Now, that is what I suspected, but, well, you know how it is. I am as politically correct as the next gay-sorry, "guy", (I meant to say).

But between you and me, do you think it is fun to have love in your shirt?

Why don't I come over and you can tell me?

Self-education means tackling difficult books with your own mind, on your own time. You don't do it for some scrap of paper, or Teacher's admiring looks.

I can only despise the small souls who speak against this beautiful process.

I like being friendly but an attack on reading and thinking deserves to be called out for the pretentious nastiness it obviously is.

Get a life, a mind, a passion for ideas. Is it more pity or disgust I feel? Who with half a testicle wastes their free time on a philosophy forum condemning the pursuit of knowledge? "Look at me! Over here! I'm educated!" As if we are going to prove ourselves that way...repeating little mantras, still looking to other human beings as authorities. Get off your knees! And stop forcing your idolatrous grime on others.

Sure, I mention the philosophers who have inspired me because I love them, and I love their phrases. But it's not about the g.d. person. It's about the ideas. The person is the background of the ideas and part of the reality the ideas treat of/are. Life before text. Text before criticism. Truth before trinkets.

Ken, you could not be any more wrong. When I was young at school I learned the usual 2+2 robot like left brain thinking. A while after I left school I began self teaching, not just reading books but thinking, after three months of self teaching I could no longer have conversations with ordinary people, I had learned more in three months of self teaching than I had in my entire schooling, and in three months I had learned more about life than people who were retiring. How could these educated people not have learned more about life in 50 odd years than I had learned in three months?

Thanks man! I only wish I wasn't coming from such an angry place when I wrote that line. I inspired other humans to hate me and show me contempt because in truth I hated them and showed them contempt. At the moment, I see how ugly and sad this situation is on both sides.

I may not have made an idol of others lately, but I do have a tendency to make an idol of myself. I think Satan (think John Milton, Byron, etc.) is a great symbol for this. I suppose this Satanic self-idolatry is more respectable in its way than the idolatry of other human beings, but it's still a good way to cut one's "self" down from its potential inclusion of all reality. In Dante's Inferno, down becomes up right as Dante and Virgil pass Lucifer who is frozen in sh*t. Now that's symbolism! Nevermind the ingenious use of the narrowing spiral.

To everyone I have talked down to, shown contempt to ----SORRY BROTHERS!!!

Let's all just admit we are sometimes *ssholes of the greatest magnitude, forgive one another and move on. This site has an enormous potential to enrich our lives. I know that dwelling on the high thoughts is what keeps me from getting caught up in the sad games we all as humans have a tendency to get caught up in.

Unfortunately I let myself get caught up in more than a few sad games in this very forum which ideally could offer me the cure or substitute for such games ---real friendship based on the shared appreciation of man's better thoughts --his better "angels" shall we say.

The limits of our language are the limits of our world are the limits of our selves. That's my story and I'm sticking to it, until I hear something better. Call me crazy, but I would like to have only love in my shirt when I log on here. When I have "stormed" off it was a frustration not only with others but also with those tendencies in myself to turn an opportunity for mutual enrichment into a place of violence no less cruel for its merely apparent bloodlessness. We are "spiritual" (read lingual/conceptual/passionate) beings and words sometimes pierce deeper than bullets --and the sad thing is that that is exactly what we sometimes enjoy about them. Oh, the cruelty of a poison tipped sentence. What the f*ck are we thinking? Some of us here have long known better. But I'm not one of those. But screw it! I'm going to give it a try. Some of you hate me, or at least the crust of me as shown on tv, and I can't blame you for that. I'm a nasty little b*tch sometimes. I've got to forgive you to forgive me and also the reverse. All this "you" and "me" distinction is practical but deceptive. We are linguistically and emotionally connected and interpenetrating. It's as obvious as the nose on our face. I know the sick thrill of setting myself above. And also the cruelty that is experienced and inspired by such treatment directed against myself. Enough is enough. Who wants to live like that? -->No, I haven't undergone some great conversion. This is just the better part of me trying to take the wheel from the worse part.

Peace!

I feel many are too young to be here, often with the "know-it-all-attitude" ..thus selling half baked bread, which I find annoying.

Most others who have a formal philosophical education, often ends up in navel gazing philosophy, really lacking essential common sense. Imo my early crusade against "this and that is a truth, and that is a lie" paid off, making people realize truth is very subjective, same with "good and bad".

I made a topic specifically to test peoples reaction toward emotionally based questions, many let their emotions get the better of them, and therefore are poor thinkers in very serious matters, as anger cloud their judgement.

Imo there's a few good thinkers, but none that really put me in awe.

Why don't I come over and you can tell me?

What in the world is this forum turning into?! :whoa-dude:

To quote the great philosopher Martin :" can't we all just get alone"?

Reconstructo is one of those people who are just plain awesome. Actually I think that often of people on this forum: you're so cool, goes through my mind. There are some who I think despise me to the extent they think about it at all. I think they're cool too. A tiny kindness can mean galaxies more than the offerer may imagine. Life can be like five years in Siberia sometimes: buried alive. But then again: some exchange happens between people.. a tiny oasis... it means nothing. And I know it'll never leave me.

No matter how kind you are, if you don't know what you are talking about, and if you cannot think your way out of a paper bag, it really does not matter. It is not a requirement that a person know much of anything, nor that he be able to think decently. But it is a requirement that a person not discuss things he know very little or anything about, and that he is unable to discuss with any modicum of logic. It is also somewhat shameful that a lot of people don't seem to realize this.

No matter how kind you are, if you don't know what you are talking about, and if you cannot think your way out of a paper bag, it really does not matter. It is not a requirement that a person know much of anything, nor that he be able to think decently. But it is a requirement that a person not discuss things he know very little or anything about, and that he is unable to discuss with any modicum of logic. It is also somewhat shameful that a lot of people don't seem to realize this.

"If you can't make it, just fake it."

You say don't fake it. Well, I say fake it as long as you know you are faking it.

But you do realize that there is no official expert around to decide who's who? Or are you claiming that role for yourself? Are you the True One? Are you the Law Personified? If not, who? And whence this authority to declare other humans unqualified to talk foolosophy?

And where is the man who can give an exhaustive justification of himself? Shall he present us with signed scraps of paper? A shining happy face? Will he hypnotize us with rhetoric?

And what are the grounds of logic? That's what amuses me. We play with our little systems but don't even bother to "check under the hood." What is logic? You say it's the way we ought to think. And how was this determined? How do we know whether this logic of yours is the way we ought to think about the way we ought to think?

If you want undeniable authority, you might have to seek another field. Philosophy is talk, and talk is cheap. Mine and yours.

There are some who I think despise me to the extent they think about it at all.

Oh, cut it out with this what are the grounds of logic stuff. What difference does that make?

The point is that if a person cannot think his way out of paper bag it doesn't matter what the ground of logic may or may not be.

What is disconcerting, and, as I said before, shameful, is that people cannot discern that he is faking it. (Or maybe, even worse, don't care).

---------- Post added 05-28-2010 at 05:51 PM ----------



But like I said, who's to decide whether or not said person can think themselves out of a paper bag?

No one decides it. Just as no one decides whether water is H20. The belief that facts are something decided by people is just nonsense, and someone who holds that view is someone that believes in nonsense. It is simply obvious that someone cannot think, and does not even care that he cannot think. Of course, he will may realize that sooner of later. Reality bites. Of course, it does not help that there are others who encourage him not to think, and, indeed, thank him for it. But then, they probably have the same problem. Since it is impossible to philosophize without having some talent for thinking, it is difficult to understand what such people are doing on a philosophy forum, or even why they want to be on it.

speaking for myself, I have learned quite a lot here about what constitutes a philosophical argument, and what does not. Of course it is a grey area in many respects because the nature of the subject does not lend itself to cut-and-dried definitions and boundaries. But there are boundaries, which are set by convention and tradition. The tradition is now very multi-faceted, with divisions between the larger schools or outlooks (e.g. continental vs anglo-american) and then, of course, many divisions with the larger schools themselves. But I would hope to be able to situate myself within the broader subject matter so that even if my arguments are idiosyncratic, which I am sure they often are, they can be supported with reference to a published source or recognizable current debate. I also recognise in my own case that my general orientation is small-t theosophical rather than purely philosophical as such and am attempting to confine myself to those debates where such a perspective is relevant and useful.