philosophy

[shereads]

What will the weather be like on April the first 2217? (the Department of Defence can pretty accurately predict weather for 4 days in advance before chaos obscures prediction)

My computer is so complicated and refined that it takes into account every conceivable condition and action which may or may not affect the weather on that day 2000 years in the future from the butterfly flapping to El nino. The one drawback is that because of the complexity, its result won't be given until the first of April 2217.

Why? Because to all intents and purposes my computer is the model itself.

Is it any wonder I've learned to love dirty stories when I can also find this here?

Bravo, G.

 

[amicus]

Apples and Oranges, Gauche


It seems to me you labor mightly to prove 'absolutely' that human emotions are undefinable and unknowable.

Is that not also an 'absolute'?

Love, hate, rage, jealousy, rage, affection, passion, compassion, none of these things are 'real', none of these emotions have a logical and rational 'real' base that can be understood, controlled and modified?

Human beings all over the world, experiencing one or more of these emotions have nothing in common? No universal source and 'reason' for each? It is not an universal emotion to 'grieve' over a lost child or loved one? No common thread of emotional response that can be studied and known?

Even something as illusive as the definition of 'beauty' can be defined in 'absolute' terms and has been.

To reject a rational approach to the study of human emotions, is to reject a full half of our existence.

Surely you jest?

amicus

 

[rgraham666]

I'm remembering a joke I heard many years ago.

They (the infamous they) built a computer, the biggest computer in existence. Then they put in every piece of information they could think of.

The first question they asked, "Is there a God?"

The answer was, "There is now!"

Shereads? After a bit of thought I have come to the tenative conclusion that art is a tool. It is a tool of communication. It, if done right, transfers the perception of the creator to the reader, viewer or listener.

The tools being used do indeed affect the perception of the creator. The medium limits and focuses the act of creation. That's why some books make lousy movies and vice versa.

The art, if done right, affects the perception of the recipient as well.

Art is also ethically neutral. It can be as uplifting as the The Grapes of Wrath, as evil as Mein Kampf, or as awful as Jaws. (The book was one of the worst pieces of trash I've ever read. The only time I've seen a movie much, much better than the book.)

 

[shereads]

I'm remembering a joke I heard many years ago.

They (the infamous they) built a computer, the biggest computer in existence. Then they put in every piece of information they could think of.

The first question they asked, "Is there a God?"

The answer was, "There is now!"

In the Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy book series, civilizations collaborate on the creation of a supercomputer named "Deep Thought," so powerful that after years of calculations, it is able to provide the answer to the meaning of the universe.

The answer is 38.

Now all we need is the question.

Shereads? After a bit of thought I have come to the tenative conclusion that art is a tool. It is a tool of communication. It, if done right, transfers the perception of the creator to the reader, viewer or listener.

The tools being used do indeed affect the perception of the creator. The medium limits and focuses the act of creation. That's why some books make lousy movies and vice versa.

The art, if done right, affects the perception of the recipient as well.

Art is also ethically neutral. It can be as uplifting as the The Grapes of Wrath, as evil as Mein Kampf, or as awful as Jaws. (The book was one of the worst pieces of trash I've ever read. The only time I've seen a movie much, much better than the book.)

Maybe its a personal connotation of the word, "tool," that makes me question this. I think of a tool as something that assists us in accomplishing necessary work. Not really true, I know; but it leads me to ask whether art is necessary, and why? Why do we care whether our personal experience of the world and our place in it, is understood by others? By strangers?

 

[gauchecritic]

It seems to me you labor mightly to prove 'absolutely' that human emotions are undefinable and unknowable.

Is that not also an 'absolute'?

It's your absolute not mine. Absolutely unknowable is an oxymoron as well you know. You're putting words in my mouth that you think you can refute.

Love, hate, rage, jealousy, rage, affection, passion, compassion, none of these things are 'real', none of these emotions have a logical and rational 'real' base that can be understood, controlled and modified?

These things that you label emotions which can be modified or controlled through their logical, rational and 'real' base is once again seeing the label as the emotion. Give me a downer when I'm hyper and you will control a chemical action not an emotion. You may as well say removing my tear ducts will stop me from crying and therefor from feeling sad.

Human beings all over the world, experiencing one or more of these emotions have nothing in common? No universal source and 'reason' for each? It is not an universal emotion to 'grieve' over a lost child or loved one? No common thread of emotional response that can be studied and known?

The commonality of emotion is the commonality of man, how can it not be? An emotional response you say. Something which can be quantified. Then how do you explain rage from one and sorrow from another over the same event? My mother dies and my emmediate response (before the grieving process begins) is rage, my brother's response is shock, my sister's response is sorrow. Ah ha you say, these immediate responses are conditioned by our relationship with each other. Our source emotion is the same, we are a close sample so explain now how the downer given to me by the doctor is not given to either of my other siblings?

Even something as illusive as the definition of 'beauty' can be defined in 'absolute' terms and has been.

You have got to be joking. In terms of this definition please explain how the beauty of language compares to the beauty of music or the beauty of art compares to the beauty of the sea.

Or did you mean physical beauty? Then please explain how a fat arse is more beautiful than a bony arse.

Oh. See what I did there, I made the word beauty into a comparative when all this time it is an absolute.

To reject a rational approach to the study of human emotions, is to reject a full half of our existence.

Surely you jest?

amicus

Which half? Study? Rationality? or is the implication that I'm rejecting emotions themselves?

How can I reject a non-physical part of that which makes me, me.

Look at it this way. Burned paper (if you capture the vapour released) weighs the same as whole paper. So what is it that burned?

A dead body weighs the same as a living body. So what is it that died?

There are two answers to this, and they both come down to the same thing.

Without the necessary tools you are weighing phlogisten.

We are a process.

Gauche

 

[rgraham666]

I have a lot of trouble with 'rational'.

The Holocaust was a rational act. The people involved calmly sat down and thought up how to kill other human beings on an industrial scale. And they succeeded.

Does this mean the Holocaust was good? According to some people's standards it must be, since rationality itself is considered by them to be good.

Or maybe it's just 'Garbage In, Garbage Out'? If you start from bad premises, all the logic in the world isn't going to give you a good answer.

Shereads? I don't know if art is 'necessary' work. But you can't accomplish anything without tools.

And art may be necessary. It's a good way to store and transmit human experience. Which, since we humans have few instincts, and none of our modern knowledge could be transmitted instictually anyway, is a good thing.

 

[shereads]

And art may be necessary. It's a good way to store and transmit human experience. Which, since we humans have few instincts, and none of our modern knowledge could be transmitted instictually anyway, is a good thing.

I like the idea of art as a substitute for instinct.

I also like that art is irrational, like so many of the things that make life worthwhile. Kindness to animals is irrational. Turning the other cheek is irrational. Planting an oak seedling, or any other slow-growing species, is said to be an act of sheer optimism, and it's certainly not the most rational thing you could do with your shovel and your time.

 

[amicus]

No, the holocaust was not rational.......nor is murder, rape, pillage and plunder...they are acts of 'irrationality' as the word 'rational' takes into consideration the 'values' of humanity...

And...all over the world, people visit museums to look upon 'beautiful' art objects and scuptures, paintings and drawings and all over the world classical music hundreds of years old entertains....and a beautiful woman knows exactly what a handsome man is as he instantly knows what a beautiful baby is basking in a beautiful sunset by a lovely seascape.

Gee all those people must really be stupid to see beauty in the same thing as there is no such thing as 'objective' beauty.

Piffles...


amicus...

 

[sweetnpetite]

Re: Re: America third-world-ized

To remain a stalwart proponent of pure, unrestricted capitalism, you have to ignore the question I've put to our neocon friends in this forum more than once: If I live upstream from you, why should I not dump toxic waste into the river that runs through my property? Is your resistance to regulating my damage to your environment, based upon the hope that my better nature will prevail when I learn that my use of my property is making your property downstream unlivable?

Is there a political or religious philosophy that has proven to be practical over centuries, remaining unweakened by power plays and human frailty?

I think this is where values, mores and comunity sensure come in, and why laws and political systems are not enough, nor will they solve all of societys problems.

At the risk of sounding like some kind of religious fundamentalist, the calapse of any real value system does have a negative effect on society. And peer pressure doesn't always have to be for bad

 

[shereads]

Re: Re: Re: America third-world-ized

I think this is where values, mores and comunity sensure come in, and why laws and political systems are not enough, nor will they solve all of societys problems.

At the risk of sounding like some kind of religious fundamentalist, the calapse of any real value system does have a negative effect on society. And peer pressure doesn't always have to be for bad

If value systems, peer pressure and the conscience of the individual were sufficient to keep the haves from screwing the have-nots, there would never have been a need for laws or government.

 

[sweetnpetite]

Re: Unions

There is a question that always pops into my mind when people run down unions.

Why is it bad for a group pf workers to band together to create enough power to affect things to their advantage, but good for a group of business people to band together for the same purpose?

Oh my, what a good point. I'll have to remember this

--Wait wait, I know. It's not that it's bad, it's just that the unions are all corupt, and are only ripping off the people they are claiming to help. [did i get it right?]

 

[sweetnpetite]

Re: Re: Re: Re: America third-world-ized

If value systems, peer pressure and the conscience of the individual were sufficient to keep the haves from screwing the have-nots, there would never have been a need for laws or government.

Oh definatly.

I was more or less replying in response to this question:

Is there a political or religious philosophy that has proven to be practical over centuries, remaining unweakened by power plays and human frailty?

with a no answer.

We need standards to counterballance it all out. (not the GOLD standard, by the way) But we need for (at least the majority) people to value human life, dignity, doing the right thing, ect. *over* saving a few bucks. (As in 'sure their products are cheap, but I won't by from them because they mistreat their laborors.)

Politics, phylosophy, rules and governments are only *part* of the solution to the problems of the world. No one system is ever going to garantee the best outcome for every single member Some will prosper and some will suffer. the more burocratic and inflexible the system is, the more difficult it will be for members to move from one category to another.

I think volentary collective living- in small groups- is one of the best solutions. This is just my oppinion, I'm not an expert and I don't have an ounce of personal experience- but this is phylosophy, so I think that's allowed. I don't agree w/ amicus that collective living must be inflexible and tyranical and *forced* nor that it must mean absolute oppression of the self for the good of the collective. This is only an extreme example given to discredit the system.

As far as I can tell, I'm agreeing with you But I'm starting to get all fuzzy and wonder what the hell I'm rambling about so I'll close out now

 

[sweetnpetite]

Maybe its a personal connotation of the word, "tool," that makes me question this. I think of a tool as something that assists us in accomplishing necessary work. Not really true, I know; but it leads me to ask whether art is necessary, and why? Why do we care whether our personal experience of the world and our place in it, is understood by others? By strangers?

Define necessary

 

[shereads]

Define necessary

Necessary to our survival.

I'm not disputing the value of art. Just asking whether everything we do as a species has some rational/practical purpose. I don't think so. I think Brahms' Third Symphony exists because his heart couldn't contain all that beauty, and he couldn't feel complete until he had it on paper and heard it performed. Could he have survived without composing? Maybe even lived longer without the stress of creating and perfecting and fighting to get his work funded and produced?

Edited to add: The fact that "starving artist" is a familiar term might be taken as evidence that art is irrational. The time spent trying to express a personal vision, that will provide an income only if others appreciate it as you do, might be more rationally spent planting a garden or raising chickens.

 

[cantdog]

Psychology, the science, is the best example of the failure of the objective to grasp the subjective in a meaningful way.

Skinner came along with his behaviorist notion of the psych patient as a black box. We have a lot of conflicting ideas, and doubtful premises; a lot of unlikely high-flown talk and also some very likely theories that no one can prove or disprove, he said, with regard to the functioning and the malfunctioning of the human mind. But! We do know one thing. We know how we would prefer that psych patient to behave.

And behavior, thank the gods, is a measurable quantity. Hell, we can change the behavior of a pigeon, one of nature's most hopelessly brainless creatures. We can induce it to ring bells and pull little toy carts. Let us forget what's in the box, and work instead on what the patient does, and what she does not do.

Behavior modification. People who had the thankless job of managing such patients with a mishmash of Freud, Perls, and Bedlam heaved a great sigh of relief and bought M&M candies and dusted off the torture machines in the basement for the purpose of negative reinforcement.

Everyone felt so much better at last to be dealing with something concrete!

Today, we have the zombie culture of psychoactives for every little thing and every big thing, too. Philosophy such as Jung's is a quaint part of pre-modern psychology, and the endless rat-maze lab psychologists have met the psychiatric hospitals in the middle in a seamless paradise for the scientists.

But the patient is as ill understood as ever. If she actually were to be understood, no one could verify, objectively, that she had been. Not objectively. You'd have to believe her when she says so, or something, and the question remains out of the reach of the objective.


cantdog

 

[shereads]

Psychology, the science, is the best example of the failure of the objective to grasp the subjective in a meaningful way.

Skinner came along with his behaviorist notion of the psych patient as a black box. We have a lot of conflicting ideas, and doubtful premises; a lot of unlikely high-flown talk and also some very likely theories that no one can prove or disprove, he said, with regard to the functioning and the malfunctioning of the human mind. But! We do know one thing. We know how we would prefer that psych patient to behave.

And behavior, thank the gods, is a measurable quantity. Hell, we can change the behavior of a pigeon, one of nature's most hopelessly brainless creatures. We can induce it to ring bells and pull little toy carts. Let us forget what's in the box, and work instead on what the patient does, and what she does not do.

Behavior modification. People who had the thankless job of managing such patients with a mishmash of Freud, Perls, and Bedlam heaved a great sigh of relief and bought M&M candies and dusted off the torture machines in the basement for the purpose of negative reinforcement.

Everyone felt so much better at last to be dealing with something concrete!

Today, we have the zombie culture of psychoactives for every little thing and every big thing, too. Philosophy such as Jung's is a quaint part of pre-modern psychology, and the endless rat-maze lab psychologists have met the psychiatric hospitals in the middle in a seamless paradise for the scientists.

But the patient is as ill understood as ever. If she actually were to be understood, no one could verify, objectively, that she had been. Not objectively. You'd have to believe her when she says so, or something, and the question remains out of the reach of the objective.


cantdog

Maybe not, Cantdog. Read Newsweek about 2 issues ago regarding the use of brain-scans to provide measurable, objective reactions to stimuli. Such as - brace yourself - TV commercials.

It's possible that everything we say we feel will become irrelevent. Imagine a tool that powerful in the hands of the personnel department at your local Walmart. The days of handing over a cup of pee to qualify for employment will be a fond dream. They'll actually know how much you like Walmart before they make a hiring decision.

 

[rgraham666]

Re: Re: Unions

Oh my, what a good point. I'll have to remember this

--Wait wait, I know. It's not that it's bad, it's just that the unions are all corupt, and are only ripping off the people they are claiming to help. [did i get it right?]

And the business associations are not just as amenable to corruption and ripping off the people they are claiming to help?

Both are made up of human beings, you know. Nothing different between either of the groups.

 

[rgraham666]

Cant? You should read the book The Undiscovered Mind by John Horgan.

It's a rather good overview of all the various psychological methods out there, and their limitations.

In it he posits an idea he calls "The Humpty Dumpty Syndrome". We can, and have, broken down the brain and the human mind into it's component parts. But we can't put those parts together again into a working theory of the human mind.

A very interesting read.

 

[cantdog]

I should read lots of things.

But I shall manfully (sorry, SnP-- heroically) put it on the list. Thank you.

Horgan.


cantdog

 

[sweetnpetite]

Re: Re: Re: Unions

And the business associations are not just as amenable to corruption and ripping off the people they are claiming to help?

Both are made up of human beings, you know. Nothing different between either of the groups.

Of course not- money/power only corrupts the poor. IN the hands of the rich, it stimulates the economy and benefits all.

 

[sweetnpetite]

I should read lots of things.

But I shall manfully (sorry, SnP-- heroically) put it on the list. Thank you.

Horgan.


cantdog

chauvanist!

 

[cantdog]

Maybe not, Cantdog. Read Newsweek about 2 issues ago regarding the use of brain-scans to provide measurable, objective reactions to stimuli. Such as - brace yourself - TV commercials.

It's possible that everything we say we feel will become irrelevent. Imagine a tool that powerful in the hands of the personnel department at your local Walmart. The days of handing over a cup of pee to qualify for employment will be a fond dream. They'll actually know how much you like Walmart before they make a hiring decision.

And would it not be MegaloMart who would begin it first, even before the Homeland HorstWessel Security Society itself. And they would find out how much I liked MegaloMart when the little cup of steaming turds was set upon their desk. "File this," I would suggest, gently and lovingly, as their brain meters twitched to the music of Diamanda Galas.

 

[Joe Wordsworth]

Originally posted by cantdog
Psychology, the science, is the best example of the failure of the objective to grasp the subjective in a meaningful way.

Skinner came along with his behaviorist notion of the psych patient as a black box. We have a lot of conflicting ideas, and doubtful premises; a lot of unlikely high-flown talk and also some very likely theories that no one can prove or disprove, he said, with regard to the functioning and the malfunctioning of the human mind. But! We do know one thing. We know how we would prefer that psych patient to behave....

...But the patient is as ill understood as ever. If she actually were to be understood, no one could verify, objectively, that she had been. Not objectively. You'd have to believe her when she says so, or something, and the question remains out of the reach of the objective.

Now, this is interesting.

Where to begin? First, I have to admit that I'm a huge fan of Behaviorism (specifically, Behavioral Analysis and Referential Frame Theory; I actually got to take courses, when I was younger, under one of the founders of ACT). Secondly, I'm a huge clinical psychology superfreak.

That being said, I'm not sure I'd agree that psychology is a failure in the regards you mention. We actually do know more about how the mind works than we did; we have greater ability to predict and influence behavior based on psychology principles. We've come a long way in that regard.

It isn't necessarily the case that the mind is subjective, so I'm not sure we can say that it is... beyond that, that psychology has not (in its very young lifespan) mapped out the mechanic of the mind (which is a model I've never been fond of, anyhow) may be less and indication of failure than propoganda might have us believe.

Little Albert comes to mind whenever anyone says "Psychology is failed/bad/impractical/wrong/error-laden science". The boy was terrified of Santa Claus.

Damn.

 

[Lucifer_Carroll]

Now, this is interesting.

Where to begin? First, I have to admit that I'm a huge fan of Behaviorism (specifically, Behavioral Analysis and Referential Frame Theory; I actually got to take courses, when I was younger, under one of the founders of ACT). Secondly, I'm a huge clinical psychology superfreak.

That being said, I'm not sure I'd agree that psychology is a failure in the regards you mention. We actually do know more about how the mind works than we did; we have greater ability to predict and influence behavior based on psychology principles. We've come a long way in that regard.

It isn't necessarily the case that the mind is subjective, so I'm not sure we can say that it is... beyond that, that psychology has not (in its very young lifespan) mapped out the mechanic of the mind (which is a model I've never been fond of, anyhow) may be less and indication of failure than propoganda might have us believe.

Little Albert comes to mind whenever anyone says "Psychology is failed/bad/impractical/wrong/error-laden science". The boy was terrified of Santa Claus.

Damn.

Okay, psychology as currently practiced is a menace to society. Allow me to explain.

Psychology only works if everyone lives in a "Metropolis"-esque environment. This is because conformity is valued over everything else. If anyone dares deviate, dares be unique, they are for the longest time thought of as mad or unhealthy. If they are lucky and evade the psychologists until they write that great novel or invent that amazing new science or technology, they are allowed to be downgraded to "eccentricity". Until then, they live in fear of being shut away forever on a diazeprin drip.

I follow Kesey in his criticisms of society and psychology. I recognize for the services of understanding, moments of catharsis, occasional lockups, etc. but I disagree with our current system. We are treating too many people who don't need it. Check out the chic of psychology in LA and NYC. There having a psychologist is fashionable. It's simply the way to spend your free time. People get to whine and consoled so that they can live in their little fantasy reality, so they can balm those dreadful doubts and feelings, so they can live like a robot and a slave to consumerism and mass culture.

We are killing our free thinkers with this new mass psychology and this needs to stop. Lend a sympathetic ear to the suicide cases, lock up and try to aid the homocidals, speech therapize the stutterers, but let's lay off the future eccentrics and the non-conformist sane.

Cause often it's good to be crazy.

 

[cantdog]

I do not speak of the mechanism, electrical, chemical, of the brain. It is doubtless yummy how far we have come. I simply make the point, for me an obvious one, that you can't know anyone objectively.

Social interactions ditto. The factors of the brain may be objective, but the personality's parts and workings are best approached on their native ground. No matter how delicate objective descriptions become, literary criticism, rhetoric, and I have to add, psychiatric evaluation must be done with another human mind, one not using objective criteria, but subjective ones. Why measure carrots in the market in acre-feet? And the twitchy brain outputs are even more indirect than that, because the native forms in which personalities are cast are entirely subjective.

Science can't handle the subjective well, so it insists that it does well in Psychology. So it does, within the amazingly stringent limitations imposed by its near-irrelevance to what is essentially not objective in the first place.

Injuries, MS flares-- these things become visible for us. The map of the brain is fining down. Yes. All true.

But the map of the personality and its development and function, its deviances and its sorrows, its joys, prides, capabilities to love, hate, nurture, distinguish, make music! These things, please stay with me here, do not duck in fear of the non-objective, these things need an objective analysis like they need a hole in the head.

But that leaves science helpless.

The solution, then, I submit, is not knowledge any more, but wisdom. Not science, but understanding. Not the true, the yardstick and guide of the objective, but truthfulness, the corresponding criterion of the subjective.

In the realms of the subjective, which we may say are the spiritual-- that which is subjective and individual-- and the interpersonal-- that which is subjective but plural or collective or what-have-you-- let us agree that a subjective technique, not an objective one, is surely best, and most likely to be productive of results.

Shall I describe it a little, this range of techniques? Can you give me that much rope? I am entirely serious.