commie

4+3!=15 being true isn't a result of my rules but of our rules. Languages are social, even if they have strange connections to non-social things. I'm not trying to prove anything nor am I claiming that you broke rules exactly... you didn't seem to be using any! Of course I don't know all the rules but my assumption is that on a forum such as this one, you'd use rules everyone would recognize (as you did when you brought up an addition) or start by talking about the rules you intended to use... The separation which seems most obvious to me (because it's what I happen to believe) would be that seeds, trees and so forth might be mental objects whereas "something" might not be. Where are mental objects and does that mean there is a connection or not? That would depend on how the mind works, and of course on what you mean exactly by "connection". And in mainstream cosmology (since you bring up the big bang), there are of course different ways in which places in the universe aren't in causal contact with each other anymore. So you could say the connection is broken. Certainly the way you've sometimes described connections ("is happening", "influencing", "during" and so forth) wouldn't apply to non-causal connections. We've already talked physics and computers but this kind of separation is also part of life, isn't it? Even without sexual reproduction, the offspring is more than just a continuation, especially after many generations. Again, there is a sort of connection in the past but remote ancestors aren't "still happening now". Yes, the life forms we know are part of a larger "something" but if we don't know anything about "something", there might not be any "super-something" nor do we know if it has parents or children or if the family stays in touch. Sure. I only brought that up because of the context in which you originally introduced "something" (people were talking about "layers" for instance).

The fractured "something" is of course not a feature of physicalism which has a non-dual "cosmology/ontology" and merely fractures your direct experience from "something" in a way you can't experience directly. Of course there must be some kind of connection, or we'd simply have two "somethings" instead of a fractured "something". But this connection could in principle take any form (continuing with the computing analogy, it could for instance involve only partial output and not the program itself) and could already be over (assuming "something" happens in time). We are both making things up (specifically, sentences) and all we can achieve is making sense. Languages have complicated rules, and as a result we can for instance say that 4+3==7 is true. What I've been claiming here is that you're not following rules which would allow you to say anything conclusive about "something".

All I'm saying is that you could be wrong, in at least two ways: Most obviously, there could be some kind of separation within a united "something" preventing us from being aware of this "something". That's what the mainstream physicalist account of our experience amounts to so I assume you're familiar with its implications: the "mystery" would indeed be going on during the "inquiry" but the unstated part of your argument would not follow. That is, there would be at least two layers, something outside of any infinity you perceive and so forth. But while physicalism guarantees a kind of unity (quite possibly encompassing all there is) foundational to our experiences , if we're not going as you've argued to make any assumptions about "something" then there is no reason to assume such a unity. Perhaps the "mystery" stops before the "inquiry" or perhaps they're separated in other ways. If anything is possible, what do we know? The programs do, in principle at least. The whole point of a general-purpose computer is that you can run different programs on it, which also means you could run its program on a completely different (and possibly completely separate) general-purpose computer. Though it would be a poor design, a computer could for instance run the "mystery" program for a millisecond then switch to the "inquiry" program and then back to the "mystery" again... Whether an experience such has ours can be the product of a computer program or not, I was only talking about behavior (programs can for instance produce words which can fool us into believing we're talking to someone like us as opposed to a crude artifice).

No, you didn't tag me or something. I also didn't say you were wrong. My only accusation was about the way you're using language (and again, it's not just you) so information doesn't come into it. No. For what it's worth, "in some way connected" is broad enough to encompass my perspective. But while we might agree about the theory if we bothered to formulate it rigorously, I don't think it is at all obvious that we actually experience the same (no)thing. In fact, I don't know that you experience anything at all and our agreement wouldn't help considering a computer can be programmed to agree for instance. I merely believe that our experiences are similar. The problem is with the "simply ask" part I highlighted. Namely, "could what ever the mystery of whats going on, not be going during the inquiry of doing so". As has already been pointed out, you're effectively assuming your non-dual conclusion. It's hidden within appeals to simplicity and other verbal ornaments but that was the central argument of your post, isn't it? Certainly I'd say that's been the central issue this whole discussion about layers, infinity and whatnot revolves upon.

Quite simply, the ends of capitalists as a class. As an illustration, you might look at the priorities underlying the macroeconomic response to this pandemic for instance. An even more topical example might be the way the "movement towards socialism" (which just won the election in Bolivia) is celebrated for having presided over a pretty impressive GDP growth.

The word you were looking for was "meaningless". 62% is quite intelligible, as is the difference between 61% and 62% for instance. Considering you're writing on this forum, the UK very likely doesn't have a fundamentally different system than the one you're used to. Certainly it's very similar to the US system. Depending on how you define "socialist" and "capitalist", every major country today has such a hybrid. But the real issue I think is whether the system serves capitalist ends or not, that is whether it's basically capitalist or not. In that sense, every major country is capitalist. Indeed, the world is.

I don't have similar "hookups" and I advise you to listen to your contradictor(s) in this thread. Because you can of course be simply wrong, appeals to simplicity will not protect anyone from delusion. Quite the contrary. I don't mean to single you out (there are worst offenders in this thread) but you aren't speaking from experience when you're misusing language in order to argue for unwarranted conclusions.

It looks like Trump and gang are behaving as if they hoped that all ballots wouldn't be counted but I don't understand how they'd be able to steal the election through the college that way. Sure, they could steal southern states (except VA) but I don't see how they can get enough electoral votes without somehow stealing a state which has a Democratic governor or which is so blue its Republican governor is anti-Trump. Do tell what I'm missing.

I try not to identify myself as a man but I have to concede I've occasionally gotten people angry with that attitude. In some circumstances, I guess I might lie and say I want to be called "he" or something to avoid trouble but my circumstances are such that I can't recall the last time I've had to do something like this (unless of course you're talking about my legal identity but allowing a consumer credit company to identify me for instance isn't lying, and it's not like I would willing choose a slaveholder's title as most forms expect of us anyway).

I don't have your experiences but I agree with you, or at least with what I read into your post (we might use the same word to mean something different). So your opinion might be grounded on something a bit more universal. The one thing in your post I don't get is identifying as "male" because it's the life you've been given. I don't identify as a man. Not only do I not feel that I've been given that identity somehow, I think that submitting to identities thrust upon you is quite dangerous (especially when it comes to nationalism). But this disagreement might be more about semantics more than anything else.

I can't speak about your situation since you say so little about it but... Gender is of course only a word. Understanding what it means only matters for the purpose of skillful communication, which means you might have to understand several meanings in order to communicate effectively with different people. Speaking for myself using my understanding of gender, I wasn't born with a gender. I'm uncomfortable with the gender I present as and do not always conform to that gender but I never considered transitioning. In my opinion, being uncomfortable isn't a reason to transition. That's for people who think they would actually be comfortable conforming to another gender (or if transitioning might protect them from persecution). Also keep in mind there are different ways to transition but that even the most extensive medical interventions won't turn a male into a female (which doesn't make them any less vital for some people of course). Unless it is a matter of safety from persecution, don't let anyone tell you you need to be this or that or to do this or that in order to look feminine to behave in a feminine way. What you really want is what matters, not words or ideology.

I'm not sure it's obvious actually. I've not seen these videos but I've heard rather clever folks being critical of science and it seems to always come down to people confusing a philosophical assumption or an ideology prevailing among particular groups of scientists with science or simply to confusing scientism with science. If you think you are special and that your critiques are actually relevant to science, maybe start by explaining very carefully what the object of your critiques is in order to avoid the misunderstandings which seem to plague most (if not all) discussions of this topic.

Here's what infection might look like: When you hear someone talk again and again about conspiracy theories, typically you also hear them talk about the joos.

I offer my condolences for your dog. Proper nihilism would mean mean no truth, no paradise or world to be liberated from... and indeed an emptiness of sorts (not believing in things). Believers often figure that without sharia, unbelievers have no morals. In the same way, some people misunderstand nihilism. Caring doesn't come from beliefs or meaning anymore than morality comes from authority.

The main problem with Brexit these last few years has been that people are treating "Brexit" as a magic word when it's all about the complicated details and not about whether or not the UK is in the EU. In the long run, freeing the EU from the English is probably worth this mess. I expect it will also force the EU to deal more constructively with nearby third countries.

It's not going to be adopted obviously, which makes this pretense of rationality ludicrous. It's obviously much easier to get public actors to commit to something. As a matter of fact, the official sector is way ahead of the private sector in providing pandemic-related debt relief for instance. Excuses for selfishness, dressed up in fancy but empty words.

If this scale is for income, the amounts are ridiculously low (my personal scale so far has been around 50% over 15K and substantial but varying amounts occasionally exceeding 100% under that). And a second scale for wealth is needed. The whole notion is silly anyway. The rich have that money because they're taking it from others, which is their role in this economy anyway. And if some rich people decide to give away a lot of money, others are going to become richer than them which means there is an inbuilt tendency for the rich as a class to lower the gross amount they give away. Therefore it's not their responsibility to give it away but the responsibility of the people to take it away from them.

The veto simply reflects the fact that if the USA, Russia, France or China are in principle powerful enough to torpedo any decision. Likewise the others aren't going to stop any ignominy if one of them backs it all the way. The UK hardly belongs in that club anymore but I don't think keeping it in is such an exorbitant privilege. Are you simply talking about the federation of NGOs? That's of course nothing like a world government. A federation would be something like the EU, but with global membership. And while the EU could have done better, it did act effectively in response to the pandemic.

Isn't this causing simply part of the net?

There's more to the UN the the security council and of course there are the non-permanent members. Permanent membership is more of a privilege than a monopoly, and is obviously outdated as you say. But there is more to it than history, namely that the US, Russia, France and China are nuclear and space powers. From that pragmatic perspective, the UK should be replaced with India. But really, the main political issue is the role of the general assembly rather than the composition of the security council. The UN isn't a federation so can't do much specifically in response to things like the pandemic and isn't supposed to. UN agencies do of course help people who can't help themselves but that's not what you're talking about I think and is work which could in principle be carried out outside of the UN even though it makes sense to do it within the framework of the most inclusive intergovernmental forum on Earth.

Your beef with unspecified mendacious hunters has nothing to do with the statement you were responding to. Do you understand why you're doing this?

That isn't much better than the average conspiracy theory you see online. Your assumption is unwarranted and you ignore the actual arguments which are a matter of public record and instead posit not just character flaws (which are of course plausible) but unspecified "corruption". Which is to say that I do not agree that: The issue isn't false equivalencies because while the implied equivalencies are misused in the OP, they're not false since certainty about the claims mentioned by the OP is indeed unwarranted. An education in critical thinking might ameliorate your take on the politics of climate change for instance (and more generally keep people from using what's socially acceptable in their circle as a guide for what to think) but the issue with the OP has to do with basic reasoning and decision-making skills instead. It's not skillful to "believe" (as you say) or to be "100% sure" (as the OP says) in/of facts. Depending on the context, the appropriate tools might be probabilities or preponderance of the evidence.

Leaving aside your misplaced certainties, your first reason has to do with the amounts consumed and not with the consumption of animals generally (which the OP's question and indeed much of the rest of your post is about). Your second conflate suffering and death in the face of social trends favoring the latter over the former. And your third again has do with specific ways animals are raised, not the principle. The OP compared human consumption of animals to the actions of wild carnivores. I sometimes encounter groups of wild grazing animals when I take a walk. A human hunter is if anything likely to cause less harm to such animals than wild hunters or indeed disease or old age. And it's naturally quite efficient to raise herds of domesticated grazing animals (which look if anything as if they're suffering less than their wild counterparts) in the same area. It's even necessary to preserve this environment.

But climate change is all about uncertainty! There is no certainty about how bad the problem is and therefore what preventive measures would be proportionate. From the first, the main rationale for action has always been based on uncertainty (specifically, on the risk of extremely serious outcomes). I think your aversion to mental gymnastics is leading you to use language unskillfully ("evil", "real", "equivalent" and so forth).

Yeah, the vegan vs. meat eater thing was hilarious. So this isn't about certainty at all. There are things I'm certain about but I'm not defensive at all about them. Why would I be? Defensiveness may arise purely from emotions or (super)ego but it often arises primarily due to lack of certainty.