A man pulls up to a snack machine.
The machine is American- yet he slides a Canadian slug in.
The machine rejects his deception mechanically, and he kicks the metal in response.
Man walks away, pissed, yet unencumbered by a sense of guilt.

Same man enters a convenience store and tries the same trick on the cashier, slipping her a slug, and the smallest look of condemnation from her makes him blush with shame.
Its not only her look that does it- the anticipation alone, knowing what he is about to commit, will inwardly disturb his psychology.
Afterwards, he kicks himself in response.

This goes to show that conscience, like hell, is other people.

A Canadian "slug"? Ya mean a Canadian dollar bill?

70 posts to go!

I am a subscriber to social contract ethics, so this makes perfect sense to me. The guilt is in the breaking of the social contract, and thus because he tried to deceive her he knows he has broken the contract. Moreover, the vending machine has no social contract and thus does not play a moral role.

Atelwulf:
A Canadian "slug"? Ya mean a Canadian dollar bill?


Whatever you wish to call dummy coins.

Cato:
I am a subscriber to social contract ethics, so this makes perfect sense to me. The guilt is in the breaking of the social contract, and thus because he tried to deceive her he knows he has broken the contract. Moreover, the vending machine has no social contract and thus does not play a moral role.
More or less.

Yet the guilt lies more in the being found out or observed than the act itself- something most theories on ethics leave out.

Nietzsche writes so eloquently:

"What we know about ourselves and remember is not so decisive a factor for the happiness of our life as people suppose. One day, that which others know about us (or think they know) assaults us- and then we realize that this is more powerful. It is easier to cope with a bad conscience than to cope with a bad reputation"

This coming from him is odd. But not if you realize he wrote it about other people.

Whatever you wish to call dummy coins.

Then are ya talking about counterfeit money?

68 posts to go!

Gendanken,

In high school, my best friend once had a moral dilemma of just this sort. He went to the bank to cash a check for party funds. The cashier overpaid him by some 40 dollars (don't recall the specific amount). We left the bank and were on the way to the liquor store when he confided to me that he had been overpaid. I was overjoyed by this and was busily thinking about the extra two cases of beer that we could by with this money and the extra hours of hedonism that this would give us. He, however, began to agonize over the moral issues involved. He wasn't so much scared of being caught as he was just sure that he was doing the wrong thing by keeping the money. I tried my best to convince him that it was the cashier's problem and our only problem was to figure out how who we were going to get to buy the beer.

Well, he deliberated for some time over this and at last decided that he couldn't keep the money. He turned the car around and started back to the bank. We got to the bank and he counted the money one last time. Turns out that it was he and not the cashier that miscounted. He had exactly the proper amount of money and his soulsearching and agonizing moral torment was completely self-inflicted and pointless.

What is ironic about this is that he later became known for being a bit of a scammer. He had the bad luck to not be charged for gas on an occasion or two and his morals had changed by this time so that he happily went on his way with a tankful of free gas. Unfortunately, the clerk remembered later that he didn't pay and the police were called on him as though he had stolen the gas. In fact, he had told her at the start of the transaction about the gas and she just forgot to ring it up. But, he was arrested for it (yeah, lame and bored cops in this town) and banned from the convenience store.

Yet the guilt lies more in the being found out or observed than the act itself- something most theories on ethics leave out.

I think that some do follow the "social contract" because of fear of repercussions, but some do have this moral thing deeply embedded into their psyches. This is not to say that these "moral" people are selfless. They tend to be believers in the invisible. And very likely fear the eyes of the spirits (ancestors, gods, whatever) on them. Judging them. And when they 'fall' they fall big. This friend of mine eventually became a very untrustworthy type of person. He owes everybody money. And has no intention of ever paying any of them back. In for a penny, in for a pound.

This is the problem with christians.



Cato,

I am a subscriber to social contract ethics, so this makes perfect sense to me. The guilt is in the breaking of the social contract, and thus because he tried to deceive her he knows he has broken the contract. Moreover, the vending machine has no social contract and thus does not play a moral role.

So, because the machine is not a man there is no contract with it? What about the owner of the machine? Or the guy that comes along to empty the change and refill the contents? It is the act of being observed that causes the guilt. If one was truly part of this 'social contract' then the vending machine would inspire just as much guilt as the cashier.

Vert:
What is ironic about this is that he later became known for being a bit of a scammer. He had the bad luck to not be charged for gas on an occasion or two and his morals had changed by this time so that he happily went on his way with a tankful of free gas. Unfortunately, the clerk remembered later that he didn't pay and the police were called on him as though he had stolen the gas. In fact, he had told her at the start of the transaction about the gas and she just forgot to ring it up. But, he was arrested for it (yeah, lame and bored cops in this town) and banned from the convenience store.

Well, there you go.
His guilt was that imputed on him by other people. As is with everyone.
How do I know?

Once his threshold for moral connotations was lowered by the slack given him by other people, he became the miscreant you describe- a miscreant with the same people he was once so fearful to cause harm.
Do you know that as children, when we saw others in pain, the first thing that came to mind was not an impulse to alleviate them?
The first impulse, the immediate reaction, was a private, selfish feeling of our own safety.

This is transmuted once we become conscious of other minds.


I think that some do follow the "social contract" because of fear of repercussions, but some do have this moral thing deeply embedded into their psyches. This is not to say that these "moral" people are selfless. They tend to be believers in the invisible. And very likely fear the eyes of the spirits (ancestors, gods, whatever) on them. Judging them. And when they 'fall' they fall big. This friend of mine eventually became a very untrustworthy type of person. He owes everybody money. And has no intention of ever paying any of them back. In for a penny, in for a pound.

This is the problem with christians.

As with any religious system.

This moral thing deeply embedded into their psyche, what you are calling a reverence for the invisible, is the very visible work of another human that has imposed himself on that psyche.

It seems that no people, no conscience.

So, because the machine is not a man there is no contract with it? What about the owner of the machine? Or the guy that comes along to empty the change and refill the contents? It is the act of being observed that causes the guilt. If one was truly part of this 'social contract' then the vending machine would inspire just as much guilt as the cashier.
I think Cato would agree with you if the machine's owner was standing right there watching him do it.

Well, he deliberated for some time over this and at last decided that he couldn't keep the money. He turned the car around and started back to the bank. We got to the bank and he counted the money one last time. Turns out that it was he and not the cashier that miscounted. He had exactly the proper amount of money and his soulsearching and agonizing moral torment was completely self-inflicted and pointless.

This is totally screwed. It is judging past events with the benefit of hindsight, at the same time doing as if the information procured *later* was already available *before*.
When he first started worrying, he thought that he was overpayed, so at *that* time his reaction was understandable.

I take you think the time logic as in "Tommy, why did you hit Ricky?" -- "Because he hit later me back." is perfectly alright.


I think that some do follow the "social contract" because of fear of repercussions, but some do have this moral thing deeply embedded into their psyches. This is not to say that these "moral" people are selfless. They tend to be believers in the invisible. And very likely fear the eyes of the spirits (ancestors, gods, whatever) on them. Judging them. And when they 'fall' they fall big. This friend of mine eventually became a very untrustworthy type of person. He owes everybody money. And has no intention of ever paying any of them back. In for a penny, in for a pound.

This is the problem with christians.

You generalize horridly.

What is it that stops you from killing or raping your nephews? Because you "believe in the invisible", "fear the eyes of the spirits"?


***

This goes to show that conscience, like hell, is other people.

1. If hell is other people, what are brotherhood, loyalty and commitment?

2. If hell is other people, then you are hell to other people too.

3. Are you your own hell too?

Rosa:
This is totally screwed. It is judging past events with the benefit of hindsight, at the same time doing as if the information procured *later* was already available *before*.
When he first started worrying, he thought that he was overpayed, so at *that* time his reaction was understandable.

I take you think the time logic as in "Tommy, why did you hit Ricky?" -- "Because he hit later me back." is perfectly alright.

Your lame attempts at wit are funny.

Anyway, his point is emperically valid. That's what empiricism is.

1. If hell is other people, what are brotherhood, loyalty and commitment?
Its a lonely, insecure girl asking these questions from being disenfranchised.

2. If hell is other people, then you are hell to other people too.
Only for those weak enough to feel it.
For that matter- and?

3. Are you your own hell too
No, I'm my own Sheol.

Rosa,

This is totally screwed. It is judging past events with the benefit of hindsight, at the same time doing as if the information procured *later* was already available *before*.
When he first started worrying, he thought that he was overpayed, so at *that* time his reaction was understandable.

I know. The bit on the end about how all the agonizing and soul-searching being self-inflicted and pointless was just a touch of humor. It had nothing to do with the point at hand. Namely that there are people who don't need the look of other eyes to arouse these feelings of guilt. And later, when this particular person (a staunch christian) 'fell' from morality. He fell completely.

In for a penny in for a pound.

I take you think the time logic as in "Tommy, why did you hit Ricky?" -- "Because he hit later me back." is perfectly alright.

Some would have it so. The new Golden Rule: Do unto others before they do unto you. And, it's a better reason that "Because..." or "Because he was looking at me." And, who knows. Maybe Tommy knew that Ricky was an asshole and that he was going to hit him if Tommy didn't hit him first?

You generalize horridly.

I so don't understand your staunch defense of christianity. Perhaps I do generalize, but the point stands. If you don't do 'evil' because of a fear of hell then once you've already sinned might as well sin some more because you're already damned in the eyes of god. Might as well get in some good sinning before absolution.

What is it that stops you from killing or raping your nephews? Because you "believe in the invisible", "fear the eyes of the spirits"?

Might be that I'm not a pedophile.

But, what keeps a christian pedophile from raping my nephews? And what happens once he breaks that commandment? What holds him back then?



Gendanken,

His guilt was that imputed on him by other people. As is with everyone.
How do I know?

Once his threshold for moral connotations was lowered by the slack given him by other people, he became the miscreant you describe- a miscreant with the same people he was once so fearful to cause harm.

Those are my conclusions as well. Remember the story of the father's cock?

And, it also shows how weak religious proscriptions are. They are a line in the sand and once the line is crossed then there is nothing to prevent you from crossing over and over again.

Do you know that as children, when we saw others in pain, the first thing that came to mind was not an impulse to alleviate them?
The first impulse, the immediate reaction, was a private, selfish feeling of our own safety.

This is transmuted once we become conscious of other minds.

Children are inherently selfish.

As with any religious system.

Right. I shouldn't just pick on christians, but you know how it is.

Right. I shouldn't just pick on christians, but you know how it is.
Somewhat.

But wholly ascribing feelings of 'bad' and 'good' to religion is erroneous.
This feeling comes from any influence by others, religious or not, so your point about your friend is valid.

But wholly ascribing feelings of 'bad' and 'good' to religion is erroneous.
This feeling comes from any influence by others, religious or not, so your point about your friend is valid.

Yes. Religion is just the most prevalent way (and least efficient method) of instilling moral values in the young. It is about other people. Bending one's will to the will of the people. Good solid productive citizen.

But, when such primitive and inefficient methods fail, they fail big. A better method would allow a slipping without a complete fall. There would be more slipping, but the distance of the slip would be less. And would be an easier climb back to 'grace'.

Your lame attempts at wit are funny.

Oh, what men do ...


Anyway, his point is emperically valid. That's what empiricism is.

And you cooked lunch because you later on ate it, right?


“ 1. If hell is other people, what are brotherhood, loyalty and commitment? ”
Its a lonely, insecure girl asking these questions from being disenfranchised.

You didn't answer my question.

Which, among other things, tells me that you are a lonely, insecure girl making these statements because she has been disenfranchised.

Not by me, mind you, I don't matter in this game of yours here. I have the immense benefit of never thinking I "belonged", so you cannot disenfranchise me.

You, Gendanken, are still a spectator, that same spectator you were in highschool. This is why all the charades.


“ 2. If hell is other people, then you are hell to other people too. ”
Only for those weak enough to feel it.
For that matter- and?

Wonderful. So the clue is to numb yourself down ("Love is a blodclot."), build a facade ("I don't validate myself by other people."), a wall ("I can do exceptionally well on my own, always have."), a moat ("I am hell for other people, only for those weak enough to feel it. For that matter- and?"), put there an army of rabid dogs ("Language is a disease."), *anything* that would hide the view of hell from you.

No, better: You "build yourself up" with Nietzsche and Sartre, and are so *free* in your mind that *nothing* can get to you. This *really* is strength, huh?

Anything, as long as it stills the headnoise.

I wonder when you last heard a cricket.


***

I so don't understand your staunch defense of christianity.

My "defense" of Christianity? I don't defend it, this is your interpretation. I think your arguments are weak and flawed, as I in detail pointed out in the "Filling the void" thread (but you never replied).


If you don't do 'evil' because of a fear of hell then once you've already sinned might as well sin some more because you're already damned in the eyes of god. Might as well get in some good sinning before absolution.

I don't understand how you can afford yourself such cheap arguments. As if religion were a mask, a coat or even shackles one wears on occasion, but that religion has nothing to do with what one is.

If you yourself don't believe in God, then how can you talk about the value and importance of judgement and hell?!


Might be that I'm not a pedophile.

Why aren't you? I mean, it's not like there's something stopping you, is there? You *could* do it.


But, what keeps a christian pedophile from raping my nephews? And what happens once he breaks that commandment? What holds him back then?

So you are not a pedophile, but you are assuming that at least some Christians are, but the reason they don't do it is fear of hell?


And, it also shows how weak religious proscriptions are. They are a line in the sand and once the line is crossed then there is nothing to prevent you from crossing over and over again.

They are only "weak" because you *don't believe* in them. It is a matter of your free choice whether you will keep to them or not.

That proscription is only a line of words. What you will do with that line of words, what value and importance you will give them -- this this line of words cannot command or decide. So don't do as if it does or should.

Those people are cowards. Even kicking a machine is a sign of cowardice, unless they are as ready to kick a cashier. Still, they're at least retarded for kicking a machine.
I'm very proud of myself that I never do that, I never try to hurt or yell at nothing, I never become angry with something that can't understand exactly what human anger is.
The ONLY thing I ever kick or become angry with are other people, i don't do it often, but i'm proud that i don't need to vent on machines or worse, animals.
I admit I might I've taken out frustrations on innocent people before, but at least I'm in the ball park. Humans are fair game because they are in the game. They understand human interaction. We're all on the same plane. Even a surprise attack on a confused homeless man will make sense to him. He'll know you're a jerk who's attacking him for a thrill or whatever. Deep down we all expect anything and everything that we could possibly throw at eachother.

People who kick machines and thrash trees and punch animals are pathetic. They're too timid to direct the behaviours intended for humans on humans, and direct them on what ever won't talk/fight back/have them arrested. People are going around making fools of themselves kicking coke machines because they are depraved of their god given right to kick people. Anger exists specifically to be directed at other people. Violence isn't necessarrily reserved for humans, but emotionally driven violence definately is. Hunting animals isn't supposed to be a teeth gratingly sadistic thrill, we aren't naturally supposed to be mad at prey animals. But I know for a fact thats how many hunters treat hunting. Especially hunters of the handicapped variety- they aim for the deer's spine and then wheel over to angrily spit on their paralysed prey before wheeling off and leaving it to die. A fucking deer, how could you possibly feel anger towards a deer? Handicapped fucks.

In misdirecting emotionally driven violence outside of the human circle we're essentially throwing the ball up in the stands because the defense is too stingy.
Well, not me, I'm not a simple fumbling fish out of water. If the ball's in my hands I'm taking it to the hole no matter how congested it is in the key. I don't get the ball very often though.
(in case you can't follow the ball is rage, and "the hole" or goal is people. Yeah see? its like a little rage ball and you just ... fuck you)

This goes to show that conscience, like hell, is other people.
What about the person that owns the machine?
The man was not only trying to screw him or her out of money, when he didn't get away with it, he took his anger out on the machine and risked to damaging it at a further cost to the person who owned the machine.
The reason he didn't feel bad about it was because he simply didn't get caught.

For most people, conscience is ruled by shame and risk of being caught.
For people with integrity, conscience is ruled by their own sense of what they think is moral and right and attempting to adgere to their ideals.

Dr. Lou:
People who kick machines and thrash trees and punch animals are pathetic. They're too timid to direct the behaviours intended for humans on humans, and direct them on what ever won't talk/fight back/have them arrested. People are going around making fools of themselves kicking coke machines because they are depraved of their god given right to kick people. Anger exists specifically to be directed at other people. Violence isn't necessarrily reserved for humans, but emotionally driven violence definately is. Hunting animals isn't supposed to be a teeth gratingly sadistic thrill, we aren't naturally supposed to be mad at prey animals. But I know for a fact thats how many hunters treat hunting. Especially hunters of the handicapped variety- they aim for the deer's spine and then wheel over to angrily spit on their paralysed prey before wheeling off and leaving it to die. A fucking deer, how could you possibly feel anger towards a deer? Handicapped fucks.

Suprise, suprise.
By far the best point- this is common in the Asian culture (specifically the Chinese), where it is considered a social ill to display aggression directly towards people.

So the weak-pussy housewife, mad at her neighbor, will wait for the neighbor to come home to start kicking the dog in full view of that neighbor, so that aggression is spent without having to deal with a human directly as consequence.
Passive aggressiveness.
Or for that matter, a woman taking her sexual frustrations with her husband out on her children. She would not confront a superior being that would bite back, so she vents with her children.

Women are notorious for this- RosaMagika, for example, is a prototype of this cowardice.

In misdirecting emotionally driven violence outside of the human circle we're essentially throwing the ball up in the stands because the defense is too stingy.
Well, not me, I'm not a simple fumbling fish out of water. If the ball's in my hands I'm taking it to the hole no matter how congested it is in the key. I don't get the ball very often though.
(in case you can't follow the ball is rage, and "the hole" or goal is people. Yeah see? its like a little rage ball and you just ... fuck you)
You're murder on literature.
And fuck you too.


One_Raven:
What about the person that owns the machine?
The man was not only trying to screw him or her out of money, when he didn't get away with it, he took his anger out on the machine and risked to damaging it at a further cost to the person who owned the machine.
The reason he didn't feel bad about it was because he simply didn't get caught.

For most people, conscience is ruled by shame and risk of being caught.
For people with integrity, conscience is ruled by their own sense of what they think is moral and right and attempting to adgere to their ideals.
Here is where I use your slogan against you:
"Shut up and Listen"

The key here is to ask where all these feelings in people come from. You say shame and risk and caught without thinking about what you are saying.
Other.People.
Think about a robot, how brusque we are around them even if they resemble humans.


Rosa:
Oh, what men do ...

Nice try.

Here's a little lesson for the next time you're too busy carrying emotional baggage around like a jealous mule: if you have something to say, say it.

I have no problems calling you an emotionally needy, passive aggressive slave with inferiority complexes that keep you from telling someone exactly what you think of them.
Its only after the fact that we hear from little, disenfranchised girls like you.

And you cooked lunch because you later on ate it, right?

Simple stuff really.

Dude said he knew another dude caught in a moral impasse.
This dude ate himself up thinking he did something wrong.
He found out later on that the person he felt he had wronged was actually careless.
And little by little dude lost all his guilt because of other people’s carelessness.
A led to B.

Invert comments on B based on A. Duh.
The point is empirically valid- what Kant labeled a synthetic judgment.


You didn't answer my question.

Which, among other things, tells me that you are a lonely, insecure girl making these statements because she has been disenfranchised.

Not by me, mind you, I don't matter in this game of yours here. I have the immense benefit of never thinking I "belonged", so you cannot disenfranchise me.

You, Gendanken, are still a spectator, that same spectator you were in highschool. This is why all the charades.

Didn't have to answer your question, chicky.
It was irrelevant, and you were being Chinese.
Fucking women.

If you yourself don't believe in God, then how can you talk about the value and importance of judgement and hell?!

Isn't this something you should say to me?
Kicking the dog again?

Because, you know, its only the Christian or the Hindu or the Muslim or some other human who believes, like all slaves, in things higher than himself that hold him in contempt or standards he can never reach- its only these people that can esteem or talk about the values of judgment and morals!
Right?


Wonderful. So the clue is to numb yourself down ("Love is a blodclot."), build a facade ("I don't validate myself by other people."), a wall ("I can do exceptionally well on my own, always have."), a moat ("I am hell for other people, only for those weak enough to feel it. For that matter- and?"), put there an army of rabid dogs ("Language is a disease."), *anything* that would hide the view of hell from you.

No, better: You "build yourself up" with Nietzsche and Sartre, and are so *free* in your mind that *nothing* can get to you. This *really* is strength, huh?

Anything, as long as it stills the headnoise.



You forgot Kierkegaard.

To wit, you should be off somewhere either talking about love or playing some Celine Dion bullshit.
And what's more- you're no different than Wanderer.

I wonder when you last heard a cricket.
Some of your most recent posts have inspired them.

You know, like all clumsy comedians do on stage when they don't know what they're doing, too busy trying too hard.

By far the best point- this is common in the Asian culture (specifically the Chinese), where it is considered a social ill to display aggression directly towards people.

So the weak-pussy housewife, mad at her neighbor, will wait for the neighbor to come home to start kicking the dog in full view of that neighbor, so that aggression is spent without having to deal with a human directly as consequence.
Passive aggressiveness.
Or for that matter, a woman taking her sexual frustrations with her husband out on her children. She would not confront a superior being that would bite back, so she vents with her children.
I know you consider it your honest duty to show aggression when you feel it, and to point out the weaknesses of others when they're evident to you, but isn't the above exactly what you're doing? Aren't you venting some hatred you feel towards yourself - or maybe just the "stereotypical woman" - that your assert yourself at other's expense? Aren't you kicking the children and the husband because the dog wouldn't react, and therefore can't be a valid target of aggression, no matter how much you hate it?

Everybody's emotionally needy. Some just deny it harder than others.

Nice try.

Here's a little lesson for the next time you're too busy carrying emotional baggage around like a jealous mule: if you have something to say, say it.

I have no problems calling you an emotionally needy, passive aggressive slave with inferiority complexes that keep you from telling someone exactly what you think of them.
Its only after the fact that we hear from little, disenfranchised girls like you.

What you've just said says something about you, but not necessarily something about me.

It is too bad that when someone has patience with you, pays attention to you, and, heaven forbid, has some compassion for you, to you this looks like "an emotionally needy, passive aggressive slave with inferiority complexes that keep you from telling someone exactly what you think of them".


Simple stuff really.

Dude said he knew another dude caught in a moral impasse.
This dude ate himself up thinking he did something wrong.
He found out later on that the person he felt he had wronged was actually careless.
And little by little dude lost all his guilt because of other people’s carelessness.
A led to B.

Invert comments on B based on A. Duh.
The point is empirically valid- what Kant labeled a synthetic judgment.

I made my comments about faulty time logic to this part of Invert's argument:

Well, he deliberated for some time over this and at last decided that he couldn't keep the money. He turned the car around and started back to the bank. We got to the bank and he counted the money one last time. Turns out that it was he and not the cashier that miscounted. He had exactly the proper amount of money and his soulsearching and agonizing moral torment was completely self-inflicted and pointless.

-- and it has been totally ingored, mistaken for something else.


Didn't have to answer your question, chicky.
It was irrelevant, and you were being Chinese.
Fucking women.

It's not irrelevant. If hell is other people, then you consider your (choice) brother to be your hell?
And why value brotherhood, loyalty and commitment? Aren't they products of conscience? And as such, about other people? If conscience is other people, and other people are hell, then things of conscience are hell as well. Do you want hell or not? Do you want brotherhood or not?
I want to see the consistency of your argument.


Isn't this something you should say to me?

Do you wish to be addressed?


Because, you know, its only the Christian or the Hindu or the Muslim or some other human who believes, like all slaves, in things higher than himself that hold him in contempt or standards he can never reach- its only these people that can esteem or talk about the values of judgment and morals!
Right?

No.

I can imagine where you got these slavery ideas from, "squatting down in a hut, despising oneself" etc. The way people feel about God says a lot of what they think of themselves, and this goes for you too. You seem to have discarded the slave idea of God that you got with your Catholic upbringing, but together with this slave idea, you also discarded the whole concept of a personal God.
Metaphorically, you didn't just pour out the putrid contents, but threw away the glass itself too.
And now you think that each person who is holding a glass, also has it filled with the same putrid disgusting brew that yours was filled with.


To wit, you should be off somewhere either talking about love or playing some Celine Dion bullshit.
And what's more- you're no different than Wanderer.

Now, why don't you say what *exactly* *you* think ...

Oh, and Wanderer believes in the Kantian conception of self, the destruction~construction theory, and that one is an island etc. None of which I agree with. If you think that he and I are no different, then you are grossly generalizing.


You know, like all clumsy comedians do on stage when they don't know what they're doing, too busy trying too hard.

You know, like all intellectuals trying to be even more intellectual, with your heartlessness, you inspire pity, and in some, compassion.

With the way you behave, you are the one raising mountains and valleys and burning down bridges -- and why? Because of conscience? Because of other people?

The man has simply built himself a lil wall of denial that shatters when seen in a mirror (someone else's eyes). He can forgoe judging himself in favor of (the potential for) satisfaction of want. When he looks in another's eyes, they are a mirror that shines judgement on him. He reels from it perhaps because he's generally unaccustomed to bearing its weight.

Suprise, suprise.
By far the best point- this is common in the Asian culture (specifically the Chinese), where it is considered a social ill to display aggression directly towards people.

So the weak-pussy housewife, mad at her neighbor, will wait for the neighbor to come home to start kicking the dog in full view of that neighbor, so that aggression is spent without having to deal with a human directly as consequence.
Passive aggressiveness.
Or for that matter, a woman taking her sexual frustrations with her husband out on her children. She would not confront a superior being that would bite back, so she vents with her children.

Women are notorious for this- RosaMagika, for example, is a prototype of this cowardice.

And what cowardice it is to wave *your* little fragile fist in front of the computer and what passive aggressiveness it is to put *your* anger into words ...

You know, like all clumsy comedians do on stage when they don't know what they're doing, too busy trying too hard.
When the concept of self is seriously threatened, one becomes defensive of it. What follows is a reaction - a denial of the attack on the self which is being made.
Ideas on politics, ideas on current events, even on religion, can be changed, perhaps not easily but changed nonetheless. But when that attack is made upon the very foundation of belief, the core from which the ideas of the self are derived, then the defence becomes all the more aggressive - and clumsy.

Jenyar:
I know you consider it your honest duty to show aggression when you feel it, and to point out the weaknesses of others when they're evident to you, but isn't the above exactly what you're doing? Aren't you venting some hatred you feel towards yourself - or maybe just the "stereotypical woman" - that your assert yourself at other's expense? Aren't you kicking the children and the husband because the dog wouldn't react, and therefore can't be a valid target of aggression, no matter how much you hate it?

Everybody's emotionally needy. Some just deny it harder than others.
Uh-oh.
Another one who, after the laborious attempts of a full three seconds he puts in his thinking, comes out with that novel idea of me hating myself.
So negative, so microwaved- as all slaves..

Anyway, what's the matter Jenyar? Damsel in distress got you hard?
*grin*

Rosa:
What you've just said says something about you, but not necessarily something about me.

It is too bad that when someone has patience with you, pays attention to you, and, heaven forbid, has some compassion for you, to you this looks like "an emotionally needy, passive aggressive slave with inferiority complexes that keep you from telling someone exactly what you think of them".

No.
Emotionally needy, as defined here, is a reactive frustration a weaker mind has in its inability to understand a stronger one and its failure to overcome that haunting feel of intimidation.
They seek status with alliance, and finding it impossible, devour themselves.

I made my comments about faulty time logic to this part of Invert's argument:

You're being both anal and argumentative- this:

"his soulsearching and agonizing moral torment was completely self-inflicted and pointless."

simply says that seeing the outcome , one can look back on the boy's moral impasse and conclude that it was pointless.
A synthetic judgment, per Kant.
"Faulty time logic" is just you being 'pissy'. Grrrr.

It's not irrelevant. If hell is other people, then you consider your (choice) brother to be your hell?

Hell is only referencing Sartre's “No Exit”.
For one.
What brotherhood has to do with this, other than you indirectly asking me about it as you've been carrying it around, is what I see as irrelevant.
For two.

What you have done here is taken hell and equated it with all people in your yearn to ask me about brotherhood. You smeared the statement together to do so.
Apples are fruit.
Oranges are fruit.
In your muddled thinking, apples are oranges.

:Socratic pose: hmmmmm.....
The way people feel about God says a lot of what they think of themselves, and this goes for you too. You seem to have discarded the slave idea of God that you got with your Catholic upbringing, but together with this slave idea, you also discarded the whole concept of a personal God.
Metaphorically, you didn't just pour out the putrid contents, but threw away the glass itself too.
And now you think that each person who is holding a glass, also has it filled with the same putrid disgusting brew that yours was filled with.

Yes.
My god is Self and ends there.
It lacks the contemptuous, jealous insecurity that reflects those men who showed theirs to me.

Oh, yes- and it hates itself. MADLY.


Now, why don't you say what *exactly* *you* think ...

Oh, and Wanderer believes in the Kantian conception of self, the destruction~construction theory, and that one is an island etc. None of which I agree with. If you think that he and I are no different, then you are grossly generalizing.

I did, you idiot.
You assumed your analysis up there about me masturbating to Nietzche and cadavers, alone in my bitter solitude because you don't fucking know me.
Like all of you clueless tards do- all three of you, now that Jenyar's shown.

And what cowardice it is to wave *your* little fragile fist in front of the computer and what passive aggressiveness it is to put *your* anger into words ...
Uhm, no.
Cowardice is you showing up to kick Invert.
When you've been dying to kick me, moron.

Me and Dr. Lou just happen to be compatible assholes.

Fenris:
When the concept of self is seriously threatened, one becomes defensive of it. What follows is a reaction - a denial of the attack on the self which is being made.
Ideas on politics, ideas on current events, even on religion, can be changed, perhaps not easily but changed nonetheless. But when that attack is made upon the very foundation of belief, the core from which the ideas of the self are derived, then the defence becomes all the more aggressive - and clumsy.
Not to mention the attempts at making those pitiful flaws pointed out in that self into virtues to hold against that thing it now sees as 'antagonist'.

These are control mechanisms used to make the powerful feel wrong and, well, clumsy for their nature without having to do anything.

Two last:

One:
And what cowardice it is to wave *your* little fragile fist in front of the computer and what passive aggressiveness it is to put *your* anger into words ...
You'd actually have a point if I did not tell you to your face what you were in the same post.

Two:
Remember what you could not ask me out in 'public', perhaps caring too much what people around here think?
You know, when I mentioned knowing about three men who so delightfully show up in your threads for 'delightful conversation', as it seems you're still in denial? I said this in a thread and you asked about in pm.

Heads up- one of them has shown. At a very manly hour. HA!

I like to purchase barnd new electronics, and put rocks or old broken down electronics in the box. Then go return it for my money back.

this is common in the Asian culture (specifically the Chinese), where it is considered a social ill to display aggression directly towards people.
Ugh... fuck the chinese, don't get me started on the chinese.
I didn't know it was particularly taboo to show aggression towards people in china, but now it all makes sense. Now I know why they boil cats alive, and sodomosie cetaceans with electric rods.
They have the most bizarre, twisted, impractical ways of doing things to animals, like some morbid genius is sitting in his basement with a pen and paper purposefully trying to come up with the most horrible ways to torture animals and then sending his notes up a chute to society. Chinese fucks.

Look at the most unaffected humans on eath, primitive tribes. Humans living as they were designed to live. They kill animals obviously for survival, but then they will show their fallen prey the utmost respect, having rituals for it and its even custom to weep for fallen prey in some tribal clans. You will never see them "enjoying" the slaughter of an animal in the way shifty pale appalachians will.
The reason? They spend their weekends angrily clubbing their rivals to death with animal bones. This is what anger is for, and they let it out in exactly the right way at exactly the right times, they're free to be what they are.
Only since we lost our right to treat humans as we intuitively feel they should be treated have we begun misdirecting our urges and treating animals like they're rival humans (and ironically over time refferring to poorly treated people as "treated like animals").

I'm sure the odd tribes person who is chased away from his tribe for whatever reason angrily kicks a rabbit or 2 in his final bitter week of struggling to survive before being torn apart by a pack of wild dogs, but thats just it, he dies.
Chinese cat boilers, handicapped deer wingers and giggling appalachian squirrel skinners carry on, and it really fucking bothers me.

Rosa,

And you cooked lunch because you later on ate it, right?

What does this have to do with my story? I don't recall making any direct causal links in such a way. What I said was that after the experience was over, I judged him in this way. That I found it funny that all his soul-searching was useless as the moral dilemma that he perceived was illusory.

I don't understand how you can afford yourself such cheap arguments. As if religion were a mask, a coat or even shackles one wears on occasion, but that religion has nothing to do with what one is.

For one thing, religion is a mask. It is a coat. And it is shackles worn on occasion. But, this is not relevant to my argument or this thread.

My argument is simple. It is a simple recognition that those who are sentenced to life in prison don't care.
Simply because it can't get any worse.
It is a simple recognition of the fact that smoking marijuana leads to harder drugs because you are already a criminal so why not?

I've already conceded that I have generalized. In fact, I conceded this point before you ever joined the conversation. Gendanken called me on this already. Still, it is a valid point and is one of the most serious problems with morals dictated at the point of a sword.

If you yourself don't believe in God, then how can you talk about the value and importance of judgement and hell?!

This is a ridiculous question. Ridiculous and patronizing.

Why aren't you? I mean, it's not like there's something stopping you, is there? You *could* do it.

I know what you're leading up to here. You're trying to get me to say that I don't do it because something inside me stops me from doing it. And you're almost right. But not really.
Nothing inside stops me from doing it. I have never once heard a voice of conscience inside urging me to not rape my nephews.
I don't need any voice to stop me from doing something that I don't want to do in the first place.

Get off the abhorrent crimes like child-raping and think of the pleasurable sins such as adultery. Or theft. Or murder.
Now, what's stopping me from committing crimes that I might wish to?
Consequences. Pure and simple.
Religion makes the punishment eternal.
Law makes the punishment tangible.
I'm more scared of prison than I am of hell.
Why? Because I don't need faith to know that prison is real.

So you are not a pedophile, but you are assuming that at least some Christians are, but the reason they don't do it is fear of hell?

And you're assuming that there are not? What about homosexuals?

They are only "weak" because you *don't believe* in them. It is a matter of your free choice whether you will keep to them or not.

They are weak because they require *faith* in god. They are weak because they postpone judgement until the hereafter. They are weak because they are imposed externally and are not necessarily relevant to whatever situation one might find oneself in.

But, as Gendanken has said, this is not limited to religiously imposed morality. It is a common trait in socially imposed morality. Morality that is imposed by the point of a sword. Fear of punishment. Fear of exile.

It's just that religious commandments are especially weak in their absolute absolutism.

That proscription is only a line of words. What you will do with that line of words, what value and importance you will give them -- this this line of words cannot command or decide. So don't do as if it does or should.

Then they aren't commandments at all. They aren't absolute. They aren't imposed. They're chosen. Do you choose religion? I thought your argument was that religion was about what one is? You're treading close to the dreaded relativism here.

Bottom line, Rosa. Someone doesn't follow the commandments you follow. They follow a different set. What do you think of them? Are they moral?
Their teachings have them sacrifice their eldest child on his 13th birthday. First they have ritual sex with him/her and then they cut out the heart and devour it while it's still pumping.
Are they moral? They're following the commandments of their religion. Their culture. But, are they moral? What is the state of their conscience?

And now you think that each person who is holding a glass, also has it filled with the same putrid disgusting brew that yours was filled with.

Wow. You don't like catholics, do you? I guess this answers the question I asked above. If you find the catholic doctrine putrid then I can only imagine what you think of my example above.

So, anyway, sounds like you're judging and this absolute human morality you go on about isn't quite so absolute.

And what cowardice it is to wave *your* little fragile fist in front of the computer and what passive aggressiveness it is to put *your* anger into words ...

Do you know what passive aggressiveness is?

Emotionally needy, as defined here, is a reactive frustration a weaker mind has in its inability to understand a stronger one and its failure to overcome that haunting feel of intimidation.

Said it, not it. Call yourself strong and powerful, and you cease being it.

You are judgemental and vain as hell.


When you've been dying to kick me, moron.

I never wrestle a pig. I would get shit all over me, and the pig would like it.

Ah, I love you, Gendy.


Remember what you could not ask me out in 'public', perhaps caring too much what people around here think?
You know, when I mentioned knowing about three men who so delightfully show up in your threads for 'delightful conversation', as it seems you're still in denial? I said this in a thread and you asked about in pm.

Twister. I doubted that you would answer in the thread, that's why I pm'd you. I know from before how you tend not to answer questions, this is why they have to be pointed out specifically somehow. I had my thoughts, I wasn't in denial, I just didn't know what you thought, that's all. I can't see into your head.

You are taking other people's patience and attention for granted. And it works for you, as you are under the protection of the very law system that you detest so much. You behave the way you do just because you *can* behave this way, not because it would be some plan of yours, or a deliberate expression of your character. You can be so easily provoked.



***


On topic:

The question was where do feelings of guilt and shame come from, where does conscience come from:

We all have standards -- values and preferences. When we fail to live up to them, we feel bad. That's how values and preferences work.

Since the idea that conscience is other people has been brought up:

It must be noted that values and preferences are not something that each individual would make up, uniquely; there are many people whose favourite colour is blue, or who prefer spicy food. One doesn't really own one's values and preferences (V&P)-- they have more or less the nature of communality. We aren't the sole owners of a certain set of V&P -- and this is one of the expressions of human gregarious nature. More importantly, it is through the communality of V&P that a society is held together, individuals being interdependent on their fulfilling of V&P, thereby providing available V&P for each other and new members.

It is easy to mistake that one feels bad for not living up to certain V&P just because of other people. Humans are gregarious beings, living in social groups in which they are mutually dependant; one cannot really live and be all by himself, one does not invent oneself from scratch.
When one fails, one feels bad because one failed both oneself *and* others. Namely, through social causality, if you fail on yourself, you are also failing on others, and when they fail, this comes back at you. (Imagine a small tribe: if one member fails, they all have negative consequences from that.)

In societies with a great number of members, the social causality seems more abstract, more distant, and often not even present. It seems that anyone can do anything, and this should not affect anyone else in any significant degree.

The philosophy of totalitarian individualism emerges, thinking that one has indeed invented oneself, that one is one's own maker. And in this regard, it certainly seems that if someone seems to "depend on other people" that they have failed to realize the totalitarian individualistic ideal. -- Which indeed they have, as they are behaving gregariously, and gregariousness is negated by totalitarian individualism (or seen merely as some remnant from the past that is to be overcome).

A healthy relationship between the individual and the gregarious seems to be the ideal solution (as long as people procreate the natural way), whereby conscience is conceptualized as I to another I.

What does this have to do with my story? I don't recall making any direct causal links in such a way. What I said was that after the experience was over, I judged him in this way. That I found it funny that all his soul-searching was useless as the moral dilemma that he perceived was illusory.

That's just it: At the point where he had the dilemma, it was not an illusion. It was real, it followed from the information he had available at that time.

With ex post knowledge, many things look stupid, irrational, illusionary; but before we have this ex post knowledge, the dilemmas we are in are real.


For one thing, religion is a mask. It is a coat. And it is shackles worn on occasion.

For you, and for some other people, religion may be a mask, a coat, shackles -- but this doesn't mean that it is that for everyone. If you say that it is, you are the one assuming to have absolute knowledge about the nature of things.


But, this is not relevant to my argument or this thread.

You brought it up, and you keep on returning to it.


My argument is simple. It is a simple recognition that those who are sentenced to life in prison don't care.
Simply because it can't get any worse.
It is a simple recognition of the fact that smoking marijuana leads to harder drugs because you are already a criminal so why not?

This goes only if by "morality" you understand "morality is what you can get away with".

In Bowling for Columbine an interesting issue about provincial American life philsophy was brought up: Children are taught that if they do bad at school when they are 12, they will end up alone, poor and miserable for the rest of their life.

Saying "smoking marijuana leads to harder drugs because you are already a criminal so why not" is an example of this very thinking.

As if one action would cement a person's life for ever and ever, as if one could not change and as if one could never learn anything. This is a gross underestimation of human abilities!


I've already conceded that I have generalized. In fact, I conceded this point before you ever joined the conversation. Gendanken called me on this already. Still, it is a valid point and is one of the most serious problems with morals dictated at the point of a sword.

And where is that sword, who is holding it?


“ If you yourself don't believe in God, then how can you talk about the value and importance of judgement and hell?! ”
This is a ridiculous question. Ridiculous and patronizing.

Explain why it is ridiculous and patronizing.


I know what you're leading up to here. You're trying to get me to say that I don't do it because something inside me stops me from doing it. And you're almost right. But not really.
Nothing inside stops me from doing it. I have never once heard a voice of conscience inside urging me to not rape my nephews.
I don't need any voice to stop me from doing something that I don't want to do in the first place.

I wasn't trying to "get you to say" anything in specific. I posited a question, to see how you would respond.

You don't seem to be aware that people have values and preferences, and that it is them that lead a lot of their doing. To you, such a value is the well-being of your nephews, and it goes without saying.
Morality is just a collective term for those values and preferences that a certain society considers desireable.


Get off the abhorrent crimes like child-raping and think of the pleasurable sins such as adultery. Or theft. Or murder.

Why is child-raping abhorrent? By what standard do you judge that child-raping is abhorrent and not pleasurable? (I swear, pedophiles disagree with you!) By what standard are adultery, theft and murder pleasurable?


Now, what's stopping me from committing crimes that I might wish to?
Consequences. Pure and simple.

This is only true if you think that "morality is something you can get away with".


Religion makes the punishment eternal.

Only if you believe so. There is no tangible force *making* you fear hell -- apart from certain people who claim to know better.


Law makes the punishment tangible.
I'm more scared of prison than I am of hell.
Why? Because I don't need faith to know that prison is real.

That's not true. We function on some faith all the time. It is just that what is termed "evidence" demands the least faith.

You know, there is no rational reason to believe, for example, that there is no conspiracy theory. There is no rational reason to believe that what scientific journals print is a result of scientific research. It is a matter of social agreement that believing in a great government conspiracy is not a sane thing. It is a matter of social agreement that we trust scientific journals (even though they bring everything-overthrowing theories every couple of years).

Not so long ago, your muscles hurt after exercising because acid collected in them; and now they have it that they hurt because the fibres get torn. And we just trust it.


“ So you are not a pedophile, but you are assuming that at least some Christians are, but the reason they don't do it is fear of hell? ”
And you're assuming that there are not? What about homosexuals?

No, I'm not assuming that some of them aren't pedophiles or homosexuals.


They are weak because they require *faith* in god. They are weak because they postpone judgement until the hereafter. They are weak because they are imposed externally and are not necessarily relevant to whatever situation one might find oneself in.

Eventually, you could claim that everything is imposed externally, even the air that we breath.
People can internalize rules, values etc., and this is when those rules become strong.


But, as Gendanken has said, this is not limited to religiously imposed morality. It is a common trait in socially imposed morality. Morality that is imposed by the point of a sword. Fear of punishment. Fear of exile.

This is how laws work, *any* laws. Comply, or face the consequences.
I don't think there are any laws that would not be perceived as restrictive at least in some way.

And if the law would be "Eat as much as you like", people would feel restricted by it -- not because of what the law says, but because it is a law.


It's just that religious commandments are especially weak in their absolute absolutism.

?


“ That proscription is only a line of words. What you will do with that line of words, what value and importance you will give them -- this this line of words cannot command or decide. So don't do as if it does or should. ”

Then they aren't commandments at all.

Non sequitur.


They aren't absolute. They aren't imposed. They're chosen.

Something is *perceived* as absolute or chosen.


Do you choose religion? I thought your argument was that religion was about what one is? You're treading close to the dreaded relativism here.

Are you denying free will?

Religion can have a lot to do with what one is, and what one is can be greatly a matter of choice.


Bottom line, Rosa. Someone doesn't follow the commandments you follow. They follow a different set. What do you think of them? Are they moral?
Their teachings have them sacrifice their eldest child on his 13th birthday. First they have ritual sex with him/her and then they cut out the heart and devour it while it's still pumping.
Are they moral? They're following the commandments of their religion. Their culture. But, are they moral? What is the state of their conscience?

They are moral by their standards, but they are immoral by my standards, and vice versa.


Wow. You don't like catholics, do you? I guess this answers the question I asked above. If you find the catholic doctrine putrid then I can only imagine what you think of my example above.

I was putting Gendanken's experience into words.


So, anyway, sounds like you're judging and this absolute human morality you go on about isn't quite so absolute.

I'm not going on about any "absolute human morality"; I believe this is the domain of some other posters.
Central is that in many cultures, there exist an (abstract) institute that can be called the "absolute". Even though it may not be specifically verbalizable, it exists.

It is the common belief in the existence of this absolute (and sometimes its unattainability) that gives us room and direction to discuss things.
If we wouldn't believe in this absolute, or if we would be sure that we have already attained it, we would not discuss -- we would take the sword and immediately kill anyone threatening us, or at least call them names and refuse talking to them.

But as long as we discuss, find arguments, better ourselves etc. this is a sign of going towards that ideal, that absolute.

Discussion is possible only if participants act on the assumption that mutual understanding is possible. (Otherwise, we have a fist fight.)
The assumption that mutual understanding is possible is an absolute.


“ And what cowardice it is to wave *your* little fragile fist in front of the computer and what passive aggressiveness it is to put *your* anger into words ... ”
Do you know what passive aggressiveness is?

(And now you will insist that I am passive aggressive, and no matter what I would say, you will insist in your point ...)

Religion sucks and is full of confusion the world over! Truth however is like a bitter pill that turns sweet in the stomach!

Rosa,

With ex post knowledge, many things look stupid, irrational, illusionary; but before we have this ex post knowledge, the dilemmas we are in are real.

I'll agree with that. You have to realize that my judgement of the pointlessness of the moral dilemma was not my point. It was merely a humorous addition. However, A still leads to B. And as has been pointed out is a synthetic judgement ala Kant.

This goes only if by "morality" you understand "morality is what you can get away with".

No. Morality is what you can't get away with. Remember what I said about not needing to be told not to do what you don't want to do. You don't need a conscience to act according to your nature. You need a conscience to go against your nature.

In Bowling for Columbine an interesting issue about provincial American life philsophy was brought up: Children are taught that if they do bad at school when they are 12, they will end up alone, poor and miserable for the rest of their life.

Michael Moore is full of shit. He wishes he were the conscience of America.

Saying "smoking marijuana leads to harder drugs because you are already a criminal so why not" is an example of this very thinking.

As if one action would cement a person's life for ever and ever, as if one could not change and as if one could never learn anything. This is a gross underestimation of human abilities!

No. It's an example of guilt by association. The anti-drug pushers would say that marijuana is illegal because it leads to harder drugs as if it were some type of inherent property of pot to make people move on to harder drugs. But, what leads to drugs is merely the fact that the drug is illegal to begin with. One begins to associate oneself with a criminal and a drug-user mentality. It becomes easier to do other drugs because they are lumped into a general category. Pot, cocaine, lsd, they're all drugs. They're all illegal. In for a penny, in for a pound.

See?

And where is that sword, who is holding it?

In the case of religion, it is held by all those who imbue you with the belief in heaven and hell. In the omniscience of a watchful and vengeful god.

In the case of law, by the enactor's of the law. Police, judiciary, prison.

In the case of social more, by the people around you who will ridicule and/or shun you should you choose to act in a way not sanctioned by the group.

In all these cases, it is imposed by other. It is eventually internalized so that you don't need other. They exist within. The shameful voice of inner conscience.

Explain why it is ridiculous and patronizing.

I can't believe that you don't know why. Just as Gendanken has said, this question makes it seem as though only the faithful are worthy to discuss the value of judgement and hell. Patently ridiculous.

Morality is just a collective term for those values and preferences that a certain society considers desireable.

Yes. Values and preferences that are imposed from without.

Why is child-raping abhorrent? By what standard do you judge that child-raping is abhorrent and not pleasurable? (I swear, pedophiles disagree with you!) By what standard are adultery, theft and murder pleasurable?

Because the majority of people in the world don't hanker for a piece of baby ass. And, I imagine that many pedophiles also consider it abhorrent and they fight within themselves to prevent their urge to rape children from surfacing.

Adultery, theft, and murder are all pleasurable in that they appeal to a more broad group of people. Practically everyone is tempted from time to time to commit these crimes while few are ever tempted to rape children.

That's not true. We function on some faith all the time. It is just that what is termed "evidence" demands the least faith.

Yes. But, if you don't see the difference in faith in scientific journals from the faith in god and eternal damnation, then... I don't know what to say.

Not so long ago, your muscles hurt after exercising because acid collected in them; and now they have it that they hurt because the fibres get torn. And we just trust it.

Yes. But that's the difference, yes? Science admits its mistakes albeit grudgingly at times. Religion can admit no mistakes. Religion is the word of god and therefore not subject to change.

Eventually, you could claim that everything is imposed externally, even the air that we breath.
People can internalize rules, values etc., and this is when those rules become strong.

Yes. This is the issue. Other imposes himself on your consciousness to such a degree that you carry a reflection of that other the rest of your life.

But, when this voice of conscience is based on a single lynch pin, then the whole framework falls apart if that lynch pin is removed. Now, all forms of socially imbued conscience are prone to this keystone failure, but none are so weakly keyed as religion. Without god all things fall apart to the religious soul.

This is how laws work, *any* laws. Comply, or face the consequences.
I don't think there are any laws that would not be perceived as restrictive at least in some way.

Yes. But, there is a difference between religious laws and societal laws. As I've said, religious laws come from god and are not subject to debate.

Me: It's just that religious commandments are especially weak in their absolute absolutism.
You: ?

Exactly what I've been saying. Religious commandments are absolute in that they are not subect to change. They are the voice of god and it isn't possible to question the veracity of such a commandment. They depend upon god and without faith they crumble into dust. The punishment of hell means nothing to an unbeliever.

Non sequitur.

How so? "...this line of words cannot command or decide."

Are you denying free will?

I have in many ways, but that isn't what I'm saying here. In many ways, this modern world does have a freedom of choice in religion. But, most of the religions follow a few lines of deviation. Christianity has its various sects. Islam has fewer sects. Hinduism, buddhism, shintoism, others that get smaller and smaller as they vanish into insignificance on the grand scale of things.

But, do you really choose your religion? Some do. But most inherit their religion just as they inherit their culture. Conversions are more commonplace than they once were, but even so they are still looked down upon by true believers. What would your family think of you if you converted to Mormonism?

They are moral by their standards, but they are immoral by my standards, and vice versa.

I am surprised to hear you say this. Aren't you the one who has spoken of ingrained human morality and such?

I'm not going on about any "absolute human morality"; I believe this is the domain of some other posters.

No. It is something that you have said several times, unless I misunderstood you. Want me to go digging for examples?

Central is that in many cultures, there exist an (abstract) institute that can be called the "absolute". Even though it may not be specifically verbalizable, it exists.

It is the common belief in the existence of this absolute (and sometimes its unattainability) that gives us room and direction to discuss things.
If we wouldn't believe in this absolute, or if we would be sure that we have already attained it, we would not discuss -- we would take the sword and immediately kill anyone threatening us, or at least call them names and refuse talking to them.

But as long as we discuss, find arguments, better ourselves etc. this is a sign of going towards that ideal, that absolute.

But, don't you think that perhaps you and I actually move closer to different "absolutes" in our quest for perfection? We come from different cultures and perhaps this might be the cause of these differences, but even those of the same culture go towards different ideals of perfection. It is only in those who come together with an ideal or goal that is similar enough for empathy that true brotherhood can exist. But, those with different ideals and goals can come together in a society. Each going his own way and yet somehow coexisting within a society. Each contributing in his own manner.

And yet, there are those who put forth that claim that all should hold equal values and ideals. And it is only those whose ideals are political and religious power that are in the position to push these ideals on others in large numbers.

Discussion is possible only if participants act on the assumption that mutual understanding is possible. (Otherwise, we have a fist fight.)
The assumption that mutual understanding is possible is an absolute.

I don't know. There are many times that mutual understanding has not been the final outcome of a discussion, especially here in these forums as a prime example. And yet, even if mutual understanding isn't achieved, both sides might very well have both progressed closer to their own particular ideal of perfection.

(And now you will insist that I am passive aggressive, and no matter what I would say, you will insist in your point ...)

I have in the past and perhaps I will in the future. But at the moment I am saying no such thing. I am merely stating that what Gendanken is doing is an example of overt aggression. Not passive.


c20H25N30,

Religion sucks and is full of confusion the world over! Truth however is like a bitter pill that turns sweet in the stomach!

How do you judge Truth?

Consider the thread a gedanken- I sat down one day and noticed the differences in human behavior around children and around adults.
An adult posits a thinking, evaluating mind which other thinking, evaluating minds are conscious of and, above all, protective of.

And so, when a thinking mind is around another mind that does not think- as in the inert blocks of the comatose or the child- a thinking mind becomes free and unscrupled as if it were alone.
Ever seen 'The Nurse'?
I picture a man picking his nose near a crib with the child wide awake, but not in a supermakert.
I then made the leap of comparing the child or the invalid to machines.
And so, unlike the Medieval rubbish of innate conscience or synderesis, conscience becomes a simple explanation of being protective and aware of other thinking minds.
Other people.
A conscience is simply a human mind that has been handled by or imposed upon by other people..
I like how it sounds…simple, yes.

Dr. Lou:
Ugh... fuck the chinese, don't get me started on the chinese.
I didn't know it was particularly taboo to show aggression towards people in china, but now it all makes sense. Now I know why they boil cats alive, and sodomosie cetaceans with electric rods.
They have the most bizarre, twisted, impractical ways of doing things to animals, like some morbid genius is sitting in his basement with a pen and paper purposefully trying to come up with the most horrible ways to torture animals and then sending his notes up a chute to society. Chinese fucks.

They are a powerful people but boy wouldn't you love to raze through a nail parlor and shoot every last fucking Chinese woman so obvsioulsy talking bad about you in her language?
Lazy cunts.

Seems the last thing a Chinese or a Japanese would do, other than kick the dog for you playing your music too loud til its barking up blood, is fucking tell you directly what is bothering them.
Koreans are also this way, but ..less.

Rosa:
Said it, not it. Call yourself strong and powerful, and you cease being it.

You are judgemental and vain as hell.

In this case you are neither 'compassionate' nor 'patient'.

For that matter, I did not call myself strong or powerful- it was a comparative statement with you as contrast. Read objectively, it does not say I am either strong or strongest.
If you value needing people or them needing you, then by all means I respect it.
What is not respectable is this trait being instrumentalized.
We're all judgmental, and vanity is blah for blahs.
Check my lipstick!

Ah, I love you, Gendy
And I love you too, draga moja.

I'm dropping this as you've brought up good points:

It must be noted that values and preferences are not something that each individual would make up, uniquely; there are many people whose favourite colour is blue, or who prefer spicy food. One doesn't really own one's values and preferences (V&P)-- they have more or less the nature of communality. We aren't the sole owners of a certain set of V&P -- and this is one of the expressions of human gregarious nature. More importantly, it is through the communality of V&P that a society is held together, individuals being interdependent on their fulfilling of V&P, thereby providing available V&P for each other and new members.
Exactly!
Now, can you see how every last piece of moral is simply a reaction formation?
Reaction to men- others.


It is easy to mistake that one feels bad for not living up to certain V&P just because of other people. Humans are gregarious beings, living in social groups in which they are mutually dependant; one cannot really live and be all by himself, one does not invent oneself from scratch.
When one fails, one feels bad because one failed both oneself *and* others. Namely, through social causality, if you fail on yourself, you are also failing on others, and when they fail, this comes back at you. (Imagine a small tribe: if one member fails, they all have negative consequences from that.)
I don't understand.

If the posion feel of failure is because some standard has not been met, who set it?
All alone, man is biology with no spirit- spirit being the basis for conscience.
No?

“ It must be noted that values and preferences are not something that each individual would make up, uniquely; there are many people whose favourite colour is blue, or who prefer spicy food. One doesn't really own one's values and preferences (V&P)-- they have more or less the nature of communality. We aren't the sole owners of a certain set of V&P -- and this is one of the expressions of human gregarious nature. More importantly, it is through the communality of V&P that a society is held together, individuals being interdependent on their fulfilling of V&P, thereby providing available V&P for each other and new members. ”

Exactly!
Now, can you see how every last piece of moral is simply a reaction formation?
Reaction to men- others.

What you are saying appears right and applicable, but I think it is a bit narrow; it is right if we see human behaviour in a short-term perspective, in a freeze-frame, synchronically.

What you are at is something like what G.H. Mead said about gestures, with the two dogs:

Dogs approaching each other in hostile attitude carry on such a language of gestures. They walk around each other, growling and snapping, and waiting for the opportunity to attack . . . . (Mind, Self and Society 14) The act of each dog becomes the stimulus to the other dog for his response. There is then a relationship between these two; and as the act is responded to by the other dog, it, in turn, undergoes change. The very fact that the dog is ready to attack another becomes a stimulus to the other dog to change his own position or his own attitude. He has no sooner done this than the change of attitude in the second dog in turn causes the first dog to change his attitude. We have here a conversation of gestures.

(http://www.utm.edu/research/iep/m/mead.htm , also the next passage)

In this sense, conscience (as you have it) would be comparable to Mead's gestures.

But Mead went further

They are not, however, gestures in the sense that they are significant. We do not assume that the dog says to himself, "If the animal comes from this direction he is going to spring at my throat and I will turn in such a way." What does take place is an actual change in his own position due to the direction of the approach of the other dog. (Mind, Self and Society 42-43, emphasis added).

We can use Mead's theory as a methodological crutch in this discussion, and work on from the assumption that there is more to conscience than just that it is "imposed", or a "reaction formation".

Thinking of conscience of being only a "reaction formation" would be something like thinking that all there is to communication are gestures (in regards to Mead's theory).


“ It is easy to mistake that one feels bad for not living up to certain V&P just because of other people. Humans are gregarious beings, living in social groups in which they are mutually dependant; one cannot really live and be all by himself, one does not invent oneself from scratch.
When one fails, one feels bad because one failed both oneself *and* others. Namely, through social causality, if you fail on yourself, you are also failing on others, and when they fail, this comes back at you. (Imagine a small tribe: if one member fails, they all have negative consequences from that.) ”

I don't understand.

I have looked up Mead today, but what I said is awfully alike what he's saying: http://www2.pfeiffer.edu/~lridener/DSS/Mead/MINDSELF.HTML

The self is not so much a substance as a process in which the conversation of gestures has been internalized within an organic form. This process does not exist for itself, but is simply a phase of the whole social organization of which the individual is a part. The organization of the social act has been imported into the organism and becomes then the mind of the individual. It still includes the attitudes of others, but now highly organized, so that they become what we call social attitudes rather than roles of separate individuals. This process of relating one's own organism to the others in the interactions that are going on, in so far as it is imported into the conduct of the individual with the conversation of the "I" and the "me," constitutes the self.

If the posion feel of failure is because some standard has not been met, who set it?
All alone, man is biology with no spirit- spirit being the basis for conscience.
No?

I don't think so. I don't think that man can ever be "biology with no spirit" and still be man.

Standards are simply about survival. But the more complex the environment and the natural predispositions of the living being, the more complex the standards (elaborate sets of values and preferences), and the more it can happen that the significance of a certain value or preference is lost in the holistic causality, thus making that value or preference appear whimsical and useless.


EDIT:
As for setting the standard: Seen diachronically, throughout a long period of time, it seems simple. Standards, in the beginning very "primal" and very obviously connected to survival (like animals having standards on which food to prefer, which mates to choose), can in time (read: emergence and further development of new species) become more complex.




***

No. Morality is what you can't get away with. Remember what I said about not needing to be told not to do what you don't want to do. You don't need a conscience to act according to your nature. You need a conscience to go against your nature.

This is backwards and assuming that people can grow up completely uninfluenced, more: that people can grow up not being raised by other people, and still be people.
"Acting according to your nature" is an expression of rebellious romantic idealism.


"In Bowling for Columbine an interesting issue about provincial American life philsophy was brought up: Children are taught that if they do bad at school when they are 12, they will end up alone, poor and miserable for the rest of their life."

Michael Moore is full of shit. He wishes he were the conscience of America.

And this is supposed to be an ad hominem ...
FYI, it was one of the makers of South Park who said what I quoted. And I think he was right: children are taught that they will be losers if they ever, in any way, even if just for a little, fail to do good in school. "One F, and your life is lost."


No. It's an example of guilt by association. The anti-drug pushers would say that marijuana is illegal because it leads to harder drugs as if it were some type of inherent property of pot to make people move on to harder drugs. But, what leads to drugs is merely the fact that the drug is illegal to begin with. One begins to associate oneself with a criminal and a drug-user mentality. It becomes easier to do other drugs because they are lumped into a general category. Pot, cocaine, lsd, they're all drugs. They're all illegal. In for a penny, in for a pound.

See?

But this is just one explanation. People don't do things they are told are harmful just "for fun" or because "they can", this is a spurious observation. They do it, among other reasons, because they think "Oh no, it won't do any harm to me, I'm stronger than that" (a seeming test of one's personality), or because they hope for the healing effects of doing something (that is also harmful though) (self-medication).


In the case of religion, it is held by all those who imbue you with the belief in heaven and hell. In the omniscience of a watchful and vengeful god.

In the case of law, by the enactor's of the law. Police, judiciary, prison.

In the case of social more, by the people around you who will ridicule and/or shun you should you choose to act in a way not sanctioned by the group.

In all these cases, it is imposed by other. It is eventually internalized so that you don't need other. They exist within. The shameful voice of inner conscience.

And it goes the other way too: It is the voice of the same conscience that tells you that education and healthy food are good for you, for example.


“ Explain why it is ridiculous and patronizing. ”
I can't believe that you don't know why. Just as Gendanken has said, this question makes it seem as though only the faithful are worthy to discuss the value of judgement and hell. Patently ridiculous.

Hm? The "worthy"? The knowledgeable, yes.

The thing is that if you don't believe in God, judgement and hell, they have no power over you, and if you still think they do, then you have merely overrationalized and old frustration that you experienced being betrayed by people who should have been good to you, doing what they said was God's work.
You're playing a victim.


“ Morality is just a collective term for those values and preferences that a certain society considers desireable. ”

Yes. Values and preferences that are imposed from without.

Uh. Imposed. Then the value of education (and education is an important value to you) is just as well "imposed" on you.


Because the majority of people in the world don't hanker for a piece of baby ass. And, I imagine that many pedophiles also consider it abhorrent and they fight within themselves to prevent their urge to rape children from surfacing.

Adultery, theft, and murder are all pleasurable in that they appeal to a more broad group of people. Practically everyone is tempted from time to time to commit these crimes while few are ever tempted to rape children.

You are making a statistic-like argument.
Just because many people do something, this doesn't mean that this is a desireable trait.
Many people like to live comfortably, living comfortably is a desireable trait.
Many people are not pedophiles, pedophily is not a desireable trait.
Many people swear, but swearing is not a desireable trait.

There's something else behind values and preferences, and it isn't just statistical averages.


Yes. But, if you don't see the difference in faith in scientific journals from the faith in god and eternal damnation, then... I don't know what to say.

Oh, how you dislike me ... :)


Yes. But that's the difference, yes? Science admits its mistakes albeit grudgingly at times. Religion can admit no mistakes. Religion is the word of god and therefore not subject to change.

It all depends on what you consider as "religion". If by "religion" all you have in mind is some "archaic, rigid, despotic social structure", then you are just once more following your old overrationalization.

Also, "religion is the word of God" is you believing that whatever anyone says that God told him, it must actually be that God told him. Which is silly, or you assume to know better. And you could know better only if you were a believer yourself. Are you?


“ Eventually, you could claim that everything is imposed externally, even the air that we breath.
People can internalize rules, values etc., and this is when those rules become strong. ”

Yes. This is the issue. Other imposes himself on your consciousness to such a degree that you carry a reflection of that other the rest of your life.

Do you think that we could still *be*, independent of all influence and "imposing"?


But, when this voice of conscience is based on a single lynch pin, then the whole framework falls apart if that lynch pin is removed. Now, all forms of socially imbued conscience are prone to this keystone failure, but none are so weakly keyed as religion. Without god all things fall apart to the religious soul.

Lynch pin. Uh. You are being awfully scientific, yes. :rolleyes:


“ This is how laws work, *any* laws. Comply, or face the consequences.
I don't think there are any laws that would not be perceived as restrictive at least in some way. ”
Yes. But, there is a difference between religious laws and societal laws. As I've said, religious laws come from god and are not subject to debate.

Let's see which laws "come from God" in Christianity. There are the Ten Commandments and Jesus's commandment to love.
What is there to debate?!


Exactly what I've been saying. Religious commandments are absolute in that they are not subect to change. They are the voice of god and it isn't possible to question the veracity of such a commandment. They depend upon god and without faith they crumble into dust.

Any commandment "crumbles into dust" if you doubt the instance that issued that commandment.
If you, for yourself, set the commandment "Don't smoke!", but then have self-doubts, that commandment will be worth nothing, yes. But the commandment itself has nothing to do with it; the commandment's worth depends on you believing in it and trusting the instance that issued it (in this case, you).


The punishment of hell means nothing to an unbeliever.

Then why the hell do you go on with such anger about hell? Maybe because you are secretly afraid of it?


“ Non sequitur. ”
How so? "...this line of words cannot command or decide."

Let's see:

Me: “ That proscription is only a line of words. What you will do with that line of words, what value and importance you will give them -- this this line of words cannot command or decide. So don't do as if it does or should. ”

You: Then they aren't commandments at all.

For a line of words to command or decide, there has to be trust in the instance that issued this line of words. You are taking this trust and this instance out of the equation, as if they weren't necessary; or more: you are taking the instance that issued the commandment and the trust in this instance for granted.

You wish for a line of words to have power over you just like that, without you beliving those words and having trust for the instance who issued those words.

This is not possible, hence what you said is a non sequitur.


“ Are you denying free will? ”

I have in many ways, but that isn't what I'm saying here. In many ways, this modern world does have a freedom of choice in religion. But, most of the religions follow a few lines of deviation. Christianity has its various sects. Islam has fewer sects. Hinduism, buddhism, shintoism, others that get smaller and smaller as they vanish into insignificance on the grand scale of things.

But, do you really choose your religion? Some do. But most inherit their religion just as they inherit their culture. Conversions are more commonplace than they once were, but even so they are still looked down upon by true believers. What would your family think of you if you converted to Mormonism?

Does to you, free will mean 'being absolutely in control of all your doings'?


I am surprised to hear you say this. Aren't you the one who has spoken of ingrained human morality and such?

I don't think so, certainly not in the way you put it.


“ I'm not going on about any "absolute human morality"; I believe this is the domain of some other posters. ”
No. It is something that you have said several times, unless I misunderstood you. Want me to go digging for examples?

Yes, please do.


But, don't you think that perhaps you and I actually move closer to different "absolutes" in our quest for perfection? We come from different cultures and perhaps this might be the cause of these differences, but even those of the same culture go towards different ideals of perfection. It is only in those who come together with an ideal or goal that is similar enough for empathy that true brotherhood can exist. But, those with different ideals and goals can come together in a society. Each going his own way and yet somehow coexisting within a society. Each contributing in his own manner.

True. But the idea of "absolute" remains; the absolute is there as an institute that can be occupied with different contents (whatever each person sees as an absolute).


And yet, there are those who put forth that claim that all should hold equal values and ideals. And it is only those whose ideals are political and religious power that are in the position to push these ideals on others in large numbers.

Yes, we can describe this as system pressure and system economy. This is what systems do.


“ Discussion is possible only if participants act on the assumption that mutual understanding is possible. (Otherwise, we have a fist fight.)
The assumption that mutual understanding is possible is an absolute. ”

I don't know. There are many times that mutual understanding has not been the final outcome of a discussion, especially here in these forums as a prime example.

I didn't say that mutual understanding *is* a final outcome; I only said that "Discussion is possible only if participants act on the assumption that mutual understanding is possible."


And yet, even if mutual understanding isn't achieved, both sides might very well have both progressed closer to their own particular ideal of perfection.

Sure.


I have in the past and perhaps I will in the future. But at the moment I am saying no such thing. I am merely stating that what Gendanken is doing is an example of overt aggression. Not passive.

Heh. "Overt aggression"? By whose standards?

Rosa:

I'd been picking my brain all day, having read Koestler's thesis on what he calls holons, picking and picking trying to remember where it was I'd read about dogs engaging in 'duels'.
Now with enough time to do so, I sit to pick up my serious posts today and lo:

Dogs approaching each other in hostile attitude carry on such a language of gestures. They walk around each other, growling and snapping, and waiting for the opportunity to attack . . . . (Mind, Self and Society 14) The act of each dog becomes the stimulus to the other dog for his response. There is then a relationship between these two; and as the act is responded to by the other dog, it, in turn, undergoes change. The very fact that the dog is ready to attack another becomes a stimulus to the other dog to change his own position or his own attitude. He has no sooner done this than the change of attitude in the second dog in turn causes the first dog to change his attitude. We have here a conversation of gestures.


To say that our internal codes are simply other people is narrow, I admitted it.
Aesthetically, the thought is complete and appealing but philosophically and practically, lacks.

Mead does come back and say these gestures between dogs are just that and lack the significance, not to mention flexibly and omnipotence, of human conscience.
So we can't say reaction formations are significant, as they only serve to react as opposed to create.
Which is why slave morality is not as much significant as it is useful and just...there.

However:
I’m remembering a German word here- Massenphscyhologie.
It means something like group mentality, which does not require the presence of other people but and Idea of people that once grasped will not go away. This Idea is much more dynamic in its influence on a man's psyche than just a person alone, as the idea of god is much stronger than a Eucharist.
For example- those two dogs reacting to each other don't do so on principles.
The fight is over and once over and each walks away to forget each other.
Yet have two men doing the same and you introduce social principles introduced by his language, customs, beliefs, and by doing so you introduce a kind of empathy that would have a man go against his Self.

I like this- "One can be a victim of group-fanaticism even in the privacy of one's bathroom"
A dog could never be as 'victimized' away from other dogs is my point.

Mead is saying almost the same here:
The self is not so much a substance as a process in which the conversation of gestures has been internalized within an organic form. This process does not exist for itself, but is simply a phase of the whole social organization of which the individual is a part. The organization of the social act has been imported into the organism and becomes then the mind of the individual. It still includes the attitudes of others, but now highly organized, so that they become what we call social attitudes rather than roles of separate individuals. This process of relating one's own organism to the others in the interactions that are going on, in so far as it is imported into the conduct of the individual with the conversation of the "I" and the "me," constitutes the self.

So by 'group mentality' we need to rip the phrase apart and create a new defintion for 'group'.

Group is not people, per se, but the language, customs, and beliefs which give a man his identity.
These go into the making of a thinking mind, which in turn, other thinking minds are aware and protective of.
Better?
Yet none is possible without people, so we can still surmise that conscience, like hell, is other people.

I don't think so. I don't think that man can ever be "biology with no spirit" and still be man.

Standards are simply about survival. But the more complex the environment and the natural predispositions of the living being, the more complex the standards (elaborate sets of values and preferences), and the more it can happen that the significance of a certain value or preference is lost in the holistic causality, thus making that value or preference appear whimsical and useless.

No, strength is about survival. Standards concern discipline.
I was thinking of standards based on a reason that creates unattainable ideas, usually copied from other people and made noble.

Meaning- man alone is a quasi-beast, spends his life looking down on his hands, his home, food, and clothing but his gorgeous mind is the source for creativity.
So on the last trait, which is his alone, we can say is his "spirit"- and no objectivist all dolled up in his philosophical little Rand trappings could equal the simplesse of this objective existence.

Man with other men spends his life looking up and around, towards others and aware of them in his sphere.
Which injects him with standards he now values not becuase of him but because of them.
And his creative 'spirit' is transformed for their sake- so he must, I feel, free himself to recapture that spirit as it was by examining himself, his will and his world.
And by this I of course do not mean flying off to some island in a loincloth like some noble savage.
Ya just need to question.

Yet none is possible without people, so we can still surmise that conscience, like hell, is other people.
Hm. What isn't other people, then?

Jenyar:
Hm. What isn't other people, then?
Good question.

I don't know, and cannot say man is an island once he has been exposed to other people. He carries the language and human leitmotif, if you will, wherever he goes.


So what isn't other people, where a person is concerned, would have to be.....what?

*edit*
Small metaphor- the finding of TB antibodies in your blood means you've been exposed to tuberculosis. Until you die, you carry these things in your blood having been exposed.
No system or technique can purge you of them.

Indeed. Morals and social norms are socially defined as well as enforced. Ever studied Sociology?

From Heidegger's idea that anxiety is what he called "authenticity":


"Initially everything we do and say and think and believe have been done and said and thought and believed before.
The activities we regard as worthy of our time and effort (learning, work, play), the ultimate values and meanings we pursue (achievement, love, children), and the particular styles and forms thru which we pursue these goals have all been provided by our various human cultures.
How different our lives are from the lives of our ancient ancestors."

- section V1, on Conformity, Inauthenticity, Lostness.

Many will be put off by what resembles educratic haughtiness if they read his work.

*edit*
And for amusement, I'll put this here. He writes:

"How can we bring ourselves back from our lostness in conformity? What have we neglected, which has enabled culture to absorb us?
How can we re-possess our lives, wrench ourselves away from the 'they'?" - same section

This, from a Nazi.

Balder1:
Indeed. Morals and social norms are socially defined as well as enforced. Ever studied Sociology?
Not as much sociology as people in themselves.
Malls, movie theathers, school- I like watching.

Psychologists and sociologists at any rate have it wrong- character is socially conditioned, not personality.
The latter is surrendered to the former.

I don't understand.

Psychologists and sociologists at any rate have it wrong- character is socially conditioned

Exactly as I said - morals(character) are socially defined and enforced. Right.

not personality.

Psychologists contend that personality is not very socially conditioned.

Character supersedes personality, ie, societal values are imposed upon individual values? Is that what you're saying?

All I was saying was that your example was an example of a moral being socially defined and imposed. Personally, I'd return the clerk condemning look with an annoyed roll of my eyes. I wouldn't feel ashamed(despite her attempt) in least, but I might be a bit uncomfortable, especially if she tried to escalate it into social conflict. It's a trivial matter. I would just take the Canadian quarter - as would most men, because we don't lower ourselves to that level. We just don't take it that seriously.

Yet have two men doing the same and you introduce social principles introduced by his language, customs, beliefs, and by doing so you introduce a kind of empathy that would have a man go against his Self.

I like this- "One can be a victim of group-fanaticism even in the privacy of one's bathroom"
A dog could never be as 'victimized' away from other dogs is my point.

You think in terms of Adam Smith economics. That older kind of economics believed that each agent does whatever is good for him, completely disregarding the group. But that's not true, gregarious beings don't behave that way.
Ideally, a rational agent will do what is best *both* for him *and* the group. Meaning that he will not simply blindly act on his interest disregarding other members of the group; he will go for what is a second-best option for him (if necessary) in order to not usurp and destroy the dynamics of the group and keep the group together.

Surely, this can be seen as "going against the Self". But being a member of a group yet acting in full disregard of the group, you are eventually endangering your own existence, as the rest of the group members will try to get rid of you.


Your theory holds only if we deny that humans are gregarious beings, or at least say that gregariousness is something detrimental.
Either way, we can observe that humans are gregarious and this is necessary for them to survive. Also, language is a phenomenon that meaningfully exists only in the realm of gregariousness.

So either give up all communication, reproduction, parenting, working and what have you of gregarious behaviour, or give gregariousness what is due.


So by 'group mentality' we need to rip the phrase apart and create a new defintion for 'group'.

Group is not people, per se, but the language, customs, and beliefs which give a man his identity.
These go into the making of a thinking mind, which in turn, other thinking minds are aware and protective of.
Better?

Better.


Yet none is possible without people, so we can still surmise that conscience, like hell, is other people.

Are you quoting Sartre just for effect, or are you also evaluating conscience as something bad and undesireable, as "hell"?

Your definition seems to be based on the individual vs society conflict perspective.
And what is the problem with consicence is that you are seeing it from the perspective of this conflict.


No, strength is about survival. Standards concern discipline.

Surely, strength plays a great role in survival, but that is too general.
Strength applied in a way that ensures better survival means living up to one's standards.
Strength per se is nothing, unless it is applied in a certain way, and that is standard.

I am thinking in terms of basic biology: standards, values, preferences -- these are terms with which we can *describe* a certain living organism and its way of living.

Like: Deer eat grass, but if the opportunity arises, they will eat lettuce in your garden instead. We can observe and describe that they act on the preference of "lettuce is better than grass". They cannot always eat lettuce, but on their preference list, lettuce is above grass. -- They cannot always live up to the standard, but sometimes they do, and they try to do it as often as they can.


I was thinking of standards based on a reason that creates unattainable ideas, usually copied from other people and made noble.

"Unattainable ideas" like what?


Meaning- man alone is a quasi-beast, spends his life looking down on his hands, his home, food, and clothing but his gorgeous mind is the source for creativity.
So on the last trait, which is his alone, we can say is his "spirit"- and no objectivist all dolled up in his philosophical little Rand trappings could equal the simplesse of this objective existence.

I'm afraid you think like a Smithian romantic!


Man with other men spends his life looking up and around, towards others and aware of them in his sphere.
Which injects him with standards he now values not becuase of him but because of them.

You better have a good explanation for this!

How exactly does person A do something "because of other people"?
Are they threatening A in some way?
Does A's life depend on them?


And his creative 'spirit' is transformed for their sake- so he must, I feel, free himself to recapture that spirit as it was by examining himself, his will and his world.

How is that -- "for their sake"? Are they telling him to do it? Are they threatening him?

Or is there some other reason, for example the one that people simply behave gregariously?

Both following statements are true, but there is a difference if I say:
(1) A does action x because of other people.
(2) A does action x because A is a gregarious being.

"Because of other people" carries no explanatory value. You have to add *why* it is that other people matter! Why do they matter?


“ Hm. What isn't other people, then? ”

Good question.

I don't know, and cannot say man is an island once he has been exposed to other people. He carries the language and human leitmotif, if you will, wherever he goes.

One is "exposed to other people" from the beginning on, one never was an island.

One may think that one can become an island, but this is, in my opinion, an attempt to create a sense of individuality, this individuality being based on the individual vs society conflict, which is an attempt that does not bear good fruit.


So what isn't other people, where a person is concerned, would have to be.....what?

What isn't "other people" is the specialness that is established in a relationship between people.


*edit*
Small metaphor- the finding of TB antibodies in your blood means you've been exposed to tuberculosis. Until you die, you carry these things in your blood having been exposed.
No system or technique can purge you of them.

You are making it sound as if being affected by other people is something bad.

What isn't "other people" is the specialness that is established in a relationship between people.

You are making it sound as if being affected by other people is something bad.

Maybe not, but there's been very few mention in this topic on to what extent is our conscience other people and what other part is our conscience ours. Yes, we are "we" before we are an "I", but after ego integrity is developed then many parts of us become more of us than other people.

Oscar:
Maybe not, but there's been very few mention in this topic on to what extent is our conscience "other people" and what other part is our conscience ours. Yes, we are "we" before we are an "I", but after ego integrity is developed then many parts of us become more of us than other people.
Pardon?
How is it that we are 'we' before we are "I", considering the most selfish humans on this planet are still in diapers?

Separate consciousness from conscience, the latter being what is thought of as a super-ego: a thing injected into men by outsiders.
The former surrenders to the latter by expanding into it.
This is when we precedes I.

Rosa:
You think in terms of Adam Smith economics. That older kind of economics believed that each agent does whatever is good for him, completely disregarding the group. But that's not true, gregarious beings don't behave that way.
Ideally, a rational agent will do what is best *both* for him *and* the group.

Only after learning the bitter lesson of powerlessness without group.
The same thing that happens to a gazelle that looks for its herd and trembles alone- this instinct is internalized into something far more powerful and/or destructive in a human mind in the form of conscience.
The good in it is that it keeps our species alive.
The bad in it is its propensity for driving men insane for their nature and limiting the idea of their own power. We are one powerful species- it seems the most powerful among us are those able to get over what other men think.

You say as much here:

Surely, this can be seen as "going against the Self". But being a member of a group yet acting in full disregard of the group, you are eventually endangering your own existence, as the rest of the group members will try to get rid of you.
Now.
Define gregariousness, you've used that word before.

You feel that humans are drawn together by a need to chat?


So either give up all communication, reproduction, parenting, working and what have you of gregarious behaviour, or give gregariousness what is due.


What does reproduction and parenting have to do with language?

Are you quoting Sartre just for effect, or are you also evaluating conscience as something bad and undesireable, as "hell"?
Excellent question.

Simple aesthetics, I like the equation.
Not wholly saying conscience is hell- it allows us to feel the subtleties in life that makes art possible.
So, mostly for effect.

Your definition seems to be based on the individual vs society conflict perspective.
And what is the problem with consicence is that you are seeing it from the perspective of this conflict.

Because it *is* a conflict for those alive or awake enough to feel the limits of its social structure.
For those that wish to break free but too conscient to do so.

Surely, strength plays a great role in survival, but that is too general.
Strength applied in a way that ensures better survival means living up to one's standards.
Strength per se is nothing, unless it is applied in a certain way, and that is standard.

I am thinking in terms of basic biology: standards, values, preferences -- these are terms with which we can *describe* a certain living organism and its way of living.

Allright.

"Unattainable ideas" like what?

Purity. Holiness.
All the thousand and one carrots our little gods place before their turtles.

I'm afraid you think like a Smithian romantic!

And you think like a dot.com Right Livelyhooder!

You better have a good explanation for this!

How exactly does person A do something "because of other people"?
Are they threatening A in some way?
Does A's life depend on them?

That is what is makes it so clever- he doesn't have to be threatened.
Introduce a m