Whose Lives Have Value?

[GE Morton]

We can also be informed by our own (non-scientific) observations, and by hearing (or reading about) the observations of others. Unless we define "science" very broadly, not all observations constitute "science".

Sure they do. They constitute science as long as the implications drawn from them are logical. People who have never heard of scientific method can, and often do, apply it. Science is nothing but making observations, confirming them by more observations (replication of results), comparing them with other observations, and drawing out the implications (theory formation). People were doing that regularly long before Francis Bacon argued for it.

[Ecurb]

Sure they do. They constitute science as long as the implications drawn from them are logical. People who have never heard of scientific method can, and often do, apply it. Science is nothing but making observations, confirming them by more observations (replication of results), comparing them with other observations, and drawing out the implications (theory formation). People were doing that regularly long before Francis Bacon argued for it.

You're defining science broadly. At most Universities, history (for example) is one of the 'humanities", not one of the "sciences". That's because it consists mostly of other people's observations, which are not repeatable or (often) verifiable. Math is another "unscientific" route to knowledge (or, at least, a necessary adjunct to scientific knowledge). So are other languages: we learn "correct" grammar, word usage, etc. I suppose you could call that a form of "science" -- but most people don't. Languages are listed as "Humanities" at Univieristies. Children (and benighted iron age peasants) learn languages without having any notion of the "scientific method". "Theology" and "Comparative Religion" departments are also listed as "Humanities".

I don't think most people would consider reading poetry a "scientific" endeavor. It's surely "educational", though. We can improve our "knowledge" about literature by reading.

[Tegularius]

The only Satanic figure that has most of the qualities of Milton's Satan is Captain Ahab in Moby Dick which I always considered more of a prose poem than a novel. The language is, I find, just as powerful and sublime as that of Milton or Shakespeare.

As for Tolstoy, after his religious conversion, my regard for him waned considerably. It just goes to show what religion can do to a mind once brilliant. The man almost turned into an idiot.

https://readersquest.wordpress.com/2011 ... nd-wagner/

Tolstoy never became religious in the standard sense of that word. He denied the divinity of Christ, and the resurrection. He did become a quasi-religious prophet, who not only despised Beethoven and Wagner, but Shakespeare as well. He thought art should be accessible to all -- and turned his estate into a sort of commune for the peasants (to the dismay of his wife, who worried about the future of their 13 children). His critique of King Lear is so scathing and well written that it's almost impossible not to agree (at least while reading the pamphlet). By the way, Tolstoy also dissed his own great novels, War and Peace and Anna Karenina. The guy wasn't afraid to speak his mind -- and he was such a good writer that he almost persuades most readers (if not quite).

Tolstoy on Lear:
https://www.open.edu/openlearn/history- ... -king-lear

George Orwell's response:

http://www.george-orwell.org/Lear,_Tolstoy_and_the_Fool/0.html

What Tolstoy never noticed was that he became, in his own way, as much a fool as Lear was in his old age. I read his Lear essay long ago which partly confirmed my opinion of Lear before I knew he wrote an essay on the subject. Lear, from the start, IS a silly story no matter how desperately one attempts to glean meaning from it. The language however remains brilliant and insightful as usual. When reading it, it's best to forget the foibles, incongruities and hyperboles in the play which, based on language alone and its psychological insights, is not hard to do. It reminds me of Mozart's Cosi Fan Tutte a play that was offered first to Salieri who turned it down and then to other composers who likewise declined considering it too silly and inept to produce an opera from before it was offered to Mozart. But Mozart needed the money so he said what the hell and accepted the commission creating one of the greatest and most beautiful operas in the repertoire.

The problem with Tolstoy was he negated everything he didn't or couldn't understand, which is not how a real thinker would react. IMO, even his most famous novels, however long and panoramic they may be, never remotely reached the supreme creative power inherent in a work like the Ring of the Nibelungen.

[Sy Borg]

Fundamentalism is on the rise in the US, the world's most influential majority Christian nation. This has been documented for decades. And the trend increases.

This is incorrect. Fewer than 50% of Americans are now members of any church -- the lowest that number has ever been. According to this web site, evangelicals constitute 16% of the population -- down from 19% ten years ago.

https://www.pewforum.org/2019/10/17/in- ... apid-pace/

Some other surveys claim 25% of Americans are "evangelical" -- I'm guessing the difference is based on who is conducting the poll, how "evangelical" is defined, and what the poll methods are.

Yes, religiosity per se is decreasing but evangelism remains strong. https://theconversation.com/think-us-ev ... ism-152640

I concede that I would have gained an impression that evangelism in the US per se is increasing because their influence on public policies in the US is increasing.

I saw the pope made a big speech two days ago about climate change. Did you notice?

I'll agree that I underplayed Satan's role in the Bible. I forgot.

Yes, and those speeches could have been made years ago. These days you can find all manner of CEOs making speeches about climate change too. We are enjoying many fine speeches about climate change, which is easy to do when you know it won't make any difference because the giant companies that produce most of the carbon pollution are too powerful to control.

Of course it is true that both Catholics and Evangelicals oppose abortion (and abortion rights). However much you (and I) may disagree, I don't think that's a good reason to despise them. As for your worship of "science" (and abhorrence of the lack of it in the past) -- hasn't the technology science has bred led to global warming and all sorts of other problems? Would it be reasonable to complain that those who are concerned about the environment must abandon their faith in science?

It appears that you have simply assumed my stringent questioning of Nick's claims means I must worship science. Very odd.

Middle Eastern Iron Age people did not have the scientific method. There's no "abhorrence" in the fact that ancient people behaved like ancient people. The fact is that humanity builds bodies of knowledge. The bodies of knowledge 2,000 years ago in the Middle East was considerably less than the global bodies of knowledge in 2021.

I see no logic in ignoring new information due to an attachment to the body of knowledge of the Middle East in the Iron Ages. Nor do I think that simply observing this fact warrants your ungrounded claims that I "worship science" or have an "abhorrence" of pre-scientific times. I leave the culture warrior BS to others. If someone heaps suppositions upon suppositions, then I may challenge them on it. As one does on philosophy forums.

This does not imply hatred, abhorrence, worship or any of the hyper-personalised bullcrap that is trotted out by those who are floundering in debate. Nick has played victim well, but it's only a game to win the moral high ground after failing to establish any kind of case for "objective value". It's a lot easier (and more fun for some) to play personalised blame games than to clearly explain one's ideas in one's own words.

Consider the "objective value" claim. That God would consider some people more valuable to its plans than others. For instance, Nick sees himself as more valuable in the eyes of God because he experiences "the third force of objective reason". This, he claims is a "higher perspective" that creates unity rather than separation (clearly this is purely theoretical to him).

By contrast, he claims, "secularists" are locked into their senses like animals. Non-religious people are incapable of objectivity or even the ability to pay attention, so he claims.

I do not understand why you are defending his prejudiced and ungrounded claims, especially since he's treated me a lot more roughly in this thread than vice versa.

[GE Morton]

Middle Eastern Iron Age people did not have the scientific method.

Sure they did. As I said above, "Sure they do. They constitute science as long as the implications drawn from them are logical. People who have never heard of scientific method can, and often do, apply it. Science is nothing but making observations, confirming them by more observations (replication of results), comparing them with other observations, and drawing out the implications (theory formation). People were doing that regularly long before Francis Bacon argued for it."

People --- everywhere and always --- employed the scientific method in hundreds of ways, to solve hundreds of daily problems, e.g., when they set about trying to learn why their neighbor got better barley yields than they did; when they sought to make spear blades sharper and the hafts stronger; when they experimented with adding carbon and other metals to molten iron, thus producing steel; when they, based on anecdotal reports, tested whether chewing willow leaves could relieve minor pains; when they learned to cut stones that fit together in such a way as to make an arch self-supporting; etc., etc.

What they didn't do was apply those empirical, trial-and-error methods to the "big" questions, such as, Why does the Sun shine?, What are the stars, and how far away are they?, Why does every living thing die?, and Where did everything come from? They didn't have the tools to answer those questions, or the mathematics to describe them, and so relied on musings and mumblings of priests and soothsayers for those answers. Then when they did develop some of those tools and mathematics and sought to apply the scientific method to answer them, that entrenched priesthood resisted those challenges to its dogmas and tried its best to to suppress those efforts. But they could not be suppressed for long. Some of those early scientists heeded da Vinci's advice: "If you find from your own experience that something is a fact and it contradicts what some authority has written down, then you must abandon the authority and base your reasoning on your own findings."

There's no "abhorrence" in the fact that ancient people behaved like ancient people. The fact is that humanity builds bodies of knowledge. The bodies of knowledge 2,000 years ago in the Middle East was considerably less than the global bodies of knowledge in 2021.

Yes indeed.

[Sy Borg]

Middle Eastern Iron Age people did not have the scientific method.

Sure they did. As I said above, "Sure they do. They constitute science as long as the implications drawn from them are logical. People who have never heard of scientific method can, and often do, apply it. Science is nothing but making observations, confirming them by more observations (replication of results), comparing them with other observations, and drawing out the implications (theory formation). People were doing that regularly long before Francis Bacon argued for it."

Formally, it started in the 19th century. Of course there have always been observations and predictions based on those observations, but the practices were not rigorous.

Whatever, we agree that there's no point eschewing the knowledge of recent times through attachment to ancient conceptions.

[Ecurb]

Consider the "objective value" claim. That God would consider some people more valuable to its plans than others. For instance, Nick sees himself as more valuable in the eyes of God because he experiences "the third force of objective reason". This, he claims is a "higher perspective" that creates unity rather than separation (clearly this is purely theoretical to him).

By contrast, he claims, "secularists" are locked into their senses like animals. Non-religious people are incapable of objectivity or even the ability to pay attention, so he claims.

I do not understand why you are defending his prejudiced and ungrounded claims, especially since he's treated me a lot more roughly in this thread than vice versa.

I'm certainly not supporting Nick or any of his self-serving rhetoric about how the rest of us are benighted in Plato's cave. Sorry if I seemed aggressive. Consider it a compliment. I don't bother arguing with Nick because it's not worth it. The only claim of his I defended (and not very strongly) is the notion that values can be "objective". Of course I have no idea what he means by that, but I have read C.S. Lewis's "The Abolition of Man" in which he argues that certain things can MERIT certain values. I don't really know if I agree or not. "Value" (as Morton points out) MEANS a value TO SOMEONE. Nonetheless, I think it's an interesting argument, and if a waterfall (per Coleridge and Lewis) can MERIT a particular value, there must be something objective about the waterfall that allows it to merit the value (I agree with Morton that the value itself is subjective, by definition).

Also, I sometimes feel compelled to defend my country (which I'm glad to criticize myself) against foreign attackers. People rarely trash
Australia or Burundi. But that's only because people don't care about them.

[Ecurb]

What Tolstoy never noticed was that he became, in his own way, as much a fool as Lear was in his old age. I read his Lear essay long ago which partly confirmed my opinion of Lear before I knew he wrote an essay on the subject. Lear, from the start, IS a silly story no matter how desperately one attempts to glean meaning from it. The language however remains brilliant and insightful as usual. When reading it, it's best to forget the foibles, incongruities and hyperboles in the play which, based on language alone and its psychological insights, is not hard to do. It reminds me of Mozart's Cosi Fan Tutte a play that was offered first to Salieri who turned it down and then to other composers who likewise declined considering it too silly and inept to produce an opera from before it was offered to Mozart. But Mozart needed the money so he said what the hell and accepted the commission creating one of the greatest and most beautiful operas in the repertoire.

The problem with Tolstoy was he negated everything he didn't or couldn't understand, which is not how a real thinker would react. IMO, even his most famous novels, however long and panoramic they may be, never remotely reached the supreme creative power inherent in a work like the Ring of the Nibelungen.

I've heard that analysis of why Tolstoy hated King Lear before. The notion is that it hit too close to home. I like some of Tolstoy's later fiction (Hadji Murat, for one) and I love his two seminal novels. I also like "What is Art" -- which is fun in part because Leo trashes Beethoven, Wagner and Shakespeare. Have you read his critique of "The Nibelungen Ring"? It's in an appenndix to "What is Art" and is almost as scathing as his critique of "King Lear".

Tolstoy was clearly pretty whacky, and got more so in his old age. He was also very opinonated, and confident in his own genius (another way of saying he "negated what he couldn't understand). But he was also a great writer -- so much so that his chapters of pure philosophy in War and Peace are persuasive largely because the (fictional) action of the novel seems to confirm them. Also, Tolstoy had great insight into human motivation and thought. When I read his novels, I often think, "That's exactly how that character would have thought." One example is the famous scene in Anna Karenina when Levin goes hunting with his dog, and the narrator takes to point of view of the dog for a couple of pages, and the reader thinks, "That's exactly how a dog would think!" Whether Tolstoy is right in knowing how a dog thinks, or is just such a skilled writer that he persuades the reader (me) that he is right is another question.

[Sy Borg]

Consider the "objective value" claim. That God would consider some people more valuable to its plans than others. For instance, Nick sees himself as more valuable in the eyes of God because he experiences "the third force of objective reason". This, he claims is a "higher perspective" that creates unity rather than separation (clearly this is purely theoretical to him).

By contrast, he claims, "secularists" are locked into their senses like animals. Non-religious people are incapable of objectivity or even the ability to pay attention, so he claims.

I do not understand why you are defending his prejudiced and ungrounded claims, especially since he's treated me a lot more roughly in this thread than vice versa.

I'm certainly not supporting Nick or any of his self-serving rhetoric about how the rest of us are benighted in Plato's cave. Sorry if I seemed aggressive. Consider it a compliment. I don't bother arguing with Nick because it's not worth it. The only claim of his I defended (and not very strongly) is the notion that values can be "objective". Of course I have no idea what he means by that, but I have read C.S. Lewis's "The Abolition of Man" in which he argues that certain things can MERIT certain values. I don't really know if I agree or not. "Value" (as Morton points out) MEANS a value TO SOMEONE. Nonetheless, I think it's an interesting argument, and if a waterfall (per Coleridge and Lewis) can MERIT a particular value, there must be something objective about the waterfall that allows it to merit the value (I agree with Morton that the value itself is subjective, by definition).

Also, I sometimes feel compelled to defend my country (which I'm glad to criticize myself) against foreign attackers. People rarely trash
Australia or Burundi. But that's only because people don't care about them.

Well, you were right to correct me that evangelism is not increasing, rather only its impacts on public policy. It was interesting to find that, in the aftermath of its embarrassing Trump worship and tacit support of the Capitol riots, evangelist Christianity's popularity was harmed.

The "objective value" idea comes directly from Gurdjieff, who also beats about the bush and never quite explains himself. The idea is to deeply study oneself and to remain unbiased in one's assessments. Gurdjieff developed a whole separate body of knowledge, borrowing from various eastern traditions, using his own quirky terminology, which Nick throws at us without properly explaining the concepts - because he himself does not always understand what Gurdjieff is talking about and is thus at a loss to explain himself.

Ideally, if we cannot explain ourselves simply then we don't actually understand what we are speaking about. It's easy to hide behind jargon and arcane terms, and thus claim superiority, but it's ultimately a shallow game of egos and not much learning is done.

I am not a postmodernist. Not all things are equal, but valuing the life of an unwanted foetus over that of intelligent adult animals is simply insane on all counts other than potential. Given the economic and political outlooks, a fair percentage of adopted "saved" children will end up living their lives essentially caged and exploited like cows anyway.

By all means bash Australia, it deserves it for its extreme selfishness. Then again, if American fossil fuel board member, Rupert Murdoch, did not own most of our print media, then we might be capable of electing a government that behaves as a responsible global citizen rather than a cheater and liar (not just the French submarines, Morrison is renowned for his dishonesty - check out how he responded to the most destructive bushfires in Australia's history in 19/20).

[Tegularius]

What Tolstoy never noticed was that he became, in his own way, as much a fool as Lear was in his old age. I read his Lear essay long ago which partly confirmed my opinion of Lear before I knew he wrote an essay on the subject. Lear, from the start, IS a silly story no matter how desperately one attempts to glean meaning from it. The language however remains brilliant and insightful as usual. When reading it, it's best to forget the foibles, incongruities and hyperboles in the play which, based on language alone and its psychological insights, is not hard to do. It reminds me of Mozart's Cosi Fan Tutte a play that was offered first to Salieri who turned it down and then to other composers who likewise declined considering it too silly and inept to produce an opera from before it was offered to Mozart. But Mozart needed the money so he said what the hell and accepted the commission creating one of the greatest and most beautiful operas in the repertoire.

The problem with Tolstoy was he negated everything he didn't or couldn't understand, which is not how a real thinker would react. IMO, even his most famous novels, however long and panoramic they may be, never remotely reached the supreme creative power inherent in a work like the Ring of the Nibelungen.

I've heard that analysis of why Tolstoy hated King Lear before. The notion is that it hit too close to home. I like some of Tolstoy's later fiction (Hadji Murat, for one) and I love his two seminal novels. I also like "What is Art" -- which is fun in part because Leo trashes Beethoven, Wagner and Shakespeare. Have you read his critique of "The Nibelungen Ring"? It's in an appenndix to "What is Art" and is almost as scathing as his critique of "King Lear".

Tolstoy was clearly pretty whacky, and got more so in his old age. He was also very opinonated, and confident in his own genius (another way of saying he "negated what he couldn't understand). But he was also a great writer -- so much so that his chapters of pure philosophy in War and Peace are persuasive largely because the (fictional) action of the novel seems to confirm them. Also, Tolstoy had great insight into human motivation and thought. When I read his novels, I often think, "That's exactly how that character would have thought." One example is the famous scene in Anna Karenina when Levin goes hunting with his dog, and the narrator takes to point of view of the dog for a couple of pages, and the reader thinks, "That's exactly how a dog would think!" Whether Tolstoy is right in knowing how a dog thinks, or is just such a skilled writer that he persuades the reader (me) that he is right is another question.

No doubt Tolstoy was a truly great writer. Every story I read by him, long or short - though I confess not having read Anna Karenina - never failed to impress. Great genius, in whatever field, has the unique ability to keep itself separated from the rest of one's personality which often, those who possess it have also noticed. Subtract the genius and what's often left is a somewhat mundane character. From everything I read of Shakespeare's life, of which little is known, he seems to have fit that description quite well.

[GE Morton]

By all means bash Australia, it deserves it for its extreme selfishness. Then again, if American fossil fuel board member, Rupert Murdoch, did not own most of our print media, then we might be capable of electing a government that behaves as a responsible global citizen . . .

We hear the same complaints in the US. If Aussie citizens, in the Internet age, rely exclusively on Murdoch's media or any other single source for their information, then THEY are the irresponsible ones.

. . . check out how he responded to the most destructive bushfires in Australia's history in 19/20).

The 2019-20 fires were NOT the most destructive in Oz history, in terms of hectares burned. That year was a distant 5th. It was the most destructive in economic terms, because that year's fires occurred in the country's two most populous states, QLD and NSW, where most of the human development is concentrated.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_m ... _Australia

[Sy Borg]

By all means bash Australia, it deserves it for its extreme selfishness. Then again, if American fossil fuel board member, Rupert Murdoch, did not own most of our print media, then we might be capable of electing a government that behaves as a responsible global citizen . . .

We hear the same complaints in the US. If Aussie citizens, in the Internet age, rely exclusively on Murdoch's media or any other single source for their information, then THEY are the irresponsible ones.

Many regional areas had no choice, there was only Newscorp. It's ultimately a failure of industry monopoly laws. People are the same everywhere; they gravitate to the low hanging fruit, which Murdoch metaphorically provides.

. . . check out how he responded to the most destructive bushfires in Australia's history in 19/20).

The 2019-20 fires were NOT the most destructive in Oz history, in terms of hectares burned. That year was a distant 5th. It was the most destructive in economic terms, because that year's fires occurred in the country's two most populous states, QLD and NSW, where most of the human development is concentrated.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_m ... _Australia

We went through this before. The fire you mention - and you already knew this - mostly burnt extremely sparse and remote areas. It was relatively inconsequential, as you know. The 19/20 fires burnt far more trees and habitats, including human ones: https://knowledge.aidr.org.au/resources ... w-2019-20/

Twenty-six people died and billions of animals lost their lives, with only the former gaining any interest from the PM. If we empathise with animals we see directly what fascism looks like from the POV of the victims. Ruthless disregard. That's why today's extinction rates are about a thousand times higher than the usual baseline rate. Humanity en masse displays the objectifying mindset of predators towards other species, not tempered by a sense of connection.

It's ironic that humanity's increasing distance and failure to relate to other species is most impacting the species we like the most - relatively large, intelligent and gentle animals. Species that appear likely to thrive in a warming world are jellyfish, cockroaches, mice, rats, crocodilians, some snakes, some beetles, starfish, mosquitoes, some sharks and so on.

There's a broader irony too that applies to human populations, how a ruthless disregard by the empowered of those they see as "other" results in a "rationalising" of the disregarded group to a core of tough and aggressive survivors, with the benign ones being first to go. That dynamic presents a pragmatic case for empathy.

[Nick_A]

Sy wrote

This does not imply hatred, abhorrence, worship or any of the hyper-personalised bullcrap that is trotted out by those who are floundering in debate. Nick has played victim well, but it's only a game to win the moral high ground after failing to establish any kind of case for "objective value". It's a lot easier (and more fun for some) to play personalised blame games than to clearly explain one's ideas in one's own words.

Consider the "objective value" claim. That God would consider some people more valuable to its plans than others. For instance, Nick sees himself as more valuable in the eyes of God because he experiences "the third force of objective reason". This, he claims is a "higher perspective" that creates unity rather than separation (clearly this is purely theoretical to him).

By contrast, he claims, "secularists" are locked into their senses like animals. Non-religious people are incapable of objectivity or even the ability to pay attention, so he claims.

I do not understand why you are defending his prejudiced and ungrounded claims, especially since he's treated me a lot more roughly in this thread than vice versa.

The thread has proven that secularists cannot distinguish between objective and subjective values and doing so provokes all sorts of ad home attacks. So who suffers? The kids of the future. A classic example of Plato's Ship of Fools. Everyone has their opinion but no one knows wherethey are going, the way home, or even if there is one.

Sy has written about everything but objective values other than to condemn them as absurd as she tries to play this verbose part on the ship of fools but all she does is celebrate the transient ignoring the futility of the glorification of subjective reason. Yes the thread is dead. She just doesn't realize it. Like Nietzsche who said that God is dead but so is philosophy or the attempt to be capable of objective reason. Shakespeare understood.

(from As You Like It, spoken by Jaques)

All the world’s a stage,
And all the men and women merely players;
They have their exits and their entrances;
And one man in his time plays many parts,
His acts being seven ages. At first the infant,
Mewling and puking in the nurse’s arms;
And then the whining school-boy, with his satchel
And shining morning face, creeping like snail
Unwillingly to school. And then the lover,
Sighing like furnace, with a woeful ballad
Made to his mistress’ eyebrow. Then a soldier,
Full of strange oaths, and bearded like the pard,
Jealous in honour, sudden and quick in quarrel,
Seeking the bubble reputation
Even in the cannon’s mouth. And then the justice,
In fair round belly with good capon lin’d,
With eyes severe and beard of formal cut,
Full of wise saws and modern instances;
And so he plays his part. The sixth age shifts
Into the lean and slipper’d pantaloon,
With spectacles on nose and pouch on side;
His youthful hose, well sav’d, a world too wide
For his shrunk shank; and his big manly voice,
Turning again toward childish treble, pipes
And whistles in his sound. Last scene of all,
That ends this strange eventful history,
Is second childishness and mere oblivion;
Sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans everything.

[GE Morton]

We went through this before. The fire you mention - and you already knew this - mostly burnt extremely sparse and remote areas. It was relatively inconsequential, as you know. The 19/20 fires burnt far more trees and habitats, including human ones: https://knowledge.aidr.org.au/resources ... w-2019-20/

We did? Are you Greta with a new moniker?

Those previous fires were "inconsequential" only because they didn't burn as many houses, businesses, farmlands, and other human artifacts. From Mother Nature's point of view they were just as consequential as the 2019-20 fires; indeed, more so.

[GE Morton]

The thread has proven that secularists cannot distinguish between objective and subjective values . . .

What it has proven is that you don't know the meanings of those terms.