How responsible is the US for the rise of ISIS?

[Walker]

For Fucks sake. "EVIL" is not a causative force you dingbat. Evil is what YOU CALL, something you don't like.

If you don't understand this you are never going to understand the situation.
As far as millions of Muslims are concerned the USA is the the EVIL, with as much credibility as you think ISIS is evil.

Evil is what you don’t like? Infantile view, but tidy for you, I guess. Such narratives keep you conditioned, where it’s comfortable.

Evil is not evil because you call it evil.
You call it evil because you recognize it as such.
.

You are the Evil. You are the one that pretends that your view is perfect, that you alone can recognise evil and that others that think you evil are wrong.
You are the danger you are the one offering violence to the rest of the world.

You have a loose and runny definition of evil.

This is the essence. This is from whence the theories derive …

Good is when you can peacefully go about your business.
Evil is what wants to kill you.

You can dress it up and make it as confusing as you want, but that’s what it boils down to. That’s the beauty of intelligence. You can steer clear of evil most times if you’re not an idiot. Once people stop fooling themselves, they can recognize evil.

This is why I dialogue with you. You are an intelligent person, and not evil.

I’m all about peace and love, my friend. You may be a little slow on the empathy to have not noticed.

But consider this in your wisdom. Christ did not advocate violence. Those who commit violence in the name of Christ are not emulating Christ, and they are not defending Christ.

If only the same could be said about fanatical fundamentalists of other faiths. But they don’t fool themselves about their role model in their emulation. Don’t fool yourself about it.

And before you turn purple over the faith business, I don’t speak from faith.

As Jiddu Krishnamurti accruately noted, faith invariably breeds violence. This is true. The key to the meaning is “invariably”. This means faith breeds the violence that exists in words. People show faith with offerings of violent words. Faith in something. Fortunately for good people not bound to habitual courtesy, an offering does not imply acceptance of the offering.

[Obvious Leo]

Evil is when I ask the barmaid for a half of lager and she gives me stout instead. Such people should be taken out the back and summarily shot.

[Philosophy Explorer]

Air power?

Going back to the Vietnam War, air power has never worked in its announced goals:

http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/former-mi6-int ... is-1529854

PhilX

[Hobbes' Choice]

As Jiddu Krishnamurti accruately noted, faith invariably breeds violence. This is true. The key to the meaning is “invariably”. This means faith breeds the violence that exists in words. People show faith with offerings of violent words. Faith in something. Fortunately for good people not bound to habitual courtesy, an offering does not imply acceptance of the offering.

Krisnamurti has exactly the same idea about evil as do I.

So does Thomas Hobbes:"Good is that which pleaseth us, evil is that which pleaseth us not"
This simple statement of truth completely revolutionised we way we think about the moral world and freed us from the bonds of relgious dogma and authority.

Your idea of evil has just so much wrong with it I don't know where to start.
You are one sick puppy.

The best way I can describe your theory of evil is one used by science of a theory that does not even begin to address basic rules of evidence" YOU ARE NOT EVEN WRONG.

[Obvious Leo]

"Good is that which pleaseth us, evil is that which pleaseth us not"

I suspect you would agree that Hobbes was the ideological founder of our modern secular notion of the "social contract." We are all free to confect our own outrage at whatever we choose to define as "evil" but in a civilised society we are not free to act according to such outrage. According to this simple definition the ISIS death cult is symptomatic of a society which is not civilised, but civilisation is not something which can be imposed on a society by military force from outwith it. This proposition is oxymoronic because in our own civilised society we are not free to act out our outrage at another society for not being civilised because this would be uncivilised behaviour.

[Walker]

So does Thomas Hobbes:"Good is that which pleaseth us, evil is that which pleaseth us not"

Well that confirms what I always knew.

Twinkies are good.

Parsnips are evil.

Within these boundaries of yours from which you perceive, Choiceless Hobbes who does what he must, know that even though my words fail to pleaseth thee to the distressful point of hurty sick tummy and sending back your beer, like you I am only a Twinkie, and not Evil.

There are two kinds of people. Those who are alive, and those who are not. You and I are the same. We are the first kind.

[Necromancer]

A two-cents answer: The World owes Iraq a Marshall plan. It should also support some other countries in a similar fashion, like Afghanistan. Would then ISIS disappear? I make a good bet in favour!

Marshall plan: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marshall_Plan

[Obvious Leo]

A good balanced comment. Also don't forget that the reconstruction of Japan and Germany after WWII was not only an enormous economic stimulus for those countries but in fact served to drive the entire world economy for over a generation.

I've seen much the same economic argument advanced in favour of a world-wide initiative on global warming. A calcifying world economy could be kicked into the stratosphere in such a way that child poverty would become nothing more than a sorry feature of human history. The arguments are very persuasive, if history is to be our guide.

[Walker]

This just in, from the unimpeachable NY Post. No need to clink the link. These quotes are the gist.

“It’s painfully clear that administration incompetence on ISIS flows from the top down.”

“As Bloomberg Businessweek reports, the Obama administration realized just days ago that ISIS is one of the richest organizations in the world — with assets totaling billions.”
(mucho dinero from Iraq)

Team Obama’s latest ISIS ‘oops’

[Walker]

A two-cents answer: The World owes Iraq a Marshall plan. It should also support some other countries in a similar fashion, like Afghanistan. Would then ISIS disappear? I make a good bet in favour!

Marshall plan: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marshall_Plan

Those who try to solve the problem end up owning the problem, and as Clinton knows, there ain’t no oil in Rawanda.

Like the Marshall Plan, when the world owes, the United States pays.

Not long ago, measured in months and few years, the Obama Administration was funding ISIS to depose Assad, ostensibly because of government-sanctioned evil inflicted upon its citizens. ISIS was part of the rebels, and on-the-ground news stories ran the narrative of brave rebels against the evil empire. The effort to depose Assad was weak and ineffectual. The red-line chest-pounding proved to be only a political photo-op to wear a stern face and sound forceful. Assad dismissed Obama as only a bloviator and continued doing what pleased him.

ISIS went on recruiting bored and fearful yutes looking to belong to something and prove their mettle. So what is the mission of ISIS. Goodness?

A day or two ago British generals said they could go in and wipe out ISIS in three weeks of war. Likely they would not be too concerned if their ordinance is smart, aneseptic, clean or surgical. They would kill a lot of people.

The resulting power vaccuum would fill right up with more tribal leaders, and their motive force is the same as ISIS.

[Walker]

A good balanced comment. Also don't forget that the reconstruction of Japan and Germany after WWII was not only an enormous economic stimulus for those countries but in fact served to drive the entire world economy for over a generation.

I've seen much the same economic argument advanced in favour of a world-wide initiative on global warming. A calcifying world economy could be kicked into the stratosphere in such a way that child poverty would become nothing more than a sorry feature of human history. The arguments are very persuasive, if history is to be our guide.

I agree with your view that its is naïve to think that all men want the same thing or view life the same way. Rationality indicates that no one could rise to POTUS and be a dummy. They've got to know something. They have access to more knowledge, more facts. Are we to simply trust their judgement, or to question? For those who wish to question without suffering a penalty, well, such men are not alone.

I think you’ll agree that tribal mentality lies close to the root.

About that: I think that a way to understand Them, is to examine the dynamics of any youth gang from any culture.

Easy enough to imagine that mentality turned into a cultural ideal, funded heavily, and sanctioned by religion. Now we’re talkin tribal.

In urban gangs, closer boundaries of city require some kind of coexistence with the city, a gangster balance if you will. The Western gangster coexists with the city.

Huge wealth sets tribal gangsters into unconcontrolled conquering mode, whereas without huge wealth they would be limited to scheming how to plunder the next tribe’s goats, or whatever, and coexisting in that way.

Tribal leaders do things for their people, too. Their people think that their leaders are good, and the peoples' tribal leaders think that their enemies are evil.

Such is tribal life. The fluctuating rule of law, which is another name for the rule of man.

[Obvious Leo]

Now that you've got off the subject of evil you're making a bit more sense. The difference between ISIS and western inner-urban gangsta culture is just a matter of degree. An age-old narrative of rebellion and "us" versus "them". Young blokes will always fight because they like the sense of belonging and the camaraderie which derives from it, and the old farts in pursuit of their own wealth and power agenda always stand willing to urge them on from the sidelines by offering them some faux ideology to fight and die for. It's a story as old as human history.

[Walker]

Now that you've got off the subject of evil you're making a bit more sense. The difference between ISIS and western inner-urban gangsta culture is just a matter of degree. An age-old narrative of rebellion and "us" versus "them". Young blokes will always fight because they like the sense of belonging and the camaraderie which derives from it, and the old farts in pursuit of their own wealth and power agenda always stand willing to urge them on from the sidelines by offering them some faux ideology to fight and die for. It's a story as old as human history.

It's good to hear more sense.

Good discussion, good to think.

Been posting a lot, lots to do now.

Have fun!

[Hobbes' Choice]

"Good is that which pleaseth us, evil is that which pleaseth us not"

I suspect you would agree that Hobbes was the ideological founder of our modern secular notion of the "social contract." We are all free to confect our own outrage at whatever we choose to define as "evil" but in a civilised society we are not free to act according to such outrage. According to this simple definition the ISIS death cult is symptomatic of a society which is not civilised, but civilisation is not something which can be imposed on a society by military force from outwith it. This proposition is oxymoronic because in our own civilised society we are not free to act out our outrage at another society for not being civilised because this would be uncivilised behaviour.

For ISIS the Leviathan is Allah. They are commanded to do his bidding, and that is what defines them in their micro-culture, would be one way to look at it. Or you could simply say that the terrorists are not willing to sign up to a social contract, in a society who they have decided does not work for them. The dichotomy is not between "civilised" or not, but whether or not you think a social contract is applicable, or if it can reasonably said to apply to members of a different nation.

Clearly babies blown apart by American bombs do not have the benefit of any contract it seems.

[Hobbes' Choice]

So does Thomas Hobbes:"Good is that which pleaseth us, evil is that which pleaseth us not"

Well that confirms what I always knew.

Twinkies are good.

Parsnips are evil.
.

If you are serious about this statement, then you have dismantled your own argument about evil being a causative agent.
Were you willing to accept that, and stop ranting in that patronising way about Jesus of nazareth then we might have a reasonable discussion.
Roast parsnips, done crisp are supreme in edible objects. Twinkies are a pernicious evil, the the failure of the manufacturer is good, except for the employees who have lost their livelihood. Such are the contradictions of good and evil.