I'm looking at the wiki for Practical Ethics (1979), but I've noticed that Singer published another book before that one, titled Animal Liberation (1975). Why do you think that Practical Ethics would be the more approachable of the two? — Arcane Sandwich

Honestly, I really don't know Singer's body of work well enough to give a best entry point. I started with Practical Ethics, but I'm sure one could start with Animal Liberation, too.

My interpretation is that they are speaking to "you in general", if that makes any sense. They're not saying "You, Arcane Sandwich", they're not saying "You, ToothyMaw". It's a sort of "you" in general, whoever that person might be.

Regarding the part about the "painful things" that they wish never happened to that "abstract you", they are effectively assuming that anyone (everyone, really) has undergone some painful things in their lives (whatever those "painful things" might be in each individual case), and they're saying that they wish that those (the painful things) never happened to anyone. And they're saying that without even knowing what those "painful things" are in each individual case.

Do you think that my interpretation of that video is more or less correct? — Arcane Sandwich

Yes, I think your interpretation is correct. In addressing this abstract "you" They are acknowledging that no one really escapes hardship - whatever form that might take - and expressing in a personal way the very human sentiment of wishing we (anyone who fits into the abstract you) didn't all have to suffer so much. But we can still console each other and shoulder the suffering together - which might make things a little more bearable. Ergo, that portion of the video.

:up:

Okay, yes, this is interesting enough to maintain at least my interest and suspension of nominalist assumptions or whatever, but you need to throw some meat out there. What are we trying to do? Lecturing us on how Peirce is misunderstood should give way to some sort of discussion of what he was trying to say.

Thank you very much once again, ToothyMaw. I'm not that familiar with the work of Peter Singer. I know of him, but I have not read any of his works yet. What would you recommend that I start with? — Arcane Sandwich

I would just get right to Practical Ethics, although it isn't an easy read in some sections (both in terms of being comprehended and being uncomfortable to read). That book is probably the main reason I ever tried to go vegan (something I'm doing again). I should say that Peter Singer is definitely not reductionist; I was just speaking to that some people who like Peter Singer or what he has to say might think in reductionist terms. Although that might be difficult now that I think about it, as he speaks on so many important things.

Changing the subject, back to this Thread. I am quite huge fan of Earth Crisis myself. Yet (and I say this as a fan), sometimes it seems to me that their message fails to engage with the listener as an individual. And that's something very interesting in its own right. Earth Crisis speak "to the masses", if you will. Well, that's technically inaccurate, since the last lines of their song "Ecocide" are literally "by me, and by you", so, they do engage with the listener as an individual in some sense. However, there is another band that does that far better: Hatebreed. They are not Vegan nor Straight Edge, but they have something in common with Earth Crisis, because they are part of the larger "world" of Hardcore Punk / Heavy Metal. Besides, Jamey Jasta himself (lead singer of Hatebreed) as said on several occasions, even on social media, that Earth Crisis is one of the bands that inspired him to form Hatebreed. So, let's take a look at one of their songs, shall we? — Arcane Sandwich

I actually quite like that song and video. It sends out a positive message, even though the instrumentation and the lyrics are a bit "harsh" for the positivity that they are attempting to transmit to the listener.

What do you make of that, ToothyMaw? Feel free to just "ramble on" about it, even if it has no logic to you. — Arcane Sandwich

I can't help but think about how that video relates to creating change in general.

It seems to me that in order to galvanize people to create positive change, it will always be useful to prescribe actions or directives to people in general (in fact, we have to), but we cannot forget that every person is different; one not only needs to appeal to a common understanding and humanity when attempting to influence people to act towards preserving the environment, adopting ethical veganism, etc. but must also provide a personal context that makes acting make sense. That is done by appealing to the individual in each of us.

Take Hatebreed’s message here, for example, of self-growth and effecting positive change in one’s life despite. Coupling this kind of message with the idea that we are individuals with our own moral arcs and (in some ways discrete) identities tied to those morals, heavily informed by some larger ideas or ideals, but never quite dictated - at least in a reductive sense - I think one can make a strong case for a subset of the public that is highly mobilized and effective at creating change.

Applying this: the ethical vegan acts ethically despite the influence of the meat industry, general ridicule, apathy towards cruelty, veggie burgers that fall the fuck apart when you bite into them, etc. There is psychological and moral growth to be had in advocating for ideas and ideals and acting morally in a more personal sense. As such, there is something meaningful to strive for other than just the validation of one’s beliefs - one is ethical. One makes the necessary sacrifices. One is making a difference. Accentuating this relationship is a large part of how we edify each other.

Ok. Thank you for letting me know that you are not interested in participating in this thread. Fortunately, there are plenty of threads on this site for you to discuss those topics in. — Mapping the Medium

Thank you very much for your time, Mapping the Medium. I'm out. Peace. — Arcane Sandwich

There is definitely something to be said for keeping threads on track, but:

That was a little...cold. I'm not sure that Sandwich wasn't contributing to the thread, and inviting someone to stop participating in a thread in the absence of belligerence or something kind of needs more justification than just that that person disagrees in a valid way with some core suppositions imo.

But whatever. You made the thread; if you think he is derailing it, you can tell him to go elsewhere if you want.

The way I see it, even if there is no logical contradiction between those two sets of premises (i.e., being Straight Edge and being Vegan at the same time), I still see the peril of reductionism, so to speak. You've stated it very eloquently. The idea, if I understood you, would be something like the following:

1) "Reductionist" Straight Edge: they say that drugs are the cause of every problem in society.
2) "Reductionist" Vegan: they say that the use of animal products is the cause of every problem in society.

Instead, you seem to be suggesting that the following (if anything) would be more rational:

1) In the case of "True" Straight Edge: drugs are not the cause of every problem in society, though they are one of the main problems.
2) In the case of "True" Veganism: the use of animal products is not the cause of every problem in society, though it is one of the main problems.

Is that correct, or is it not? — Arcane Sandwich

Yes, I would say so. Like you seem to be saying, it isn't like people even have to abandon the main thrust of, or the vast majority of the normative claims made by, Straight Edge or ethical veganism to avoid reductionism; they just need to accept that neither provides a totally comprehensive account of what the problems are that face society or what we should do to address those problems. You can still be a devout fan of Earth Crisis and love Peter Singer and avoid this very real peril.

systemic factors — ToothyMaw

I suppose I should at least give one specific, significant factor. Consider the influence of corporations on policy in the United States, for example. That might be able to be related to drugs somehow, I guess, but I think it has far more to do with public apathy, ignorance, etc.

1) In your honest opinion, is it fair for Earth Crisis (and Straight Edge in general) to blame societal problems solely on drugs? Or are there other elements of "society" that need to "take the blame" here, so to speak? — Arcane Sandwich

This question is actually a little more difficult than I initially thought. Because, in a way, Straight Edge seems to have provided an all-encompassing account of what our society faces and how to resolve it and adding veganism just amps that up even further - perhaps in a good way, perhaps not. I’m not sure. But I’ll give my opinion anyways:

No, I don’t think it is reasonable to blame drugs for every problem in society; to do so indicates a reductive way of looking at the problems that face us even if the core reasoning of Straight Edge has an internal logic and high level of appeal.

I will start by pointing out that, although it doesn’t indicate invalid reasoning, it seems that Earth Crisis’s core reasoning, and that of the Straight Edge movement in general (if Firestorm is any indication), is circular: people do drugs because of societal circumstances, this makes people less effective at advocating for themselves or acting morally, which then leads to the use of more drugs and/or the toleration of living on the terms of corrupt cops and politicians who themselves then enable this process.

So, according to this reasoning, it seems that the best thing we can do to interrupt this process is stop doing drugs (Or rise up and resist the bad people with violence). Whether or not that is true, this loop is not closed; there are many more reasons than drugs that people are more or less moral or more or less rational, or more or less good at advocating for themselves, including systemic factors, cultural factors, factors like upbringing - even if that last one could be related to bad experiences associated with drugs. I think that those factors could easily eclipse the problem of people doing drugs in certain circumstances.

Really, you would have to believe that the pernicious influence of drugs has suffused everything to believe that stopping doing drugs will actually rid us of all of our problems. But based on what I’ve read, that one guy (Buechner, I think) from EC said that stopping doing drugs doesn’t actually make one a good person; one still has to act with that added mental clarity.

Alternatively, you could just be a really careful nominalist. Maybe.

edit: nope, probably not

By labeling,
— Mapping the Medium

Again, nominalism isn't a tendency to proliferate labels. Nominalisation is closer to being that. — bongo fury

I think the point is that from a nominalist perspective, deriving noun phrases like "honey has sweetness" (or just "x has y-ness" in a more general form) from a self-evidently true predicate like "honey is sweet", is often valid even in the existence of ambiguity over whether or not honey does indeed possess sweetness statically or intrinsically (and thus, at all) because we are only dealing with the physical particulars associated with a subject (honey). That is to say, if a specific label (y-ness) only arises from the particulars associated with some subject, how can we rightly prescind those qualities or particulars when dealing with that subject wherever we might encounter it? It seems we would need some sort of genuine abstraction or abstract process, and I guess that could be hypostatic abstraction or something.

edit: removed the "mental" part of "mental abstraction"

Right, but this is the part where the "orca lawyer" steps in and says: "But mate, orcas kill for sport sometimes, they get a kick out of it, they think it's fun. So if the orca can hunt for sport and enjoy it, why cant I? Why can't I go and hunt whatever I feel like hunting? Why can't I shoot a 'roo or an elk or a guanaco or whatever it is that people hunt in their respective continents?" — Arcane Sandwich

Since no one else seems to want to respond: that is like asking why one cannot willfully flush their Christmas toy truck decorations down the toilet because a child has done something similar. You could do it, but that reasoning doesn't make it any less destructive to your plumbing. Except in the case of dealing with killing or maiming animals, you just killed or maimed something, so the stakes are a lot higher than having to hire a plumber.

I mean, are we going to swim out there and stop the orcas? Is the orca lawyer committed to waging a campaign to end the unnecessary killing of seals? Is that feasible? Would that be a wise way of spending resources if we want to reduce suffering? Or should we just not kill animals in the tens of thousands in slaughterhouses?

My first thought it that one might prescind qualities from a concept that don't require adherence to a category such that that concept does not possess that quality ambiguously (I'm thinking the result of an incorrect hypostatic abstraction). So, keeping up with the honey example, we could prescind sweetness from honey if it turns out through hypostatic abstraction that honey does indeed possess sweetness, and we can prescind sweetness from honey if it possesses that quality intrinsically or statically, but we cannot prescind sweetness from honey if there is ambiguity in if the honey truly possesses that trait intrinsically or statically in the absence of a valid hypostatic abstraction.

My second thought is that I'm not sure what I'm talking about at this point.

edit: that was mostly a joke. I understand what I'm saying even if the intention behind the creation of this thread is still not entirely clear yet.

You said that life is often beautiful by default. I'm not sure that I agree with that. Can you try to convince me of that, please? — Arcane Sandwich

That would be difficult, as I think I can only speak to my subjective experiences, really, which kind of means I can't say that the world in its entirety is beautiful, but rather it is beautiful (sometimes) when viewed through the lens of my experience. So, I probably can't do that, actually.

Because then you say "clearly not in some ways", and I agree with that, but then you say "as human nature appears to give away to incredible self-destruction, cruelty and apathay". Here's where I would say a fallacy, because a lot of people actually do use this fallacy IRL: "Well what about killer whales when they attack a poor seal that just wants to live? I don't see anyone complaining about that."

What would you say in response to that fallacy? Do you think it's a fallacy, or would you consider it good, sound reasoning on the part of the "orca lawyer"? — Arcane Sandwich

It is clearly garbage reasoning, for the following reasons:

We have little to no control over orcas, and even if we wanted to prevent orcas from doing what they do, we would need to insert ourselves into an ecosystem and disrupt it which could have catastrophic consequences for that ecosystem. So, it is true that orcas cause suffering, but it isn't something we should or can prevent imo. This applies to any predatory animal.

Furthermore, humans very well can mold their behavior such that we don't give in to the darkest parts of our natures, and that is not possible for something like an orca. They just kill to eat because they have to. So, humans can act ethically apart from our evolved instincts, whereas other animals almost certainly cannot.

So, deflecting to orcas is pretty dumb.

edit: didn't mean to call humans animals there.

I appear to be the only who wants anything to do with this, for whatever reason. Yes, it is moral for Earth Crisis to align with PETA and vice versa. Yes, we should all be vegans and advocate for veganism. Once again, only T's from me.

hey, who said that Life was supposed to be beautiful by default? — Arcane Sandwich

I think life often is beautiful by default, honestly. Clearly not in some ways, as human nature appears to give way to incredible self-destruction, cruelty, and apathy. Maybe It's just my privilege or something, though; those chickens in the video certainly don't live beautiful lives.

People might think that it is cogent to say or believe that honey (for example) possesses sweetness in a static or intrinsic sense according to concretized categories, when the reality is much more complicated.
— ToothyMaw

:sparkle: Happy New Year! — Mapping the Medium

Yes, Happy New Year to you too. You doing anything special? I'm not.

edit: you don't have to answer that, lol. That kind of puts you on the spot. My bad.

we have abstract qualities like "sweetness" and "hardness" that gain meaning through relations determined by the process of hypostatic abstraction, and, thus, affixing the relevant quality to a subject requires human judgments. As such, certain relations humans might make seem to be rooted in mental phenomenon as any continuum or relation referenced by the process of hypostatic abstraction originates mentally. If that is the case, then the existence of sweetness, for example, only really exists as a cohesive whole in one's mind. — ToothyMaw

If that is the case, then some properties are not static, while others are. I'm thinking that the properties related through hypostatic abstraction are not static unless the subject possesses the quality of "y-ness" referenced in the original predicate intrinsically. So, while sweetness could take as many arguments as propositions indicating something is sweet exist, whether or not something possesses sweetness statically relies upon the qualities of the relevant subject(s). — ToothyMaw

Therefore, it isn't really a category error, as this new "predicate of predicates" is derived from a physical reality: things are more or less sweet, and, thus, those things that qualify as being sweet are themselves more or less sweet depending upon a judgment. That is to say they possess sweetness - even if sweetness is not a monadic predicate in the sense that it only takes one argument. It could take many. Furthermore, if we (optionally) visualize a continuum of sweetness, it is clear that the statuses of other propositions regarding other things being sweet have no bearing on whether or not honey possesses sweetness. — ToothyMaw

By labeling, nominalism often concretizes properties that are actually relational. Nominalism argues that properties, types, or forms only exist as names or labels and does have the effect of concretizing abstract or relational properties. When we use labels to categorize and identify properties, we often treat them as more concrete than they might actually be. — Mapping the Medium

I think that this line of reasoning indicates the existence of the continuum is necessary if sweetness and properties like it exist so open-endedly in mental representation - even if those mental representations arise partially from physical observation or experience. People might think that it is cogent to say or believe that honey (for example) possesses sweetness in a static or intrinsic sense according to concretized categories, when the reality is much more complicated.

I like where you're going with this. Are you now envisioning a fractal-like nature of sweetness that maintains that thread in the continuum? — Mapping the Medium

I'll have to think about what you mean by that, unless you can expound a little?

even if sweetness is not a monadic predicate in the sense that it only takes one argument. It could take many. Furthermore, if we (optionally) visualize a continuum of sweetness, it is clear that the statuses of other propositions regarding other things being sweet have no bearing on whether or not honey possesses sweetness. — ToothyMaw

It also helps to think about the commonly understood definition of 'a property'. Is a property a static characteristic? — Mapping the Medium

I might be overreaching here, but this is what I think:

What you are getting at here is that we have abstract qualities like "sweetness" and "hardness" that gain meaning through relations determined by the process of hypostatic abstraction, and, thus, affixing the relevant quality to a subject requires human judgments. As such, certain relations humans might make seem to be rooted in mental phenomenon as any continuum or relation referenced by the process of hypostatic abstraction originates mentally. If that is the case, then the existence of sweetness, for example, only really exists as a cohesive whole in one's mind.

If that is the case, then some properties are not static, while others are. I'm thinking that the properties related through hypostatic abstraction are not static unless the subject possesses the quality of "y-ness" referenced in the original predicate intrinsically. So, while sweetness could take as many arguments as propositions indicating something is sweet exist, whether or not something possesses sweetness statically relies upon the qualities of the relevant subject(s).

Okay, this is how I see it:

If there are many propositions that could express that certain things are sweet, and sweetness is constructed from the properties of things being more or less sweet, then to turn the predicate "honey is sweet" into "honey has sweetness" seems valid, as it indicates a relation between one thing (honey) and a tangible property that corresponds to the original predicate being turned into a relation (that is to say the relation between things being more or less sweet and those things having the property of being sweet).

Therefore, it isn't really a category error, as this new "predicate of predicates" is derived from a physical reality: things are more or less sweet, and, thus, those things that qualify as being sweet are themselves more or less sweet depending upon a judgment. That is to say they possess sweetness - even if sweetness is not a monadic predicate in the sense that it only takes one argument. It could take many. Furthermore, if we (optionally) visualize a continuum of sweetness, it is clear that the statuses of other propositions regarding other things being sweet have no bearing on whether or not honey possesses sweetness.

So, my theory is that the "has" in "honey has sweetness" just represents a judgment that honey exists according to some measure of being sweet such that it possesses the more general property of sweetness by virtue of things being more or less sweet.

I think that it might be useful to look at the examples @Mapping the Medium has provided.

In terms of the honey example, this is my understanding: you can say honey is sweet, and that may be regarded as true depending on the perception that honey is indeed sweet, as you are stating a simple predicate. When you perform the hypostatic abstraction, however, you take that predicate and turn it into a relation between honey and the object "sweetness" (honey has sweetness). The logical functioning of introducing "sweetness" consists solely in the truth values of those propositions that possess the property of being sweet. This last part indicates that there is a collection of propositions that might indicate certain things are sweet, including the one we started with, and they must possess sweetness if sweetness is itself a measure that exists on a continuum that entails the property of "sweet".

If you guys think there is something wrong in there just say so; I'm sure there is.

I'm reading about him on Wikipedia and the SEP and it appears he just transposed firstness, secondness, and thirdness (terms he used when he was feeling appropriately abstract) onto a bunch of categories because he liked threes.

I think one could easily come up with some sort of relation that might justify more names. I mean, I read what he said about it, and he said that he just "thinks not" that we could endlessly perform hypostatic abstractions to derive more "intentions". So, I suppose that is the closest we might get to insight: he doesn't think it is useful to repeat the process past twice. For whatever reason.

I suppose in a concrete example of the type we talked about in this thread it would be useless to go past one or two applications of hypostatic abstraction, though. So I guess the examples might fit into the triad.

But I could be wrong on all of this, so take it with a grain of salt.

The first video, "Ecocide", was a little like being punched in the face. I definitely agree with the lyrics - I think they even capture an arguably appropriate attitude - and after reading about the band on Wikipedia I think I probably do agree with them in general, even the straight edge parts. I personally don't drink or do drugs (except caffeine) and think veganism is the way to go even if I have failed at it lately. I guess that means I'm not exactly living up to the wise words of Buechner at the moment. So, for me at least, T's all the way down. Cool that they like Peter Singer.

what Claude the A.I. tells you seems fishy to me.
— Arcane Sandwich

If you really think that I am trying to promote AI in my work, you are sorely mistaken, and there is no reason to discuss this further. — Mapping the Medium

No one is skeptical of you or your intentions, I think he just doesn't think much of AI.

If you carefully and thoroughly review my work, you will see how right you are and that nominalism is the problem. — Mapping the Medium

I don't know if I've said anything that goes against nominalism, honestly. I would just separate the abstract notion of hardness from something actually being "hard" in some cases, for example. I don't really think hardness as an idea is an independent entity, as it exists as a result of our perceptions and mental models of the world. No to mention, we couldn't have hardness if there was not a variety of things of various "hardnesses" as it might be measured, so these abstract continuums and such seem to arise naturally to me. Or maybe I'm being naive. I don't know.

Not that AI is useless. Maybe I'll read what you linked.

I got ChatGPT to tell me I solved the double-slit experiment once. Needless to say, it turned out to almost certainly be bullshit.

Taking your idea as a sketch, let me see if I can add some color to it. I would say:

(a) This honey tastes sweet to a human being.
(b) Therefore, this honey possesses sweetness in itself, if by "in itself" we mean an object-subject relation.
(c) Any object-subject relation can be reduced (abstracted away) to a something-something relation.
(d) And in a something-something relation, there are two individual variables, "x" and "y", such that something binds them, and that something is a relation.

However, that relation itself, can be treated either as a unary predicate, or as an individual variable "z", but then you would need a fourt element to play the role of the ternary, binding predicate.

Does that make any sense? I'm not sure that it does. — Arcane Sandwich

Yes, I think that makes sense. The object-subject relation between the honey and perceived sweetness is provided by relations that should be able to be abstracted until we can isolate it as two variables bound by some relation in the form of a unary predicate or something. At that point I suppose we could say that we have achieved...something.

This is the most rigorous representation I could come up with quickly of the current status of the example with the honey.  

The following argument can be made when someone tastes honey:

[[tastes]] = {(sweet: -> T), (like honey -> T)}

We also have another argument that seems necessary that says that:

[[tastes sweet]] = {possesses sweetness -> T}

This second argument is backed up by the fact that we know sweetness as a measure is entailed by the things that make something sweet and that “sweet” as a judgment occupies a region on some sort of sweetness continuum.

Therefore, the person in question could make the logically sound utterance after tasting the honey:

(a) This honey tastes sweet.
(b) Therefore, this honey possesses sweetness.

This is, clearly, only valid from the viewpoint of the person making the value-judgment associated with the honey tasting sweet. That is to say that in this example we see that the hypostatic abstraction is only valid with a subjective judgment made by a human and even then it is still limited by that person’s experiences, as someone else might not believe that honey qualifies as sweet (hypothetically; of course everyone finds honey to be sweet).

Thus, objectively, we cannot say that honey possesses sweetness in a general sense, as we are measuring it according to an inherently subjective measure.

But it's somehow "unsatisfactory", innit. I mean, if that humble first-order formula is all that I can possible contribute to this conversation, then that makes me quite sad. I take that as a personal flaw about my own persona, though. — Arcane Sandwich

You definitely helped me think about it more rigorously. And as far as I can tell there is plenty of room for more conjecture, so don't be glum! :up:

edit: you introduced rigor to the conversation. I shouldn't have just framed that in terms of myself. Sorry.

I would have to buy them. Maybe this coming month when I get my check.

edit: didn't read the free account part

Does that make any sense? — Arcane Sandwich

Not on its face, no. But I'll think about it.

edit: yes, that makes sense

Hypostatic abstraction is a formal operation in logic that transforms a predicate into a relation. For example, "Honey is sweet" is transformed into "Honey has sweetness". In this example, it might be thought of that 'sweetness' is now a 'property' of honey.
— Mapping the Medium

Here's how I might go about this from a formal point of view (again, I might be wrong about this, so, grain of salt and all of that sort of cautionary talk).

"Transforms a predicate into a relation". Using "honey", "sweet", and "sweetness" as the three basic terms, I would symbolize "honey" as an individual constant, "i", next I would symbolize "sweet" as a unary first-order predicate, "S", and finally I would (controversially) treat "sweetness" as an individual constant, not a predicate. Here is how that would work. There's two steps to it. The first step is this:

1) S(h). This means "honey, as an individual thing, has the property of being sweet."
2) S(hs). This means "honey, as an individual thing, and sweetness, as an individual thing, are related by the relation of "being sweet".

The problem here, however, is that you cannot say (1) and (2) at the same time. You cannot define "S" as a unary predicate and then attempt to use it as a two-place predicate. Either you use two different predicates, or you go about this in a completely different way. — Arcane Sandwich

Your logic looks correct to me. S(hs) just reflects that honey is not intrinsically sweet. We know it isn't because the relation of being sweet in S(hs) is based in that we know that there are observable qualities that make honey sweet, and we also know what makes something sweet in general. Since we cannot prescind the sweetness of honey from the existence of fructose/glucose, we conclude that to measure the fructose/glucose in a sample of honey is to measure its sweetness. Thus, sweetness is not a static property, but rather one that can more or less be measured, and, thus, to claim that honey possesses the property of being sweet is an abstract value judgment based on a measure of sweetness.

What they have in common is where we need to focus our investigation into the rewards and pitfalls of hypostatic abstraction. — Mapping the Medium

That's a little vague.

I suppose you are referring to that we cannot rightly perform a hypostatic abstraction if the thing in question does not possess that trait intrinsically without some amount of subjective or linguistic value-assignment. Thus, I do think @alleybear is/was on to something.

edit: sorry for presuming you to be male.

edit 2: fixed the language I used.

I think he was just referring to the emission of light, which is directly related to the energy it emits. To take issue with the wording because it would require organisms to perceive that energy for it to technically qualify as "light" seems a little pedantic. But maybe he'll indicate what he meant.

The sun is bright. ... The sun has brightness.

Is brightness a static, intrinsic property of the sun? — Mapping the Medium

Yes, I would say it is intrinsic. There is either light or no light, and so long as a light exists it has a brightness. Therefore, the sun must have brightness so long as it exists. This is to say that anything that exudes light must exist on the continuum of brightness and must therefore have brightness. This is only negated when the sun ceases to exist, at which point it no longer needs to have the quality of having brightness for it to have possessed brightness intrinsically; that the quality of this brightness depends upon the sun's existence, and would persist for its whole lifespan, means it is intrinsic to the sun.

But is 'hardness' a static, intrinsic property of a diamond? — Mapping the Medium

No, because hardness is a trait associated with a continuum implied by our language and abstraction of the term. So, what is defined as hard can change, even if diamonds are probably hard by most measures.

Is hardness a static, intrinsic property of a diamond? ... Does a diamond possess hardness? — Mapping the Medium

I would start by seeing if the language indicates that the quality of hardness can exist on a continuum and if such a thing can be measured. In the case of hardness, it does look like it can exist on a continuum, and if we can determine that diamonds exist at some point on this continuum (presumably all diamonds are of equal hardness) such that they measure up as being hard, we can then say that they possess the quality of hardness. How we measure hardness I'm not sure, but I do think this makes diamonds intrinsically, or at least statically, hard.

I see sweetness and beauty, when used to describe something, as value judgements. Value judgements are analog; measures of fructose or glucose are specific and digital. Sometimes there is relevant correspondence between analog notation points and digital ones, and sometimes there isn't. — alleybear

So, do you think there is sufficient correspondence between fructose/glucose and perceived sweetness (value judgment)? It sounds like you must if you think sweetness is not a static property of honey. Or so it seems to me from the angle you're taking.

Hypostatic abstraction is a formal operation in logic that transforms a predicate into a relation. For example, "Honey is sweet" is transformed into "Honey has sweetness". In this example, it might be thought of that 'sweetness' is now a 'property' of honey.

My question to you is this .... In this example, is 'sweetness' truly a static property of honey? It is true that we can measure the amount of fructose and glucose in a specific sample of honey, but can we discern the differences in quality of sweetness to the taster? Consider the same with the word 'beauty'. — Mapping the Medium

I think that since we just predicated the quality of sweetness to honey, we have to ask what the degree of separation the quality of sweetness has from objective, scientific markers of what makes something more or less sweet - if they exist. It does indeed seem that the sweetness of a sample of honey cannot be prescinded from the amount of fructose or glucose that exists in that sample of honey (science has shown us that those things directly cause a perception of sweetness), or what would be causing that perception of sweetness? A hallucination? Therefore, the synechistic layer resides in that the sweetness of honey must exist on a continuum that relates smoothly to a scientific measure. As such, I would say that sweetness is not a static property of honey because we can measure the changes in intensity.

Okay, maybe; but why would any for-profit corporation or military organization ever build an "ethical android" that would be useless as either a slave or a killer? — 180 Proof

Think about this: if you were to have an android in your house that would help take care of your family or something, or even if we just had androids walking around doing things at all, people would undoubtedly want these androids to be able to behave morally because they would inevitably be in positions to act morally. And, if that is what the consumers would want, I think corporations would provide it.

So, while there is a difference between an android capable of behaving morally and an android that has substantial moral beliefs like a human might, corporations will have incentives to create some sort of android that can behave ethically. In the OP I'm just discussing androids that are internally morally comparable to humans.

Furthermore, an ethical android is no more useless as a slave or a killer than a well-programmed human, so already we see that people tend towards thinking about these androids inconsistently.

edit: also: when I say "beliefs", I really do mean beliefs comparable to what humans have, not just habits.

I find that poem very compelling and think things may ultimately play out that way. I think Brautigan said more about it in a short poem than I could in a book.

edit: to be clear this is the first time I've seen this poem.

edit 2: I get it. The further along the path we get to the end situation in which we are "watched over by machines of loving grace" the stronger the urge or necessity of getting there. What a brilliant poem. I suppose giving androids the same status as humans with or without a means of self-reflection would advance us towards that end.