I like your philosophy.

The right to pursue happiness should be replaced, for the time being, with The right to flee suffering. In short aponia.

you suffer — L'éléphant

On target! I do (for no apparent reason)! :sad:

Personally I don't think it much matters. — Tom Storm

The parable of the arrow

Gracias señor!

debilitating — ZzzoneiroCosm

pathological anxiety. — ZzzoneiroCosm

Documented and confirmed!

A vicious cycle: Anxiety leads to irrationality and irrationality leads to anxiety. From a Darwnian point of view, I don't quite understand this destructive positive feedback loop? What is its final cause (telos)? :chin:

I'm not Hindu, but the idea of listing one's hierarchiy of priorities is an interesting one.

Truth and justice seem like they should make the list, but not beauty unless that is taken to mean all worldly pleasures.

At any rate, my top priority is my family, truth and justice be dammed. — Hanover

My response would be that the transcendentalia are going to be beneficial for your family.

Perhaps I/we commit what I call the omniscience fallacy which is basically arguing from the false assumption that we know everything there is to know about a certain topic and drawing a possibly erroneous conclusion from actually incomplete information. Hillary mentions ugly truths as a counterexample to the transcendentalia; however, that maybe more a symptom of our ignorance than a truth about the world. That said, I haven't the foggiest how genocide, cold-blooded murder, rape, etc. can be labeled aesthetic. :confused:

You're shallow and you suffer from lack of something in you. This is the true meaning of your desire for physical appearance. I've dated super good looking individuals, and appearance-challenged individuals. I'm speaking from experience. — L'éléphant

To appreciate beauty, a quality listed among transcendentalia, is, I think, decidely not shallow! Even the Hindus, as outlined in the OP, made a big deal of sundaram. There's an entire branch of philosophy - aesthetics - devoted to the topic.

Put down that old dog-earred "Nietzsche for Dummies" and go read Freddy's works. ↪180 Proof — 180 Proof

:ok: Clark Kent (Superman) didn't own slaves!

:point:

aponia — 180 Proof

I agree wholeheartedly that hedonism (pursuit of happiness & avoidance of suffering) isn't a philosophy we can afford to be flippant about, as of now that is; the future, however, could be radically different, oui?

A question that needs urgent attention:

Do things have value because they make us happy or do they make us happy because they have value? This is something I've been mulling over for the past 4 or so years.

Ipecacuanha (The Island of Dr. Moreau)

Ok. Thanks for the opportunity to brush up on Diogenes & Alexander. They were both maaturbating in their own way I suppose.

The 21^st century version of the OP's title should be, in my humble opinion, Nietzschean argument in defense of robotics.

"Alexander, please! You block my Sun!" — Hillary

:chin:

There are things far more important than truth? :chin: — Agent Smith

What nonsense!

:snicker:

Diogenes could've been a solipsist. Other people? What other people? :snicker:

From a naïve utilitarianism perspective, if pain is objective, morality is/has to be too, oui? :chin:

:ok:

The million dollar question: If veganism is "good", why did carnivory evolve? Does mother nature make (silly) mistakes? Does God make boo boos? Something doesn't add up now does it?

The worker is given artificial factory food, a cheap prefabricated housing, if money is left, an occasional artificial entertainment, an even rarer occasion to escape hell for a week in a plane which always returns, and a tiny chance to live a life like the ruling slavemasters, the possessing class. Long live the Revolution! Crush the state! — Hillary

We need to update our definitions!

My neighbor is an ugly little bald-headed self-righteous SOB, spreading lies behind your back and pretending. That's the ugly truth. Dunno what's he good for. Then again, he's only human.

The True, the Bad, and the Ugly. A holey trinity? — Hillary

:snicker:

Most interesting. — Ms. Marple

That's why, I suspect, verum, bonum, and pulchrum were designated as transcendentalia; they describe an ideal or best-case scenario. It would've made my day so to speak if all 3 were, well, inseparable and acquiring 1, any one, meant getting the other 2 as well (package deal of sorts).

You might then wanna say "In your dreams Agent Smith, in your dreams!" :sad:

Arigato gozaiumus.

To each his own. I don't wanna give up on something so numinous even if it means a trip to the psychiatrist for psychosis! Madness is better than Sadness? :chin: I think I chickened out 180 Proof.

:ok:

If truth isn't the first principle, one cannot really believe the second and third principles. — unenlightened

:chin:

So,

1. Truth
2. (True) goodness
3. (True) beauty

3017amen (profile)

Truth is beauty, beauty is truth. That's all ye know, and all ye need to know. — John Keats (On a Gracian Urn)

Maybe, just maybe, Truth = Good = Beauty. They're the same thing?!

My analysis is incomplete. Maybe someone can help out. Establish the truth ( :chin: ) of the following equalities:

1. Truth = Good
2. Good = Beauty

You have to understand something in order to criticize it. — Wayfarer

Yeah! Sorry, my wild shots (in the dark) has found an unintended victim it seems. :grin:

If wages are so stipulated that input (pay) = output (for bare necessities with nothing left over) then that's the modern incarnation of slavery. The money (that exchanges hands) is a mere illusion and to cap it all of a burden.

Wriggle finger. :zip: — Cratylus

Read the texts and judge for yourself. :smirk: — 180 Proof

:ok:

Yeah, reminds me of the famous Arthurian round table - order of importance is N/A. The riddle of the Sancta Trinitas maybe the same idea (to block attempts to develop an hierarchy for the Holy Trinity). All 3 or none! There's more but let's not bite off more than we can chew.

The other thing I wanna know is how to we close the gap between the real (immanent, tangible) and the ideal (transcendental, ethereal)? Pragamtism wins, nevertheless idealism is indispensable. For a moving target, shoot in front of it!

E.g. Genesis: 16-33 – Abraham interrogates God (via its angels) about whether or not it's just to punish the innocent along with the "wicked" in its imminent destruction of Sodom & Gomorrah.

Epicureans – "The Riddle of Epicurus"
Gnostics – re: "Demiurge"
Spinozists – Tractatus Theologico-Politicus — 180 Proof

What was God's reply? if I may ask. Collateral damage?

I suggest we "think outside the box". There was a thread not so long ago on how people tend to understand ideas/concepts/phenomena/whathaveyou in terms of things they already do.

Last night I had an interesting experience with a 3 year old. This guy was hungry but he seems to know only one word that meant food viz. "chips". He repeatedly said "chips, chips, chips" and I was trying my best to convince him that chips was junk food and not recommended at his age. Only later did I find out that for this toddler "chips" = food.

As you might've already noticed, I use a computational framework (files, apps, windows, menu, etc.) to make sense of reality. We all do that I guess.

The same thing's happening here too - we're trying to get a handle on information (new) with the aid of substance (old). It's time we did something different in my humble opinion. How? I dunno!

So, if the speed limit is 60 mph, and I drive at 59.999 mph, I'm not speeding.

There is no slavery in the modern world they say but that's only on a technicality. What's the difference really between being paid $0 and a wage of $0.0001?

:zip: Wriggle finger. — Cratylus

My hunch is capitalism piggybacks on (the promise of) freedom. Liberty is so god damned important that we don't mind becoming slaves so long as we're not! :snicker:

In other words, there's diabolical nexus between so-called democracy and capitalism.

well, the last paragraph in the post basically refers to philosophical theism, to which I'm positively disposed. Nothing to do with 'generic information', which I still say is an oxymoron. :grimace: — Wayfarer

:ok:

"God" (not gods) has always been "on trial" – such, IMO, is the provenance of myths / heresies, ancient philosophies & modern freethought. — 180 Proof

Are you aware of any myths where people put gods in the dock?

I can meet you part-way at least. — Wayfarer

:up:

Münchhausen/Agrippa's Trilemma

Also,

Hello, hello, 911, T Clark just shot himself!

You can do this, you can give up lesser pleasures in the pursuit of better ones. — baker

Yeah, it can be done but it's not exactly something an untrained person can pull off. The lower pleasures tend to, well, give more pleasure for a given amount of effort. If this weren't true, the world would be quite a different place, oui?

Was it John Stuart Mill who talked about higher and lower pleasures?

Better Socrates dissatisfied than a pig/fool staisfied. — J. S. Mill

This statement has implications on the meaning of "better" we discussed.

In a sense, J. S. Mill planted a bomb inside the utilitarianism house - it went off a long time ago. No one's noticed it. How peculiar! How very peculiar!

Great post. The question: Why do we need/want (a) god(s)? As per historians religions were simply the, how shall I put it now?, complexification of hope (hope for timely rainfall, for a good harvest, for a good hunt, for a healthy life, and so on). It makes complete sense that if these can be attained by ourselves, god(s) would no longer be necessary and we all know what humans do to things they don't need, oui? Where's the bloody trash can? :grin:

See the OP. — Banno

:snicker:

Will the simple biconditional statement below contribute?

I am anxious $\leftrightarrow$ I care!

A motto of mine which, unfortunately, I haven't been able to implement: Always Panic!

I suppose the OP boils down to the hot passion vs. cold logic debate. I would prefer both, but, it just dawned on me, if one has to choose one and only one, I'd go for cold logic. However, that's cold logic self-promoting. Trust issues crop up!

There is an answer to this, but it's too politically incorrect to talk about it in public. — baker

:lol: Suit yourself.