Philosophy: books and discussion

[beppe]

Originally Posted by FlorenceArt

Hello Troy, thank you for participating. And I don't know what's behind Plato, but I know it's not comfortable



Beppe, my friend, I don't know if Kenny is dogmatic, but it seems to me that you are deliberately trying to confuse rational issues to leave some room for irrational beliefs. And that's sneaky

The dogmatism of Kenny is referred to in previous posts and it might be easily understood just by reading them.

My dearest and adored High priestess!
I am not trying to deliberately confuse anything. If this is your impression, I will make amend in two ways.
Way 1, In my next posts on this thread I will try to be as constructive as possible and to follow the spirit by which you started this thread.

Way 2. Envision this metaphor. When the broom hits the dirt, a big cloud of dust arises. The dirt is gold dust, and in my metaphor gravity does not matter.

I will leave in few days for 2 weeks, no internet alas. When I will come back I will make a post, in this thread or in another one, or in the Italian Group, with the purpose of illustrating a fundamental mathematical construct that every body with a little of attention will be able to make her/his own, and that is essential to understand what's going on. I know. I'll make a pdf in attachment.

One of the problems of Philosophers, with some exceptions maybe, is that they do not know nothing about mathematics beyond the simple arithmetics. And this cuts them out from a whole wide world. So, when somebody talks of comparing this to that, (in the contest of scientific theories and reality) he does not have the faintest idea of what there is behind an objective comparison between this and that.

My announced post will be toward giving a sound mathematical base to this and other related aspects. Do I have authority to do this? Oh yes! But it will not interfere anymore with this beautiful thread, for which I am very and adoring grateful.

[kennyc]

Religion is dogmatic, science is not. Kenny doesn't matter.

[TimMason]

Religion is dogmatic, science is not

I think all human institutions have a tendency to conservatism and routine. Religion isn't necessarily any more prone to dogmatism than any other approach to living. Max Weber saw religions as going through a prophetic phase, when a charismatic leader would introduce new ways of seeing and new ways of being, and then settling into a more staid routine, with a priesthood whose task it usually was, he said, to 'routinize the charisma.' Kuhn said something like the same thing for the sciences, with one settled scientific paradigm being replaced by another in a 'scientific revolution'.

But that may all be rather too programmatic. In fact, there are many religions that never achieve routinization. Robert C. Scott, in his books on the hill peoples of Zomia, argues that these groups deliberately keep their religions open, and are ready to change them very quickly when conditions change. And in the US, I believe it's well established that people are quite ready to change their religion very rapidly indeed. I remember meeting a guy who had been a Mormon, a Baptist, and an Episcopalian all in the space of about five years - and his family along with him.

[beppe]

Originally Posted by kennyc

Religion is dogmatic, science is not. Kenny doesn't matter.

The Catholic Church, through its official doctrine, is explicitly dogmatic, and some of the dogma are hard to digest outside the faith contest.
In synthesis the dogma are concerned with matters of faith and not the behavior. I post the link for information.

Science is not, without qualifications to the proposition, appears to me as an other dogmatic proposition, (or wishful thinking, being kenny devoid of an army or of a longa manus, long hand).

Kenny matters

@Florence: this is just a communication of service

[beppe]

In absence of instruction I proceed with my plan.

I looked up desire and got 544 hits. The first is a nice paper by Tim Schroeder (a Carneade?) which I read in diagonal and covers quite a range of aspects.

1 Desire To desire is to be in a particular state of mind. It is a state of mind familiar to everyone who has ever wanted to drink water or desired to know what has happened to an old friend, but its familiarity does not make it easy to give a theory of desire. Controversy immediately breaks out when asking ...

2 Spinoza's Psychological Theory In Part III of his Ethics, "On the Origin and Nature of the Affects," Spinoza addresses two of the most serious challenges facing his thoroughgoing naturalism. First, he attempts to show that human beings ... desire, and Hobbes in his physiology uses the term to refer to the physical causes of human desire (Leviathan VI). So ‘conatus’ has both broad, physical and specifically human, psychological ...

3 Plotinus Plotinus (204/5 – 270 C.E.), is generally regarded as the founder of Neoplatonism. He is one of the most influential philosophers in antiquity after Plato and Aristotle. The term ‘Neoplatonism’ ... desire. But in the highest life, the life of Intellect, where we find the highest form of desire, that desire is eternally satisfied by contemplation of the One through the entire array of Forms that ...

then the hits move away from what I imagine Florence's whishes.

Florence I am waiting for a word from you.

[TGS]

On desire: from Ajahn Sumedho

Desire can be compared to fire. If we grasp fire, what happens? Does it lead to happiness? If we say: ‘Oh, look at that beautiful fire! Look at the beautiful colours! I love red and orange; they’re my favourite colours,’ and then grasp it, we would find a certain amount of suffering entering the body. And then if we were to contemplate the cause of that suffering we would discover it was the result of having grasped that fire. On that information, we would, hopefully, then let the fire go. Once we let fire go, then we know that it is something not to be attached to. This does not mean we have to hate it, or put it out. We can enjoy fire, can’t we? It is nice having a fire, it keeps the room warm, but we do not have to burn ourselves in it.

[TimMason]

Fire and Ice

Some say the world will end in fire,
Some say in ice.
From what I've tasted of desire
I hold with those who favor fire.
But if it had to perish twice,
I think I know enough of hate
To say that for destruction ice
Is also great
And would suffice.

Robert Frost

[kennyc]

Fog

The fog comes
on little cat feet.

It sits looking
over harbor and city
on silent haunches
and then moves on.

Carl Sandburg

[TimMason]

When I was a boy, the fog that covered London was as thick as a blanket. Smog, they called it, and desire made it. People died, and in the end Parliament passed a Clean Air Act. Desire was brought to heel.

William Blake, whose 'Marriage of Heaven and Hell' is echoed in Frost's 'Fire and Ice', believed that desire should not be denied. Notoriously, he wrote: "Sooner murder an infant in its cradle than nurse unacted desires," a line that has occasioned much commentary. It is impossible to believe that Blake believed this literally - you only have to read his poems of Innocence, in which maltreatment of children is one of the touchstones by which he measured how far the Age fell short of humanity. It may be that the infant is the self, and that the poet warns his reader against stifling his inner needs in obedience to the priest.

Which is why he wrote this :

The Little Vagabond

Dear mother, dear mother, the Church is cold;
But the Alehouse is healthy, and pleasant, and warm.
Besides, I can tell where I am used well;
Such usage in heaven will never do well.

But, if at the Church they would give us some ale,
And a pleasant fire our souls to regale,
We'd sing and we'd pray all the livelong day,
Nor ever once wish from the Church to stray.

Then the Parson might preach, and drink, and sing,
And we'd be as happy as birds in the spring;
And modest Dame Lurch, who is always at church,
Would not have bandy children, nor fasting, nor birch.

And God, like a father, rejoicing to see
His children as pleasant and happy as He,
Would have no more quarrel with the Devil or the barrel,
But kiss him, and give him both drink and apparel.

[FlorenceArt]

Possibly Blake was reacting to the tendency of Christian Churches to consider desire as evil, especially sexual desire but more generally any physical desire. It has been a tendency of modern thinking to try to break that prison that the Church built around our bodies and minds. Of course, the difficulty is where to stop, and that brings us back to Recluse's preoccupation.

[FlorenceArt]

Sorry for not participating much, but I do have to work from time to time, even though this particular job is not too busy at the moment. And I am going to my weekly painting class tonight, which, believe it or not, has a lot to do with some of our discussion topics. More, hopefully, tomorrow...

[WT Sharpe]

In the spirit of keeping religion out of the philosophy thread (and tongue firmly in cheek), I offer the following titles of an editorial and various articles from the current issue of Philosophy Now (Apr/May 2010).

Forgive me, High Priestess; for I know not what I do.



EDITORIAL
Meet the New Atheism / Same as the Old Atheism?
by Tim Madigan

NEWS
Issue 78 April/May 2010
News reports by Sue Roberts.

THE NEW ATHEISM

The Varieties of Atheist Experience
Paul Cliteur asks: if an atheist is someone who doesn’t believe in God, which God don’t they believe in?

Is God Coming or Going?
David Ramsay Steele surveys American Belief to explain New Atheism’s popularity.

What’s New About The New Atheism?
Victor Stenger answers the question.

The Not So New Atheists?
Jon Wainwright considers the resonance of a Victorian ‘ethics of belief’ debate.

Where’s The Evidence?
Michael Antony argues that the New Atheists miss the mark.

Two Priests Respond (I)
Rev. Dr. John R. Mabry opposes the New Atheist caricature of religion.

Two Priests Respond (II)
A force for good? Fr. Thomas Crean says it depends whether a religion is true or not.

A Catholic Clergyman Responds to the New Atheists
by Rev. Mr. Dylan Schrader

Good Religion, and the Good It Can Do
by Fr. Jeffrey Kirby

Is Religion Bad For Society?
by Rev. Bob Eckhard

New Atheists and Old Atheists
by Fr. Andrew Pinsent

[troymc]

"I count him braver who overcomes his desires than him who overcomes his enemies."

- Aristotle

from Joannes Stobaeus' Florilegium

Don't be ruled by your desires. Typically Aristotelian - there's no indication that he advocated the opposite extreme: passionlessness - instead seek a balance.


Troy

[WT Sharpe]

Passion is an emotion. I'm not at all sure consciousness thought, much less intentional action, is possible without it. David Hume believed that the will is the slave of the passions.

[kennyc]

Originally Posted by WT Sharpe

Passion is an emotion. I'm not at all sure consciousness thought, much less intentional action, is possible without it. David Hume believed that the will is the slave of the passions.

Gotta WANT IT!