Where are all the 'rugged individualists', the 'rebels without a cause'? As much as we pay lip service to our desire to stand-out, we are strangely sheepish.
They won't show up. Say that 90% of people on the net were 'rugged individualists', and they all search for something different. The other 10% are not, and they all search for Britney Spears. Britney Spears gets the #1 slot.
You can't tell much from this data, at least in the form it's presented.
Unfortunately, utilitarianism is still based on a relative view. Remember that Germany was trying to rid of its internal problems by exterminating its Jewish minority. From their point of view, it would be the most useful course of action for improving their society.
I would argue that they were mistaken. Any tool or ethical system can be misused or misunderstood. People misunderstand religion all the time, and do horrible things which they believe their religion justifies (or demands). So I agree, utilitarianism can lead to horrible things, but this probably isn't due to relativity, since religion has done the same.
I'd also argue that utilitarianism is not strictly relative (and also that there could be good utilitarian arguments against communism), but now I'm going waaaay off-topic.:)
Since we still lack a source, God merely becomes subject to the same philosophical difficulty that we are trying to solve. Typically, omnipotence and omniscience are ascribed to God and that avoids the problem.
But is this really avoiding the problem? As a tool for authority, it works. But if the goal is to know what is right and wrong, how does this help? Whether God has told us what's right or wrong or not, aren't you going to have to coerce an awful lot of people to believe in one set of rules which you can't ultimately prove to be correct, since you can't call up God for clarification? I know some might counter by saying that you can read the Bible or something, but I'd have to already buy into this way of seeing the world to agree with that.
And if someone really can speak to God, how can I know that? Isn't there the tremendous chance of abuse, if none of this can be verified?
I don't see what rational benefits religion offers over secular ethical systems. As you say, faith is a part of this, though I don't think that's exclusive to religion. Secular ethical systems require a bit of a leap of faith too, but I think they require less than religion. I also think that secular systems have an important advantage, in that people of different religions may be able to agree with the same secular system. It'd still be tough, but easier than without one.
I may not have stated myself clearly on the "neighbor's infant" thing. My point was not that someone might wrongly think that God is telling them to do this and that - my point was that if these rules truly are decrees by God, and not just communicated, then they are arbitrary. That is, X is right because God says so. So if we could somehow directly access God, and he said that strangling your neighbor's baby is ok, then is it? That's what that sort of system implies - that things aren't inherently wrong, they're wrong because God says so. Does that make more sense?
It also makes it difficult to make decisions, since if these rules are arbitrary, they may not be cohesive. And if they're cohesive, I'd argue that they may not, in fact, be arbitrary.:)
I agree with your overall point, though. Religion can play a useful role in the recognition of inherent, inalienable rights. I just like to quibble.:)
Maybe. But it's also Lockean. They may have just wanted to say, "Look, this is a good idea" and not argue about what they already agreed with.
I agree, it is really hard to make a case for inalienable rights without deferring to God or whatever. That's not to say it can't be done. Utilitarianism goes a long way towards doing that.
I don't think you need a religious bedrock to avoid moral relativism. But in any of these ethical theories, there are certain things that have to just kind of be accepted. In Utilitarianism, for example, you have to accept that the general well-being of the populace and of individuals is a desirable thing. That may sound silly to deny, but that doesn't mean you can prove it. It's an easier stretch than saying, for example, X is wrong because God says it's wrong.
Which brings me to the point where a lot of these conversations can end (or go haywire) - if ethics and morality are dependent on God, does God create these rules for us? Or merely communicate them? If he's merely communicating them, then those rules would seem to be independent of him. If he's creating them... well, would anyone argue that if God said that it was ok to strangle your neighbor's infant, then it's ok?
One could counter that God doesn't create them, but he's the one and only way to know these rules. That is, we can't discover these truths independently. But I'm not sure how anyone would begin to offer a good argument for that.
Heh. You misunderstand. I'm totally with you on this. I just haven't heard a good argument to completely convince me that we actually have these things called "rights" which are independent of outside control or whim. Do I believe it? Yeah. Can I prove it, or at least disprove the opposite? No. But if someone can, it'll make my day.
It gets even more confusing when people start saying that intellectual property is a right, or bearing arms, or whatever. You can claim these things all you want, but can anyone show that we all have the inherent right to bear arms? Can anyone show that we have the inherent right to a speedy trial? And if any of these rights are inherent, and can't be granted or revoked by a government, does that mean we have to abandon all forms of penal systems?
Maybe those are too specific (you could argue that these are derived from basic rights), but it does demonstrate the problem.
By the by, do you really believe non-living chemicals learnt to walk and talk all by themselves?
You're right. That's crazy. Everyone needs to accept the cold, rational truth: a big, magic, invisible, all-powerful, timeless dude made us out of mud.
Oh, and he doomed us to eternal pain and suffering unless we do the right dance.
The possession of rights, in practice, is indistinguishable from the ability to exercise those rights. That is to say, you can claim that you have this or that right all you want, and you may even give an excellent argument for it, but if the state effectively prohibits you from exercising that right, then "This is my right" is more of a political statement or desire than an actual statement of fact.
I guess it comes down to whatever is the more persuasive definition of "right". I'm pretty confused, and have been for a while. I know what I'd like to believe, but there's good arguments for and against it.
In 20 years some then current environmentalist when confronted by dire predictions 20 years ago will dismiss those people as not having had the full picture whereas they do now. The same this is being said when opponents to the current pc point of view point out the fallacies of 20 years ago.
Wait - what are you saying? That we don't know that we have the full picture, so we shouldn't warn of possible consequences for environmentally irresponsible behavior? Can we ever know if we have the full picture?
I agree with your cry-wolf argument, but certainly we should continue to try and understand our environment and we should certainly make testable predictions. Besides, even if high CO2 emmissions aren't causing global warming, wouldn't the air be much more pleasant and healthy to breath with it reduced?
Of course, someone forgot to tell W that, if I remember correctly. I seem to remember someone from the NY Times asking about his administration's change in attitute towards the existence of global warming. Bush was confused, and I believe his press secretary stepped in and smoothed things over.
I'm hoping these will start to appear in at least prosumer models soon. My main concerns are:
the time it takes to capture the footage
dropouts
I hate that when we shoot 45 mins of footage, it takes 45 minutes to capture it. Then another 10 minutes to copy it onto a firewire drive.
There is an upside to this, in that I'm pretty much forced to view all the footage straight through before editing, which I may not do otherwise. It's still irritating, though.
And the dropout problem can probably be mostly taken care of by using more expensive tapes, but they still happen.
Every news source puts their own spin on things based on however they lean and/or what will sell more copies.
...
I'm sure Google isn't trying to be biased, but if you think that delivering both sides of a story is part of some kind of Code of the Journalist (right along with "only report the whole truth"), you're dreaming.
Granted, a lot do put some spin on it. But I'd say that there's some that at least attempt to maintain some level of objectivity. No one's going to be 100% successful, of course. But to say that someone who holds that general expectation is dreaming is cynical.
I'm not sure what the Journalistic definition of objectivity is, but I certainly don't think it necessarily entails showing all perspectives ("both sides of a story") on a news item. Objectivity involves seeing, uninfluenced by external manipulation, something as it is. If that sometimes requires showing more than one take on a story, then fine.
Surely you would agree that, for example, the BBC is noticeably less biased than Fox News?
If anything, Google's less likely to be biased than most places, since it just mechanically indexes things.
This seems obvious. But I disagree. Being more democratic does not mean it's less biased or more objective. I guess it depends on whether bias is necessarily intentional. I'd argue that it isn't.
The first one I played was FF4 (FF2 US) back in '92 or whatever. I've played every one since then, except for that gamecube one. And I never had the patience to beat Tactics.
I doubt my opinion will be too popular, but I thought that 7 was the best until 10 came out. 7 is definitely my favorite, though. If that makes sense.
I also think that 8 gets a bad rap. Definitely one of the better ones. 9 was my least favorite.
I know old-school FFers are supposed to think that everything after 6 is eye candy. Sorry - can't say that I agree. I think they get generally better with each new game. I even enjoyed X-2, as silly as it was.
Didn't say I was offended. I just tuned it out. I did think that the rant was childish and not particularly clever or funny. Therefore, he didn't do too well in persuading me of his point. That's all.
that think all the worlds problems stem from the rich, never stopping to think that there will always be someone richer than someone else unless you have a totally classless society
Put down the No-Spin Zone book for a second. What the hell are you talking about? Did I say anything about the rich? Who are you talking to?
Should I be learning to despise the rich and mouth the brainless mantra of class warfare, all the while ignoring the fact that rich people make investments, start companies, purchase durable goods, and many other things that ultimately benefit everyone? To listen to you, I should be doing just that.
Dude - you just took one little line there and went on a completely irrelevant rant.
A rather typical rant, too. Your rantings are cloaked in typical angry-white-conservative rhetoric, which is often a cloak for jealousy.
My attempt at instructive irony aside, though - I think the point of the post you responded to was that we have a serious problem if college degrees become essentially irrelevant. There's a lot of people working shit jobs that they didn't have to go to college for. I've been working my ass off to get even a semi-decent job, and it's tough out there. I don't ask for anyone's help and I don't "whine". But self-righteous little jerks like you piss me off.
And nothing anyone has said has taught you anything. You already decided it before you read anyone's post. But it makes you sound witty and clever, so keep it up.
Yeah, I got the same feeling reading through them. One or two were actually a little funny at first, but after that, it was quite disheartening. I'm not above a little playful humor that pokes fun at stereotypes, but there's some serious overkill here, and it's ceased to be even slightly funny.
So I'm not entirely sure why I pointed out your "editorial comment". You're probably right. But as a know-it-all 20-something male, I guess I couldn't resist making the point.;)
But what do i know? I'm just an insensitive male clod!!
Yes, you are. The dead giveaway was: "I swear.... with all the 'women's rights' stuff, and women bantering on about how they want to be treated as equals, then why..." 99% of anything following that has got to be stupid.
I can only imagine that the mods got it wrong. For example, when you said, "Don't get me wrong, i mean... i dig chicks, but I guess i just don't understand why women have to simultaneously prove that they're both equal and special.", you were trying to be ironic and funny. Right?
Either the moderators are idiots or you are. Pretty depressing either way.
Unfortunatly you have very little chance of changing their male 20-something minds because they are convinced that their view of the world is the only valid one.
Ok, I was with you on all your points except this one. This seems pretty hypocritical to me. How is saying that any different than saying that women or older men are technologically illiterate?
As a 20-something, I'm offended by your condescension. Ok, not really. But you get the point.
You're presuming to use logic (or something similar) to understand a non-logical phenomenon. Don't work.
Whoah. Hold on there captain. You're basically saying that human behavior is fundamentally non-logical? While some behavior seems to fall into that category, it can be analyzed, and can be determined to be logical, even if it's based on false premises. Unless you think all script kiddies behave in totally chaotic, non-logical and insane patterns. Seriously.
Reminds me of an argument a philosophy prof made - a person can be insane and make sane decisions. They think so and so is the devil, so they kill them. Yes, killing them is insane, but their reasons aren't. I mean, killing the root of all evil is not insane. Being mistaken is. But there's still a logical flow here.
Slashdot Mirror
They won't show up. Say that 90% of people on the net were 'rugged individualists', and they all search for something different. The other 10% are not, and they all search for Britney Spears. Britney Spears gets the #1 slot.
You can't tell much from this data, at least in the form it's presented.
I would argue that they were mistaken. Any tool or ethical system can be misused or misunderstood. People misunderstand religion all the time, and do horrible things which they believe their religion justifies (or demands). So I agree, utilitarianism can lead to horrible things, but this probably isn't due to relativity, since religion has done the same.
I'd also argue that utilitarianism is not strictly relative (and also that there could be good utilitarian arguments against communism), but now I'm going waaaay off-topic. :)
But is this really avoiding the problem? As a tool for authority, it works. But if the goal is to know what is right and wrong, how does this help? Whether God has told us what's right or wrong or not, aren't you going to have to coerce an awful lot of people to believe in one set of rules which you can't ultimately prove to be correct, since you can't call up God for clarification? I know some might counter by saying that you can read the Bible or something, but I'd have to already buy into this way of seeing the world to agree with that.
And if someone really can speak to God, how can I know that? Isn't there the tremendous chance of abuse, if none of this can be verified?
I don't see what rational benefits religion offers over secular ethical systems. As you say, faith is a part of this, though I don't think that's exclusive to religion. Secular ethical systems require a bit of a leap of faith too, but I think they require less than religion. I also think that secular systems have an important advantage, in that people of different religions may be able to agree with the same secular system. It'd still be tough, but easier than without one.
I may not have stated myself clearly on the "neighbor's infant" thing. My point was not that someone might wrongly think that God is telling them to do this and that - my point was that if these rules truly are decrees by God, and not just communicated, then they are arbitrary. That is, X is right because God says so. So if we could somehow directly access God, and he said that strangling your neighbor's baby is ok, then is it? That's what that sort of system implies - that things aren't inherently wrong, they're wrong because God says so. Does that make more sense?
It also makes it difficult to make decisions, since if these rules are arbitrary, they may not be cohesive. And if they're cohesive, I'd argue that they may not, in fact, be arbitrary. :)
I agree with your overall point, though. Religion can play a useful role in the recognition of inherent, inalienable rights. I just like to quibble. :)
It ain't random, Sparky. It's pretty systematic.
I agree, it is really hard to make a case for inalienable rights without deferring to God or whatever. That's not to say it can't be done. Utilitarianism goes a long way towards doing that.
I don't think you need a religious bedrock to avoid moral relativism. But in any of these ethical theories, there are certain things that have to just kind of be accepted. In Utilitarianism, for example, you have to accept that the general well-being of the populace and of individuals is a desirable thing. That may sound silly to deny, but that doesn't mean you can prove it. It's an easier stretch than saying, for example, X is wrong because God says it's wrong.
Which brings me to the point where a lot of these conversations can end (or go haywire) - if ethics and morality are dependent on God, does God create these rules for us? Or merely communicate them? If he's merely communicating them, then those rules would seem to be independent of him. If he's creating them... well, would anyone argue that if God said that it was ok to strangle your neighbor's infant, then it's ok?
One could counter that God doesn't create them, but he's the one and only way to know these rules. That is, we can't discover these truths independently. But I'm not sure how anyone would begin to offer a good argument for that.
Heh. You misunderstand. I'm totally with you on this. I just haven't heard a good argument to completely convince me that we actually have these things called "rights" which are independent of outside control or whim. Do I believe it? Yeah. Can I prove it, or at least disprove the opposite? No. But if someone can, it'll make my day.
It gets even more confusing when people start saying that intellectual property is a right, or bearing arms, or whatever. You can claim these things all you want, but can anyone show that we all have the inherent right to bear arms? Can anyone show that we have the inherent right to a speedy trial? And if any of these rights are inherent, and can't be granted or revoked by a government, does that mean we have to abandon all forms of penal systems?
Maybe those are too specific (you could argue that these are derived from basic rights), but it does demonstrate the problem.
You're right. That's crazy. Everyone needs to accept the cold, rational truth: a big, magic, invisible, all-powerful, timeless dude made us out of mud.
Oh, and he doomed us to eternal pain and suffering unless we do the right dance.
The possession of rights, in practice, is indistinguishable from the ability to exercise those rights. That is to say, you can claim that you have this or that right all you want, and you may even give an excellent argument for it, but if the state effectively prohibits you from exercising that right, then "This is my right" is more of a political statement or desire than an actual statement of fact.
I guess it comes down to whatever is the more persuasive definition of "right". I'm pretty confused, and have been for a while. I know what I'd like to believe, but there's good arguments for and against it.
Unless this "Peter Torr" is in fact Professor Tor Coolguy, then I'm just not interested.
Wait - what are you saying? That we don't know that we have the full picture, so we shouldn't warn of possible consequences for environmentally irresponsible behavior? Can we ever know if we have the full picture?
I agree with your cry-wolf argument, but certainly we should continue to try and understand our environment and we should certainly make testable predictions. Besides, even if high CO2 emmissions aren't causing global warming, wouldn't the air be much more pleasant and healthy to breath with it reduced?
Of course, someone forgot to tell W that, if I remember correctly. I seem to remember someone from the NY Times asking about his administration's change in attitute towards the existence of global warming. Bush was confused, and I believe his press secretary stepped in and smoothed things over.
Anyone? Is my memory correct?
I hate that when we shoot 45 mins of footage, it takes 45 minutes to capture it. Then another 10 minutes to copy it onto a firewire drive.
There is an upside to this, in that I'm pretty much forced to view all the footage straight through before editing, which I may not do otherwise. It's still irritating, though.
And the dropout problem can probably be mostly taken care of by using more expensive tapes, but they still happen.
Very funny. But isn't this just utilitarianism?
Granted, a lot do put some spin on it. But I'd say that there's some that at least attempt to maintain some level of objectivity. No one's going to be 100% successful, of course. But to say that someone who holds that general expectation is dreaming is cynical.
I'm not sure what the Journalistic definition of objectivity is, but I certainly don't think it necessarily entails showing all perspectives ("both sides of a story") on a news item. Objectivity involves seeing, uninfluenced by external manipulation, something as it is. If that sometimes requires showing more than one take on a story, then fine.
Surely you would agree that, for example, the BBC is noticeably less biased than Fox News?
This seems obvious. But I disagree. Being more democratic does not mean it's less biased or more objective. I guess it depends on whether bias is necessarily intentional. I'd argue that it isn't.The first one I played was FF4 (FF2 US) back in '92 or whatever. I've played every one since then, except for that gamecube one. And I never had the patience to beat Tactics.
I doubt my opinion will be too popular, but I thought that 7 was the best until 10 came out. 7 is definitely my favorite, though. If that makes sense.
I also think that 8 gets a bad rap. Definitely one of the better ones. 9 was my least favorite.
I know old-school FFers are supposed to think that everything after 6 is eye candy. Sorry - can't say that I agree. I think they get generally better with each new game. I even enjoyed X-2, as silly as it was.
Sorry, too much coffee. The first question should have been more specific: "Um, where is free speech being stiffled by slashdotters (in particular)?"
Um, where is free speech being stiffled?
Freedom of speech includes the right to disagree. You're even allowed to argue out loud.
I'd also like to point out how you placed all slashdotters in one basket there.
The name of the image is _40113813_virtual_face203.jpg. So I'm guessing it's Memorex.
Didn't say I was offended. I just tuned it out. I did think that the rant was childish and not particularly clever or funny. Therefore, he didn't do too well in persuading me of his point. That's all.
Holy flaming strawman!
Put down the No-Spin Zone book for a second. What the hell are you talking about? Did I say anything about the rich? Who are you talking to?
What? When did I say that?
Am I the only one who kind of tuned out after (or even before) reading this?
Dude - you just took one little line there and went on a completely irrelevant rant.
A rather typical rant, too. Your rantings are cloaked in typical angry-white-conservative rhetoric, which is often a cloak for jealousy.
My attempt at instructive irony aside, though - I think the point of the post you responded to was that we have a serious problem if college degrees become essentially irrelevant. There's a lot of people working shit jobs that they didn't have to go to college for. I've been working my ass off to get even a semi-decent job, and it's tough out there. I don't ask for anyone's help and I don't "whine". But self-righteous little jerks like you piss me off.
And nothing anyone has said has taught you anything. You already decided it before you read anyone's post. But it makes you sound witty and clever, so keep it up.
Yeah, I got the same feeling reading through them. One or two were actually a little funny at first, but after that, it was quite disheartening. I'm not above a little playful humor that pokes fun at stereotypes, but there's some serious overkill here, and it's ceased to be even slightly funny.
So I'm not entirely sure why I pointed out your "editorial comment". You're probably right. But as a know-it-all 20-something male, I guess I couldn't resist making the point. ;)
But what do i know? I'm just an insensitive male clod!!
Yes, you are. The dead giveaway was: "I swear.... with all the 'women's rights' stuff, and women bantering on about how they want to be treated as equals, then why..." 99% of anything following that has got to be stupid.
I can only imagine that the mods got it wrong. For example, when you said, "Don't get me wrong, i mean... i dig chicks, but I guess i just don't understand why women have to simultaneously prove that they're both equal and special.", you were trying to be ironic and funny. Right?
Either the moderators are idiots or you are. Pretty depressing either way.
Unfortunatly you have very little chance of changing their male 20-something minds because they are convinced that their view of the world is the only valid one.
Ok, I was with you on all your points except this one. This seems pretty hypocritical to me. How is saying that any different than saying that women or older men are technologically illiterate?
As a 20-something, I'm offended by your condescension. Ok, not really. But you get the point.
Whoah. Hold on there captain. You're basically saying that human behavior is fundamentally non-logical? While some behavior seems to fall into that category, it can be analyzed, and can be determined to be logical, even if it's based on false premises. Unless you think all script kiddies behave in totally chaotic, non-logical and insane patterns. Seriously.
Reminds me of an argument a philosophy prof made - a person can be insane and make sane decisions. They think so and so is the devil, so they kill them. Yes, killing them is insane, but their reasons aren't. I mean, killing the root of all evil is not insane. Being mistaken is. But there's still a logical flow here.