Realism Cannot Be Realistic

Discuss any topics related to metaphysics (the philosophical study of the principles of reality) or epistemology (the philosophical study of knowledge) in this forum.
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Londoner
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Re: Realism Cannot Be Realistic

Post by Londoner »

Spectrum wrote:
Me: Let us start there. Suppose I dispute that figure; suppose I claim that '30% are born with an active evil tendency'

If you have some basis and rationality to your 30% claim, then I will readily accept your figures.


I'm asking you how we would decide which of us is right and which of us is wrong. In order to do that we would have to know what we are counting; what objective empirical fact that number relates to.

Me: What is the objective empirical observation we could make of each newborn baby, so that we count count its occurrence, and (by inductive reasoning) show that your statistic about its frequency is correct and mine is wrong?
No empirical observation? Then your figure is arbitrary. So you are not doing science.

As I had indicated my hypothesis is proven by the empirical resultant evils, terrors and evil from Muslims around the World.


Again, what are you counting? What empirical fact corresponds to one unit of 'evil'?

As for the potential in newborn babies, we don't have the technology to study the precise neural conditions yet. At present we already have fMRI scanning and imaging that can detect activities in the brain for certain mental problems. When the Connectome Project advances in the future we will be able to determine which baby will have an active potential evil with higher accuracy.


'Active' or 'potential'? The scan can only detect what is 'active' i.e. already present. It cannot detect 'what might be there in the future' which is what 'potential' means. 'Active potential' is an oxymoron.

You say above 'we don't have the technology to study the precise neural conditions yet. And yet you claim to already know a percentage figure for the number of humans who have this feature! So you must have decided that some neural feature equates to 'evil potential'. What is it?

At What Age Can We Identify Psychopathy in a Child?
https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/fu ... y-in-child


They can identify it because there is something there to identify. The child exhibits behaviour X, behaviour X is what we mean by 'psychopathy', therefore the child has it.

But you are claiming to be able to identify that a newborn child is psychopathic, before there is any psychopathic behaviour to observe. So you cannot be looking at what the child does, but at something else. What? You produce statistics, but never say what you are counting.

More about stats:

Yes, even if 1% of the skin cell has black pigment, technically we can identify the person as a 1%-black-person. It would not appear visually to be right, but technically there is nothing wrong to label the person as 1%-black-person if we deliberate on a continuum of blackness.
However if we deliberate on the continuum of whiteness, then that person is a 99% white person.


You tie yourself into knots with words. If that is the system you are using, then a '99% white person' and a '1%-black-person' would mean exactly the same thing. But to continue:

Thus in the case of the evil continuum.
I rate genocide as 99% on the continuum while say petty crimes at 10%.
Technically a petty crime is an evil along the continuum, albeit with an evilness of 10%.


But with the cells, there was a physical fact; this 'black pigment'. (It's not how it actually works, but let that go). We look at the cells of an individual human and see 17% (or whatever) have that pigment. If we say 'they are 17% black/83% white' then that is what we would mean. It is something anyone can confirm. That if I (or anyone else) looked at that person's cells, that is what they would find.

Now tell me the equivalent for 'evilness'. How do I (or anyone else) look at 'genocide' and count the 'evilness'? What are we counting?

Once again, you need an answer, or you are not doing science.

About DNA:

Here is another example.
Recently the DNA Ancestry Profile Testing is very common.
Let say a person DNA profile has the following results;

  • 1. African 80%
    2. Ethnic XYZ 10%
    3. Jewish 9%
    4. European 1%


Although the above person is likely to be 'black' it is not technically wrong to identify him as European, albeit a 1%-European-Person.


The DNA profile will not have those results. The DNA profile will simply describe the DNA. What will make somebody 'African' would be your (rather odd) decision to label certain bits of DNA 'African'. Then, 'African' would simply be a label for some portions of DNA.

Where you depart from science would be if you then allowed other connotations for the word 'African' to become mixed up in that label, so that 'African' did not only label those portions of DNA, but also carried implications of geography, skin colour, culture and so on, which are arbitrary human constructs. At that point you would be using 'DNA' as a general symbol, it would no longer simply refer to an empirical fact about the cell.

What has confused you is that we can use certain features of DNA to trace kinship. So, we can say that X has DNA that is common in people who live in location Y, and guess that they are related to them. But to class the people in location Y as 'Jews' or 'Europeans' is arbitrary, and how we do it is culturally determined. So, for example, you could look at everyone's DNA and say they are '100% African', in that we are all related to Africans. And nobody is 'European' because the difference between Europeans are greater than their similarities. Or we could look at the similarity between me and my parents and say my group identity is 'Londoner's family'. And so on. In other words, where we draw the lines between groups is arbitrary.

(And just to be clear, all humans have almost identical DNA. Humans and chimps are 98.8% identical. Humans and bananas are 50% identical. So any difference between individual humans is way less than 1%, not the 10% etc. in your list.)

But in case this diversion means you have missed the main theme, I am asking what you are counting when you produce stats to do with quantities of evil, or quantities of 'evil potential'. If you cannot name an objective empirical fact, then your statistics are not facts.
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Razblo
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Re: Realism Cannot Be Realistic

Post by Razblo »

Steve3007 wrote:I agree with Burning Ghost that the word "terrorism" is used so often that it has lost most of its impact, but I suppose that doesn't mean it's lost its meaning. It just means that it's been misused. It still means the use of violence deliberately against civilians with the specific aim to intimidate people into acting in certain ways.

I guess "terrorism-phobia" would be an irrational fear of terrorism - i.e. a fear that is out of proportion to the threat. That's where Londoner's "fear or snakes in London" analogy comes in. If you fear terrorism to an extent that is way out of proportion to the liklihood of you actually falling victim to it, it's an appropriate term. Perhaps, judging by this research (below), most American people suffer from both terrorism-phobia and government-corruption-phobia?
Just further underlining my point. When every personality trait - every aspect of an individual which defines individualism itself, becomes a diagnostic tool, then 'phobia' itself loses all meaning. It becomes irrelevant everywhere. It becomes a non thing in entirety. It becomes as irrelevant as calling someone an asshole (or **** hole, depending on the censorship algorithm of this site). 'Islamophobia' is merely an ad hominem.
Steve3007
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Re: Realism Cannot Be Realistic

Post by Steve3007 »

Razblo:
Just further underlining my point.
Your point being that "Islamophobia" is a non-thing (that it is used merely as an ad hom), yes?
When every personality trait - every aspect of an individual which defines individualism itself, becomes a diagnostic tool, then 'phobia' itself loses all meaning.
I'm not exactly sure what you mean by "every personality trait becoming a diagnostic tool" and how that relates to the concept of a phobia. It seems to be reasonable enough to make a distinction between two types of fear: a fear which is demonstrably in proportion to the threat and one which is not. Of course, there would be an arbitrarily drawn dividing line which determines whether the threat is serious enough to warrant the actions that are normally associated with fear. I guess the position of that line would depend in part on our attitude to risk. But the world is full of arbitrarily drawn dividing lines.

So if somebody appears to be exhibing behaviours associated with extreme fear in relation to snakes or terrorism in a town in England, without those fears having been caused by unpleasant personal experiences with those things, then it seems not unreasonable to class that as a phobia, unless they can demonstrate via argument and empirical evidence that the risk (or potential for future risk) is in fact much more significant than it appears at first. If they do that then I'd expect the phobia label to be removed.

Perhaps you mean that there's a danger that we classify people's opinions as part of their psychology and thereby dismiss them? Yes, I see that danger. But in a forum like this where everyone is free to speak and defend their position, without being put in a straitjacket and hauled away to the funny farm, they can attempt to defend their opinion with logical arguments stemming from mutually accesible and verifiable empirical evidence and therefore stop it from being dismissed as a "mere" phobia. Or at least demonstrate that such dismissal is not justified.

That seems to be what Londoner is trying to get Spectrum to do and what Spectrum would probably say he's already done in the past. I'm interested to see the outcome this time around.

-- Updated Wed Sep 06, 2017 11:33 am to add the following --

Obviously the specific thing that's currently happening is an attempt to demonstrate how we objectively and reproducibly quantify the amount of evil in any given action. I'm very interested to see how that works.
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Razblo
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Re: Realism Cannot Be Realistic

Post by Razblo »

Steve3007 wrote:Razblo:
Just further underlining my point.
Your point being that "Islamophobia" is a non-thing (that it is used merely as an ad hom), yes?
When every personality trait - every aspect of an individual which defines individualism itself, becomes a diagnostic tool, then 'phobia' itself loses all meaning.
I'm not exactly sure what you mean by "every personality trait becoming a diagnostic tool" and how that relates to the concept of a phobia. It seems to be reasonable enough to make a distinction between two types of fear: a fear which is demonstrably in proportion to the threat and one which is not. Of course, there would be an arbitrarily drawn dividing line which determines whether the threat is serious enough to warrant the actions that are normally associated with fear. I guess the position of that line would depend in part on our attitude to risk. But the world is full of arbitrarily drawn dividing lines.

So if somebody appears to be exhibing behaviours associated with extreme fear in relation to snakes or terrorism in a town in England, without those fears having been caused by unpleasant personal experiences with those things, then it seems not unreasonable to class that as a phobia, unless they can demonstrate via argument and empirical evidence that the risk (or potential for future risk) is in fact much more significant than it appears at first. If they do that then I'd expect the phobia label to be removed.

Perhaps you mean that there's a danger that we classify people's opinions as part of their psychology and thereby dismiss them? Yes, I see that danger. But in a forum like this where everyone is free to speak and defend their position, without being put in a straitjacket and hauled away to the funny farm, they can attempt to defend their opinion with logical arguments stemming from mutually accesible and verifiable empirical evidence and therefore stop it from being dismissed as a "mere" phobia. Or at least demonstrate that such dismissal is not justified.

That seems to be what Londoner is trying to get Spectrum to do and what Spectrum would probably say he's already done in the past. I'm interested to see the outcome this time around.

-- Updated Wed Sep 06, 2017 11:33 am to add the following --

Obviously the specific thing that's currently happening is an attempt to demonstrate how we objectively and reproducibly quantify the amount of evil in any given action. I'm very interested to see how that works.
I suppose, then, I should list every religious phobia of a typical Islamist. Buddhaphobia, Christianophobia, Hinduphobia, Shiaphbia (for the Sunni), Sunniphobia (for the Shia), Shintophobia, Taophobia, Confuciophobia, Sikhophobia, Jainophobia, Atheistophobia, Agnostophobia.......infinitumophobia.
Steve3007
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Re: Realism Cannot Be Realistic

Post by Steve3007 »

If part of the definition of "typical Islamist" is someone who hate or fears all other religions in a way that is out of proportion to any possible threat posed by those religions then it seems pretty reasonable to think of that type of person as having a phobia about those religions. I don't really see the purpose of listing them here though.
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Razblo
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Re: Realism Cannot Be Realistic

Post by Razblo »

Steve3007 wrote:If part of the definition of "typical Islamist" is someone who hate or fears all other religions in a way that is out of proportion to any possible threat posed by those religions then it seems pretty reasonable to think of that type of person as having a phobia about those religions. I don't really see the purpose of listing them here though.
Rational hate should hardly be a phobia. As long as 'isalmophobia' is listed then the typical Islamist's may as well be.
Steve3007
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Re: Realism Cannot Be Realistic

Post by Steve3007 »

Steve3007 (from which you quoted):
...unless they can demonstrate via argument and empirical evidence that the risk (or potential for future risk) is in fact much more significant than it appears at first. If they do that then I'd expect the phobia label to be removed.
Razblo:
Rational hate should hardly be a phobia.
Do you read the things that you quote?
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Burning ghost
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Re: Realism Cannot Be Realistic

Post by Burning ghost »

I wouldn't say "ad hominem" in every case.

I think it is a fair term if used to describe the fear spread disproportionally by governments and media in order to back up certain actions. If aimed at individual people then yeah, I agree. Calling someone "Islamophobic" is pretty daft.

I will admit that I do look at people differently simply because of what the media makes us believe, be it dependent upon colour of skin or dress style. I don't do this all the time, but the more and more bias and stereotypes are thrust in my face I cannot pretend I am immune to them. Just like if I see a girl in a short skirt or a guy with slicked back hair and wearing a suit, I have a certain impression of them that is completely unrealistic.

Generally I think both the terms mentioned above are so rife because they are acting to counter each other. I am from the UK so the word "terrorist" is more common to me than the average American I suspect (certain channels in the US were very well connected to funding the IRA ... after 911 I bet those people distanced themselves as quickly as possible.)

Anyway, shame a nice topic got chewed up like this.
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Spectrum
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Re: Realism Cannot Be Realistic

Post by Spectrum »

Steve3007 wrote:Presumably the calculation of the evil coefficient for any given crime would have to take into account circumstances. If the average coefficient for petty theft is 0.1 then presumably the theft of a piece of bread to feed a starving family member (Victor Hugo style) would be less than that. Maybe even negative. (AKA "good"). Whereas the theft of a piece of bread purely because I like the idea of another person being a bit hungry (i.e. sadism) or because my sacred text told me to do it (a relatively rare occurrence I suspect) would attract a higher evil score than the average for petty theft.
It we rate petty theft = 0.1 then it is fixed that specific level.
However we can add another level of coefficient [weightings] for petty theft in various contexts and multiply it to get the net-rating to differentiate from others.

-- Updated Wed Sep 06, 2017 10:32 pm to add the following --
[b]Londoner[/b] wrote:
Spectrum wrote: Me: Let us start there. Suppose I dispute that figure; suppose I claim that '30% are born with an active evil tendency'

If you have some basis and rationality to your 30% claim, then I will readily accept your figures.


I'm asking you how we would decide which of us is right and which of us is wrong. In order to do that we would have to know what we are counting; what objective empirical fact that number relates to.

Btw, what I relying upon is Social Science and not Physical Science. The empirical basis for Physical and Social Science is different.

Let start again;
  • 1. I have defined what is 'evil' and evil comes in degrees from 1%-Low to 100% -highest.
    2. I rated genocide as 90% evil and petty crimes at 10%. [I don't foresee dispute in this].
    3. There are polls [don't have it on hand] that indicate >60/80% of adults had lie and will lie if necessary [thus an active evil tendency].
    4. Since lying is a type of evil
    5. Thus I infer >60% of adults are evil [albeit 10% evilness].
    6. Thus my projection that 20% of people has an active evil tendency is very conservative.


If >60% or even 80% has an active evil tendency to lie, then 20% [conservatively] are likely to have an active tendency to commit greater evilness than lying like committing violence [to list details] and the likes.

Thus 20% of all humans has an active tendency to commit violence of all sorts.
This is a probability and the confidence level of this premise is based an intelligent analysis of available data, polls, knowledge for various field etc.
To support my point I will prepare a list of violence [& other evil] that this 20% of evil prone will commit. Example are acts of aggression and violence that are likely to cause injuries like knife attacks, throwing acid, fist fights, mob violence, and the likes.
I am confident the majority will agree to what the listing of evils those within the 20% of evil prone will likely to act.

I don't think 80% of the evil prone will commit acts of aggression and violence that are likely to cause injuries like knife attacks, throwing acid, fist fights, mob violence, and the likes. We can start reducing the % to 70%, 60%, 50% and based on my estimation the most likely is 20%.
However based on your estimation you think it is 30%, it is not an issue as the variation is merely 10%. So I don't have a problem with other estimation of 15-10% as long as it is not 80% or merely 1%.

So it is not a matter of precise counting the numbers but rather as assessment of the probability of what numbers.

Thus my hypothesis is 20% of all Muslims are evil prone to commit violence of various kinds.
That is translatable to a potential pool of 300 million Muslims around the World who are willing to commit violence on non-Muslims and even other Muslims at any time.
(note I have not discounted the number of babies, toddlers, old women and men, but excluding these the number are still significant).

My 20% i.e. 300 million is very conservative in reflecting the terrible potential of evil from Islam and Islamists. Even if it is 5% that is 75 million. Even if at say 1% it is still a frightening 15 million even prone Muslims.
Note it is well known within the psychological and psychiatric community that 1% of humans are likely to be psychopaths and a certain % are evil psychopaths.

The frightening potential is, it only took 18++ Muslims to do a 911 and even a lone wolf can potentially create terrible evils. Morally killing or injuring even a person is one too many.
What is worse is there are lots of polls which indicate >50% of Muslims [as a duty of their religion] will extent their moral support for stoning to death for adultery, killing of homosexuals, killing of apostate and other violent acts.

Btw, I have not mentioned, even some % of goody-two-shoes Muslims could turn malignantly evil when brainwashed by the evil doctrines of Islam.

Note my starting point is from the SO GLARINGLY EMPIRICAL EVIDENCES of terrible evils, terror and violence by those SOME Muslims [from pool of 20% with active evil tendencies].

In addition, my hypothesis is easy testable and predictable.
So easy, I predict any one who dare to draw a cartoon of Muhammad in a square with many Muslims [5,000] in a city in Afghanistan or Islamic State, will be lynched by mob from a potential pool of 1000 (20%) evil prone Muslims. You dare to bet I am wrong?
I would have no problem and will be accurate in predicting possible evils wherever there are Muslims.

Therefore as long as humans exist and Islam exists as it is, there will be permanent streak of terrible evils, terror, and violence by SOME Muslims who are evil prone [20%] and compelled by evil laden elements in the Quran.
The proofs for the above is SO GLARINGLY EMPIRICAL EVIDENT.

Note the general methodology I have applied above has been used by within the Social Sciences and such methods has produced reasonable results.

As for more precise counting and exact Science, we do not have the competence yet to fully explore and take advantage of the knowledge of the Genome and the brain at present, but I am optimistic we will be able to do so in the near future [given the current trend].

-- Updated Wed Sep 06, 2017 10:53 pm to add the following --

Londoner wrote:Now tell me the equivalent for 'evilness'. How do I (or anyone else) look at 'genocide' and count the 'evilness'? What are we counting?

To convert such abstraction to be of practical value we do a relative assessment based on common knowledge.

I have mentioned I have prepared a taxonomy with a list of 500++ types of evil committed within human history.
I start by rating the obvious higher extremes, i.e. genocide at say 90% evilness, others at 90% are mass rapes, mass torture, and the likes.
Then I rate petty crimes and the likes at 10%.
The above should be easily agreeable.
Then using the above two extremes as relative points we can fill in the others in between.
For example I will rate general violence at say 60-80 of evilness.
When I have rated the listing of 500 types of evil, the whole taxonomy will make reasonable sense with some margin of error and can also be improved upon. Surely no one will rate stealing of a loaf of bread at 90% or even 50% evil.

Why we are trying to estimate is, what is the % of people will likely commit at each level of the % of evilness.
As demonstrated >60% [could be 95%] of people are likely to lie, i.e. a 10% evilness
My hypothesis is around 20% of all people are likely to commit evilness of say 60%+ e.g. violence that will maim or kill.
I estimate around 0.5% of all humans are likely to be genocide prone and influence others evil-prone to assist in the genocide [90%].

As for rating of evil, there is an exercise done by Michael Stone done on the evilness of murderers.
wiki wrote:Most Evil is an American forensics television program on Investigation Discovery presented by forensic psychiatrist Michael Stone of Columbia University during seasons 1 and 2 and by forensic psychologist Dr. Kris Mohandie during Season 3.[1]
On the show, the presenter rates murderers on a scale of evil that Stone himself has developed. The show features profiles on various murderers, serial killers, mass murderers and psychopaths.


The above is a precedent I can refer to, improve upon and expand its applications to all evils.

-- Updated Wed Sep 06, 2017 11:15 pm to add the following --

[b]Razblo[/b] wrote:I suppose, then, I should list every religious phobia of a typical Islamist. Buddhaphobia, Christianophobia, Hinduphobia, Shiaphbia (for the Sunni), Sunniphobia (for the Shia), Shintophobia, Taophobia, Confuciophobia, Sikhophobia, Jainophobia, Atheistophobia, Agnostophobia.......infinitumophobia.

This is a good point.
Why non-Muslims do not raised the above "phobia" against Muslims and Islam.

Why Islam the only religion that raised the accusation of Islamophobia when there are real rational fears from Islam and its evil prone Muslims.

The point is it is Islam that is having a real phobia to the extent SOME Muslims will kill non-Muslims [to spread terror as sanctioned by Allah] merely because they are disbeliever and exists. This is a proven fact, note all the killings of innocent people in the name of Allah, Islam and Muhammad as compelled by the doctrine of Islam.

When these evil prone Muslims spread terror by killing innocent people around the world for merely disbelieving [glaringly evident proofs], most of the non-Muslims will definitely experience real fears of various degrees.

When non-Muslim experience real fears from Islam [by the evil prone Muslims] and been told Islam is inherent evil, surely the non-Muslims will criticize and condemn Islam.

Islam spread real fears as decreed by its doctrine, and when non-Muslims criticize Islam because of the real fear, the Muslims and Islam-apologists condemn the non-Muslims as Islamophobia. What an irony.

The fact is the non-Muslims and even other Muslims are condemning the evil part of Islam based on real fears. There is nothing irrational in these criticisms.

As I had claimed the bastardized term 'Islamophobia' it an ideological weapon used by the Muslim Brotherhood to silence critique of the real evils of Islam so they can spread more evils and kill more non-Muslims within a false sense of arrogance to dominate the World.
Not-a-theist. Religion is a critical necessity for humanity now, but not the FUTURE.
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Burning ghost
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Re: Realism Cannot Be Realistic

Post by Burning ghost »

Spectrum -

GLARINGLY naïve and fall of faults. Keep going. It is easier to see how badly formed your "opinion" is the more you talk.

Again ... I await your "thesis". Does your nationality have any bearing on your "opinion"? What background were you brought up in? Malaysia?
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Steve3007
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Re: Realism Cannot Be Realistic

Post by Steve3007 »

Spectrum:
Why non-Muslims do not raised the above "phobia" against Muslims and Islam.
They do. It is very, very frequently pointed out that extreme Islamists such as those that join Daesh seem to hate all other religions and (at least in the case of Daesh) openly say so. It is extensively analysed in various media. The list of religions that are hated isn't enumerated in the way that Razblo did presumably for the same reason that if someone suffers from Ophidiophobia (Fear of snakes. I looked it up.) we don't say that they suffer from adder-phobia, boa-phobia, rattlesnake-phobia, Anaconda-phobia... Why bother?
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Re: Realism Cannot Be Realistic

Post by Londoner »

Spectrum wrote: It we rate petty theft = 0.1 then it is fixed that specific level.

2. I rated genocide as 90% evil and petty crimes at 10%. [I don't foresee dispute in this]
So we are clear that you 'rate' it. There is no empirical fact about it that you observe and count. So if I 'rate' it in a different way to you, no observation we could make to say my rating is wrong and yours is right.
Btw, what I relying upon is Social Science and not Physical Science. The empirical basis for Physical and Social Science is different.
Social science records quantifiable facts about society, not the subjective opinions of the sociologist.

Now we have cleared away all the pseudo-science, you are welcome to continue with your rants about Muslims.
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Re: Realism Cannot Be Realistic

Post by Steve3007 »

Londoner:
There is no empirical fact about it that you observe and count. So if I 'rate' it in a different way to you, no observation we could make to say my rating is wrong and yours is right.
One empirical fact could be the percentage of people who agree that genocide is more evil than petty theft - a vote. That is something that could be measured. It could be proposed that if more than a certain percentage agrees with that proposition then it is deemed to be true. That wouldn't attach numbers to those acts (like 90% and 10%) but it would at least place them in order on a scale.

Isn't that form of observation not so very different from observations of the things we regard as objective facts? Facts that are established empirically, like whether it's currently raining of whether the moon exists or whether there is a dagger floating in front of me are established by a similar type of consensus, or vote, aren't they? A consensus of various sensory observations, both personal and inter-personal. In the case of Macbeth's dagger, it was two of Macbeth's personal senses - his senses of sight and touch. Two senses in favour? the dagger exists. The senses disagree? It is but a dagger of the mind.

Spectrum:
1. I have defined what is 'evil' and evil comes in degrees from 1%-Low to 100% -highest.
I don't think that either you or anybody else has defined evil in any way that can be generally agreed upon, despite plenty of celebrated attempts through history.

We might try to define evil by saying various things like:

1. Evil is a property of actions not of people. There is no such thing as an inherently evil person, only the acts that a person carries out.

2. An evil act is one that increases the sum of misery in the world more than it increases the sum of happiness.

3. An evil act is one that is selfish.

4. An evil act is one that treats people as a means to an end, not as an end in themselves.

and so on. And people would disagree endlessly about all of it. I think concepts like evil, good, love, hate etc are all inherently vague, qualitative and subjective and trying to quantify any of them only works unambiguously at the extreme ends of the spectrum, and then it's only really possible to place the cases in order, not to assign them a number. For example:
2. I rated genocide as 90% evil and petty crimes at 10%. [I don't foresee dispute in this].
I don't think these numbers mean much. I think they're arbitrarily chosen. I think all you can really say is things like:

"Deliberately killing an entire ethnic group as a deliberate and specific act for no other reason than that you do not think that group should be alive is more evil than stealing someone's iPhone for no other reason than that you want an iPhone but don't want to do the work required to earn the money to buy one."

As soon as you try to move together from those two relatively extreme ends of the spectrum you start to run into problems.
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Re: Realism Cannot Be Realistic

Post by Londoner »

Steve3007 wrote: One empirical fact could be the percentage of people who agree that genocide is more evil than petty theft - a vote. That is something that could be measured. It could be proposed that if more than a certain percentage agrees with that proposition then it is deemed to be true. That wouldn't attach numbers to those acts (like 90% and 10%) but it would at least place them in order on a scale.

Isn't that form of observation not so very different from observations of the things we regard as objective facts? Facts that are established empirically, like whether it's currently raining of whether the moon exists or whether there is a dagger floating in front of me are established by a similar type of consensus, or vote, aren't they? A consensus of various sensory observations, both personal and inter-personal. In the case of Macbeth's dagger, it was two of Macbeth's personal senses - his senses of sight and touch. Two senses in favour? the dagger exists. The senses disagree? It is but a dagger of the mind.
It would certainly be a fact, but it would be a fact about people's opinions, not the thing that they have the opinion about. What would be true is 'they think that'. So, I could say '90% of people think adultery is wrong, but I think it is OK' and there would be no contradiction since we are not discussing whether adultery is wrong, only what people think about it.

In the case of empirical facts, which would include the findings of opinion polls, we expect more than a consensus. If a substantial number of people had a different observation, say they looked at the figures that were recorded and declared the answers were not what we claimed them to be; or they attended the survey and heard the answer to questions as 'yes' where others heard 'no', then we would be baffled. It would indeed be like Macbeth seeing the dagger; but such a case rarely arises, where some see the dagger and others don't. Normally, (nearly) everybody sees (or doesn't see) the same thing.

But morality is not like that. We do not observe 'evil'. Two people may see exactly the same event, agree entirely about the empirical nature of an abortion say, but disagree about the morality. A pacifist and a non-pacifist both agree what war consists of, but 'see' the evil in different places.

I think the problem asking for opinions on morality is that you have to beg the question. For example, 'petty theft' is wrong because 'theft' already embodies a negative judgement. It is an abstraction. But think of any concrete example; stealing food in order to live, stealing the slave owner's key so you can free the slaves etc. and 'petty theft' becomes something different. And does 'killing' extend to non-human life? Is 'meat murder'? The Vegan and I can both agree in an opinion poll that we are both against 'murder', but not mean the same thing by that word.

There are probably areas where humans can reach agreement, but they are not the problem. If everyone agrees, we do not see it as an ethical question; nobody debates 'should mothers eat their babies?' because no mother wants to do that. Discussions of good and bad arise around issues where we do not agree. So any opinion poll that apparently found a consensus would probably be relying on phrasing the questions in a way that fudged the issues.
Spectrum
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Joined: December 21st, 2010, 1:25 am
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Re: Realism Cannot Be Realistic

Post by Spectrum »

[b]Steve3007[/b] wrote:Spectrum:
Why non-Muslims do not raised the above "phobia" against Muslims and Islam.
They do. It is very, very frequently pointed out that extreme Islamists such as those that join Daesh seem to hate all other religions and (at least in the case of Daesh) openly say so. It is extensively analysed in various media.
My point is non-Muslims do point out that extreme Islamists and Islam itself hate other their religions. But even then Christians do not accuse Muslims of being Christianophobia. Buddhism and Buddhists are condemned by Islam but Buddhists do not accuse Muslims of being Buddhistophobia. The Jains do not invoke Jainophobia against the Muslims.
Why is it that ONLY Muslims are accusing non-Muslims as Islamophobic?
My answer is those evil Muslims are insecure and they sense their religion is inherently evil [as evident] thus they used the bastardized term 'Islamophobia' as an ideological weapon to shut off genuine criticisms.

-- Updated Fri Sep 08, 2017 9:46 pm to add the following --
[b]Londoner[/b] wrote:
Spectrum wrote: It we rate petty theft = 0.1 then it is fixed that specific level.

2. I rated genocide as 90% evil and petty crimes at 10%. [I don't foresee dispute in this]
So we are clear that you 'rate' it. There is no empirical fact about it that you observe and count. So if I 'rate' it in a different way to you, no observation we could make to say my rating is wrong and yours is right.
Btw, what I relying upon is Social Science and not Physical Science. The empirical basis for Physical and Social Science is different.
Social science records quantifiable facts about society, not the subjective opinions of the sociologist.

Now we have cleared away all the pseudo-science, you are welcome to continue with your rants about Muslims.
Note my views above are not based on opinions but rather on empirical facts, i.e.
  • 1. What is genocide [as defined] and that genocide has been committed by various 'evil' people is an empirical fact. The large numbers of humans killed and the brutality associated with genocides are empirical facts.

    2. The hashness of condemnation of genocides by society in general is an empirical fact.

    3. The seriousness of genocides as dealt by various war tribunals, i.e. the description, the charge and penalties are an empirical fact. The penalties charged by judges in various war tribunals with their narrations can be quantifiable in various quantifiable terms, i.e. death
    penalties, life imprisonments, day in prison for those who are guilty.

    4. There are a tons of other facts related to genocide.
Thus if I rate genocide at 90% evil and petty crimes [empirical facts] at 10%, I believe the average informed person will agree to the above [at most will slight variation at both ends].
I stated somewhere different people may use different % but it is obvious there must be a significant contrast to reflect the two extremes.
The variations can genocide [99% to 80%] and petty crimes [1-15%].
Londoner wrote:So if I 'rate' it in a different way to you, no observation we could make to say my rating is wrong and yours is right.
As I mentioned based on available empirical facts of genocides [1-4 above], your rating [if average] will not deviate significantly from mine.
Surely for this purpose you can't rate genocide 20% evilness and petty crimes at 10%. Then there must be greater evil worst than genocides from 21% to 99%.

In order to support my premises, i.e. "genocide at 90% evil and petty crimes at 10%" I will eliminate mere subjective 'opinions' but direct all involved to the facts related to real genocides that has happened.

Kant put the concept of 'opinion' in perspective to truth, i.e. opinion is based on a lack [say 5%] of subjectivity and 0% objectivity.
What I have relied upon is not 'opinions' but rather highly supported personal beliefs [personal Justified True Beliefs -JTB] and empirical facts [general JTBs] of genocide and other evils.

Note to establish consensus, I will have to make sure [no problem with availability of internet] those who take any poll or give their views, understand the concepts of genocide and evil fully and given the available facts related to genocide before they arrive at their judgment. (like those on the jury who are given the facts of the case in a court of law).
Now we have cleared away all the pseudo-science, you are welcome to continue with your rants about Muslims.
I'll remind you once again. My critique in this case solely on the evil ideology of Islam, NOT on Muslims in general.
I respect all Muslims as human beings and pity those Muslims who are unfortunately born with an active evil tendency to be compelled [subliminally] to commit evil on Islam's behalf. Legally, those unfortunate Muslims [victims of Islam] will have to face the secular Laws of the Land. [note in contrast they will not be guilty under Sharia Laws]
Somehow you cannot escape conflating the two, i.e. the ideology and the humans.

It is a fact that Islam & doctrines is responsible in compelling [subliminally] SOME Muslims who are evil prone to commit evils ranging from genocides [90% evilness] to petty evils [10% evilness]. My thesis my support the above premise with justified evidence and proofs.

-- Updated Fri Sep 08, 2017 10:18 pm to add the following --
[b][b]Steve3007[/b][/b] wrote:Spectrum:
1. I have defined what is 'evil' and evil comes in degrees from 1%-Low to 100% -highest.
2. I rated genocide as 90% evil and petty crimes at 10%. [I don't foresee dispute in this].
I don't think that either you or anybody else has defined evil in any way that can be generally agreed upon, despite plenty of celebrated attempts through history.

I don't think these numbers mean much. I think they're arbitrarily chosen. I think all you can really say is things like:
"Deliberately killing an entire ethnic group as a deliberate and specific act for no other reason than that you do not think that group should be alive is more evil than stealing someone's iPhone for no other reason than that you want an iPhone but don't want to do the work required to earn the money to buy one."

As soon as you try to move together from those two relatively extreme ends of the spectrum you start to run into problems.
As I had mentioned one of my forte is problem-solving and its techniques.
The general default is, if a problem and its variables are not quantified [at least optimally] then the resolution of the problem will not be effective. Do you dispute this?

This is why I am so persistent to ensure the critical variables are quantified.
As I explained in my reply to Londoner above, I don't produce my figures arbitrary but they are grounded on empirical facts. I also stick to principles and rules in arriving at a number that is optimal [given various constraints]. I maintain my own high degree of intellectual integrity and will not simply pull numbers from the air.

All figures and premises I produced have reasonable status as Justified True Beliefs from a personal and collective level based on evidence, proofs and rationality.
I don't think that either you or anybody else has defined evil in any way that can be generally agreed upon, despite plenty of celebrated attempts through history.
In the past and currently, the term 'evil' has been used mostly from an ontological and theistic perspective, like some kind of entity or substance lurking around.

At present there is a trend within the philosophical community of looking at 'evil' from the perspective of human acts because the term 'bad' is not strong enough to cover certain extreme acts like genocides, etc.

I am optimistic in the future [>100 years or sooner] when the Connectome Project is sufficiently advanced, humanity may be able to quantify basic 'evil' in terms of neural algorithms.
During the past thirty years, moral, political, and legal philosophers have become increasingly interested in the concept of evil.
This interest has been partly motivated by ascriptions of ‘evil’ by laymen, social scientists, journalists, and politicians as they try to understand and respond to various atrocities and horrors of the past eighty years, e.g., the Holocaust, the Rwandan genocide, the 9/11 terrorist attacks, and killing sprees by serial killers such as Jeffery Dahmer.
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/concept-evil/
What I am looking at is something very novel with an effective definition and supported by a detailed taxonomy. I believe when fully presented my concept of evil will be readily accepted by many.

The critical point with the concept of evil is to quantify the critical variables, at least crudely at the beginning then improved upon it later.
My base is always going for numbers [as best as I can] and then a flow-chart logically connecting all the relevant variables.
Not-a-theist. Religion is a critical necessity for humanity now, but not the FUTURE.
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