Secularist Dogma: Final Refuge Of The Unfeeling?

[Chris Smith]

I just wrote a response to Loran that got lost because my wi-fi timed out. Ugh. Maybe I'll try again later.

[volgadon]

and a nationalist, racialist ideology that could be held as well by Christians and atheists alike.

The brutal ethnic cleansings in the areas contested by Poles and Ukrainians were carried out by devoted Roman Catholics and Greek Catholics, respectively.

Edited August 30, 2011 by volgadon

[mfbukowski]

Pounding the poor into oblivion is, indeed, "bad business," but it really goes far beyond that. The consumer and the producer are, in essence, the same people. Hence, to produce is to consume, and vice versa. It seems a bit of an apples and oranges stretch here, mf, to use this analogy. LDS (and all interested in revealed religion and the life of the spirit) want to know what is right, and what its absolute ground is. Pragmatism can only carry and disseminate already existing cultural assumptions and norms, but it cannot generate them. The same is true with utilitarian ethics.

So it appears that you believe that Platonism and the search for the "Absolute" did NOT grow out of Greek culture but in fact somehow "generated" these truths? Plato, the man who lived a life we LDS would call "immoral" was an inspired man?

Rather than think of "civilizations" here I think it would be better to think in larger terms, perhaps the word "culture" would be more appropriate.

Not a single human civilization has ever "survived." Not a one. Can you name one?

That's why we can learn from individual "civilizations" - the Book of Mormon certainly teaches quite a few lessons about the historical contingency of righteous societies vs unrighteous ones- in fact one could see that as clearly one of THE major themes from the BOM

But "Civilization" as opposed to "civilizations" has been around as long as history has existed. Why is that? Well because before that no one was "civilized"! It becomes tautologous. No culture, no writing, no history.

Nothing, but the problem with pragmatism is that one of its entire points was to displace absolute standards of right and wrong based in revelation and eternal verities with relative standards of effects or "utility." You don't seem to have grasped my point yet that any such system is itself only viable to the degree that it drags already preexisting moral sentiments and norms along with it. It cannot be a source of morality, but only a culturally bound interpreter.

Not at all. Pragmatism developed to solve epistemological problems primarily. William James, one of the founding Pragmatists wrote "The Varieties of Religious Experience" which first showed some ways in which religious experience might be justified. He was raised in a theist, Swedenborgian household- and the parallels between Swedenborgians and the LDS are well known.

In many cases, doing "the right thing" brings pain, suffering, and deeply negative effects, from the perspective of the individual undergoing such sacrifice or suffering. If many more others are helped by such sacrifice, one can always point to this and say, "See, it worked. Hence, it was moral." The problem is that, as a culture and its core values change, pragmatism has no alternative but to simply follow those trends. It cannot "raise a warning voice" and "cry repentance" as it has, itself, no ultimate ground.

Precisely what kind of an "ultimate ground" did you have in mind? Platonism? I like the Greeks too, but I much prefer Heraclitus.

If you are married, have children who love and depend upon you, and have a good job, and you commit a very heinous, serious crime, in which you victimize others, is it practical to admit to the crime and be placed in prison for a long period, in which your wife and children are denied their breadwinner, husband and father? Is it practical, from an economic standpoint, relative to the support of your family? is it practical, from the emotional and psychological support that will be withdrawn from them while you serve your sentence? Is is practical from the standpoint that the experience may psychologically scar or destroy you in the process of accounting for your crime, not to mention having a permanent criminal record that employers will be able to look at when considering hiring you?

Or is it right to confess to the crime and account for your behavior? Are your victims not entitled to justice? From a pragmatic perspective, and depending upon either your individual moral philosophy or that of your society, this question does not have a clear, settled answer. This is part of the basis of the entire postmodern worldview. Only in revelation and in the absolute standards of the gospel, as revealed to human beings through prophets throughout time, can a settled standard be arrived at.

This is a caricature of Pragmatism, not Pragmatism. I am not disagreeing with you about the prophets- I am just saying that there is NOTHING which conflicts with, say, the Pragmatism of William James and LDS doctrine. In fact, it supports LDS doctrine quite nicely.

As far as Postmodernism, I am a great fan of Rorty- but he was not perfect. His main problem was his contradictory view of the "ironist" - combining the idea of someone who creates her own reality while at the same time supposedly being a contingent "self" (That one was for you Facs 3- I am working on that article now- to be put you know where)

But that is where I think Postmodernism is ultimately flawed- the notion of the contingent self. But that is for another thread- I think actually that is far too specialized for this board though.

They are true because they are true. They may be deeply impractical (like Abraham's call to sacrifice Issiac), but they remain true all the same.

Well of course I suppose that is in the eye of the beholder. I am kind of surprised you would say that- I rather value the Abrahamic Covenant and find it rather "practical" for my understanding of the gospel

I don't need to, as I see the question as involving a false dichotomy.

On that we disagree.

[mfbukowski]

I think that moves close to what I'm trying to argue here, and which I've expressed by saying that while pragmatism can express the good, it cannot be its source. It cannot generate the basis of morality. It cannot be the foundation itself.

My other criticisms, regarding the degree to which, because of this, pragmatism must follow cultural change and cannot ground a society in perennial standards (constancy amid change, as President Kimball once phrased it), are closely connected to this.

But certainly you are not saying you are "good" soley because the prophets told you to be? You keep the commandments because they are the commandments and not because they are the basic rules of any civilized society?

Honestly, I think I keep them because my mom raised me to be a "good boy"- it is totally a case of socialization and empathy for the feelings of others,- which she also drilled into my head- not because they are somehow "Commandments" of a God who will punish me for doing wrong.

I don't, I think, EVER act for those reasons. I try to be "Good" because that's what "we" do.

I was perhaps a little less principled while I was an atheist - but honestly it was more out of rebellion than anything else. But nothing serious by any means.

[mfbukowski]

The brutal ethnic cleansings in the areas contested by Poles and Ukrainians were carried out by devoted Roman Catholics and Greek Catholics, respectively.

As a Pole, I must say, unfortunately, you are right.

And (dare I say the unmentionable?) we LDS do not have the best record historically in terms of discrimination against Blacks.

Edited August 30, 2011 by mfbukowski

[Facsimile 3]

I'm sorry, but "Utilitarianism," "Relativism," and "Pragmatism" are "loaded words?" And here all along I thought they were philosophical systems/bodies of belief.

Pragmatism is a close relative of utilitarianism, and both contain the same fundamental weakness in that neither can point to any ultimate.

I'm not sure where you see the circularity (and its "Loran," not "Lauren" (I'm male)) at this point, as the argument has not yet even been made at any length (although I did expand a bit upon it above). The problem is really quite simple. Pragmatism asserts that it is the effects, or consequences of an act that determine whether it is moral or not. For MIll, the basis for moral choice and ethical values inhered in the higher strata of society and in experts within the social sciences, including, most importantly for him, education. If one wanted a final ground for ethics, morality, and the highest values, one asked or observed the values, attitudes, and tastes of "the best and the brightest." The fundamental problem here should be, at least, fairly (especially from a gospel standpoint) obvious, and that involves I think, at the very least, two key points:

1. If morality is to be grounded in that which is practical (pragmatic) or in that which produces the most happiness for the greatest number and the avoidance of pain/discomfort for the greatest number, then the question immediately arises as to the basis upon which the determinations of just what good consequences ( a pragmatic understanding) actually means, and why they are to be understood as good consequences, and what counts as "happiness" or "suffering" in a utilitarian system. In other words, Pragmatism looks to consequences as the basis of that which is "moral," and in so doing, immediately begs the question of the origin of the value judgements upon which the concept of "good consequences" rests. Pragmatism, in other words, cannot tell us what is good, but only that something understood as good can be brought about by certain means. In like manner, Utilitarianism, by placing the ground of morality in "the greatest good for the greatest number," immediately begs the question of the definition of the term "good."

What should be clear here is that, in both the pragmatic and utilitarian case, the definitions of what counts as a good consequence of a given action, or what constitutes "good," are subject to the time, place, and cultural context within which these philosophical systems arose. As an example, if I see that if I jump into an already overloaded lifeboat, it will capsize and sink, and I refrain from jumping into it, and go down with the ship for the sake of the greater number already in the lifeboat, a number of value systems would see this as commendable. Both Pragmatism and Utilitarianism, having arisen in a western, liberal context, and already infused with many centuries of Judeo-Christian ethical teaching, would see this as comprising moral behavior within that frame of reference. Notice though, that the cultural frame of reference must preexist pragmatic and utilitarian philosophy. They are "hitchhikers" upon the settled assumptions and principles about just what constitutes the good and the virtuous.

However, other value systems would not so behold the understanding of the term "good," or see the same consequences as being of the same value. In a Nazi value system, I may administratively send thousands of Jews to the ovens, and strip them of all their human rights and dignity. Within the perimeters and frame of reference of that value system, a committed Nazi pragmatist could legitimately say that the gas chambers and ovens were "good" because of the racial purification they were bringing to the world, a greater good upon which other "goods" were dependent. A utilitarian Nazi could claim that the ethnic cleansing of the Jews was, indeed, providing long term benefits to both his nation and the world in the sense of delivering the greatest happiness to the greatest number from within that value system.

The value system of Hugh Hefner, and many like him, is wholly oppositional to those of the gospel, from the perspective of the purpose of human sexuality and the relationships between the sexes, but, from within that value system, what a Latter day Saint (or any serious Christian) considers either "good" or "the greatest good among the greatest number" is, for Hefner, inverted. For someone like Nietzsche, it is inverted and then transcended in the "will to power," after the "revaluation of all values." Of what good is a pragmatic or utilitarian ethics to an immoralist except to the degree that they become transmitters of immoralist values?

The problem is, then, that both theses philosophies create, or begin, a regress beyond themselves to the actual core of their determinations as to just what "moral" and "good" means. Both are thoroughly dependent upon preexisting assumptions and settled cultural agreement as to just what a moral action is or is not. Within a different value system, the definitions would change, and both Pragmatism and Utilitarianism could still continue to exist, but as purveyors of very different values and concepts regarding human beings and our relations to one another.

Hence, Pragmatism and Utilitarianism cannot be understood as a basis for a stable ethics, but only as limited carriers or platforms for the ethics and morality of a certain age and society. Hence, both these system kick, as it were, the epistemological and metaphysical can down the road, at which point we must ask, yet again, "What is the ultimate source, or ground, of morality?"

I have seen, in this very forum, the attempt to defend the Church from without it, in one case, using postmodern thought, and in another, the present attempt at a syncretistic grafting of secular humanism into the tame olive tree. Both attempts I consider to be, at a minimum, positively Kafkaesque.

Hey sorry about spelling your name wrong, it was late. I assure you that I felt your masculinity in your writing style and assumed you were a dude.

OK, look you and a lot of people on this board are conservative and believe in negative freedom (freedom from another person's life project getting in the way of your life project). I assume that you fear socialism based on your responses that I have now gone through and read (for the entire thread).

So, forgive me for being very confused as to why you are vilifying Utilitarianism as 1. Not predicated on religion to function as a system of governing a country or an individual's life, and moreover 2. Actually insinuating that it leads to socialism.

Wow, where to start.

First of all, John Stewart Mill (The William James of Utilitarianism if you will) is the hero of ideological libertarians. Libertarian organizations subsidize many of his books so that they can either sell them for cheap or give them away like tracts.

Eat your heart out:

http://www.fff.org/freedom/0601b.asp

John Stuart Mill declared that his preferred doctrine of Utilitarianism requires that political arrangements satisfy the "liberty principle", whereby each person is guaranteed the greatest possible liberty that would not interfere with the liberty of others, in order maximize happiness.

http://www.philosophybasics.com/branch_libertarianism.html

What people tend to forget is that Utilitarianism started out as a radical political movement in the late 18th century and then the ethics part grew out of it later. It's hard for us to imagine it being that radical in the realm of politics or even in areas like ethics because it seems to common place today. And contrary to critiques outside of the Anglo American tradition from Kant to Marx who thought that it was just a phase in industrialization, Utilitarianism has become so complete in its changes in our Democracies that we hardly take notice. The Utilitarians welcomed and aided in ushering in the Free Market.

Bentham and James Mill (John Stewart Mill's father) were so radical that they turned John Stewart Mill's life essentially into a project life of Utilitarianism. Mill, by the age of 14 had the equivalent today of multiple PHDs and though he wrote extensively as a philosopher, he did so during his spare time, as he had much work to do with things like trade and such. He was actually the head guy over the British Trade Company that was over India until Britain came in and just took them over in the 1800's. Which means, in some ways, Mill may have been the only thing close to a Philosopher King (while he was a the head of the East India Company) since the ancient times. Though Bentham had dabbled in ethics, Mill did some major repair work to it and really made Utilitarian Ethics a part of the conversation(what James did to the Pragmatism of Peirce).

The men who we think of as crazy dictators never touched Utilitarianism nor Pragmatism in making their decisions. For one, all such dictatorships required a positive view of liberty which entailed that the state was needed to make people good. In Feudalistic Christian Europe this meant the King was also in charge of the righteousness of his people (in the same way the Supreme Leader of Iran is in charge of his peoples' righteousness). In socialist countries like Nazi Germany, Communist China and the Soviet Union the same thing applied by just replacing God with The Party. So this essentially meant that if you weren't good, if your life project did not fit with their brand of positive freedom, you were either converted, economically marginalized, jailed or killed. The positive freedom of these socialist (real socialism as in a planned economy not Glen Beck Socialism or Marxism as in FDR), Islamic and Feudalistic states require an ultimate good and that requires the hierarchy to revel it to the masses. Socialist States (ones with planned economies), Islamic States and Christian Feudalistic States suffocate when encased in Post Modern thought.

Post Modernism suffocates Platonism (which isn't needed for LDS beliefs) and relocates truth from being only in our heads or only outside our bodies to being in sentences based on how we construct our experiences in narratives. And since God is a glorified Human or in other words, since humans are proto Gods, He creates culture just like we do, and in fact, creates culture with us. We can choose His laws which are the most Pragmatic in meeting our potential or we can choose otherwise and get what that gives us.

Pragmatism looks to the future to determine truth (what something is becoming), instead of the past or some external ideal (or "scientific") reality. The whole point in pursuing philosophy if you don't believe in God is to think about the world around you in a consistent and coherent way and to live your life in a more consistent and coherent manner. The whole point in pursuing Philosophy if you do believe in God is to think about the world around you in a consistent and coherent way and to live your life in a more consistent and coherent manner.

Edited August 30, 2011 by Facsimile 3

[Calm]

Honestly, I think I keep them because my mom raised me to be a "good boy"- it is totally a case of socialization and empathy for

Sounds like my mom...."well, how do you think that makes the other person feel?"

[Facsimile 3]

I forget, why you went there. School?

I spent the summer in Jerusalem at the Hebrew University and I learned some Hebrew there.

Well that's good!

A bent mind reaches around the corners better!

I love having my mind blown and luckily my limited intellect allows for it to happen often!

[Facsimile 3]

As far as Postmodernism, I am a great fan of Rorty- but he was not perfect. His main problem was his contradictory view of the "ironist" - combining the idea of someone who creates her own reality while at the same time supposedly being a contingent "self" (That one was for you Facs 3- I am working on that article now- to be put you know where)

But that is where I think Postmodernism is ultimately flawed- the notion of the contingent self. But that is for another thread- I think actually that is far too specialized for this board though.

I can't wait to read it!

[mfbukowski]

Hey sorry about spelling your name wrong, it was late. I assure you that I felt your masculinity in your writing style and assumed you were a dude.

OK, look you and a lot of people on this board are conservative and believe in negative freedom (freedom from another person's life project getting in the way of your life project). I assume that you fear socialism based on your responses that I have now gone through and read (for the entire thread).

So, forgive me for being very confused as to why you are vilifying Utilitarianism as 1. Not predicated on religion to function as a system of governing a country or an individual's life, and moreover 2. Actually insinuating that it leads to socialism.

Wow, where to start.

First of all, John Stewart Mill (The William James of Utilitarianism if you will) is the hero of ideological libertarians. Libertarian organizations subsidize many of his books so that they can either sell them for cheap or give them away like tracts.

Eat your heart out:

http://www.fff.org/freedom/0601b.asp

http://www.philosoph...rtarianism.html

What people tend to forget is that Utilitarianism started out as a radical political movement in the late 18th century and then the ethics part grew out of it later. It's hard for us to imagine it being that radical in the realm of politics or even in areas like ethics because it seems to common place today. And contrary to critiques outside of the Anglo American tradition from Kant to Marx who thought that it was just a phase in industrialization, Utilitarianism has become so complete in its changes in our Democracies that we hardly take notice. The Utilitarians welcomed and aided in ushering in the Free Market.

Bentham and James Mill (John Stewart Mill's father) were so radical that they turned John Stewart Mill's life essentially into a project life of Utilitarianism. Mill, by the age of 14 had the equivalent today of multiple PHDs and though he wrote extensively as a philosopher, he did so during his spare time, as he had much work to do with things like trade and such. He was actually the head guy over the British Trade Company that was over India until Britain came in and just took them over in the 1800's. Which means, in some ways, Mill may have been the only thing close to a Philosopher King (while he was a the head of the East India Company) since the ancient times. Though Bentham had dabbled in ethics, Mill did some major repair work to it and really made Utilitarian Ethics a part of the conversation(what James did to the Pragmatism of Peirce).

The men who we think of as crazy dictators never touched Utilitarianism nor Pragmatism in making their decisions. For one, all such dictatorships required a positive view of liberty which entailed that the state was needed to make people good. In Feudalistic Christian Europe this meant the King was also in charge of the righteousness of his people (in the same way the Supreme Leader of Iran is in charge of his peoples' righteousness). In socialist countries like Nazi Germany, Communist China and the Soviet Union the same thing applied by just replacing God with The Party. So this essentially meant that if you weren't good, if your life project did not fit with their brand of positive freedom, you were either converted, economically marginalized, jailed or killed. The positive freedom of these socialist (real socialism as in a planned economy not Glen Beck Socialism or Marxism as in FDR), Islamic and Feudalistic states require an ultimate good and that requires the hierarchy to revel it to the masses. Socialist States (ones with planned economies), Islamic States and Christian Feudalistic States suffocate when encased in Post Modern thought.

Post Modernism suffocates Platonism (which isn't needed for LDS beliefs) and relocates truth from being only in our heads or only outside our bodies to being in sentences based on how we construct our experiences in narratives. And since God is a glorified Human or in other words, since humans are proto Gods, He creates culture just like we do, and in fact, creates culture with us. We can choose His laws which are the most Pragmatic in meeting our potential or we can choose otherwise and get what that gives us.

Pragmatism looks to the future to determine truth (what something is becoming), instead of the past or some external ideal (or "scientific") reality. The whole point in pursuing philosophy if you don't believe in God is to think about the world around you in a consistent and coherent way and to live your life in a more consistent and coherent manner. The whole point in pursuing Philosophy if you do believe in God is to think about the world around you in a consistent and coherent way and to live your life in a more consistent and coherent manner.

Dude! What can I say??

Dunno if you saw my post- I am working on the Rorty thing.

Edit- oops- crossed posts- you already responded to this!!

Edited August 30, 2011 by mfbukowski

[mfbukowski]

Sounds like my mom...."well, how do you think that makes the other person feel?"

Yep, that's really it, ultimately. The hand that rocks the cradle rules the world!

[Loran Blood]

So it appears that you believe that Platonism and the search for the "Absolute" did NOT grow out of Greek culture but in fact somehow "generated" these truths? Plato, the man who lived a life we LDS would call "immoral" was an inspired man?

Platonism was grounded in metaphysical absolutes, the forms of which all mortal, temporal things are only shadows. That's what the allagory of the cave is all about. Pragmatism attempts to ground the basis of morality in consequences, which still leaves the question of the definition of "good," and "moral" an open question at the outset. Platonism does not. That we may not agree with its conception of the good is immaterial. Plato believed it to be grounded in transcendent metaphysical realities that could be known intellectually through intense contemplation and reflection, and it was they that determined what the structure of society and rules of human conduct should be, not subjective human ideas of what "good" consequences or outcomes "should" be.

That's why we can learn from individual "civilizations" - the Book of Mormon certainly teaches quite a few lessons about the historical contingency of righteous societies vs unrighteous ones- in fact one could see that as clearly one of THE major themes from the BOM

True enough, but this doesn't get us even close to pragmatism as understood by its humanist founders. The gospel is an eternal system of laws and rules of human conduct that transcend all subjective human conceptions and which are eternal in nature. They are all practical in the sense that they "work" to mediate cultural interactions and human relationships in a positive way. Human behavior can be conditioned by and develop in conformity with the moral, but the true moral (righteousness, in the gospel sense) cannot be derived from human behavior. Morality "works," but it must first be known, and neither pragmatism or utilitarianism can reveal it, or originate it in any authoritative sense. They can recognize aspects of it, here and there, more or less, given the cultural setting, but this would seem to be the limit of their efficacy. Fallen human nature is quite capable of diverging from gospel morality in any number of ways, and justifying such through any number of philosophical systems. True morality, therefore, must ultimately be revealed, and then taught and retaught to each new generation. Barbarism is a natural inclination, probably the natural inclination, and its consequences can be, have, and are, reinterpreted as "good" by those who hold them. As perceptions and definitions change, a pragmatic morality based in consequences, which must of necessity be based in cultural agreement as to what constitutes "moral" behavior and "good" consequences has, ultimately, no choice but to simply express the morality of the cultural moment.

Precisely what kind of an "ultimate ground" did you have in mind? Platonism? I like the Greeks too, but I much prefer Heraclitus.

The gospel, understood as the ultimate laws of the universe underlying all human relations.

Edited August 30, 2011 by Loran Blood

[jo1952]

Hi jo,

FWIW, I was raised as a very devout evangelical, and had my fair share of powerful spiritual experiences.

Peace,

-Chris

Hi Chris!

I appreciate you sharing this information - I thought I remembered something about how you realized at around the age of eight that you would be giving up your belief in Christ. Do I have that story straight? I admit upfront that I may have this mixed up, so I apologize if this is not correct.

Anyway, if you are akin to the idea, I would love to discuss this with you privately since I don't think all eyes need to be privy to such a conversation, nor is it in keeping with the purpose of this OP.

Love,

jo

[LeSellers]

there is not a shred of evidence to support the contention that Hitler or Mao (or some others of similar bent) were in any clinical, psychological sense, insane. The insanity explanation for the behavior of these people has long been the favorite retreat for cynical, secularist moderns deeply threatened by the concept of radical evil. Secondly, atheism qua atheism removes any and all barriers to radical evil, even though it does not prescribe it overtly. Atheism is a sufficient condition for radical evil of all kinds, even if not a direct incitement to it in all cases. It is both enough and "the perfect storm."

I suspect that one of the reasons so many fall prey to the notion that evil derives from insanity is the rejection of evil, as you say. But there is, I believe, another piece: evil, deep-seated wickedness, satanic emulation leads, inextricably to insanity. Even in the most evil person*, there remains a tiny ember of the Light of Christ. To have denied that to the point of a Hitler, a Mao, or an Amin, wrenches the person's spirit, and the conflict must resolve itself. It does so by resort to insanity.

* The Sons of Perdition

may

be exceptions.

Insanity does not cause consummate evil, such evil causes insanity.

Lehi

Edited August 30, 2011 by LeSellers

[thesometimesaint]

sociopathic is not the same thing as psychopathic.

[subgenius]

......The whole point in pursuing philosophy if you don't believe in God is to think about the world around you in a consistent and coherent way and to live your life in a more consistent and coherent manner. The whole point in pursuing Philosophy if you do believe in God is to think about the world around you in a consistent and coherent way and to live your life in a more consistent and coherent manner.

Balderdash!

You simplify, or rather reduce, each endeavor above as a self-gratifying exercise.

More reductionist error

[thesometimesaint]

subgenius:

If an activity doesn't bring at least some level of joy or satisfaction. That activity doesn't last very long.

Edited August 30, 2011 by thesometimesaint

[LeSellers]

If an activity doesn't bring at least some level of joy or satisfaction. That activity doesn't last very long.

Congratulations!

You have just provided a working definition of "Praxeology".

On a grander scale, it is also the definition I use for what I call "The Iron Law of Humanity": no person or entity continues to act in a way that does not advance his/its agenda; you can tell what the goal is by observing what the entity accomplishes over time. (I usually use this in unmasking gctf-welfare schools, but it works for everything: in religion, politics, love, war, business. It is, after all, "the Iron Law".)

Lehi

[mfbukowski]

The gospel, understood as the ultimate laws of the universe underlying all human relations.

If you would actually read what I am saying instead of arguing against YOUR IDEA of humanism, you would see that ultimately we are on the same page.

In other words- horror or horrors, we agree!

Like the mythic blind men, you are seeing the elephant as a snake and I am seeing it as a wall, but it is all the same elephant.

A Jain version of the story says that six blind men were asked to determine what an elephant looked like by feeling different parts of the elephant's body. The blind man who feels a leg says the elephant is like a pillar; the one who feels the tail says the elephant is like a rope; the one who feels the trunk says the elephant is like a tree branch; the one who feels the ear says the elephant is like a hand fan; the one who feels the belly says the elephant is like a wall; and the one who feels the tusk says the elephant is like a solid pipe.

A king explains to them:

"All of you are right. The reason every one of you is telling it differently is because each one of you touched the different part of the elephant. So, actually the elephant has all the features you mentioned."

[1]

This resolves the conflict, and is used to illustrate the principle of living in harmony with people who have different belief systems, and that truth can be stated in different ways (in Jainist beliefs often said to be seven versions). This is known as the Syadvada, Anekantvad, or the theory of Manifold Predictions.^[1]

[mfbukowski]

......The whole point in pursuing philosophy if you don't believe in God is to think about the world around you in a consistent and coherent way and to live your life in a more consistent and coherent manner. The whole point in pursuing Philosophy if you do believe in God is to think about the world around you in a consistent and coherent way and to live your life in a more consistent and coherent manner.

Balderdash!

You simplify, or rather reduce, each endeavor above as a self-gratifying exercise.

More reductionist error

LOL

Thanks for that. I really needed a good laugh! I can see that your actions speak louder than words,

It's pretty clear that you like all of us have a developed (hopefully, though I doubt it) "consistent and coherent way to think about the world", and a quite opinionated one at that.

[Mark Beesley]

sociopathic is not the same thing as psychopathic.

A sociopath is someone who can afford a better shrink . . . wait . . . no, that was the difference between neuroses and psychoses.

[Mark Beesley]

subgenius:

If an activity doesn't bring at least some level of joy or satisfaction. That activity doesn't last very long.

I like this. The danger in providing something as succinct as this is insane desire of some to argue and disagree about everything and in so doing make the statement more than it is, thereby destroying its usefulness.

[thesometimesaint]

Lehi:

Public schools have a thousands of years record. In the US it has been nearly from the landing of the Pilgrams.

What are the first public buildings to go up in any settlement? The church house and the school house.

[wenglund]

LOL

Thanks for that. I really needed a good laugh! I can see that your actions speak louder than words,

It's pretty clear that you like all of us have a developed (hopefully, though I doubt it) "consistent and coherent way to think about the world", and a quite opinionated one at that.

The unwitting irony brought a chuckle to my lips as well. I particularly liked how s/he spoke of "reductionist errors" by reducing the assessment to only three words. Great stuff.

Thanks, -Wade Englund-

[thesometimesaint]

Mark Beesley:

One out of one of us is Neurotic, and two out of every one of us is Schizophrenic.