What is Dasein?

Getting somewhere? In what context? When human behaviors come into conflict over value judgments there are generally three options available to “get somewhere”.

1] might makes right: the “optimal” behaviors here revolving around whoever has the power to enforce his or her own perceived self-interest
2] right makes might: the “optimal” behaviors here revolving around whatever it is decided are the most rational and virtuous behaviors
3] moderation, negotiation and compromise: the “optimal” behaviors here revolving around a political give and take rooted in democracy and the rule of law.

Really, you pick the conflicting goods and we can explore these options more substantively.

Or, as with Communism, are the “sub-optimal” issues “resolved” only when others come to accept your own take on them?

Sure, when you set the default at your own reasonable arguments and assumptions [about Communism, abortion or anything else], then those who don’t share them are “dumbasses”.

Really, I truly do get that part.

Thus the pros of Communism here – greengarageblog.org/10-chief-pr … -communism – are the opinions of dumbasses while the cons arguments reflect the opinions of the smart ones.

Yet each side makes arguments that the other side cannot just make go away. It merely revolves around commensing with a different set of assumptions about human interactions. For example, should social interaction revolve more around “I” or “we”.

And, of course, here too there are dumbass and smart answers.

And, it would seem, rational men and women can “think this through” such that whatever particular experiences they had with either Communism or capitalism is subsumed in their deduced moral obligations as rational men and women. Thus it is assumed that [as with Ayn Rand] to be rational is to be virtuous.

No, I speculated that renditions of this are rooted existentially in daseins confronting conflicting goods out in one or another actual political economy.

Just as they can speculate on what all of this is for me, I can speculate on what all of this is for them. It’s just that I clearly recognize that my own speculations here are no less existential contraptions than theirs.

If you say so. Only why on earth wouldn’t I?

I can only get out of my hole when I come upon a new experience that succeeds in yanking me up out of it. Or when another relates an experience they had in which they convince me there is in fact a reasonable manner in which to make a demonstrable distinction between right and wrong, good and evil behavior.

What other option is there?

Well, God could manifest Himself and yank me up out of it. Sure, that’s not necessarily impossible.

What criteria do you have other than “think like I do and you’re out of the hole”?

What on earth does this mean?! To you for example. Note a single context in which this has worked for you.

Indeed, just as when Will Durant critiques his “epistemologists”, he in turn seems to suggest that good and bad are within reach of the philosophers.

Well, if either of them were still around, I would confront them no less with the components of my own frame of mind here: dasein, conflicting goods and political economy.

But only out in the world of actual conflicted human behaviors. And they too could choose the actual context.

As for the subjunctive elements involved, how are they in turn not embodied in dasein, conflicting goods and political economy?

Can you cite examples from your own life?

Speaking of cherries being picked, you ignored all of the points and questions that I raised with you above and focused only on this one.

Or are we to just accept your own assumptions regarding the “evil” hole that I am dragging others down into?

Note to others:

Can you believe this?!!

Is it even possible to be more abstract in encompassing evil in human interactions?

I would challenge him to yank these words down into an actual existential context but, perhaps, one of you might suggest it instead.

Note in Barrett’s Irrational Man, he did point out and highlight the evil hole that humans are facing or in. He ultimately warned readers to get out of that evil hole or ensure one do not fall into it. Barrett did suggest solutions [only generally] but ‘you’ choose to be stuck in that evil hole and continue to dig deeper to trap others to fall into it and live a life of psychological sufferings - that’s an evil intent and act.

I am well versed with Buddha’s [& others’] solutions to the problem and management of sufferings thus can easily deflect your attempts. Initially I thought you were asking for suggestions to help you to get out of that evil hole but subsequently you had revealed your hidden evil intention of trapping people into your “venus fly trap.”

Btw, I have told you earlier, you are borrowing the term ‘dasein’* without reasonably understanding what it is supposed to represent in its full range. Even if you want to use it for your own purpose you should have understood it reasonably [not necessary agree] before you deviate from it for your own use.
*By now I have spent lots of time and still reading B&T so I am reasonable [not fully yet] familiar with the concept of Dasein.

Here is one clue from B&T

Those ‘rival goods’ that you mentioned are problems of the ontic average everydayness - i.e. ruled out for serious considerations. But what is most critical for the Dasein in B&T [including existentialism in general] is not the ontic-existentiell but rather the ontological existential structures and processes of Dasein. It is from these ontological roots that humans can find solutions to problems and realize human-based possibilities optimally.

I anticipate you will send the above to the ‘Recycle Bin’ as ‘intellectual contraptions’ I don’t give a damm on your intention.

It seems that you have not even figured out the nature of general solutions and you are already talking about “optimal solutions”.
If you examine the process of producing general solutions, then you can come to some conclusions about reasonable and unreasonable solutions.

I don’t think that you do get it. If someone says that my assumptions and arguments are not reasonable, I take that seriously. Why? Because I see “reasonableness” as being outside of my opinions. Something is not reasonable just because I think that it is - because I label it that way.

Somehow, you have managed to turn that ass-backward, suggesting that I’m setting the standard of “reasonableness”.

Because watching me eat will not satiate your hunger.

But you’re not having new experiences … you are just watching/reading the experiences of other people.

All thoughts are merely thoughts, but some are better than others.

Consider gratitude journaling or gratitude meditation. It really works.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gratitude_journal

Utter pessimists won’t end up with much in their gratitude journals.

Start small. Think of one thing that you are grateful for at the end of the day.

Soon you will be able to think of three things and then more…

Aw, I’m an annoying optimist…always hopeful and thankful.

Why on earth would I imagine that Barrett would construe the practical implications of “rival goods” in the same manner that I do?

And my intent [re dasein] is to grapple with the is/ought world given the assumption [mine] that we live in a No God world. How on earth do mere mortals arrive at the most or the only rational moral and political narrative/agenda when confronted with these rival goods?

How do you do it? Provide for us an existential trajectory that intertwines the experiences you had in your life and the knowledge/information/ideas you had access to such that you are not in the hole I’m in. In regard to a value judgment all your own.

How would Buddha – “the one who is awake” – have reacted to a context in his days in which different people embraced conflicting value judgments that precipitated conflicting behaviors.

What does being “awake” mean when confronted with any one of hundreds of moral and political conflagrations that have cleaved the human species over the centuries? Bring the knowledge/information/ideas provide here – en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buddhist_ethics – to bear regarding a particular set of conflicting goods.

In other words, out in the world where behaviors are actually judged by others…where very really consequences can be meted out to those who behave in the “wrong” way.

BTW, I have responed to this point any number of times above. I keep waiting for you to bring your own understanding of Heidegger’s understanding of Dasein out into the world of actual conflicted behaviors derived from actual conflicted goods.

How about the points I raised above regarding the workman using a hammer on a nail and a Nazi soldier using a bullet on a Jew?

That aspect of Dasein. Differentiate the ontic from the ontological here.

Instead it’s just more of the same intellectual contraptions:

I challenge you [or anyone else] to bring this particular “world of words” out into the actual flesh and blood world of human interactions in conflict over conflicting goods.

Note to others:

Wouldn’t you deem this to be basically an “intellectual contraption” as it relates to your own conflicted behaviors with others?

If not, please explain why.

But what if, after having done that, the conclusions reached by those who defend Communism as a reasonable [optimal] solution to the problems that plague the human species persist in arguing that those who defend capitalism are the ones being unreasonable?

A philosopher can either provide us with an argument here that resolves this in one or another deontological assessment or she can’t.

And all I ask of the “real me” moral objectivists is that we bring general descriptions such as this down to earth.

But sooner or later these assumptions and arguments are going to be intertwined in one or another political agenda where actual flesh and blood human interactions precipitate consequences that revolve around rewards or punishments.

How [b]then[/b] do we get around either subscribing to might makes right, right makes might or moderation negotiation and compromise?

Again, choose a set of conflicting goods and lets examine more substantively our respective moral narratives.

And, instead of providing a context pertaining to your own interactions with others, we get this:

[quote=“phyllo”]
Consider gratitude journaling or gratitude meditation. It really works.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gratitude_journal
[/quote [/quote]
Okay, that seems reasonable to me. But what does it really have to do with the relationship between the manner in which I construe the meaning of dasein, as that relates to the hole I am in when confronting conflicting goods?

Would counting their blessings and having a grateful outlook have worked when John and Mary confronted her unwanted pregnancy?

Will the liberals and conservatives pummeling each other over one or another moral and political conflagration here at ILP, cease and desist after counting their blessings and embracing a more grateful outlook?

I know: Let’s ask Wendy. :wink:

You asked me what it means to use intellectual contraptions as tools. I gave you an example - gratitude journaling. A person changes his/her attitude and thinking by focusing on some particular aspects in life for which he/she is grateful. It has a measurable impact on the quality of life.

It works in any/every context. I personally use it.

If Mary and John were unhappy/depressed/frustrated/stressed about the abortion, then gratitude journaling would make them feel better about it and about themselves.

Same goes for the liberals and conservatives. And they could end up being more civil in their interactions.

Are you going to try it?

Probably not.

But, in a philosophy forum, the focus would seem to be less on how optimistic or pessimistic an idea makes you feel, and more on how reasonable or unreasonable it is to think it.

As I noted on this thread [or another] when Nietzsche focused his own philosophical narrative on the “human all too human” consequences of living in a No God world, any number of rather optimistic religious folks might have succumbed to a more pessimistic frame of mind. After all, that’s what having to abandon immortality, salvation and divine justice will do to some.

Yes, my own take on the existential relationship between identity, value judgments and political economy can at times be brutally pessimistic.

But is it unreasonable to think like this?

Sure, maybe.

But all I can do here is to engage the more optimistic folks in an exchange that permits us to examine why “for all practical purposes” we feel either one way or the other.

It’s just that folks like prismatic actually seem able to convince themselves that in doing so this makes me “evil”!!

Or is he just being optimistic? :wink:

Anyway, on the bright side of pessimism there’s this: moral nihilists are not anchored to one or another objectivist dogma. Therefore, the actual existential options available to them would seem to increase rather dramatically.

Sure, you say that now.

In the next post, you will be saying that nobody has any options because everything is determined from the beginning of time. #-o

As usual you are clueless in the above.
The above contain the basis for positive actions to be taken.

The quote from Heidegger above is telling you why you are wrong in going the direction [too involved in the ontic rather than the ontological] you are doing at present.

The above is merely an intellectual contraption.

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ACUY_66IdfM[/youtube]

Awe. I feel as though I’ll truly know Dasein when this entire thread is thrown into the final Re: Post.

But in context above, where the gratitude meditation was brought in by Phyllo, it had to do with the practical issue of choosing thoughts that work for you. You asked for how this could work for him, he mentioned the journals. Now it might have made you happier if he had said specifically what it did for him, but there is research that shows that doing this works and that one can consciously change thoughts over time.

How is this relevant to your topic?

Well, you refer to where you are as a hole. That metaphor tends to mean, between humans, a place with negative aspects, unpleasant ones. So you have been bringing in emotions through that. You have also talked about how objectivists- that is anyone who disagrees with you, whether they are objectivists or not - are afraid when heading to your hole via your powerful rhetoric. In this context, showing that there is a way out of the hole, one that neither contradicts your non-objectivism nor contradicts objectivism in general, is relevant to the context you have presented the issue.

IOW you can either try to show that this way of getting out of the hole does not work OR you should, it seems to me, never again mention the hole and that you’d want to get out of it AS IF the only way out is to have your dilemma of contrasting goods solved. You don’t need to give up the issue of conflicting goods and that conundrum, but you can stop presenting the issue in the context of the hold, other people’s fears, your bravery for staying in the hole and facing it and so on.

If you try the gratitude journal for a significant amount of time - or any of a bunch of other approaches, including ones by non-objectivist buddhists, say - and you still find yourself in an emotional hole, you could ask for more help with that, but it is a separate issue.

The whole brave nihilist in the hole where others fear to tread self-presentation game is a farce you can drop. One does not have to be in the hole, even if one does not solve that conundrum, though you could keep it up for intellectual reasons, never fear.

I agree this may well be the case. But it is all no less situated in a particular set of experiences that each individual will in turn come to interpret/embody in his or her own unique way.

And then I come back to this:

…what does [gratitude journaling] really have to do with the relationship between the manner in which I construe the meaning of dasein, as that relates to the hole I am in when confronting conflicting goods?

Cite examples from your own life here.

Perhaps. But I suspect the baby would still be dead. And I suspect the relationship would still have imploded because of this. But, sure, who really knows how things might have been different had they employed this tool.

How about this:

You take this suggestion to the Society, Government, and Economics board. You try to convice Peter Kropotkin and Uccisore [who is back] to give it a go. Then, after a few weeks, we calibrate any differences in their exchanges with others.

No, probably not. But how on earth would I even begin to explain that to you? How would I manage to convey all of the countless existential variables over the years that have come together to predispose me here and now to suspect that it would not be an effective tool for me. Given the points that I raise regarding dasein on this thread.

On the other hand, when you are able to note the manner in which this tool has succeeded in keeping you out of the hole I’m in…

What we need here is someone sufficiently perceptive enough to determine whether you misconstrue me more or less than I misconstrue you.

The thing about determinism is that it seems clearly to be in the realm of what we call an “antinomy”: “a contradiction between two beliefs or conclusions that are in themselves reasonable; a paradox.”

Right?

What’s particularly strange here for me is that this seems to be an issue that transcends dasein…and yet is still not able to be pinned down as either this or that.

Again, this falls into the gap between those things that we think we know here and now and all that would need to be known in order to pin down Existence itself ontologically.

Cue Donald Rumsfeld’s “unknown unknowns”.

Or, with God – or with something analogous in nature – teleologically?

It just seems reasonable to me that moral nihilists [narcissists, sociopaths, global capitalists etc.] would have more options available to them because they don’t have to calculate each behavior as either the right thing or the wrong thing to do.

They simply ask themselves, “is this what I want here and now”? And then, in acknowledging that others may well not share in or tolerate their answers, calculating the odds of getting caught and punished.

The thing about determinism is that it’s not useful when making decisions. It’s one of those things that seems useful when looking back but only to rationalize actions.

Superficially that seems to be true but is it true? A moral nihilist will reject options which are based on objective morality or inherent morality. For example, someone who believes that “man is inherently honorable”, can choose an action which relies on that belief. A moral nihilist would not choose it.
If one has “faith in God” then that opens up all sorts of possibilities, some of which are completely unsupported by empirical evidence or logical reasoning. Very risky actions or “unrewarding” actions become valid options.

Intuitively, I think the non-nihilist has more choices or he has a richer set of choices even it there are fewer in number.

Of course, I can’t demonstrate it. :smiley: