Comments

  • profundity
    ↪universeness
    What do you call that additional quality we need to take our understanding of the world to the next level?
  • Deus Est Novacula Occami
    omnipresence — trogdor

    I recall playing a space strategy video game and part of the gameplay was dispatching scouts/probes into unexplored territory to find resources and make contact with other civilizations. That's the human way of achieving omnipresence, ja? Like I remember this line from movie (paraphrasing), "You all are my eyes and ears." God's omnipresent through us. Machines, these days, have taken over, CCTV (panopticon). Machines have taken their very first step towards becoming (our) gods, they have omnipresence under their belt. I guess we should consider this as proof of concept. One (omnipresence) down, three (omniscience, omnibenevolence, omnipotence) more to go!

    :point: Answer (Fredric Brown)
  • Idiot Greeks
    ↪trogdor
    The existing (scientific) paradigms, especially the Theory of Evolution, can't be used to make sense of altruism (re The Selfish Gene, Richard Dawkins). That's all.

    Moreover, the Tao is, if you'll permit me to humanize it, unbelievably wise: the idea, it seems, is when offered a choice like this (altruism) or that (selfishness), one must have the gumption to ask "why not both?"

    :smile:
  • Adam Eve and the unjust punishment
    ↪Fooloso4
    Adam & Eve. We're all cousins! :grin:

    The near in blood, the nearer bloody. — Donalbain (Macbeth)

    :fear:
  • Adam Eve and the unjust punishment
    ↪Possibility


    :zip: Wriggle finger — Cratylus
  • Understanding the Christian Trinity
    The transitivity property of equality doesn't hold.

    So, if F = The Father, S = The Son, H = The Holy Spirit, and G = God then,

    1. F = G
    2. S = G
    3. H = G

    but

    4. F S
    5. S H
    6. F H

    The law of identity has been shot to pieces.

    7. G G (substitute G for F, S, H in 4, 5, 6 above)

    Negation has a different, unconventional meaning. For example,

    8. F S doesn't imply that F = S is false.

    :zip: Wriggle finger. — Cratylus



    Apart from the unsavory truth that God's a mother f**ker, I'd say we may need to explore:

    1. Temporal logic
    2. Identity & Change (Metaphysics).
  • Pessimism’s ultimate insight
    ↪Possibility
    What's your opinion of the following?

    1. In life there's potential for suffering and joy.

    2. It's impossible, at the moment, to ensure the actualization of joy sans suffering.

    3. On the whole, suffering > joy. Ask a person whether s/he wants their pain taken away from, or more joy be added to, their life? I bet they'd want the former (pain taken away).

    Ergo,

    4. Antinatalism.
  • Understanding the Christian Trinity
    The Hydra Riddle

    The Hydra, a mythical polycephalic beast, was considered as one creature. Quite unlike how the dicephalic parapagus twins Abby & Brittany Hensel are treated as two individuals.

    The same issue is found in Hinduism, Ravana (the 10-headed demon) is one person and so is Brahma (4 heads) of the Trimurti.

    Methinks this is a case of confusion in re personhood. Just picture Yahwheh with 3 noggins and bewilderment is unavoidable. Sancta Trinitas, Unus Deus.
  • Pessimism’s ultimate insight
    Sure, but there’s more to potentiality in relation to being than a binary value, or even a linear continuum. Intentionality is an integrated, four-dimensional relation of effort and attention. You can’t reduce that accurately to ‘the potential to suffer’ - not without ignoring or excluding a whole lot of information. This is what is happening here — Possibility

    :roll:
  • Can morality be absolute?
    ↪Tom Storm


    Well, in that case, we could start from incontrovertible truths, these being hedonic judgments, in re morality, oui? Let's keep things simple and begin with nobody likes to be physically assaulted. To that one could add psychological pain e.g. insults. These are universal and true across the board.

    To complicate matters, though the indicators of good & bad are clear viz. :smile: & :sad: , the triggers are not. The classic spanner in the works for ethics is masochism which typifies one man's meat is another man's poison. This, let's just say, exception, thwarts any attempt at formulating universal laws with respect to morality. This state of affairs is what moral relativism is.

    It's worth mentioning here that the differences mentioned vide supra seem to be intuitive in nature i.e. not much in the way of systematic analysis is done. There could be an underlying rationale that justifies the diverse values i.e. moral relativism could simply be an illusion and can be dispelled à la how Thanos sees through Dr. Strange's magical clone illusion in Avengers, Infinity war! :grin:
  • The Concept of Religion
    A.k.a. hypoxia. — baker

    Paraphrasing

    Spock (bleeding): I'm pondering upon the meaning of life.

    Dr. Leonard McCoy (applying compression to the wound): Feeling philosophical, eh? That's what massive blood loss will do to you.
  • Can morality be absolute?
    Frankly, I don't understand the question.
  • The Predicate of Existence
    It would be a contradiction for unicorns to exist here and now. — litewave

    Because they don't exist in the here and now?

    1. Principle of Plenitude

    2. Modal Realism

    3. Many Worlds Interpretation
  • Are there any scientific grounds for god?
    ↪Gnomon


    Taking into account the fact that only the empirical is useful to us in any way at all, would you agree that metaphysics is useless. I'm taking a pragmatic approach I believe, but it is a question worth asking.

    Your theory of Enformationism, what's its selling point? As far as I can tell, it seems to have utility in a yin-yang sorta way; in other words is Taoism metaphysics or not? Taoism is practical advice, oui?
  • What it takes to be a man (my interpretation)
    It looks like, quite naturally, we see people as having 3 components:

    1. The Mind: A person must be rational (IQ)

    2. The Heart: A person must understand feelings, how to manipulate use 'em (EQ).

    3. The Body: A person must be physically fit, in the best of bodily health for their age (PQ1, physical quotient or the more traditional BMI, Body Mass Index).

    A unisex idol to be emulated by men & women!


    1. PQ: How your physical wellness measures up to a person of your age in peak form.
  • profundity
    Well the obvious answer is yes, because humans are a subset of all animals. — universeness

    This is a profound statement in my book.

    I still think your comment of 'all you need is common sense,' is misleading — universeness

    Perhaps we're talking past each other. All I can say here is that by common sense I mean the ability to detect/extract patterns (from everyday experiences). Once one has mastered the skill, all you need to do is apply to so-called intellectual activities known for being tough like STEM.
  • The eternal soul (Vitalism): was Darwin wrong?
    ↪Athena
    :up:
  • Can morality be absolute?
    It's simply that an item that does not appear in the assumptions of an argument cannot appear in the conclusion. Hence a series of assumptions or observations about how things are cannot lead to the conclusion that things ought be — Banno

    :ok:
  • profundity
    ↪universeness


    Do animals experience so-called profundity?

    Does a chimp go "That's deep, dude!"?

    Does an ant stop dead in its tracks, food in its jaws, and ask "Why am I doing this again?"

    These are instances when true common sense bubbles up to the surface and pops into your head. We're (hyper)focused and that means a lot of good stuff escape our notice: Selective attention test (vide infra)

  • Pessimism’s ultimate insight
    potentiality — Possibility

    The potential to suffer?
  • What motivates panpsychism?
    Just to clarify, wu wei is to act as if dead - to deliberately and consciously align our ideas and logic with that of the universe, striving to understand and be aware of the energy that flows through it all, ourselves included. Laozi is not advocating a blind faith here, but a fully conscious one — Possibility

    :up:
  • What motivates panpsychism?
    Do you ever wonder why inanimate matter obey the laws of nature to a tee.

    As per Laozi, simplifying Taoism, we're supposed to emulate the nonliving: go with the flow ( :heart: ); only dead fish go with the flow, one remarked.

    The point then is to die or act dead, let the chips fall where they may (wu wei, actionless action). Momma nature knows best! Trust in her experience (4.5 billion years), have faith in her wisdom (she is the Tao, mother of the myriad things).

    I follow (human) laws when I understand them perfectly. Understanding requires consciousness!
  • The Predicate of Existence
    they don't exist here and now — litewave

    :up: Let's keep our conclusions proportionate to the evidence! Proportio Divina
  • profundity
    ↪universeness


    In my humble opinion, I've never asked any deep questions; so I wouldn't know what they are first-hand. However, I do recall reading up on how some queries get to the heart of an issue (that's my definition of a deep question).

    I listened to a Sam Harris (atheist, neuroscientist) lecture last night as I dozed off. He said one word that satisfies my definition of profundity and that word was "structural". Every issue seems to possess a form that's both generalizable but also possessed of features unique to it. This is clichéd now but since I came to know of it, it's always been at the back of my mind, buried somewhere in my subconscious or something like that.

    Horse sense is, per my views, what enables you to cut through the noise and tune into the signal. Pattern recognition is all there is to intelligence/wisdom: there's no difference between a casanova grasping how to bed women and a physicist sussing out a formula that describes some phenomenon s/he's investigating - both require you to notice patterns (in women and in nature, respectively).

    That's all for now! I've run out of steam.
  • Can morality be absolute?
    unfortunately — Nickolasgaspar

    :lol:
  • Can morality be absolute?
    ↪Nickolasgaspar
    You're free to disagree, but don't do it just so you can. I, for one, am sold on Thomas Carlyle's idea about how only a few thousand or so men & women have been responsible for humanity's successes and failures.
  • The Predicate of Existence
    everything possible exists necessarily. — litewave

    Possible vs. Actual dichotomy? Unicorns are possible (don't entail a contradiction), but they don't actually exist, do they?

    In other words, n(the set of possible worlds) > n(the set of actual worlds).
  • Can morality be absolute?
    ↪Banno
    I can't wrap my head around the so-called is/ought problem. An ought is meaningless unless there's an is that it's designed to correct, oui?

    An ought requires two conditions:

    1. A set of values which serves as the standard for comparison.

    2. An is i.e. the current state of affairs.
  • Can morality be absolute?
    because we are talking about a "job" called reason and wisdom.? — Nickolasgaspar

    Still...it makes no sense to have more people than absolutely necessary to accomplish a given task.

    The history of the world is but the biography of great men (sic). — Thomas Carlyle (Great Man (sic) Theory)
  • Adam Eve and the unjust punishment
    The Tree of knowledge (of good and evil)!
  • Adam Eve and the unjust punishment
    Literal interpretation of biblical text is proven to be an ignorant route, either way. I’ll not go down that road with you, if that’s your aim. — Possibility

    To each his own I suppose. It's either literalism or flights of fancy. In other words, it's either incoherence, allegedly, or fantasy. They say...all roads lead to Rome. We're free! Yippee!

    Do what thou wilt — Aliester Crowley

    A bit Kantian but looks more like a mirror-image of the Categorical Imperative.
  • What it takes to be a man (my interpretation)
    Not sure I understand what it has to do with the topic at hand... — stoicHoneyBadger

    :ok:
  • Can morality be absolute?
    so an interesting philosophical question would be why they don't do it? — Nickolasgaspar

    Why send two/many people to do a job which one can handle?
  • What it takes to be a man (my interpretation)
    religion for the weak — stoicHoneyBadger

    Most idols tend to have attributes the idolizers lack. I suppose they complement each other - making up for each others' defects. An alloy is better than either of the metals that are so combined. The whole is greater than the sum of its parts (Holism).
  • Can morality be absolute?
    those qualities do not demand special skills...anyone can do it. — Nickolasgaspar

    Yep! If Tom can do it, so can Dick and Harry!
  • Deus Est Novacula Occami
    So, you could say that the TOE is both simple (singular ; container), and complex (comprehensive ; contents). — Gnomon

    I like where you're going with this. :up: I haven't outgrown either-or thinking as of yet. In my defense though I'd like to bring to your attention that, in my experience, we can say what we can't mean. An example? God exists & God doesn't exist. There, I said it, but I can't mean it (it's inconceivable).

    it from bit — Gnomon

    So that's what it means! :up: The way I make sense of it is that with regard to anything & everything, we can come up with an algorithm (code) that tells us how to create them. In short, we're in the process of sussing out how to create a universe, and all things, including consciousness, in it.

    The next stage is to, again, invent some basic ground rules as to interaction between the stuff we created. This too algorithmic.

    These two under our belt, we become gods. Simulations have been done and though they're simple, it's a start. We await the next major breakthrough in computation, allowing us to go into details - chemistry, biology, minds, and so on, from atoms to galaxies.
  • Are there any scientific grounds for god?
    ↪Gnomon
    What do you make of the fact that (empirical) science can be verified i.e. we can, with certainty, tell the difference between empirical truths and empirical lies? For someone into logic/rationality, the empirical world is paradise - we can establish truths and disprove falsehoods.

    On the other hand, metaphysical matters (God, etc.) are mere possibilities, unproven/unverified; quite frankly, they maybe unprovable/unverifiable.

    Now look at how the two stack up against each other: Imagination (metaphysics) vs. Facts (empirical science). Is this even a choice? Fantasy vs. Reality? Maybe it is, but daydreaming is frowned upon, oui?
  • The white lie
    ↪Harry Hindu
    What isn't...a trap? It's my suspicion that we're all prisoners, held in mental and physical goals, and what we believe to be freedom is nothing more than changing cells and cell mates. Something's better than nothing - the illusion of liberty is better than the reality of jail.
  • A far away light in infinite darkness
    The Light of the Tao is Dark.
  • Adam Eve and the unjust punishment
    Knowledge of good and evil is not knowledge of ethics - it’s simply awareness of their own capacity for judgement, without any experience or subsequent understanding of the world. It’s like crowning a two year old as king. — Possibility

    Possible! I, nevertheless, like my interpretation which, to my reckoning, is literal and so not open to multiple interpretation which would, I feel, open up a giant can of worms. Let's not get too creative, oui?
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