Is a Public Philosophy Still Possible?

[Obtenebrator]

^^ I refuse to entertain a retarded debate with you about whether dolphins, bobcats , and lemurs conceivably might know the quadratic equation, Pi, the value of e.

Actually it's a fair question. YOU made a claim you cannot possibly know other than your "feelings".

You claim you are an agnostic precisely BECAUSE you cannot know if God exists or not. But for some reason you are more than happy to make positive claims about things you cannot possibly know.

You simply CANNOT KNOW the mind of another animal that you cannot communicate with.

End of story.

 

[Cypress]

In the past it was religion that played a major role in setting a society's moral compass.

But I don't know why the human mind is drawn to religion, and a belief in unchanging transcendent moral imperatives.

I don't think we have a science or theory of knowledge at this time that can explain human conciousness and abstract belief.

 

[Obtenebrator]

Did you and Hitler just have different opinions, which are entirely subjective and subject to the popular whim?

So long as you steadfastly ignore the explanation for how it is possible to be an atheist and think Hitler wrong you will always be mystified.

 

[Hume]

But I don't know why the human mind is drawn to religion, and a belief in unchanging transcendent moral imperatives.

Seems obvious. Psychological need.

 

[Obtenebrator]

Science and the principles of Darwinian evolution would indicate Hitler was correct

No. You have been told why this is incorrect but you choose to ignore it and go on with your strawman.

 

[Cypress]

Actually it's a fair question. YOU made a claim you cannot possibly know other than your "feelings".

You claim you are an agnostic precisely BECAUSE you cannot know if God exists or not. But for some reason you are more than happy to make positive claims about things you cannot possibly know.

You simply CANNOT KNOW the mind of another animal that you cannot communicate with.

End of story.

You're welcome to believe it's conceivable that dolphins and monkeys know the quadratic equation and other abstract mathmatical concepts

I think it's retarded that you even accept that possibility.

Math was developed in human cultures for purposes of engineering and surveying.

Please provide the board some examples of dolphins and lemurs doing engineering and surveying

 

[Obtenebrator]

You're welcome to believe it's conceivable that dolphins and monkeys know the quadratic equation and other abstract mathmatical concepts

I do not know if they can or cannot. But I DO know that consciousness and mental acuity do appear to be on a spectrum across the animal kingdom. It is highly likely that there are other minds on this planet that can conceive of advanced concepts. What those may be and how they conceive them are simply unknown (and possibly unknowable) to us.

I'm honestly surprised you didn't know that you can't read another animal's mind.

 

[T. A. Gardner]

But I don't know why the human mind is drawn to religion, and a belief in unchanging transcendent moral imperatives.

I don't think we have a science or theory of knowledge at this time that can explain human conciousness and abstract belief.

There are two sides to religion. One is the theology side, the belief in God and all that, the other is social. Many people choose to participate on the basis of social interaction more than a solid belief in the theological underpinnings.

 

[Hume]

There are two sides to religion. One is the theology side, the belief in God and all that, the other is social. Many people choose to participate on the basis of social interaction more than a solid belief in the theological underpinnings.

That seem right. Some people just like congregating.

 

[Cypress]

Seems obvious. Psychological need.

Psychology is largely the study of behaviors, not of the underlying physical/biologic/chemical root causes.

That still leaves you with the conundrum of moral relativism: it's just your opinion that Hitler's psychological state was wrong, you can't say it was objectively wrong.

You started this thread insinuating that Socrates should be our teacher. Socrates and Plato detested the relativism of the Sophists, and they did not believe everything should come down to opinion and popular whim.

They believed there were objectively true forms of justice, love, virtue that existed independent of human opinion.

 

[Cypress]

There are two sides to religion. One is the theology side, the belief in God and all that, the other is social. Many people choose to participate on the basis of social interaction more than a solid belief in the theological underpinnings.

I think that's as 21st century apocryphal explanation attempting to explain something that is at least 50 thousand years old.

Paleolithic cave art indicates that our remote ancestors thought they were perceiving a transcendent spirit world, long before there was theology, religious dogma, Sunday bake sales.

It's totally unique in the animal world, and all other animals in Earth's history had social interactions and social heirachy without appealing to abstract transcendent ideas of a reality beyond this one. That requires an explanation

 

[Hume]

Psychology is largely the study of behaviors, not of the underlying physical/biologic/chemical root causes.

That still leaves you with the conundrum of moral relativism: it's just your opinion that Hitler's psychological state was wrong, you can't say it was objectively wrong.

You started this thread insinuating that Socrates should be our teacher. Socrates and Plato detested the relativism of the Sophists, and they did not believe everything should come down to opinion and popular whim.

They believed there were objectively true forms of justice, love, virtue that existed independent of human opinion.

Mostly you argue straw men. I never said those things you assert.

 

[Cypress]

I do not know if they can or cannot. But I DO know that consciousness and mental acuity do appear to be on a spectrum across the animal kingdom. It is highly likely that there are other minds on this planet that can conceive of advanced concepts. What those may be and how they conceive them are simply unknown (and possibly unknowable) to us.

I'm honestly surprised you didn't know that you can't read another animal's mind.

Thanks for tacitly admitting you cannot show the board any example of dolphins, lemurs, or monkeys doing any engineering and surveying. Because those are exactly the reasons why ancient humans started to think about and understand mathmatical concepts.

I leave you to wallow in your retarded speculations that orangutans might know the quadratic equation.

 

[Cypress]

The Socrates of the Platonic dialogues believed that there was an objectively true and ideal version of virtue and morality that existed above and independent from human opinion. That is the basic gist of the Platonic forms.

I've never seen an atheist, a cynic, a skeptic, a relativist say that there is moral code and framework of virtue that is objectively true and universal independent of human opinion, popular vote, popular whim or custom.

I would think Protagoras would be the hero of atheists, because he famously said that 'man is the measure of all things'

"In Plato's Theory of Forms, in which Forms are defined as perfect, eternal, and changeless concepts existing outside space and time, the Form of the Good is the mysterious highest Form and the source of all the other Forms. It is a Platonic ideal."

"In essence, Plato suggests that justice, truth, equality, beauty, and many others ultimately derive from the Form of the Good."

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Form_of_the_Good

 

[Obtenebrator]

Thanks for tacitly admitting you cannot show the board any example of dolphins, l

Do you even read the posts you respond to? I'm genuinely curious.

I leave you to wallow in your retarded speculations that orangutans might know the quadratic equation.

I'm utterly fascinated at how someone can be as well read as you claim to be yet who can't understand that he can't read animal minds.

 

[Obtenebrator]

"In Plato's Theory of Forms, in which Forms are defined as perfect, eternal, and changeless concepts existing outside space and time, the Form of the Good is the mysterious highest Form and the source of all the other Forms. It is a Platonic ideal."

"In essence, Plato suggests that justice, truth, equality, beauty, and many others ultimately derive from the Form of the Good."

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Form_of_the_Good

Now you are responding to your own posts.

Maybe if you tried reading what was said to you by OTHER PEOPLE you might do better at discussions.

 

[Hume]

"In Plato's Theory of Forms, in which Forms are defined as perfect, eternal, and changeless concepts existing outside space and time, the Form of the Good is the mysterious highest Form and the source of all the other Forms. It is a Platonic ideal."

"In essence, Plato suggests that justice, truth, equality, beauty, and many others ultimately derive from the Form of the Good."

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Form_of_the_Good

so?

 

[Obtenebrator]

Psychology is largely the study of behaviors, not of the underlying physical/biologic/chemical root causes.

Huh??? Where do you get your cartoon views of science? You act as if psychology is somehow completely divorced from psychiatry and neurology.

 

[Obtenebrator]

so?

@Cypress only values the posts of @Cypress. Cypress is pretty sure the only person whose magnificent intelligence is worthy of his time is Cypress.

 

[Cypress]

so?

Your thread is about Socrates.

Socrates is only a character in Plato's dialogues, and therefore represents Plato in a very substantial way.

Your OP implies we should look to Socrates as our teacher.

Socrates/Plato rejected the moral relativism of the Sophists, because Plato believed truth, justice, beauty, virtue were objectively real and eternal, and we could discover their ideal forms through the dialectic process.

Seems extremely relevant to your thread