Scholar

Maybe you don't think it is accurate because you still view the world through a very individualistic lense? Be open-minded that there is a reason for why you value what you value, for why you find certain argument compelling and others not, for why you agree with John Glubb instead of someone like Ken Wilber. What you value will determine how you will perceive the world. And how you perceive the world will determine what you will think to be true and false.

I have stopped to admire people for their grand achievements, I don't see anything special in Napoleon other than unfortunate genetics that allowed him to accomplish his egotistical needs. Someone who has the capacity to spare a creature like a spider despite fearing it to me is more admirable than Napoleon could have ever been, even if he conquered the entire world. I wonder how you would have talked about Hilter if he did succeed in creating the Third Reich. What if the world indeed would be better off without the jews? Would you then be sitting here and arguing for why Hilter had admiring qualities despite his relative cruelness? I could list a hundred people who I find far more extraoridnary than Napoleon. What you value, what you find extraoridnary and admirable, depends on your level of consciousness. Do you think Jesus would have listed Napoleon in his top 5 human beings ever? To me it seems like you are very biased towards Napoleon because you are attached to him. Especially because you have been reading about him from such a young age, it is likely that you have attached your identity to him.

Yes but then would you not agree that Napoleon was exceptionally ruthless and egotistical?

Yes but I don't think we also should just relativize everything to a point where everyone is basically just a person with some flaws. I would state that Napoleon and people like him were exceptionally egotistical and ruthless, otherwise they could have not assumed the positions of power they did. If I for example would compare Napoleon to Marcus Aurelius, I would say Marcus was definitely less egoic than him. But even he was embedded in a culture of imperialism. When you ask the people who had to live with the consequences of what Napoleon did and what Hitler did, you will probably get very similar responses. This is even true in contemporary contexts, where the imperialism of the US in the middle east is viewed as pure evil by those who are effected by it. Sure Hilter was more ruthless, but he also existed in a different historical context. We have to recognize that both of them were basically pure evil in the eyes of those who suffered greatly as a result of their conduct. Would you ever argue that a person who rapes children but also runs a non-profit charity that cures cancer is a person with some flaws?

Alright, I have not done too much research into it so you could be right. I think the entire point Leo was making was that this attitude of war and exploitation is so normalized that we don't even look at it like it was particulary egotistical. "Oh Napoleon just fought for france, he was just good at his job! And besides he did so many good things for france!" This entire attitude is a result of completely blatant self-bias. How could Napoleon have done what he did if he had not been ruthless? It's not like Napoleon stayed in france and defended it from foreign invasions. He was the conqueror. To be imperialistic you have to be egotistical.

So what did he say in the video that was unfactual?

Watch the video I posted above, about Napoleon's greatest foe. You can then research the names of the villages he mentions to verify it for yourself.

Napoleon destroyed entire villiages of innocent people who had nothing to do with the war, who were completely neutral, and from whoms destruction he gained no strategic advantage at all. He killed thousands of people because he felt like it. I think you really need to read up on Napoleon, the guy was a narssicistic maniac. Sure, he was also a strategic genius and fought for france, but in what world is that a justification for murdering innocent people, conquering and invading countries etc.? Napoleon is highly romanticized. Noone here is using barbaric as a description of Goths. I think you know what we mean when we say barbaric here.

I think any historian would call Agustus Caesar barbaric, in the common sense of the word. By the way you are arguing, you could say Hitler just did what was best for Germany. The only difference would be that Hitler failed while Napoleon had some temporary success.

@Nemo28 Essentially the answer is "Because Nemo28ness is not Dogness". It's like asking "How can there be individual atoms when the universe is one unified field or wave-function?". It's like asking "How can there be green while there is red?" By framing it this way you are already begging the question. You already assume that there is such a thing as possession, or some sort of metaphysical idenity. This right here is like a grain of sand. Look at how many grains of sand there are. Each grain of sand is it's own grain of sand, how is that even possible? Instead of buying into your thoughts of seperation, question them, look at them. What is "two thing"-ness? What is the substance of "two-thing"-ness? What is the substance of "me-vs-the-dog"-ness?

I think this is a very Stage Orange way of looking at politics. You seek to increase freedom while protecting the non-aggression principle, and that way you seek to structure your political system. A stage Green political system would be structured around compassion, cooperations and equality. It would limit freedom whenever it would compromise these three values. Direct democracy would not be possible because the majority will vote against the minority. Freedom will not be possible because it allows for systems of discrimination and inequality to propogate. It's not simply about "As long as you don't hurt anyone, you are fine." it's about "We have to help each other as long as we are unequal.". In the extreme, a stage orange system would allow starving people to death while you have the capacity to help them. A strage green system on the other hand would enforce the world so as that this could not take place. Also, a problem of direct democracy is that the population is not perfectly informed, allowing established forces of power to control the information flow and thus control the will of the population, an example of this is the Cambridge Analytica scandal, but it goes far deeper than that. Freedom leads to destabilization due to the natural way powerstructures evolve. A stage green political system would seek the well-being of their citizens as a priority, even if that meant limiting their freedom. A stage orange system based on freedom however might allow people to self-destruct if it was their will. Yet, stage Green recognizes the futulity of choice, and knows that no choice is truly free, especially in systems that are governed by misinformation and opressive power structures.

Give that a listen. Especially the part when Napeleon exterminated an entire village just because he was frustrated. Hitler established animal welfare regulations, like requiring breaks for the transportation of pigs. There was also this prominent figure who didn't like when soldiers would treat the jews badly before executing them. That hardly makes them saints.

Which is why I told you that it is paramount to find a meat-replacement, like lab grown meat, instead of waiting for cultural changes that might take decades. Again, even if we are the soy that the animals ate, we would reduce the amount of it being produced substantially. Cows require far, far more soy to produce the same amount of calories in meat. Whether people want to eat soy or not is their choice, even if everyone ate soy instead of meat we would be far better off than now. But you yourself recognize that this is not a solution that can be implemented in time. So again, meat replacement is of utmost importance.

Exactly. This is what we are doing here. Figuring it out.

How do you propose to fix the issue?

Because Brazilian forests are not the only thing people are worried about, aside from the fact that humanitarian organisations don't save forests.

Yes but the problem is that the market will find solutions to cheapen the prices at all costs. They will lobby, they will invade other countries and burn their forests down. They will incentivise goverments to support them. Don't forget that they are being funded by everyone who buys meat. That's billions of people. That won't just go away by regulation, especially when people aren't even informed that the problem is the meat industry. Currently you have western goverments subsidizing the costs of meat. Because of the demand of entire populations, goverments will use taxes to make meat affordable. And they have to, it's what the people want. The people want meat. Either we change the people's wants, or we find a better way to produce meat. I don't see any other viable option that will solve this problem in any meaningful way. If we had all the time in the world it would be different. But the facts are that our time is very limited. The only way to stop this it to create radical change.

Ban soy to feed the animals? What else are you going to feed them with? Grass, that requires far more land use than soy? Soy already is the most efficient way of feeding landstock. Again, these solutions will do nothing to change anything as long as people demand and pay for this industry every single day of their life. "I don't want you to burn down the forests!" "Here, take my money, I want me beef." These two actions are contradictory. You can't have both. It's not possible. Sometimes there are no regulations to be made, sometimes the population needs to sacrifice it's own comfort for the greater good. Or atleast be smart about the solutions. Regulations will be effective once there will be an alternative to animal farming, because then we will be able to satisfy the populations need. Do you still consume beef? If so, how can you possibly expect brazil to make a huge economic sacrifice to save their forests when you can't even let go of your steak to do the same?

It would be more helpful for you cease interpreting my words from your own mental framework and instead try to learn from what I am trying to communicate to you. You have no understanding of Goodness and Evilness, you treat them as mental abstrations, when they are a very fundamental part of the way the ego constructs and interfaces with reality. Just look at it, look at how it is here right now, while you are denying that it exists. Your framework is so utterly confused that you still believe morality could reflect the outside world. But both morality and outside world are mental constructions within mind. You intermingle aspects of consciousness and further delude yourself. Just look at what is going on instead of creating new ideas. As long as your ego reacts to everything I am telling you with an attempt to debunk it to show off your intellectual superiority, you will not learn anything at all. Goodness and Evilness only cease to exist once the ego ceases to create them. It has nothing to do with an external world, it has nothing to do with objective prescriptions or moral realism. You keep operating within mental constructions while I am pointing you to the substance of realness itself. The flowing of time exist only as a mental idea in your head. As long as you cannot see that what I just told you is clearly and undoubtedly the case, you will be confused. I am not pointing you to labels, I am telling you that all labels are just that, labels. What you need to see is things beyond labels, which you so clearly struggle to do. Otherwise you would realize that all the questions you asked are like asking what Santa Clause is eating for breakfast.

I don't think it works for him at all, he is deeply confused and anything short of direct experience will just make him more confused and ideological. He doesn't need more fancy non-dual explanation. What he needs is to look at direct experience. This is like arguing what the color red is without ever having experienced it. Once you have clearly seen and identified it, we can move on to mental constructions.

I am not sure you understand the gravity of the problem of animal agriculture. There is no other solution but to replace it. Watch the video Keyhole posted. Theres fires have been going on for years now. Not just in the amazon.

I disagree, I think questions this fundamental require the absence of mental constructions, not a reconstruction. Making him believe that time is an illusion doesn't help him if he doesn't even know what time is, or what illusion is.

You will not find answers by creating more elaborate constructions of thoughts and ideas. You are trapped in your concepts, you replace one concept with another. Time is this, time is that. Time is an illusion. Time is relative. Consciousness is time. All of these statements are utterly absurd and untrue. Time is one thing and one thing only. Time is time. You will not find insight into the nature of reality by shuffling concepts around, you will only find insight by looking at that which you seek to know. The looking is the recognition and the recognition that which it is. Good and Evil exist too. It is clear as day, I can be directly aware of these two fascets of realness. They are as real as anything else could be real. To see the truth you must stop confusing different aspects of realness for each other. Time is time. Good is Good. Evil is Evil. There is nothing that is evil, there is nothing that is time, there is nothing that is round, there is nothing that is fast. Only fastness is fast, only roundness is round and only time is time. Time is not an illusion. Only illusion is illusion. All you have to do is look mindfully. Stop confusing your thoughts for that which is not thought.

I wonder if anyone is using psychedelics in a non-pleasant environment to develope oneself? For example, using it while watching terrible war videos or slaughterhouse footage. It seems like most of the time the more pleasent aspects of reality are being investigated, but why do we not investigate the terrible ones? Maybe we can gain deeper insights into the nature of suffering that we have not yet discovered? I mean saying suffeirng is illusion is a very surface level insight, maybe there is more to it? Maybe there is depth of these aspects, and maybe their unpleasentness makes us avoid to truly dive into them?

But how do you know this? Have you ever taken psychedelics while confronting suffering outside of the psychedelic experience itself? Infact, do you know a single person who did this intentionally? From me it seems like psychedelics are being used in a perfect bubble, instead of the full spectrum of reality, because it is uncomfortable to us. But how can we expect to learn about all aspects of the relative world if we are only willing to face our microcosm of spirituality. Should spirituality and psychedelic use not be all encompassing? Look at people like Christ who was directly confronting suffering. What spiritual teacher, even the most advanced ones like Sadhguru, do you see actually helping the poorest of the poor? I see a lot of talk about Love, but I do not see action. Would Leo for example be able to compose himself in a situation in which those around him suffering greatly, want to kill him etc.? How can we expect to understand Love in all it's fascets if we just sit in our perfectly designed caves? What if a bad trip is nothing compared to a bad trip confronting suffering? And what if it requires that inhuman amount of suffering for us to get a deeper understanding of it? Can you have true empathy for someone who exists in terror, if you yourself have never truly experienced terror yourself? If we knew what terror was, could we still watch idly while others are experiencing it? Would we not behave fundamentally differently if we knew what it is like to be enslaved?