So we agree on desert after all? I thought you thought I was wrong. You said as much more than once.Burning Ghost:
You seem to know what I haven't thought even though I thought about that, as I assume every one had, since they were a teenager??? I am truly baffled why you think I would not want to ask that question or haven't answered it the same as you. I just did so, so damn long ago I no longer consider it worth driving at someone else because I assume people are not quite so dumb as you seem to assume me to be.
Maybe we're just the only two enlightened individuals on this forum, or maybe what you are appealing to is pretty much old news to everyone here (as it is to me.)
Steve Pinker Lambasts American Left for Political Correctness
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Re: Steve Pinker Lambasts American Left for Political Correctness
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Re: Steve Pinker Lambasts American Left for Political Correctness
Oh, thank you for clearing that up. I was waiting with bated breath.Daschund:
Yes, the term "Sausage Dog" is common slang for "Dachshund" in England and Australia. In the US, however, the public call them "Weiner Dogs", (a weiner is a sausage in North America).
But it is wrong to break down the term dachshund into its two syllables dachs and hund and say that dachs = sausage.
Dachshund in a German word; "dachs" = the German term for a European badger", while "hund" = the German word for dog.
So a Dachshund is literally speaking, a "(European) badger dog". This came about because Dachshunds were originally bred in rural Germany ( c 1500s, I think) to hunt European badgers (farmers wanted to get rid of the badgers from their land as they were regarded a pest). In time, using Dachshunds for hunting Europoean badgers became a sport in the sense that fox hunting was a sport. There are still sporting Dachshund Clubs in Europe and the US, though I disapprove of them, as I think the practice of using "blooded" Dachshunds to hunt down prey is very cruel ( just as fox hunting is cruel). Hunting or "Sporting" Dachshunds are called TecKels ( German) BTW; my Dachshund is merely a harmless, domestic pet, though, and in Germany miniature pet Dachshunds like mine are called "Dackels".
You realize that to have a political view is not reference in the past tense. Where are your arguments? I am beginning to believe, quite sincerely, that you really don't understand that a political idea has its cash value exclusively in policy making, not in nostalgia, not in some wobbly narrative. Speak it, man! Say how it something is politically defensible in terms of the policy it endorses. You come beating your breast, offended by liberals being simply dismissive of the conservative mentality, not giving you a fair shake; well, here is your chance: do tell! Read the objections I have put to you and take me to task.
Or, are you like Donald, and think in time, people will just forget all you've boasted about, and regale one more time about how Nietzsche was a Burkian, or Trump a neo-feudalist, or the rest. Not too far from John Boehner, who, when asked about his anti-gay beliefs deferred to his aunt, who "just didn't think it was right" to be gay, thereby letting his auntie legislate. No defense, just his late auntie told him so, and that was good enough.
I think of you when I think of Boehner.
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Re: Steve Pinker Lambasts American Left for Political Correctness
I don't remember the precise words I used, and I don't really need to because I know my position on this matter - would make more sense if the need continues to take up that discussion again in the relevant thread? Was it in this one? What is this thread about now ... oh yeah! Political Correctness, and the strange idea of Pinker "lambasting" with his softly spoken manner.
No, I was against the victimhood mentality. The idea of saying "life's not fair," and "I deserve better".
I have repeated several times that life is not fair and saying someone doesn't derserve more than you is a pathetic way to approach life - true or not. When someone is good at something we applaud them because we admire what is good, but we don't applaud someone simply because they tried hard.
It doesn't take much thought to understand why this is. If someone tries to save people from a small fire and ends up, due to incompetence, burning an entire building to the ground and indirectly causing the death of several families we don't applaud them merely for their effort (the opposite!), whilst someone capable rushing in and putting out the fire saving the building and perhaps saving someone is applauded (sometimes) for their efforts.
You could even agrue in the above scenario that the incompetent person applied more effort. That doesn't make the amount of effort, nor the intention, more praise worthy.
None of this is to deny that a meritocracy doesn't suffer from various flaws. Nor am I saying some people are not justified when they complain; pretty much everyone has had justification to scream at the harshness of human existence for one reason or another.
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Re: Steve Pinker Lambasts American Left for Political Correctness
Put the matter to then, to rest; but then you say this. Our inquiry is not interested in the general regard for the unfortunate good deed doer. if that is all we wanted, we could just put thoughtful analysis away and not bother. But here we bother, and their is nothing pathetic in this. Indeed, this is the way understanding evolves. So putting aside what people would say, give the man his due: what is the basis for applauding the his "competitor" who was successful? It was the practical results, and with what does this rest? It rests with those abilities the man was "given"; his ability to "beat" his competitor for applause, you might say, issues entirely from the advantages that have nothing to do with some free willed and independent agency of action. The proper motivations rose to the occasion, while "he" was, in simple terms, lucky. And luck is morally arbitrary.urning Ghost:
I don't remember the precise words I used, and I don't really need to because I know my position on this matter - would make more sense if the need continues to take up that discussion again in the relevant thread? Was it in this one? What is this thread about now ... oh yeah! Political Correctness, and the strange idea of Pinker "lambasting" with his softly spoken manner.
No, I was against the victimhood mentality. The idea of saying "life's not fair," and "I deserve better".
I have repeated several times that life is not fair and saying someone doesn't derserve more than you is a pathetic way to approach life - true or not. When someone is good at something we applaud them because we admire what is good, but we don't applaud someone simply because they tried hard.
It doesn't take much thought to understand why this is. If someone tries to save people from a small fire and ends up, due to incompetence, burning an entire building to the ground and indirectly causing the death of several families we don't applaud them merely for their effort (the opposite!), whilst someone capable rushing in and putting out the fire saving the building and perhaps saving someone is applauded (sometimes) for their efforts.
You could even agrue in the above scenario that the incompetent person applied more effort. That doesn't make the amount of effort, nor the intention, more praise worthy.
None of this is to deny that a meritocracy doesn't suffer from various flaws. Nor am I saying some people are not justified when they complain; pretty much everyone has had justification to scream at the harshness of human existence for one reason or another.
I agree, this is quite elementary. But as you seem to know, people do not think like this at all. People praise the great deeds of some and celebrate them, never asking about originary endowments and the justification for their distribution.
The importance of this is really not so obvious, though. It tells us that there is no ethical foundation for the world we are each thrown into, that no one deserves what they get at all, for desert needs justification, that is, when we say X deserves Y, there must be something other than the arbitrary conditions of fate and fortune. Pol Pot committed atrocities, but did he deserve to be an amoral deplorable? As much as I despise Trump, I do not blame Trump: I blame the arbitrary conditions that compels and drives him.
Of course, the question here turns to agency. That is where this leads.
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Re: Steve Pinker Lambasts American Left for Political Correctness
We see this kind of thing in sports where people berate themselves in their youth for squandering opportunities.
The positive product (however that is deemed) is worthy of praise - it is self evident that the praise is justified, although the degree of effort put in by someone may vary greatly.
In a utopian world things would be different, and I am all for setting up a vision of a better future. I am also cautious about forcing such ideals into existence when we're so mind-numbingly ignorant about so much. Human existence is a delicate balance.
It generally doesn't enter people's minds when viewing a masterpiece that the person who produced it doesn't deserve praise (ironically in some circumstance they often don't live to receive it anyway.) This is why we refer to humility as a virtue. Those that seek praise are somewhat broken inside; and I think we all seek praise in some form or another, maybe more indirectly and less visibily at a glance, nevertheless idea of the unsung hero is the most admirable kind, the mythos of the ideal human being - hence the symbolism used throughout religious history and the reason why I do heap praise upon the work of Carl Gustav Jung.
What is quite a curious, and perverse thing, is that when we "praise" or "admire" someone it is really almost a sense of self-achievement. We, in some form or another, admire our aesthetic sensibilities and intellect for being able to recognize such a worthy artifact of human existence - we greedily feed from it.
The darker side of every good deed makes it good. We just don't tend to skulk in the shadows or we'd end up confusing the darkness as elucidation, when it is from the light of understanding that the darkness is revealed (the analogy of The Cave works well enough here.)
And yes, the question of agency is the crux and hence the insufferable position of victimhood takes hold over the idea of taking some responsibility for your position even if you don't believe you're the one at fault - and you can usually be sure this is to some extent a two way road so we're better off trying to turn the flow in our favour if we believe in the "good" at all. If not the path of destruction spreads.
What is forever a puzzling thing to me is understanding how incredibly dark I am and facing that full on. It is not something I can in all honesty recommend to do, because it could do serious harm. We have no rule book other than our own honesty to ourselves buttressed by our best attempts at bold exploration into the world we find ourselves. It is quite remarkable we're not all (completely) mad! haha!
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Re: Steve Pinker Lambasts American Left for Political Correctness
I take it that the nature of goodness and love is the implicit theme of the original title.It doesn't take much thought to understand why this is. If someone tries to save people from a small fire and ends up, due to incompetence, burning an entire building to the ground and indirectly causing the death of several families we don't applaud them merely for their effort (the opposite!), whilst someone capable rushing in and putting out the fire saving the building and perhaps saving someone is applauded (sometimes) for their efforts.
Ghost's illustration shows that goodness and love necessarily include prudence and reason and usually prolonged and tenacious effort. While spontaneous courage and goodwill are necessary for goodness and love they're not sufficient.
Is it perverse of many physically disabled persons that they took courage from the example of Stephen Hawking and have not scrupled to say so publicly? Am I not to be allowed to look to certain others for a good example?What is quite a curious, and perverse thing, is that when we "praise" or "admire" someone it is really almost a sense of self-achievement. We, in some form or another, admire our aesthetic sensibilities and intellect for being able to recognize such a worthy artifact of human existence - we greedily feed from it.
The question of agency includes the variable of how much power the respective actors have . The less an actor is empowered the less she is able to be an agent and the more she can be a victim. If two equally matched gladiators are set against each other to fight to the death neither is the victim of the other. If someone sneaks powder of nerve poison into some unsuspecting person's pocket the latter is a victim .And yes, the question of agency is the crux and hence the insufferable position of victimhood takes hold over the idea of taking some responsibility for your position even if you don't believe you're the one at fault - and you can usually be sure this is to some extent a two way road so we're better off trying to turn the flow in our favour if we believe in the "good" at all. If not the path of destruction spreads.
What is forever a puzzling thing to me is understanding how incredibly dark I am and facing that full on. It is not something I can in all honesty recommend to do, because it could do serious harm. We have no rule book other than our own honesty to ourselves buttressed by our best attempts at bold exploration into the world we find ourselves. It is quite remarkable we're not all (completely) mad! haha!
We are each or us " dark" compared with some positive criterion of good. I like St Augustine of Hippo:
Here and Now wrote:------ For what is that which we call evil but the absence of good? In the bodies of animals, disease and wounds mean nothing but the absence of health; for when a cure is effected, that does not mean that the evils which were present—namely, the diseases and wounds—go away from the body and dwell elsewhere: they altogether cease to exist; for the wound or disease is not a substance, but a defect in the fleshly substance,—the flesh itself being a substance, and therefore something good, of which those evils—that is, privations of the good which we call health—are accidents. Just in the same way, what are called vices in the soul are nothing but privations of natural good. And when they are cured, they are not transferred elsewhere: when they cease to exist in the healthy soul, they cannot exist anywhere else
We all may be determinists as we contemplate eternity. We are forced to deal with the here and now so we have to consider who is more of an agent and who less of an agent, and legislate according to which morality we want our society to be governed by. For instance I'm a socialist so I want our societies to confer power of agency as equally as possible.Of course, the question here turns to agency. That is where this leads.
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Re: Steve Pinker Lambasts American Left for Political Correctness
We're ready to accept responsibility and authorship when things go well, but when things go badly we're not so inclined to wave our hands in the air shouting "I did that!" and it takes some serious resolve to do such a thing, even privately!
A little self pity and finger pointing is just something we do to stem the possibly overwhelming flow of self-hatred. We're all "victims" of nature if that is your preference. I prefer to say we're all manifestations of nature and leave it at that.
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Re: Steve Pinker Lambasts American Left for Political Correctness
It's true that there are lots of variables attached to moral preconditions. This is what is so awesome about the sacrifice of Christ that it was perfectly selfless. We alas are none of us JC.I meant "perverse" in the sense of the strange dynamic I see between idea of selflessness and selfishness. Both for me diverge upon the same point if taken to the extreme. I was just illustrating that even the most positive qualities of humility can be seen with a lens of "selfishness". No good deed, and all that waffle.
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Re: Steve Pinker Lambasts American Left for Political Correctness
I am not a determinist, because I do not think the world is determined in any way we can imagine. I simply put the matter of desert to the test and see how it fares. Such an analysis does seem to divest moral terms lik accountability, responsibility, desert, innocence, and others of their essential meanings.Belindi:
We all may be determinists as we contemplate eternity. We are forced to deal with the here and now so we have to consider who is more of an agent and who less of an agent, and legislate according to which morality we want our society to be governed by. For instance I'm a socialist so I want our societies to confer power of agency as equally as possible.
Being forced to deal, as you put it, is another matter entirely. First, you have to understand the terms you are dealing with, which is, of course, a philosophical problem. How this translates into enlightened thinking on how we define ourselves as moral agents, in this case, frankly, does more harm than good, at least at this stage of our social development. For we depend on these terms for our actual legal and moral affairs to work out.
It is not unusual at all, in fact, it is the usual course of things to have philosophical insight contradiction practical need and "common sense".
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Re: Steve Pinker Lambasts American Left for Political Correctness
You are entangled in many thoughts on the matter of ethics, and a lot of this is, by my thinking, correct and insightful. But I am inviting you to put most of this aside and just look plainly at the foundation of ethics. Things get clear when we disentangle ethics at the level of basic assumptions from the way ethics is embedded in our daily lives. This latter is very, very difficult to work out, as you clearly know. But they are mostly out of consideration here, just as the the kinds of things political savants talk about in the media are largely out of consideration when the matter turns to Hobbes, Rousseau, Locke, et al, and social contract theory, for example.Burning Ghost:
Who do you dislike more, the man with talent who doesn't put it to use, or the man with little talent who does? I would say the issue is the lack of talent is more visible than the lack of use of a talent (more often than not.)
We see this kind of thing in sports where people berate themselves in their youth for squandering opportunities.
The positive product (however that is deemed) is worthy of praise - it is self evident that the praise is justified, although the degree of effort put in by someone may vary greatly.
In a utopian world things would be different, and I am all for setting up a vision of a better future. I am also cautious about forcing such ideals into existence when we're so mind-numbingly ignorant about so much. Human existence is a delicate balance.
It generally doesn't enter people's minds when viewing a masterpiece that the person who produced it doesn't deserve praise (ironically in some circumstance they often don't live to receive it anyway.) This is why we refer to humility as a virtue. Those that seek praise are somewhat broken inside; and I think we all seek praise in some form or another, maybe more indirectly and less visibily at a glance, nevertheless idea of the unsung hero is the most admirable kind, the mythos of the ideal human being - hence the symbolism used throughout religious history and the reason why I do heap praise upon the work of Carl Gustav Jung.
What is quite a curious, and perverse thing, is that when we "praise" or "admire" someone it is really almost a sense of self-achievement. We, in some form or another, admire our aesthetic sensibilities and intellect for being able to recognize such a worthy artifact of human existence - we greedily feed from it.
The darker side of every good deed makes it good. We just don't tend to skulk in the shadows or we'd end up confusing the darkness as elucidation, when it is from the light of understanding that the darkness is revealed (the analogy of The Cave works well enough here.)
And yes, the question of agency is the crux and hence the insufferable position of victimhood takes hold over the idea of taking some responsibility for your position even if you don't believe you're the one at fault - and you can usually be sure this is to some extent a two way road so we're better off trying to turn the flow in our favour if we believe in the "good" at all. If not the path of destruction spreads.
What is forever a puzzling thing to me is understanding how incredibly dark I am and facing that full on. It is not something I can in all honesty recommend to do, because it could do serious harm. We have no rule book other than our own honesty to ourselves buttressed by our best attempts at bold exploration into the world we find ourselves. It is quite remarkable we're not all (completely) mad! haha!
Do desert, responsibility, accountability and all of those other like terms make any sense at all? And the answer seems to be no, notwithstanding the complexity of the moral world we live in. This is not a vote for moral nihilism. In fact, in my thoughts, it does exactly the opposite. And that makes this narrow line of inquiry very worthy, indeed.
Socrates would put us exactly on this course: what IS justice, moral accountability? Can we make sense of this term? Not that I would agree with him.
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Re: Steve Pinker Lambasts American Left for Political Correctness
Can you give some examples?Do desert, responsibility, accountability and all of those other like terms make any sense at all? And the answer seems to be no, notwithstanding the complexity of the moral world we live in. This is not a vote for moral nihilism. In fact, in my thoughts, it does exactly the opposite. And that makes this narrow line of inquiry very worthy, indeed.
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Re: Steve Pinker Lambasts American Left for Political Correctness
It is a very complex issue. That is as much as I am willing to say at the moment (I'm sure we'll find plenty of time in the future to discuss this - at least I hope so; and hope we can both provide each other with some partially fresh perspectives.)
Belindi -
Well, I think we are, because I believe in the "mythos" of the figure rather than the figure itself. It is basically us glorying at our own potential, and being equally inadequate knowing we cannot be "perfect." It is the most perculiar and moving conundrum of the whole human disposition.
I have mentioned this to a few people and it may sound weird and/or silly. I experienced this when listening to Beyoncé's "Halo" of all songs; because of my state of mind I understand the song as me singing to myself and then saw all love songs as songs being sung not to someone else, but in actuality being sung to yourself - only a kind of forced social disgrace of self valuation makes us impose the ideal of love on another rather than seeing the obvious spring it bursts from being in our own being and our own fashioning of the experience - this is what I meant by the Selfish/selfless issue ... and yes, it is a VERY narcissistic and/or egotistical posture, yet it is a strangely benevolent one (hard to express what I mean here so view this as the manifestation of your anima/animus imposed on some other and break that spell - something like that.)
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Re: Steve Pinker Lambasts American Left for Political Correctness
Of course: moral responsibility.Eduk
Can you give some examples?
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Re: Steve Pinker Lambasts American Left for Political Correctness
When I say example I was hoping for something a bit more illustrative. For example if I said there was gravity and you said give me an example I would say for example if you drop your pen it falls under the force of gravity. I could then go further and say if you drop it from a certain height it will hit the ground after a certain time at a certain speed. I could illustrate my point. You might then go wow what a useful theory I can see the application now. Or you might think something else, who knows.Of course: moral responsibility.
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Re: Steve Pinker Lambasts American Left for Political Correctness
Here is a fairly recent post I wrote to Burning Ghost. It has my thoughts on the matter at hand regarding desert (and by extension, the others I mentioned):Eduk:
When I say example I was hoping for something a bit more illustrative. For example if I said there was gravity and you said give me an example I would say for example if you drop your pen it falls under the force of gravity. I could then go further and say if you drop it from a certain height it will hit the ground after a certain time at a certain speed. I could illustrate my point. You might then go wow what a useful theory I can see the application now. Or you might think something else, who knows.
Burning Ghost
The argument of "desert" didn't seem to make sense to me. To me it seemed more like a wishful appeal to an idea that anyone can do anything and that any differences between people should be ignored, and/or punished, in order to create "safety" and thus allow people to become "different."
Because you don't take the term 'desert' to the level of basic assumptions. X deserves Y? Why? Answer this in a non question begging way, that is, such that your answer does not include a bunch of assumptions that can further analysis. If there are terms that beg the question, the job is to look closely at these. It is not so esoteric at all. Just inquire. X deserves Y because she mixed her labor with it, for example. There is some sense in this, and it is followed by more questions being begged: What motivated her to mix her labor, to do it as well as she did? And her gifts, her social advantages, her money?: if she deserves Y and desert rests with talents, intelligence and so forth, which it doubtlessly does, then the question of desert moves to these: How does she deserve these, the being born to wealthy and talented parents and the rest? THIS is the question you do not want to ask, and yet it is the only question that makes sense given the path reasonable inquiry has taken you on. And you know the answer already: no one deserves any of what they are given originally (unless you want to argue they do, and that there was some prior condition, bad deeds figuring into your karma, for example, carrying over into the present incarnation; but this is just metaphysical extravagance and has no place here).
So what do you do with this? A wishful appeal would be more along the lines of reincarnation or Christian promises that all will be well. Nothing of that is here. There is one question begged here, and that is why bother with desert at all? Who cares if one does or does not deserve their fate? Just drop the term altogether and let people be free to act as they are naturally "given".
There has been a great deal written on this, of course. I dare say, every secular philosopher that has ever tried to defend that Protagorean maxim, man is the measure of all things, has failed to adequately account for ethics. Very different from questions about non ethical propositional knowledge, like "grass is green". Here, it is the joys and horrors of our "outrageous fortune" that presents an entirely different dimension of understanding.
You don't want to hear my thoughts on this so I won't tell you. But here, it is important to know that if one abandons desert as a moral term at the level of basic questions and assumptions, then one has to embrace the consequences in what is morally permissible. It means one accepts the idea that all that restrains thought and behavior in matters bringing harm to others is a social convention. If we lived in an abstraction of word-relations, who would care? But the world is not like this. Here we make judgments about how people's lives can be lived. It's called voting.
Conservatives like Daschund look at afflicted people in society and believes those kids growing up in wretched environments deserve this. Do you see why I take such issue with this? It is not about Nietzsche, or Burke, or the Great Chain of Being. These are all ploys to justify systematic abuse of the least advantaged class, the kind of abuse found in underfunding in schools, structural poverty and ignorance and crime, while billionaires toy with their cash. You think this is about people just being able to be different?? No: it is the very serious business of determining the fate of millions.
2023/2024 Philosophy Books of the Month
Mark Victor Hansen, Relentless: Wisdom Behind the Incomparable Chicken Soup for the Soul
by Mitzi Perdue
February 2023
Rediscovering the Wisdom of Human Nature: How Civilization Destroys Happiness
by Chet Shupe
March 2023