Question: What is the best thing a philosopher can do to further mankind

[anthony]

Whew, Frediano, no mincing words there.

I do agree with the sentiments.

(The lyrics of the German anthem haven't been changed at all, have they? Same tune anyhow.)

On the question of philosophers furthering mankind, my answer - in the second-greatest language after English :-

"Laissez nous faire!"

Tony

[Selene]

Frediano:

Your fatal mistake Frediano is in not understanding that Shayne is in possession of completely superior argumentation than anyone else here at OL except George, who he grudgingly admits is better read than anyone [certainly true as far as I can determine].

Moreover, you also seem to be incapable of understanding how intuitive Shayne is at being able to accomplish a pseudo-Vulcan mind meld which allows him to read meaning into other posters words.

You, as I have realized, just must accept his clear superiority in all matters great and small.

Adam

[sjw]

What a dishonest interpretation, particularly given the context above. If American patriots has not wanted to make THEIR world better for the part of mankind in their domain, they would have stayed under the thumbs of the British.

It is clear that I do not ask questions regarding how to *force* people to do this or that, that I want liberty and justice for mankind. So it is also clear that you do not want liberty and justice to mankind, and your reference to Germany is just sick irony.

Shayne

[Selene]

See what I mean.

[sjw]

Frediano:

Your fatal mistake Frediano is in not understanding that Shayne is in possession of completely superior argumentation than anyone else here at OL except George, who he grudgingly admits is better read than anyone [certainly true as far as I can determine].

Moreover, you also seem to be incapable of understanding how intuitive Shayne is at being able to accomplish a pseudo-Vulcan mind meld which allows him to read meaning into other posters words.

You, as I have realized, just must accept his clear superiority in all matters great and small.

Adam

My estimate of you just dropped from "neutral" into the sewer Selene.

Shayne

[sjw]

See what I mean.

Yeah, you and your new collectivists buds can go wallow in the sewer together, have fun.

[Selene]

Shayne:

Thanks.

Kinda warm and fuzzy down here.

Adam

[9thdoctor]

able to accomplish a pseudo-Vulcan mind meld which allows him to read meaning into other posters words.

You, as I have realized, just must accept his clear superiority in all matters great and small.

Not from Vulcan, try Krypton if you must have an other-worldly fictional reference. Dialogues that would make Socrates proud.

But Animal Planet surely provides more fertile ground for Shayne metaphors. This one's particularly apt:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D_QoDpd6sDQ

[sjw]

Well, I'm sure Ninth's innane Youtube videos can puff up that tiny dust particle that is your self-esteem Selene. I thought you were better than that, but you know what they say, lie down with dogs...

[sjw]

"He that would make his own liberty secure must guard even his enemy from oppression; for if he violates this duty he establishes a precedent that will reach to himself." --Thomas Paine

What a megalomaniac. He wanted to make somebody else's liberty secure. He should have spent more time worrying about himself like those narcissistic Objectivists and less time worrying about mankind.

[Brant Gaede]

"He that would make his own liberty secure must guard even his enemy from oppression; for if he violates this duty he establishes a precedent that will reach to himself." --Thomas Paine

What a megalomaniac. He wanted to make somebody else's liberty secure. He should have spent more time worrying about himself like those narcissistic Objectivists and less time worrying about mankind.

Ah, the rhetoric of liberty. If it was good enough back then for patriots, why not now?

Because nobody seems to know the language any more or feel the necessity of its substance.

--Brant

[Selene]

The Great Debate:

On the fiftieth anniversary of the first great TV debate between Nixon and Kennedy, we have the Lesser Great Debate: Shayne vs. Shayne:

"If American patriots has[had sic] not wanted to make THEIR world better for the part of mankind in their domain, they would have stayed under the thumbs of the British."Post #78

"What a megalomaniac. He wanted to make somebody else's liberty secure. He should have spent more time worrying about himself like those narcissistic Objectivists and less time worrying about mankind." Post # 85

Thomas Paine - is, was, and always will be an American Patriot.

Adam

[sjw]

"He that would make his own liberty secure must guard even his enemy from oppression; for if he violates this duty he establishes a precedent that will reach to himself." --Thomas Paine

What a megalomaniac. He wanted to make somebody else's liberty secure. He should have spent more time worrying about himself like those narcissistic Objectivists and less time worrying about mankind.

Ah, the rhetoric of liberty. If it was good enough back then for patriots, why not now?

Because nobody seems to know the language any more or feel the necessity of its substance.

--Brant

Well, they have their YouTube, their X-Box, their Netflix, their McDonalds, and their band of Randists who tell them that virtue is self-centeredness (that is all they hear anyway), so why worry about a principle here or there?

The Federalist/Anti-Federalist papers do indicate how far we've fallen as a country, back then a good number of people knew how to think in principle. Now that Alexander Hamilton has won the day look at where we are.

Shayne

[sjw]

Thomas Paine - is, was, and always will be an American Patriot.

Adam

You're a good little slave Selene. You serve your masters well by ringing the praises of dead patriots while not comprehending anything important about them. Just like all the other slaves.

Shayne

[Selene]

Yessuh...Massah...we field Nigras is jest a hoppen dat we gets to be de house nigras next to you Massah and da Massah's ladies...yessuh!

[Frediano]

What a dishonest interpretation, particularly given the context above. If American patriots has not wanted to make THEIR world better for the part of mankind in their domain, they would have stayed under the thumbs of the British.

It is clear that I do not ask questions regarding how to *force* people to do this or that, that I want liberty and justice for mankind. So it is also clear that you do not want liberty and justice to mankind, and your reference to Germany is just sick irony.

Shayne

I understood them clearly. They understood the essence of freedom. It is the single concept, the one rallying theme that gays, straights, artists, atheists, priests, businessmen, vegans, meateaters, pacifists, military, criminals, cops, musicians, plumbers, accountants, stock brokers, rodeo clowns, students, teachers, ... and Amway salesmen can all possibly line up behind, sufficient to dedicate their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor, etc:

The right to be free from each other.

The right to participate in free, not forced, associations. Certainly, not forced associations dreamed up by self-proclaimed social geniuses, intent on working out their paternalistic megalomania tendencies on the others. They need to relax: one skin is plenty to run.

No matter how good it all sounded at 3am in the dorm one night, when 'The Truth' visited the religiously delusional and their plans for "S"ociety/mankind/others...call paternalistic megalomania what you will.

Religiously delusional? Where did I get that? From the "still seminal" Emil Durkheim, and his, no, not a footnote, but prominently in his summary at the end of Formes:

Society is not at all the illogical or a-logical, incoherent and fantastic being which has too often been considered. Quite on the contrary, the collective consciousness is the highest form of psychic life, since it is the consciousness of consciousness. Being placed outside of and above individual and local contingencies, it sees things only in their permanent and essential aspects, which it crystallizes into communicable ideas. At the same time that it sees from above, it sees farther; at every moment of time it embraces all known reality; that is why it alone can furnish the minds with the moulds which are applicable to the totality of things and which make it possible to think of them.

...excuse me, I have to get some air. All that nutcake religious fervor is making me a little woozy.

Free people are constantly assaulted by the foaming at the mouth visions of the self-anointed 'geniuses' -- just like Durkheim, when he rolled his eyes into the back of his head and delivered the only honest definition of "S"ociety (an alternative religious totem for 'mankind' when a religious nut is lifting his leg and trying to speak on behalf of Magic Spirits in The Sky.)

I wasn't kidding about that telethon. We should throw telethons, not elections. There is a cure out there somewhere.

regards,

Fred

Edited September 25, 2010 by Frediano

[sjw]

Frediano: "Blah blah blah blah --- Oh no, the Mad Genius is out to get me! He says he wants liberty and justice but I know what a genius really wants! Help! Help! I'm being oppressed!"

What a whacko you are Frediano, you're definitely in good company with Selene.

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Folks,

Just a suggestion. Knock it off.

If you get off of each other's cases for a moment, you will see that there there are some good ideas floating around--even in your discussions.

Nobody I know of on this forum is the moral equivalent of slave-drivers or sewers or Hitler.

Boy will be boys, but it's the imprecision of the insults that bothers me.

You guys are the good guys.

If you good guys are calling each other the things you are calling each other, what in hell do you call the bad guys? There's no where to go.

Michael

[Frediano]

Folks,

Just a suggestion. Knock it off.

If you get off of each other's cases for a moment, you will see that there there are some good ideas floating around--even in your discussions.

Nobody I know of on this forum is the moral equivalent of slave-drivers or sewers or Hitler.

Boy will be boys, but it's the imprecision of the insults that bothers me.

You guys are the good guys.

If you good guys are calling each other the things you are calling each other, what in hell do you call the bad guys? There's no where to go.

Michael

My comments were directed at 'this group of geniuses' who 'believe that it is in their own interest to advance mankind in the best way they can devise' in the following post.

So suppose also that this group of geniuses believe that it is in their own interest to advance mankind in the best way they can devise.

For all I knew, Shayne was ridiculing the same 'this group of geniuses' as I was. I have characterized such as 'paternalistic megalomania', and I have linked 'paternalism' to 'the Fatherland' and the kind of paternalistic megalomania which characterized 20s Gernamny and the Great Volksgemeinschaft.

If I am one of the boys mentioned above who has called anybody anything, can you refer me to the post where I directed any such insult at Shayne the person? If so, I will immediately off to remove it and replace it with an apology to Shayne the person.

regards,

Fred

[Selene]

Michael:

Point of information.

There is a lot of banter that is created on OL because we, thankfully, have very bright, very knowledgeable and very passionate individuals here.

However, a textual analysis of Shayne's exponential escalation of ad hominem language cannot be justified as far as I can discern.

I think I can substantiate that assertion if Shayne made a formal demand of me.

Of course, I would have to direct him to the correct sewer cover, but I would gladly accommodate him.

Adam

[Brant Gaede]

In any case it's not advancing mankind but getting the anti-advancers who suffuse government out of the way so people can take care of that business for themselves if they so wish. Freedom is not Utopia, it is self-responsibility. Utopias are bloodbaths realized.

--Brant

[sjw]

So suppose also that this group of geniuses believe that it is in their own interest to advance mankind in the best way they can devise.

For all I knew, Shayne was ridiculing the same 'this group of geniuses' as I was. I have characterized such as 'paternalistic megalomania', and I have linked 'paternalism' to 'the Fatherland' and the kind of paternalistic megalomania which characterized 20s Gernamny and the Great Volksgemeinschaft.

If I am one of the boys mentioned above who has called anybody anything, can you refer me to the post where I directed any such insult at Shayne the person? If so, I will immediately off to remove it and replace it with an apology to Shayne the person.

regards,

Fred

You are 100% pure whacko. The only point in my phrasing it the way I did was to say "what is the best possible approach that the most intelligent sensible people might come up with for freeing us from this tyranny that runs across the globe."

George Smith, reasonable person that he is, interpreted my question in a sane manner and in the intended manner. Could I have asked a better-phrased question? Sure. But that doesn't give you license to read like a deranged lunatic.

Shayne

[sjw]

Michael:

Point of information.

There is a lot of banter that is created on OL because we, thankfully, have very bright, very knowledgeable and very passionate individuals here.

However, a textual analysis of Shayne's exponential escalation of ad hominem language cannot be justified as far as I can discern.

I think I can substantiate that assertion if Shayne made a formal demand of me.

Of course, I would have to direct him to the correct sewer cover, but I would gladly accommodate him.

Adam

You put yourself on the side of the nutcase who can't read, it's a question of judgement who escalated to what level first, and your judgement hardly has much weight with me after what you did.

Shayne

[Selene]

Shayne:

Does that response mean that you wish to demand, or request, a formal substantiation of my assertion as to your[shayne's] exponential escalation of ad hominem language? Yes or No. I will not accept[oops!] a maybe.

Adam

Edited September 25, 2010 by Selene

[sjw]

Shayne:

Does that response mean that you wish to demand, or request, a formal substantiation of my assertion as to your[shayne's] exponential escalation of ad hominem language? Yes or No. I will not accept[oops!] a maybe.

Adam

I don't care what you do, you crossed the line with me, the only thing I'll accept from you is an apology.

Shayne