Replies

"I have no idea what you mean by that."

If this is true, I apologize. Sincerely.

I have had a variety of conversations in which a snide "oh, so that's what you are like, thank you very much" basically means "I don't want to talk about this because it makes me uncomfortable, so Id rather posture to make you look bad for daring to mention uncomfortable subjects".

If you weren't doing this, I'm going to chalk up the misunderstanding to differences between internet and in-person communication.

"Oh, we're back on that nonsense again are we? I said neither more nor less than I meant; apparently you're determined to read something into it, and then you blame me for the result. Why do you do that?"

Again, real life conversation experience. A "Thank you very much, period" reply to a long discourse is not an explicit snub, but, then again, neither is "he has beautiful handwriting" on an academic reference letter.

My experience is, very often, you get into an argument, you lay out what you think about an uncomfortable idea, your opponent doesn't want to do likewise, and so, he postures to make you look bad. If you weren't doing this, then I'm sorry for thinking you were. I'm telling you what I think and I'll say when and if I realize I'm wrong. I don't want to be postured aside for doing so by someone who isn't similarly willing to say what they think.

"Um, can I have some of whatever you're smoking? My posts in this thread are killing people? You seem.... er... rather excited. I suggest you lie down."

Look, I'll say it plainly. I started in heavily on this thread because I don't think we are necessarily out of the mass murders of the the sort that happened 20th century yet; culture is sticky, murderous-philosopher-king ideas seem especially so.

This is something I really care about. I suspect the next wave of killing will likely come, if at all, bolstered by a combination of Singer's type of utilitarianism and Dawkins' type of rabid anti-evolutionsim. Maybe I am totally wrong on whether this is a real risk or not, but I don't think I'm wrong for caring about preventing it, as I honestly think it is a realistic possibility.

Insofar as I think this is a concern, I think the issues the discussion led to are also a concern. They are connected to it. That's why I reacted the way I did to what I saw as snubbing of the discourse.

"In short, you implicitly believe the proposition that my property isn't mine, but is subject to the control of some agent of force. Which brings us back to my original statement: a fascist naturally gravitates toward exerting force on others. The main reason you can't process that, seems to be that you believe in exerting force on others, but don't consider yourself at all fascist, which causes paralyzing cognitive dissonance."

BS. First, to make this clear, I'm not anywhere near your property. I'm typing words onto the property of a third party, who has set up this property, ostensibly, for the typing of words. I want you to keep your property. I also want you to keep your life if the state ever decides the socialized cost of it is too high. There are people with some darn good arguments against your keeping your life in that situation, and I think one important way to fight them is with ideas. If you find those ideas fascist, please point to which idea makes you think this, instead of accusing me of being on your property against your wishes. I am not on your property against your wishes, not in any way, shape, or form.

And, fwiw, I'm not necessarily even advocating that I be allowed on this message board. If I am in any way on private property that the owner doesn't want me on (?), tell me, and I'll leave. I'm fairly new here, and if that is what you are talking about (???), tell me explicitly, and I'll go.

I am not a fascist. Or a socialist. Or a fan of philosopher kings. (On this thread I've been using the word 'fascist' interchangeably with the term 'socialist', not because I have some sort of weird cognitive dissonance thing with the term 'fascist', but because to me the core idea in both is philosopher-king command-and-control. And, more, because to my understanding, 'socialist' is the more general term and 'fascist' the more specific ('fascist' has meaning specifically about relationship between corporations and government, and military and national boundaries, 'socialist' isn't as specified on these factors, so far as I am aware).)

I think the "default" in human societies tribal leader or philosopher king. I think it is what happens if people don't put in a lot of work and thinking and organizational effort - some strong dude, somewhere, will go at the rest with a fist, and only effort and thinking will prevent this structure from winning. I think constitutional republican democracy is an structure that provides the immune defense against social structures headed by tribal leaders and philosopher kings, and all the misery and great human loss those cause.

I don't see how this is cognitive dissonance, or fascism. And I'm not freakin standing on your lawn, or anything remotely like. You imply that by speaking here, I'm doing anything at all equivalent to standing on your lawn against your wishes (unless the owner of the forum minds?), and you're setting yourself up for the charge of fascism.

"As for Jefferson, he regarded government as a necessary evil."

And yet he had a hand in designing a social system, apparently in recognition that doing so was better for people and for freedom than refraining from doing so.

He had the option not to help design the system, so it wasn't really necessary in the sense of being physically compelled. It was necessary *for* some relative *good*.

I'm not saying that government is good. I'm saying that many times, one government is better than the only other realistic options.

Yes government does bad things. But it can also provide structure to prevent even worse things. Is that good or bad? Depends on how you look at it... is it bad to imprison a murderer? It's a human being locked in a cube, and that's bad, but given the context, it prevents worse. And that prevention can be called good.

I expect the world to remain imperfect, because there is chaos in it, and that is a force for both good and bad. I don't think it is in the fabric of this world to wipe out chaos, one significant source of bad, without also wiping out life itself - and life is a great good. So, I think bad can be minimized (by doing things like locking up murderers and supporting our decent constitutional democratic republic), but I doubt it can ever be wiped out completely - to my understanding, the only way to do that is to wipe out good (specifically, life) as well.

"That puts him in a different league entirely than yourself."

No, I don't believe so. It means we were both pragmatists, who like social systems with as much liberty as possible, but with that 'possible' constrained by enough structure as is necessary to prevent revert to a tribal leader/ philosopher king system.

Look, I'll say it plainly. I started in heavily on this thread because I don't think we are necessarily out of the mass murders of the the sort that happened 20th century yet; culture is sticky, murderous-philosopher-king ideas seem especially so.

The best possible preventative is a heavily-armed populace. There's a reason you never heard of a Holocaust in which six-million armed Jews were massacred.

This is something I really care about. I suspect the next wave of killing will likely come, if at all, bolstered by a combination of Singer's type of utilitarianism and Dawkins' type of rabid anti-evolutionsim.

To be strictly technical, the wave of killing on world-war scale is going to be Armageddon.

BS. First, to make this clear, I'm not anywhere near your property.

Non sequitur. I said you believe that there is an authority with the legitimate prerogative of seizing my property. I didn't say you'd ever personally stolen anything.

You imply that by speaking here, I'm doing anything at all equivalent to standing on your lawn against your wishes (unless the owner of the forum minds?), and you're setting yourself up for the charge of fascism.

On the contrary. I came right out and said, that by (implicitly) insisting that there must exist an agent of force--what we usually call "government"--you have already conceded that some people have the right to aggress against others. When humans achieve genuine civilization, the very notion will seem abhorrent. The concept of "rulership" will be inherently repugnant, and the a debate about the best form of rulership will be seen in the same light as a debate whether it's better to be stabbed to death or bludgeoned.

Needless to say, we aren't there yet.

And yet he had a hand in designing a social system, apparently in recognition that doing so was better for people and for freedom than refraining from doing so.

Give the man some freaking credit. He realized that government was evil, but failed to escape the misconception that it was necessary. That's incredible progress, for a man raised in a mercantilist world. I don't begrudge him his error, in light of his tremendous accomplishment.

It means we were both pragmatists, who like social systems with as much liberty as possible, but with that 'possible' constrained by enough structure as is necessary...

That's what I mean when I say we haven't evolved to the point of true civilization. As long as we insist on "as much structure as necessary," we're still mired in our tribal past. True society will virtually eliminate victimizers. It certainly won't anoint a special class of victimizers with authority to have their way with the rest of us.

Put a bit differently, I'm sure you're as disgusted as I am when you see Teddy Kennedy sitting down to legislate. But you apparently want to throw the bum out and get someone else to replace him; I believe that the problem isn't really Kennedy, but the chair he sits on. I want to throw him out, and then burn down the building as a warning to anyone else with the gall to try and push other people around.