Comments

  • Ukraine Crisis
    And Russia is the only player (that I know of) that has actually done this before. Possibly more than once. But those Georgia incidents made a lot more sense at the time. With Nord Stream it's not obvious. — SophistiCat

    Russians might have been also behind explosions/sabotage attempts against the Ukrainian gas pipelines: https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2014/06/17/323011294/pipeline-explosion-in-ukraine-could-be-act-of-terrorism
    https://geostrategy.org.ua/en/media/articles/putins-streams-perpetuum-mobile-of-state-terrorism-how-girkin-and-malofeev-contributed-to-the-nord-stream-2
  • Ukraine Crisis
    Use your brains guts, people. — Tzeentch

    I corrected it for you. For people like you and many others here, the US is the right kind of supervillain whom anybody can ultimately blame for anything in this war. And there is no doubt that the US had motives, means, background history of covert operations, and the good amount of hawkishness to directly or indirectly support such operation.
    The point is that this operation didn’t “end” Nord Stream 2 (it can be repaired within months) and most of all we shouldn’t forget other players. Russia too has means, the right amount of hawkishness and a history of false flag operations to directly or indirectly support such operation. Ukraine, Poland, the UK, other nordic states have means and motives to directly or indirectly support such operation.
    Here some Russian predictions (or potential alibi?) since October 2021:
    https://en.topwar.ru/188140-vozmozhna-li-podvodnaja-diversija-na-gazoprovode-severnyj-potok-2.html
  • Ukraine Crisis
    He goes around proclaiming Putin to be a great man and Russia being "on the right side of history", etc. I don't trust such a person's judgement. If you do, good for you. — Tzeentch

    Those statements express some personal opinion that go beyond hard facts and what they might imply. Number of land troops and land movements do not falsify the Western narrative of the earliest phases of the war and grounded on the Russian intelligence failures. That's all.
  • Ukraine Crisis
    He also gave the figure of 60,000 Ukrainian defenders, which supports the hypothesis. — Tzeentch

    No it doesn't. Indeed, again Scott Ritter in that article gives similar figures: The fact of the matter remains, however, that a force of 40 000 men, no matter how aggressively employed, cannot take, and hold, a city of some three million inhabitants defended by a mix of 60 000 regular, reserve, and territorial soldiers.
    Yet he doesn't think that the number of troops or their movements of Kiev are enough evidence to automatically exclude the possibility that in the earliest phases of the war the Russians were hoping for a quick Ukrainian capitulation due to wrong belief that the Ukrainian military and population would have not resisted.
  • Ukraine Crisis
    Couldn't be further from the truth. I don't take Scott Ritter very seriously. — Tzeentch

    Then which other expert is explicitly supporting the "diversion hypothesis" as you do?

    Do you? — Tzeentch

    Scott Ritter is a controversial commentator but his article is interesting because despite his expertise ("United States Marine Corps intelligence officer, former United Nations Special Commission (UNSCOM) weapons inspector", https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scott_Ritter), having many times taken issue with the western narrative (at the point of being accused of spreading pro-Russia propaganda https://russiavsworld.org/scott-ritter-how-former-sex-offender-and-us-marine-works-for-russian-propaganda/), and being supporter of the "diversion hypothesis", yet he doesn't find outlandish the idea that there was a Russian intelligence failure about an easy capitulation by Kiev which might explain the weird behavior of the Russian military around Kiev at the beginning of the war. He didn't claim this was a piece of Western fabricated narrative (60K Ukrainian troops do not prove that either!). Yet this is not incompatible with a "diversion" strategy as a plan B.
  • Ukraine Crisis
    Assuming that's true, and I suspect that it is (and probably the reason why the order of battle remains undisclosed), this means the defense of Kiev was a successful Russian attempt at diverting forces away from the east. — Tzeentch

    Logic jump [1].

    If we are to believe Hersh's sources, it turns out the idea of the advance on Kiev being a binding operation and not an attempt at capturing and occupying Kiev - an idea that I have posited multiple times in this thread - wasn't so far-fetched after all. In fact, it might've been exactly what took place. — Tzeentch


    In other words, the western media spin was pure bullshit to influence the public perception of Ukraine's chances in this war.

    Let me end by saying, I find no pleasure in these hard facts.     — Tzeentch

    Rhetoric jump.


    [1]
    BTW Scott Ritter, a "diversion theory" supporter (I suspect it's him your first expert source), also claims:
    Moscow had opted not to employ its forces according to standard doctrine, opting instead to take a light approach, which appeared to be born from a concerted effort to minimise civilian casualties and harm to civilian infrastructure that itself was derived from a fundamental misunderstanding of the reality of the situation on the ground in Ukraine.
    The reported purging of 150 officers from the 5th Department of the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB), responsible for operations in the so-called ‘near abroad’ (which includes Ukraine), along with the
    arrest of Sergei Beseda, the former head of the department, suggests that Russia had suffered a failure of intelligence the likes of which has not been seen since the Israeli failure to predict the Egyptian crossing of the Suez Canal during the Yom Kippur War of October 1973    .
    While the Russian government has remained characteristically tight-lipped about any possible shortcomings regarding the work of the 5th Department prior to the start of the military operation, the statements by Russian leadership suggesting that the Ukrainian military might remain in its barracks and that civilian leadership would not interfere with Russia military operations suggest that these assumptions were made using intelligence provided by the 5th Department.
    That such assumptions, if indeed they were made, proved to be so fundamentally off target, when combined with the preparedness of the Ukrainian military to engage the initial columns of Russian forces, suggests that the work of the 5th Department had been disrupted by Ukrainian security services, who took control of Russian human networks and fed false reports back to the Russian leadership.
    The fact is that columns of Russian troops, advancing boldly into Ukraine without the kind of attention to route security and flank protection that would normally accompany offensive operations, found themselves cut off and annihilated by well-prepared Ukrainian ambushes. It was, to use an American colloquialism, a Turkey shoot, and the Ukrainian government made effective use of combat footage obtained from such encounters to great effect in shaping global public opinion about the effectiveness of Ukraine’s defences. However, the limitations of the Ukrainian armed forces did not allow it to turn its impressive tactical victories into positive operational and strategic outcomes.
    https://www.herald.co.zw/ukraine-winning-battle-on-twitter-on-the-ground-kiev-is-losing-fight/
  • Ukraine Crisis
    ↪neomac
    So you agree that a European security cooperation that does not involve primarily the United States and the United Kingdom would be beneficial to Europe, and it's just the practical aspects that you are worried about?     — Tzeentch

    Yes if it was feasible and sustainable. In the shitty situation we are I simply don't see how we can get there. Even less, safely (or "democratically" for that matter).
  • Ukraine Crisis
    Obviously the practical implementation of this is a whole other story. The European Union is a non-democratic abomination that needs to be replaced with something that is actually functional before this could ever happen, but lets leave that aside for now. — Tzeentch

    Yet that's practically the whole point whatever one might think of the EU. It's more easy to agree on what is desirable, than on what is feasible. Outside the EU (or some other form of federation) Europeans might go back to compete one another not only economically but also for security. And outside the US sphere of influence, we might compete not only with Russia, and China and other regional or global competitors, but also with the US. Good luck with that.
  • Bernard Gert’s answer to the question “But what makes it moral?”
    This is where I see the "no true Scotsman," 20/20 hindsight problem coming in. It's easy to say now that all sorts of prior norms were irrational. — Count Timothy von Icarus

    But I'm not denying the possibility of rationally justifying some past practice in certain circumstances, yet such possibility doesn't imply that the rational justification was what led people to adopt that practice. Many behavioral dispositions are acquired by individuals since they were children before any actual pros/cons calculation rationally justifying that behavior could take place. And also in our adult life we may show a significant degree of gregarious behavior that encourages conformity to some common pattern of behavior without there being any conscious calculation of pros/cons at the origin of that collective behavior (which is also what could explain social reluctance to change behavior as soon as circumstances rationally require it). All I'm saying is that we shouldn't confuse rationality with a posteriori rationalizations. Said that, I didn't mean to exclude that certain now morally questionable practices (like the alleged practice of infanticide in ancient Greece) were grounded on plausible reasons and widely accepted for those reasons.

    we can posit and idealized world where agents agree to follow moral principles before they enter the world, perhaps from behind some "viel of ignorance." — Count Timothy von Icarus

    I think this would be a more charitable understanding of what Gert's normative definition of morality might assume. However "idealized" Gert's assumptions are, yet they may explain why we might be inclined to consider those 10 moral rules as plausibly universally acceptable by rational individuals. Besides those practices like infanticide or human sacrifices do not necessarily question Gert's normative definition of morality, instead they simply suggest the existence of extreme social or environmental conditions that would allow individual to exceptionally but rationally derogate to default rational moral rules.
  • Bernard Gert’s answer to the question “But what makes it moral?”
    Do you mean include rules about human sacrifice and slavery? — Count Timothy von Icarus

    I was referring to Gert's 10 rules that all moral agents would follow (it looks like the first 5 should be taken to be the most evident to him): https://sites.pitt.edu/~super1/lecture/lec42951/006.htm
    Plus 5 five ideals (which however are supererogatory): https://sites.pitt.edu/~super1/lecture/lec42951/008.htm
    As I understand them, they would exclude slavery and human sacrifice at least by default, because all rational human beings would find unacceptable a moral system where human sacrifice or slavery would be permitted. I guess that this conclusion follows from assuming that rational people want to avoid harm by default (https://sites.pitt.edu/~super1/lecture/lec42951/002.htm, https://sites.pitt.edu/~super1/lecture/lec42951/003.htm) and impartiality (https://sites.pitt.edu/~super1/lecture/lec42951/007.htm). Rational people wouldn’t find acceptable a moral system that would permit anybody to enslave or sacrifice them by default. However there might be ad hoc social rules that may specify under which exceptional circumstances moral rules would need to be rationally integrated with other rules.


    If you really thought human sacrifice meant the difference between famine and a good harvest, isn't human sacrifice rational? There it is merely an information constraint that changes the nature of such a behavior.
    We might abhor slavery, but military conscription, a form of temporary bondage, is seen as essential to virtually all states.     — Count Timothy von Icarus

    Two comments:
    1. As far as I understand Gert’s normative definition of morality, only a subset of social rules can be considered rationally moral and such rules apply to the default behaviour (which doesn’t exclude exceptions). The acceptability of “human sacrifice” practices can not be dictated by rational moral rules in that sense. Maybe there are religious or pagan social rules that govern human behaviour in exceptional cases but it's not up to morality to determine such cases and their rationality remains to be established depending on the circumstances. On the other side “prostitution” as a free choice is not excluded by default by those 10 moral rules. Other religious or legal rules might however exclude it as an unacceptable behavior.
    2. As far as I’m concerned, I wouldn’t be so quick in calling some behaviour “rational” just because it may look functional to the survival of the individual or the community. I don’t know enough relevant details about human sacrifice practices but I’m not sure that human beings adopted or preserved such practices as the result of some conscious effective calculation that would make look their behaviour rational (e.g. addressing the problem of famines which may be more plausible in case the ritual increased the availability of food by reducing the demand of food within the community and/or by allowing cannibalism) and not just an evolutionary unintended consequence of some traditionalist cultural imprint.
  • Bernard Gert’s answer to the question “But what makes it moral?”
    What do you understand descriptively moral and normatively moral to refer to? — Mark S

    As I understand it, Gert's "descriptive" notion of morality tries to capture what would characterize normative systems as "moral" cross-culturally, independently from the geographic or historical latitude, in short rules/ideals protecting a group from harm is what counts as moral [1].
    Gert's “normative” notion of morality requires that these rules/ideals be acceptable by all rational agents. He identified 10 rules (and 4 ideals, if I remember correctly) that satisfy this normative constraint (they do not seem to include e.g. rules against cannibalism or prostitution but they seem to exclude rules about human sacrifice or slavery).
    Gert’s doesn’t need to talk about cooperation strategies (domination, partnership, marker) because he is not interested in classifying systems that satisfy his descriptive definition of morality. This classificatory task belongs to a lower level of analysis (which I guess would be a preliminary step to morally profile societies of different geographic and historical latitude and correlate such profiles with other social/natural factors).
    The reference to cooperative strategies is not only a further classificatory task wrt the general “descriptive” definition of morality offered by Gert, but it suggests a whole different research program, namely one that tries to connect pre-human pro-social behaviour and human morality. Indeed the cooperative behaviour is present in some “natural” form also in certain non-human animals. So morality would be an upgrade of these pro-social animal dispositions. The problem is again if this is just matter of degrees or there is something emergent in the moral dimension. In both cases one might take morality as an improvement of such pro-social animal dispositions, yet one would need to specify in what sense morality constitutes an improvement (e.g. in what sense circumcision - which animals do not have - is a marker rule that improves the benefits of cooperation?)
    Conclusion, even if I see why you might be interested in integrating Gert’s definition with a reference to cooperative strategies, I don’t think it would be an improvement, because Gert’s definition belongs to a greater level of abstraction (once again compare “rational animal” and “rational animal with genital organs“) and results from a philosophical investigation about the notion of human morality (independently from its continuity wrt animal behaviour).

    [1] notice that the notion of "moral agents" in Gert's descriptive definition of morality risks to make the definition circular.
  • Bernard Gert’s answer to the question “But what makes it moral?”
    Morality descriptively is NOT simply lessening harm as Gert’s version implies. Morality descriptively is lessening harm by increasing the benefits of cooperation. — Mark S

    Yet I didn't see how you can prove that the definition you suggest is an improvement. You are simply making claims not proving a point. For example, is it possible to have an informal public system applicable to human beings that has lessening of harms suffered by those protected by the system as its goal, but it decreases the benefits of cooperation? If it's not possible, then you definition is just redundant.
    Besides the more I think of your definition and the less I find it clear. I think cooperative behavior can be found also in animals. The partnership, dominance and marker proto-rules (or patterns of behavior) can be found also in the animal world. Am I wrong? If so and animals showing cooperative behavior are not moral agents, then cooperative behavior must be conceptually decoupled from morality. Now, if morality increases the benefits of cooperation, there must be something in "morality" that can not be reduced to those patterns of behavior constituting cooperation the increases the benefits from such patterns.
  • Ukraine Crisis
    t1Td1H4.jpeg
  • Ukraine Crisis
    Odd how that whenever it suits your narrative we should trust his word, and whenever it doesn't suit your narrative, he's lying.

    15 years of protest against NATO expansion > Not a genuine expression of worry, but a carefully crafted lie.

    Some war-time rhetoric > Not nonsense narratives meant to influence the public, but a genuine expression of his intentions.


    You have to be pretty deep down the propaganda rabbit hole not to see this.     — Tzeentch

    Do you mean "some war-time rhetoric" is the lie while "15 years of protest against NATO expansion" is expression of Putin's genuine views? And doesn't that suit your narrative too?
  • Ukraine Crisis
    Top Russian official's remark about Ukraine war draws laughter
  • Bernard Gert’s answer to the question “But what makes it moral?”
    How does Gert’s definition of what is descriptively moral based on “lessening of harms” explain, as you claim:
    (A) “slaves must obey their masters”
    (B) “working on the sabbath deserves death”
    (C) “homosexuality is evil”.

    I don’t see that it can. My "Morality As Cooperation Strategies" (MACS) definition of what is descriptively moral does explain them because it includes cooperation strategies. It explains them as marker and domination strategies, strategies for increasing the benefits of cooperation in ingroups at the expense (always for domination norms and sometimes for marker norms) of outgroups.     — Mark S

    My points are 2: one is about explanation, the other about generality.
    1. Gert's descriptive definition of morality is : What morality is: An informal public system applicable to all moral agents that has lessening of harms suffered by those protected by the system as its goal”
    As I understand it, the definition itself in this formulation doesn't specify any strong rationality requirement nor how wide is the group of the people protected by the moral system. So if A, B, C are forms of lessening the harms of a certain group that is protected by the moral system, then these are moral rules that satisfy the definition offered by Gert. In case A the group would be the masters, in case B the group would be all those who need to rest at least once a week, in case C the group could be e.g. all those (as the politicians) would benefit from a demographic growth through etherosexual mating or by limiting the transmissibility of certain sexual diseases or by limiting naturally repugnant sexual behavior (and religious beliefs might have "irrationally" strengthen this belief)
    2. Gert's descriptive definition of morality can account for all moral rules (like A, B, C) your definition can account for then your definition is redundant wrt Gert's definition, because talking about "cooperative strategies" doesn't add anything valuable to the general definition, other then alluding to something that is more specific than required by a minimal general definition (for comparison take 2 definitions of "human beings" as "rational animals" or as "rational animals with sexual organs").
  • Bernard Gert’s answer to the question “But what makes it moral?”
    Yes, “slaves must obey their masters” has too often been a cultural moral norm enforced by an ingroup to exploit an outgroup.

    The reason that "increasing the benefits of cooperation" improves Gert’s definition of what is descriptively moral is that 1) it adds explanatory power, particularly for marker norms such as “working on the sabbath deserves death” and “homosexuality is evil”, and 2) it directly follows from the ultimate source of morality - the cooperation problems that all highly cooperative societies must solve.

    Without "increasing the benefits of cooperation" you can’t say you have a definition of what is descriptively moral that explains past and present moral norms. And you can’t link cultural moral norms to their ultimate source - the cooperation problems that all highly cooperative societies must solve.     — Mark S

    These are just claims, where is the argument to support them?

    Consider:
    (A) “slaves must obey their masters”
    (B) “working on the sabbath deserves death”
    (C) “homosexuality is evil”.
    (BGD) Gert's definition: “What morality is: An informal public system applicable to all moral agents that has lessening of harms suffered by those protected by the system as its goal”
    (MSD) your definition: “An informal public system applicable to all moral agents that has increasing the benefits of cooperation and lessening of harms suffered by those protected by the system as its goal” (which looks like BGD plus "increasing the benefits of cooperation" clause)
    If A, B, C can be explained by both BGD and MSD then how is MSD more accurate than BGD and not just more redundant wrt BGD?
    To support your claims you should be able to provide an example X historically considered as moral that BGD does NOT classifies as moral while MSD classifies as moral, AND/OR an example Y historically considered as non-moral that BGD classifies as moral while MSD does NOT classify as moral.
    If you can't provide any such cases then your general definition is simply redundant, and the allusion to cooperation strategies (partnership, dominance, marker norms) belongs to a deeper level of analysis or empirical investigation (for comparison take 2 definitions of "human beings" as "rational animals" or as "rational animals with sexual organs").


    BTW can you clarify better what "marker norms" means and why it is to be distinguished from dominance and partnership norms?
  • Bernard Gert’s answer to the question “But what makes it moral?”
    He has not justified stating this as a normative (ought) claim as you (and perhaps others here) are interpreting it. — Mark S

    That said, I am frustrated by Gert’s ambiguity in his lecture about whether he means the definition to be descriptive (the only way I can make sense of it) or normative (which he has not justified). — Mark S

    To me, Gert’s definition of “morality” is descriptive. What I think Gert takes to be a normative definition of morality is the set of rules and ideals he discussed later in his lecture.


    For example, the definition includes the phrase “by those protected by the system”. Consider the moral norm: “slaves must obey their masters”. If those protected from harm by the system are only the slave masters (which was too often the historical case), then this repulsive moral norm would be included under Gert’s definition of what morality ‘is’. This makes no sense to modern sensibilities as a normative claim but is sensible as a claim about what is descriptively moral. — Mark S

    Both your descriptive definition of morality and Gert’s descriptive definition of morality can account for the fact that “slaves must obey their masters” can be taken as a moral rule. Can’t they? If so, this example doesn’t show us in what way adding "increasing the benefits of cooperation" improves Gert’s definition of morality.


    My suggested revision, “An informal public system applicable to all moral agents that has increasing the benefits of cooperation and lessening of harms suffered by those protected by the system as its goal” more accurately reflects what science tells us of morality’s function – the principal reason what we call descriptively moral behavior exists. — Mark S

    In what sense it’s more accurate about the function of morality? Talking about “cooperation” seems to me a way to suggest that there are different ways in which morality can be implemented depending on the cooperation strategy (which must be specified and be correlated to other factors, e.g. material conditions of existence, demographic dynamics, environmental conditions, technological advancement). But the most general notion of “cooperation” itself can be formulated entirely in Gert’s descriptive moral terminology. So adding it to Gert’s general definition doesn’t bring anything to it. In other words, allusions to cooperation strategies should be part of a lower level wrt Gert’s general descriptive definition of morality and a more oriented toward an empirical investigation.
  • Ukraine Crisis
    Explosions heard in western Crimea, test of civil defense alert system planned
  • Ukraine Crisis
    By the way, I can think of some that would like the US going all isolation and NATO closing up shop. Can't tell if that's what you're suggesting here; is it? — jorndoe

    If European leaders are incapable of serving European interests, NATO is a threat to European security.     — Tzeentch

    If European leaders are incapable of serving European interests, Europeans better be outside NATO. Feeling better now?
  • Bernard Gert’s answer to the question “But what makes it moral?”
    What morality is: An informal public system applicable to all moral agents that has increasing the benefits of cooperation and lessening of harms suffered by those protected by the system as its goal. — Mark S

    It's not clear in what way adding "increasing the benefits of cooperation" improves Gert’s definition of morality. Can you give concrete example to clarify that?
  • Ukraine Crisis
    post-Soviet Russian hegemonic ambitions in short:
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Primakov_doctrine
  • Ukraine Crisis
    The shared rule. — neomac

    If we shared a rule we would have agreed on the first proposition. If there were some rule (which we agree on) that can be used to demonstrate the truth of a rational argument, such that it compels me to believe "you committed fallacy X", then it could have been used in the first place to compel me to believe your original proposition. I don't see why it suddenly becomes more compelling when used to argue for a fallacy.     — Isaac

    Not sure to understand what you are saying. I could explicitly conclude “all cats are animals” from “all cats are mammals” and “all mammals are animals” according to the “Barbara” syllogistic rule. You could argue instead that I inferred that conclusion from “all cats are planets” and “all planets are animals” always according to the “Barbara” syllogistic rule. And since the premises are false, so is the conclusion.
    Your counter-argument would be a strawman, since I didn’t infer that conclusion from the premises you suggested. The strawman fallacy expresses a rule that is different from the “Barbara” syllogistic rule.
    And the shared “Barbara” syllogistic rule might compel you to believe my conclusion if it wasn’t for the fact that you failed to use the right premises either because you overlooked my actual argument by mistake or because you are intellectually dishonest. In the former case you may readily acknowledge the strawman charge, in the latter case you may still want to escape the accusation with some other sophism.


    If we can't converge on such basic level, we remain unintelligible to each other. — neomac


    Nonsense. I can vaguely understand people even talking to me in a foreign language. Most of our words are just fluff. We needn't agree on much. I determine most of my opinion about what you mean from my experience of people and assumptions about what kind of person you are and what you might likely be trying to say. You become a character in my story, playing a role I determine. You'll fit that role all the while it's not overwhelmed by evidence to the contrary because it's easier for me to predict your behaviour that way. It's just basic cognition. We're not powered by words and their meanings, we're powered by predictions, stories, expectations.     — Isaac

    Not sure to understand the contrast between “words and their meanings” and “predictions, stories, expectations”, and how this relates to what I said. As far as I’m concerned your predictions, stories and expectations should still be based on shared rules to make sense to me. It’s also ironic that you are trying to evade my conclusion about nonsensical objections by calling it “nonsense” and still expecting to make sense to me.
  • Ukraine Crisis
    And what prevents anyone from rejecting that 'showing', why are they suddenly compelled by your second judgement when they weren't by your first? — Isaac

    The shared rule. If we can't converge on such basic level, we remain unintelligible to each other.
  • Ukraine Crisis
    I should have had you pegged for a 'fallacy-o-phile.

    A couple of questions...
    Do you think those with whom you're arguing would agree that their propositions succumb to these fallacies?     — Isaac

    To the extant I and my opponent share the same argumentative rules, we must converge about how we apply them too. So if I claim he failed or my opponent rejects the charge, it must be shown through the shared argumentative rule who is right.
    For example you recently accused me of strawmanning you, but I argued that I wasn't strawmanning you: if you make a general claim X but intend to refer specifically to Y, and I don't get what you are referring to (I even told you so), so I can just argue against X, you can not accuse me of strawmanning you, because I'm still arguing against your actual claims, not something different.

    If not, to what do you then appeal when arguing that they, in fact, do? More fallacies? Fallacy fallacies? And then, when we disagree about the fallacy fallacies? Fallacy fallacy fallacies, perhaps? — Isaac

    Shared rules are necessary to work out differences intelligibly. So if we disagree on some argumentative rule application, at best we can try to work it out through more basic rules (like our conceptual framework). At worst we remain unintelligible.
    For example, as far as I've understood, you accused me of "hypocrisy" based on the idea that I'm advocating for "dispassionate" contributions, while I myself am not contributing "dispassionately". But I'm not claiming to offer dispassionate contributions nor advocating for dispassionate contributions nor implying or suggesting in favor of "dispassionate" contributions. So either that's settled and you must agree, or you must offer a compelling argument against my objection: e.g. quote where I solicited people to offer dispassionate arguments or claimed I'm offering dispassionate arguments or implied or arguably suggested in favor of "dispassionate" contributions, and see if it is compelling enough to accuse me of hypocrisy.
  • Ukraine Crisis
    What are these rules? Can you enumerate a few? — Isaac
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_fallacies
  • Ukraine Crisis
    But usually failed wars don't bolster jingoism and your willingness to use force again. Usually the result is the opposite. After the Vietnam war the US wasn't eager to fight similar wars. It needed for the Cold War to end and 9/11 attacks to happen before the US was ready to go recklessly everywhere to fight "The War on Terror". Now with Afghanistan fallen and the Taliban with their Emirate back in charge, notice the absence of anyone talking about "The War on Terror". — ssu

    Sure, that sounds plausible, at least in the short term. But even in the short term, as long as the Russian political and military elites are the same along with their powerful triggers (fighting for hegemonic survival and perception of a “declining” West), they may still try to compensate or come back against the West in other forms, increasing control over strategic areas (in the mediterranean, North Africa and Middle East), reinforcing the anti-West alliance, by fostering instability within the West, and connive with rogue American politicians (if not presidents).



    But note, this fear of the dissolution of Russian federation is actually the pillarstone for Russian imperialism. Catherine the Great said something very crucial when she said that in order to defend her country's border, she has to push them further. Russia always portrays itself to be the victim, even if it isn't always Napoleon or Hitler marching into their country. This is the way the Russians are fed the propaganda of their imperialism: the evil West is out to destroy Russia. We must fight back!!!

    Similar reasoning is evident in Communist China too: if China would let democracy work, then "the Middle kingdom" would collapse again due to separatism. Tibet and the Muslim west would go, but perhaps also the south and the north would separate.

    These fears of course forget that India, which has so many different people and ethnycities and religions, is a democracy, and isn't likely to collapse.     — ssu


    Not sure to what extent this comparison is useful. Russia and China didn’t experience established Western-like democratic institutions to effectively channel ethnic grievances. So the transition to a more democratic regime might more easily support separatist movements wherever the relation between ethnic groups is diverging or has been historically tense if not dramatic. See the case of ex-Yugoslavia.
    Even in India authoritarianism has been on the rise for a while now (https://www.journalofdemocracy.org/articles/indias-endangered-democracy/) and national unity crisis has been called out by Indian intellectuals (https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/india-facing-collapse-of-nation-crisis-amartya-sen/articleshow/92583017.cms).


    But those are hypotheticals, just like the lie that if Americans withdraw from Afghanistan and leave the country to the Taliban, it will become a haven for terrorists. Well, has it? — ssu

    There are reasons to be optimistic, I’m not questioning this. But strategic thinking has to deal with hypotheticals, and taking into account the worst scenarios given certain realistic circumstances is part of the task.


    In my view in similar line with France and Germany. — ssu

    But in their case the reason is clearer and more relatable (if you are a Western European). The benefit/cost delta of this war may be more positive for the US and the Eastern Europeans, than for the Western Europeans, at least in the short term. And in the long term there are lots of unknowns.
  • Ukraine Crisis
    I'm not the one claiming this is all about rational debate like some rules-based chess game. This is politics. It's your hypocrisy I'm pointing out. — Isaac

    I'm simply pointing out to you that your claim of dispassionate, rational, chess-grandmaster "weighing of the evidence" is preformatively contradicted by your use of pejorative rhetoric. — Isaac

    I claimed nowhere that I’m dispassionate nor that a rational debate should be dispassionate.
    Even in playing basketball or chess one can be passionate, especially if the opponent cheats or plays lazily.
    I’m not even questioning the fact that our moral/political views are motivating our engagement in such political discussions, colouring our communicative style, pressing us for certain conclusions.
    However the fun part to me is mainly to play by argumentative rules that make one’s views rationally compelling to opponents’ views. Besides since this is a philosophy forum and not a science forum, we can more easily end up discussing our conceptual frameworks, our terminology, our beliefs’ inferential or explanatory power, etc. and this in turn can help not fix the world, but fix (clarify/reorder/clean up) one self’s ideas about the world.
    Where is the hypocrisy in all this exactly?
  • Ukraine Crisis
    Where was the argument in... — Isaac

    I didn't claim that I or anybody should provide only arguments and counter-arguments.

    Because it sounds like a weak attempt at sarcasm, followed by a lame cliché about anyone not cheerleading the war being pro-Russia. — Isaac

    As lame as your attempts at calling opposing views "cheerleading the war", "bollokcs" and "bullshit". Serving you your own "sarcastic" soup.
  • Ukraine Crisis
    Your idea of pariahship is having people engage with you in page-long discussions? :chin:

    I'm sorry the forum isn't your personal echo chamber, I guess.     — Tzeentch

    I don't see the relation of your comment with what I wrote which was about taking position and its costs.
    Besides if I'm engaging with other people who think differently from me, how am I in an echo chamber?
    That's a philosophy forum, so I guess if people provide arguments and question each other's arguments with arguments, it should be welcomed. If you do not feel like playing this game with me, don't do it. No hard feelings.
  • Ukraine Crisis
    You're presented with two theories, which you otherwise can't tell between A and B. Those advocating for A stand to gain several hundred billion dollars from the pursuit of policies according to A, those advocating B stand to gain nothing but pariah-ship and contempt for advocating it, yet do so anyway. — Isaac

    A horrible and bloody internet "pariah-ship and contempt" is what the majority of anonymous users of this thread have to suffer from the minority of other anonymous users for advocating B and calling "bollocks" and "bullshit" thinking otherwise. But they are doing it for a good cause, the Ukrainians' well being, which they know much better than the Ukrainians themselves. And that's no virtue signaling by no means. From Russia, with love.
  • Ukraine Crisis
    ↪ssu



    A humiliating defeat might not be enough to get rid of Russian hegemonic ambitions once for all. It may set also the grounds for the next imperialist surge. Unless it brings to the dissolution of the Russian federation. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hypothetical_dissolution_of_Russia
    But this may bring other problems to the West: the fate of the Russian federation’s nuclear stockpile, China hegemonic expansion in post-Russia federation states.
    The American leadership and engagement in this war is indispensable to force Russia to back down yet the Americans, despite the rhetoric, can’t be fully trusted by the allies. Not with Biden, way less with presidents like Trump (and next elections are getting closer). If Vietnam, Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria definitely compromised the American reputation more in the Rest, Trump definitely compromised the American reputation more within the West. And the American contribution in the war in Ukraine looks suspiciously too slow-paced and replete with mixed-signals. For the Europeans the future looks pretty grim, especially if they are not pro-active and coordinated in building their own foreign politics (like a “new deal“ with Africa? and South America?), and more autonomous in shaping their military security.
  • Ukraine Crisis
    The loss of their “empire” after the collapse of Soviet Union principally due to NATO expansion and the need to recover their hegemonic status overshadowed by the Americans. — neomac


    ...is hypothetical.

    offensive means to threat Western security — neomac


    ...the actual use of which is hypothetical.

    Russian hegemonic ambitions. — neomac


    ...which are hypothetical.

    promoted/pursued an anti-West alliance with other authoritarian states (like China and Iran) with hegemonic ambitions. — neomac


    ...hypothetical ambitions.     — Isaac


    So you practically ignored all other facts to focus on “hegemonic ambitions” which in the case of Russia, China, and Iran you claim to be “hypothetical”. Let’s first clarify terminology. How do you understand the notion of “hegemonic”? And what constitute evidence of “hegemonic ambitions” to you?

    Russia’s military activity beyond its borders up until now shows an actual non-hypothetical pattern of “Western containment” — neomac

    ...not even going to dignify this bullshit with a response.     — Isaac

    Unless this kind of answers is the best you can afford.

    There's no debate at all about the threat Russia poses to Ukraine. That's the difference. — Isaac

    There is debate also about the threat Russia poses to Ukraine. You can hear it when discussing about peace. Different peace scenarios and conditions are also influenced by a different understanding of the threat Russia poses to Ukraine.
  • Ukraine Crisis
    Russia's threat to 'the West' is entirely hypothetical — Isaac

    There is absolutely nothing hypothetical about Russia's threat to 'the West'.
    • Russia has actual non-hypothetical motives to be hostile against the West. The loss of their “empire” after the collapse of Soviet Union principally due to NATO expansion and the need to recover their hegemonic status overshadowed by the Americans.
    • Russia has actual non-hypothetical offensive means to threat Western security (3rd country by military capability, largest stockpile of nuclear warheads in the world, cyberwar capabilities through hackers and disinformation agencies), and ways to heavily interfere in Western political life, through lobby and a network of far-right movements.
    • Russia has plenty of actual non-hypothetical pretexts and leverage to conduct anti-Western activities in the West: Russian minorities in neighbouring countries, rebellious countries like Serbia and Hungary , political ties and support from within the West (Trump being the most clear example encouraging Russian adventurism), and economic bonds that up until now induced complacency toward Russian hegemonic ambitions.
    • Russia has actually non-hypothetically made plenty of hostile declarations against the West since 2008 and has promoted/pursued an anti-West alliance with other authoritarian states (like China and Iran) with hegemonic ambitions.
    • Russia’s military activity beyond its borders up until now shows an actual non-hypothetical pattern of “Western containment”: by encircling Europe with its military activity in the mediterranean, North Africa, Middle East and the Baltics. And now by meddling in Western backyard with a genocidal war: Ukraine wants to join the West and is also plenty of natural resources the West may integrate in its economy (wheat and gas among others). And during this war Russia also dared to threaten the West with a nuclear escalation.
    So no, there is absolutely nothing hypothetical about Russia's threat to 'the West'.
  • Ukraine Crisis
    Acting as if something is safe, when it isn't, just because it ought to be, is reckless. It's not complicated. — Isaac

    It's not complicated. As this one: acting as if Russia is not a threat to the West, when it is, just because the West ought to be peaceful, is reckless too.
  • Ukraine Crisis
    Ukraine ought to be able to enjoy its sovereignty without being threatened by powerful neighbours. Pretending that's how the world is when it blatantly isn't is reckless. — Isaac

    Unless you are confusing "ought" claims with "is" claims, aren't you?
  • Bernard Gert’s answer to the question “But what makes it moral?”
    I think that the notion of "morality" is at the crossroad of different considerations pointing in different directions. So it's very possible that any definition may leave something out. For example, the problem of Gert's definition is that it leaves us wondering what the notion of "rational people" and the "specified conditions" may mean or be determined without begging the question or being too large (traffic rules maybe a rule of conduct that satisfies the definition without being moral) or too strict (in certain societies homosexuality is considered immoral).

    In this situation we better maximise our understanding of moral behaviour by analogy/contrast between moral conduct/norms and non-moral conduct/norms. Here I can draft the main points:
    • - Moral norms apply timelessly, spacelessly, and universally: they apply to individuals at any time, and do not change. That is different from ludic or professional norms that can apply to us at a given time (e.g. when we play when we sign a work contract). They also differ from law: legal norms can be changed over time (like in a democracy and they do it also for moral reasons) and space (different countries have different laws), but moral norms do not change. If homosexuality or killing innocent people is immoral, there was no prior time (or different place) in which homosexuality or killing innocent people was moral and a later time (or different place) where both turned out to be moral. We shouldn’t confuse moral norms with their popularity. Popularity can certainly change over time, space and individuals.
    • - Moral norms can always overrule non-moral norms in both conduct and ethic assessment: concerning the conduct, let’s say that there is a law legitimising prostitution or weed selling, whoever considers that law immoral may protest against it or not act the way those laws allow. So the way one feels or decides to act wrt the law is overruled by moral norms. That doesn’t mean that moral norms can’t be occasionally and narrowly suspended: e.g. in box people are allowed to physically hurt each other, or in a movie people are allowed to lie, in art naked adult sculptures are not considered obscene, etc. At the end of the day, people’s life is ultimately assessed wrt moral conduct. Namely one life is more valuable if it is compliant to moral norms more than it is to legal or fashion norms or artistic norms.
    • - Moral norms are self-promoting at social level and psychological level: it’s not just that individuals should follow moral norms (like do not kill, do not steal, do not lie) but they should also care if other individuals follow them (e.g through praise and blame). Moral norms have an intrinsic social dimension (like laws). We can think of a code of conduct for specific individuals e.g. a king’s code of conduct, or private in its genesis (e.g. the son promises his father to continue his business after he retires). But they are qualifiable as moral only to the extant they should become object of social pressure (praise and sanction). Moral norms should also be internalised in both conduct and emotion as pre-reflexive habits accompanied by specific feelings e.g. outrage, dignity and guilt. While economic and legal conducts are more dependent on cost/benefit calculi, can be more emotionally neutral and evolve over time.
  • Vogel's paradox of knowledge
    Al doesn't know that p and that he doesn't know that not-p. — Ludwig V

    This might be true from a third person perspective. Not from a first person perspective. If a person makes a knowledge claims and then she herself discovers that what she believed is false, the discovery of her belief's falsity itself would support another first-person knowledge claim.
    That's different from the knowledge claim where the justification is to be questioned. Imagine I claim: I know that Erik the Red used to wear horned helmets because Erik the Red is a Viking and Vikings used to wear horned helmets. But then I discover that archeologists have widely called as a myth the belief that Vikings used to wear horned helmets. Then I might say: I didn't know (not "I don't know"!) that Erik the Red used to wear horned helmets, or I doubt that Erik the Red used to wear horned helmets.
  • Vogel's paradox of knowledge
    Something reliable can fail once or twice and still be classed as reliable. But if something certain turns out wrong, it is no longer certain. — Ludwig V

    I get your point. Still it depends on what we are certain about. We can also be certain that something is reliable. So if that something turns out to be wrong that doesn't mean it's unreliable, or no longer certain.


    I prefer "defeasible" because "fallible knowledge" can be taken to mean that If I claim to know something on good grounds but it still turns out false, it is nonetheless knowledge. So I'm anxious to insist that knowledge doesn't fail - people do. So a claim to knowledge that p must be withdrawn if p turns out to be false. — Ludwig V

    I substantially agree but what I find more interesting to notice is the following: while the falsity of p implies that "I know that p" is false, the epistemic "withdrawal" from a belief that "turns out" to be false (as opposed to "unjustified") might correspond to different epistemic conditions: e.g. "I don't know that p", "I know that non-p", "I believe that non-p", "I don't believe that p", or "I doubt that p". Yet only "I know that non-p" would make sense to say to me in that case. In other words, knowledge claims defeated out of falsify are not just "withdrawn" but "replaced" by other knowledge claims.
  • Ukraine Crisis
    Scott Ritter on prior to the Russian invasion (in December 2021): Russia won't invade Ukraine, it's a manufactured crisis (by the West) and if there would be war between Russia and Ukraine, Russia would defeat Ukraine in 6 to 7 days (If Ukraine made an attack in the Donbas). And so on... — ssu

    what a guy:
    On April 6, 2022, Ritter was suspended from Twitter for violating its rule on "harassment and abuse" after he posted a tweet claiming that the National Police of Ukraine is responsible for the Bucha massacre https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scott_Ritter
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