Is there an ideology of knowledge?

[vicdan]

And every enlightened person knows that suffering is good -- hence Buddhism, the very purpose for being of which is to maximize suffering.

Dude, you are a bloody screaming idiot.

I don't know what you are talking about anymore. Buddhism is about evading suffering as is your morality.

<claps> My, my, you are a bright one! Your next lesson will be to learn how to play dead and lick your own ass, and then you will have almost achieved a troglodyte level of advancement!

You believe knowledge is a good thing because it raises the standard of living, brings about technology, reduces suffering, etc. Are these good things though? I view them as bad things. Don't get me wrong, knowledge is definitely something I pursue, but I don't want everyone else to have it.

See, the problem with relativism is that your view that relativism is superior, is itself wholly relative. Your earlier indignant incredulity at me [supposedly] making a point based on my subjective values, simply exposes your fundamental incoherence.

You are a gibbering idiot.

The difference between myself and you is that I don't get emotional and upset when other people are suffering whereas you do.

The difference between us is that I reason and you rationalize.

[Kevin Solway]

You are a gibbering idiot.

I'm going to have to draw the line at this point with the insults.

Such descriptions can have their place if used sparingly, but if everyone used insults to the degree that you do then the entire forum would be little more than a forum of insults.

[ZenMuadDib]

And every enlightened person knows that suffering is good -- hence Buddhism, the very purpose for being of which is to maximize suffering.

Dude, you are a bloody screaming idiot.

I don't know what you are talking about anymore. Buddhism is about evading suffering as is your morality.

<claps> My, my, you are a bright one! Your next lesson will be to learn how to play dead and lick your own ass, and then you will have almost achieved a troglodyte level of advancement!

You believe knowledge is a good thing because it raises the standard of living, brings about technology, reduces suffering, etc. Are these good things though? I view them as bad things. Don't get me wrong, knowledge is definitely something I pursue, but I don't want everyone else to have it.

See, the problem with relativism is that your view that relativism is superior, is itself wholly relative. Your earlier indignant incredulity at me [supposedly] making a point based on my subjective values, simply exposes your fundamental incoherence.

You are a gibbering idiot.

The difference between myself and you is that I don't get emotional and upset when other people are suffering whereas you do.

The difference between us is that I reason and you rationalize.

I guess that the question is, why do we pursue this technology? Is it simply to create better and better weapons or was there a different purpose to begin with? Maybe the thinking went that we needed weapons to protect what we had and war is an expression of that. Haven't we reached a point though where everyone can have enough?

[vicdan]

I'm going to have to draw the line at this point with the insults.

Such descriptions can have their place if used sparingly, but if everyone used insults to the degree that you do then the entire forum would be little more than a forum of insults.

This forum is already little more than a forum of abject idiocy. Just look at some of the stupefyingly dumb, ignorant shit posted here. You don't try to get people to think, and you reap the result.

now you will police form while ignoring content -- with entirely predictable result.

[Imadrongo]

See, the problem with relativism is that your view that relativism is superior, is itself wholly relative.

Sorry, I don't see any real problem here. This sounds akin to David's objection that the claim that "there is no absolute truth" is a claim to "absolute truth" (whatever that is) itself. Is anything non-relative? How do we know? Are you into metaphysics these days?

Your earlier indignant incredulity at me [supposedly] making a point based on my subjective values, simply exposes your fundamental incoherence.

It would if I was simultaneously claiming to be tolerant of other values or something, but I'm not.

[vicdan]

I guess that the question is, why do we pursue this technology? Is it simply to create better and better weapons or was there a different purpose to begin with?

Technology is just a shadow of science. Science, or at least foundational science, is pursued for the purpose of acquiring knowledge. Better weapons are a side effect.

Maybe the thinking went that we needed weapons to protect what we had and war is an expression of that. Haven't we reached a point though where everyone can have enough?

You could have had 'enough', in a certain sense of the word, as a hunter-gatherer. it's all a continuum. Why stop now? life expectancy keeps growing, the hedonic adjustment keeps chugging away, etc. If history is any indication, then the improvement will continue. Why stop now, of all times?

Furthermore, you can't stop. If you stop, someone else won't, and a decade or two or five later they will have the weapons to kick your ass and take your shit. Yes, it's a competition. That's life.

[ZenMuadDib]

See, the problem with relativism is that your view that relativism is superior, is itself wholly relative.

Sorry, I don't see any real problem here. This sounds akin to David's objection that the claim that "there is no absolute truth" is a claim to "absolute truth" (whatever that is) itself. Is anything non-relative? How do we know? Are you into metaphysics these days?

Your earlier indignant incredulity at me [supposedly] making a point based on my subjective values, simply exposes your fundamental incoherence.

It would if I was simultaneously claiming to be tolerant of other values or something, but I'm not.

See, the problem with relativism is that your view that relativism is superior, is itself wholly relative.

Sorry, I don't see any real problem here. This sounds akin to David's objection that the claim that "there is no absolute truth" is a claim to "absolute truth" (whatever that is) itself. Is anything non-relative? How do we know? Are you into metaphysics these days?

Your earlier indignant incredulity at me [supposedly] making a point based on my subjective values, simply exposes your fundamental incoherence.

It would if I was simultaneously claiming to be tolerant of other values or something, but I'm not.

It is true in general terms that the desire to 'make life better' is to make life more comfortable, and that we strive toward comfort, but this comfort (reduction of pain and conflict for example) is not necessarily the best thing for us. But I propose to you that Nietzsche's medicines cannot be applied to a literal social context, and that it is a mistake in reading him to think they can. It seems to me---I propose to you---that Nietzsche can only function internally, on an individual. Nietzsche applied externally leads to tangible disasters; but applied internally, more often than not to interesting growth and 'spiritual progress'. Nietzsche is for psychologists and poets, not for statesmen.

Are disasters bad or good? Nietzsche seems to have thought highly of them. I agree Nietzsche is directed towards the individual. After, say, the individual sees through Christian-morality, religions, etc, how do you then think he should act? Surely not go out and do altruistic acts, but instead bring about "disasters" if necessary to pursue his goals/values.

It is kind of horribly true that the most difficult experiences I have lived, the ones I would much rather have avoided, are the ones that brought me the most benefit.

Definitely.

In so many ways Nietzsche seemed to have sensed something right: that Europe was tending toward a balanced condition that had 'mediocre' characteristics. Hermann Hesse, in Demian, romanticized the coming war (WW1), the war everyone felt was coming, and chose, or needed, to see the destruction as a catharsis, as a creature struggling to release itself from its egg. But his story was more than anything a map of an inner journey.

It is easy to see that Christian-morality, democracy, etc leads to a mediocre society. The herd seeks to eliminate both extremes of men -- the degenerates and the men above them. As Nietzsche said: they are not creative whatsoever, they aim to make all equal, content, secure, etc.

I haven't read Hesse.

I don't think, really, that the point is to create disasters per se. That is a little like creating a rollercoaster to experience something thrilling. However, this is not a real experience, for two reasons. First of all, you created it, secondly, you know what the outcome is going to be. My interpretation of Nietzsche's views on suffering was that it prevented people from becoming too complacent with routine. I don't believe that he thought suffering was good for its own sake.

[ZenMuadDib]

I guess that the question is, why do we pursue this technology? Is it simply to create better and better weapons or was there a different purpose to begin with?

Technology is just a shadow of science. Science, or at least foundational science, is pursued for the purpose of acquiring knowledge. Better weapons are a side effect.

Maybe the thinking went that we needed weapons to protect what we had and war is an expression of that. Haven't we reached a point though where everyone can have enough?

You could have had 'enough', in a certain sense of the word, as a hunter-gatherer. it's all a continuum. Why stop now? life expectancy keeps growing, the hedonic adjustment keeps chugging away, etc. If history is any indication, then the improvement will continue. Why stop now, of all times?

Furthermore, you can't stop. If you stop, someone else won't, and a decade or two or five later they will have the weapons to kick your ass and take your shit. Yes, it's a competition. That's life.

Isn't the point to be able to take care of each other. Why do people pursue anything? Well, in America it's a different story, it's all about consumerism. That is simply an ideology maintained to support the economy in this time, but if everyone had what they needed and they could pursue their artistic interests then why would there be a need for fighting? It seems to me that it would be more of a peaceful exchange of ideas and invention.

[ZenMuadDib]

I'm going to have to draw the line at this point with the insults.

Such descriptions can have their place if used sparingly, but if everyone used insults to the degree that you do then the entire forum would be little more than a forum of insults.

This forum is already little more than a forum of abject idiocy. Just look at some of the stupefyingly dumb, ignorant shit posted here. You don't try to get people to think, and you reap the result.

now you will police form while ignoring content -- with entirely predictable result.

I think that what he is saying is that you can insult someone to get their attention, but too much if it is not called for. It can be seen as a rhetorical technique maybe, but are we looking to convince or create a real dialectic here? I'm not really sure you were out of line here though.

[Imadrongo]

Isn't the point to be able to take care of each other. Why do people pursue anything? Well, in America it's a different story, it's all about consumerism. That is simply an ideology maintained to support the economy in this time, but if everyone had what they needed and they could pursue their artistic interests then why would there be a need for fighting? It seems to me that it would be more of a peaceful exchange of ideas and invention.

Life is essentially competition. When the humans decide they don't want to compete anymore they become nihilists, adopt a Christian-morality, and don't pursue anything other than their ideal of non-suffering, peace for all, etc. The weak have always aimed at equality, non-suffering, etc, because they were suppressed by the stronger, who had their own values. Now that the weak have taken over (through knowledge & numbers perhaps) they are continuing this goal. Technology and science is used as a means to achieve this.

[Imadrongo]

I don't think, really, that the point is to create disasters per se. That is a little like creating a rollercoaster to experience something thrilling. However, this is not a real experience, for two reasons. First of all, you created it, secondly, you know what the outcome is going to be.

Staged disasters aren't really disasters....

"My interpretation of Nietzsche's views on suffering was that it prevented people from becoming too complacent with routine. I don't believe that he thought suffering was good for its own sake.

We who are their opposites, we who have opened our eyes and conscience for the question where and how up to now the plant “Man” has grown most powerfully to a height, we think that this has happened every time under the opposite conditions, that for that to happen the danger of his situation first had to grow enormously, his power of invention and pretence (his “spirit") had to develop under lengthy pressure and compulsion into something refined and audacious, his will for living had to intensify all the way into an unconditional will for power.

We think that hardness, violence, slavery, danger in the alleys and in the hearts, seclusion, stoicism, the art of attempting, and devilry of every kind, that everything evil, fearful, tyrannical, predatory, snake-like in human beings serves well for the ennobling of the species “Man,” as much as its opposite does. In fact, when we say only this much we have not said enough, and we find ourselves at any rate with our speaking and silence at a point at the other end of all modern ideology and things desired by the herd, perhaps as their exact opposites? Is it any wonder that we “free spirits” are not the most talkative spirits? That we do not want to give away every detail of what a spirit can free itself from and in what direction it may then perhaps be driven? And so far as the meaning of the dangerous formula “beyond good and evil” is concerned, with which we at least protect ourselves from being confused with others, we are something other than “ libres-penseurs,” “ liberi pensatori,” “ Freidenker,” as all these fine advocates of “modern ideas” love to call themselves." BGE44

[ZenMuadDib]

I don't think, really, that the point is to create disasters per se. That is a little like creating a rollercoaster to experience something thrilling. However, this is not a real experience, for two reasons. First of all, you created it, secondly, you know what the outcome is going to be.

Staged disasters aren't really disasters....

"My interpretation of Nietzsche's views on suffering was that it prevented people from becoming too complacent with routine. I don't believe that he thought suffering was good for its own sake.

We who are their opposites, we who have opened our eyes and conscience for the question where and how up to now the plant “Man” has grown most powerfully to a height, we think that this has happened every time under the opposite conditions, that for that to happen the danger of his situation first had to grow enormously, his power of invention and pretence (his “spirit") had to develop under lengthy pressure and compulsion into something refined and audacious, his will for living had to intensify all the way into an unconditional will for power.

We think that hardness, violence, slavery, danger in the alleys and in the hearts, seclusion, stoicism, the art of attempting, and devilry of every kind, that everything evil, fearful, tyrannical, predatory, snake-like in human beings serves well for the ennobling of the species “Man,” as much as its opposite does. In fact, when we say only this much we have not said enough, and we find ourselves at any rate with our speaking and silence at a point at the other end of all modern ideology and things desired by the herd, perhaps as their exact opposites? Is it any wonder that we “free spirits” are not the most talkative spirits? That we do not want to give away every detail of what a spirit can free itself from and in what direction it may then perhaps be driven? And so far as the meaning of the dangerous formula “beyond good and evil” is concerned, with which we at least protect ourselves from being confused with others, we are something other than “ libres-penseurs,” “ liberi pensatori,” “ Freidenker,” as all these fine advocates of “modern ideas” love to call themselves." BGE44

The point though is not simply to be better than other people and show that you are better. If you're a Buddhist, it is to enlighten yourself as well as others. While you can't do this for other people directly, you can steer them in the right direction, I guess there are infinite directions though. I just fear that separating yourself from others as something higher only serves to continue the cycle.

[Imadrongo]

The point though is not simply to be better than other people and show that you are better. If you're a Buddhist, it is to enlighten yourself as well as others. While you can't do this for other people directly, you can steer them in the right direction, I guess there are infinite directions though. I just fear that separating yourself from others as something higher only serves to continue the cycle.

I'm not a Buddhist, nor is Nietzsche.

[Carl G]

I protest the censoring of Victor. Someone has to point out the idiocy. And Victor always includes a decent amount of content -- he says why the idiocy is idiotic.

We cannot all be docile emotionless purveyors of ageless "wisdom."

[Nick]

This forum is already little more than a forum of abject idiocy. Just look at some of the stupefyingly dumb, ignorant shit posted here.

Right, all I need to do is read what you say and I get my daily dose.

now you will police form while ignoring content -- with entirely predictable result.

On the contrary he is policing content, the juvenile insults in particular. Just because this is "Worldly matters" doesn't mean it's a designated Junior Highschool atmosphere.

[ZenMuadDib]

The point though is not simply to be better than other people and show that you are better. If you're a Buddhist, it is to enlighten yourself as well as others. While you can't do this for other people directly, you can steer them in the right direction, I guess there are infinite directions though. I just fear that separating yourself from others as something higher only serves to continue the cycle.

I'm not a Buddhist, nor is Nietzsche.

Ok, but you still point to suffering as being necessary training or something. What is the use of this training? To survive in the conditions presented to you. If these conditions did not exist you would not need this knowledge or skill.

[vicdan]

Right, all I need to do is read what you say and I get my daily dose.

I am surprised you can read... Pleasantly surprised, but surprised nonetheless.

On the contrary he is policing content, the juvenile insults in particular. Just because this is "Worldly matters" doesn't mean it's a designated Junior Highschool atmosphere.

No, it's worse. it's the Autistics Anonymous atmosphere.

You gotta have your eight fish sticks, right?..

[vicdan]

Ok, but you still point to suffering as being necessary training or something. What is the use of this training? To survive in the conditions presented to you. If these conditions did not exist you would not need this knowledge or skill.

You are looking in the wrong place, dude. Nick doesn't care about suffering. He cares about talking about suffering. It's all in the image -- the image of a brutally selfish, uncaring ubermensch... except that Nietzsche envisioned nothing of the sort. Nietzsche right now should be spinning in his grave fast enough to power a small S&M accessory factory.

Nick took from Nietzsche the most superficial meaning, and left out the poetry and the greatness. He is like a man who thinks that 'achievement' means getting an in-ground pool. Nick sees hoarding power in a zero-sum game, where he should be seeing creation of power, a fount of creativity and life, the will-to-power spilling over in abundance. He sees pettiness and misses greatness. Greatness doesn't fear the 'slave classes', as he describes them, getting knowledge. Ubermensch doesn't need to rob others, nor to deny something to them -- Ubermensch creates, bathing in the waters of freedom. Nick is merely yet another slave who wishes to play at being a free man, without understanding what it means.

Did you notice how it's all we to Nick?

We think that hardness, violence, slavery, danger in the alleys and in the hearts, seclusion, stoicism, the art of attempting, and devilry of every kind, that everything evil, fearful, tyrannical, predatory, snake-like in human beings serves well for the ennobling of the species “Man,” as much as its opposite does. In fact, when we say only this much we have not said enough, and we find ourselves at any rate with our speaking and silence at a point at the other end of all modern ideology and things desired by the herd, perhaps as their exact opposites? Is it any wonder that we “free spirits” are not the most talkative spirits? [emphasis mine -V] That we do not want to give away every detail of what a spirit can free itself from and in what direction it may then perhaps be driven?

He so desperately wants to see himself as ubermensch, he thinks merely adopting the rhetoric, achieving a superficial projection, does the trick. There's no "I" there -- he is still a part of the herd, he just thinks he found a better herd to be in; and he is still trapped in thinking that to grow, he needs to tread on others' heads -- the ultimate tell-tale sign of weakness, of a man who cannot create but can only take.

Nick treats Nietzsche as a gang ideologist.

[Alex Jacob]

"Oh wearisome condition of humanity,
Born under one law to another bound,
Vainly begot and yet forbidden vanity,
Created sick, commanded to be sound.
What meaneth nature by these diverse laws,
Passion and reason, self-division’s cause?
Is it the mark or majesty of power
To make offences that it may forgive?
Nature herself doth her own self deflower
To hate those errors she herself doth give. . . .
If nature did not take delight in blood,
She would have made more easy ways to good."

Fulke Greville
___________________________________________

Neil writes:

"Are disasters bad or good? Nietzsche seems to have thought highly of them. I agree Nietzsche is directed towards the individual. After, say, the individual sees through Christian-morality, religions, etc, how do you then think he should act? Surely not go out and do altruistic acts, but instead bring about "disasters" if necessary to pursue his goals/values."

I am still of the opinion that you would do well to begin to read some of the people who were strongly influenced by Nietzsche. I am pretty certain that you would really like 'Proper Studies' and certainly 'Brave New World'. I am not saying you or anyone should simply follow and accept the opinions of others, but in the interviews on video I posted on another topic, Huxley speaks of his belief that one crucially needs to wed one's 'intelligence' ('in the widest sense possible') with 'love' and feelings of concern, etc. One can't just accept something someone else says, but it is sensible to keep in mind that a pretty tremendous mind was of this opinion.

Also, I don't think you really have to worry too much: the world is now and seems always to have been a troubled place, and difficulty and conflict are always there. You live in a quintessential Nietzschean nightmare of mediocrity---the USA---(in the sense of a consumer haven, the terrestrial Jerusalem of consumption) and almost anywhere you look you can see the 'levelled effect'. I personally find it stifling, and prefer South American locura for that reason (I like contrasts), but I think you have to accept that most people, given the choice, will choose comfort and ease over conflict and pain. I think you might want to seriously consider reading, say, Steppenwolf, if only to see how the Nietzschean idealism can function on inner levels. It is a brilliant book. Hesse was completely opposed to the destruction of war but found inner roads of challenge and difficulty as 'compensation'. Our struggles do not all have to be external, Neil.

_________________________________________

""But I like the inconveniences."

"We don't," said the Controller. "We prefer to do things comfortably."

"But I don't want comfort. I want God, I want poetry, I want real danger, I want freedom, I want goodness. I want sin."

"In fact," said Mustapha Mond, "you're claiming the right to be unhappy."

"All right then," said the Savage defiantly, "I'm claiming the right to be unhappy."

"Not to mention the right to grow old and ugly and impotent; the right to have syphillis and cancer; the right to have too little to eat; the right to be lousy; the right to live in constant apprehension of what may happen tomorrow; the right to catch typhoid; the right to be tortured by unspeakable pains of every kind." There was a long silence.

"I claim them all," said the Savage at last.

Mustapha Mond shrugged his shoulders. "You're welcome," he said.

--from Brave New World
_________________________________________

Point Counter-Point
_________________________________________

Steppenwolf

_________________________________________

Another Nietzschean, with huge impact, especially on the American scene:

The Virtue of Selfishness, Ayn Rand

[Philosophaster]

Neil thinks that moving beyond Christian morality means simple-minded rebellion against every precept of it, in the manner of a teenager who rebels against the Christianity of his parents by becoming a "Satanist."

[ZenMuadDib]

Nietzsche is vastly complex and probably requires reading and re-reading. I've about Nietzsche and know that he was very ironic, sarcastic, used a lot of hyperbole, and probably satirical in the process.

[ZenMuadDib]

"Oh wearisome condition of humanity,
Born under one law to another bound,
Vainly begot and yet forbidden vanity,
Created sick, commanded to be sound.
What meaneth nature by these diverse laws,
Passion and reason, self-division’s cause?
Is it the mark or majesty of power
To make offences that it may forgive?
Nature herself doth her own self deflower
To hate those errors she herself doth give. . . .
If nature did not take delight in blood,
She would have made more easy ways to good."

Fulke Greville
___________________________________________

Neil writes:

"Are disasters bad or good? Nietzsche seems to have thought highly of them. I agree Nietzsche is directed towards the individual. After, say, the individual sees through Christian-morality, religions, etc, how do you then think he should act? Surely not go out and do altruistic acts, but instead bring about "disasters" if necessary to pursue his goals/values."

I am still of the opinion that you would do well to begin to read some of the people who were strongly influenced by Nietzsche. I am pretty certain that you would really like 'Proper Studies' and certainly 'Brave New World'. I am not saying you or anyone should simply follow and accept the opinions of others, but in the interviews on video I posted on another topic, Huxley speaks of his belief that one crucially needs to wed one's 'intelligence' ('in the widest sense possible') with 'love' and feelings of concern, etc. One can't just accept something someone else says, but it is sensible to keep in mind that a pretty tremendous mind was of this opinion.

Also, I don't think you really have to worry too much: the world is now and seems always to have been a troubled place, and difficulty and conflict are always there. You live in a quintessential Nietzschean nightmare of mediocrity---the USA---(in the sense of a consumer haven, the terrestrial Jerusalem of consumption) and almost anywhere you look you can see the 'levelled effect'. I personally find it stifling, and prefer South American locura for that reason (I like contrasts), but I think you have to accept that most people, given the choice, will choose comfort and ease over conflict and pain. I think you might want to seriously consider reading, say, Steppenwolf, if only to see how the Nietzschean idealism can function on inner levels. It is a brilliant book. Hesse was completely opposed to the destruction of war but found inner roads of challenge and difficulty as 'compensation'. Our struggles do not all have to be external, Neil.

_________________________________________

""But I like the inconveniences."

"We don't," said the Controller. "We prefer to do things comfortably."

"But I don't want comfort. I want God, I want poetry, I want real danger, I want freedom, I want goodness. I want sin."

"In fact," said Mustapha Mond, "you're claiming the right to be unhappy."

"All right then," said the Savage defiantly, "I'm claiming the right to be unhappy."

"Not to mention the right to grow old and ugly and impotent; the right to have syphillis and cancer; the right to have too little to eat; the right to be lousy; the right to live in constant apprehension of what may happen tomorrow; the right to catch typhoid; the right to be tortured by unspeakable pains of every kind." There was a long silence.

"I claim them all," said the Savage at last.

Mustapha Mond shrugged his shoulders. "You're welcome," he said.

--from Brave New World
_________________________________________

Point Counter-Point
_________________________________________

Steppenwolf

_________________________________________

Another Nietzschean, with huge impact, especially on the American scene:

The Virtue of Selfishness, Ayn Rand

The Brave New World part is very good.

[vicdan]

That sounds a lot like Nietzsche's conceptualization of eternal return.

[Imadrongo]

Did you notice how it's all we to Nick?

Did you fail to notice it was a quotation from Beyond Good and Evil? And you got the wrong name....

[Imadrongo]

Alex,
I will pick up Brave New World, it looks interesting, and maybe the other too, though I have way too much on my to-read list right now, I could sit for a year doing nothing else. Ayn Rand was pretty ridiculous.

Victor,
Do you see your place in that story? Discouraging the untamed man -- "ohs noes, disease and suffering are bad we must eliminate them!! peace for all, long lives and science!!"

Neil thinks that moving beyond Christian morality means simple-minded rebellion against every precept of it, in the manner of a teenager who rebels against the Christianity of his parents by becoming a "Satanist."

No, but it definitely involves... moving beyond Christian morality. You can't move beyond it and continue to be governed by it. I'm not at all saying you should be a Satanist.