I don't think moral nihilism is something anyone stands by. Morality is the first necessity for the formation of society, it only makes sense in that context. An organism is in isolation in nature and there is no morality to nature. Do people use the term nihilism to describe the state of the physical world regarding meanings? Meaning is the property of life forms, or biological consciousness and never the property of the object or the physical world. The physical world only acquires meaning when the conscious subject bestows its meanings on a meaningless world.iambiguous wrote: ↑Mon Mar 25, 2024 1:02 amSame thing though. I read this and fail to grasp how "for all practical purposes" your point is relevant to my point regarding nihilism...moral nihilism pertaining to our day to day interactions with others that come into conflict over value judgments.popeye1945 wrote: ↑Sun Mar 24, 2024 2:17 amThe pertinent circumstances for you are your everyday reality, your apparent reality, which is a biological readout of how the world alters your biology to create and experience.iambiguous wrote: ↑Sun Mar 24, 2024 12:25 am
It was largely tongue in cheek. I read your post and had no idea what your point actually was in regard to the points I raised above pertaining to nihilism. That's why I always encourage posters here to focus in on a particular set of circumstances.
popeye1945 wrote: ↑Sat Mar 23, 2024 9:14 pm I just means that biology is the measure and the meaning of all things and that in the absence of a conscious subject, in this case humanity; the physical world is utterly meaningless.
Well yes, that sounds like a fair description. There is no such thing as free will, the fact that all organisms are reactive organisms unlines that reality. Organisms do not experience ultimate reality, they experience the effects of ultimate reality as it alters the state of one's biology giving it experience/meanings/knowledge.Then the argument others make that in a wholly determined universe, the human brain itself is just more matter inherently embodying the laws of nature given the only possible reality.
Again, given what context? And, sure, if all of us reacted to the same set of circumstances in exactly the same way, philosophers could then note this and suggest it reflects -- re both genes and memes -- the optimal human reaction. But we don't do we? This I ascribe existentially to dasein as encompassed in my signature threads. What do you attribute it to? [/quote]popeye1945 wrote: ↑Sun Mar 24, 2024 2:17 amThere is nothing which is not nature. All organisms are reactive organisms, there is no such thing as human actions there is but human reactions.
The larger reality the physical world and the cosmos are cause to all organisms, it is this to which they react, and their reactions in turn are cause to the physical world in incremental ways contributing to its ever-changing nature. I don't believe there is such a thing as optimal human reaction, reaction is as varied as the complexity of existence, which is beyond human comprehension.
Spinoza pointed out to us just how we come to know the physical world of objects, he said objects alter our biology giving us experience/ meanings and knowledge of the outside world. Our everyday reality, our apparent reality is a biological readout of those alterations the outside world makes to our biological being. We only know the world this way, on a subjective level, we are like an island onto itself in the way of personal experience.
Then, given "the gap" and "Rummy's Rule", we can speculate about meaning...but since we have no capacity to connect the dots between the "human condition" and the existence of existence itself, how on Earth would any of us go about pinning down whether the physical world is utterly meaningless? We can't connect them either scientifically or philosophically. And [so far] the theologists among us have produced exactly zero Gods. To the best of my current knowledge.
Okay, how was this applicable given his interactions with others in the is/ought world? Given, in turn, contexts in which what is deemed meaningful to some might be construed as gibberish [or flat-out wrong] to others. [/quote]popeye1945 wrote: ↑Sat Mar 23, 2024 9:14 pm Spinoza outlined how we come to know the world of objects, and that is by the alterations the physical world affects on our biology, this gives us experiences to which we bestow meanings, which we then attribute to the physical world in the way of projections formulating out of this apparent reality.
The world is full of objects, others are objects to us, though with fellow humans we can communicate, all inhabiting a like form as we do. To the individual experience is truth, and to the collective truth is agreement. Experience is always true to the biology experiencing it, if that biology is impaired, its experience will be true to that impairment. Biology is the measure and the meaning of all things. There is nothing in the world that has meaning in and of itself, it has meaning only in relation to biological consciousness.
When we are born into the world we have no identity, we are simply a constitution, we acquire an identity through our journey through the environment context we are born into, you've heard the term context defines yes? How we fair in this journey through context our thoughts and feelings about successes and our failures conditions our psyche which in effect is our identity. Institutions, systems, structures, and inventions are all biological extensions or expressions of our humanity and tend to reflect back upon us further conditioning our journey through our environmental context.Here I connect the dots existentially in the is/ought world. The meaning we ascribe to many things pertaining to moral and political value judgments are rooted subjectively -- intersubjectively -- in dasein and in the Benjamin Button Syndrome. Historically, culturally and in regard to our uniquely personal experiences. Then the subjunctive components embedded in our emotional and psychological reactions. In our "intuitions".
And then, if that wasn't spooky enough, there's the subconscious and the unconscious mind. There's the id and instinct and drives we can scarcely grapple with at all...logically? [/quote]
That is more or less my own frame of mind "here and now". But then, given my own assessment of this in the signature threads, it seems reasonable to sustain a "fractured and fragmented" moral philosophy given a No God world. Except for those crucial formative years as a child when we are thoroughly indoctrinated to sustain the identity of those who raised us. They brainwash us in much the same manner as they were brainwashed given the historical and cultural parameters of their time and place. But this is often done out of love. They certainly don't see themselves as having been indoctrinated, or as indoctrinating their own kids. [/quote]popeye1945 wrote: ↑Sat Mar 23, 2024 9:14 pm We are born into this world without an identity and the formation of identity is created as we react to our environmental context, context defines as the saying goes. Identity is an ever-growing thing as we move through the context of the world until death, emotional and psychological reactions are the formation of the psyche, and the psyche at any given point is your identity ever-changing.
THAT IS CONTEXT AND CONTEXT DEFINES.
Again, however, what on Earth does this mean given our reactions to all of the moral and political conflagrations that beset the species? Just follow "the news" for a spell and be confronted over and again with conflicting goods. Then the part where philosophers/ethicists either are or are not able to take into account the points we both agree on above and arrive at something in the vicinity of an objective, deontological moral philosophy.[/quote]popeye1945 wrote: ↑Sat Mar 23, 2024 9:14 pm There is no unconscious mind, there is the subconscious mind which I believe is the consciousness of the community of the body. The Id and instinct are your very constitution as vital or as weak as it might be. Identity is like clothing the constitution with the experiences of life. The subject is never fully clothed or is constantly changing costumes.
Shakespeare states, " There is no such thing as right or wrong, only thinking makes it so." Heraclitus: " Only to man is there a right and wrong, to god all things are right and good."
On the other hand, the realities embedded in the either/or world -- nature, mathematics, the empirical world around us, logic -- do seem applicable to all of us. Communication breakdowns here tend to revolve around those who are either ignorant of what is in fact true for all of us or are flat out wrong about it. Assuming of course that "somehow" we did acquire free will and that we don't inhabit a dream world or a sim world or are being shaped and molded by those sustaining one or another rendition of the Matrix.
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I have no idea what "for all practical purposes", given human interactions that come into conflict regarding value judgments, this means. Note its significance given your own relationships with others.popeye1945 wrote: ↑Sat Mar 23, 2024 9:14 pm The constitution is a unity to some degree, an island onto itself, the constitution at birth has some propensities and qualities that the environment will mold, strengthen, or inflict harm upon the constitution forming and perhaps extinguishing the given constitution and identity.
Biology may create all meaning in a wholly determined universe but given some measure of autonomy in a No God world, how could that possibly be true? If it's all about biological imperatives then how to explain the fact the human beings coming into the world with the same biology but being raised [memetically] in very different historical and cultural and experiential contexts have come to sustain all manner of conflicting moral and political philosophies?popeye1945 wrote: ↑Sat Mar 23, 2024 9:14 pm Apparent reality is a simulation, a biological simulation, reality is not what we experience, what we experience is how ultimate reality alters and affects our biology giving us experiences and meanings relative to our biology, at which time we project those meanings onto a meaningless world. Biology creates all meanings and is the measure and meaning of all things.
Not in my view. If nihilism revolves around what is deemed either meaningful or meaningless, rational or irrational, moral or immoral by individuals out in particular worlds they have come to understand in particular ways, a universe absent consciousness is just a "brute facticity". That's why Gods are invented. To have something we can connect our own meaning to. To make our meaning that which all other men and women are obligated to embrace if they wish to be thought of as rational and moral themselves.[/quote]popeye1945 wrote: ↑Sat Mar 23, 2024 9:14 pm Nihilism is the natural state of the physical world in the absence of conscious life forms, it is meaningless.
Nihilism is the absence of all meaning and that would be the physical world in the absence of biological consciousness, for again, biology is the measure and the meaning of all things Take away the physical world as object, the object being the fuel of mind, and the subject ceases to be, take away the subject and the world ceases to be, on a subjective level of course, but that is the only level in which we know anything.
On the other hand, there are facts that can be ascertained about the flower and about those like us who react to it. The either/or world is bursting at the seams with things -- relationships -- that mean the same thing to all of us.popeye1945 wrote: ↑Sat Mar 23, 2024 9:14 pm It cannot even be said to exist, for to exist is to be perceived subjectively. What is the meaning of a flower, an old Buddhist asked his students, and after a time one student indicated he knew the master's insight, the flower has no meaning, it just is, and what is, affects us one way or another, that effect upon us is experience/meaning and is never the property of the flower/object.
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The flower only has the meaning we attribute to it, it just is, and so, that is the nature of the world.