On abortion

I often focus less on political issues, but the problem I face when considering abortion is that of distinguishing between potential experience of sentient creatures, and actual experience. Another issue that accompanies this is, in my pseudo-utilitarian moral theory, should well being me maximized, or should suffering me minimized? Can it be both?

Pro-choicers tend to focus greatly on actual experience in their arguments and for the most part I can really sympathize with that. If a being isn’t actually able to experience anything yet, how are they being affected - that is - what suffering is being caused? While pro-lifers will often try to argue from the religious position, that doesn’t fly; you aren’t going to convince people who don’t adhere to those same beliefs and values. When they do try to make secular-based arguments they often bring up the idea that abortion is murder, but this tends to fall short just as easily because they focus on the notion that some sort of harm is being caused to the unborn child while the entire scientific community says otherwise.

So to me it’s pretty clear that pro-lifers consistently get off on the wrong foot when they try to argue for their cause. Their insistence of focusing on actual experience and the basic moral concept that suffering should be minimized tends to completely undermine the points they attempt to make. To me it seems that the only case that can ever come close to being made for an anti-abortion position is one that does not distinguish between actual and potential experience, and the maximization of well being. Really once you get others to admit that they too value the maximization of well being (which many atheistic people do), it becomes a much less difficult task to blur the line between the actual and the potential in regards to the experience of sentient beings. One thing that I see as a huge shortcoming of moral theory based on that idea, however, is that taken to its logical conclusion, it’d be immoral for humans to refrain from having as many offspring as possible, all the time. 

This has been way too wordy and I really hate it when I do that. I just needed to write about something because, even though I enjoy contemplating and discussing metaphysics much more, I haven’t had the inspiration to read or write philosophy for some time. Thank you community college.  

A redditor’s response to a person questioning “The Excommunication of Continental Philosophy from Anglo-American Universities”:

“Flat-out politics. The fact is that there are institutional and career-based incentives to relegate thinking that is too disruptive with regard to established norms/ideologies to the fringes, and to regard ‘the matter as closed’ with respect to fundamental questions of metaphysics and ontology. Naive realism and in-curiosity rule the day, and all that is left to do for institutional philosophers is to calculate the trajectory and interaction of logical entities - or so these institutions would have us believe. This isn’t true of all schools, obviously, but it is true of a distressingly high number of them, especially in North America.

I hereby renounce my claim to any truth or real knowledge. This does not imply that statements about the world cannot be consistent with my reasoning and observation, but to say that these statements are also true and may therefore together be the composites of knowledge is to also say that through my reason I have found it reasonable to believe that reason may capably recognize truth - a statement which is itself observably inconsistent with my reason.

On valuing truth

Question: “How much do you value truth (what ever truth is)? Are you willing to live with a contradiction? How comfortable are you with a paradox?” 

Truthful statements, as I see it, are those that accurately describe reality as it is, and not merely a perception of reality. The problem lies in knowing whether a perception of reality is truthful, and in the fact that all we have are perceptions. Can I say I value truth if I’m uncertain whether I have encountered a truthful statement?

I have a difficult time imagining a scenario in which I would willingly accept a contradiction in my own beliefs, except those where choices made due to extreme emotion would contradict what I believe I ought to do (morally).

I will readily accept a paradox so long as I understand the reasoning behind its existence.

On (blind) fatih

Your faith, your unfounded belief in the truth or existence of a thing, is inconsistent with everything else you hold as a source of knowledge. Your rationality - your use of reason - is such an assumed source that I am certain we share, just as your blind faith is a similar assumption that we do not. There are differences between the two, but the point I wish to make is that to have one is to forfeit the other. Attempting to do otherwise is special pleading, and you lack a universe that will entertain the request.

Sources of knowledge

In recent days, the means by which knowledge is gained has become increasingly foreign to me. What I’m faced with in every argument I have with myself and with others is always the regress problem. That is, each justified belief is necessarily founded in a further justified belief. As of yet, I have not found my own way around it.

What I have considered today in conversation with others is the idea that a certain set of assumptions about how we gain knowledge must be accepted. I have a very difficult time accepting this notion. It is circular, and in the end, seems to be just as arbitrary as basing one’s claim to knowledge on pure faith.

However, the argument I have made for this idea is of the same kind I would make for any science, namely: it works. It functions in a way that we observe as consistent with the world around us. We can separate this system of assumptions from the world it seeks to explain, and make predictions about that world. But again, even this is circular because one component of this proposed system of assumptions is empiricism, and arguing in this manner would be trying to justify the validity of empiricism by using empiricism.

Fuck man. This has been a shitty post. 

Anonymous asked: Your gf slanders you wayyy to often online.

You are using that word incorrectly and meant to say something else, or, you are being extremely presumptuous and have no idea what you speak of.

In either case, you are making value judgments about my relationship and her posting behavior online while I can be certain that you rest upon no vantage from which to do so.

She does not say the things she says without good reason, as is the case here.

In short, your statement is decidedly invalid. Also, please direct your concerns about my personal life to this blog. ofthefjords.tumblr.com 

A Dialogue…

My Original Post:
Your values? You do not hold them because there is objective truth in their foundation. You hold them because your culture discovered they have a functional application at one point or another.

Commenter Response:
“Functional application? It’s not too much of stretch to conceive of some values that do not have, never have had, and will never have functional application. Perhaps you’re being too generous. We humans have demonstrated that we like parameters; and I’m inclined to think that we’ll make them up on a whim just because we want them and not because they are “functional.” (I guess the argument could be made that fulfilling a want is functional though. :P ) (If you were to ask me to give examples of values without function I would respond with, “Gimme a sec.” )”

My Response:
Likewise, I’m inclined to believe that any value which does not serve a function (for a large enough group within a culture) will eventually be rooted out. Obviously we see vestigial value systems today, the presence of which I believe is unprecedented simply because of the rapid globalization that has been brought about by technological breakthroughs.

I would have to ask you to give me examples of values whose function cannot be observed between today and the time of their conception. I’d have also to ask, are there so few of these values with unobserved functions that we may reasonably assume their functions are merely that: unobserved, yet still present?

Anonymous asked: I don't mean intellect in the most literal sense of being conscious. I'm essentially asking what are things you enjoy about analytic thought. What attracts you to the activity of pondering, mulling over, and analyzing problems, theories, etc?

It is as much the satisfaction associated with exercising my mind in such a way as it is the negative emotions associated with *not* utilizing my mind.

I don’t tend to think about what it is I like about thinking. It feels like a basic need, if anything - a natural inclination. The (probably bad) anology I’m using in my mind is that of a specific food craving. Dark chocolate is not necessary for my survival, but it is immensely satisfying to consume. Similarly, it is not necessary to tackle the concepts that I attempt to tackle, but it is fulfilling on one of the deepest levels, and beyond that it will likely have a positive effect on my long-term well being.

Anonymous asked: What is the point of life for you personally? Also, do you believe in parallel universes?

As I do not recognize any objective purpose to life, whether we’re speaking in terms of my own life or simply the existence of life, I can not say I am justified in believing any notion about what one ought to do with their life.

On a practical basis, I aim to achieve my own greatest level of enjoyment and satisfaction while minimizing the suffering brought upon others in the process. That sounds so cliche to me, but it is the case. You would be right to accuse me of embracing a largely “selfish” existence.

If at some point I find myself with the emotional capacity to go above and beyond that aspiration, all the better.

That’s a question about physics that I am not qualified to make any comment on, but I may as well. Due to that lack of qualification, though, my actual belief in any theory in physics remains suspended.

I have little to say either way, but it does not seem that the mechanics of a ‘parallel’ universe would be such that a set of parallel universes would be innately linked to each other, as many cartoons and other works of fictions seem to portray. No, it seems that their existence would be contingent upon (necessitated by, really) the presence of an infinite number of universes.