My understanding of Kant's antinomies is that they aren't mere undecidable alternatives, but necessary contradictions. Cue for example the singularity...
If you need a conspiracy theory, a better one is that the wealthy are few and maintain their dominance by means of divide and rule. by keeping poor ci...
Because without the magic, there is only the bald monkey? 'The naked ape does not (any more) proclaim his naked-apeitude, he throws his shit about.' D...
Yeah, no, not me, not you, fair enough. But you posit self and spell. I am asking about the ontology. Let's say a spell is made of words, or maybe pos...
What would you say is this 'self'? Is that I that posits? Do they? What are they made of? You see I think they are things that exist in the mind. And ...
Your fear, your anger, or your love can be invoked, or evoked, as can mine, by the feeble power of a troll, for example, who, impotent in the world, w...
There are at this moment, soldiers in trenches in Ukraine trying to kill and being killed without invoking powers or spells, and without assuming anyt...
"It's a Snark!" was the sound that first came to their ears, And seemed almost too good to be true. Then followed a torrent of laughter and cheers: Th...
And from the enlightenment comes the white man, conquerer of the world and civiliser of Johnny Foreigner with his kilts and scarification and dreadful...
I can claim to be unenlightened at least, but I have to live in a post enlightenment world, being no angel. I think that's right. We speak a nihilist ...
Yeah, but no, but... one is not born with the right interpretation, or any interpretation, one is indoctrinated with here and now, already haunted by ...
You have to laugh, surely, at such hubristic naivety? And written just after WW1, that fine exemplar of rational methodical control —not. A thermostat...
Let's not psychologise, let's philosophise. That it's partly the way I'm interpreting events is partly the way you're interpreting events. Interesting...
I didn't have you down as a conspiracy theorist. If that counts as an explanation at all, it's less convincing than the demonic tides in the collectiv...
It doesn't really work for me. Are you saying that Trump is sufficiently plausible, convincing, a clever manipulator of people? He doesn't look that g...
Do you have a decent explanation for how such transparent bullshitters (Trump, Boris, Berlusconi, etc) manage to convince enough people to gain power?...
It's a reference to the cliche that the ends justify the means, analogised as "you can't make an omelette without breaking eggs." But to answer your q...
Ends are ideas, means are behaviour. My behaviour is to break eggs, with the end in mind to make an omelette. But eventually, my end is achieved (or n...
To be open to understanding is to be open to misunderstanding; apologies for reading too much between the lines. One more word before I wake up to the...
Your experience is only half the romance: it takes two to tango. Alas my instruction to breathe came too late. The whole point is the mutuality of rel...
A note on understanding. (For your own comfort and safety, please breathe between paragraphs.) To reach an understanding is to find a mutual accommoda...
A uniform is an enchantment. One puts on the accoutrements of a nurse, or the police, or a soldier, or a bank robber, and one becomes that identity; o...
Surely the most dangerous and potent enchantment is the one that induces the belief in the person that they are not enchanted and are immune from ench...
https://academyofideas.com/2017/06/carl-jung-spiritual-problem-modern-individual/ "We ought not to underestimate the psychological effect..." the drea...
Wole Soyinka in Conversation with Ulli Beier on Yoruba Religion. 1992 Well I think one can find the same kind of rigidity on these boards very easily....
On one side, there is a lesson to learn that the world needs a coordinated response, if containment is to be effective, and any quarantine measures or...
That's right. As it is, the poor chap must choose between various compromises between fast, safe, comfortable, reliable and affordable. One buys a car...
Not since the ban the burkha thing. The general venal awfulness and total incompetence of the UK government has been rather a theme in my general post...
Yes, objection. Choice is always conflict, and conflict is the end of freedom. It is always will that is supposed to be free, but my experience is the...
I don't much like the this kind of use of 'we'. Let me give an example: I go to a restaurant and order a steak. I have learned from experience in rest...
No it isn't. You are trying to have your cake and eat it too. It doesn't matter where you look in the environment, runaway success doesn't last becaus...
I'm sorry if it wasn't clear. A species, such as Elm disease, that destroys its environment will not last long. Aeroplanes are part of the fossil fuel...
Yes. things start from almost nothing and either die out or get better. But you mention aeroplanes as if they are unequivocally progressive and not on...
if the starting point is the extended family/tribe, the smallest viable group, there are only extinction, stasis, or enlargement as options. If the st...
That's why everything that is must necessarily have been previously made, either by the God of Sandwiches, or some lessor deity. Even your post, poor ...
In my day the milkman, the coal man and the bin man were all accorded the dignity of existence, and a tip at Christmas. But now the sandwich man is no...
They have to be pre-made, otherwise it's just cold food with bread and butter. I used to pre-make sandwiches amongst other services in the hotel I wor...
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