Debating topics

[Munkay]

How fitting it is that a Debate began in a Debate Topic post. :P

That being said, I'm quite sure that I have made some points that could be subjected to critique.  Feel free.

Give me another year of school and I'll be up for a quality refutation Chaerophon.

Cheers,

Munk

[Brista]

Apologies, I'd missed that Gekko is from Canada

[Guest]

I think prostituation should be illegal because people would get aides. I know somebody who died from aides.

Edit: Fixed spelling and grammer.

[Chaerophon]

Get a life. A poor effort at trolling.

[Occhidiangela]

Tell that to Nietzsche, Foucault, and Sartre. One of Nietzsche's fringe gripes is that language, as it exists, is a tool not best fitted to the proper elucidation of his philosophy.

Was not as smart as he thought he was, was not as imaginative as he needed to be, and was perhaps merely full of sheisse.

Occhi

[Occhidiangela]

Asserted:

Posters who lack the wit to spell correctly; who are too obtuse to use simple cut and paste techniques to employ a word already used in a thread; who fail to present coherent thought on a regular basis; who cannot or will not start and end sentences correctly; and who in one line commit no less than six grammatical errors; should be banned for the good of the community because they fail to uphold the minimum standards of the Lurker Lounge.

Litter mars the Lounge.


Pro and Con.

What say ye, Lurkers?

Note: We may end up talking about a troll, but certainly not to it.


Aside: Sports for fifty, Alex?

Occhi

[Brista]

To me it's more about whether I think they're doing it on purpose

I've a lot of tolerance for people who spell or punctuate poorly

I've not got a lot of tolerance for people who just post stupidly on purpose

I think that at times troll-feeding is inevitable. Even talking about them is feeding them. I think it's about time that a certain very intelligent but equally childish Lurker got a "grow up" PM from someone with authority here so that we don't need too spend more time doing so

[Chaerophon]

Well, my quote is certainly oversimplified for the sake of not starting an entire new discussion. An excerpt that you may be interested to read (or not :)):

EDIT: Added reference at the bottom.

The Language of Christianity: Interpretation as Power Base

The question of the language appropriate to a proper understanding of things is particularly important for a comprehension of the history of Christianity, too, because, as we all know, Christianity takes as its central text a book full of poetry, narrative, imagery. And faith in what this book "means" or what it "reveals" about the nature of the divinity is a central part of being a Christian. Many of the most urgent and contumacious disputes in the history of Christianity have arisen out of the metaphorical nature of this holy text: since metaphors and metaphorical narratives are inherently ambiguous, they need interpretation. And whose interpretations are decisive in any disagreement becomes a vital concern.

Controlling the text and maintaining the authority to determine interpretations of the holy text were always a central imperative of the medieval Catholic Church, which recognized very clearly and correctly that to give people (even parish priests) access to the Bible would result in interpretative anarchy. Hence, the Catholic Church's strict control of the book, its refusal to distribute it widely or to translate it into the common language of the people, and its insistence that the basis for popular sermons should be, not the Bible itself, but the clear and unambiguous official interpretations authorized by the Vatican.

The Church's suspicion of the anarchy that would follow upon any general access to the Bible revealed itself as correct once Luther's Reformation made the holy text generally available in translation. All of a sudden, the enforced interpretative consensus dissolved, and scores of competing sects arose, each claiming a correct version of the truth derived from an interpretation of the metaphorical constructions in the Bible. An extreme (but not altogether uncommon) example was the war between the followers of Zwingli and the followers of Muntzer, two Protestant leaders, over whether the communion wafer was the body of Christ or symbolized the body of Christ and over the interpretation of baptism. Many thousands died in the quarrel over these interpretative questions.

Said Zwingli to Muntzer,
"I'll have to be blunt, sir.
I don't like your version
Of total immersion.
And since God's on my side
And I'm on the dry side
You'd better swing over
To me and Jehovah."

Cried Muntzer "It's schism
Is infant baptism.
Since I've had a sign, sir
That God's will is mine, sir,
Let all men agree
With Jehovah and me
Or go to hell singly"
Said Muntzer to Zwingli.

And each drew his sword
On the side of the Lord.
(Phyllis McGinley)

Today such issues which involve killing others over the ontological status of a biscuit or bathwater may seem ridiculous, but the issue is not. An authority which derives from a poetical metaphorical text must rest, not on that text, but on a particular interpretation of it. And whoever is the spokesperson for the official interpretation has official power. Thus, from this point of view, one can interpret the religious wars of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries as quarrelsome interpretation run amok.

The Enlightenment Call for Linguistic Clarity

Certainly, the conclusion of the religious wars brought with it a demand to clean up language, to be wary of metaphors and especially of writing that was highly metaphorical, and to place our verbal understanding of the world and ourselves on a more rationally clear basis in a language more appropriate to such a requirement.

It's no accident that the period following the religious wars (the mid-seventeenth century) marks the beginning of an interest in dictionaries (whose major goal is to promote accuracy of shared denoted meanings), a revival of interest in Euclidean geometry, a growing distrust of political and philosophical arguments based upon scripture, a rising criticism of extravagant rhetorical styles (like those of Shakespeare or John Donne or "enthusiastic" preachers), the beginning of a concerted attempt to understand moral and judicial questions mathematically, and a rising demand for a language as empty of ambiguous metaphor as possible.

We witness this in a number of writers, above all in Hobbes. As we discussed, Hobbes' major concern in Leviathan is to recommend practices which will minimize a return to the civil chaos of the religious wars and the English Civil War. And Hobbes is centrally concerned about language. Over half of Leviathan is concerned with religion, above all with the question of interpretation of scripture. For Hobbes is deeply suspicious of literary interpretation and has a clear preference for the language of geometry, the argumentative style of Euclid--not necessarily because that language provides a true description of the nature of the world (although many people claimed and still claim that it does) but rather because only that sort of deductive clarity--based on clear definitions and fundamental principles of deductive logic--can win wide agreement, can, that is, promote social harmony essential to political peace and "commodious living."

The reason for this preference in Hobbes seems clear enough. Metaphorical language breeds arguments over interpretations; such arguments breed civil quarrels; civil quarrels lead to a break down in public order and foster a return to a state of nature. A different language, one based on the precision of geometry, can foster agreement, because we all can share a common understanding if definitions are exact and the logic correct.

One of the attractions of the new science (although there was considerable argument about this) was that it offered an understanding of the world delivered in the most unambiguous way, in the language of mathematics rather than of scripture. Newton's equations, for those who could follow the mathematics, did not promote the sorts of arguments that arose from, say, the text about Ezekiel making the sun stand still or Moses parting the waters of the Red Sea or God's creating the world in a week. And what disagreements or ambiguities Newton's explanation did contain could be resolved, and were resolved, by a further application of the method he demonstrated (in the "normal science," as Kuhn calls it, which took place in the generations after Newton).

And throughout the nineteenth century, the rising success of the new science seemed to be delivering on the promise of an exact description of the world. And the application of this spirit of empirical observation and precise, unambiguous description to an understanding of history and morality, of the sort offered by Karl Marx, set up the hope of a triumph of the language of philosophy (as defined earlier) over the language of poetry (in spite of the objections of the Romantics).

It was an alluring vision, because it promised to lead, as Hannah Arendt points out, to the end of traditional political argument. Since we would all have a full and shared understanding of the way a just state really does work, we wouldn't need to argue about it (any more than we argue about the Pythagorean Theorem). Anyone could govern, since governing, traditionally the most challenging task in human affairs, would be simply a matter of applying known and agreed upon rules, something a technician could do. As Lenin observed, governing would be for cooks, because the truths of political life would be expressed in a language coherent to anyone, a language which did not require interpretation of any sort.

There was an enormously arrogant confidence or, if we think in terms of classical tragedy, of hubris about this, especially among some scientists and social scientists, who firmly believed that many of the most contentious moral, political, and scientific questions would soon be settled for all time. The future of physics, said A. A. Michelson in 1894, will consist of little more than "adding a few decimal places to results already known."

Nietzsche's Sense of Language: "Truth" as Metaphor

Nietzsche, as we have already seen, sets his sights firmly against such a confidence that language, any language, can provide an accurate description of the truth. That was, in the nature of things, impossible, because language is inherently metaphorical, it is an invented fiction, with a history, a genealogy, a contingent character.

For Nietzsche, the belief that the sort of language developed by Euclid or the new science­­with its emphasis on precision and logical clarity--is somehow "true to nature" is, like beliefs that any system is true, plainly erroneous. All language is essentially poetry, inherently metaphorical, inherently a fiction. Those who, like so many scientists, make claims that their descriptions of the world are true or even more accurate than alternative languages are simply ignorant of the metaphorical nature of all language.

In other words, for Nietzsche there is no privileged access to a final definitive version of life, the world, or anything else, and thus no privileged language for achieving such knowledge. Truth is, in Nietzsche's pregnant phrase, "a mobile army of metaphors," a historical succession of fictions, which does not, as Kant and Marx claimed, reveal any emerging higher truth, like progress or the march to a final utopia or a growing insight into how reality really works. In Nietzsche's view of language there is no final text available to us; there is only interpretation, or, more accurately, an unending series of freshly created interpretations, fresh metaphors.

Thus, as Rorty has observed, Nietzsche is announcing the end of the ancient war between poetry and philosophy by indicating that all we have in language is metaphor. We were mistaken in believing that the language of Euclid was anything other than one more fiction. It is not. Therefore, it has no special preeminence as the language most appropriate to a description of reality.

Since there is no privileged language and since accepting as true any inherited system of metaphor is limiting oneself to a herd existence, our central purpose is the construction of new metaphors, the assertion of new values in a language we have made ourselves. Hence, central to Nietzsche's vision of how the best human beings must live their lives is the insistence that individuals must create for themselves a new language, fresh metaphors, original self-descriptions. To escape the illusions of the past, to release the arrow in flight, these activities are linked to the creative ability to construct in one's life and language new metaphors.

Johnston, Ian. 2000. "There's Nothing Nietzsche Couldn't Teach Ya About the Raising of the Wrist" (Monty Python) A Lecture in Liberal Studies. http://www.mala.bc.ca/~johnstoi/introser/nietzs.htm.

[--Pete]

Hi,

Whether you call it a 'pachydentin citadel' (as its inhabitants probably do) or the simple Anglo-Saxon 'ivory tower', it remains the residence of pompous idiots whose education far outstrips their intelligence. Anyone who would seriously write "Today such issues which involve killing others over the ontological status of a biscuit or bathwater may seem ridiculous, . . ." is clearly out of touch with the world as it is and and as it has been throughout recorded history.

Five years of working construction should be a prerequisite for anyone applying to a school of philosophy. Socrates, at least, knew the realities of his world. He was, as far as my reading has uncovered, the last philosopher to do so.

--Pete

[Occhidiangela]

Erudition to Perdition, there's nothing makes the plants grow like an essay on philosophy mixed with traces of philology. Add three glasses of absynthe, break the glass, and grind the fragments into your eyes. Chew on the stems. Feel better? Good, let's ride the roller coaster of critiquing Fred "Bad Hair" Nietzsche. (Batting third behind Plato and Hegel today at Farah Field . . .)

Many of the most urgent and contumacious disputes in the history of Christianity have arisen out of the metaphorical nature of this holy text: since metaphors and metaphorical narratives are inherently ambiguous, they need interpretation. And whose interpretations are decisive in any disagreement becomes a vital concern.

Nietzche, per this analysis, appears to overlook and ignore how interpretation and argument advanced the philosophical and doctrinal legacy of the Jews, whose continued argument added depth and richness to their religious and cultural heritage. Self criticism, and peer criticism. Hey, sound remotely like the scientific method. Also looks as though old Fred was a glass half full kind of guy. A whiner. (hey, why didn't I get a full glass of beer??? Hmmmm, OK, at least a decent reason to whine.) Fred appears through this lens to be someone who thought there is ONE RIGHT ANSWER.

Maybe I'm being harsh on the Fredmeister. The process, the journey of interpretation and internal discovery, the path to wisdom, is one of the great attributes of Christian thought, particularlyl its doctrinal disputes. What's a few hundred years of war and looting, pillage and rapine, among friends who wear the same school tie? He wanted a tidy answer, methinks, or an untidy answer, but not another path of inquiry. Oh, a new language might fix the problem, the old one is owned by the Pope, that nefarious rapscallion.

And whoever is the spokesperson for the official interpretation has official power. Thus, from this point of view, one can interpret the religious wars of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries as quarrelsome interpretation run amok.

What bollocks. The wars were political wars, using religion as an excuse and a tool, since its place in society was one of the sources of power and income. Popes were involved in political wars, and used their position as justification that they were right. That dog won't hunt.

Certainly, the conclusion of the religious wars brought with it a demand to clean up language, to be wary of metaphors and especially of writing that was highly metaphorical, and to place our verbal understanding of the world and ourselves on a more rationally clear basis in a language more appropriate to such a requirement.

Here we see it again: there must be ONE right answer! What, you mean life is not a multiple choice test where you get the answer at the end of the lesson and before nap time? "OK, then nothing has real substance and meaning," sulks Fred in high dudgeon, "I shall go existentialist on everyone as my form of protest!" Oops, did I slip some Nihilism in there? Cheeses K. Rice, those philosoper fellas had lousy attitudes. More beering, less navel peering, would have done them good. Shoulda raised the wrist a bit more often, eh Fred?

and a rising demand for a language as empty of ambiguous metaphor as possible.

Tolkein wept. He saw metaphor and richness as a strength of language. Glass half full. Of Real Ale! :D

For Hobbes is deeply suspicious of literary interpretation and has a clear preference for the language of geometry, the argumentative style of Euclid--not necessarily because that language provides a true description of the nature of the world (although many people claimed and still claim that it does) but rather because only that sort of deductive clarity--based on clear definitions and fundamental principles of deductive logic--can win wide agreement, can, that is, promote social harmony essential to political peace and "commodious living."

Another terminal student looking for an answer that ends the question. Now I begin to see the roots of the modern theory of prolonged adolescence as an inalienable right.

It was an alluring vision, because it promised to lead, as Hannah Arendt points out, to the end of traditional political argument. Since we would all have a full and shared understanding of the way a just state really does work, we wouldn't need to argue about it (any more than we argue about the Pythagorean Theorem). Anyone could govern, since governing, traditionally the most challenging task in human affairs, would be simply a matter of applying known and agreed upon rules, something a technician could do. As Lenin observed, governing would be for cooks, because the truths of political life would be expressed in a language coherent to anyone, a language which did not require interpretation of any sort.

Which puts lawyers in the unemployment line. Hmm, maybe we are on to something here . . . nah, sharkbait is a better use.

our central purpose is the construction of new metaphors, the assertion of new values in a language we have made ourselves. Hence, central to Nietzsche's vision of how the best human beings must live their lives is the insistence that individuals must create for themselves a new language, fresh metaphors, original self-descriptions. To escape the illusions of the past, to release the arrow in flight, these activities are linked to the creative ability to construct in one's life and language new metaphors.

Brilliant. The 1996 Corvette is imperfect, let's build a 2004 Corvette. That will fix our driving problem, the ambiguity of travel, that metaphor for lif'e journey on super unleaded gas.

Central Purpose? My central purpose, for the near term, has bloody eff all to do with metaphor, other than having coined a slogan that I am trying to get adopted by the Air Force as their official motto.

"Love From Above."

No one seems to be biting, drat, and furthermore, I am not being taken seriously! Imagine that! :o I hear that there is a cash prize for the winner. Winning this prize would allow me more beer money, which would then allow me to test the assertion that "there's nothing Nietzsche couldn't teach ya 'bout the Raisin' of the Wrist", and get like Socrates, permanently pissed.

The article you provided -- thanks for the ride Chaer -- is very much like what I just posted, and what can be found in piles on the Kansas prairies: a load of BS.

Occhi

PS: I could teach old Freddy a thing or two about drinking, that Poofter! *Crack Two!*

PPS: "God is dead." -- Nietzsche -- "Nietzsche is dead." --God-- Hmmm, who won that round? Round, I'll have another round! *Crack Two!*

-- No actual beer was harmed in the crafting of this post. No caffeine was used, or abused. The opinions of this Rogue are in no way the official position of that hooker over there in the -- hey, wait a minute, this is a nice family place, lady! You can't come in here and advertise like that! Hie thee hence! Get on down the road to battle.net, where you belong! We run a class establishment here. *sound of whining* I said haul buns, sister, before the Leather Boot of Acceleration connects with your thong inhaler! --

[Chaerophon]

To begin: I am an admirer of Nietzsche; however, it would be a stretch to call me "Nietzschean". Just wanted to clear that up. Anyways, although I quite enjoyed your post, I think that you've missed a few things and perhaps been a bit quick to judge...

Nietzche, per this analysis, appears to overlook and ignore how interpretation and argument advanced the philosophical and doctrinal legacy of the Jews, whose continued argument added depth and richness to their religious and cultural heritage. Self criticism, and peer criticism.

Nietzsche had a lot more respect for the Jews than he did for doctrinal Christians. That being said, he saw weakness in their reasoning in that in their striving, they assumed that there was, in fact, an origin, a purpose, a constraining hierarchy of values that was worth arguing for.

Fred appears through this lens to be someone who thought there is ONE RIGHT ANSWER.

And that answer is? As you point out later; that there is no answer, no origin, no purpose and that the act of creation, of self-determination, the recognition of the constraining falsehood of the 'herd' moralities and the subsequent recognition and fulfillment of one's own will to power should be the goal of humanity. Improvement of the spirit. Generational ennobling of the will. Humans should become willful creators, not followers. The greatest weakness in Nietzsche is that he was quite successful in tearing much down while offering little in return. Even "Thus Spake Zarathustra", his supposed 'positive' creation, was an act in negation. There were times when even he could admit that. Then again, perhaps I lack the courage to overcome. Maybe "overcoming" is overrated. Either way, I find his work fascinating, and, in particular, I find his characterization of history, not as a series of phenomenological trends and inevitable developments, but as a genealogy centered in haphazard events and the 'struggles of the will' to be particularly interesting.

Shoulda raised the wrist a bit more often, eh Fred?

With that, I would agree.

and a rising demand for a language as empty of ambiguous metaphor as possible.

Tolkein wept. He saw metaphor and richness as a strength of language. Glass half full. Of Real Ale!

You've misquoted the author here. He points to Hobbes and other such Enlightenment thinkers as searching for a "scientific" truth. Nietzsche despised such trash, instead arguing that "To escape the illusions of the past, to release the arrow in flight, these activities are linked to the creative ability to construct in one's life and language new metaphors." As the author points out:

Nietzsche is announcing the end of the ancient war between poetry and philosophy by indicating that all we have in language is metaphor. We were mistaken in believing that the language of Euclid was anything other than one more fiction. It is not. Therefore, it has no special preeminence as the language most appropriate to a description of reality.

Nietzsche sought to free the will and the spirit by debunking this notion of Enlightenment rationality's inherent superiority.

Another terminal student looking for an answer that ends the question. Now I begin to see the roots of the modern theory of prolonged adolescence as an inalienable right.

Are you talking about Hobbes or the author here? If Hobbes, why? Contextualize, contextualize, contextualize! Hobbes led to Locke led to Bentham led to Mill, led to a million others. What you see as flawed in Hobbes is just as flawed in many other 'classical' liberal theorists - they saw one rational answer, one superior 'purpose' in government. Seems to me that you're arguing against such Enlightenment discourses... perhaps you don't disagree with Nietzsche as much as you had thought (?).

Brilliant. The 1996 Corvette is imperfect, let's build a 2004 Corvette. That will fix our driving problem, the ambiguity of travel, that metaphor for lif'e journey on super unleaded gas.

An absurd example. Metaphor in the Nietzschean sense:

"What exactly does Nietzsche mean by the term metaphor? Here, Nietzsche considers all conceptualizing to be metaphoric -- it is an approximation, inexact, a convenient lie. In fact, Nietzsche writes that “we believe that we know something about the things themselves when we talk of trees, colors, snow, and flowers; and yet we possess nothing but metaphors for things -- metaphors which correspond in no way to the original entities.”[3]

The concept (i.e. a concept of a tree) is thus found to be an abstraction three powers away from the original sense data, or nerve stimulus. This fundamental metaphorical position can be described via the three metamorphoses of the original stimulus:[4] first, the nerve stimulus is transformed into image (thus leaving dreams as originary writing?). Second, the images become sounds, or words. Language, which is so pervasive in our human existence, is thus the second level of metaphor. Finally, there is the transformation from the sonic realm back to the conscious, as the sound/word becomes the concept. Thus, there is no proper concept, or direct correspondence, but only figurative, metaphoric conceptualizing."

--From John Hartman. Nietzsche’s Use of Metaphor. http://www.geocities.com/Athens/1575/nmetafor.html

Some have said that Nietzsche's attempts to transcend traditional metaphysics led to the creation of his own metaphysics (e.g. Heidigger). I think that that's often a fair criticism. However, the methods of Nietzsche's analysis, like that of Marx, has helped shape modernity and, in fact, there is much in both that is of great use. Both gave birth to critical discourses that help to objectively analyze structures of power and the ways of the world. Both were "creators" in the sense that both gave birth to new metaphorical perspectives on power and human relationships.

"God is dead." -- Nietzsche -- "Nietzsche is dead." --God--

Linky-loo...

[Minionman]

Hi,

Whether you call it a 'pachydentin citadel' (as its inhabitants probably do) or the simple Anglo-Saxon 'ivory tower', it remains the residence of pompous idiots whose education far outstrips their intelligence.  Anyone who would seriously write "Today such issues which involve killing others over the ontological status of a biscuit or bathwater may seem ridiculous, . . ." is clearly out of touch with the world as it is and and as it has been throughout recorded history.

Five years of working construction should be a prerequisite for anyone applying to a school of philosophy.  Socrates, at least, knew the realities of his world.  He was, as far as my reading has uncovered, the last philosopher to do so.

--Pete

It isn't just ivory tower. The culture going around any debates seem to be ignore the actual world and argue with (I think it's "prefabricated") arguments like "The religious books don't suggest violence" or "It will take away all morality". I notice this from people who do actual work, ort people in school who go through their own life problems but can't associate the way they deal with these problems with the big issues. For example "abotion should be legal because women need freedom of choice", a lot of people who make this argument don't really think of having the sex or not as a choice, and also don't think of in their argument whether the fact that people make what seems like a bad choice of doing that comes from not having information, not caring, or a bigger problem of males running over females. (This is the kind of information I like having before taking sides on issues, as well as economics. I'm neutral on abortions so far because I don't have a lot of this information). Not meant to be an argument about these particular issues, just a point about the way people argue them.

This is an example of the debating topics I thought of earlier, whether people consider enough real world information when deciding points on issues.

(mods can just delete the sex sentence if it's a problem, I read the bit that you think it's editing, but for that sentence I'm O.K. with that, the point still works the same)

[kandrathe]

I view the conflict as that between ideology and pragmatism. Or, that most things are not strictly black and white, but have shades of grey which require a case by case analysis. Which is why we have laws that describe what is right and wrong, and a judiciary to review individual cases to determine if and how those laws should be applied. This is why I think sentencing mandates violate the spirit of jurisprudence.

The problem I see with these polarizing debate topics is that people take a stand without looking for commonality. For instance, I would suspect that a majority of people would agree that we should try to eliminate the need for abortion. If both sides of that debate spent their energy and resources fighting to end the need for abortions, there might be a few hundred thousand fewer of them. I think many people have moved into that area of preventing unwanted pregnancies, but there again the ideologues on one side refuse to accept the reality of sexuality, and on the other side refuse to accept the moral implications.

So then the argument is between advocating abstinence only, or assenting that copulation will occur between people who are unprepared to accept the consequences, so it would be better to make birth control available to those who might later need to resort to abortion. Then we get to a point where the rubber hits the road (so to speak), and we need to think about funding this idea. Then of course many people will look at the idea of spending public money to make birth control freely available as either frivolous, funding sexuality, or antithetical to a moral message.

But, focusing in on the aspect of copulations that occur between people who are unprepared to accept the consequences, I ask, "At what point do parents get to decide to opt out of raising children?". The moral point in question is if there is a difference between killing the baby inside, or outside the womb. The rights question is; can a women be forced to carry a pregnancy she does not want? So it might be that the answer our society has come up with to resolve the conflict between those two questions is that infanticide is an acceptable form of birth prevention.

I digress.

Pete suggested, "Five years of working construction should be a prerequisite for anyone applying to a school of philosophy." To which I would suggest that that five years also be spent working in hospital emergency rooms, free clinics, and homeless shelters. The point being that unless one experiences the problems of life as it exists, one should not pontificate about the solutions.

And, about the sex sentence. The only problem with it that I can see is that is run on, and therefore hard to understand.

[Occhidiangela]

Fred appears through this lens to be someone who thought there is ONE RIGHT ANSWER.

And that answer is? As you point out later; that there is no answer, no origin, no purpose and that the act of creation, of self-determination, the recognition of the constraining falsehood of the 'herd' moralities and the subsequent recognition and fulfillment of one's own will to power should be the goal of humanity.

There is an answer to many question, but there is no ANSWER to what he was looking for, yet.

Don't put words in my mouth, I did not say that there was no purpose, no origin, etc. While fulfillment of one's own will to power is an interesting goal of "humanity" the discrete individuals of humanity all exercising the fulfilled power will induce conflict, chaos, or both. So be it.

The greatest weakness in Nietzsche is that he was quite successful in tearing much down while offering little in return.

Yep. Just like a terrorist. Tis easier to destroy than to build and sustain. As well, tis easier to analyze than synthesize, in my opinion.

You've misquoted the author here.

No, I was commenting on what the author wrote, regardless of whether it was Hobbes or Nietzsche who was in the gunsights at the time.

He points to Hobbes and other such Enlightenment thinkers as searching for a "scientific" truth. Nietzsche despised such trash, instead arguing that "To escape the illusions of the past, to release the arrow in flight, these activities are linked to the creative ability to construct in one's life and language new metaphors."
Might I point out that under Fred's nose, and our own, that is exactly what happens with language?

MIght I suggest you read some Bill Bryson, on language. You will find that language changes, and the images evoked by new words paint new metaphors. Nietzsche, I do not believe, in his desire to tear down the language obstacle understood, or even wanted to understand, how a language is built, grows, and evolves. His suggestion is as absurd. Reform the language? Make it a better tool? Sure. Build one from scratch? OK, computer scientists have done so. See how much that has done to improve upon the condition that Nietzsche decries. What it has done is . . . create more questions! :lol:

Nietzsche sought to free the will and the spirit by debunking this notion of Enlightenment rationality's inherent superiority.

I tend to free the will and the spirit with Guinness. More practical, and achievable. Sure, it is temporary, but then, so is life itself. ;)

As to Hobbes, I was commenting on the picture of Hobbes the author was painting. Nuff said on that score.

In fact, Nietzsche writes that “we believe that we know something about the things themselves when we talk of trees, colors, snow, and flowers; and yet we possess nothing but metaphors for things -- metaphors which correspond in no way to the original entities etc ad nauseum

So, do you figure Hegel, Nietzsche, and Fichte all got drunk together? I'd guess not, given their temporal dispersion. This is the sort of rot that had me beating my head against the desk when I read Hegel. Halfway through, I found better things to do with my time. Had I been at school, I might have finished Hegel. Or, I might have gambled on the exam and discussed Norman Vincent Peale. :P Ya know, I'd guess that Nietzsche still had to wipe all that conceptual horse crap from his boots when ever he tripped over a road apple while he wandered about with his head in the clouds . . . conceptualizing on the word for "could."

As to God is dead, etc.

The assertion, if that is what Nietzsche actually said, is self-contradictory. God is, by convention, omnipresent and hence immortal, beyond the bounds of life and death. If God were to be, God would always have been and will awlays be. If God never were, God could not be dead, for to be dead God must have been, and been alive, in the first place. Once having been, being God, could never not be. This is based on God within the standard understanding of the typical person in the 1800's. Not just any old god, but God.

Now, do you see why I drink? That almost made sense to me! :huh:

Cheers!

Occhi


:huh:

[Chaerophon]

While fulfillment of one's own will to power is an interesting goal of "humanity" the discrete individuals of humanity all exercising the fulfilled power will induce conflict, chaos, or both. So be it.

As you know, that didn't really concern Nietzsche (not as far as I can tell, anyways).

Yep. Just like a terrorist. Tis easier to destroy than to build and sustain. As well, tis easier to analyze than synthesize, in my opinion.

Oh trust me, a part of me agrees with you on that. However, I also believe that the individual can become stronger through the contemplation of their place in the world. No one stimulates more thought in that regard than Nietzsche. In many ways, despite its seeming lack of 'synthesis', as you put it, I do find his philosophy of the will to be persuasive and informative - even in my daily life.

His suggestion is as absurd. Reform the language? Make it a better tool? Sure. Build one from scratch?

I would suggest that in some minimal sense, he managed to actually accomplish his goal. The modern language of philosophy and, more importantly, politics has clearly been heavily influenced by his work. While it may be a stretch to say that he 'created' these modern metaphorical systems, one can certainly see his influence in any number of modern political and philosophical discourses (particularly with regard to power structures in international relations, e.g. Neo-Marxist/Neo-Gramscian, Foucault, etc.).

As to God is dead, etc.

The assertion, if that is what Nietzsche actually said, is self-contradictory. God is, by convention, omnipresent and hence immortal, beyond the bounds of life and death. If God were to be, God would always have been and will awlays be. If God never were, God could not be dead, for to be dead God must have been, and been alive, in the first place. Once having been, being God, could never not be. This is based on God within the standard understanding of the typical person in the 1800's. Not just any old god, but God.

This is an interesting little bit. It almost falls into the old pattern of the 'ontological argument', but I'm not sure that it quite gets there. Still don't like the t-shirt, for obvious reasons that aren't really dealt with by your example. :P

[Minionman]

You just explained that idea about abortion much better than I did.

I picked abortion as the main example because the non-moral sides(moral being choice vs. life) have'nt ben looked at much. I heard that there was a study that suggested abortions help keep crimes down, those studies are something I'd like to see more of.

And as people can probably tell, in idealistic vs. pragmatic, I come on the pragmatic side.

[Guest]

Any individual can reasonably take 1 of 2 outl looks on the world - "I am" or "I am part". They are both valid perspectives and no dialectic can bridge the gap between the two.


Nietzsche choose "I am" (as did most others we call existentialist.) That makes him bad. "Bad" is of course subjective, but if you believe in the concept of "bad" its hard to find anything worse then the "I am" perspective.

Nietzsche is dumb because he could never come to terms with the simplicity of this perspective, in fact he never quite could even embrace it.
Instead he took ugly concepts build solidly on existentialism and then tried to apply to to a more broad perspective.

Its odd that this 100 years later we still have people still tryng to believe that Nietzsche's conundrum was that the substrates of reality didnt fit his understanding rather that Nietzsche was just confused.

[Tal]

Nuevo Tacos

[Minionman]

Its odd that this 100 years later we still have people still tryng to believe that Nietzsche's conundrum was that the substrates of reality didnt fit his understanding rather that Nietzsche was just confused.

C'mon, it's so much less fun if someone's just confused instead of making philosophy. :)

[Occhidiangela]

If by bad you mean "he as anti Christian norms and beliefs" then yes, he was bad. I'd call that a rather narrow context, and that may not be what you meant.

Dumb: mute, or not very bright? I'd say he was plenty bright, however, he bit off a bit more than he could chew. Even so, Chaer is correct in observing that Nitezsche's writings and thoughts had an impact on the future, and reached forward into time to influence the modern world, at the very least by influencing "schools of thought."

Bright? Yes. Right. Unproven, maybe only partially right.

COnfused? Yes, but then, in the face of the questions most philosophers tend to ask, and the answrs they seek, it's hard not to get confused. The universe and life are incredibly complex. People even moreso.


Occhi