An existential ethics

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Age
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Re: An existential ethics

Post by Age »

promethean75 wrote: Fri Dec 24, 2021 3:46 am "What are you 'trolling' for, EXACTLY?"

Fantastic people.
What does "fantastic people" even mean or refer to, EXACTLY?
promethean75 wrote: Fri Dec 24, 2021 3:46 am What CAN YOU do that's FANTASTIC... other than your USE of THE caps-lock?
But I am NOT using caps lock here. WHY do 'you', people, ASSUME so MANY Wrong things?

My answer to your CLARIFYING question will all depend on what you mean by 'fantastic'.
promethean75
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Re: An existential ethics

Post by promethean75 »

"Yeah, but your "above reasons" are based on you mistakenly conflating the limitations implicit in the workings of physical matter with that of the infinite possibilities inherent in the workings of mind and consciousness."

See you're talking about 'mind' and 'consciousness' as if they were things that we possess, rather than as descriptions of meaningful behaviors (remember W's 'beetle inna box' experiment). We'll let Hacker explain what you've got going on here...

https://youtu.be/0yv_k5uMCpU

Jesus its an hour long dude. Might have to spread it out a little. Just hang in there, bro, and have a spot of tea while you watch.

p.s. you have no idea what havoc this seemingly innocuous philosophical mistake has caused in the world. It sits at the very core of the bourgeois machinations that have not only alienated everybody on erf from one another, but also damn near brought civilization to existential ruin. This is why er'body hates each other. We all think we're trapped in our own heads and pitted against everybody else. The 'self' as secret agent, battling the nefarious forces of the 'other'! Watch out!
seeds
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Re: An existential ethics

Post by seeds »

seeds wrote: Thu Dec 23, 2021 10:37 pm Yeah, but your "above reasons" are based on you mistakenly conflating the limitations implicit in the workings of physical matter with that of the infinite possibilities inherent in the workings of mind and consciousness.
promethean75 wrote: Mon Dec 27, 2021 3:42 pm See you're talking about 'mind' and 'consciousness' as if they were things that we possess, rather than as descriptions of meaningful behaviors...
Yes, that's true. However, when I speak of the "mind," I am talking about what I suggest is a living "arena" in which our thoughts and dreams are created and suspended.

For example, close your eyes and create the image of a basketball before the "eye" of your mind and then shuffle it over to the left-hand side of your inner field of vision.

Next, create the image of a golf ball and shuffle that over to the right-hand side of your inner field of vision so that there is a good deal of space in between the two.

And just for kickers, cause the golf ball to orbit around the basketball like the moon orbits the earth.

(I suggest that you try to imagine the objects as possessing a level of clarity and realism as the objects you experience while dreaming.)

The point is that the inner "spatial arena" in which those two holographic-like objects are suspended and orbiting each other is a part of the extended essence of your own personal being. And it is that extended essence that makes-up what I am calling the "mind."

And just to address a couple of points in the video you linked to, one of Peter Hacker's fictional characters stated the following bits...
...the question I think is what a human being is? I mean we speak of having a mind and having a body. It seems as if the entity that has the mind and has the body is the "I," but what exactly is this "I"?
The "I" is the self-aware entity (the inner mental "agent") that willfully created the basketball and the golf ball in my earlier suggestion as to what the mind is.

And what that means is that you are carrying around - right within your own skull - a perfect representation of substance dualism. And that's because the creator of the basketball and the golf ball does not seem to be made of the same malleable substance from which those two objects are formed.
...Is it a self?
Yes, the "I" is the self.

In fact, the "I" and the "self" and the "soul" are all synonyms for the same thing.
And what's a human being? Is it a self-attached to a mind and body?
As pointed out earlier, the mind is the self's extended essence that forms the inner spatial arena in which the self's thoughts and dreams are created and suspended.

Whereas, on the other hand, the body and, especially, the brain represent the physiological means by which the self (aka, the "I"/"soul") is awakened into existence.
Or is the self the mind?
No, the self is not the mind, it is the owner of the mind. The self is that which sits at the throne of consciousness within the mind's arena.
But if the self is the mind, how can we speak of it having a mind?
Again, the self is not the mind. Therefore, it is perfectly reasonable to think of the self as having a mind.
I'm afraid we are confused.
Yes they are, but not quite as confused as the self-declared forum "troll" who recommended the video, and who claims that he would rather be fishing than debating such things. :D

What's the deal, dude?

Is this how you troll people? You goad them into responding to something and then blow them off by insisting that you just don't have the patience to do these types of exhausting arguments over and over again?

(Btw, it would help if you used the site's quote system. It notifies us when someone posts a reply to our own posts.)
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promethean75
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Re: An existential ethics

Post by promethean75 »

I have a question. If the capacity to recollect and imagine an image of something once experienced (basketballs and golf balls), 'in the mind', constitutes the proof or even the essence of the mind's existence, what becomes of the proof if the same is said about someone without sight?

It sounds to me like you are basing the proof for an independent existence of the mind, on some capacity to remember things actually experienced. So, does the mind not yet exist until there is experience, and the capacity that follows, to recollect it... to remember it?

If so, this would mean mind exists in degrees, according to and determined by the content of experience, e.g., a person with five senses has more mind than a person with four... a person with four, more than a person with three, and so forth.

Pray tell, sir, how this can be.
promethean75
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Re: An existential ethics

Post by promethean75 »

"In fact, the "I" and the "self" and the "soul" are all synonyms for the same thing."

So the body possesses the mind as it might possess a foot, or a head of blonde hair, or a weight of 146 pounds?

I find this rather strange because it quite confuses my understanding of what it means for things to have properties. Moreover, if I were mistaken about what I thought was the nature of such possessions - he has a size ten foot - I would be able to confirm or disconfirm this theory by observing the foot... but how would I know I was mistaken about the nature of someone's mind?

Perhaps we can solve this non-problem (which is linguistic and not conceptual) by identifying the existence of mind with/by particular behaviors and dispositions, such that we observe people acting mindfully (or not) rather than being in possession of a mind, which we could be quite mistaken about and not even know it. Consider the p-zombie argument.

These are only epistemological problems so far. There is also a strong basis for denying the existence of a causally and substantially independent ontological substance such as 'mind', as Descartes proposed.
seeds
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Re: An existential ethics

Post by seeds »

promethean75 wrote: Tue Dec 28, 2021 6:20 am It sounds to me like you are basing the proof for an independent existence of the mind, on some capacity to remember things actually experienced. So, does the mind not yet exist until there is experience, and the capacity that follows, to recollect it... to remember it?
Metaphorically speaking, does the RAM capacity of a computer "not exist" until it receives input?
promethean75 wrote: Tue Dec 28, 2021 6:20 am If so, this would mean mind exists in degrees, according to and determined by the content of experience, e.g., a person with five senses has more mind than a person with four... a person with four, more than a person with three, and so forth.

Pray tell, sir, how this can be.
Explain to me how a human mind (or, more specifically, how the mind's inner "agent") could be missing one of its senses?

(Note: Be careful not to confuse the existence of a sense with that of its corresponding "window" to the outer world.)
seeds wrote: Tue Dec 28, 2021 2:31 am "In fact, the "I" and the "self" and the "soul" are all synonyms for the same thing."
promethean75 wrote: Tue Dec 28, 2021 6:20 am So the body possesses the mind as it might possess a foot, or a head of blonde hair, or a weight of 146 pounds?
No.

The body momentarily possesses (holds/encapsulates) the mind and its agent in the same way that the human placenta momentarily holds and encapsulates a human fetus...

Image

In which case, "...a foot, or a head of blonde hair, or a weight of 146 pounds..." would simply be the physiological attributes of that no longer needed glob of tissue...

Image

...that gets discarded after expelling (delivering) its contents.
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promethean75
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Re: An existential ethics

Post by promethean75 »

Seeds imma have to bail, bro. You're too far gone and I don't think I can help you.

Good luck, and godspeed!
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henry quirk
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Re: An existential ethics

Post by henry quirk »

So the body possesses the mind as it might possess a foot, or a head of blonde hair, or a weight of 146 pounds?

No, the mind possesses the body. The body is possessed by the mind. The mind is not an extension of, or function of, the body. Man is a composite of two very different things melded or mixed together (the body which without mind is robotic meat; the mind which without the body has no purchase in the material world).

Spirit and substance: soul and flesh; information and matter.
promethean75
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Re: An existential ethics

Post by promethean75 »

No Henry no. 'mind' is an attribute of substance, and the extended body is all that 'mind' can have knowledge of (through affections; effects acting on the body). We have a monistic parallelism here, not a platonic/Cartesian substance dualism. These modes - mind and body - are not causally independent.

If you have 'soul', it's because you're super bad, not because some second, immaterial substance is interacting with your body.
Last edited by promethean75 on Wed Dec 29, 2021 8:04 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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henry quirk
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Re: An existential ethics

Post by henry quirk »

'mind' is an attribute of substance

yeah, I used to believe and say the same thing: now, I know better
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Sculptor
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Re: An existential ethics

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Gary Childress wrote: Tue Nov 23, 2021 7:02 pm I exist and there is no manual for how to exist. I just have to feel my way through it. When I do something bad, I feel bad. When I do something good, I feel good. I learn to do good by avoiding bad feelings. However, I can also become angry and allow bad feelings to persist or grow. It's very easy to act on anger sometimes and very difficult to subdue it or sublimate it. I want to feel good and so I try to do good. That's all I know.
But you can know so much more.
Maybe you would benefit from acknowledging that you were born into a specific culture with a set of norms. From then on you have the ability to assess each endemic assumption you hold and maybe challenge it.
Travel, living and working outside your culture, learning a different language; studying history and anthropology can help you understand your assumptions in much wider contexts.
You should always be asking what, when, why, how good, how bad, what are the consequences of your culture on the rest of the world, on your self and on your own country.
There is much more to ethical thinking that this balance between goodness and badness you describe which seems to be based on some sort of hedonistic assumption.
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Re: An existential ethics

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Gary Childress wrote: Sun Nov 28, 2021 4:59 pm
I don't know. I guess that's the biggest question that exists in the realm of ethics. How do sinners navigate a world without atoning for all of our sins? I mean, sin (such as breaking most of the 10 Commandments) is so deeply rooted in my being that I don't know how to atone for it.
The 10 commandments are shite.
If you had ten rules for living the good life what would they look like?

The first four are completely wasted on the church and god.
Six, eight and nine could be shortened to say obey the law of the land.
That leaves 3. Which parents might like, even the bad ones. And adultery and covetting.

I'd want to mention child protection and equal rights regardless of colour, creed and gender.
The decalougue is a complete failure of ethics.
promethean75
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Re: An existential ethics

Post by promethean75 »

Especially the first commandment. God got totally beat on that one. Check it out. Regarding capital punishment, you can't blame the jury or the judge because they don't actually kill anyone. You can't blame the state or it's laws because these are abstractions, not blamable people. And finally, you can't blame the executioner if he's not sure the switch he pulled did the deed.

What a dumbass. God, I mean. He really needs to revise that commandment in lieu of recent developments (like add a subsection to the statute). Prolly be another 'no show', tho. Can't count on the dude for nuthin.
Jori
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Re: An existential ethics

Post by Jori »

I think good and bad has nothing to do with feelings and consequences. An act is good or bad in its own sake, regardless of how you feel about it and its consequences. For example, you returned money that you found. Although you feel about it and get verbally abused and left by your wife who wants to buy a new pair of expensive shoes, it's still a good act.
popeye1945
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Re: An existential ethics

Post by popeye1945 »

Ethics is just catagorical morality is it not, the guide to behaving civilly, morally, ethically in given situations. That is my take on it, if it is out in left field I stand to be corrected. One should remember I think that morality in all its shades is mutually exclusive to autonomy, thus a societal construct. It is an educational medium for civilizing the generations.
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