Christianity

[Alexis Jacobi]

I'm always open to correction if I am indeed misunderstanding something, but in this case, it seems pretty straightforward to me.

Alexis clearly stated that at this present moment he "entertains" ideas that are condemned and vilified in the present dispensation.

In which case, I was just trying to get him to not only tell me what those specific ideas were...

First I would ask you to talk about 'the present dispensation'. Talk about, or list, which ideas you have noticed that have been shunned, vilified, banned, suppressed etc. and then, if possible, talk in some detain about your views on free speech. If I said "I am opposed to gay marriage" for philosophical or other reasons I would, with that statement, show myself (in today's dispensation) entertaining ideas vilified in the present.

You will have to show me that you are familiar with contemporary issues. And then, as I said, list out some of the conventional liberal assumptions and tenets that you feel are attacked by those who stand in opposition to your (I gather) generally Left-Progressive views.

Doing that you will have made a commitment. And doing that I will make efforts to respond directly and straightforwardly.

So, no, there's no misunderstanding, at least not in this latest exchange, for I'm just trying to cut through the walls of his eloquent prose in order to get a bead on his take on reality.

For example, for all I know at this point, Alexis might be a well read and highly educated Trump supporter, and that would speak volumes to me as to where his head is at - as seen from the purple haze of my entheogenically-induced, psychedelic stupor.

No, there is no misunderstanding, I don't think. But there is you. And you come from a specific political and social orientation which seems to me rather binary and reductive.

I have written post after post where I speak about my "take on reality". Deal with what I have written in a fulsome manner. If you do that I will take it as reciprocity and cooperation. It is a fair request. [/quote]

[Alexis Jacobi]

Elaborate on this, please. What are the manifestations of this degeneration, and what more specifically are its causes?

A few pages back (my they accumulate quickly) you said you pay no or little attention to SA affairs. In this instance I am speaking to widespread degeneration within the SA state. How about this: dedicate some time to researching contemporary events and then (?) we will talk.

You seem to want me to do work that you should do.

It's not about anybody doing anybody else's work. It's that when, on a discussion forum, a person makes a claim, they are generally seen as being responsible for justifying and/or clarifying it when asked. Do you reject either that that's the convention, or the convention itself? If so, again, what do you see as reasonable conventions to accept in a discussion?

Can you not find more to respond to in the post I wrote to you?

As far as 'reasonable conventions' I can say that I do not grill other people and sit back and expect for them to answer me. I write independent posts (not blog posts as you insinuate) and invite you to dedicate similar amount of time to respond. Another convention I have is that those who write on contemporary issues, and philosophy, should be reading. My sense is that you lack strongly in this discipline. So it is hard to have 'discussions' with you.

I am quite forthcoming in the presentation of my thoughts. I would hope that you would match the effort by explaining your views.

[Immanuel Can]

You will not even concede that you are the same Immanuel Can who responded to this:

The outlets that use 'legacy media' in this way are your Pravda news.

with this:

Yes, they are.

Sure, I will. But at first, I misunderstood your implication -- and you misunderstood mine. So I withdraw my seeming approval of that comment. See if you can do the same.

I won't hold my breath.

As I already said, I don't have a "Pravda," like the legacy media. You will continue to ignore the fact that I did, of course.

[Harry Baird]

Can you not find more to respond to in the post I wrote to you?

My sentiments are that the post is at a more abstract and generalised level than I'm well-positioned to respond to. It doesn't offer much in concrete terms. I'm more geared towards dealing in specifics. That's a large part of what motivates me to ask you questions: it's hard for me to respond when it's not clear what you're saying in specifics, or what the specific implications of what you're saying are.

I guess it comes down to differences in style. You prefer to write on an abstract, generalised level, and I prefer to get into the nitty-gritty. Such is life.

I am happy to take examples from your post and explain why and how (specifically!) I find it hard to respond to them given their level of abstraction.

I write independent posts (not blog posts as you insinuate)

My point wasn't that your posts are blogs, it's that, if you refuse to discuss them when others seek clarification, they may as well be.

[Alexis Jacobi]

I will discuss anything and everything. You are forgetting to take into consideration a very essential element: some of the ideas I do entertain you see as absolutely unethical, extremely opposed to what you believe is ‘right & good’, and when I focus in that area, as I must, you tend to react and, as well, show real difficulty in examining your own ‘cherished notions’.

Any position that is not your accepted position (regarfing SA and indeed the founding of Australia) is, effectively, off-limits. When I encounter that I stop and try to interrogate it (investigate the tenets) because I’m left no others choice. I don’t feel that probing is very welcome, either.

So an impasse develops. The possibility of conversation freezes. This paradigm is repeated time and again on these forums! You should be aware of that.

There is much to comment on that is not abstract.

[Harry Baird]

I will discuss anything and everything. You are forgetting to take into consideration a very essential element: some of the ideas I do entertain you see as absolutely unethical, extremely opposed to what you believe is ‘right & good’, and when I focus in that area, as I must, you tend to react and, as well, show real difficulty in examining your own ‘cherished notions’.

I suspect that, along the lines of sentiments seeds independently expressed (and I had been thinking the same thing before he posted it), an independent fact-checker's verdict on this claim would end up as: "Overblown". Why? Because I expect that, just as for the rest of us, there are certain things that you will not discuss, or at least will not consider appropriate to discuss.

For example, let's say you had a young step-daughter, and somebody on this forum proposed to discuss the best ways to kidnap young girls from their parents and the best ways to abuse them satisfyingly and productively. Would you be willing to engage in a discussion predicated on that starting point? Would you be willing to patiently and calmly point out why you think that such a thing is not justified, and engage in a lengthy back-and-forth in a (futile) attempt to persuade the proponent of this notion of how and why it is not justified?

Or would you take the view that such a conversation should in the first place be shut down, because no good could come of it, and that the proposed notion, being extremely opposed to what you believe is ‘right & good’, is absolutely unethical?

If so, would it be reasonable to describe you in this scenario as showing real difficulty in examining your own ‘cherished notions’?

Note very well that I am not attempting to equate the ideas that you are attempting to discuss with child abuse. I am simply for persuasive purposes picking an example so extreme that you cannot deny it, so as to point out to you the problem with your affirmation of being open to discussion of anything and everything, and of implicitly condemning those of us who (you contend) are, in contrast to yourself, not.

Given such extreme and incontestable examples, it simply remains to point out that all of us draw the lines as to what is beyond dispute - and thus what we are not open to engaging on in any way other than to condemn it - for ourselves, and not at all arbitrarily, and that you are not - as you claim to be - immune from this generalisation, despite that you might draw the line differently than others of us.

There is much to comment on that is not abstract.

That in itself is the sort of abstract claim I'm talking about. It is asserted on a general level, but it invites the question: OK, you could very well be right, but, if so, to what specifically are you referring?

If, though, one does respond in that way, all one gets in return is "Do the work yourself".

[Harry Baird]

That in itself is the sort of abstract claim I'm talking about. It is asserted on a general level, but it invites the question: OK, you could very well be right, but, if so, to what specifically are you referring?

If, though, one does respond in that way, all one gets in return is "Do the work yourself".

An interesting thing about this response is that it presumes agreement. In other words, it presumes that if the questioner was to "do the work", (s)he would take, and conclude, from it exactly what you do. You are, in this sense, fascinatingly, as presumptive as the "hyper-liberals" you criticise for the same.

[Harry Baird]

I will discuss anything and everything. You are forgetting to take into consideration a very essential element: some of the ideas I do entertain you see as absolutely unethical, extremely opposed to what you believe is ‘right & good’, and when I focus in that area, as I must, you tend to react and, as well, show real difficulty in examining your own ‘cherished notions’.

Any position that is not your accepted position (regarfing SA and indeed the founding of Australia) is, effectively, off-limits. When I encounter that I stop and try to interrogate it (investigate the tenets) because I’m left no others choice. I don’t feel that probing is very welcome, either.

So an impasse develops. The possibility of conversation freezes. This paradigm is repeated time and again on these forums! You should be aware of that.

There is much to comment on that is not abstract.

One final point: the post of yours that I quote seems disconnected from the post of mine to which it was ostensibly responding. I don't really understand its purpose in that sense, despite that I responded to it in its own right.

[ETA: Nevermind, I've found the connections now:

(1) I'd written that "My point wasn't that your posts are blogs, it's that, if you refuse to discuss them when others seek clarification, they may as well be. This seems to have motivated (via the word "discuss") your opening sentence: "I will discuss anything and everything." It's still not particularly responsive, because I was critiquing your unwillingness to discuss in response to questions and requests for clarification, not the limits of the areas you leave open for discussion.

(2) (Obviously) Your writing "There is much to comment on that is not abstract" in response to my having written that "the post is at a more abstract and generalised level". There remains, though, much to which you failed to respond regarding abstract versus concrete expression, which I consider to be the most important part of my post.]

[Harry Baird]

[A]t first, I misunderstood your implication

Hooboy. If you'd simply acknowledged that at the start, your whole bizarre campaign of denial and misguided counter-accusation, and the need for tillingborn to rebut it, could have been avoided.

What's most bizarre is that you blithely and matter-of-factly acknowledge it now as though, until now, your failure to acknowledge it hadn't been the problem all along, and all that tillingborn was (rightly) objecting to.

[Harry Baird]

On reflection, there's more to add:

Any position that is not your accepted position (regarfing SA and indeed the founding of Australia) is, effectively, off-limits. When I encounter that I stop and try to interrogate it (investigate the tenets) because I’m left no others choice.

Can you point me to where you've done this? I ask because I'm very cognisant of the need to defend my beliefs and position, so I expect that if you really had interrogated it (investigated its tenets), I would remember being interrogated/investigated and how I responded, at least vaguely - but I can't bring anything to mind.

I don’t feel that probing is very welcome, either.

Welcome or unwelcome, it is incumbent upon one to defend one's beliefs. I'm just not sure where you've prompted me to do so.

[iambiguous]

Yep. But my own "thing" here revolves less around what objectivists of her ilk post [about Christianity or any other set of value judgments] and more around exploring how, given the manner in which their lives unfolded existentially [out in a particular world understood in a particular way] they came to think and to believe what they insist that all others must think and to believe as well. In other words, if they wish to be thought of as rational and virtuous human beings. Like they are.

Philosophically, my own "personal prejudice" as it were.

She'll either go there or she won't. Most objectivists won't, however, in my view, because what if my own arguments begin to sink in? What if they begin to suspect that their own comforting and consoling "sense of identity" in regard to moral and political and spiritual convictions are just "existential contraptions" rooted subjectively in dasein in turn?

Oh, I see. I'm not aware of VT's objectivist views.

Depending on what you mean by it, I'm something of an objectivist myself, so it's possible you and I don't see so eye-to-eye here.

What I mean by it is someone who often reacts in an "arrogant, autocratic and authoritarian" manner towards those who don't share their own moral or political or religious value judgments. Why? Because as often as not they are convinced they are in sync with the Real Me in sync further with the Right Thing To Do. About what? Well, to cite just one example: everything under the Sun.

Thus enabling them to divide up the world between "one of us" [the smart, good guys] and "one of them" [the dumb, evil guys].

Both sides here are "woke". It's just each side has their own collection of political prejudices that others are expected to be wide awake regarding. Our rendition of "politically correct" not theirs.

And it's not whether we see eye to eye here in terms of what we think or believe about Christianity...it's what we are actually able to demonstrate is in fact true such that all rational people really are obligated to think and to believe the same thing.

Again the difference between thinking or believing the Pope resides in the Vatican and thinking and believing that the Christian God resides in Heaven. Or the difference between respecting someone's existential leap of faith to the Christian God and calling someone who does so a "kristofuckturd".

On the other hand, maybe VT is just playing a character here. Or maybe her posts are actually meant to be taken ironically.

I also hadn't encountered the word "dasein" until I saw IC criticising you earlier in this thread for using it. Doing a bit of googling, I'm not really sure what it means over "human existence". Are the two terms synonymous? If not, what beyond "human existence" does "dasein" denote (and connote, if applicable)?

Well, I encompass my own understanding of it in the OPs of these threads:

https://www.ilovephilosophy.com/viewtop ... 1&t=176529
https://www.ilovephilosophy.com/viewtop ... 1&t=194382
https://www.ilovephilosophy.com/viewtop ... 5&t=185296

Then I ask others how, given a particular set of circumstances, they do not construe their own sense of identity in regard to moral and political conflagrations of note in the same way.

As for "human existence" itself, grasping that will always be profoundly problematic. Why? Because there is an enormous gap between what any particular individual thinks it means and all that would need to be known about the existence of existence itself in order to truly grasp it.

Then the part where we don't even know for certain if the human brain itself either is or is not in turn just an inherent component of the laws of matter. That this entire exchange is but another domino toppling over in the only possible reality in the only possible world.

Indeed, given free will, why do you suppose so many believe in God? Because He is one possible explanation for everything.

[iambiguous]

Philosophically, my own "personal prejudice" as it were.

She'll either go there or she won't. Most objectivists won't, however, in my view, because what if my own arguments begin to sink in? What if they begin to suspect that their own comforting and consoling "sense of identity" in regard to moral and political and spiritual convictions are just "existential contraptions" rooted subjectively in dasein in turn?

What if "existential contraptions rooted subjectively in dasein" is just an "existential contraption rooted subjectively in dasein". Then what? Do her convictions then get the possibility of their objectivity restored?

Well, if you were more familiar with my own frame of mind, you'd know I often acknowledge I do not exclude myself from my own point of view. I am no more able to actually demonstrate that moral nihilism is in fact true objectively than, in my view, the moral objectivists are.

And, again, it's not her convictions -- what she thinks and believes -- that interest me nearly as much as how existentially she came to arrive at them given her own trajectory of experiences, relationships and access to information and knowledge. And how she would go about demonstrating that all rational men and woman are themselves obligated to think and to believe what she does. Given a particular context. And why, over and again, she seems to pummel those who dare not to share her own frame of mind.

[Gary Childress]

What if "existential contraptions rooted subjectively in dasein" is just an "existential contraption rooted subjectively in dasein". Then what? Do her convictions then get the possibility of their objectivity restored?

Well, if you were more familiar with my own frame of mind, you'd know I often acknowledge I do not exclude myself from my own point of view. I am no more able to actually demonstrate that moral nihilism is in fact true objectively than, in my view, the moral objectivists are.

Do you mean to say you do not exclude yourself from your own point of view, or do you mean to say you do not exclude yourself from having your own point of view?

If others don't know how steeped they are in their own views, how can you be sure that in itself is not you being steeped in your own views?

[Harry Baird]

What I mean by [objectivist] is someone who often reacts in an "arrogant, autocratic and authoritarian" manner towards those who don't share their own moral or political or religious value judgments.

No offence intended, but that definition seems to me to be a little more tendentious than necessary. My own definition is a little different: someone whose perceptions and reasoning convinces them that there are moral and/or political and/or religious value judgements that are objectively correct; that is, that are correct independently of anybody's (subjective) opinion.

Why? Because as often as not they are convinced they are in sync with the Real Me in sync further with the Right Thing To Do. About what? Well, to cite just one example: everything under the Sun.

Thus enabling them to divide up the world between "one of us" [the smart, good guys] and "one of them" [the dumb, evil guys].

Both sides here are "woke". It's just each side has their own collection of political prejudices that others are expected to be wide awake regarding. Our rendition of "politically correct" not theirs.

I do acknowledge the problem that underlies all of this: even if there are objective values, it is up to individual subjects to recognise as much, which they might not, instead mistakenly presenting their own subjective - and objectively false - values as truly objective, and mistakenly doing so zealously and fanatically.

At least, that's how I put it in this context.

And it's not whether we see eye to eye here in terms of what we think or believe about Christianity...it's what we are actually able to demonstrate is in fact true such that all rational people really are obligated to think and to believe the same thing.

Your allusion here to the need for inter-subjective standards by which truth can be reasonably demonstrated is well noted. Perhaps it's a direction for this thread to take - finding agreement at least as to what those standards are or should be, even if we can't agree on anything else.

Well, I encompass my own understanding of [dasein] in the OPs of these threads:

https://www.ilovephilosophy.com/viewtop ... 1&t=176529
https://www.ilovephilosophy.com/viewtop ... 1&t=194382
https://www.ilovephilosophy.com/viewtop ... 5&t=185296

Then I ask others how, given a particular set of circumstances, they do not construe their own sense of identity in regard to moral and political conflagrations of note in the same way.

As for "human existence" itself, grasping that will always be profoundly problematic. Why? Because there is an enormous gap between what any particular individual thinks it means and all that would need to be known about the existence of existence itself in order to truly grasp it.

I see. It seems to me that based on all of that, your definition or at least understanding of dasein is encapsulated as: "The full context of a human being's existence, which colours that being's perceptions and, more importantly, values".

Then the part where we don't even know for certain if the human brain itself either is or is not in turn just an inherent component of the laws of matter. That this entire exchange is but another domino toppling over in the only possible reality in the only possible world.

Again, no offence intended, but the whole "dominoes toppling" take on the will seems very implausible to me. That the will is free is a very defensible or at least plausible notion, in much the same respect as the proposition that solipsism is false is very defensible or at least plausible.

[Harry Baird]

A clarification:

What I mean by [objectivist] is someone who often reacts in an "arrogant, autocratic and authoritarian" manner towards those who don't share their own moral or political or religious value judgments.

No offence intended, but that definition seems to me to be a little more tendentious than necessary.

I should allow, though, for the possibility that you were describing VT's "brand" of what you take to be objectivism, rather than objectivism in general.