/lit/ - Literature

People who ironically call themselves authority figures only allow you to have sadistic and ignorant attitudes towards criminals because they are too incompetent and impoverished to successfully rehabilitate them.
Just like how other toxic social phenomena like in-group biases are allowed to be a part of 'the human condition', instead of something to be outgrown in early youth through education.
That way the dumb public will support pointless wars and be able to condone or justify the murdering of women and children overseas by their fellow country men.
No one with any political or social influence anywhere is encouraging you to have a healthy and realist world view.
That's how manipulative people work.
You need to be smart enough to work their machines, but dumb enough to never realise they should be shut down.
How can you say "Who cares about them, It's all about us!" when you know there is no 'them' and there is no 'us'?

To summarise my opinion, I feel like you can have a PHD degree in rocket quasar biology and the worlds thickest coke bottle glasses; but you shouldn't seriously consider yourself to be an intelligent person if you hold any of these kinds of heartless and mindless opinions.
That's ridiculous.
You're no more intelligent than a clapping seal who can do one neat little trick from memory.
I don't care about your coffee table book about the comparative size of hypothetical planets.
I don't care about your 1080p virtual reality Angry Birds iPhone app.
I don't care about your medical science breakthrough patent you'll only lose to some evil billionaire's pharmaceutical drug cartel through extortion anyway.
Fix your lack of general intelligence before you start bragging about progress.
Nothing in this world is worth more than human life and universal equality in quality of life.

I LOVE YOU

nice anime villain speech bro

>>7020958
>person says compassionate thing appealing to reason and logic with slight bitter edginess
>"n1c3 An1m3 5p33ch br0o0o0"
...cool.

>>7020958

topkek

That was pretty good, OP

Mind if I ask how old you are and which country you live in?

I was agreeing with you until the last paragraphs

>Achievement is merely the product of opportunity, education, money, time and effort. The people who have those things didn't earn them and everyone knows it.

virtually everything else you said was spot on except for this.

If your achievements are the product of your own time and effort, that is "earning it" by definition. If you were handed down a fortune 500 company by your father, you hardly earned it. But if you started from nothing and through hard work and perseverance managed to create a Fortune 500 company, then you have earned it. However, one must not leave out the fact that not all people are created equal and that there is an order in nature that separates the weak from the strong. There are some individuals that have inherent advantages through good genetics, if that's what you were getting at.

>>7021058
I think the main problem with that statement is that the first part suffices to itself in denying the pertinence of the very concept of "earning", adding the second part to it is just weird.

>>7021058
You got to the place where you 'earned' the company through arbitrary circumstance.
You didn't choose to be educated and emotionally stable enough to make use your opportunities.
You didn't choose to be born the guy who would eventually secure those opportunities.
You didn't earn the company.

>>7021207
Yeah still your last paragraphs are still incorrect because you mistake intelligence with morality, you can aknowledge all the things that you previously said but still abuse other human beings, that has nothing to do with being or not being smart

>>7020947
nice anime villain speech bro

>Being an educated adult and desiring retribution or punishment (over rehabilitation) for criminals is nothing other than egotistical sadism
Do you understand how this contradicts your point

>achievement is a product of effort.. people who have it didn't earn it
Another contradiction

I'm intellectually justified in doing whatever I want at thr expense of others. The other day I beat a friend's ass and ruined his eye for no real reason and I even made him feel like it was his fault. I've abused women, I want to pimp women, I've thought in depth about experimenting on people - and again this comes from an intellectual standpoint so I can pretend to be any kind if way to get myself out of something. If I can't be rehabilitated then am I just above being justifiably reprimanded?

>>7021219
If you can get to be an adult withoutever seriously studying into ethics and morality (and not stoppping until you have an opinion that is intelligent and compassionate, not one or the other) then I find it very difficult to consider ou an intelligent person.
Ethics and morality only require critical thinking to understand.
If you can't understand them, then you are stupid.
Other kinds of 'intelligence' like craftsman ship and mathematics relies entirely on memory.
Stupid people can do these things.

>>7021512
Pointing out sadism makes you a sadist or you don't know what a hypocrite is?
Also your second point is equivalent to saying "muh ticking timebomb scenario, therefore torture is always okay".
Also your argument doesn't make sense.
I said people have flawed understandings of identity and personal responsibility.
How does your argument contradict or even relate to what I'm saying?

>>7020947
>Nothing is impressive anymore.

This is based in ignorance. If humanity knew how to make something more impressive than anything that currently existed, it would have been made already.

It would be like declaring Olympus the tallest mountain in existence: if it was the Ancient Greeks making the claim, they're wrong only because they don't know about the Himalayas.

>>7021633
you're implying that there's an objective morality which is wrong, again I can understand determinism which is what your post is about and still have a different moral code than you because I have a different personality, your mistake is in believing that ethics and morality are based on critical thinking when they're based on personality (feelings)

>Being an educated adult and desiring retribution or punishment (over rehabilitation) for criminals is nothing other than egotistical sadism
>egotistical sadism
>sadism

ironic word choice because de Sade posits the first half of that sentence in his philosophy

>>7020947
Thats because you look based on a system of meaning. A meaning based system (asking why questions) will inevitably fall apart, or continue forever. Because there is no meaning, you will never find an answer. Assuming that these are somehow "realist" and "enlightened", is quite arrogant.

The fact of the matter is; that there is only purpose. You act for purposes--regardless of meaning. Punishing a criminal is negative reinforcement to prevent them from doing it again, and harming others. Which is better than doing nothing at all for the effected parties. Because the individual willed his action to be done, so shall others in response no matter what. If you were to ask yourself these same questions with at least some sense of scientific enquiry, you might reach an answer and finally stop dwelling on unanswerable statements.

>just regurgitating the wikipedia page for determinism

>>7021633
Ethics and morals are subjective and require no critical thinking. The 'intelligence' you refer to and ethics/morals are not related in any way.

Mathematics relies entirely on logic. You're confusing "mathematics" with the application of equations that have been derived and formed from mathematical principles that may themselves need to be memorised if used frequently in a particular field of study. The comprehension of the basis behind the use of these equations is not based on memorisation either. That said, you could get by on memory alone in many disciplines.

>>7022309
Want to know how I know you're terrible at philosophy?

>>7021512
you're an intellectual midget

>>7021654
>it's not the fault of group a to be criminals but shame on group b for being sadists
The second contradiction is the nonpoint you're trying to justify that if someone gets somewhere from effort that they didn't earn it

The argument I shoe horned in involving myself is basically me saying you can be both educated and a bad person. The worst people, committed from positions of power, are from the educated conscious and informed

>>7022319
How

>>7021633
Ethics and morality
I experience the world from my point of view. What is good for me is good, what is bad for me is bad

Refute this

>>7022319
And this is me. A lot is on my mind and I'm nowhere near lucid but I'm more than accomplished in critical thinking - did you read my post about masculinity in the mira thread

>>7020947
>>7020950
You will do well in this retarded modernity.

>hurr durr determinism

Do people really still argue this? Science has thoroughly disproved this, everything is just a product of its environment, bullshit. How can you possibly think to call the belief in individual agency dated and ignorant when you're arguing for a Newtonian universe?

>>7020947

What does the word deserve even mean in your philosophy? It seems to mean nothing, and yet you use it gratuitously.

Give an example of something earned, something deserved?

I'd readily argue what happens is exactly what's deserved, what's earned. Anything else is outside of causality. The poor are poor for a reason, even if you don't like that reason.

>>7020947
>>7020950
>Blaming criminals for their actions is identical in logic to blaming a cat for eating a mouse.
I see you've read Aurelius, however, people aren't mice, and comparing them is ridiculous.

>No one wants to be impoverished
Cynics, ascetics, etc. There are philosophies who state that impoverished life is the only life worth living.

>Nothing is impressive anymore.
Bullshit. This has no place in your post either.

>Achievement is merely the product of opportunity, education, money, time and effort.
>The people who have those things didn't earn them and everyone knows it.
You're a neckbeard? Have you ever worked for anything in your life? even if you go full determinism, you still earn things. Implying time and effort aren't the two most vital things you get to utilize as a human being is stupid, and >>7020958 is starting to feel pretty accurate.

>We don't need fiction to make sense of the world anymore.
You never talk to people, do you? Everyone fictions away to make sense of just about anything.

>No one with any political or social influence anywhere is encouraging you to have a healthy and realist world view.
There are, they just require some effort finding. Also, this implies there is a ''realist'' world view. I challenge you to find anyone who knows ''how the world really works''.

ps: You didn't account for sociopaths.

>>7021512
nice pic

>>7020947
>>7020950
Fucking spot on to be honest. Most reasonable post I've read in a long time.

>>7020947
>Blaming criminals for their actions is identical in logic to blaming a cat for eating a mouse.
>No amount of complex behaviour will ever make humans more responsible for their actions than other animals.
humans and cats both have a will which they can't control
so blaming a criminal for wanting to do something bad wouldn't makes sense, just as it doesn't make sense to blame a cat for wanting to kill a mouse
humans have a mind and reason while animals only have a mind but no reason (I hope the words mind and reason make sense as I usually use the german words and don't know how they are usually translated)
and we have the possibility to deny our will, which animals haven't
so you can blame a criminal for his deeds, but not a cat

>>7020947
>Don't cling to delusions that flatter your ego.
you're currently playing a game that flatters your ego, though
the game of "I understand the world more realistic (profane) than you"
basically a game of intellectual one-up manship

I like your thread OP, at least it starts some discussion

>>7021038
15, UK
May I ask why my good sir?

>>7022667
>humans and cats both have a will which they can't control

Except we can control our passions. It's called reason, and it's what distinguishes us from the animals.

>>7022764
that's what I said, read the rest of my post

>>7022612
>I see you've read Aurelius, however, people aren't mice, and comparing them is ridiculous.
Yeah, let's turn to ancient dilettantes for biology.

>>7022667
>and we have the possibility to deny our will, which animals haven't
We don't. What you call 'denying our will' is merely one desire prevailing over the other. If you stop smoking you don't deny your will, your will to not smoke is just greater than your will to smoke.

>>7022772
>he can't read

>>7022757
>15
>thinks he understands anything
You've got a lot to learn kid

>>7020950
>No one with any political or social influence anywhere is encouraging you to have a healthy and realist world view.
what's a realist world view?

>>7020947
Free will.

>>7022778
"May I ask why, my good sir"

>>7022449
What are your arguments to say that determinism is not real?

>>7020950
>Nothing in this world is worth more than human life and universal equality in quality of life.
dumb

>>7020947
>all this ideology

it's much more sinister, but also much simpler, than your moral gripes about punishment or rehabilitation: the prison population is cheap labor, and running a prison is very profitable. that's all.

>>7023322
not that guy, but quantum mechanics are indeterministic
so, how can you defend a deterministic world view if we know the smallest parts of the world don't behave deterministic?
You'd have to say that the determinism only starts at a higher level, but that doesn't really sound reasonable
How can a system be deterministic if the parts it is build of aren't?

>>7023347
Being that worth is an abstraction that exists solely in the human mind, as an object to be related to human lives, I'd say he's spot on.

Without a person, you can't have worth.

>>7023364
Well it is reasonable to say that the level we live is deterministic and there are explanations to that, check feynman experiments and read hawking's book "the theory of everything"

>>7023369
human life being the starting point for value judgements doesn't make it the highest worth

>>7023405
My dear fellow, human beings are the entire POINT of value judgements.

>>7023384
first, it doesn't actually matter if some parts of the universe are deterministic, if only one part isn't determinism as a whole is wrong
I am aware that I am moving the goal post, and I don't want to take the discussion in this direction, since the discussion if live at at our level is deterministic is more interesting
I just wanted to clarify that determinism, if the whole universe is concerned, is wrong

naming books isn't really a valuable argument, so if you'd actually like to discuss this, explain some actual arguments instead
>tfw I read hawkings once and think he is an overrated pleb when it comes to philosophy (and his books can barely be called anything else)

we can also develop a philosophical stance that supports free will, deriving this view from Schopenhauer's metaphysics, although I am not sure if you'd like to go down that route, since the discussion started with someone saying indeterminism is a scientific fact and I don't know if you care about the philosophical ideas at all

>>7023522
In simple terms a particle will move randomly but combined with others with the same charge it will start moving in a direction, the more there are the more "deterministic" it will be, I'm curious about what you have to say about schopenhauer, I thought he was some sort of deterministic.
Also,I think this discussion is relevant to the thread because its the basis of op's claims and yes you are correct to say that maybe the whole universe is not deterministic but the level we live (and the one op is concerned with) is

>>7020947
Who blames a cat for eating a mouse?

>>7020958
My sides have left the building.

>you will never live in an ancient aristocrat society

>>7020947
>Blaming criminals for their actions is identical in logic to blaming a cat for eating a mouse.
>Being an educated adult and desiring retribution or punishment (over rehabilitation) for criminals is nothing other than egotistical sadism.

But certainly blaming people for using force against those who violate social expectations is also like blaming the cat for eating the mouse.

>>7023561
>I'm curious about what you have to say about schopenhauer, I thought he was some sort of deterministic.
we'll his most famous quote is "you can do what you will, but you can't will what you will", but this "you can't will what you will" isn't based on a materialistic point of view saying that the will is only a byproduct of the brain,
but it is based on his idea that the "thing itself", the basis of reality, is the will (not just the human will, it's only called the will because our will is it's closest analogy and manifestation)
as a manifestation of the will (as the thing itself) our will is like a force (other forces like gravity are too manifestations of the will) and we have no control over it

the reason his metaphysics can be seen as indeterministic is that space, time and causality are not properties of the thing itself, but a priori assumptions of our cognition
the world as we perceive it (with space, time and causality) is only representation though, the only real thing is the will
since the will is outside of space, time and causality, it is also indeterministic (no causality, no determinism)
the world as representation seems deterministic (because cognition makes it so), but the underlying reality (the will) isn't

but the level OP is probably concerned with is not the underlying reality, but the world as representation the way we see it, which is, from Schopenhauer's point of view, deterministic
actually, we could say it's the deterministic representation of an indeterministic reality

>>7020958

>>7023364
Quantum mechanics, an admittedly half formed theory, doesn't rule out determinism; it just illustrates our inability to determine