Diogenes or Plato? Why?

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Anonymous Tue Sep 30 22:36:31 2014 No.5512631 [Reply] [Original]

Diogenes or Plato? Why?

>>	Anonymous Tue Sep 30 22:38:02 2014 No.5512639 >>5512631 When Plato gave Socrates' definition of man as "featherless bipeds" and was much praised for the definition, Diogenes plucked a chicken and brought it into Plato's Academy, saying, "Behold! I've brought you a man."

>>	Anonymous Tue Sep 30 22:40:21 2014 No.5512647 >>5512631 Diogenes, because I've taken to quietism.

Anonymous Tue Sep 30 22:40:51 2014 No.5512650

>>5512639
And upon this Plato amended his definition to fit the objection, thus showing that he was concerned with accounting for thing, while Diogenes was merely a contrarian faggot bent on delivering snappy old-liners, half of them likely apocryphal by the way.

You're right, anon. OP should go with Plato.

Anonymous Tue Sep 30 22:47:32 2014 No.5512686

>>5512631
I like Diogenes because he is such a smartass.

A classic Diogenes moment was him yelling "whores are like poisoned honey" over and over outside a brothel, and after getting enough coins tossed at him to shut up, he went into the brothel to spend them.

Anonymous Tue Sep 30 22:54:38 2014 No.5512711

>>5512650

That's more-less true. You will see in this thread praise for Diogenes though OP, because he was "LOL so randum" and /lit/, despite being generally of above average intelligence admires edginess. The reality is while Diogenes was undeniably a witty man with a sharp mind he was nowhere near Plato in description of human condition, psyche or structure of the world. For example the story about Diogenes trolling Plato's "form of the cup" by indicating that there is no "form of emptiness" (no matter if the story is actually real or not) is a result of author's/Diogenes' misunderstanding of Plato's theory of forms as of blueprints of exclusively positive concepts.

>>	Anonymous Tue Sep 30 22:56:59 2014 No.5512720 File: 61 KB, 500x413, image.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google] Diogenes, Plato sucked cock Pic related: It's Diogenes owning Alexander

>>	Anonymous Tue Sep 30 22:58:23 2014 No.5512727 >>5512631 Both.

>>	Anonymous Tue Sep 30 22:59:25 2014 No.5512732 >>5512727 >Why? Because it's not a competition.

>>	Anonymous Tue Sep 30 23:02:10 2014 No.5512745 >>5512631 Plato is the best greek.

>>	Anonymous Tue Sep 30 23:04:07 2014 No.5512758 File: 13 KB, 200x286, 1411824977140.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google] >plato/socrates/aristotle Spooked. >diogenes Not spooked.

>>	Anonymous Tue Sep 30 23:04:19 2014 No.5512762 >>5512711 tell me how Diogenes misunderstood Plato's theory of forms the theory of forms seems stupid as fuck

Anonymous Tue Sep 30 23:04:22 2014 No.5512763

Plato was discoursing on his theory of ideas and, pointing to the cups on the table before him, said while there are many cups in the world, there is only one `idea' of a cup, and this cupness precedes the existence of all particular cups.
"I can see the cup on the table," interupted Diogenes, "but I can't see the `cupness'".
"That's because you have the eyes to see the cup," said Plato, "but", tapping his head with his forefinger, "you don't have the intellect with which to comprehend `cupness'."
Diogenes walked up to the table, examined a cup and, looking inside, asked, "Is it empty?"
Plato nodded.
"Where is the `emptiness' which procedes this empty cup?" asked Diogenes.
Plato allowed himself a few moments to collect his thoughts, but Diogenes reached over and, tapping Plato's head with his finger, said "I think you will find here is the `emptiness'."

>>	Anonymous Tue Sep 30 23:04:47 2014 No.5512764 >>5512711 >>5512745 This. Nailed it. Diogenes was smart, but Plato was a genius. People admire Diogenes, because of his obscurity and contrarianism.

>>	Anonymous Tue Sep 30 23:05:44 2014 No.5512772 >>5512763 Plato BTFO like a stupid sophist cunt >mfw people unironically talk about 'cupness' and 'the universal form of _____"

Anonymous Tue Sep 30 23:06:38 2014 No.5512776

>>5512650
Or he was alluding to the ultimate futility of Plato's task. See, the problem is that Plato is trying to solve an inductive problem with something as concrete as deduction. Diogenes is all about doing, not thinking. He knows there is a place for function and a place for form.

>>5512711
Why does it seem like everyone is driving on the wrong side of the road except you? Probably because you try to box everything in a glass box like Plato did, even if it ends up suffocating from it.

>>	Anonymous Tue Sep 30 23:08:33 2014 No.5512782 >>5512763 I can't understand... the one 'idea' of cup is already empty, not filled with "emptiness".

Anonymous Tue Sep 30 23:08:48 2014 No.5512785

>>5512762

I'm not sure that the story is even real in the first place. Also, I'm not even arguing for or against the theory of forms. However in the story Diogenes trolls Plato on the merit of the theory itself therefore he should realize that theory doesn't state there are any forms for negative concepts such as "emptiness". Theory of forms insists only on existence of blueprints of positive concepts.

Here you have this flawed story >>5512763

>>	ANARCHY99 Tue Sep 30 23:10:32 2014 No.5512791 File: 1.93 MB, 235x240, 159.gif [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google] >>5512772

>>	Anonymous Tue Sep 30 23:10:39 2014 No.5512792 >mfw people are calling plato a genuis His arguments were universally terrible

Anonymous Tue Sep 30 23:12:28 2014 No.5512799

>>5512776
>everyone is driving on the wrong side of the road except me

Does /lit/ shape your view of generally acclaimed philosophers? Because it seems so. Don't expect to see any significant concern with Diogenes outside of this board. That's of course, contrary to Plato.

>>	Anonymous Tue Sep 30 23:14:30 2014 No.5512805 >>5512782 It's an insult/joke.

Anonymous Tue Sep 30 23:27:09 2014 No.5512848

>>5512799
They drive on the other side of the road in Britain. If you're going to drive on the left no matter what, maybe you should do it in Britain, for everyone's sake.

Likewise, if you want to jerk off to Plato maybe you should do it where you will be happily jerked off by the guy sitting next to you.

(no homo, of course. Plato hated homos.)

If you're interested in actual discussion then you'll have to do better than "Wow you are such a sheeple only an idiot would like Diogenes."

>>	Anonymous Tue Sep 30 23:27:28 2014 No.5512850 >>5512758 Diogenes wouldn't last 5 minutes in a deb8 with based Aristotle, neither would Stirner.

>>	Anonymous Tue Sep 30 23:27:43 2014 No.5512853 >>5512799 Just because something is popular doesn't mean it's good. Justin Bieber is popular. Diogenes is clearly superior to Justin Bieber. Justin Bieber is Plato.

Anonymous Tue Sep 30 23:29:26 2014 No.5512861

>>5512850

Who cares about debate.

Debate is sophistry and solves nothing. It's a socio-sexual competition to dominate someone else. It says nothing about anything other than who is more of an ape.

As we are still talking about Aristotle 2000 years later, I'm sure he was quite an intense ape when it comes to arguing.

He can still suck Stirner's dick.

>>	Anonymous Tue Sep 30 23:30:02 2014 No.5512862 like spooks? plato like doing away with spooks? diogenes

>>	Anonymous Tue Sep 30 23:32:25 2014 No.5512872 >>5512861 Are you debating me?

>>	Anonymous Tue Sep 30 23:35:25 2014 No.5512886 >>5512776 Diogenes wasn't about doing, he did nothing all day but eat, shit, beg, masturbate and occasionally troll people.

Anonymous Tue Sep 30 23:35:44 2014 No.5512888

>>5512853

What are you talking about? Where did I imply it? I just replied to the person stating "everyone seems to be driving on the other side of road except you" what is not true.

I absolutely don't believe that popularity alone gives you any credibility. That statement was just simply wrong.

>>5512848

Bait? Or problems with reading comprehension? I already wrote in the previous posts why I value Plato over Diogenes. You're making false presumption that I "jerk off" to Plato and what's more you can't scroll up to see my other posts.

>>	Anonymous Tue Sep 30 23:37:30 2014 No.5512892 >>5512792 At least he was having arguments.

>>	Anonymous Tue Sep 30 23:39:45 2014 No.5512899 >>5512861 >Aristotle >sophist Pick one.

>>	Anonymous Tue Sep 30 23:41:16 2014 No.5512905 >>5512886 4chan is the modern Diogenes?

Anonymous Tue Sep 30 23:47:12 2014 No.5512923

>>5512899
lul
>>5512861
>Who cares about debate.
>Debate is sophistry and solves nothing.It's a socio-sexual competition to dominate someone else. It says nothing about anything other than who is more of an ape.

1.) Domination is a little thing called political order.
2.)Highly developed rhetoric tuned towards teaching and debate isn't a test of ape-ness

>>	Anonymous Tue Sep 30 23:48:38 2014 No.5512926 >>5512631 Oh, and the answer to all you plebs who didn't start with the Greeks is that Plato and Diogenes are on the same side.

Anonymous Tue Sep 30 23:52:21 2014 No.5512936

4chan is probably the only place where people care about Diogenes said.

Diogenes was an underachiever. A man of wit, probably, that resigned to a life of edginess and cynicism instead of taking the hard, virtuous road, the road men like Plato choose.

That's probably why /lit/ idolizes him: he is an narcisistic fuck that thought so much of himself he stopped using bathrooms or living under a house.

>>	Anonymous Tue Sep 30 23:53:57 2014 No.5512941 >>5512936 confirmed for never having read a serious academic work on ancient cynicism

Anonymous Tue Sep 30 23:54:47 2014 No.5512946

>>5512886
Yes and every last minute of it was consistent with his philosophy. He taught by doing.

>>5512888
Plato said romantic things about the human condition, psyche, or structure of the world because he outrightly said, "There is none." You're basically so intrenched in Platonic beliefs that you can't see Diogenes for what he is. Frankly I blame your parents.

Also that other quote is dubious at best. I highly doubt it is canon.

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 00:04:06 2014 No.5512976

>>5512936
>he is an narcisistic fuck that thought so much of himself he stopped using bathrooms or living under a house.
Yeah fuck him what a narcissist.
I hate all those narcissist hobos who live in our streets they're so fucking pretentious in their grimy hats and their shopping carts like fuck off stop trying so hard. Literally the epitome of self-love.
This is what you sound like.

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 00:06:48 2014 No.5512982

>>5512946

You haven't understood a word from what I've written. Lord, can people at least read on this site? I refuted idiotic apocryphal story about Diogenes trolling Plato and said that the system developed by the latter is much more complex and bears a lot more significance. I haven't even said I agree with Platonism in any way. The point is Diogenes cynism is so obscure because of its primitivity.

>Plato said romantic things about...

Holy shit. Have you ever read Plato and studied his method of discernment? You even attacked me originally for supposed appeal to popularity while I was refuting yours/some other guy's statement which was appeal to popularity in itself.

I can't cope with people like this.

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 00:13:17 2014 No.5512999 >>5512862 Why the fuck do you guys care about spooks so much? Stirner is shit; there's a reason he's been pushed to the back shelf of academia. Plato4lyfe

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 00:15:51 2014 No.5513006 >>5512999 the theory of forms is maybe the stupidest thing ever put forth

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 00:16:51 2014 No.5513012

>>5512946
>Yes and every last minute of it was consistent with his philosophy. He taught by doing.

Pretty much. So why are you on the street begging (and don't you use that cup to drink, you have your hands for that) ?

Diogenes is short-lived as a philosophical mentor, because either you man up and live like him, or you don't and become part of those who look awe-struck at him and do nothing. He offers very little margin for thinking.

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 00:19:13 2014 No.5513021

>>5513006
No. Your post is.

See ? We're now on even ground, argumentation-wise.

Now I'll add that Plato's work isn't limited to theory of forms, and actually the one of the smartest criticism of the theory of forms was put forth by Plato himself (see: the dialogue titled "Parmenides").

But that is perhaps too much for the average 4chan brain.

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 00:22:15 2014 No.5513032

>>5512936
I'm the poster that started the "Diogenes is a troll" argument (was mainly a joke but I see it has gotten out of hand) and even I think you're full of shit.

Living the arduous life of virtue is almost word for words the credo of ancient cynicism (and Diogenes was an ancient Cynic).

Not having any constraint or hierarchy can seem easy, but think that it means you have to live on the street in a dirty city like Athens. It's no easy life.

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 00:22:31 2014 No.5513034

>>5513012
Is the proof NOT in the pudding, sir? What's the point in pondering the unponderable if, having pondered the unponderable, the only resulting result is that you've spent an age pondering the unponderable? Should NOT all things pondersome aim at something of the practical?

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 00:40:11 2014 No.5513096 guys what's the best book on diogenes?

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 00:43:00 2014 No.5513103

>>5512982
>Have you ever read Plato and studied his method of discernment?
We can't read everything bud. If you came here to fly your cape then you're doing a simply epic job of doing so. This may shock you but we can't debate Plato anymore: we can only debate you.

If Plato (and by extension, you) are so obviously in the right then you should have no problem dispatching the lessers among us with irrefutable argumentation. But clearly *that's* not going to happen any time soon.

>You even attacked me originally for supposed appeal to popularity while I was refuting yours/some other guy's statement which was appeal to popularity in itself.
Stooping to your opponent's level is dumb and you are dumb.

>I can't cope with people like this.
Then by all means, leave. We don't want you here if you're just going to throw a little shit fit every time you realize you're too inarticulate to add anything to the discussion.

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 00:49:33 2014 No.5513131 >>5513096 Critique of Cynical Reason

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 00:58:26 2014 No.5513156 >>5512763 One possible inconsistency, isn't it so that the greeks at the time didn't know the brain was a thinking organ?

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 01:02:00 2014 No.5513168

>>5513103
If you refuse to read what I've written I might as well give up right now. I said multiple times already that I'm not in favour of Platonism, only in favour of approach/method in which Plato constructs his philosophical system. To call Platonism some "romantic ramblings" and to overlook Plato's use of justification logic through adherence to natural law and unified human perception of artificial objects is just stupid. You didn't even bother to realize what's the object of my critique in your reasoning.

Also
>stooping to your opponent's level is dumb and you are dumb

For fucks sake. The point is my statement right here: >>5512799 wasn't an appeal to popularity by any means. I intended to show that the post I was responding to was not only fallaciously appealing to popularity, but also simply wrong. There is no implication in my post that mentioned state of being lends any credibility to Plato. I think I restrained myself long enough from calling you a moron.

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 01:03:29 2014 No.5513171 File: 692 KB, 939x582, laughing frenchmen.png [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google] >>5512872 >>5512899 >>5512923 >mfw this pleb can't respond otherwise he'd engage in a debate and become that which he hates

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 01:15:51 2014 No.5513202 Was Diogenes the first NEET?

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 01:20:19 2014 No.5513214 >>5512792 Plato is legitimately better than every modern philosopher from Descartes onwards.

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 01:27:20 2014 No.5513230 File: 1.81 MB, 2800x2100, 1408495031031.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google] >>5513202 Yessim

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 01:27:38 2014 No.5513232

>>5513168
Plato himself said that Diogenes was "a mad version of Socrates." Diogenes doesn't throw everything Plato says out the window; he just challenges it and qualifies it in a way that, while being more restrictive than Plato's definitions, are probably closer to being true.

On the contrary, neither Diogenes nor his progeny dismiss a good argument or sound logic. Where Socrates might bring up that a chicken may be plucked, Diogenes actually brings the chicken: that's what makes him mad. He's not only clever, but philosophically he is right: not just in the particular action but in the principle of that action. Socrates once said about the average person, "This man, on one hand, believes that he knows something, while not knowing (anything). On the other hand, I — equally ignorant — do not believe (that I know anything)." What he means by that is that there is strength in knowing not only what you know, but in knowing what you don't know. Being skeptical and critical of what your knowledge is, and what it can achieve, is the father of rigor: that is both philosophers' end.

If everyone here seems to believe this, and you're sure that the situation is some way else, then you should perhaps go somewhere that won't generate so much conflict / namecalling. At the bare minimum we expect people to have an open mind about the philosophers we discuss here and to question whether our initial judgements about those philosophers are true instead of just assuming that X philosopher is primitivistic or shallow.

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 01:33:54 2014 No.5513254 >>5513232 Hm nice write up

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 01:38:04 2014 No.5513264 File: 60 KB, 500x500, 1412129879591.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google] Yo yo yo can any niggas recommend me some Diogenes essential reading?

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 01:39:54 2014 No.5513270

>>5512946
Plato did not say that there is no world or psyche or human condition. I'm pretty sure he argues against that kind of scepticism some where.

Plato thought that the world of ideas was the real world and that the physical world emanated from ideas. However, just because he said that the real world was in the mind does not mean that he thought that the world was subjective; I'm the contrary, he thought that ideas were objective and he argues against and parodies the idea that the world is subjective in Thaetatus. Aristotle said that the physical world was the real world and that ideas are abstracted from it.
It's the sophists who say that there is no real world or that the real world is subjective. Modern philosophers are closer to the sophists. They all agree that the real world is a fabrication in the mind (idealists) or constructed by language (nominalists) or that the real world exists but cannot be known except in the form of probabilities or approximations or working hypotheses (empiricism) or that the real world exists and can be known but cannot be communicated because it resides purely in the senses (sensists), or that nothing exists at all but for practical purposes we can assume they do (pragmatists). There are three main sophisms: that nothing exists, that something exists but it cannot be known to exist, that something exists and can be known to exist but this knowledge cannot be communicated. Almost all modern philosophers hold at least one of these statements to be true. They all undermine the very basis of philosophy because 1. if nothing exists, then there can be no knowledge or wisdom of things which is the aim of philosophy, 2. if things exist but cannot be known to exist, then again there can be no knowledge and thus no philosophy, 3. if things exists and can be known to.exist but cannot be communicated then as a philosopher you cannot communicate to anyone in order to educate them and so we would.never know who was a philosopher and who wasn't, and that a child or a frog speaking would communicate as much truth as a so-called philosopher speaking.

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 01:44:13 2014 No.5513284 >>5513270 Plato said romantic things about the human condition, psyche, or structure of the world but Diogenes outrightly said, "There is none." Probably makes more sense in context.

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 01:44:13 2014 No.5513285 >>5513270 what about Kant?

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 01:47:20 2014 No.5513295 >>5513285 Think he was an idealist. He thought that things exists but they cannot be known.

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 01:53:46 2014 No.5513308

>>5513295
He also seems to be a pragmatist in that he says that things cannot be known but we should assume that we do know them for practical purposes.

In the language of Aristotle if something is "ethical" or "unethical", "good" or "evil", that is a real property of a thing, something that it really has. In the language of pragmatism ethical/unethical, good/evil are imaginary concepts that we assign to things for the practical purpose of having a system of ethics, not actual properties of a thing.
Which do you think sounds more familiar to modern ears?

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 01:59:41 2014 No.5513320

>>5513308
In the language of the empiricists good/evil are just feelings or perceptions or mental states that have no substantial connection to a thing. This again is extremely modern, "just because you think something is good doesn't mean it is", to Aristotle this statement means something like "it's possible to mistake something that is actually evil for something good", but to a modern it means more or less, "nothing is either good or evil, but thinking makes it so".
So in a realist ethics good/evil are real things and can be known and can be communicated. But in an ethics that is not realist either there is no such thing as good or evil, or there is good and evil but we can't know what is good or evil, or there is good and evil and we can know what is good or evil but nobody can communicate what is good and what is evil.

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 02:11:49 2014 No.5513341

>>5513320
And of course, just as the three sophisms I mentioned undermine the basis of philosophy, so do these three sophisms undermine the basis of ethics. If you accept any of these sophisms you cannot be an ethicists. If you don't believe anything is good or evil, or that nothing can be known to be good or evil, or that you cannot say that something is good or evil, then obviously you cannot enter a discourse on good or evil which is the matter of ethics. "Metaethics" is more popular today than real ethics, and metaethics is where people argue about those three sophisms, about which of them are true and which of them are false.
They are called sophisms because they claim to be truth/wisdom while undermining the very existence of truth/wisdom, making those that espouse them hypocrites, e.g. "I am wise, I know that nothing exists!" - "Hypocrite, if nothing exists, then the wise man does not exist and therefore according to your own account you do not exist, therefore you should never say 'I am'." "I am a wise man, and I declare that nothing can be known!" "Hypocrite, if nothing can be known then how do you know that you are a wise man?" "I am a wise man, and I say that wisdom cannot be communicated by language or any other medium." "Hypocrite, if wisdom cannot be communicated by language then we can never know if what you are saying is true or not."
Same with the ethical sophisms. "Nothing is good or evil? Well then the statement that nothing is good cannot be a good a statement, and therefore I will ignore it."

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 02:19:31 2014 No.5513354

>>5513341
More clean;

"Nothing is."
"Is that so?"

"Nothing can be known."
"Do you know that?"

"Knowledge cannot be communicated."
"Then what are you communicating?"

"Nothing is good or evil."
"Neither is that a good statement."

"We cannot know what is good and what is evil."
"Neither can we know if this statement is good."

"We cannot say what is good or evil."
"Neither can we say that this is a good proposition."

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 02:19:39 2014 No.5513355 >>5513264 i bet his daughter bought that shirt with his credit card and then made him wear it so she could take a photo for facebook

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 02:31:05 2014 No.5513378

>>5513341
That's a terrible analysis of those positions. What they say it more along the lines of "Reason tells us that we cannot produce absolute truth. If reason is self-defeating in this way, what possible road to truth is there? We can see none."

The counterargument is in no way a refutation but only says: "Absolute truth must exist because otherwise we can't establish the absolute truth."

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 02:31:36 2014 No.5513379

>>5513354
In Aristotle truth and good, falsehood and evil, are equivalent, they are both real. For Aristotle, what truth and falsehood are to the mind, good and evil are to the will. For a lot of modern thinkers truth and falsehood are real but good and evil are "just feelings". This occurred when Descartes cut off the mind from the body and so the desire of the mind (truth) no longer corresponded with the desire of the will (goodness). From the separation of the mind and the will, truth and goodness, you either get those that overmphasise the mind and say that ideas are real but passions are imaginary, or those that overemphasise the will and day that passions are real but ideas are.imaginary. For the former they only care about what is true "regardless of whether it is good or evil", and for the latter they oh care about what is good "regardless of whether it is true or false." For Aristotle this is an absurdity because everything true is by that very reason good, and everything false is by that very reason evil, and vice versa. Of course, you also get those that say that both ideas and passions are imaginary, that nothing is true or false AND that nothing is good or evil, like Nietzsche. Nietzsche hated those that were inconsistent in the above manner. He thought, "if you embrace the three negations in the metaphysical realm, you also have to embrace the three negations in the ethical realm." He mocked those that tried to hold on to a realist ethics while abandoning a realist metaphysics especially.

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 02:32:27 2014 No.5513384 >>5513354 >>5513341 >>5513320 >>5513308 You're on fire today aren't you? Too much coffee? Bj? Anyway. Kant wasnt an idealist, he was a transcendental idealist. He isnt part of the sophisms.

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 02:34:15 2014 No.5513390

>>5513378
>Reason tells us that we cannot produce absolute truth.

That is the second negation/sophism. If reason tells us that we cannot know absolute truth then reason tells us that we cannot know that the statement "reason tells us that we cannot know absolute truth" is absolutely true - a flat contradiction.

>The counterargument

The counterargument is a reductio ad absurdum as I have demonstrated just above.

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 02:35:54 2014 No.5513400

>>5513284
If Diogenes says this, you should look at it in the context of what he is doing. He is acting like an animal to demonstrate the way people actually live. He is bringing the truth about how people live into the open.

When/if he says "There is none" he is calling them animals, which is perfectly in line with Plato.

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 02:37:45 2014 No.5513405

>>5513390
I.e. see:

>"Nothing can be known."
>"Do you know that?"

You edit this just a little bit rhetorically but it remains substantially the same:

>"We cannot know anything for sure, we can only get an approximation."
>"Do you know that for sure or is that just an approximation?"

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 02:42:35 2014 No.5513418

>>5513405
Kant gets round this by saying that there are some things we can know for sure and some things we can only get approximations of.

Knowledge a priori is the knowledge that we can be sure about. The statement "there are some things we can know for sure and some things we can only get approximations of" is knowledge a priori, something we know for sure.
However, the place where divides things that can be known for sure and things which we can make approximations about is the physical world, which is why I called him an idealist above because in regards to the objects of the physical world he believes that they exist but cannot be known.

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 02:44:23 2014 No.5513421

>>5513390
>If reason tells us that we cannot know absolute truth then reason tells us that we cannot know that the statement "reason tells us that we cannot know absolute truth" is absolutely true - a flat contradiction.
Exactly. And the conclusion to be drawn from this is that reason is self-defeating, since it is reason itself that produces this contradiction -- just as in the case of the liar's paradox.

The only argument in favor of absolute truth is, as I have said, "absolute truth must exist because otherwise we cannot know the absolute truth of the matter (and then we have an absurdity)" -- which is in no way sound reasoning even apart from the fact that it ignores that it is reason itself which produces the absurdity.

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 02:49:00 2014 No.5513433

>>5513421
>The only argument in favor of absolute truth is,

Or you know, move up to Heidegger and the rediscovery of the Divine Ground of being. There is something more to the human than body and mind, and it is what senses and orients us toward the truth.

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 02:53:38 2014 No.5513437 >>5513421 To put it succinctly: any time we accept the absolute consistency and validity of reason, this very reason tells us we must reject its absolute consistency and validity.

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 02:53:41 2014 No.5513438 >>5513418 I think you misunderstood Kant. Read his Prolegmona to future metaphysics. We can have a priori knowledge of our categories and essentially our filters.

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 02:53:58 2014 No.5513439

>>5513421
>And the conclusion to be drawn from this is that reason is self-defeating

But in order to draw that conclusion we have to use reason, which you say is self-defeating . . . therefore you are defeating yourself once again.

>It it is reason itself which produces the absurdity.

Reason does not produce any absurdities, faulty reason does. The existence of absolute truth is not an absurdity, it is a basic principle of reason.
Do you not see the absurdity of trying to reason that reason is always absurd? If reason is always absurd then you cannot reasonably establish that it is, so your rejection of reason CANNOT be reasonable, it can only be motivated by misguided / unreasonable passion.
This is what I was saying earlier about the three negotiations undermining the basis of philosophy. If truth doesn't exist then we cannot even begin to talk. We should all be silent seeing as nothing we can say will be true. "Truth" will become just an approximation or a prejudice or a rule enforced on the weak by the strong. The rejection of the existence of truth is actually a very subtle way of justifying tyranny. The Communists have always liked the idea tha truth doesn't exist because it means that the State can decide what truth is and is not, c.f. Orwell.

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 03:01:01 2014 No.5513454

>>5513439
>>5513439
If truth does not exist and good/evil do not exist then reality and law is whatever the strongest day it is. It's the metaphysics of a Machiavellian.
There was an Arab man who would intoxicate young men with drugs and send them to his mansion where they would be met with fine wine and beautiful women. He would then convince them that he had sent them to paradise and that if they died in his service they would go immediately to the same paradise. Thus he brainwashed them. He later made the statement, "nothing is true, everything is permitted." See how the willingness to brainwash and deceive goes hand in hand with the belief that there is no truth and no ultimate moral law.

This is why I hate when materialists say that we are just apes made by random chance, a pure accident without meaning, because I know very well that that is a subtle justification for tyranny.

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 03:03:12 2014 No.5513465 >>5513454 I hate materialists too anon. Can we have the butt sex?

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 03:03:42 2014 No.5513467 >>5513454 This is because it denies the existence of the soul.

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 03:06:26 2014 No.5513475

>>5513439
Where, then, is the faulty reasoning in the liar's paradox, which is the exact analogue of this situation?

"If he is lying he speaks the truth, if he speaks the truth he is lying."

"If we accept the absolute validity of reason it forces us to reject it, if we reject it then this rejection loses its absolute validity."

In both cases everything has been done "according to the rules" and yet we find ourselves with these absurdities.

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 03:07:22 2014 No.5513480

Plato was a shrewd politician and his dialogues are partly political tracts.
He makes an account of how in the Symposium when the tyrants took over Athens they found it necessary to destroy the bonds of love and friendship between people, especially between husband and wife, because people that had love in their lives were strong and motivated enough to resist tyranny. He also says that the tyrants were ultimately undone because of a wife's defense of her mistreated husband.
He also says elsewhere that there is nothing more dangerous then men who are half-wise, who have ideas but do not know where their ideas come from, because they are the willing pawns of the tyrants who will spread ideas that serve their political ends. So he stressed that everyone should be very suspect about the origin of an idea.

This is more true of our age than in any other age. The ideas of feminism for example are made out to be the ideas for the liberation of women, but if you are shrewd enough you can see that they are the ideas of tyrants who want to enslave mankind by the same methods that the ancient Athenians used, namely,.destroying bonds between men and women.

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 03:15:07 2014 No.5513507

>>5513480
And Darwinism was originally about getting the nations to war against one and other as they subsequently did, see: the original title of his Origin of Species, which includes the phrase "struggle for the survival of the favoured races" or something like that. Anyhow, it put the idea into the European mind that they were in a state of competition against one and other to see who's race would prove to be the fittest.

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 03:17:21 2014 No.5513513 >>5513475 >If we accept the absolute validity of reason it forces us to reject it, False. You are contradicting yourself, "if we accept the absolute validity of reason we have to reject the absolute validity of reason", no we don't.

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 03:19:02 2014 No.5513515 >>5513475 It isn't an exact analogue.

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 03:20:43 2014 No.5513519 >>5513475 If you have a man that says "there is absolute truth" you have no paradox If you have a man that says "there is no absolute truth" you have a paradox analogous to the liar's paradox

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 03:22:16 2014 No.5513521 >>5513519 there is absolute truth = a Cretan saying that Cretans can tell the truth there is no absolute truth = a Cretan saying that Cretan's lie / cannot.tell the truth

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 03:24:13 2014 No.5513527 >>5513521 The liar's paradox means: nobody can say that he is a liar without contradiction. Yiur analogy means: nobody can say that there is no absolute truth without contradiction

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 03:42:33 2014 No.5513565

>>5513513
Yes we do. Reason tells us that nothing can prove its own validity (such a "proof" would be circular and therefore no proof at all). But any proof we try to create for reason must either be within reason (i.e. circular and not a proof) or outside reason (i.e. unacceptable to reason, since reason allows only reasonable proofs). So where's the absolute validity? Reason itself forbids it.

We cannot FROM reason derive a necessity FOR reason -- we can only blindly accept it, without justification or the means to produce a justification.

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 05:01:41 2014 No.5513747

>>5513565
>Yes we do. Reason tells us that nothing can prove its own validity (such a "proof" would be circular and therefore no proof at all). But any proof we try to create for reason must either be within reason (i.e. circular and not a proof) or outside reason (i.e. unacceptable to reason, since reason allows only reasonable proofs). So where's the absolute validity? Reason itself forbids it.

Ah, I see. Yeah, you've struck upon a real problem that Aristotle deals with in his Posterior Analytics.

>Some hold that, owing to the necessity of knowing the primary premisses, there is no scientific knowledge. Others think there is, but that all truths are demonstrable. Neither doctrine is either true or a necessary deduction from the premisses. The first school, assuming that there is no way of knowing other than by demonstration, maintain that an infinite regress is involved, on the ground that if behind the prior stands no primary, we could not know the posterior through the prior (wherein they are right, for one cannot traverse an infinite series): if on the other hand-they say-the series terminates and there are primary premisses, yet these are unknowable because incapable of demonstration, which according to them is the only form of knowledge.

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 05:06:42 2014 No.5513758

>>5513747
Here he describes your position. You are saying that seeing as the only type of knowledge is logical demonstration, reason cannot produce knowledge because it relies either on undemonstrated (unreasonable) premisses, or there is an infinite regress where the primary premisses upon which are built all demonstrations are never found, leading to an infinite regress or vicious circle.

> And since thus one cannot know the primary premisses, knowledge of the conclusions which follow from them is not pure scientific knowledge nor properly knowing at all, but rests on the mere supposition that the premisses are true. The other party agree with them as regards knowing, holding that it is only possible by demonstration, but they see no difficulty in holding that all truths are demonstrated, on the ground that demonstration may be circular and reciprocal.

>Our own doctrine is that not all knowledge is demonstrative: on the contrary, knowledge of the immediate premisses is independent of demonstration. (The necessity of this is obvious; for since we must know the prior premisses from which the demonstration is drawn, and since the regress must end in immediate truths, those truths must be indemonstrable.) Such, then, is our doctrine, and in addition we maintain that besides scientific knowledge there is its originative source which enables us to recognize the definitions.

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 05:09:10 2014 No.5513760

>>5513758
Aristotle solves your problem by saying that there is knowledge PRIOR TO reason or logical demonstration, a kind of intuitive knowledge that serve as the primary premisses on which all logical demonstrations are based. You are right that this is offensive to reason, but ONLY in the case of a dogmatic Rationalism which asserts that the only kind of knowledge is demonstrative. However, in a moderate position which states that reason is not the sole source of knowledge reason is a useful source of knowledge without being the only one.
In other words, when you say that reason refutes itself, what you mean by "Reason" is a dogmatic Rationalism which asserts that the only kind of knowledge is demonstrative that the only source of knowledge is Reason. You state the Reason refutes itself because Reason states that the only knowledge is demonstrative, but Reason also proves that not all knowledge can be demonstrative because you would reach an infinite regress. That is true ONLY if you keep to the premise that "Reason states that the only knowledge is demonstrative". However, in truth Aristotle proves that true Reason states the opposite, viz. "Reason states that not all knowledge is demonstrative."

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 05:10:10 2014 No.5513761

>>5513760
You are right to say that self-sufficient Reason refutes itself, because Reason is not self-sufficient seeing as it relies on premisses which are beyond the scope of Reason. However, true Reason which is not self-sufficient but which relies upon first principles which are beyond demonstration does not refute itself.

http://classics.mit.edu/Aristotle/posterior.1.i.html

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 05:13:20 2014 No.5513767

>>5513760
>However, in truth Aristotle proves that true Reason states the opposite, viz. "Reason states that not all knowledge is demonstrative."

Another way of saying it is:

"Reason shows that not all knowledge is reasoned knowledge, that there is reasonable (in the sense of it is proper to hold) knowledge which is not arrived at by Reason."

So yeah, I hope that satisfies you. I think you have been bamboozled by the people that say that "ALL I NEED IS REASON", which you are right to assert is a fallacious, unreasonable argument. However, in contradicting this argument you set up your own fallacious, unreasonable argument, i.e. "Reason refutes itself". Obviously, Reason cannot refute itself seeing as refutation is an operation of Reason in the first place.

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 05:16:05 2014 No.5513776 >>5512720 This.

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 05:18:11 2014 No.5513781 >>5513156 Aristotle thought it was for cooling blood but his view was by now means ubiquitous. You don't have to be Hippocrates to suspect that the brain has something to do with thinking.

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 05:19:40 2014 No.5513786 >>5512631 ITT: Wikipedia scholars

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 05:19:43 2014 No.5513787

>>5513767
So, a succinct way of modifying your argument so that it is correct would be: "Reason refutes the proposition that Reason is sufficient unto itself." In other words, Reason proves that Reason is based on something beyond Reason.
Now, something beyond Reason is NOT necessarily unreasonable. The intuitive premisses on which Reason is based are not UNreasonable, they simply lack reason or demonstration. An unreasonable argument is a false demonstration; an argument that lacks reason is not a demonstration at all, indeed, it is not an argument. So the first premisses are not arguments or demonstrations, they just "are", they are just known. If you think about this you'll see how it confirms our everyday experience. There is a kind of fundamental knowledge of being or reality we have that is beyond words or argument or demonstration.

>[Dr. Samuel] Johnson relied on a unique form of rhetoric, and he is well known for his "refutation" of Bishop Berkeley's immaterialism, his claim that matter did not actually exist but only seemed to exist: during a conversation with Boswell, Johnson powerfully stomped a nearby stone and proclaimed of Berkeley's theory, "I refute it thus!"

Obviously, Johnson's demonstration here is not logical demonstration. He is referring to first principles which are beyond the scope of demonstration.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samuel_Johnson

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 05:27:25 2014 No.5513808

>>5513787
Also reminds me of a Chinese parable where the emperor called a sage and asked him to explain something like the meaning of reality or something of that sort, and the sage held up a precious vase and then allowed it to fall and smash to the ground. When the emperor said that he did not understand the sage's message the sage replied that he could not help the emperor.
In other words, the sage was saying that he could not logically demonstrate the first principles, he had to rely on a metaphor or figure which pointed towards the first principles in hope of making the emperor aware of them.

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 05:28:24 2014 No.5513812 >>5513786 >all of /lit/

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 05:29:40 2014 No.5513815 >>5513786 >I'm not going to add to the conversation, I'm just going to point out how poor the conversation is. >I'm not going to make things better, I'm just going to complain about the state of things. Guess you favour Diogenes then.

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 05:31:01 2014 No.5513819

>>5513761
But surely you must see the problem with undemonstrated premises and absolute truth. If the premises don't have to be demonstrated, their selection must be entirely arbitrary and never produce anything we might call "absolute truth". John might choose X as a premise, and Jack Y, and end up with completely different "truths". Each may reject the other's premise, but this rejection must also be entirely arbitrary.

(You could say that such a situation would never arise since all humans intuitively use the same premises, but even if that's the case, it doesn't make the usage any less arbitrary.)

So it's exactly as I said with reason: "we can only blindly accept it, without justification or the means to produce a justification".

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 05:46:38 2014 No.5513848

>>5513819
>But surely you must see the problem with undemonstrated premises and absolute truth.

I see why there might be a problem in the eyes of a person committed to a Rationalism which states that the only form of knowledge is demonstration, i.e. that only demonstrated truth is "absolute truth".

>If the premises don't have to be demonstrated, their selection must be entirely arbitrary and never produce anything we might call "absolute truth". John might choose X as a premise, and Jack Y, and end up with completely different "truths". Each may reject the other's premise, but this rejection must also be entirely arbitrary.

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 05:47:38 2014 No.5513854

>>5513848

Yeah, you are right. So how do we escape complete subjectivism/relativism? It's an interesting question and I've only heard of one argument that really approaches anything like I satisfying answer, which is Christ's statement, "by their fruits ye shall know them". In other words, you shall know what kind of a character a person as by their actions. But, we can apply this to first principles too. We shall know how good a first principle is by how good the conclusions that are derived from it are. Earlier I complained how materialism leads to tyranny, because if we are only animals then who cares what we do to one and other? We are animals, it is to be expected. Who cares if a man molests a child? The child is just a stinking animal anyway, and if it gets too upset by the molestation we can always put the thing down or "euthanize" it. So, seeing as such disgusting conclusions follow from the premise that man is purely material, that, to me, is an adequate refutation of materialism. But I say that it is disgusting, and you might reply, "disgusting to you, maybe someone likes those conclusions and finds them attractive". Yes, but then we only need to extend the principle "by their fruits ye shall know them" further and see what actions result from those conclusions. So if having accepted these conclusions something like child molestation or euthanasia becomes popular we can then see that they are ill fruits and the original premise of materialism was wrong.

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 05:48:58 2014 No.5513857

>>5513854
But then, "how do we know that these are ill fruits, and not good fruits". And then it will ultimately come down, as you might expect, to something SEEMINGLY subjective. I think that only the true first principles leads to order. Not just logical order, but order in society, in law, in ethics, in psychology, etc. Whereas all false first principles, however different they may be, will ultimately result in disorder or chaos. Now, there is another statement by Christ, "Therefore I say to you: Every sin and blasphemy shall be forgiven men, but the blasphemy of the Spirit shall not be forgiven." Now, I think that this "blasphemy of the Spirit" is the rejection of the true first principle in favour of an arbitrary subjective one that leads to destruction. How will one know that one is in union with "the Spirit" and not a follower of a false principle? All I can say is that, again, it is beyond logical demonstration. It's a mystical experience.
After Pythagoras had been meditating and fasting in order to be received into a mystery school, he said:
"You are not allowing Pythagoras in. I am a different man, I am reborn. You were right and I was wrong, because then my whole standpoint was intellectual. Through this purification, my center of being has changed. Before this training I could only understand through the intellect, through the head. Now I can feel. Now truth is not a concept to me, but a life."

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 05:49:59 2014 No.5513862

>>5513857

>If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not charity, I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity, I am nothing.And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not charity, it profiteth me nothing. Charity is patient, is kind: charity envieth not, dealeth not perversely; is not puffed up; Is not ambitious, seeketh not her own, is not provoked to anger, thinketh no evil;

>Rejoiceth not in iniquity, BUT REJOICETH IN THE TRUTH; Beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things. Charity never falleth away: whether prophecies shall be made void, or tongues shall cease, or knowledge shall be destroyed. For we know in part, and we prophesy in part. But when that which is perfect is come, that which is in part shall be done away.

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 05:50:07 2014 No.5513863
File: 997 KB, 245x150, 1412156505556.gif [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google]

All you lil philosophy students looking for the "truth" are so adorable and cute. When you get all serious talking about philosophy you have no idea how dang cute you look. I just want to hug and kiss you all day. 3
Xoxoxo

Plato btw hehe

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 05:52:07 2014 No.5513868

>>5513862

>When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child. But, when I became a man, I put away the things of a child. We see now through a glass in a dark manner; but then face to face. Now I know in part; but then I shall know even as I am known. And now there remain faith, hope, and charity, these three: but the greatest of these is charity.

I think that charity is the first principle. "God is Love" (Charity). If you think about it it makes sense intellectually. God is by his nature perfect, and so in the beginning God didn't need to create anything, he could have spent eternity being perfectly happy by himself, but instead he chose to create and to love things LESS THAN HIMSELF, so that the principle of all creation is Charity, i.e. love for the sake of love, even love for things less than yourself. God sustains everything in existence. Everything that exists is participating in God, because God is "I AM WHO I AM", i.e. God is Being-Itself, he is the very verb "to be". So seeing as God is perfect and seeing as he sustains everything that exists, it is clear that he sustains everything that exists through love, i.e. "love sustains everything", or, a lest trite phrasing, "Omnia vincit Amor; et nos cedamus Amori"; "Love conquers all, and we must yield to love."

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 05:54:12 2014 No.5513876 >>5513868 Sophocles: >They are not wise, then, who stand forth to buffet against Love; for Love rules the gods as he will, and me. >One word >Frees us of all the weight and pain of life: >That word is love.

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 06:03:41 2014 No.5513893

>>5513819
>So it's exactly as I said with reason: "we can only blindly accept it, without justification or the means to produce a justification".

In a way, yes. Which is an approval of what the theologians have said, viz. that Faith is a higher form of knowledge than Reason. That intuitive or spiritual reason which relies on contemplation of immediate realities is higher than reasoned or demonstrated reason which grasp mediated realities through logical forms.

So, how do you know which Faith to follow? "By their fruits ye shall know them", that's really the only guide you have.

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 06:04:12 2014 No.5513896

>>5513857
It's clear you don't agree with Nietzsche, but you are closer than you probably think to his position: that the question of truth isn't what matters, but that "the question is, how far an opinion is life-furthering, life-preserving, species-preserving, perhaps species-rearing".

This is the first good conversation I've had on /lit/ so thanks for that.

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 06:07:12 2014 No.5513901

>>5513896
>that the question of truth isn't what matters, but that "the question is, how far an opinion is life-furthering, life-preserving, species-preserving, perhaps species-rearing".

Yes, but I would say that the preservation of life is a kind of truth, that not all truth is intellectual.
Also, I obviously disagree with him on his assessment of Christianity as life-denying. He thinks that because Christianity embraces the weak it is life-denying, because a fundamental fact of life is that the strong survive and the weak die. But that is only true if the purpose or end or telos of life is survival or perpetuation; if the meaning of life is Charity then obviously embracing the weak is life-affirming, and rejecting the weak is life-denying. So it comes down to a matter of final ends, what you think the meaning of life is. I think Nietzsche got it wrong. I don't think that the meaning of life is the strong triumphing over the weak.

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 06:10:50 2014 No.5513908 >>5513815 There's no way I can force anybody on this piece of shit board to have academic credentials, intellectual integrity, or logic. Sorry.

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 06:11:18 2014 No.5513909 File: 93 KB, 500x453, image.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google] BASED A S E D

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 06:11:43 2014 No.5513911

>>5513901
>I don't think that the meaning of life is the strong triumphing over the weak.

If the meaning of life was that the strong are to triumph over the weak then that means that the meaning of life in a way contains death, doesn't it? Because by the strong triumphing over the weak we mean that the strong survive and the weak die. This means that Nietzsche has brought two opposites - life and death - together, a kind of contradiction. Whereas the Christian view of life keeps life and death totally separate:

>For he (God) created all things that they might be: and he made the nations of the earth for health: and there is no poison of destruction in them, nor kingdom of hell upon the earth.

The Christian view of life presupposes that life OUGHT to exist, that it was made to live. Under Nietzsche's understanding of life certain life is meant to die. So in a way Nietzsche is death-affirming; for him there isn't a clear distinction between life-affirming and death-affirming, because life means death, whereas in Christianity life and death are separate and affirmation of one means rejection of the other.

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 06:13:35 2014 No.5513912

>>5513911
>whereas in Christianity life and death are separate and affirmation of one means rejection of the other.

Thus, the hope for eternal life.

>For God created man incorruptible, and to the image of his own likeness he made him. But by the envy of the devil, death came into the world: And they follow him that are of his side.

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 06:13:46 2014 No.5513914 >>5513911 >yet another inept interpretation of Nietzsche brought to you by PepsiCo (TM)

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 06:15:06 2014 No.5513918 >>5513908 There's no way that statements like these are ever going to improve this piece of shit board. >>5513914 >everyone misinterprets Nietzsche xD love this meme

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 06:17:23 2014 No.5513923 >>5513918 Nobody ever argued that they would. You need logic. Btw hiding behind "muh maymay" when somebody calls out your shitty interpretation is just sad. You are a mental midget.

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 06:18:09 2014 No.5513924

>>5513914
Nietzsche really does conflate life and death. Read his works. He has a romantic view of life where life and death, the pleasant and the horrible, are mixed. By "life-affirming" Nietzsche also means "death-affirming"; when he says "amor fati" he means loving not just your life, but your death too. Often when Nietzsche says "life" he doesn't mean actual life in distinction to death, he means something like a strong flow of blood and a feeling of excitement and power, "the Will to Power". That is often what he means by "life", "the Will to Power"; whatever is the will to power is life, and whatever is the will to renunciation of power is death.

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 06:19:43 2014 No.5513925 >>5513924 Do you know German?

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 06:20:09 2014 No.5513927

>>5513924
>whatever is the will to power is life, and whatever is the will to renunciation of power is death.

Which is just a simple inversion of the Christian maxim: "Whoever will exalt himself will be humbled and whoever will humble himself will be exalted."

Nietzsche, "Whoever will exalt himself will be exalted and whoever will humble himself will be humbled."

Nietzsche's makes sense if there is no God and man is a law unto himself, but if there is a God then obviously God is going to smack down everyone that tries to set himself up as the Law.

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 06:20:24 2014 No.5513928 >>5512631 All philosophers except Wittgenstein are a waste of time.

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 06:21:35 2014 No.5513929 >>5513925 No.

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 06:21:54 2014 No.5513931 >>5513928 That's a funny way to spell Montaigne

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 06:22:54 2014 No.5513932 >>5513929 So have a think about what you're saying. >>5513931 That's a funny way to spell Nick Land.

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 06:23:35 2014 No.5513936 >>5513932 >So have a think about what you're saying. Why? Walter Kaufmann is a decent translator, I think.

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 06:24:19 2014 No.5513937 >>5513932 That's a funny way to avoid the subject.

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 06:24:42 2014 No.5513939
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>>5513925
this is /lit/. In academia, anyone trying to say anything about a philosopher he hasn't read in the original would be shunned.
On 4chan, most people don't even realize Nietzsche wasn't American.

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 06:25:44 2014 No.5513942 >>5513936 You think Kaufmann is a decent translator, but you don't know the language he's translating from. What the fuck am I reading.

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 06:27:01 2014 No.5513946 >>5513942 Why don't you just state what you think my misinterpretation of Nietzsche consists of rather than skirting around the edge of the issue?

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 06:28:13 2014 No.5513950 >>5513939 Are you an academician?

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 06:28:57 2014 No.5513952 >>5513946 Why don't you see that knowing the original language of the text is a prerequisite for worthwhile interpretation? Or do you enjoy being a dilettante?

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 06:30:55 2014 No.5513954 >>5513950 I don't even have to be a human being for my argument to remain valid. Why are you so interested in my biography?

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 06:35:38 2014 No.5513963

>>5513952
>Why don't you see that knowing the original language of the text is a prerequisite for worthwhile interpretation?

You are right. For example, you are unable to interpret my language, because I am speaking the language of ideas whereas you are speaking the language of pedantry.

No, I don't think that someone has to be able to read Ἐγώ εἰμι ἡ ὁδὸς καὶ ἡ ἀλήθεια καὶ ἡ ζωή to understand the words, "I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life." Because language is not made of ideas, it is made of labels which point to ideas.

If you think I misunderstood Nietzsche's ideas, then please tell me how. But telling me I can't read the original labels Nietzsche gave to his ideas is just pedantry.

"How can you eat apples from Germany without knowing the word Apfel?!"

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 06:39:30 2014 No.5513969

>>5513963
I think Nietzsche himself says somewhere that he wanted to write Zarathustra in French at one point. I suppose then, according to you, the book would have been made of totally different ideas if he had written it in French.
Although, I read "I originally wanted to write Zarathustra in French" in an English translation, perhaps in German "I originally wanted to write Zarathustra in French" means something totally difference. Perhaps "French" is German is a mentonym for "Baguette". "I originally wanted to write Zarathustra with breadsticks." If so, it's a shame that Walter Kaufmann forgot this subtlety of the German language.

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 06:41:48 2014 No.5513978 >>5513963 Yes, resort to fallacies instead of admitting that language is subtle and the fact that you don't know German means you haven't actually read Nietzsche. Your arrogance will ensure you never achieve anything. Faggot.

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 06:47:30 2014 No.5513987

>>5513978
I know I haven't read Nietzsche. I couldn't care less about reading Nietzsche. Seeing as he is a philosopher and not a poet, I am interested more in his ideas than his words. If you told me that I don't understand the real romance of Nietzsche's words because I haven't read him in German then I would agree with you, but telling me I haven't understood his ideas because German ideas are different than English ideas is preposterous, because ideas exist outside of language and language is merely a system of labels. True, in some languages there may be labels to ideas in which in another language there is no label, so that the speaker of one language never comes upon a certain idea except extra-linguistically, but that is the job of the translator: to sort out the labels so that they point to the same ideas that the original did.

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 06:50:47 2014 No.5513991

>>5513987
It's like saying that nobody has understood Virgil's "love conquers all" until he has read "Omnia vincit Amor", because "love" and "amor" are different concepts; Englishmen love differently than Italians; only Italian love conquers all, English love, on the other hand, does not.

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 06:51:53 2014 No.5513994

>>5513987

The point is that you have no way of verifying how fidelious the translation you read was, and have no access to the original text. You simply don't have any basis for accessing the 'ideas', because for all you know the 'labels' you're referring to in Nietzsche don't match up to the original German. You're blind, hermeneutically.

And that's not even to bring up the fact that the Myth of Museum you're invoking (ie "muh labels") was blown the fuck out by Quine.

Get an education before you try to argue, kid.

And by the way, Nietzsche was as much a poet as a philosopher.

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 06:52:36 2014 No.5513995 >>5513987 translation is lossful, ideas in philosophy aren't precise like mathemical definitions (if they were you could do actual math with them, but you can't because they're not). you're full of shit >Du bist voll Scheiße

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 06:53:04 2014 No.5513996 >>5513995 +1

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 06:55:56 2014 No.5514004

>>5513991

No, this is fallacious reasoning. There's no problem if you already know that 'omnia vincit amor' can be translated as 'love conquers all', because only the English phrase is actually doing any work here unless you actually know Latin. Reading an English translation of Latin and then claiming to have 'read' the original text, however...

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 06:56:58 2014 No.5514008 >>5513987 >this stunning ignorance of philosophy of language and translation theory Holy fuck anon.

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 06:58:11 2014 No.5514011 >>5513991 >It's like saying that nobody has understood Virgil's "love conquers all" until he has read "Omnia vincit Amor" No it's not. The two are not analogous. Why is /lit/ so stupid.

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 06:59:43 2014 No.5514015

>>5513994
>You simply don't have any basis for accessing the 'ideas'

I do. Ideas are accessed through contemplation, not through language. Language is a mere occasion that may serve to stimulate contemplation.

I can't help that you are a nominalist and I am a realist.

>And that's not even to bring up the fact that the Myth of Museum you're invoking (ie "muh labels") was blown the fuck out by Quine.

You mean another nominalist like yourself.

>because for all you know the 'labels' you're referring to in Nietzsche don't match up to the original German.

But this is always the case. Whenever someone puts their ideas in the form of language there is a chance that the interpreter of the language does not grasp the same original idea.

>And by the way, Nietzsche was as much a poet as a philosopher.

I think he was even more a poet than a philosopher, but I'm not interested in him as a poet.

>>5514004
>Reading an English translation of Latin and then claiming to have 'read' the original text, however...

The problem is that I have never claimed to have read Nietzsche. I have from the beginning been discussing his (or what I think to be his) ideas, not his words. For some reason a man is asserting that what I think are Nietzsche's ideas are not his ideas, but he is reticent on how.

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 07:01:50 2014 No.5514017 >>5514015 You haven't read Nietzsche but you think you know what his ideas are. You cannot be this insane.

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 07:04:56 2014 No.5514022

>>5514015
>The problem is that I have never claimed to have read Nietzsche.

In truth, nobody can read Nietzsche, in the sense of reading his mind or soul. We can only read Nietzsche's words. You are saying that I can't access Nietzsche's minds because I am reading a translation of his words. But you are reading a translation of his ideas in the form of the German language in the first place. If you are saying that there is to be inevitable loss in a translation of a translation, then I tentatively agree with you: but there was loss in the original translation to begin with, from Idea to Deutsch, so neither of us has completely read his mind.
So when you say to me, "you can't understand Nietzsche because you haven't read the original" you are confusing yourself, because Nietzsche was a man not a book. You haven't read the original Nietzsche either, you've only read a copy of him in the form of a book. So why aren't you crying to yourself that you cannot ever get a true interpretation of Nietzsche because you are reading Nietzsche in textual translation and not reading the original man?

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 07:06:45 2014 No.5514024 >>5514017 >You haven't read Nietzsche but you think you know what his ideas are. But ideas and language are separate. I am not a nominalist. In fact, I think that it is Nominalism that is insane.

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 07:07:09 2014 No.5514026

>>5514022

There is no language of 'Idea'.

Your argument is empty because it rests on a false premise.

The point is that the German version of Nietzsche's texts were written by Nietzsche, and the translations were not. The original and the translation are not equivalent.

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 07:07:10 2014 No.5514027 >>5514017 his ideas are that all/most other ideas are stupid

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 07:08:21 2014 No.5514030 >>5514024 This has nothing to do with nominalism or realism. This has to do with the fact that you're claiming to interpret a philosopher without reading what you claim to be interpreting.

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 07:09:53 2014 No.5514032 >>5514026 How different are the English and German though, really? I read Beyond Good And Evil and found the English translated his ideas well enough for me to comprehend them.

>>	o !!r3+23beQiOG Wed Oct 1 07:10:31 2014 No.5514033 >>5514026 Embrace buzzfeed

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 07:10:45 2014 No.5514035

>>5514026
> The original and the translation are not equivalent.

Obviously.
But we are talking about ideas and not words.

OK, here's the problem reduced to false principles. You are all under the impression that the reading of a philosopher occurs when you sound out the words that he has wrote with your mouth, or with the voice of your mind. I am saying that the reading of a philosopher occurs when you contemplate his ideas, which are distinct from his words. Now, I have already admitted that in a translation from one language to another the copy might be less able in pointing the reader to the idea which the original signified, but you still have not given me an example of how I have misinterpreted Nietzsche's ideas.

>>	o !!r3+23beQiOG Wed Oct 1 07:11:33 2014 No.5514037 >>5514033 http://www.buzzfeed.com/ludwigwittgenstein/fantastic-ways-to-distinguish-between-sense-and-nonsense#25vdvxm

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 07:11:45 2014 No.5514039 >>5514030 Nietzsche's philosophy is not in German. No philosophy is in German. Philosophy is not contained in language.

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 07:14:01 2014 No.5514043

>>5514035

Reading always involves reading a text. There is no such thing as purely 'contemplating ideas' unless you've already read the text. If what you're claiming was true I could know, automatically, what Kripke thought without reading his texts, by simply 'contemplating his ideas', as you claim to be doing. But that is absurd, and your position doesn't have any merit beyond allowing you to get around the effort of actually sitting down and reading the material.

>>5514032

You read the German version and the English version?

>>5514039

Nietzsche wrote in German. Sorry.

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 07:14:28 2014 No.5514045

>>5514039
Nietzsche himself said this, funnily enough.

"Although, again, I read in English, so perhaps "Alas! what are you, after all, my written and painted thoughts! Not long ago you were so variegated, young and malicious, so full of thorns and secret spices, that you made me sneeze and laugh—and now? You have already doffed your novelty, and some of you, I fear, are ready to become truths, so immortal do they look, so pathetically honest, so tedious! And was it ever otherwise? What then do we write and paint, we mandarins with Chinese brush, we immortalisers of things which LEND themselves to writing, what are we alone capable of painting? Alas, only that which is just about to fade and begins to lose its odour! Alas, only exhausted and departing storms and belated yellow sentiments! Alas, only birds strayed and fatigued by flight, which now let themselves be captured with the hand—with OUR hand! We immortalize what cannot live and fly much longer, things only which are exhausted and mellow! And it is only for your AFTERNOON, you, my written and painted thoughts, for which alone I have colours, many colours, perhaps, many variegated softenings, and fifty yellows and browns and greens and reds;—but nobody will divine thereby how ye looked in your morning, you sudden sparks and marvels of my solitude, you, my old, beloved—EVIL thoughts!"

Perhaps "the original German" points towards totally different ideas though.

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 07:16:17 2014 No.5514048 >>5514043 >Nietzsche wrote in German. Yes, his words are in German, but not his ideas. I can't remember which philosopher said that one of the first mistake people have to get over is confusing words for ideas.

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 07:16:40 2014 No.5514050 >>5514043 No only the English. I knew somebody was gonna say/ask this. I meant the English version seemed to convey a set of thoughts perfectly fine, which are attributed to Nietzsche. Anybody wanna answer my question?

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 07:18:10 2014 No.5514057

>>5514043
>Reading always involves reading a text. There is no such thing as purely 'contemplating ideas' unless you've already read the text. If what you're claiming was true I could know, automatically, what Kripke thought without reading his texts, by simply 'contemplating his ideas', as you claim to be doing. But that is absurd, and your position doesn't have any merit beyond allowing you to get around the effort of actually sitting down and reading the material.

Let me ask you a question.

Does a German child who slowly sounds the German words of Nietzsche understand Nietzsche's ideas better than a philosopher who reads Nietzsche's words cast in English?

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 07:18:15 2014 No.5514058

>>5514048

Nobody's confusing words for ideas here, I'm just pointing out that Nietzsche wrote the original German versions, not the translations. There's no getting around this.

>>5514050

So you only read the translation, and not the original, but you're claiming that the translation was a 'good' one. Don't you see the problem with this?

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 07:19:37 2014 No.5514059 >>5514057 In other words, does a German child of 4 come closer to Nietzsche's idea of "Uebermensch" than an Englishman who reads the word "Overman"?

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 07:22:23 2014 No.5514067

>>5514057

Not necessarily. But he is reading Nietzsche's words, and not those of a translator. Readers who are content with the translation cannot do this, and cannot ascertain whether the translation they are reading is fidelious or completely misleading. It also depends on the age of the 'child'. Your question is phrased in a misleading, sophistical way and doesn't really have much content.

>>5514059

See above. It's a misleading question because comparisons of the German and English should be made ceteribus paribus, not with regard to special cases like you are doing.

Also, the only reason you can say this at all is that you already know that Uebermensch can be translated as Overman. This in itself suggests the hole in your argument. You don't access "ideas" in themselves directly. Get. Over. It.

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 07:25:13 2014 No.5514075

>>5514067
The point is, is that if you admit that because someone reads Nietzsche in the German does not necessarily understand his ideas, it follows that there is a distinction between words (which are sounds or figures) and ideas. Which opens the possibility of a man reading Nietzsche's German words and not understanding his ideas, and reading a translator's English and understanding Nietzsche's ideas.

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 07:25:56 2014 No.5514077 >>5514058 Yes, i'm claiming the translation was good having not read the german, but i'm saying the translation of his thoughts seemed good enough not the translation of the german words of Nietzsche. Make sense?

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 07:27:09 2014 No.5514083

>>5514067
>You don't access "ideas" in themselves directly.

Of course you do. How else do you access them? Language only suggests ideas, it does not access them. A proof of this is that when I tell my dog to stop licking me the idea of not-licking doesn't appear in his mind.

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 07:30:25 2014 No.5514092

>>5514075

If someone reads a translation, the likelihood of the ideas being represented accurately depends on the quality of the translation. If you haven't read the original, you cannot assess the quality of the translation, and are basically up shit creek. There's a 'possibility' that you can the ideas through a translation, but there's no grounds for reasonably believing you have. This is what the argument is about, not about distinctions between ideas and words. I never claimed there wasn't a distinction. Go read some translation theory or stop distorting the conversation.

>>5514077

If you haven't read the original how do you know if the translation is a good one? What is your basis for assessing it?

>>5514083

Your dog doesn't possess the language faculty, so don't invoke your dog in an argument about language and interpretation. Try a better example.

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 07:31:38 2014 No.5514093 >>5514075 Does a man not think in words too? He doesn't think in "thoughts" or abstract ideas but words.

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 07:33:25 2014 No.5514094

>>5514092
>If someone reads a translation, the likelihood of the ideas being represented accurately depends on the quality of the translation.

I agree.

> If you haven't read the original, you cannot assess the quality of the translation

I can, by the approval it has received from critics that no better than myself.

>There's a 'possibility' that you can the ideas through a translation, but there's no grounds for reasonably believing you have.

On the same token, there is no grounds to reasonably believe that you have the idea that Nietzsche originally intended, even when you read him in German. The language doesn't make a difference.

>Your dog doesn't possess the language faculty, so don't invoke your dog in an argument about language and interpretation. Try a better example.

OK, when I tell a French kid to stop licking me who doesn't understand English the idea of not-licking does not appear in his mind.

>>5514093
No, he speaks in words. He thinks in ideas. Those sentences you speak with your "inner voice" are not ideas, they are sentences, speech.

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 07:33:30 2014 No.5514095 >>5514093 My point about Nietzsche's German being the original doesn't have anything to do with whether we think in words or not. Don't get sidetracked.

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 07:35:37 2014 No.5514099

>>5514094
>No, he speaks in words. He thinks in ideas. Those sentences you speak with your "inner voice" are not ideas, they are sentences, speech.

So when a man thinks, "I need to go to the shop." He can think this purely conceptually, or he can say to himself in an inner-voice, "I need to go to the shop", with the concept accompanying it. The use of language implies thought but it is distinct from it. There is a difference between thinking and talking to yourself. And when men are speaking words to themselves in their minds, that is them talking to themselves, which implies that they are also thinking to some degree, but it distinct from their thought.

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 07:36:05 2014 No.5514102 >>5514095 it's no sidetrack, the point i'm making is: that the very thoughts you say can't be translated into german are actually german in the man's head in the first place

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 07:36:52 2014 No.5514104 >>5514102 >that the very thoughts you say can't be translated into german are actually german in the man's head in the first place No they aren't. No thoughts are in German. Speech is in German. Thoughts are not linguistic.

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 07:38:02 2014 No.5514110

>>5514094
>I can, by the approval it has received from critics that no better than myself.

No, in that case you are not assessing the quality of the translation, but deferring to someone else. It is not equivalent.

>>5514094
>On the same token, there is no grounds to reasonably believe that you have the idea that Nietzsche originally intended, even when you read him in German.

Another bad argument. We can't know what the author 'originally' intended, but we can at least read the text that he wrote. The impossibility of reading Nietzsche's "mind" doesn't make translations and original text equivalent.

>>5514094
>OK, when I tell a French kid to stop licking me who doesn't understand English the idea of not-licking does not appear in his mind.

That's because he doesn't understand your words. Because he doesn't know English. Obviously.

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 07:38:33 2014 No.5514115 >>5514104 Sauce? I'm not being snotty, I'm actually curious.

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 07:39:27 2014 No.5514117 >>5514102 It's basically a conjecture depending on your philosophy of mind, and doesn't really have anything to do with the point about Nietzsche.

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 07:41:55 2014 No.5514123

>>5514104
Language is just the movement of the tongue to form sounds which signify concepts, intentions, commands, etc., or the simulation of those sounds in the mind or in written symbols, etc.
Language may signify thoughts but language is not thought, and speaking is not thinking.
There is no such thing as German thought as distinct from English thought like there is a difference between German speech and English speech.

>>5514110
> It is not equivalent.
> The impossibility of reading Nietzsche's "mind" doesn't make translations and original text equivalent.

Can we stop talk about equivalences in words and start talking about equivalences in ideas? I know that German words and English words are not equivalent. Can you please tell me how my understanding of Nietzsche's ideas are not the same as Nietzsche's ideas?
>>5514115
Contemplate the idea. There is no textual source. I thought about it.

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 07:43:26 2014 No.5514125 >>5514117 Yes, that's true. But, then conversely, how is the opposite that you claim not a conjecture as well? It's relevant though, since it pertains to our discussion, right?

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 07:45:23 2014 No.5514129 >>5514123 I did, I can't REALLY fathom a distinction between thought and the voice in our head which just happen to (with great coincidence?) to resemble each and every thought we happen to have?

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 07:45:41 2014 No.5514131

>>5514123
>Can we stop talk about equivalences in words and start talking about equivalences in ideas? I know that German words and English words are not equivalent. Can you please tell me how my understanding of Nietzsche's ideas are not the same as Nietzsche's ideas?

You're distorting the discussion. The original point was that if you haven't read the original German you don't have any basis for interpreting Nietzsche, other than a second-hand one taken from the interpreter, and which you cannot evaluate with regard to whether it is fidelious to what Nietzsche wrote. That is the point. Whatever you believe you understand about Nietzsche's ideas is a fantasy unless you've at least read the original text. It's not an argument about ideas, it's about interpretation. You cannot interpret that which you haven't read.

>>5514125

I'm not claiming anything about the relationship of language to thought. And no, it isn't relevant unless you want to confuse the conversation.

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 07:46:52 2014 No.5514132 >>5514129 It might be useful to consider that Einstein thought (or so he claimed) in images and spatial relations, and very rarely in words.

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 07:47:07 2014 No.5514133

>>5514129
Thoughts aren't voices mates. Try having a silent thought. Better yet, try having a thought that isn't sensuous at all, that isn't audible, visual, etc.
If you need inspiration for these kinds of thoughts read some metaphysical or mathematical tract.

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 07:48:12 2014 No.5514139

>>5514123
>Can you please tell me how my understanding of Nietzsche's ideas are not the same as Nietzsche's ideas?

I think he's trying to say that your ideas of Nietzsche's work are different from yours because of the different languages you interpreted them in.

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 07:49:35 2014 No.5514142

>>5514131
I've already said that I don't care what Nietzsche wrote, I care about what his ideas were. You tell me that I can't tell if a translation is faithful to the words of the original, but I don't care if it is or it isn't as long as the translation serves as an adequate occasion to arrive at the contemplation of the ideas which Nietzsche had.

>>5514139
But we don't interpret Nietzsche's ideas in different languages, we interpret his / his translator's words in different languages. Nietzsche's thoughts aren't in any language.

>>	Omnisexual Tyrannosaurus !!33slhp0V42i Wed Oct 1 07:49:54 2014 No.5514143 Diogenes lived an authentic bohemian lifestyle, so yeah, him.

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 07:51:21 2014 No.5514146

>>5514139

What I'm saying is that unless you've read the original German, you haven't read Nietzsche. What he's saying about ideas doesn't actually bear on the argument at all, but is just an evasive rhetorical tactic.

>>5514142

But you have no way of knowing whether the 'ideas' you're talking about are those of Nietzsche. What you do have access to is the text, if you could be bothered to learn German. You can contemplate all you like, but you don't really have a basis for saying those ideas you're contemplating are those of Nietzsche.

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 07:51:33 2014 No.5514147

>>5514131
>I'm not claiming anything about the relationship of language to thought. And no, it isn't relevant unless you want to confuse the conversation.

I see the confusion, I bumped into your argument with another anon with >>5514093 this post, I had no part in whatever you were arguing beforehand.

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 07:52:13 2014 No.5514151 >>5514146 >But you have no way of knowing whether the 'ideas' you're talking about are those of Nietzsche. Neither does someone who reads him in German.

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 07:53:20 2014 No.5514153

>>5514147

If you're interested, Andy Clark has written some very interesting things about the relationship between thought and language. Ironically, this is actually what I work on at university, but I don't care about it in this context.

>>5514151

Completely irrelevant. Nietzsche wrote in German. That is the point.

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 07:58:24 2014 No.5514175

>>5514153
>Nietzsche wrote in German.

So how do you know that when you are reading Nietzsche in German that you are contemplating the same ideas that he was contemplating?
I've already given the example of a child reading Nietzsche in German and not having the same ideas as Nietzsche. So obviously the sounding of the words is not sufficient, it's not a purely linguistic exercise; it is also mental. So, seeing as we arrive at Nietzsche's ideas mentally and not linguistically, it is perfectly possible for someone to arrive at Nietzsche's ideas having never read him or his translators. Like Leibniz and Newton each arriving at Calculus independently.

You say, "how will you know if the ideas you have are the same as Nietzsche's if you only have read a translation of Nietzsche's words?"

I ask, "how will you know if the ideas you have are the same as Nietzsche's when you read the original German?"

So, how do you know?

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 08:00:56 2014 No.5514186

This is what I can't understand: your complaining that I am reading Nietzsche in translation.

BUT EVERYONE IS READING NIETZSCHE IN TRANSLATION: nobody reads Nietzsche, except God. We all only read a translation of his ideas in the form of his German. Yours is a translation; mine is a translation of a translation. I admit something may have been lost in the translation of a translation - take note: I ADMIT - but you still haven't pointed out where this loss has taken place.

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 08:01:49 2014 No.5514189

>>5514175
>So how do you know that when you are reading Nietzsche in German that you are contemplating the same ideas that he was contemplating?

You don't, interpretation is an inherently precarious endeavour, and nobody claimed you do. Your entire post is a red herring. I'm just pointing out that reading a translation is not the same as reading the original text, and you keep coming up with these cheap, fallacious, arguments so you can avoid the work of learning German and reading Nietzsche properly.

Contemplate 'ideas' all you want, but don't claim that it has (necessarily) anything to do with Nietzsche if you can't even be bothered to read him.

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 08:02:11 2014 No.5514193

>>5514133
The voices we hear in our heads (and which I claim to be our thoughts) are actually only our conscious thoughts. We have thoughts in the sub-conscious (where our brain discusses things and tries to work out problems, etc.).

I read about this in Thinking Fast and Slow, it tackles this somewhere in the middle of the book, it's not a bad read, at all.

>>5514132
Interesting, perhaps it's one of those things were certain people see colours in words?

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 08:02:51 2014 No.5514195 >>5514186 This is nonsense and a distortion. The text that Nietzsche wrote in German is the original text, it is not a translation. You're just abusing the meaning of 'translation'.

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 08:04:37 2014 No.5514202

>>5514193
>Interesting, perhaps it's one of those things were certain people see colours in words?

No it's got nothing to do with synesthesia, it just suggests that language and thought can't be equated.

>>5514186
>but you still haven't pointed out where this loss has taken place.

At the point where a translator got involved. I'm sorry, but no amount of sophistry on your part is going to change the fact that Nietzsche wrote in German.

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 08:06:25 2014 No.5514208

>>5514189
> I'm just pointing out that reading a translation is not the same as reading the original text,

Which I have admitted at least thrice.

>so you can avoid the work of learning German and reading Nietzsche properly.

Only God can read Nietzsche properly. If by "Nietzsche" you metonymically mean "the works of Nietzsche" then I agree with you I am not reading the works of Nietzsche in their most authentic form. But to say that I don't understand Nietzsche's ideas because I haven't read his original words is a wild claim.

>anything to do with Nietzsche if you can't even be bothered to read him.

Only God has bothered to read Nietzsche. Many people have read his works; I have read a translation of some of his works. If you are saying that my reading of the translation of his works is not the same as your reading of his original works then please point out how. If you are urging me to become a scholar of Nietzsche be aware of the fact that I have never claimed to be a scholar of Nietzsche or have claimed to have the desire to be. I HAVE claimed to understand (some of) Nietzsche's ideas, and you still have not contradicted me on this, you have only said, "how can you understand Nietzsche's ideas if you don't understand his words?" - well, the same way that Newton understood Calculus without reading Leibniz's words.

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 08:07:36 2014 No.5514214

>>5512762
>the theory of forms seems stupid as fuck
I think the theory is wrong yet to say it's stupid is simply ignorant. Not only that, most people's thinking (i.e. "common sense") is based on some subconscious belief in such forms even if they consciously deny their existence. If nothing else Plato offers a good attempt to explicate such a belief.

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 08:09:00 2014 No.5514218

>>5514208
>then I agree with you I am not reading the works of Nietzsche in their most authentic form.

You should just admit you aren't interested in reading Nietzsche at all.

And your claim that 'only God can read Nietzsche properly' is a distortion of 'read', and incoherent. I can't believe that you are being this evasive. You cannot transcendentally access a person's thoughts through telepathy.

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 08:10:24 2014 No.5514221 >>5514208 So basically you intend to understand Nietzsche's ideas not by reading them but by accident. Good luck with that.

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 08:10:53 2014 No.5514223

>>5514208
>the same way that Newton understood Calculus without reading Leibniz's words.

Which is an apt example seeing as how it relates a case where an Englishman understood the ideas of a German without having to read German.

I'm English. Nietzsche was German. I am claiming to have understood Nietzsche's ideas without reading German. What's wrong with that?

>>5514218
>You should just admit you aren't interested in reading Nietzsche at all.

I'm not interested in reading Nietzsche at all. I was interested a while ago, but not interested enough to learn German for the sake of reading his works, as I thought that Walter Kaufmann was likely a skilled enough translator, given his reputation, to preserve much of the subtlety of Nietzsche's thought.

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 08:11:25 2014 No.5514224 >>5514208 >I HAVE claimed to understand (some of) Nietzsche's ideas Actually, you don't even have any criteria by which to judge whether you have understood his ideas or not. Your claim to have understood Nietzsche is completely vacuous.

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 08:12:25 2014 No.5514227 >>5514202 ~~Sorry , I meant it's LIKE one of those things, not related in any way whatever

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 08:13:07 2014 No.5514228

>>5514223
>I am claiming to have understood Nietzsche's ideas without reading German. What's wrong with that?

You have no criteria by which to say whether you have understood his ideas or not. Understanding is meaningless if you exclude the very text that is to be understood. And your apparent belief that the ideas are 'out there' is ridiculous. How do you know when an idea you contemplate has any relation to Nietzsche whatsoever?

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 08:13:47 2014 No.5514230

>>5514221
>So basically you intend to understand Nietzsche's ideas not by reading them but by accident.

Nobody has ever understood Nietzsche's ideas by reading them. Ideas are not read, they are contemplated. Words are read, not thoughts or ideas.
Nietzsche's ideas are not in German; his words are in German. Somebody can come across Nietzsche's ideas without ever having known there was such a place as Germany.

>>5514224
>you don't even have any criteria by which to judge whether you have understood his ideas or not.

You have not presented any criteria either.
My criteria is that my understanding of Nietzsche's ideas fits with what the best scholar's understanding of Nietzsche's ideas according to the words of those scholars.

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 08:14:56 2014 No.5514232 >>5514228 >You have no criteria by which to say whether you have understood his ideas or not. What is your criteria by which you judge whether or not you have the same ideas as Nietzsche originally had?

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 08:15:42 2014 No.5514236

>>5514230
>You have not presented any criteria either.

Irrelevant because you are the one that is claiming to have understood Nietzsche's ideas.

Anyway, I have to go study neuroscience now, so I'll just wish you a long, happy life of understanding philosophers you haven't read.

Bye.

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 08:16:50 2014 No.5514243 >>5514236 > happy life of understanding philosophers you haven't read. Only God reads philosophers or men in general. We only read the words of philosophers.

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 08:18:24 2014 No.5514247 >>5514243 and I have admitted that I have not read Nietzsche's words.

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 08:23:58 2014 No.5514260

So, assuming that the words of german even aren't exactly what Nietsche wanted to convey, how much would it really in practicality differ from what his intended message was?

Not much I reckon, as even if the two are a little distance, the fact that they often state their opinions and then go on to elaborate on them quite a few times, only an idiot wouldn't know what the author is trying to say.

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 08:25:22 2014 No.5514265

>>5514247
and I assert that having not read someone's words does not mean that you have not understood their ideas.

a man in France may well have the same idea "frog" or "the number seven" as I do, even though he has never read my words and does not use the same words to label the ideas that I do.

I have already admitted that there is a relation of words to ideas, but that this is not a definite relation, only a relative relation, i.e. words and ideas do not exactly correspond, they are not the same thing.
I have admitted that in translating a text from one language to another the correspondence between the words and the ideas that the author originally intended me be lessened, but I am confident that the ideas which I call Nietzche's are the same or are similar to the actual ideas of Nietzsche because I trust in the capability of Nietzsche to accurately represent his ideas in German, and his translators to accurately represent his ideas in English. I do this not out of reasoned certainty but out of a certain trust in the capabilities of others who have a reputation for having this capability.

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 08:33:09 2014 No.5514287

Diogenes was a cynical thinker in the sense that he always tried to desconstruct any attempt to create more complex theories about reality. Socrates' "I just know that I know nothing" is, in other words, a request for more consistent and critical thinking. Your knowledge should be justified, you should be able to prove whatever claim you said is to be true.

The problem with Socrates' proposition is that is also a safe haven for a lazy approach to knowledge. It becomes almost a sophism in the sense that "I just know that i know nothing" becomes "I cannot know nothing". This is diogenes for me. He takes this extra step on Socrates reasoning, it is because of this decision that he disregard reality, property, money and that he becomes overly critical and cynical. And I admit, he's good at this, clever motherfucker.

But, this is also the reasoning that makes me put Plato above Diogenes. Socrates had tons of disciples ready to enquire your reasoning to exaustion trying to prove you wrong. Anything you tried to propose in Athens after Socrates teachings would be rigoursly inspected by dozens of people (some of the explicitly trying embarass you). This is a very a hostile enviroment for constructive knowledge (and, i dare say, the same thing happens today, just look to /lit/).

Plato survived this. He proposed a great theory. He gave an answer when everybody else was questioning and destroying other theories. This is why he is the foundation of western philosophy. He created a solid foundation in a incredible hostile enviroment. This is why I think he ia genius.

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 08:35:53 2014 No.5514298 >>5514260 These anans are too short-sighted to see the big picture fellow anon.

Anonymous Wed Oct 1 08:38:01 2014 No.5514306

>>5514260
>assuming that the words of german even aren't exactly what Nietsche wanted to convey
>only an idiot wouldn't know what the author is trying to say
You're explicitly contradicting yourself here. I agree with your first statement. Nietzsche does too (e.g. his thoughts on language or what he writes about reading and writing).
I didn't read the whole debate, but my opinion is that the source is closer to what Nietzsche *thought he meant* yet a good translation is not that far away either so it shouldn't be dismissed, only critically assessed. Original German is also a translation. Nietzsche's thoughts themselves are a translation of a "complex of drives that he was".
But you definitely won't get a good (in a opposition to a very reduced and simplified) interpretation of Nietzsche from a few quotes, summaries or encyclopedia articles.

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 14:24:17 2014 No.5515336 >>5513230 Why isn't Zizek on here?

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 15:09:12 2014 No.5515547 File: 129 KB, 640x960, image.jpg [View same] [iqdb] [saucenao] [google] Which one of you did this?

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 15:14:03 2014 No.5515566 diogenes

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 15:14:42 2014 No.5515569 >>5515547 you probably

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 15:15:56 2014 No.5515579 >>5513230 Jesus didn't write a single book. His disciples were responsible, no?

>>	Anonymous Wed Oct 1 17:05:58 2014 No.5516151 >>5515547 huehuehue

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/lit/ - Literature