. Though for some here these seem to be trivial pursuits.
gib wrote: Yes, you've made that abundantly clear. Given that description, you wouldn't call it a game. I do. I see philosophy, or at least debate, as competition--competition between two contenders over their conflicting views--each one making moves and counter-moves with the goal of "winning"--if not in the eyes of each other then in the eyes of other readers.
Again, fine. But the bottom line [mine] is that, to the extent we choose to interact with others, rules of behaviors are a necessity. Call them morality, call them something else. And millions of us do connect the dots between them and the fate of "I" the other side. So there is certainly a gap between the word games that philosophers might play on threads like this and the manner in which religions out in the world precipitate very real conflicts, precipitating very real consequences, that often have a profound impact on the lives of millions.
Introduce the intellectual construct of "games" to these folks.
iambiguous wrote:What else could it mean given the gap between what any of us think we know about all of this and all that there is to be known? I mean, come on, please, what would a "sincere effort" consist of here?
gib wrote: For starters, stop being so resistant to the offers of help and suggested solutions to the gap problem that others here bring to the discussion. This is what I'm calling disingenuous. You say you're trying to close the gap, but I think the impossibility of this task is precisely your point in all your posts, and you're trying to demonstrate this by challenging others to make the attempt--dressing it up as a plea for help--and then putting every effort into tearing apart and rejecting those attempts with response like "well, that to me is just another intellectual contraption".
What can I say: let's focus the exchange here on a set of circumstances relating to morality/immortality in which you can point out specifically the suggestions of others. And the manner in which I refuse their help.
Also, over and again, I aim my arguments here at those religious objectivists who insist that others can only be helped in connecting the morality/immortality dots by embracing their own dogmatic/denominational agenda.
iambiguous wrote:Given the fact that 1] we all have to confront conflicting goods on this side of the grave and 2] that the spiritual/religious among us connect the dots here to one or another ecclesiastical scripture anchored to one or another rendition of "I" on the other side, what would the least disingenuous approach to this be?
gib wrote: ^ Similar response to this. A more "ingenuous" approach would be to be more honest about your true motives. I don't think you're simply trying to connect those dots the same as everyone else--as if once you've made the connection, you could save the world by offering it to all those seekers--but an attempt to prove that it cannot be done. I think your motive runs opposite to trying to connect the dots, but to dismantle any attempt by others to do so.
I've already acknowledged the embodied complexities here:
Yeah, that's part of it. If they can't yank me up out of the hole "I" am in, then maybe "I" can yank them down into it instead. At least I'll have someone able to empathize with me...up to a point.
In trying to understand my "self" here, I often come back to this:
He was like a man who wanted to change all; and could not; so burned with his impotence; and had only me, an infinitely small microcosm to convert or detest. John Fowles
Only I recognize that here there countless existential variables that have gone into the making of "I" going all the way back to the womb. Then all the way back to an understanding of existence itself. The unimaginably, staggeringly vast chasm between what I think here and now as an infinitesimally tiny speck of existence and "all there is".
iambiguous wrote:What is your own? Given a particular context.
gib wrote: What? My least disingenuous approach to 1) and 2) above? I live a relatively peaceful lifestyle and engage with people with whom any "conflicting goods" (whatever that means) are minimal and trivial. (This is why I described your earlier statement on this front as hyperbolic--though I know for many others it's not.) I don't feel a pressing urgency to deal with 1) all that much. I feel like I'm lucky enough to have a life and live in a place in the world where 1) more or less deals with itself. As for 2), I have my beliefs about the afterlife, but again, I don't feel this is a pressing urgency that demands a kind of rigorous and serious approach. I don't even feel I have to justify it with flawless logic and objective demonstration. It just sort of sits there in my mind as what I currently believe for the moment.
Tell me this isn't the embodiment of dasein. Given the life that you have lived and the circumstances in which you now find yourself, this is how you have become predisposed to think about the world around you. Here and now. And, like you say, "[t]his is why I described your earlier statement on this front as hyperbolic--
though I know for many others it's not".
That's basically how it works all right. At least until you become a religious objectivist/zealot. Then it's also how it ought to work for everyone else too. I'm mainly curious as to how Buddhists connect these dots given a No God religion.
As for the meaning of "conflicted goods", well, I took that from the manner in which William Barrett described "rival goods" here:
"For the choice in...human [moral conflicts] is almost never between a good and an evil, where both are plainly marked as such and the choice therefore made in all the certitude of reason; rather it is between rival goods, where one is bound to do some evil either way, and where the ultimate outcome and even---or most of all---our own motives are unclear to us. The terror of confronting oneself in such a situation is so great that most people panic and try to take cover under any universal rules that will apply, if only to save them from the task of choosing themselves."
I merely deconstruct the "self" here more radically still: as a "fractured and fragmented" frame of mind.
iambiguous wrote:iambiguous wrote:If your own focus here is not in the general vicinity of mine, I don't see the point.
gib wrote:But that's just the thing. My whole aim here is to try to align my interests squarely with yours. I'm trying to play your game. With anyone else on this board, I've never had any trouble staying on topic and making progress. Only with you have I repeatedly experienced minimal progress conforming to your own agenda before you bring the discussion back to vague generalities.
Again, this is an intellectual contraption.
gib wrote:So if my interests don't align with yours, you don't see the point in pursuing the discussion further, but if they do, it's just another intellectual contraption? Is there space here for a win?
No, I would just prefer that when we discuss "aligning our interests" or "making progress", it be in regard to an actual set of circumstances involving morality/enlightenment on this side of the grave and immortality/reincarnation of the other side of it. How are these
words fleshed out given a situation that most here would be familiar with.
This part:
iambiguous wrote:Choose a particular context that will be recognizable by most of us here. A set of circumstances in which mere mortals connect the dots between morality/enlightenment here and now and one's fate there and then.
What in this discussion would constitute "progress"?
gib wrote:Well, let's resume where we left off with the Buddhist scenario. You gave the context--a murderer on death row--how do I as a Buddhist alleviate the suffering involved in this scenario when it seems the alleviation of each party's suffering is mutually exclusive with the other's? My response wasn't so much to address how I would alleviate everyone involved's suffering but to do what I can (as a Buddhist) to offer a bit of alleviation to whichever party is willing to lean on me for such alleviation--regardless of which party that is--the only caveat being I don't think it would be a good idea to engage both parties at the same time. I'm not a perfect person (whether as this phony Buddhist I'm pretending to be or IRL) and I can't resolve the grand scale problems you seem to be interested in--but I can do whatever's in my power to move a bit closer.
Okay, you "alleviate" suffering. But how is alleviating the suffering on one side not probably going to aggravate it on the other side? And if you are a Buddhist confronting a context of this sort, how is enlightenment, karma, reincarnation and Nirvana understood given the very, very real intertwining of "I" here and now and "I" there and then. Once we move beyond Buddhism's capacity to offer up the sort of stuff that Karpel Tunnel and others here focus on.
Again, the stuff -- morality ---> immortality -- that most interest me about religion. The stuff that, if not the most important thing to others, would/should/could incline them to ignore my posts.
And I'm certainly not arguing that they ought to be interested in my own propensities here, only that these are the things that
do interest me about religion most of all.
iambiguous wrote:gib wrote:And what do you want people to do with this scenario? Are you trying to extract how they think they would handle such a situation? How they would resolve it once and for all? What they think is the "right" thing to do? What kind of a response would satisfy Biggy here?
The distinction I always come back to here is the manner in which "I" as a moral nihilist have come to understand human interactions when confronting conflicting goods as dasein out in a particular political economy, and the objectivists -- God or No God -- who insist that the manner in which they have come to understand it is in turn obligatory for all others who wish to think of themselves as rational and virtuous human beings. A further distinction here being those who insist that if one chooses to live one's life in accordance with rational and ethical and enlightened truths, they will be rewarded on the other side given one or another religious dogma.
gib wrote: Again, back to vague generalities.
But my point in regard to the Buddhists among us is to focus in
on sets of circumstances in order to illustrate texts of this sort. I have made any number of attempts involving any number of moral and political conflicts to describe why "I" am fractured and fragmented in regard to both morality and immortality. In fact, I created a whole thread of my own in order to explore this very thing:
viewtopic.php?f=5&t=186929And then to everyone I always request that they choose a context involving behaviors that are of particular importance to them.
Instead, the "question" you want answered here...
gib wrote: I call this a lack of progress because it doesn't answer my question. You're pointing out a couple distinctions you focus on when you ask others for particular contexts, but I'm asking what a response from them would look like such that you get a clear picture of the distinctions you're looking for. You know what would help? If you gave a hypothetical example of what a discussion between you and an objectivist would look like. You pose your questions, and then write a response from a hypothetical objectivist that would satisfy your inquiries.
...pertains to no particular context at all.
iambiguous wrote:What on earth are you talking about here? Note an example of what you construe to be behaviors in which moral and political value judgments come into conflict. Reconfigure your words into this discussion.
gib wrote: How 'bout the BLM movement? That's a prime example of moral/political value judgments coming into conflict if there ever was one. My point is that most people on this board (I could be terribly wrong here) typically aren't forced to engage in the thick of the conflicts surrounding the BLM movement on a regular basis (though this movement and others related to it seem to be picking up momentum pretty fast and I'm not sure how much longer most Americans, or even Canadians, can stay out of it).
Again, my
own interest here in regard to Buddhism revolves around individual Buddhists who find their own lives becoming embedded in actual contexts that
do involve race relations...how is their understanding of enlightenment and karma on this side of the grave factored into the behaviors they choose in regard to what they believe regarding the fate of "I" on the other side of it.
The role that religion plays
in their day to day lives.
My "thing" here.
This part:
iambiguous wrote:Just follow the news. You want conflicting goods? How about the coronavirus, the economic crisis, the social unrest? Hundreds and hundreds of issues in which both religious and nonreligious objectivists are hell bent on yanking everyone else onto their own "side". And then the nihilists who own and operate the global economy. What of their "convictions"?
gib wrote: What of their convictions? I assume when you engage others on this board with your questions, the focus is on their convictions.
No, my focus revolves around the extent to which the moral, political and religious convictions
of any particular individual are derived more from the manner in I construe the "self" here as an
existential construction/deconstruction/reconstruction rooted in dasein from the cradle to the grave; or, instead
essentially in a scientific or philosophical or theological assessment able to be demonstrated as obligatory for all rational/virtuous human beings.
gib wrote: My point was that when you bring up the point about having sooner or later to engage with particular people out in a particular world over particular conflicts [yada yada Biggy-talk yada], you make it out to seem like unless we figure out how to connect the dots once and for all, we're all doomed--doomed--to get pulled into these conflicts with such intensity that we'll have a major crisis on our hands--violence, war, oppression, death, you name it; again, I'm not saying this isn't commonplace throughout the world or throughout history, just not as commonplace amongst most of the members on this board with whom you engage (hence, my describing it as a hyperbole).
Again and again and again: we need a context here. What particular conflict in this particular world [our own] construed in what particular way?
You choose it. And, then, when you do in regard to an issue like capital punishment above, I react insofar as my own interest here revolves around how individual Buddhists address it in terms of the main components of their own religious denomination.