One thing that Prismatic and Iambiguous share is their implicit and sometimes open claim to be braver than their opponents: theists in the case of Prismatic, Objectivists – which would include most theists, but is not limited to them – in the case of Iambiguous.
Prismatic (Spectrum perhaps) has faced death and theists are not capable of it. Iambiguous has faced the inability to truly 1) know what the objective good is and 2) how to convince people effectively to give up their side of conflicting goods disputes and objectivists are made too uncomfortable by this, so they run or attack him or try to help him join their cult.
Two brave men, the former likely much younger, having faced the harsh truths, locked in struggle with more cowardly humans, unable to deal with their knowledge.
There are a lot of ways to question this fundamental position they share.
The first is to point out that dasein-based models AND modern science should make one wary of hard positions about what one is doing, why one is doing it and one’s own ability to KNOW what the motivations of other people are.
‘The difficult thing is not to reject belief in order to shock the believing other, but to be a non-believer without the need for another subject supposed to believe on my behalf.’ Zizek.
Note this is just an example, I am not claiming I know that Prismatic and Iamb get off on the dynamic. Get off on the dynamic of ‘being the one who can face harsh truths that others cannot’ and hence the attraction of continuing the dynamic, rather than, say, finding ways to move in the world that one values. I also think it would be an oversimplification in both cases, even if it were true. I suspect it is a factor and that in both cases the dynamic itself is in part protecting them both from facing certain fears, whatever those may be.
You will not find Buddhists who actually have meditated a long time with discipline going on and on about the bad Muslims, nor will you find them speaking about subject/object splits and advanced Buddhist abstractions based on more meditation and states-reached than they have. Only early stage, adolescent practitioners will focus on all these terms as if they know what they hell they are talking about in more than some abstract Westerner, feels right in my neocortex’s imagination way Prismatic has. So one can wonder what the hell Prismatic is avoiding facing when he runs around spouting Buddhist truths, as if he has achieved the meditative states which ground this knowledge, and judging publically the motivations of people who believe differently from him. There are reasons Buddhist communities of all kinds and Buddhist masters of all kinds advice novices to avoid such behavior and it is hardly brave to engage in this what is a best cart before the horse behavior.
And most post Heidiggerians, will not simply lock onto the conflicting goods, problems with contingency stuck point, but will face the fear of acting in the world without a deity’s or science’s permission to. Iamb wants permission to act in the world, in the sureness that it is towards the Good, something he, at this point, does not believe is a valid concept. He does not believe in a deity. He does not believe there is an objective Good or one could not know it if there was one. YET he is waiting before acting in the world ever again, for permission from that non-existent deity or perhaps somehow from science (if it can manage to convince him it knows ‘ought’ along with ‘is’. This is hardly a brave stasis.
Both these men hide in the neocortex, one having sided with Buddhists who instead of finding ways to integrate the limbic system, for example, teach one to disidentify with it AND to not allow the natural flow of the limbic system into expression. Their practices specifically disconnect the limbic system from the vocal apparatus and from the bodies movements in general. Such people with such goals, should be very wary about judging how much fear they themselves can face, since they are actively suppressing and disengaging from their emotions.
There’s that scene in Heat, Deniro in the hotel room with the man who betrayed his gang. He is going to kill the guy. He is pointing his gun in the guy’s face. The guy is not looking at him and is not particularly afraid. Look at me, Deniro says a number of times. He knows that by a simple not looking the man is not facing his fear, a mere physical posture. The guy finally looks up at Deniro’s face, realizes he is going to die and Deniro kills him. There are all sorts of ways to not really feel one’s fears. Neither of these two brave philosophers has a good way to judge their own abilities in relation to others on this front, though I suspect Iamb has faced a lot more fears than the boyish - even if he is not as young as he comes off - Prismatic.
Iamb might agree on this, but think that on this specific issue of the problem of dealing with conflicting goods, etc., he has faced a fear that objectivists have not, however brave they may be in other areas. But even this is speculation. And there are plenty of holes to go around and face. I doubt either one of you know what a religious person going through a dark night of the soul experiences, since the very practices that person engages in intensify the connections between the limbic system and the neocortex. They haven’t been hard at work cutting off the connections or suppressing the mammalian brain, nor have the projected their emotions onto other groups, to give them the role of their own limbic expression. Even if it is a wrong turn to accept the whole brain, you who would disidentify should be wary of thinking you can somehow meansure how much discomfort or fear others have faced in compaison with you. Let alone what the religious person who thinks it is likely they will go to hell will face.
This does not mean you need to give up your rational critiques or search for answers, it is the framing of the dynamic and the simple assumptions this is based on I find pretty hubristic.
Who knows how much fear the theist they are feeling superior to is actually facing. And besides, modern science has a number of other theories about why theists believe and Prismatic’s smug hypothesis is mere speculation.
Iamb will not act in the world, except to the degree he runs his threads. Talk about not leaving his comfort zone. Yes, there may be other factors, but even via the internet there is the opportunity to do what comes after noting one’s thrownness, the problems of determining objective morals, and stepping into life without God or permission from science for one’s choices.
Cognitive science should make one somewhat cautious about certainty about one’s own motives for engaging in the dynamics one does and even certainty about what one believes - if one 1) puts current scientific consensus on a pedastal as both you and 2) one intentionally enacts one’s distaste for the limbic system, as both do. And that’s not even getting to how cautious one should be about the motivations of others if one has just science to go on as THE EXPERT. And since these two render unto science that which is science’s and even base their smugness on it and it’s clear distinction, for them, from what other people base their beliefs on, it would behoove them to notice the humility about their own bravery that comes with modern science in relation to self-knowledge. And since both have tremendous distaste for the limbic system – despite Damasio, for example – the likelihood that they are even more cut off from what they are really up to than many of the enemies – who do not share that same distaste for the limbic system or may to lesser degrees, humility might be more consistant.
Or more honesty about the rage and smugness that’s there. The good, rational neocortex man who wants to make the world a better place stance in both cases is very hard to buy.