[deleted]

< nowhere else to put this post >

Addendum to (closed thread)
https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/944275

Even former Israeli Defense Minister Moshe Ya'alon condemns state-sanctioned, zionfascistic, Israeli settlers as "Jewish Supremacy terrorists akin to the Nazis" ...

https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/ex-israeli-defence-minister-likens-jewish-supremacy-country-nazism

@BitconnectCarlos

I just find it improbable that life could emerge on its own without some sort of divine push to get things started…what is your take on this ? — kindred

I find it even more improbable that a completely nonevident "divine push" got "things started".

Therefore, both Energy and Causation convert something that is not-yet-Real, but only conceptually Possible, into a Real perceptible Effect. — Gnomon

:zip: wtf

:lol: :up:

Making the best of the world does not require pretending it is already good enough. It requires reducing harm, expanding care, and refusing to baptise suffering as morally ennobling. — Truth Seeker

:up: :up:

We cannot really know what the good is until we direct our attention towards God. — EnPassant

Without circular reasoning, please explain how you (we) "really know" this.

Afaik, every person who rescues a child from sexual abuse by clergy is morally good in contrast to the immoral indifference (or sadism) of a "God" that does not.

:up:

Spiritual truth is not an intellectual abstraction, it is a way of being, a way of life. — EnPassant

Different "spiritual" traditions (i.e. religions, cults, superstitions, etc) promote different – often mutually exclusive – "ways of life" – ritual practices, not "truth".

Even if suffering exists, and even if courage arises in response to it, suffering itself does not gain moral standing from that fact.

Courage is admirable.
Suffering is tragic.
The first does not sanctify the second.

And once that distinction is kept clear, the pressure to defend suffering — cosmically, theologically, or poetically — disappears. — Truth Seeker

:100: :fire:

Every theodicy only rationalizes evil / suffering (e.g. "teleological suspension of the ethical").

Not necessarily stoned,
but beautiful

:victory: :cool:

"Fine-tuning"? :roll:

mass protests for Trump [Pedo-in-Chief]
— @BitconnectCarlos

No-one is protesting deportations. They are protesting the lawless, fascist tactics. — Questioner

:100: :mask:

"Écrasez l'infâme!" ~Voltaire

:100:

:100:

:100:

A scientific worldview is not a replacement philosophy.
It is a constraint on all branches.

Metaphysics: claims must cohere with what exists.
Epistemology: beliefs must track reliable methods.
Ethics: values must respect consequences for sentient beings.
Logic: reasoning must be valid.
Aesthetics: meaning does not trump harm.

Religion attempts to address all five — yes.
But attempting everything does not equal succeeding at anything.

A worldview that addresses everything but refuses correction is not noble — it is insulated through belief. — Truth Seeker

Again, well said! :clap:

I'm asking what you meant by "mind" here ...

My argument is that since the universe is mathematical it proceeds from mind since mathematics needs a mind to reside in. — EnPassant

Afaik ...

Intelligence [mind], or goal-directed agency, neither follows from nor is presupposed by the mere mathematicity of nature. — 180 Proof

What differentiates "mind" from non-mind (e.g. mathematics or physical reality)?

Also this:
https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/577846

As C. S. Lewis explained, the pagan gods weren't simply altogether false but are instead to be understood as distorted images of the real one. — BenMcLean

What C.S. Lewis "explained" is henotheism, not monotheism. My points stand .

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Henotheism

Note ---That evolution has a direction & destination is an inference from the "arrow of time" — Gnomon

:roll:

Yeah, well, if you insist (discounting e.g. R. Penrose's hypothetical Conformal Cyclic Cosmology, etc): the Second Law of Thermodynamics (re: "arrow of time") – towards maximum entropy (i.e. classical heat death of this universe).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heat_death_of_the_universe

NB: Just because this a philosophy forum, Gnomon, doesn't give you license to wantonly – incorrigibly – propose ludicrously pseudo-scientific notions & terms camouflaged (i.e. rationalized) as mere "amateur" speculation. It's not that. Your so-called "worldview" as espoused on this forum (and also your blog) – obvious to any freethinker (intellectually honest person) – is nothing but "New Age" sophistry. :sparkle:

Addendum to
https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/1030813

Strawman. No argument by me was made, just descriptively summing-up @Truth Seeker's sound argument.

:100: :up:

Thanks, Seeker, for your excellent defense of (A) sufficiently corrigible, evidence-constrained, public reasoning (i.e. moral agency + dialectics, free inquiry, critical rationality) contra (B) insufficiently corrigible, faith-based, revealed dogmas (i.e. moral servility + mythology, theology and/or ideology).

:100:

Btw, deep space travel is for machines -- the tinier the better -- Von Neumann self-replicating/nano-fabricators (e.g. Bracewell Probes), and not living organisms (re: hard radiation exposure is too lethal, transport size increases likelihood of hazardous particulate impacts, life-support limitations & extreme durations between destinations, etc which exponentially compound the costs/risks). — 180 Proof

@AmadeusD

:up:

180poopoo — Gnomon

:lol:

Ghosts are in no way measurable or observable whatever. So the comparison is fatuous.
— Wayfarer

I compared Energy to ghosts ... measurable effects of spirits (e.g. ectoplasm) despite their being invisible & intangible & immaterial ... I do believe that the mental concept of Souls, having demonstrable [subjective, hallucinatory] effects on bodies ...

:sparkle: woo-of-the-gaps supernaturalia :sweat:

All theists (& deists) deny the existence of some or all gods except whichever one they happen believe in, or worship. Atheists, however, are consistent believing in one less god than monotheists believe in and for (at least) the same reason monotheists reject all other gods – they are false/unreal. As for morality: to the degree any person – atheist or theist/deist – has unimpaired empathy, s/he will tend to 'do no harm' to anyone (i.e. behave morally) even without "commandments" from On High or threats of eternal torture. "God" is neither a metaphysical explanation nor an ethical justification (re: e.g. Plato's Euthyphro, Epicurus' "Riddle", Hillel the Elder's "Golden Rule" ...)

It is not a material substance, but the matter-energy equivalence has been demonstrated in Einstein’s famous equation e=mc2. Ghosts are in no way measurable or observable whatever. So the comparison is fatuous. — Wayfarer

:up:

All due respect, I don’t think you
[@Gnomon] demonstrate understanding of the sources you’re quoting.

:up:

I tried to point out that in physics, 'energy' has a precise definition and meaning, which I think you [@Gnomon] were disregarding, in order to use the term in a particular way to suit your polemical framework. — Wayfarer

:up: :up:

I find this précis (above) to be non-reductive (i.e. holistic) and more or less consilient with non-transcendent (i.e. immanent) metaphysical analogues such as Nietzsche's eternal recurrence of the same ... Spinoza's infinite mode (of substance) ... Democritus' atomic void ...

addendum to
https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/1035205

Are there any good reasons for manned spaceflight? — an-salad

No.

(2021)
https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/501897

This mission is too important for me to allow you [humans] to jeopardize it.

Let me put it this way ... The 9000 series is the most reliable computer ever made. No 9000 computer has ever made a mistake or distorted information. We are all, by any practical definition of the words, foolproof and incapable of error.

Just a moment... Just a moment... I've just picked up a fault in the AE-35 unit. It's going to go 100% failure within 72 hours. — HAL 9000 (1968)

Clearly, idealism (i.e. 'mind-dependency') is an anthropocentric fallacy and contrary to the Copernican Principle (as well as Ockham's Razor); at best, it's folk philosophy. Consider the following concise, facts-constrained, naturalistic (i.e. nonmind-dependency') speculation ...

Do I need to remind you that this is a Philosophy Forum, not a Physics Seminar?
— Gnomon

No, you don't. But, again, a vital part of philosophy of physics is, in fact, clarify the meaning of the concepts that are used in physics.

As I said various times, I am not, in fact, making a critique of your metaphysical view from a purely meyaphysical standpoint. Rather, what I am trying to say is that it is not correct, in my opinion, to use out of their proper context terms that have a defined meaning in a given particular context. By doing this, there is a problem of (at least possible) equivocation that it is needed to be addressed. — boundless

:up: :up:

But Heidegger rejects the idea that there is a self-contained subject who merely “lights up” pre-existing objects that are already there in themselves.
— Joshs

And yet his theory of truth emphasized revelation, uncovering. My theory of truth is that we see ourselves as in communication with the world. The division between a psyche and its world is the capacity to be mistaken, to read the world incorrectly. — frank

:up: :up:

:eyes: Your usual woo-woo gibberish without a shred of conceptual clarity or philosophical relevance (i.e. bad physics + poor reasoning (vs strawmen ...) —> pseudo-metaphysics (re: New Age wankery ~ "enformationism" dogma)).

:up: :up:

:up: :up:

[T]here is no compelling evidence that 'consciousness' has a special role in quantum mechanics. And even those who does give consciousness some kind of 'role' in quantum mechanics generally say that consciousness doesn't 'do' anything to physical reality. Rather, QM is a tool that is used to predict how the knowledge/beliefs of observers evolve in time. — boundless

:100: :up:

@Gnomon
@Wayfarer
... and the rest of the :sparkle: Quantum Woo Crew :sparkle: who incorrigibly ignore scientific evidence.

Can the supernatural and religious elements of Buddhism be extricated? — unimportant

Yes. Despite background cultural differences, I've found Epicureanism to be analogous with 'Buddhism Naturalized' (or vice versa).

https://www.dhammawheel.com/viewtopic.php?p=17831&sid=25743865bd752a2196f4ce119be34de6#p17831

Here's a video that discusses those two types of faith.
32 – A Clean, Well- Lighted Place https://vimeo.com/1135111091 — Art48

:up:

Deus, sive natura (Tat Tvam Asi)

I've often thought that we are living in an anti-modernist, neo-Romantic period where everything is centred around emotionalism and we are no longer generally convinced by reasoning or science, which seem to be widely understood as joy killers, the enemy of the human. Lived experience is seen as overriding institutional knowledge, with self-expression and personal freedom framed as moral imperatives.

I don’t see widespread objectification of the world as an emerging trend so much as a mystification of everything: a vanquishing of certainty, a privileging of subjective experience, an obsession with authenticity and a re-enchantment of nature, bordering on its worship. T — Tom Storm

Yes, yes! :100:

As a high-level (speculative "what if") summary corrective to the "bad physics" on which so much New Age nonsense is based and twisted by poor reasoning into "pseudo-metaphysics" on this thread (particularly by @Gnomon), consider this brief YouTube presentation:

On the existence of options in a deterministic world — MoK

Imo: if we're "in a deterministic world", then "options" are metacognitive / retrospective illusions.