Substance/System/Structure

[rgraham666]

Great So let me dispel one myth before it takes hold here - I have been accused of being intelligent before, but nothing could be further from the truth. Ok, I read a book or two and have been known to use words on occasion. But that's about it. I might be able to reason my way out of a paperbag, but I think it's infinitely more funny to just blow it up.

So in real life I usually ask people whose eyes glaze over during one of my discourses to forget about it, go home and meditate on the phrase: "Why try to explain the world when you can throw a brick at it" every time they masturbate.

I haven't mastered the paper bag thing myself. If you get good at it, let me know how.

And that last piece of advice was just mean.

If you want to attach a proper label to my philosophy I suppose 'existentialist' would be closest. A person is what they do, not what they intend. A person is, in my opinion, responsible for the results of their actions.

Which is why I don't like the 'rational' systems very much. Most of them, it seems to me, sideline personal responsibility. The system takes on the responsibility allowing its proponent to avoid it.

"I have no choice," is the most common phrase you will hear from a 'rationalist'. Which is weird considering how often they are proponents of 'freedom'.

 

[Pure]

i think that's relevant to this thread, rg.

'existentialism', at least Sartre style, denies "Man" has an essence, that is a fixed and determinate nature. what's missing is that the analysis is not particularly historical. probably you know Sartre moved to his own variety of marxism for that.

marx, as far as I know, views people as constructing their environment and therefore themselves. "Man" does not leave Nature as is, but shapes it, e.g., makes cities, in which he or she lives. Hence the urbanite (the metrosexual?).

An even better case is language, esp. written. Aristotle wrote, and the writings are part of human culture, *the one is which amicus and Roxanne* grew up. They are thus NOT in the same position as Aristotle. The whole edifice of human written culture is part of *our environment.

Ami says he's done radio talk shows. Assuming that's the case, the radio, and the *audience of those with radios* is something that is not more than 200 years old. This radio culture spawned Rush Limbaugh, Amicus' more intelligent younger brother.

It is a very nostalgic philosophy, in the midst of this flux, which seeks the eternal and unchanging human essence, said to lie in Reason. Even odder is the attempt to link Reason and capitalism, though of course, unknown to Amicus, there is a claim by Hegel that Reason and Freedom are unfolding together in History. That humans, all in all, are *gaining* in freedom.

This, of course, is the doctrine of progress, an idea of humans that's really taken hold since the renaissance and the industrial revolution.

So Ami wants Human Essence, Reason, and Progress--wants to see it in earthly life. There is no rational basis for this view, but one mainly hears "How could we live life without values such as these,and those derived from them?" "Wouldn't there be paralysis and nihilism?" **

That greatly worries Amicus, Roxanne, and the Pope. Sartre made the interesting point that you *limit* Man if you ascribe essence; that freedom can't be "realizing one's nature." That would be slavery, e.g., sort of like a 'dairy cow' is meant for milk, and that's its existence. How limited if we knew our 'essence' in simple terms and had simply to live it out.

Thanks to all contributers to this thread.



---
** This is a problem that Dostoevsky and Nietzsche first dealt with.
Rand read a bit of Nietzsche, absorbed a little, then rejected him ever after and told her followers to do the same. Pity they do not engage--except for slurs-- the one philosopher who looked into 'nihilism'--and found reason for humans to celebrate the
fröliche wissenschaft.

 

[cantdog]

I haven't read the thread because I'm under the gun with work deadlines right now, but I was asked to weigh in on Aristotle here, presumably because you've picked Ami's carcass clean and need some fresh meat to feed on. I wish I had the knowledge to authoritatively weigh in, but I don't. I know enough about Ari to know that I'm with him on the important essentials, but not nearly enough to hold forth on the issues. A lot of my info comes second hand through the man who I suppose is my primary "guru" these days, Charles Murray, who combines a great soul with a rational mind. Here are some tidbits that amount to me channeling Murrary who is channeling Aristotle:

I am desolated to find you entering one of these refreshing discussions with such a gloomy outlook, Roxanne. Please believe that most of us don't actually sharpen the knives when we see you? And I am hoping you don't worry so much about how deeply you may understand, as academics understand, which is via years of commentaries and critiques, a philosopher of the past. I would prefer you to swing from the gut. You're not a callow teenager; you have lived. You introspect, you reflect, and you have a working morality in consequence, one which attributions don't really affect.

I think the thread will be much more satisfying if it doesn't worry what Heidegger may have posited, or what Poincaré may have said about epistemology. I detest that sort of discussion, and only partly because it almost never happens that everyone in it has read the same people. My real objection is that it stands, for me, a pace back from philosophy. It is about philosophy, or even worse, merely about philosophers. Philosophology, maybe.

Anyway, what struck me in your quoted material was this:

Virtue does not flourish in the next generation because we tell our children to be honest, compassionate and generous in the abstract. It flourishes because our children practice honesty, compassion and generosity in the same way that they practice a musical instrument or a sport. That happens best when children grow up in a society in which human needs are not consigned to bureaucracies downtown but are part of life around us, met by people around us.

It's actually another reason to appear as your own philosopher, particularly as regards ethical questions. Ethics isn't a paper discipline, but an everyday factor in one's life. You use your ethic every hour of the day. Oh sure, once in a blue moon one strikes a dramatic moment of ethical cusp, the kind of thing that novelists love to arrange for in their characterizations. Most people, if you ask them about Ethics, see it with the capital letter and think you mean some philosophical entity, but one makes myriad decisions to do or not do, because it would be best, because it would be kind, because it would be fair, even as one makes them because it would be smart or sensible.

 

[Pure]

MurrayVirtue does not flourish in the next generation because we tell our children to be honest, compassionate and generous in the abstract. It flourishes because our children practice honesty, compassion and generosity in the same way that they practice a musical instrument or a sport. That happens best when children grow up in a society in which human needs are not consigned to bureaucracies downtown but are part of life around us, met by people around us.

It might be noted that this yields (Aristotelian) Localism, not necessarily capitalism. It could be a bunch of little communities in 'city states' practicing life as Aristotle lived it, let's say, with slavery.

Ironically, capitalism, as evolved to its present state, is NOT particularly local, and it's the boardroom in HK that is determining how your needs are satisfied.

Assuming however that one wants to get to 'global capitalism' from Aristotelian virtue, you need an additional premise:

Only capitalism, pure and unrevised, meets human needs adequately.

 

[past_perfect]

I haven't mastered the paper bag thing myself. If you get good at it, let me know how.

And that last piece of advice was just mean.

If you want to attach a proper label to my philosophy I suppose 'existentialist' would be closest. A person is what they do, not what they intend. A person is, in my opinion, responsible for the results of their actions.

Which is why I don't like the 'rational' systems very much. Most of them, it seems to me, sideline personal responsibility. The system takes on the responsibility allowing its proponent to avoid it.

"I have no choice," is the most common phrase you will hear from a 'rationalist'. Which is weird considering how often they are proponents of 'freedom'.

Existentialism was what brought me back to philosophy, or more precise Camus' "The Stranger". Being steeped in humanism and Kantian rationalism at the time, I wanted to create a protagonist who could actually find a valid response to that. Then I started off researching, reading, digesting - and the play I had in mind was never written.

My current angle is consciousness and perception.
I'm getting better at it, if I master it completely, I will let you know.

I did order "Voltaire's Bastards" and "The Doubter's Companion" today, after some disappointing attempts to get them at any local bookshops.

And I got a friend of mine, who will pick me up in a few minutes, to spend some time and effort with me to come up with a structure for an introduction to Rombach's work (and he has still copies of "Die Phänomenlogie des gegenwärtigen Bewußtseins" and "Strukturontologie", whereas mine are still missing in action). So if everything goes as planned, I should be able to translate what we come up with until Sunday evening.

 

[cantdog]

This is shaping up to be a really good thread. I'll likely be gone the next twenty four hours, but I'm so content here that I'll be back as soon as I can. Play nice, and try to keep in touch with the earth!

 

[NoJo]

I'm very pleased that people find here find these rambling philosphical topics as much fun as I do.

I've spent years reading (and occasionally writing) philosophy, which was my Masters degree at university. I had to read a lot of stuff, much of which I (and most of you, I suspect) would cheerfully dismiss as confused, obfuscated crap.

I have a feeling from what I've read on this thread about Rombach, that I guess he would fall into the "crap" school of philosphy. (But by all means, past_perfect, write that wikipedia article. I've seen biographies in wikipedia of people who no doubt contributed less to culture than he did).

Good Philosophers have a preoccupation with the meaning of words to an extent verging on pedantry -- because their preoccupation also happens to be their occupation.

I now present a shortlist of Good Philosophy to Read Before You Die: (And don't come back until you've read some of them)

Plato -- "The Line And The Cave" -- the heart and soul of Dualism

Ludwig Wittgenstein -- "Philosophical Investigations" -- What can and can't be known, what it means to draw a picture

Gertrude Anscombe -- "Actions" -- A little book about doing things, which simply explains the concepts of Freedom and Responsibility

Dan Dennett -- "Consciousness Explained" -- The title is not a boast

John Austin -- Performative/Constantive-- A transcript of a BBC broadcast, where he explains where language comes from and what it is.

Aside from Plato, All these people are 20th century philosphers, modern people living in the modern world. They worked hard to shake off the myth-eaten ideas of their predecessors, and on the whole they did a great job.

 

[mismused]

delete

 

[sincerely_helene]

Aside from Plato, All these people are 20th century philosphers, modern people living in the modern world. They worked hard to shake off the myth-eaten ideas of their predecessors, and on the whole they did a great job.

As long as we have established that Plato is not a planet, then.

 

[Roxanne Appleby]

I am desolated to find you entering one of these refreshing discussions with such a gloomy outlook, Roxanne. Please believe that most of us don't actually sharpen the knives when we see you? And I am hoping you don't worry so much about how deeply you may understand, as academics understand, which is via years of commentaries and critiques, a philosopher of the past. I would prefer you to swing from the gut. You're not a callow teenager; you have lived. You introspect, you reflect, and you have a working morality in consequence, one which attributions don't really affect.

I think the thread will be much more satisfying if it doesn't worry what Heidegger may have posited, or what Poincaré may have said about epistemology. I detest that sort of discussion, and only partly because it almost never happens that everyone in it has read the same people. My real objection is that it stands, for me, a pace back from philosophy. It is about philosophy, or even worse, merely about philosophers. Philosophology, maybe.

Anyway, what struck me in your quoted material was this:

Virtue does not flourish in the next generation because we tell our children to be honest, compassionate and generous in the abstract. It flourishes because our children practice honesty, compassion and generosity in the same way that they practice a musical instrument or a sport. That happens best when children grow up in a society in which human needs are not consigned to bureaucracies downtown but are part of life around us, met by people around us.

It's actually another reason to appear as your own philosopher, particularly as regards ethical questions. Ethics isn't a paper discipline, but an everyday factor in one's life. You use your ethic every hour of the day. Oh sure, once in a blue moon one strikes a dramatic moment of ethical cusp, the kind of thing that novelists love to arrange for in their characterizations. Most people, if you ask them about Ethics, see it with the capital letter and think you mean some philosophical entity, but one makes myriad decisions to do or not do, because it would be best, because it would be kind, because it would be fair, even as one makes them because it would be smart or sensible.

Thank you Cant, it's really nice of to say these things.

My cannibalism crack was an attempt at wry humor, not a genuine fear - my carcass doesn't lie still enough to permit much picking over. My time constraints are real, however, so I fear I can only dabble and not read much, which is not fair to those who spend so much time and passion composing posts.

A dabble:

Pure: "Only capitalism, pure and unrevised, meets human needs adequately."

"Adequately" is a huge fudge word. "Hunting and gathering" can meet the needs adequately (if not for 7 or 10 billion people.) I don't want to be a hunter and gatherer, though, or a dirt farmer, either.

Fukuyama's End of History concludes that since capitalism is the most productive (efficient) way to meet human material needs and wants, in a competitive world it will dominate.

The other part of his thesis is that liberal democracy meets a human spiritual need for recognition (is that the term?), which I believe he derived from Hegel. There are some wonderful passages in the book describing how disidents like Havel in the old evil empire illustrated and explained this human need.

I like this two part thesis. I don't know if it's complete, and we'll only discover in a 500 or 1,000 years if the predictions he bases on it are correct, but I think it does some useful work.

 

[rgraham666]

I read End of History. I thought it was hilarious!

History won't end, not until the human species ends.

Liberal democracy is losing ground. And capitalism is very happy with that. Capitalism and democracy tend to be at odds with one another. They aren't enemies per se, not the way democracy and authouritarianism are, but they sure aren't friends.

As evidence I present China. It's not a 'liberal democracy' and isn't likely to be in the forseeable future. And the capitalists, more correctly the executive employees masquerading as capitalists, are falling over themselves to do business there.

Even here in the West, democracy is fading. Between the failing education systems, the modern media and the power of the lobbyists, we individuals have less and less knowledge, power and importance all the time.

So I found Fukuyama's book an amazing piece of comedy. Rather like that guy in Hussein's Iraq constantly proclaiming victory, even as the tanks rolled into Baghdad.

 

[Roxanne Appleby]

from the end of history http://www.marion.ohio-state.edu/fac/vsteffel/web597/Fukuyama_history.pdf :

The state that emerges at the end of history is liberal insofar as it recognize and protects through a system of law man's universal right to freedom, and democratic insofar as it exists only with the consent of the governed. For Kojève, this so-called "universal homogenous state" found real-life embodiment in the countries of postwar Western Europe -- precisely those flabby, prosperous, self-satisfied, inward-looking, weak-willed states whose grandest project was nothing more heroic than the creation of the Common Market.3 But this was only to be expected. For human history and the conflict that characterized it was based on the existence of "contradictions": primitive man's quest for mutual recognition, the dialectic of the master and slave, the transformation and mastery of nature, the struggle for the universal recognition of rights, and the dichotomy between proletarian and capitalist. But in the universal homogenous state, all prior contradictions are resolved and all human needs are satisfied. There is no struggle or conflict over "large" issues, and consequently no need for generals or statesmen; what remains is primarily economic activity.

Edited to add: I scanned the article, and he does not delve into the "recognition" thing deeply as he does in the book, so this is a necessarily skimpy illustration

 

[elsol]

Is this the part where I mention... I actually prefer Nietzsche.

So I guess I'm actually a relativistic Nietzschian Catholic with a very large Vulcan Logic tilt.

I think that happened because I have extremist tendencies... the whole "Blood of the Unbelievers flowing through the street' gives me wood, I'm just not particular about which unbelievers... any unbeliever will do.

"What?!? You don't believe that Grey's Anatomy is great tv... DIE HEATHEN!"

 

[amicus]

There seems to be a quietude or pause on the thread at the moment...perhaps time for another injection, Quioxtic like, of Amicus...

H, ave not read End of History...never agree with rgraham on anything, but from the excerpt, he may be correct, a comedy.

Rather a tragi-comedy if you will, as the Marxists made the same error, they did not include that innate, unchangeable nature of man in their calculations.

"... But in the universal homogenous state, all prior contradictions are resolved and all human needs are satisfied. There is no struggle or conflict over "large" issues, and consequently no need for generals or statesmen; what remains is primarily economic activity. ..."

Not that I wish to depart from Roxanne for any reason, but the next 500 to 1,000 years wil find man no different, basically, than he has ever been.

And there will always be some little short shit, terrorized by his father, like Napoleon Bonaparte, the the current pretty little man, Abinjadabadboy, lording it over Iran, or that funny little mustached house painter guy, Adolph who will throw caution to the wind and assert himself in world affairs.

Another aspect is to view natures cruel hand in the affairs of man, for example the little ice age, when, somewhere around the 15th century, completely changed norther europe and the future immensely.

More recently the Tsunami in Indonesia, a quarter million people ceased to exist, what might they have become? Or New Orleans, or Darfur. Will there be another drought and famine, like the great dust bowl of the 30's, a true pandemic such as HIV was thought to be, or H5N1 might become that takes, like Bubonic Plague did, half of all living people?

Not to even mention stray asteroids, global warming, the next ice age or a Yellowstone Super Volcano...

But back to the beginning, the essential, unchanging, fundamental and defining characteristic of Man...that his is an individual...and a pesky one at that.

The individual man insists on procreating and having his own way, if he likes a pretty skirt, he goes after it, sometimes not in a nice way.

The individual man eats when he is hungry, a rather basic necessity, and some eat more than others and some only feel secure when their source of food, sustenance (more than one thing) is protected and defended and secure from others.

In other words...he looks after himself, looks after number one, self interest, rational self interest if he is a man of principle and does not see the acquisitions of others as fair game for his desires.

Also concluded, based on life experience or 'empirical data', if you wish, is that most people do not 'think' rationally in terms of large events, philosophy or psychology or, basically, anything, the just live their lives as they choose, based on whatever they choose to base it on, be it family, religion or politics.

In other words...most people are followers. Even in the worst of circumstances such as Nazi Germany or Communist Russia or China or tiny Cuba, people do not and perhaps cannot control their own circumstances and must bow to the powers that be (PTB an Anne McCaffrey novel)

Insofar as relevance to this thread, the intense study and discussion of formal philosophy, I learned, has little relevance in everyday life or even in the long term events that take place. Once upon a time I thought philosophy would replace religion as a guiding force in everyday life, but I observe, as with the 1328 different religions (that was in the 60's when I looked it up) there are as many different philosophies and with the same trappings as formal religion.

So while is it amusing, sometimes, to debate and discuss philosophy and philosophers, I have found it much more rewarding to actually discuss 'ideas'.

One of the greatest deterents to discussion is language. Not differing languages and interpretations, but the basic concept of what human language is and how it functions.

Here again, we run up against those who see no 'absolutes' in anything. Whereas, in my opinion, without absolutes, without an absolute, reality based definition of words that accurately describe human thoughts in an universal manner, understandable by all, in whatever language they use...we cannot communicate.

That is why, over a period of almost three years now, on this forum, I precede most statements with a definition of the word and/or the concept I am discussing.

Of course that ties in precisely with defining the nature of the human mind, how it functions and what it can know and not know.

I did want to include a small word on the concept of Capitalism as the ultimate economic system for mankind. It is not a 'system' imposed on mankind, rather a rational, logical outgrowth of man's innate desire and right to be free from coercion by others.

But then again, on this forum at least, we cannot reach any agreement on whether man even has those 'innate and inalienable' rights in any absolute terms.

Well...thas enough for now...

have a nice day...


amicus...

 

[elsol]

But back to the beginning, the essential, unchanging, fundamental and defining characteristic of Man...that his is an individual...and a pesky one at that.

Hmmm; this doesn't jive with reason.

Evolution states homo sapien evolved from something else. (Thus the nature & characteristics of a thing do change... minorly and majorly.)

Man is Homo Sapien.

Are you saying if we evolve to something that has more of a hive mind... that we are no longer 'man'?

 

[amicus]

elsol]Hmmm; this doesn't jive with reason.

Evolution states homo sapien evolved from something else. (Thus the nature & characteristics of a thing do change... minorly and majorly.)

Man is Homo Sapien.

Are you saying if we evolve to something that has more of a hive mind... that we are no longer 'man'?

[/I]

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Elsol...without doing a search, I am sure you are aware of the history of the evolution of man...i.e. Homo erectus, Neanderthal and several that preceded.

So, yes, I guess, if homo sapiens evolved to something like a 'hive mind' as you put it, I suspect that species would be identified as something other than 'man', as that term holds a specific and absolute definition.

I found the science fiction stories of Anne McCaffrey, the 'Rowan' series in particular to be most interesting as the species developed mental powers, telekinesis, teleportation, et cetera, that in effect would redefine the nature of man, homo sapiens. However, both co-existed, those with powers and those without, and leaves interesting questions for future evolution.

Sometimes I wonder...I do not fabricate ideas or opinions on a whim and most of what I say has been said before, many times, by those more erudite than myself, so I wonder is it just resistance to ideas or do most simply not know of some of the ideas and concepts I espouse?

curious...


amicus...

 

[elsol]

[/I]

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Elsol...without doing a search, I am sure you are aware of the history of the evolution of man...i.e. Homo erectus, Neanderthal and several that preceded.

So, yes, I guess, if homo sapiens evolved to something like a 'hive mind' as you put it, I suspect that species would be identified as something other than 'man', as that term holds a specific and absolute definition.

I found the science fiction stories of Anne McCaffrey, the 'Rowan' series in particular to be most interesting as the species developed mental powers, telekinesis, teleportation, et cetera, that in effect would redefine the nature of man, homo sapiens. However, both co-existed, those with powers and those without, and leaves interesting questions for future evolution.

Sometimes I wonder...I do not fabricate ideas or opinions on a whim and most of what I say has been said before, many times, by those more erudite than myself, so I wonder is it just resistance to ideas or do most simply not know of some of the ideas and concepts I espouse?

curious...


amicus...

You stated something that did not make sense to me... that the 'defining' characteristic of man is that 'he is an individual'.

I conceive of it differently; the defining characteristic of man is biology. It's a question in philosophy of science fiction to define how much of man's physical structure we could change to mechanical and still define the thing as a 'man'.

Your definition leads to a dissection of what the requisites for individuality are

a) That a thing be an 'individual' thing physically separate from other things in its environment.

b) Or that a thing be capable of perceiving itself as an individual thing separate from its environment

The first one allows for future evolution of homo sapien towards a hive-mind and allow the new thing to be identified as man... as surely, we would call Neanderthal man, 'man'; but I wonder if you would feel comfortable defining a true hive-mind as 'man', we're clearly social animals but that seems to stretch the definition of man beyond the pale.

The second one connects definition of invididuality to perception and leaves me in a very uncomfortable state in the present with theories that babies have to 'learn' to perceive itself as separate from their mothers. If that theory were proven to be true, then a newborn is not 'man'.

Thus when I take the conception of the DEFINING characteristic of man being 'individuality' and start dissecting it and taking the elements to their logical conclusions... the model breaks down.

Of course, again, we could just be using 'man' in different ways, which is why I asked what you meant.

 

[amicus]

Okay, Elsol, perhaps I was not focusing of just what you were asking.

A 'defining characteristic', as I understand the term, is that one essential ingredient in the entity that sets it a part from all other similar entities. Like an iron molecule is composed in a precise manner just as a copper molecule is possessed of a certain atomic structure that we can identify.

In man, the defining characteristic, apart from being an individual entity, is, 'rational animal'.

Man is the only sentient animal in the universe as we know it, thus his ability to think rationally is the essential defining characteristic that sets man apart from all the other 'animals'.

Now if you want to play semantic games with infant humans or mentally incompetent humans, then I do not wish to play.

The underlying point, as I recall, was my statement that words describe real objects and things according to the characteristics of those objects. 'Defining Characteristic', as I noted, is that essential characteristic the defines the unique entity one is describing.

Hope you are sincere and not just pulling my chain.


amicus...

 

[Pure]

oops

Man is the only sentient animal in the universe as we know it, thus his ability to think rationally is the essential defining characteristic that sets man apart from all the other 'animals'.

Now if you want to play semantic games with infant humans or mentally incompetent humans, then I do not wish to play.

I guess you haven't met my dog, Pluto... or is it Plato. He's quite sentient.

Check the dictionary sometime, my friend.

As to what sets man apart from the animals.... Well, making H-bombs, i suppose, and grand pianos and toxic dump sites--making his environment inimical to his life. That's a rare gift. Recreational fucking, i suppose, excepting our bros., the bonobos.

Men and women are free to choose values, neither God nor Nature dictates them; nor Ayn Rand. One can choose to be a laisser faire atheist, and ascetic monk in a hair shirt or a debauché like Sade. He or she is under no compulsion to exercize the alleged 'higher capacities' or 'essential characteristics', like doing nuclear physics instead of fucking. Or be a saint rather than a garbage man. St. Paul's and your preferences notwithstanding.

Further, except for human artifacts (like hatchets), 'essential characteristics' or 'specific purposes' are matters of opinion, not fact. Attributing either to a 'product' of Nature is an anthropomorphic fallacy, like saying, 'Horse are alive in order to fulfill their essence: to run fast with humans on their backs.' You have absolutely no evidence or reason supporting your preferred 'essential characteristic' of humans.

The example, Sade, does make a point about the limits on values: if your fellow humans see you as too dangerous, they may kill or imprision you. Among you laisser faire folks, there are a few in jail, like Bernie Ebbers or Kozlowski. Martha just got out. Then there are the Colombian drug lords, Randian to a man.

 

[rgraham666]

Hmm. Pondering on the word 'individual'.

Does the word contain an ethical value? Or is it simply enough to be an individual?

After all, an individual can be good to their children and spouse. Or indifferent. Or cruel. Does the fact that they are an individual override these things? Not allow us to comment on them as doing so would infringe on their individuality?

I'll have to think about this.

Also, as I've mentioned before, my name for our species is 'Homo Instrumenta', Tool Using Man. That more than anything can differentiate us from other animals.

Not only do we make tools, but we make tools to make tools with. And our tools can be very abstract things like government, business and money. Philosophy too.

We use tools all the time, each and every one of us. I'm not at all sure we think that much though.

 

[elsol]

Okay, Elsol, perhaps I was not focusing of just what you were asking.

A 'defining characteristic', as I understand the term, is that one essential ingredient in the entity that sets it a part from all other similar entities. Like an iron molecule is composed in a precise manner just as a copper molecule is possessed of a certain atomic structure that we can identify.

In man, the defining characteristic, apart from being an individual entity, is, 'rational animal'.

Man is the only sentient animal in the universe as we know it, thus his ability to think rationally is the essential defining characteristic that sets man apart from all the other 'animals'.

Now if you want to play semantic games with infant humans or mentally incompetent humans, then I do not wish to play.

The underlying point, as I recall, was my statement that words describe real objects and things according to the characteristics of those objects. 'Defining Characteristic', as I noted, is that essential characteristic the defines the unique entity one is describing.

Hope you are sincere and not just pulling my chain.


amicus...

Amicus...

There IS a difference between saying

The Defining Characteristic...
A Defining Charateristic...

In your post you said 'the...defining characteristic..."

That means the singular and only characteristic necessary to...

To use "the" there must 1 and only 1'defining' characteric... if I had to pick one, then I have to go with our biology, because it allows me to cover the most things that could be defined as man.

You violated the language of your own post with the last one by stating 'In man, the defining characteristic, apart from...'

Means you do believe in more than one 'defining' characteristic...

This isn't pulling your chain; your post does not make sense considering you ascribe to a tremendous amount of rationality... then clearly either the language you chose is wrong or I misunderstand your use of the language in this case.

 

[amicus]

Ah, Pure(I try to be creative here) you are like a cat-fish, a bottom feeder, caught on a hook of reason, but fighting every inch of the way. I suppose that is an admirable trait/characteristic, to some.

"...Men and women are free to choose values, neither God nor Nature dictates them; nor Ayn Rand. One can choose to be a laisser faire atheist, and ascetic monk in a hair shirt or a debauché like Sade. He or she is under no compulsion to exercize the alleged 'higher capacities' or 'essential characteristics', like doing nuclear physics instead of fucking. Or be a saint rather than a garbage man. St. Paul's and your preferences notwithstanding..."

Well, at least you admit 'free will' "free to choose", guess we gotta start somewhere.

Also true, you can choose to be what ever you wish...within the parameters of the possible.

But you see, the matter of choice, or responding to one's highest calling, is a matter of values. Since the fundamental, primary, absolute value of human kind, is life itself, then the 'rational' man chooses those values that reflect and enhance life.

And of course, we do it according to our individual abilities, modified by will power, environment and circumstances. I would not choose to be an Iranian author, writing antithetical diatribes against the Koran, might incur a short lifespan.

Feel free to muddle about as you are doing, even your risque and baudelarian adjectives seem to suit your personality.

amicus...

 

[amicus]

Elsol...I went back and reread the post, there is no contradiction. Perhaps a matter or word usage or the 'set-aside' I used and the "in part" or however I wrote it was in response to to someone who made a comment about 'individual' human beings, in light of that, I thought it necessary to state the axiomatic, that individuals exist entirely independent of all other individuals. It is not a separate defining characteristic, but it seems that not all can even agree that each human is a separate entity, totally unique unto itself (even twins).

That is simply how the epistemology of human language works. We identify things by their simularities and dis-simularities on a macro or conceptual level, in other words, 'trees', then we go on to identify the specific and unique nature of an individual species of 'tree', and then discover the one thing that basically sets a maple tree apart from a birch. That one thing, is 'THE essential defining characteristic' of that entity.

And the same holds true in language and epistemology for all things under the sun. The mind is a marvelous tool, but one is required to learn how it works and how not to foul up the works with fallacies and contradictions. Doing so will invalidate one's ability to reason and eventually drive one insane, incapable of using the mind at all.




amicus...

 

[dr_mabeuse]

That is exactly what any attempt--any attempt at all-- to develop a rational absolute for anything--for morality, for ethics, for literally anything human-- is doing. It is building a structure of reason and then shoehorning the human into the box. That's why Kant's esthetics fail. That's why Rand fails. That's why any derived morality from a rational premise will fail.

"The greatest good for the greatest number"or "do no harm"-- neither can produce a workable moral guide nor encompass the human. "Enlightened self-interest" can be made to explain altruism and love only through the most convoluted of paths and cannot be used to predict any sort of free human behavior. And it isn't that there is no kernel of truth to these things, it is merely that the human is not monistic. Human life doesn't orient to any one pole, no single principle will fit. Rand's ideas fail for this same reason, as will any other rationally derived system from principle.

They are working in the wrong sandbox. Human minds and personalities admit of several different impulses and systems, all operating at once. A balanced mind, a moral person, has these things in good equilibrium. One of these is reason itself, but only one. In a real human being, one who is not a logical construct but a breathing being, reason operates together with several other factors, in equilibrium, each affecting the rest. Reason is necessary to the human life well lived, but it is not capable of acting alone. Pretending to consult only the rational faculty for resolution of a decision is deluding yourself.

But play your games. When you get tired of them, start talking to other human beings about why they make their choices, and how. Try to derive your ideas from men and women rather than from a principle in a sterile intellectual field. People will speak to you truthfully if you ask them to and elicit it from them. It isn't as easy as reasoning in a vacuum, but the results will be more reliable.

Beautifully said.

We are more than reason, more than emotion, and more than morality, and in the mystery of not knowing what we are lies all of our freedom and most of our grandeur and certainly everything that makes us human.

 

[amicus]

Ah, yes, Mab, Ignorance is Bliss....and I suppose for some it seems that way.


amicus...