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merjet

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  1. Thanks
    merjet got a reaction from Harrison Danneskjold in "Is Capitalism NECESSARILY Racist?"   
    Fraser gives three perspectives on capitalism: exchange, exploitation, expropriation. That implicitly sweeps production under a rug or reduces it to exploitation and/or expropriation. She says nothing about using reason, how markets form or change, the role of knowledge and information (such as described by F. Hayek), entrepreneurship, innovation, supply and demand, prices, goal setting, resources, and organization or management. All these are subsumed under exploitation or expropriation.
    She remarks that using the exchange perspective, others could say that capitalism is indifferent to color, but she says this delinks capitalism from racism by definitional fiat. She similarly delinks production from capitalism by definitional fiat.
    Fraser uses “power” a few times. The first four times are “labor power.” The rest are in the sense of the power to coerce or subjugate. None are really about the power to create. The term “labor power” was coined by Karl Marx and plays a large role in his view and critique of capitalism. It basically views laborers as “tools” for doing what’s demanded by capitalists.
  2. Like
    merjet got a reaction from William Scott Scherk in Shameful Display of Anarchy and Violence   
    Dupin,
    Heh. Duh! What is the relevance of your article?
    Of course, a statement might be true, or partly true and partly false, or totally false. The same applies to a set of statements. However, when you start with what is largely false and construe it as largely or wholly true, that’s called voluntary derailment. When you assume that the hearsay of Donald Trump, whose standards for truthfulness are far below average, are true, then your speech acts become irrelevant.
     
     
  3. Like
    merjet got a reaction from Boydstun in Correspondence and Coherence blog   
    Intuit will withdraw from IRS Free File program
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    Theater of consciousness
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    Aristotle's wheel paradox #4
  4. Thanks
    merjet got a reaction from dream_weaver in Do animals have volition II?   
    Its importance to its consciousness/awareness and to its bodily movements. 
    Consciousness is a biological adaptation that has many uses/functions. They include for humans awareness of the external world and inner and outer body states, perception, concept-formation, controlling actions, learning, remembering, language, setting priorities, problem solving, decision making, imagining, and planning. 
    That's a very complicated list. To get a better understanding of consciousness, we can focus attention on a small part of the list and/or try to grasp the essential functions of the consciousness of creatures with a much simpler kind of consciousness. Think outside the box, especially the one that Ayn Rand made. I believe the authors of What is consciousness for? did that. I believe Pierson and Trout doing so led them to some great insights. 
    - Consciousness and volition are integral: consciousness evolved as the platform for the volitional control of movement.
    - Volition is the sole causal efficacy of consciousness.
    - Volition directs attention which in turn directs movement.
    Attention to the movements of humans opens the door to a vast variety of bodily movements, especially those of the hands and fingers (using tools and machines, making things, writing, typing, etc.) and the mouth, tongue, and vocal chords (all involved in speaking). None of these things could happen without controlled bodily movements. 
    In footnote 3 Pierson and Trout say: "By 'motor movements' we are referring to all movements of an organism, not just locomotion. Other examples would include eating, mating, speaking, freezing in place, and moving the tongue, eyes, ears, nostrils, mouth, arms, head, torso, etc. Obviously, volitional movements require extensive neurophysiology in addition to consciousness."
    Yes, they implicitly include hands and fingers for humans. Yet greater attention to hands and fingers should help highlight the huge significance of bodily movements to human life.
    If an image of a human body is distorted in size to represent the brain's dedication to various body parts, then the hands, fingers, and mouth would be far larger proportionally than the rest of the body. It would be something like this. Cortical homunculus.
    That's subjective, pessimistic, and a non sequitur. I was not aware that upholding animal volition in this tiny community could have such a destructive global effect on humanity. Having been involved in it for its short existence, I now hold a very contrary opinion. Consider the efficacy of animal volition versus that of human volition. Compare the efficacy of homo sapiens with its intelligence and hands to the efficacy of another species with its intelligence and hands or forepaws. Homo sapiens wins hands down.  Compare what homo sapiens can do with its mouth speaking a language with what another species can do with its mouth making sounds. Homo sapiens wins again. The differences are huge and widen the gap.  
  5. Like
    merjet reacted to Eiuol in Do animals have volition II?   
    Can you be more precise about what you mean by self-awareness?
    You could mean it like metacognition, awareness of one's thinking habits and methods, and monitoring one's thinking, and recognizing that you are the one acting. This would imply explicit awareness that one has made a certain kind of choice for particular reasons related to subsequence of thoughts or emotions.
    Or you could mean it like internal awareness and perception. By that I mean in contrast with external perception (touch, smell, vision, etc.). This would be pain, pleasure, temperature, proprioception, and probably plenty more that I didn't even know had a particular name. Self-awareness is present at least to the extent that there is internal awareness of what is going on in the animals mind, although it lacks metacognition. Even more, external perception implies some internal perception, otherwise, the animal would not have a means to self-correct locomotion. The biological function of the external senses requires self correction. So, the extent that an animal has a range of internal perception, they would be self-aware.
    Of course, metacognition is the widest range of internal perception using these explanations. So humans have the greatest capacity to be self-aware.
    I would say self-reflective awareness is always conceptual. The nature of conceptual thought permits metacognition.
  6. Sad
    merjet reacted to whYNOT in Do animals have volition II?   
    And still, "physical" volition persists (as the argument for animal volition). Which was entirely covered, when one understands her, by self-generated, self-directed action - goal directed action - self-initiated motion - by Rand. 
    The actions to life which every life-form has and must have, by definition.
    So what "volition" is left to mankind, one which distinguishes his nature apart? 
    Using volition for every act by any creature (like a Covid virus attaching itself to a host) devalues the concept of "volition" and makes it mundane. Then:
    'Equality' of all living things, all under equal 'volition'. Which in practice inverts to equal determinism.
    THIS is the form of the concrete-bound, anti-metaphysical assault on man's volitional consciousness, and one effect of growing skepticism, determinism and anti-individualism.
  7. Like
    merjet got a reaction from dream_weaver in Do animals have volition II?   
    Both humans and other vertebrates have a nervous system. The nervous systems of different species have a multitude of similarities. "In vertebrates [the nervous system] consists of two main parts, the central nervous system (CNS) and the peripheral nervous system (PNS). The CNS consists of the brain and spinal cord. The PNS consists mainly of nerves, which are enclosed bundles of the long fibers or axons, that connect the CNS to every other part of the body. Nerves that transmit signals from the brain are called motor nerves or efferent nerves, while those nerves that transmit information from the body to the CNS are called sensory nerves or afferent. Spinal nerves are mixed nerves that serve both functions. The PNS is divided into three separate subsystems, the somatic, autonomic, and enteric nervous systems. Somatic nerves mediate voluntary movement" (my bold). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nervous_system
    "The somatic nervous system (SNS), or voluntary nervous system is the part of the peripheral nervous system associated with the voluntary control of body movements via skeletal muscles" (my bold). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Somatic_nervous_system
    A voluntary action is one done by choice, i.e. volitionally. 
  8. Thanks
    merjet got a reaction from dream_weaver in Do animals have volition II?   
    Instinct And Learning
  9. Thanks
    merjet got a reaction from Boydstun in Aristotle's Wheel "Paradox"   
    I agree completely. It would be strange if I didn't, since I wrote the Analysis and Solutions section of the Wikipedia article.
    To the best of my knowledge, I am the only person who has ever resolved the paradox  based on cycloids. Mathematical Fallacies and Paradoxes deals with the paradox and mentions cycloids, but says the solution is that the smaller circle slips. "Skids" is better than "slips", but even "skids" is based on a flawed analogy. The behavior of the smaller circle is partly similar to that of a real-world wheel skidding, such as caused by the driver of a car braking hard and the wheel losing traction due to ice or snow on the road. 
    One can peek at the relevant pages of Mathematical Fallacies and Paradoxes using Amazon's "look inside" feature and the search terms "dime" and "cycloid." The author uses a dime and half-dollar glued together to illustrate the paradox. The analogy fails because the dime does not lose traction and is not even on its own surface.

     
       
  10. Like
    merjet got a reaction from MisterSwig in Do animals have volition II?   
    http://rebirthofreason.com/Articles/Jetton/Scope_of_Volition.shtml
  11. Thanks
    merjet reacted to whYNOT in Bitcoin and Cryptocurrencies   
    ***Split from Correspondence and Coherence***

    Most upbeat. What's to stop bitcoin crashing in a year or two? There's no inherent or objective value/standard that I can see, and the huge fluctuations seen in its value point to its obvious attraction for speculators, well above the individual freedom and practicality the writer justifies. Does one want to own a speculative cryptocurrency which can soar or crash, the value varying by market demand day by day? Could make one nervous.
  12. Like
    merjet got a reaction from Boydstun in Correspondence and Coherence blog   
    Thomas Reid's theory of ideas
     
  13. Thanks
    merjet reacted to dream_weaver in Truth In Politics Youtube Channel   
    Andrew Bernstein's TruthinPolitics on rumble.
  14. Like
    merjet got a reaction from Boydstun in Correspondence and Coherence blog   
    From Brooks' article: "I’m worried about a world in which we spend borrowed money with abandon. The skeptical headline on the final preretirement column of the great Washington Post economics columnist Steven Pearlstein resonated with me: 'In Democrats’ progressive paradise, borrowing is free, spending pays for itself and interest rates never rise.'”
    I guess that Brooks believes this is not limited to Democrats. Many Republicans -- Donald Trump for sure -- believe likewise even if what they regard as "progressive" differs.
    This prompts some speculation about future interest rates on U.S. federal government securities. Traditionally U.S. federal government securities have been the primary source of collateral for financial derivatives (futures, swaps, options), many loans, and required margin for investment accounts. Their use as collateral has thus upped the supply and demand for U.S. federal government securities. Something that began recently is use of Bitcoin for collateral (link). The extent of that now is very small. However, if it grows significantly, it will lessen the supply and demand for U.S. federal government securities.  I suspect that will lead to an increase in interest rates on U.S. federal government securities.  Like I wrote in my blog article: "Of course, reaching 3% or 4% instead of the current 1% implies the federal government's interest payments would triple or quadruple, and this would put pressure on other federal government spending."
  15. Like
    merjet got a reaction from Boydstun in Aristotle on Selfishness   
    Having now read most of Salmieri's article, which I had not when I wrote the above, there are significant similarities between the article and Chapter 6 of of A Companion to Ayn Rand. The article and Chapter 6 were written for different audiences -- the former for readers of philosophy journals and the latter for a much larger audience -- but do use some common themes.  
    For example, section 2 of the article says: "Pointedly rejecting or seeking to replace the conventional usage of a term is a tactic used by thinkers who want to challenge an entrenched belief that underlies the usage and that they think exerts a pernicious influence on ordinary thinking."
    Chapter 6 says: "Rand’s stance here is like that of other thinkers who seek to reform language that they think reflects and reinforces widespread prejudices."
    Salmieri even uses the same examples of "slut" and "queer" in both places. He writes about sacrifice in both places. 
    A difference is that Salmieri did not attribute Aristotle with trying to reform conventional language, but only with noting the different and inconsistent uses of philautos or "selfish behavior" by his contemporaries. Contrarily, Salmieri did attribute Ayn Rand with trying to reform conventional language.
     
  16. Like
    merjet reacted to MisterSwig in HB v. AB: Is collectivism the greater evil?   
    In an interview with TAS Williams rejected the label "conservative" and called himself a "radical for individual liberty." What's interesting to me, however, is that both Rand and Williams were popular with conservatives. To this day many people think of them as conservatives. Williams died in December, and he had spent so much time with conservatives that his NY Times obituary called him a "conservative economist" in the headline. I think it's a credit to conservatives that they find value in the ideas of radicals like Rand and Williams. And it's a telling fact that the liberals have rejected them.
  17. Like
    merjet got a reaction from Boydstun in Existence, We   
    I look forward to reading it, Stephen. I also will have an article in the July JARS. The title is Selfish vs Selfish. (There are two legit meanings.)
  18. Like
    merjet got a reaction from MisterSwig in Form v. Matter   
    Huh? My writing "gibberish," which was flippant, referred to the numbers in the following.
     
  19. Like
    merjet got a reaction from MisterSwig in Form v. Matter   
    Gibberish to some people. Are you one of them?
  20. Like
    merjet got a reaction from Boydstun in Form v. Matter   
    Aristotle, Generation of Animals 5.8, 789a8–b15
    Aristotle, Physics, 2.8, 199b27-9
  21. Thanks
    merjet reacted to Boydstun in Form v. Matter   
    George Walsh - “If you talk about the glass merely in terms of the macroscopic level, then don’t you need some concept of ‘dispositions’?”
    Rand - “In what way? How?”
    Walsh - “Because the glass is not acting now, it’s not breaking into pieces.”
    Peikoff - “Well, what’s wrong with the Aristotelian concept of ‘potentiality’? An entity has the capacity to act because of its nature.”
    Walsh - “Well, the reason I was bringing this up was because I thought you rejected the concept of ‘potentiality’.”
    Rand - “No. . . .”
    Walsh - “I have memory or a misremembrance of someone saying that Objectivism does not accept the Aristotelian concept of ‘potentiality’.”
    Rand - “Specifically, that wasn’t me. Unless it was in some context of what Aristotle makes of it, as in regard to his matter-form dichotomy.”
    ITOE Appendix 285-86
    ~~~~~~~~~~~~
    A good help on the Aristotelian metaphysical distinction in being between matter and form is here.
  22. Like
    merjet got a reaction from StrictlyLogical in Unexamined emotions as a form of dishonesty?   
    Impulsively , no. Examining every emotion, no matter how fleeting and superficial, would be a profound waste of time. To examine fleeting and superficial ones is not faking reality, but focusing on more important things.
  23. Thanks
    merjet got a reaction from Boydstun in Economic Values As Objective   
    The link for the book doesn't work. This Amazon one does for now.
  24. Thanks
    merjet reacted to whYNOT in Does social media censor?   
    I knew there was good reason to altogether stay away from social media...
    The consuming one now is "hate speech", however our Big Tech Moral Guardians wish to define it. One man's facts are someone else's "hate speech".
     
  25. Haha
    merjet got a reaction from dream_weaver in How many masks do you wear?   
    Oh, my. So profound! Do you believe I would wear a catcher's mask to avoid infection by a virus? 
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