Oppose me

In the history of religion, the ‘evil one’ is understood to be the tester of faith and character.

In the Bible, this character is Satan

In Buddhism, this character is Mara or Yama

To understand these religions is to understand that the evil one is at worst a misguided character… as it could just give you all the right answers ahead of time.

In Buddhism in particular, Mara is called the evil one because he appears before someone close to being enlightened and works to prevent enlightenment.

However, many traditions honor such characters as true tests of value or worth for this state of being.

Perhaps that’s how we should see our debators, as a blessing instead of a curse.

I always tell people that the funniest possible judgement day would be if the “evil” deity like Satan and Mara and the devil were like, “I’m a really nice person, what the fuck is wrong with you!?”

Everyone thinks they’re right and on the good path, and it’s the others who oppose or are not for your path who are wrong - even the most “evil” of people think this. The more interesting question is why are they right? But one should ask first why are they themselves the evil one.

Moreover, how are you relating this to the opening post?

You asked specifically about opposition. This idea is thousands of years old, mostly religious oriented. These archetypes are deeply imbedded.

Satan is called ‘the accuser’. I’m just adding that the archetype for opposition, in its very rich history, looks at these types of interactions as a vetting process, necessary, helpful, even divine.

These have all come up. Here are some others that have…
10. I want a distraction
11. I want to finally say what I generally cannot say in face to face discussions
12. I want to have the discussion with someone else playing the role of one of my own warring parts
13. I want to see what makes ‘such people’ tick
14. I want to explore the dynamic between two memes or POVs or paradigms
15. I want to agitate
16. I want to see if I can break new ground on the issue and what happens when I do
17. I want to hone my discussion skills
18. I want to end up more unified in myself
19. I want to find out what my own thoughts actually are
20. I want to see what happens if I try lines of thought I haven’t before
21. I want to see, again and again, that rationality is rarely the issue, so I stop thinking I have this obligation to speak truth to power or whatever. To really and finally get it that people all have blind spots that they will protect by any means.
22. To entertain.
23. To express myself
24. To play
25. To help break the facile dismissal of orphan thoughts - orphan here meaning something like it does in orphan drugs and orphan diseases, where there is not enough financial motivation to develop drugs, since not many have these diseases. To fight, so to speak, the facile dismissal of ideas outside the mainstream.
26. The undercut the various smug positions out there
27. To defend the underdog
28. To smack things that annoy me
29. To eat away at the things that hate life

I am sure there is more…

Well, if you have mixed motivations, you will have a mixed approach. That’s a very general and abstract answer, but it’s where I’d have to start since I have so many motivations for my approach(es). And with distraction a really rather strong and embarrassing motivation, for example, what happens is going to be a mixed bag.

I think this might be less true than I used to think it was. I think there are people out there who know they are doing what they are doing for themselves and know they are not good and even think this focus on good and evil/bad is just silly. They know the importance of morals and play the game, but don’t buy into it. I think a lot of the power players are like this. They are just busy winning, sucking life out of people, and doing whatever to get that done. Sociopaths and psychopaths.

Yeah and that’s the path they think is right and good. In such cases as you bring up, people redefine right and good away from the traditional or socially acceptable way to justify what they are doing and rid cognitive dissonance. Perhaps they do it out of good intent to change the traditional or socially acceptable way for the better, perhaps they do it out of resentment to get back at the traditional or socially acceptable way - either way in their mind it’s the good and right thing to do. This isn’t a weakness or something that ought to be overcome, it’s a necessary precondition for motivation to act at all. And even in the depressed case that withdraws from motivation, the same gymnastics occur that turn against oneself in a disembodied way because it’s the right and good thing to do to turn against oneself in their mind. Even depression is motivation, but inverted in its direction. Sociopathy and psychopathy deviate from the norm in the same way but with different direction, caring and not caring respectively about the impact beyond one’s own gain. Genius deviates, as does foolishness, as does disinterest - there are many ways to deviate from the traditional or socially acceptable path - all of which are justified as a more right and good path, and there are many components within the traditional or socially acceptable path to contribute towards - as is the right and good path in the minds of those who choose such a path in a much more simple way.

The doers and the thinkers.
Thinking is doing, but a particular type of doing that belays other types of action. Action as “other types of action than thinking” is the antithesis to breadth and depth of thought - it’s the condensation of all thought down to one strain, and making it happen. You can act in all kinds of ways, the same as there being many components within the traditional or socially acceptable path - none of which require thought. You can think beyond this and then act, but only in one way at a time. Breadth and depth of thought, as with the variety and conflict that results from Free Speech, negates action and homogeneity in favour of heterogeneity. What then, is there to be gained from debate and discussion for its own sake outside of the realm of thought and into the realm of action? Why do you debate and discuss? To not act or to act counter to breadth and depth of thought seem to be the only options.

Yeah, some great additions there - some more similar to one another and to what I already came up with than others, but I guess with a nuanced twist. Perhaps some categorisation could be performed here.

However, I still stress the question - what are you doing all this probing for in all these mixed ways - not just KT but anyone else here?

KT, you might say there is no one end to your mixed approaches, and maybe you’re saying that you don’t know any particular reasons for taking them because you have so many different ones to take - making any answer general and abstract as you say. To me this would suggest the means are ends in themselves, like with Arcturus.

Perhaps it is the case that everyone here is discussing and debating with no ends other than the means themselves?

Not in my experience. They think other people are stupid for believing in right or good. They see them as hallucinating the existence of moral goods. They consider themselves to be simply going for goals. And do not think morals have any existence. Not gods, no objective morals. Just getting what you want.

Yeah, no, not at all. They don’t have that issue. They don’t care about other people and they don’t believe in morals.

I used to think like you, but I have met enough of these people to see that there is a rather large group of sociopaths and psychopaths and they rise in the current systems. They may present moral arguments, because this are effective tools, but they don’t give a shit and do not feel guilt or shame about being immoral, cruel, bad…It’s all…all practical issues to get to goals.

And I am not aiming this ‘at my political enemies’. These people can be found in any political party. They just want the power and will wear any ‘political outfit’. They do not care about that, except as a tool.

The main problem with Modern-Post-Modern thinkers and wannabe philosophers, like most on this forum, is intellectual dishonesty and general cowardice. In order to engage Philosophy, and become Philosophical, or more, a Philosopher, you have to lay it all out on the line. You have to put your core-values, beliefs, and ideas to the test. That means, comparing them with others, recognizing disputes of interest, and then engaging rational dialogue and exposition with opponents. You need a level of intelligence high enough to keep track of logical contradictions. Most of humanity says one thing, thinks a second thing, and acts on a third thing. So most people don’t know themselves very well.

In reality, people act on their core-values, which are most obvious in Instinct and Reflex. Philosophers are most distant from Nature, in the sense of being removed from immediate dangers, threats, and predators, and so can dwell on complex and paramount issues, questions, mysteries, doubts, etc. which are most important to the whole species. Philosophy is a mark of prestige and the highest class, in this way. Other humans merely live out their lives, unaware, and generally meaningless, without ever knowing or becoming aware of anything ‘better’.

All this said, to Silhouette and the OP, if you remain a coward, and continue to withhold your core-believes, values, and metaphysics, then you’ll never really progress in any meaningful way. In order to have disputes, you first have to believe in the thing that you are disputing. There must be something at stake. This is why more common topics, such as sex, are more appealing since the views anybody and everybody has, directly correlate and represent the individual and their status. You can’t have an opinion on sex and sexuality, without having a stake in the game.

Philosophy has been this classically, but is not so in Modernity, which is a grave mistake. Philosophers in previous eras knew, that in addition to building a metaphysical worldview, and after examining all the important points and perspectives, you must then act on what you believe and state. This is why Socrates must “drink the poison”. You must follow-through with your philosophy. If that leads you to a bottle of poison, or ethical dilemmas, abortion, murder, starting World War II, then that is simply the outcome which must follow logically and objectively.

So, to conclude, Philosophy cannot be done when everybody is cowardly and half-arguing. You need to be courageous, lay it all out, what you believe in, and then the arguments need to matter. If you lose, then you must concede to the superior mind, and follow the rationale and logic as proved through exposition. If you continue to believe in contradictions, because you are stupid and/or a coward, then to repeat, Philosophy is not for you. But this is the normal state of things. The Wannabes line-up, the amateurs, the average minds, they “play with” philosophy, but do not actually cross the threshold and DO philosophy.

I question whether you, Silhouette, are even capable to begin with, after our previous arguments and debates about free-will…

It’s not as complicated an issue as, say, ‘why are you social?’ but let me use that even broader question to explain why it may not be simplifiable. In fact I am skeptical that anyone has only a couple of reasons for their participation and only a couple of goals that explain how they participate, react and act. We are coming in contact with personalities and ideas. People are reacting to our ideas and participation. Many of these ideas matter a lot to us. Our egos matter to us. People react in a wide variety of ways. There is a wide variety of issues being brought up. This triggers and brings into the room a host of personal and idea-related reactions in us across a wide range of potential social, academic, interpersonal, intrpersonal tensions.

Anyone who suggests that they are here to find the truth and this explains their behavior is oversimplifying radically. Any other single answer is a radical oversimplification when it comes to explaining what they do.

It might be that I consciously allow for a wide range of goals and try a few more approaches by conscious choice than others, but I find it hard to imagine there isn’t a comparable complexity on an unconscious level in nearly everyone who participates with any regularity.

Yes, that is also true. I feel the urge to do many of these things. Some of the urges are already in motion, some come up in response. But then many of these reasons/goals also have ends. Like distraction. If I want distraction, I get it. If I want to bother a person with an idea that bothers me. Well, I achieve that, sometimes. If I want to find out what I actually believe, well that happens, sometimes. so, there are small achievements under most of those categories.

If I had to come up with an overarching end, it would be a vague one. Something like: trying to be better at being myself. But this certainly doesn’t cover things like wanting to be distracted.

Silhouette,

I do not know how you gleaned that from what I wrote and I am not sure that I actually thought of it in that way but I would suppose that that could be true for me.

It reminds me of the saying that the journey is as important as the destination or at least in this case that preparing for the journey which brings us to the destination (truth and answers) is also vital.

It can be seen as packing a bag for a vacation. The end of the packing is the beginning of the vacation more or less. lol Most of us would not go away without packing. That to me is an end in itself. How important a one depends on the individual.

I think that some people though would view “the means as ends in themselves” as a negative though but I think that would depend on the situation.

And yet, it may be a more inclusive comment, more general in scope. It may imply the kind of short circuit that sets in with deconstructing personalities along with the general trend of simplification of the quality of recreating a style. It may be the silver lining that shines irreducibly, after all manner of substantial importance have been vested.
People now days are easily irritated by the occasional repartee that inclines them to conclude that it was an intentional distraction, whereas , positive overkill, emphasizes such hyper mirroring.
My opinion of You, Arcturus negates any semblance of impression that it is ‘true for You’ , I rather think that You are hesitant for some reason to open such a can of worms, reluctant to make the wavelets that can grow into a feared typhoons like wave.
Yes cool is the word, be cool, or be fooled.
Do not underestimate Natures potency in asserting Her natural dominance. The male in us would be very weary to have his reticence to her true nature revealed.
It really is nothing else but a ploy , by which it uses euphemisms to cover the depth from disintegration.

Typical.

And so being not stupid for believing in right or good is the right and good way to go in their minds, yes? Not hallucinating the existence of moral goods, gods, objective morals or caring about other people - and simply going for goals and getting what you want is the right and good way for them. By “right and good” I don’t mean in the normal slave morality way as described by Nietzsche - for the types to whom you refer it is “right and good” in the master morality idem. I’m speaking in terms of moral relativism: yes, they’re not fitting what they do into the regular moral framework - “morals” derive from “customs” and their customs are to go for goals and seek what they want, which is a different moral framework in which they are right and good.

Of course they might present their actions to others in terms of slave morality - because as you say this is an effective tool, and not because they give a shit or feel guilt or shame about being “immoral”, cruel and bad. I’m not aiming this at any particular political “side” either. If you say you used to think like me as though there was one absolute morality, then I don’t think you did used to think like me. If you were already thinking in terms of moral relativism in the Nietzschean philological sense, and you disagree with his take, then maybe you did - but that’s not what’s coming across so far.

Simply being social would be another reason to add to the list.

The overall impression of your reasons for debating and discussing is that they are very diluted. Both “Trying to be better at being myself” and “for distraction” alike seem as though you enjoy the means as ends in themselves much like Arcturus, though in your own way(s): both of you and others having plural answers without any call for radical oversimplification of course.

This reasoning doesn’t come up against the obstacle that I wanted to get at: that “free speech” and “some one best action to take as a result” are at odds. For you there is no intention for action to be taken beyond your self, from what I can tell. No doubt this is why people advise that change comes from within and to change the world you just need to change yourself, and can only change yourself.

This is entirely consistent with Individualism, where everyone is supposed to contribute of themselves in line with what they want, and what ends up actually happening sort of bubbles over at the top as an emergent property.
The up-side of this is that quantitatively a majority of people find that actions taken are close enough to their own interests.
The down-side of this is that homogeneity is incentivised, and mediocrity is what we all get.
I’m interested in the possibility of anything better, but I suspect something better is not possible because the homogeneity of perceived fairness in society’s rules, laws and morals is at odds with the variety and conflict that is symptomatic of everyone expressing themselves differently in a free speech environment. This would make Nietzsche’s Last Man the result.

You don’t know how I gleaned it, but I was correct?
From what you say, you are journey oriented. But you also speak of the destination/vacation that follow the preparation/packing. Is there anywhere you or others are trying to get to, or are you just on your journey and finding out where you end up? - that is my question. I’m not saying it’s good or bad either way at the moment, I’m just gathering information.

Yes though as I said I was not even thinking in those terms but we learn to read between the lines as you did.

.

Extremely - I am like a gypsy, but I do eventually like to reach my destination which then in a way begins another journey. I also rather enjoy being a contrarian. Who wants to really think like someone else, like everyone else. That may also be a great approach to the beginning of the “journey”.

Something about that made me laugh. Who knows why. How can I speak for others?

Anyway, it occurs to me that in a sense, that IS one of the philosophical methods of ultimately finding truth and answers, I think… that we go along on this journey observing and exploring and thinking and questioning and doing just what you said ~~ finding out where you end up or one might say “getting one’s bearings”. But “ending up” is not necessarily the end of the journey or the ultimate objective - it just allows us to see if we are going in the right direction to find the truth, the answers. I am not sure if I am expressing this in a way that you will understand. I might say that doing this is like the scout who goes out before to see what is ahead. Perhaps not a good analogy.

This I do not see as a waste of time since finding out where you end up is only the half of it.

No, personally I do not think of it as a bad thing. It just depends on how each individual approaches something. We do not get from A to Z in one giant leap. If we do not “see” things along the way we may end up in a ditch and break our ankles. lol or have to go back to where we began and begin again.

I hope that this was helpful to you.

Hi Meno,

What are you saying here? That I am not exercising my inner dragon? Or better yet, my inner tsunami?

Are you calling me a coward? lol Explain yourself, Sir!

Not in any moral sense and not something they want to spread and not in the sense of making things better for anyone but themselves.

If you meant it to include that way from the beginning, sure. But it didn’t read like that.

It’s practical, for them.

It’s not a moral framework.

Right.

Nope, not saying that. I am saying I used to think

That even the people who seemed horrible to me thought they were being moral and were trying to make the world a better place. In fact, I still think Hitler was like that. But I don’t think that in general anymore about a lot of people in power. I think many more of them might put on a moral front, but in fact they are just playing a game for their own gain. I would not use that sentence that I just quoted about them. I don’t think it fits psychopaths to say they think they are right and on the good path. I think there are a lot of psychopaths in positions of power. I don’t think anything that sentence will imply to most people fits either.

Perhaps you meant it to include that psychopaths might think others are silly to worry about being good for moral reasons. I think then that sentence was poorly worded if it was meant to include that.

But if what you meant includes thinking that its better for them not to have morals, ok. But not morally better. And they don’t want to spread this less hampered, as they see it, way of being. They are happy others are shackled. And they are not trying to improve things, except for themselves. They are not really social mammals. Not in the full sense.

Sure Arcturus. I have meant to complement Your reticence, and You must have interpreted diagonally, as if such restraint was a negative. That’s all. Peace!

Sorry for the misinterpretation not coinciding with the intended!

No need to apologize, Meno. Hakuna Matata. I was not insulted in the least as you can see by my above smilies.

You really only see me here. You do not see me out in the real world albeit one can say in a way that this is also the real world…like a masked ball. Sometimes I like to pick and choose my battles in here depending on what is at stake. I have no problem opening the can of worms though I do not so much like them (though I do save them from drowning when it rains) or making waves. It just depends. I think that we all have different personas and “wear” them for different occasions. We may not always find it but it is a good thing I think to seek some balance. Anyway, I am a Libran. lol

Again Hakuna Matata, my friend.

Arc, Natura Obscura, or regardless of style, nature lovers unite. I never had doubt!

i’d argue that sociopaths/psychopaths… let’s just generalize and call em all ‘anti-social’ for convenience sake… aren’t suffering from what the folk psychologists of the herd like to call an affliction; it isn’t necessarily a weakness of character to be discriminatory toward people you associate with. but this pop psychology you find in the DSM narratives is already ambiguous, not to mention influenced by the pervading spirit of the over-socialization encouraged by the western world and lifestyle. ergo, if you ain’t hanging out with all kinds of people and out spending money and shit, you must be sick.

but think about this, maybe. perhaps it’s just that for the anti-social person, interest is more easily and quickly lost in people. the public becomes an amorphous blob of identical people and anomie sets in for the anti-social. but put him in the company of someone who stands out, who’s unique, and his interests are stoked. it’s like drugs, man. anti-social people develop tolerances for people just like drugs. they need something stronger because they’ve developed a tolerance. you put a ted bundy in a room with nine out of ten people and the greater percent of his interaction is going to be on a trivial level. the public person in him will play he expected role; hey how ya doing, nice weather, etc., etc. but the private person has absolutely no interest in those people beyond their use to him. but wait. is that because ted’s ‘anti-social sickness’ prevents him from experiencing genuine congeniality, or because those people simply aren’t interesting to him? and if the latter, who’s fault is that? but you put me in a room with teddy and i’ll have that fucker wanting to go bowling with me in less than five minutes. provided that the sociopath has some degree of intelligence and is able to respond, he has the capacity to be intrigued. you just gotta know how to do it. you gotta be fantastic enough to be interesting to someone who’s normal emotional character is a general malaise in the company of others.

i think rather most people aren’t fantastic enough to draw the attention and interests of those who we like to call ‘anti-social’, that’s all. and because it hurts the feelings of ordinary people to know that a sociopath somewhere doesn’t attribute any more value to them than he does to a monkey, they get together and agree to call him ‘sick’.

and check this out. search terms ‘i am a sociopath’ on youtube and look at the results. none of those clowns are real sociopaths. to them, its just a fashion statement, some obscure shit they read somewhere that felt empowering, so now they play the role as if it were some kind of game. lol. sociopaths don’t make videos explaining that they’re sociopaths. that was the first give-away.

I don’t think even the dsm is that bad and I hate the dsm. And I agree that psychopaths and sociopaths are not sick. But they are partially human. They do not have a disease, but they are partial people. And if they have power, it is a problem for full people. And a lot of the power positions are held by these people, in part because emotions and giving a shit has been pathologized. In part because we are taught to hate out intuition - so we pretend these people are whole and also fail to notice the emptiness behind their facades.

Sure, and that’s no a psychopath, who might find someone interesting like that, but would not give a shit about them except to the extent he could use them.

This is some other issue you’re running. A lot of these psychopaths in power today look quite social. They can, precisely as you yourself described, play the game.

And they don’t do this for people who are exceptional either except as tools You’re conflating two differnt things.

and futher, you are justifying, implicitly a failing. If they are so damn exceptional, they can find other exceptional people and be social with them. Yes, the group you are talking about may have less contacts and friends. But they will not be or look anti-social. They may not like parties and small talk, but they will have a group of friends and they will have acquantances who they will care about, just far fewer. If they don’t, well, guess what, they are probably not as exceptional as they think and their feeling of superiority is a defence mechanism. sure, they may be smart, but the reason they are mostly alone is because they have problems. And you wouldn’t believe how manyo f these people come to philosophy forums and pronounce their greatness and then take their smugness and half-lives to the grave without solving their problems. But they are hot psychopaths. They could care about people, but pride and fear are keeping them from getting enough intimicy in their lives.

Of course.