Kevin Beal

I've sent you a PM.

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Unless we were talking about a god that exists insofar as he is represented as existing in a collective sense. (Money is an example of this.) But in that event it would make no sense to say that he exists independent of human minds the way trees and rocks do.

Yes. And for the reasons you mentioned. That is not to say though that subjective experience is arbitrary or is not causal in any way. Things like learned paralysis and phantom limbs are an example of this. And maybe even more fundamentally, you can think that you saw a lion, but it was actually coincidental lighting on some dirt mound can cause you to run away. And just because your dreams don't actually exist, it doesn't make them arbitrary or anything like that. They serve an important function. Philosopher John Searle makes a distinction between ontologically subjective vs ontologically objective. Ontology refers to claims about existence. The ontologically objective being things we can touch, rocks, trees etc. Ontologically subjective referring to things that "exist" subjectively within human minds. You might be surprised how much falls into the second category (deontic powers, functions of objects, semantics, etc). If we accept his distinction we can save concepts from non-existence, but with the important qualifier that it exists subjectively. I was conflating "existing" with "ontologically objective". And I think the distinction he presents is much more useful and accurate. So, totally contradict myself, I'm going to flip flop and say that concepts exist in an ontologically subjective way, since I accept his conclusions based on the arguments he presents in his books and this video:

It's nothing like that, actually, since I didn't create the homeless person. If you had a child and didn't feed him on the other hand... God is directly responsible, whereas I could be very distantly responsible in some abstract way (at best). Your argument is specious.

A forest is a concept. It doesn't exist in your mind. There is no forest in your mind. The "mind" in this context is a subjective phenomena produced by the brain. It occupies no space and contains within it nothing at all, physically speaking. The contents of conscious experience are things like perceptions, desires, beliefs, etc. These things do not exist, but are in reference to things that can exist. Concept, belief, desire, etc describe subjective experiences produced by the brain. "Exists in the mind" is a convenient shorthand, but philosophically speaking it's absolutely untrue. This confusion arises out of the human ability to "create" institutional "reality" where they represent things as existing. The lines on a map aren't actually representative of big black lines carved in the earth. This is very useful most of the time for division of labor, contract, common law, and things like this. But sometimes it's used to exploit people such as in the case of "countries". They exploit the ambiguous nature of the word "exist" in ascribing characteristics to collectives independent of the individuals who make up those collectives. The distinction is actually very important and it stands up logically time and time again. It's not like the scholastics who asked if Adam had a belly button, or asking what's beyond the universe. It has actual implications in our lives.

Whatever you can do to help children is awesome. Sometimes having policemen take you away from your molester or tormenter and putting you in foster care is better for the child. In the real world, reports of child abuse are written down and not acted upon most of the time. They use those reports later as corroborating evidence in the case that it's ever so blatant and over the top that it actually puts people in jail or court. In which case the further evidence of your report may help a child never get beat or molested again in his/her life. Foster care is generally pretty shitty and I've known a lot of foster kids, but in every case I heard about, it was far better than the previous home they were in. I was traumatized many times just listening to the stories that these kids told. The idea that they would be forced to go back to the old house terrified me. I've never reported anything, myself. And I really really really don't want to, but I'd do it if I thought I could a child doing it, I would. I'd rather live in a world where there are mistakes made than a world where that child receives no help at all and where people just rationalize to themselves "oh, well, if I report it, it just might end up worse for them" and then do nothing, or only in the abstract. A crazy fucking parent is bad enough. A complacent, cowardly society is even worse in a lot of ways.

I honestly don't mean to come off as snarky, but it's not my understanding of "own" that "allows" this, but rather my understanding of logic. I could care less that you understand a word differently than I do. I've made exhaustive arguments which I believe demonstrate the point in threads you've read and participated in.

The website got a shout out on the call in show tonite woot!

I have the concept unicorn. Electrical activity in my brain exists forming my subjective thoughts around unicorns, but that unicorn that I conceive does not itself exist within my mind or out in space. Neuronal activity is not a unicorn, obviously. Concepts describe the object of our conscious thinking experience. The thinking experience exists, not necessarily the object, such as in the case of illusions, imagination, fantasy, etc. If concepts existed, there would be no such things as illusions. A concept does not exist. The thing that concept points to might exist, but not the concept itself.

I wasn't addressing you. I was addressing GreekRedemption whose characterization of your argument was directly analogous to saying that resisting rape is violence, since I own my body (we can quibble on the word "own" in that sentence, but you get what I mean). As far as I can tell, you and I both value property rights and voluntary exchange, so that's what I care about

This is way cool Thank you for setting this up!

If I'm not feeling well, I will talk to someone about it or lie down on my bed and decompress until something comes up to process, then decompress again, then process some more, then repeat. Also getting some vitamin D out in the sun helps a lot. My normal routine for self therapy is to wake up and do sentence completion exercises, go to work, take frequent breaks to stretch and walk around, and then journal a page or two when I get home. If I remember a dream, I'll write it down as soon as I wake up and then reflect on it when I get home from work.

Resisting rape then is violence. It's the exact same logic.

Yes, the analogy you referenced is inaccurate for exactly the reasons you described. The comparison between a hoodectomy and the average male circumcision is still bad though. Anatomically it's analogous, but not with regard to function or pain. I can't find the link right now, but the pain scales I've seen between the different forms of male and female genital mutilation put the hoodectomy way below the typical male circumcision. Probably due to the larger amount of skin taken and because the foreskin serves more functions than the clitoral hood. Also, the greatest source of stimulation is the foreskin on men, which is not the case for women. Without going into too much detail, I was circumcised as an infant and it's not uncommon for the head of my penis to feel irritated like you described, especially after ejaculation. Also, gauging how close I am to climax is difficult because of the decreased gradation of feeling. I also occasionally have a weird moment where I don't know if something is painful or pleasurable (nerve mappings are rewired when circumcisions are performed on infants). I've never had a clitoral hood, much less had it removed, but I'm inclined to think that what happened to me is a lot worse than a hoodectomy since they are performed regularly on adult women so that they can have their clitorises exposed to greater stimulation, and what I have is decreased stimulation and the other problems I already mentioned. I will never feel what it is like to be intact. I deeply resent that. The only apology I ever remember getting from my mother was for having me circumcised. I don't know what that means exactly, but I felt like sharing that.

Heya Sam! Welcome to the boards What was it about the show that drew you in? How long have you been listening to the show?

Heya Avo, welcome to the boards! I think it's totally awesome that you are doing the peaceful parenting thing so fully

You reference a moral principle regarding property and then in order to explain how that principle is invalid you give an example of how it's inconsistently applied. You are actually arguing for property rights and voluntary exchange, presumably, without realizing it, because if the principle were applied consistently, you would not be violently removed from that land. Also, just nitpicking, but your definition of "capital" is incorrect. Capital is money / assets used for investment (esp. for starting a company). And the way that "capitalism" is used within the context of the show, it does actually include bartering. Sahadda's definition is actually how it's used when Stef uses the word. He offers a nearly identical definition throughout the series.

Just very generally I take the approach of starting with something like "I know this will probably sound crazy, but I've been thinking a lot about X" and make some brief case. And after they make some kind of snarky dismissive comment, I've already put forward that qualifier and the argument, so the onus is entirely on them, so you can challenge them with "I'm happy to hear counter argument or counter evidence". I might add something like "but, please, spare me the snarky dismissive bulshit" if it's relentless or really offensive.

And he uses that as proof that white men are privileged: because he is. There's just no winning with that guy, haha!

I have the privilege of having my thoughts and feelings rejected whenever I talk about issues of gender or race. I am overcome with joy and relief in this, my high status as a white male. The patriarchs still won't let me participate in their smokey underground meetings, though. I'll just have to take out my aggression on the closest woman

They're coming The problem he saw showed up in all modern browsers, but is fixed now.

I believe this post has the torrents you are looking for: https://board.freedomainradio.com/topic/39836-fdrpodcastscom-official-launch/?p=365010 (I think they are grouped by the hundred)

I think you make a great case! I will try that the next time I hear that face palmer You haven't heard this podcast yet, have you?: FDR1009 God' is really the fear of others... http://media.freedomainradio.com/feed/FDR_1009_Religious_Scarring.mp3

Done! And every other set of results (tags, podcast ranges, volumes, etc) Thanks for the idea!