Evil can be chased away only with incense and torture but issue is that evil today has run out of control not by amount of evil but rather by count of people tolerating evil. — SpaceDweller

The alternative, mon ami, is worse: Should the good retaliate (tit-for-tat)? That would be moral suicide, oui? Evil only understands evil, eh?

As fire drives out fire... — Brutus

The spray? — Hillary

Something like that! I however can't figure out how Jesus was a pest? It's relative then. Good folks can get in the way of a perfectly laid out plan. :chin:

Exactamundo! Try getting hillary to appreciate all that science has done for him :roll:
He is an ungrateful little tyke of a polytheist! :rofl: — universeness

:snicker: We've made so much progress! :grin:

No. — Banno

Why?

How would you round off 0.0001?

No. Infinitesimals are "explicitly not zero". — Banno

Ok, but they could be described as zeroish. That's the point, oui monsieur?

I like this (a lot). So look here, infinitesimals are zeroish, but not zero! You're geniusish but no, you're not a genius! It's a cheat code in the game! You fool the system with ishyness. :snicker:

thanks to Science — universeness

:up: Quick & Painless Morte!

:snicker:

Wolf in sheep's clothing!

But the question is does it exist as a 'force of evil,' outwith the human condition or/and outside of the sentient experiences of any lifeform? — universeness

In my humble opinion, evil is just biological (pest) control. :snicker:

brother Agent! — Hillary

:snicker:

Here's what I think:

Evil, there seems little doubt that it's real/it exists; I've deliberately ignored the possibility that it has to be an illusion (omnibenevolent God, karmic debt, justice).

Let's proceed...

Contextualize evil in an end-means framework/setting.

1. Evil as an end is, in my humble opinion, true evil. To enjoy/draw satisfaction from the suffering/death of others (sadism). Rarest of the rare and so less of a problem.

2. Evil as a means. Sic vita est. A saving grace, a redeeming quality, ought implies can. We really need to work on this, with a vengeance I might add. We should be able to figure out how we can make both the ends and the means good. Anyone who discovers this secret of morality deserves not one, not two, but an $\infty$ of Nobel Prizes.

:snicker:

Cite a single unique, repeatable, prediction "ID" makes. — 180 Proof

Great question! As always, you have grokked the heart of the issue.

If it looks like a duck, swims like a duck, and quacks like duck, it must be...a duck!

Gracias for letting me know about the position that Russell's paradox isn't as damaging to math as iniitially believed. Didn't know that. It's a moving target I suppose. What's Dana Scott's argument? Do you know?



I like what you said there.

I can't add more black to black and hope to get white!

As for your attempt to show Zeno's paradoxes are self-referential negations, I'm sorry I don't follow. Let's keep it simple, use one of Zeno's many paradoxes (your choice) and demonstratehow it is self-referential negations. Danke!

I don't see why you should object to what is the official position on Russell's paradox. Russell's set (of all sets that don't contain itself), in colloquial language, breaks math; to be precise, it, via ex falso quodlibet, means every mathematical statement is true. In my world math is broken when that (trivialization of math) happens; it happens because the set theory based axioms of mathematics allows Russell's set to, well, exist; what happens next is common knowledge.

No, it doesn't. 2+2 still makes 4, regardless of Russell. — Banno

:snicker: 2 + 2 = 5 or chimpanzee too if Russell's set is allowed in math based on set theory. I recall reading how Russell attempted damage control by, in a sense, making his set of all sets that don't contain itself illegal in a manner of speaking.

What sayest thou, kind sir?

Right, so any worker happy with their work is unalienated? — schopenhauer1

Most interesting. — Ms. Marple

The subjective nature of happiness doesn't allow us to use it as a reliable metric of (true) well-being. Nevertheless, given the principle of uniformity of nature, sensu amplo, a happiness index approximates alienation among workers.

So, I would recommend :smile: and :sad: as only a rough guide to worker well-being. The truth may need to be calculated from info on income, working hours, price of commodities and basic amenities, and so on, oui?

Well, paradoxes break math (Bertrand Russell and his set of all sets that don't contain itself) for the reason, I was told, that ex falso quodlibet renders such mathematical systems trivial (all well-formed formulae are true). :grin:

Why I said what I said was because the LNC (the law of noncontradiction) is an axiom (vide the 3 laws of logic); paradoxes, if real, imply that the LNC can no longer be an axiom, it has to go. That's what I meant.

On the larger point...

If true paradoxes exist (re heterological paradox), we're either

1. Using paraconsistent logic, a version of it

or

2. We're ignoring them but not in a systematic manner (picture a bomb disposal unit at work)

Bear with me...this is mainly guesswork.

A few points:

1. I haven't the foggiest why classical logic with its principle of bivalence (PB: true/false, nothing else) and the law of noncontradiction [LNC: [~(p & ~pl)] became the standard in Greek and then in Western philosophy.

Even to someone who's never been exposed to formal logic, contradictions feel very counterintuitive and are rejected outright (cognitive dissonance & double think are rather unpleasant states to be in). In other words, the LNC seems hardwired into our brains.

The PB, however, wasn't like that. Aristotle himself, if memory serves, was of the opinion that statements about the future were neither true nor false i.e. a third truth-value was in the process of being proposed viz. unknown (trivalent logic).

Does the above matter to your EnFormAction thesis? My hunch is it does and you're in the know about that. If one violates the LNC, a 3^rd truth value (the excluded middle is this 3^rd value; vide the law of the excluded middle, LEM) must exist. It gets complicated after this and I have very little experience with fuzzy logic or multivalent logic; I'll leave it at that before I begin spewing nonsense. :snicker:

2. All these different kinds of logic that have been put forth gives me the impression that philosophy & logic, all thinking in fact is, well, play/game. We can, it seems, tinker around with the rules, but not in any which we way we please; we have to ensure the system of logic we invent/develop doesn't reduce to a triviality which has been defined as a schema in which all statements are true (Greek philosophers seem to consider the sophists their nemesis, re relativism).

That's how my brain makes sense of this issue.

Comments...

Finally, the voice of rational, cool reason, offering clear insight. :cool: — Hillary

:blush:

Temet nosce (know thyself). — Orcale of Delphi

Not easy, not easy at all.

The subject-object dichotomy is what the Oracle is referring to. We (our minds) seem more outward-directed (other-aware) than inward-directed (self-aware). We appear to have got the hang of the external world - we know how to make nature reveal her secrets to us that is - but of the internal world (our minds), we know very little, and we've only just begun to get a handle on the basics and that's being charitable.

In a sense, if a psychiatrist took a look at the human race as a whole, we're kinda insane (we lack insight into our own condition). The Orcale of Delphi & Socrates were alerting us to the possibility that we could be cuckoo!

The unexamined life is not worth living. — Socrates

Let's be systematic and keep it as simple as possible. Given that conflict is bottom line aggravated disagreement, we must find something the whole world agrees on: The sky is blue...on sunny days (we gotta be careful now). Let's start from there shall we? :snicker:

So where the bloody hell are you? — Banno

In a better place ( :death: ) :snicker:

:up:

Alienated worker: :sad:

Unalienated worker: :smile:

:smile:

not all spasms are retardation if you implied.

Spasms are real brainy things. — Varde

:snicker: It makes sense to you don't it?!

I am a musician, and I speak to myself all the time. Hilary thinks that means I'm mad. I'm also a composer. How do you think an artist could create a piece of music if they didn't have it in their mind? Do you think it's a matter of trial and error? Or do you think composers simply use mathematical formulas to put the music on paper, then try it out on the instrument? — Metaphysician Undercover

So, that's what's going on!

These Romans Musicians are crazy. — Obelix

:snicker: You maniacs!

:smile:

Between Scylla and Charybdis. Right! My, my what a pleasant day it is.

spasm — Varde

You're all out of ideas, huh? :snicker:

But why blame Djokovic for this? — baker

No free will, eh? :snicker:

You mistake me for someone who might care. — Banno

:snicker: Djokivic is in Bulgaria and you're in Terra Australis. He can't do anything to you, neither can you to him.

WE CANNOT allow technological advancement and technological applications to be left to the whims and machinations of creatures such as Elon Musk. — universeness

What if the other option is Donald Trump? :snicker:

There's nothing American or German about governance/politics. All we have to remember is that when we make a choice, it's not the best of the best but the best of the worst (least worst).

An unalienated worker gets his/her fair share of the spoils i.e. s/he isn't exploited (his/her work = $10 and his/her pay < $10).

:snicker:

Methinks values start off as personal, some justified and others not. These then are put out there in the public domain for vetting. Two things can happen: Either justifications are sought and they're found and accepted by society OR people find others like-minded, justification is either a mere formality or simply ignored. That's how societal values come into existence and then are enforced. It's a majority wins deal, those who oppose such group values must do so surreptitiously or not at all, follow the herd as it were.

Values, like memes, tend to form mutually-reinforcing value-complexes; the component values are compatible and synergistic.

Yes, I think all truths are conditional. — Jackson

In objectivity, because of dissimilar axioms.

In subjectivity, because of dissimilar biases.

:up:

You mean, you didn't read what I reported Penfield to have said? — Wayfarer

:blush: I'll get to it. Au revoir.

Well, I understand your views. Sometimes symptomss can be severely discomfiting if you catch my drift, especially if it's pain. Isn't the history of humanity a struggle against Algos and Thanatos (Algos is more terrible of the two. Vide suicide and euthanasia).

However, my worry is this: Nazism hasn't died with Hitler. If he were the disease, we should've been cured of the illness, oui? I'm not a fortune teller but it seems possible that another Hitler is just around the corner in Europe or America.

IIRC, Tertullian is the first Church Father to single-out epicureanism (as representative of "Greek wisdom") as heresy which was foundational in early apologetics and later Christian theology. Leibniz, a devoutly theological and philosophically astute Christian, develops his panglossian modal theodicy deliberately ignoring heresies (such pagan philosophies e.g. atomism / epicureanism) whenever and as much as possible. — 180 Proof

Arigato 180 Proof.

I was on this other thread, it's on Trump. I mentioned that physicians, while they do treat symptoms (fever, aches & pains, nausea & emesis, so on), their main objective remains treating the disease. On this view, I feel we should consider social problems such as racisim, discriminatiom of any kind, injustice, crimes, psychiatric issues, etc. not as diseases but as symptoms whose aetiology (cause) we have to zero in on and, like a good doctor, manage/medicate.

Intriguingly then Hitler or people who've been compared to him aren't the real problem - they're actually symptoms, not diseases we haven't as yet diagnosed. So long as this remains true, Hitlers and Herods and Ted Bundys will continue to spawn.

There's more but I'll leave it at that.

You mean to say we can self-experiment on our brains but only if you have some assistants (a neurosurgeon would be a must have). I could then instruct the neurosurgeon to display my brain on a screen and instruct/guide him/her to do things to my brain and experience and record the effects. Doesn't that mean we can gain insight into the subjective/first-person aspects of conscious using science? :confused: