baker

Chronic pain, among other things. Social ostracism, disenfranchizement.

A view suitable for people who have pretty much ended their worldly efforts and are now just waiting for death, pleasantly. But it's not possible to l...

For when the intutitive optimism like yours wears thin. * * * But you can't, don't, won't teach others your solution. You simply blame them. (So typic...

No, it's called scapegoating.

First, to set the tone for discussing "individuality". https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XFkzRNyygfk I don't consider them to be "enemies of individuali...

It seems you have an underlying assumption here, but it's not clear what it is. It seems you're after a universally applicable explanation of gratitud...

Not sure what you're asking. It seems that for most people, their intuitive response to an experience of lack is not gratitude, but sadness, contempt,...

Such extraordinary powers ascribed to one man. Talk about the cult of personality!

Sadly, you're thinking of the wrong "modern Hitler".

He said If something can be turned to evil, then it's not a virtue to begin with.

*sigh* Go back and reread the discussion. How does explaining things the way Gregory did help you in any way?

Oh, for crying out loud.

It has no explanatory or didactic power.

This sounds like a worldly understanding of the matter.

It is; but to religiously talk about religion can only take place in an actual religious setting (e.g. a church, the living room of a religious person...

For one, because many philosophers do just that: They use philosophy to talk about religion.

Read again. Philosophy is for talking about religion, among other things.

One cannot provide for oneself. The default is lack. One is left to the mercy of millions of other beings. Starting with plants which make breathable ...

Hence gratitude requires a metaphysical framework in order to be meaningful.

It's not clear it's a belief. It could also be simply strategy, a claim they repeatedly make (even though they know it isn't true) because it serves t...

How does Christianity "speak to the human condition/experience"? I don't feel addressed by it at all.

Isn't Amurica great?!

Depends on what one believes "enlightenment" is. In that case, it makes no difference whether one is enlightened or not; in which case, why bother.

Except when one finds oneself on the receiving end of such harm and cannot reciprocate.

That's not true. I think the innocent deserve that no harm befall them, and that others, those who exist already before the innocents, have a duty to ...

What a sadistic method for improvement. And another one.

Well, Fred's dead, but there is such a thing as assuming too much familiarity. And as for being masters: If that were true, Mr. Proof wouldn't have tr...

Not sure where this is going ... I don't have much time for the forums. I don't even turn on the computer every day. I keep up via smart phone, but po...

Actually, given your authoritarian attitude, you've got the makings of someone who can get to the top. I really am interested in how plutocracy can be...

*sigh* And this is how you're actually helping those at the top stay there. I'm saying you're idealistic to a fault, to the point of ineffectiveness. ...

I'm not disagreeing with either point. In fact, I agree. However, I have found that by being more deliberate, innocence and passion are gone. Many peo...

History is repeating itself. People watched on as Nazism grew, and did nothing.

People need to learn the worth of life and property, because they have clearly either forgotten that, or never learned it to begin with. But, of cours...

The basic principles of morality are what is at stake here. They are what underlies every individual assessment, every individual response, every post...

Freddy, Freddy, Freddy, like the two of you have a bromance. You think he'd approve of your intimate advances?

Sorry, but your "solutions" sound like pipe dreams. What you're suggesting would all need to happen from the top down. It's clear that those at the to...

You make for one shitty übermensch. Come on, answer my question. Construction engineers who also happen to be religiously affiliated generally aren't ...

How?

Because that's what philosophy is for.

Awww.

Actually, it should come from a sense of lack, from a recognition of one's insufficiency and indebtedness.

Not for the self-confident, self-assured.

I once had a brief and unsettling exchange with a psychologist who researches gratitude. On his blog, I asked how to express gratitude when I feel tha...

How, and how?

Then stop complaining about Russia.

Bossiness. The craving to get the upper hand.

Basic principles of morality.

How ironic, coming from someone who wishes his country would join an organization that exists for one purpose only: war.

*sigh* Talk about bad faith. You look to interpret my words in such a way as to make them easily dismissable. I use the term "Westerner" in a cultural...

Heh. This year, June 6 went by, no mention of the Invasion of Normandy. Normally in the time around June 6, national televisions show documentaries ab...