Do you think compassion is an emotion? Do you think all emotions are more or less the same kind of thing? Are there 'noble' emotions (such as altruism and compassion) and base ones (such as moodiness and self-indulgence)?

---------- Post added 11-17-2009 at 08:45 PM ----------

Incidentally, I believe there is a connection between ethics and reality. In this view, which is basically the view of any religion, the universe itself has an ethical dimension. I am practising the Buddhist discipline, which says that there is a moral law, called Dharma 'that which holds everything together'. I can't see a lot of purpose in a universe that...well...doesn't have a lot of purpose. I guess you can say there is no purpose, but I do wonder what purpose that argument would serve, because if it is true, it wouldn't matter.

suppose i plant a bomb in their hideout and before they come back little red riding hood stops to get a snack and the bomb goes off and kills her? or would i use a sophisticated trigger that would only be set off by a photo alarm of the enemies who would be recognized by it and only then go off? any remote device is liable to malfunction. no, i would just run away.

and we already know the wonderful results from following 'intelligence information', like bombing red cross hospitals and overturning governments for wmp which they never had. getting into a country and doing a ground invasion is also lame-look at vietnam. how many villages were wiped out with those little big guns? who even knew who the enemy was and who was innocent in those days? same thing is going on today in iraq-try to stop a car at a checkpoint because you are alone and afraid they are suicide bombers and they are afraid you are going to kill them, and they take off and you murder them all and find out the car was full of women and children going to visit a relative or something.

Do you think compassion is an emotion? Do you think all emotions are more or less the same kind of thing? Are there 'noble' emotions (such as altruism and compassion) and base ones (such as moodiness and self-indulgence)?

Incidentally, I believe there is a connection between ethics and reality. In this view, which is basically the view of any religion, the universe itself has an ethical dimension. I am practising the Buddhist discipline, which says that there is a moral law, called Dharma 'that which holds everything together'. I can't see a lot of purpose in a universe that...well...doesn't have a lot of purpose. I guess you can say there is no purpose, but I do wonder what purpose that argument would serve, because if it is true, it wouldn't matter.

I would use a remote controlled bomb and wait outside their hideout and make sure that it's clear. Remember that this is in the name of self-defense for you and your loved ones. I understand if you don't have the heart to do it, but don't judge as immoral someone else who does.

So your alternative to saving thousands of people is to allow the ethnic genocide in the name of anti-violence? Doesn't that seem like an oxymoron in some way?

If there is no purpose in nautre, then all our purposes are vanity. It seems more anthropocentric to me to say that nature has no purpose, and than that the only purpose in the universe is that which we devise. It says that human purpose and human intention is the only purpose and only intention. Tell me that is not anthropocentric.

I say that the universe has no intentional purpose or meaning because I am being honest with myself. There is no evidence whatsoever that says or implies that the universe is governed by intentional, willed, volitional forces. The universe is governed by natural law-like regularities, not intent or volitional will. The volitional will exhibited by living things is an epiphenomenon of fundamental law-like, unwilled, deterministic regularities.

Psychologically speaking, it is natural for human beings to perceive purpose in all things (even a damn rock) because as social creatures we survive our environments by recognizing intent in others. To attribute human like characteristics to the universe, such as intent, will and, of all things, morality, is to liken the universe to the nature of man. That's what I mean by vanity. It's a level of self-absorption that is excessive and misplaced. I said that such beliefs were anthropomorphic, not anthropocentric; there's a difference. I don't regard humans as the central element of the universe, and so there is nothing about my metaphysical position that is anthropocentric.

...There is no evidence whatsoever that says or implies that the universe is governed by intentional, willed, volitional forces. The universe is governed by natural law-like regularities, not intent or volitional will. The volitional will exhibited by living things is an epiphenomenon of fundamental law-like, unwilled, deterministic regularities.

Psychologically speaking, it is natural for human beings to perceive purpose in all things (even a damn rock) because as social creatures we survive our environments by recognizing intent in others. To attribute human like characteristics to the universe, such as intent, will and, of all things, morality, is to liken the universe to the nature of man. That's what I mean by vanity. It's a level of self-absorption that is excessive and misplaced. I said that such beliefs were anthropomorphic, not anthropocentric; there's a difference. I don't regard humans as the central element of the universe, and so there is nothing about my metaphysical position that is anthropocentric.

have you read the causal argument thread posted by shostakovich? you would be a good person to give some feedback on that. i also saw things pretty much as you do, but it has given me a lot to think about-and there is nothing anthropomophonic about it! it's a long thread now, but at least if you read the OP i would love to hear your thoughts on it-over there i mean. (sorry to interrupt this particular train)

You gave me a heads up on that thread, remember? I read the OP and gave a counter argument.

I can't see why it is more logical to say that there is no reason, meaning or purpose in nature, than to say that there is. I think every culture, except for post-enlightenment European philosophy, was predicated on the observation that nature has purpose. The EE did away with the idea because it was deemed 'religious'. It is a very short step from there to nihilism, or to the idea that the uber-mensch are the only ones in the universe with a purpose. And from there to modernity.

i am willing to accept the possibility of there being intent and will in the unified field, or ground of being, (god if you wish) which is more than i have able to agree with since i was eleven years old. but at the same time, i must say i am not sure it really matters! i think either way we are so limited in our condition that we may never find out. and as to whether or not we as organisms have free will or not, that too doesnt really matter. because if we knew we did not, what should we do, commit suicide? even that wouldnt be our own free will! so why not just try and make the best of it. like a game of D&D...you make up a character and choose an alignment for him, either good, evil or chaotic, and play the game. is it enough?

Written in the form of journal entries, it follows 30-year-old Antoine Roquentin who, returned from years of travel, settles in the fictional French seaport town of Bouville to finish his research on the life of an 18th-century political figure. But during the winter of 1932, a "sweetish sickness" he calls nausea increasingly impinges on almost everything he does or enjoys: his research project, the company of "The Self-Taught Man" ("The Autodidact" in some translations) who is reading all the books in the local library alphabetically, a physical relationship with a cafe owner named Francoise, his memories of Anny, an English girl he once loved, even his own hands and the beauty of nature.

Over time, his disgust towards existence forces him into near-insanity, self-hatred; he embodies Sartre's theories of existential angst, and he searches anxiously for meaning in all the things that had filled and fulfilled his life up to that point. But finally he comes to a revelation into the nature of his being. Antoine faces the troublesomely provisional and limited nature of existence itself.

In his resolution at the end of the book he accepts the indifference of the physical world to man's aspirations. He is able to see that realization not only as a regret but also as an opportunity. People are free to make their own meaning: a freedom that is also a responsibility, because without that commitment there will be no meaning.

I can't see why it is more logical to say that there is no reason, meaning or purpose in nature, than to say that there is. I think every culture, except for post-enlightenment European philosophy, was predicated on the observation that nature has purpose. The EE did away with the idea because it was deemed 'religious'. It is a very short step from there to nihilism, or to the idea that the uber-mensch are the only ones in the universe with a purpose. And from there to modernity.

We know there is a purpose to nature, but we do not reach it with preconceptions...For us, nature is life; and we need more life... You can't find any meaning apart from life... What meaning has the most beautiful sunrise to a dead man???Without life there is no meaning, so to ever seek meaning apart from our lives and the existence of life on earth is simple...We can judge all that we see on earth by the standard of what it does for us, and how it affects our lives, and there is its value, and its meaning...You will never find an abstract purpose, or a metaphysical purpose apart from the source of all our reality, which is our tenure in life...

Well I say it really matters (and I am not really arguing for Diety.) Or you could say, if it is not the case, then it is true that it doesn't matter, because nothing matters. Living, dying, it is all pretty much the same, except for what meaning we are able to imbue it with by virtue of our own efforts and authenticity. Here we are back at existentialism. True, there is a certain kind of dramatic heroism about it. Sartre was offered the Nobel Prize (which he declined, much to his great credit, in my view - the only writer to have ever done so) on the basis of his novel Nausea:



But the themes in Sartre's work paint a very bleak picture of the human condition. 'Hell is other people'. Being in a situation for which we are not responsible and over which we have no control ('No Exit').

Finding a sense of unity with nature and a sense of greater life through compassion seems preferable to me. And how would this be possible, from the perspective of being a lonely ego in a meaningless world where nothing has purpose? And again, how is this not anthropocentric? Only modern man feels like this. It is the hallmark of modernity. Of course, modernity has many advantages, but I don't think this is one of them.

very simple and simply stated. what else do we really need to know?

hey fido, you dont believe in life after death? if we meet again there, i will depend on you to explain to me the meaning and purpose of that too!

It is a matter of interpretation, not evidence. There are eloquent arguments on both sides. Arguments for whether there is a cosmic intelligence or whether there is a moral law can never be proven objectively. It is a matter of personal predilection. But if the universe is lawful in regards to gravity and electromagnetism, there is no reason to believe it is not lawful in other respects as well. Who are we to dicate which aspects of it are lawful, and which are not?

The human body was understood by the ancients to be a kind of replica of the universe, a 'microcosm'. I would think, if you were an advanced intelligence from another universe, you could infer the whole development of this universe on the basis of one human body. So as it is the result of a billion-year process of evolution, why would it be vain to believe that the characteristics of the human being reflect the attributes of the Universe that gave rise to it?

How someone interprets that information in mystical ways is beyond me. You think that an advanced intelligence from another universe you could infer the whole evolutionary development of the universe on the basis of the human body?! Now that's anthropocentric. If the characteristics or behaviors of the human being reflect the attributes of the universe then that only goes to show that the universe is caused by unwilled, deterministic regularities.

Many of the great old philosophers say that morality comes with the birth of society, which is created because of X. X is where all kind of variety comes in, where Hobbes says society is necessary for humans to thrive and Nietzsche says society is self destructive (but ultimately leading to something greater eventually). But no matter the cause I think it is safe to form an opinion for myself that humans create morals as an inherit effect of taking part in society, where they are dependent.

"In this fathom long body, I declare is the world, the origin of the world, the cessation of the world and the path leading to the cessation of the world."

The Buddha

Morality comes out of our navels, literally...We learn love and kindness before we walk, the fear of strangers and the affection of the familiar... It comes out of our births, as society is born in the family... We do not create morals, but are created by them... We are the result of moral forms turned into social forms...

Nihilistic asceticism straight from the horse's mouth.

---------- Post added 11-18-2009 at 04:30 PM ----------



You're talking about emotions, not morals.