Tom Storm

Burning the Koran is a reckless provocation. Given that Islam is a religion where fundamentalism enacts and endorses violent retaliation for perceived...

I often work with politicians and bureaucrats and find the enterprise fairly disgusting. I understand the attractions of an authoritarian and technocr...

To see what others who are interested think and why. I said “little” interest not no interest.

Could be. It would be fair to say I take very little interest in politics,

:up: I don't know anything about US politics, I just know what I don't like. :wink:

Nick Land?

Appreciate your work, your sense of balance and fairness. Take care.

I think it’s a problematic word, yes. Does supernatural mean anything? Is the supernatural unnatural?

I think that’s a common view, but I also think that's a way to determine whether particular conscious creatures are present. I personally question the...

I'm never really sure what counts as nature in these discussions. I would tend to count buildings and machines as a part of nature too, since we made ...

:up:

Do you think it's as hopeless in the US as many think? Are the President and his billionaire boys' club staging a nascent fascist coup in America? If ...

Not sure any of this helps my sense making efforts. But it takes all sorts, right? What do you value in Nietzsche - as far as living your life is conc...

Nothign to apologize for at all. I enjoy your contributions greatly. I'm not following, I'm afraid. Huh? Who do you think is a misanthropist? Nietzsch...

Thanks guys but I am asking specifically about why this resonates.

I'm not sure that resonates with me or what it even means. By the way, to quote just highlight what the other person has written and click on the quot...

Sure, but that's the approach - what about the book's content you find particularly interesting? When you say, "I think Nietzsche is becoming more-and...

Can you say some more about what specifically you get from reading Zarathustra and what you think is important about the work?

:up:

I am familiar with this common argument and it has always left me somewhat cold. I don't have anything devastating against this view just some random ...

:up:

Absolutely. The world has become a Bond movie. One way to deal with climate change is to kill 80% of all people, right? :wink:

I think part of the problem with this matter is that we have to follow inferences to come to particular conclusions. Not everyone will make the same i...

Agree, which is why he needs his loyalists. It’s likely to get much uglier, don’t you think?

Doesn't look like there's any useful opposition to any of this. Surely some disgruntled and powerful ex FBI/CIA types are making plans... Possibly the...

It was always an article of faith amongst my circle that America is a plutocracy. It's been owned and run by corporations for some time. Isn't the dif...

I'm not sure what you mean. Horse in what race? The idea of using logic to establish some kind of "fact" about a mythological character (Jesus) and an...

Yes, in the logic of the stories, it may be that JC saw himself as the Messiah, which is not the same as God. You are likely right to see it as symbol...

Yes, that seems to often be the case. Authoritarianism quickly transcends and engulfs whatever politics may have been the original impetus.

Yes, that does make sense.

That's fair, but it has been never been proven either. So what do we do? Would it not be prudent to put the as yet undemonstrated logic of the ancient...

No idea. But it's when an idea like this is weaponised into policy that it matters. I suspect the myth of the lazy government employee is an old one a...

Well, this has been a consistent thread in English speaking governments for the past 40 years and a key plank in neoliberal driven politics. Its origi...

:up:

You put it very well, I understand the reasoning and I am sympathetic. And what smatterings of phenomenology I have read certainly resonates.

:up: I'll ponder whether I agree. I tend to agree but I guess that depends upon what we mean by appearance - in recent history we have certainly devis...

Well that makes sense if you believe in scientific realism - that there is a reality which can be understood and studied. This assumption isn't demons...

Everyone is different. I don't think I have asked the quesion "Who am I?" It doesn't engage me, not does it seem answerable. Consciousness is indeed i...

Doesn't epistemology rely upon metaphysical commitments for it to make sense? I'm not sure one can meaningfully talk about what we can know unless we ...

I hear you, but I don't think what the founding fathers intended matters much to most - assuming they even if they know or understand the history. It ...

:up: I'm not thinking corruption, I'm thinking more that they may be aligned with authoritarian visions for America and long to rid society of deviant...

Do you think the police and military would oppose Trump should he decide to suspend the constitution and remain in power as a totalitarian ruler?

Do we have good reason to assume that law enforcement isn't already a large part of this group? Yes - particularly if elements of the media have been ...

:up: Sorry CT, I have no view on the paper, I was just making a needless quip.

Interesting. Given the interest in nostalgia projects of every kind these days, along with a hatred of modernity, I wouldn't be surprised if Medieval ...

Very interesting responses. So am I right in thinking that for you idealism consists more of our cognitive apparatus making order our of a type of cha...

Yes, I think this is the key problem for most people in thinking this matter through. The idealist might say that the idea of solid objects misses the...

Hmm - I wish I could find the quotes by Kastrup - I'm sure he has written and stated in interviews that mind-at-large is "not metacognitive and is pur...

Yes - I think of Berkeley as somewhat similar in his conception to the contemporary thinker Bernardo Kastrup. Instead of a God, Kastrup posits a "Mind...

Yes, that definition probably encompasses Trump fairly well. Reading Ian Kershaw's rise of Hitler (Hubris) there are some parallels with Turmp. It’s a...