FlyingLionWithABook
Has a C. S. Lewis quote for that.
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User ID: 1739
FlyingLionWithABook
Has a C. S. Lewis quote for that.
1mo ago
If I was them I wouldn’t be me, as you’ve said, so it’s a pointless statement to say “if you were them”. It’s like sayin “If X was Y, then X would be Y.” Which is tautologically true, but provides us with no new information. If I was a cat I’d be a cat. If I was Hitler I’d be Hitler. If my aunt had balls, she’d be my uncle.
FlyingLionWithABook
Has a C. S. Lewis quote for that.
1mo ago
Yes, if I was them I would be them.
FlyingLionWithABook
Has a C. S. Lewis quote for that.
1mo ago
If I was them I would be them and not me. I cannot think of a meaningful sense in which you could say "If you were them".
I'm sympathetic to the idea that environmental or genetic factors may make it more or less difficult to not make choices that will give you a chronic disease. That would change the level of responsibility, but unless someone held a gun to your head you've still got some responsibility.
FlyingLionWithABook
Has a C. S. Lewis quote for that.
1mo ago
Thanks for asking for data. It's easy to armchair philosophize about things that we actually have data for, and I usually forget to check.
FlyingLionWithABook
Has a C. S. Lewis quote for that.
1mo ago
I think the government/academic jobs vs private sector jobs is doing most of the divide there. As Ghostbusters said, "You don't know what it's like out there! I've worked in the private sector. They expect results."
I've worked government jobs (low level ones) and I've worked private sector, and in the government job I just had to do the minimum required and follow the rules and I could be sure not to be fired. Private sector there have been times I've worked my butt off and still went home scared that I'd be unemployed next month because the company went belly up.
FlyingLionWithABook
Has a C. S. Lewis quote for that.
1mo ago
The thing that I took away from SMTM that seems most important is that something weird is going on, and it's getting worse despite our best attempts to fix it. People are getting fatter and fatter, and as a society we've been putting more and more resources into not getting fat. This does seem mysterious, and I do think something more is going on then just "food is cheap and corporations make food taste great".
Until someone figures out what that thing is definitively, though, the best I can do is employ willpower to try not to get any fatter than I am now.
FlyingLionWithABook
Has a C. S. Lewis quote for that.
1mo ago
I can see an argument for saying that the obese are people with a chronic disease tautologically: arguably being obese is a disease, and it's certainly not an acute condition (nobody gets obese overnight, and nobody stops being obese overnight). Of course if you take that perspective then I'm not sure how you can square it with "fat pride." Nobody goes around being proud of having multiple sclerosis, or saying that goiters are beautiful. And the fact that it is a chronic disease does not absolve someone of responsibility for acquiring that condition: cirrhosis of the liver is another chronic disease that is almost always the result of personal choices.
FlyingLionWithABook
Has a C. S. Lewis quote for that.
1mo ago
Thanks for bringing a Calvinist perspective, since I was not confident I portrayed the Calvinist position right. Growing up my Dad always told me, "Son, beware the yeast of the Calvinists."
He also said that Arminians were Calvinists who flunked logic, though I never could figure out why. Every time I try to study Amrinianism they either seem to be agreeing with my perspective, or saying something completely incomprehensible to me.
FlyingLionWithABook
Has a C. S. Lewis quote for that.
1mo ago
Thanks for that context. It really clarifies the Catholic Church's stance on this matter.
I agree wholeheartedly with the Jesuit's "middle knowledge" and it's neat to see an argument that seems to be a direct precursor to Leibniz's "best of all possible worlds" theodicy.
FlyingLionWithABook
Has a C. S. Lewis quote for that.
1mo ago
I'll first note that your comment seems to reinforce my point; the idea that staying fit and attractive helps people stay married goes hand in hand with the idea that your partner becoming less attractive is reasonable grounds for divorce. That's much more of a left wing than right wing perspective on marriage. But you're right! We should find some actual data and check.
Pew found that when it comes to the statement "Couples who are unhappy tend to stay in bad marriages too long" 69% of Democrats agreed compared to 41% of Republicans. That divide gets wider the further to the right or left you go: for Republicans that described themselves as "conservative" (as opposed to "moderate" or "liberal") only 35% agreed, compared to 76% Democrats who described themselves as "liberal".
Of course that's just stated attitudes, what about actual divorce rates? A study from the National Marriage Project at the University of Virginia found that for people who had ever been married at all 41% of Republicans had been divorced compared to 47% of Democrats. They also found that 57% of Republicans are currently married, compared to 40% of Democrats.
Another study found that the divorce rate was higher in red states than blue states, but they also noted that the marriage rate was much higher in red states than blue states which may account for it. A smaller percentage of divorces among a larger number a marriages may mean that Republicans divorce more per capita, but divorce less as a proportion of all married individuals.
FlyingLionWithABook
Has a C. S. Lewis quote for that.
1mo ago
I always highly recommend Chesterton's Ballad of the White Horse.
If the size is too daunting, you can dip your toe in with Chesterton's Lepanto. If you like Lepanto, you'll like Ballad of the White Horse.
As with all good poetry, reading it aloud is a must.
FlyingLionWithABook
Has a C. S. Lewis quote for that.
1mo ago
While the consensus is that God knows the future with 100% accuracy, there is not Christian theological consensus on predestination, election, or free will.
In the Evangelical tradition I grew up in the position I heard the most was that the Bible commands us to choose certain things, which means choice is possible. And that the Bible says God knows all things, including the future. Like most Evangelical theology, how to square that circle is left as an exercise for the reader.
The Calvinists, quite famously, believe God chooses who will be righteous and who will be damned from jump. We have no ability to choose salvation or damnation. Many Calvinists believe that we do have free will, but our choices are based on our desires and characters and God choose to give us particular desires and characters that will constrain the choices we have available.
The Catholic church teaches that we have the free will to either accept or reject the grace of God, and that when God predestined the course of history he left room for us to make decisions. He knows what decision we'll freely make in advance, of course.
C.S. Lewis described the intersection of our choices and God's predestination this way in Mere Christianity:
If you picture Time as a straight line along which we have to travel, then you must picture God as the whole page on which the line is drawn. We come to the parts of the line one by one: we have to leave A behind before we get to B, and cannot reach C until we leave B behind. God, from above or outside or all round, contains the whole line, and sees it all.
…
Everyone who believes in God at all believes that He knows what you and I are going to do tomorrow. But if He knows I am going to do so-and-so, how can I be free to do otherwise? Well, here once again, the difficulty comes from thinking that God is progressing along the Time-line like us: the only difference being that He can see ahead and we cannot. Well, if that were true, if God foresaw our acts, it would be very hard to understand how we could be free not to do them. But suppose God is outside and above the Time-line. In that case, what we call "tomorrow" is visible to Him in just the same way as what we call "today." All the days are "Now" for Him. He does not remember you doing things yesterday; He simply sees you doing them, because, though you have lost yesterday. He has not. He does not "foresee" you doing things tomorrow; He simply sees you doing them: because, though tomorrow is not yet there for you, it is for Him. You never supposed that your actions at this moment were any less free because God knows what you are doing. Well, He knows your tomorrow's actions in just the same way — because He is already in tomorrow and can simply watch you. In a sense, He does not know your action till you have done it: but then the moment at which you have done it is already "Now" for Him.
It's possible that those on the left value being skinny and attractive more than those on the right do. The urban left is more likely to be interested in casual sex with strangers, and more likely to be going from relationship to relationship as opposed to settling down with someone. Also more likely to get divorced and try to find a new partner. With that environment in mind, it is advantageous to maintain your attractiveness so you can continue to attract mates.
In contrast, the further to the right you go the more likely you are to have a culture valuing finding someone to settle down with and start a family. Once you've bagged a mate and said your vows, staying physically attractive is much less important for your day to day happiness. What's more, on the right you're more likely to have broad family and local networks to fill your social needs: people who don't need to find you attractive to be in your life. For the urban left, I can imagine you have to build your social network more from fostering relationships with new people rather than leaning on your family and the people who have known you since you were a kid.
All that is speculative, of course. What I can confirm is that in right wing cultural spaces if someone is fat they'll usually say something like "I love to eat, that's why I'm fat!" or "I know being fat ain't healthy, but eating food is what makes life worth living." It comes from a place of personal responsibility, including the personal responsibility to accept the consequences of your actions and the trade-offs you have made.
FlyingLionWithABook
Has a C. S. Lewis quote for that.
2mo ago
When someone does something brave in service to what is right, it is understandable that others may call him a role model. As for your points, they are not addressing the question at hand which is "what are some positive conservative role models for boys?" For a conservative the fact that Mike Pence commits himself to virtue in the sexual sphere, believes consistently in the sanctity of human life, and is pro coal are positives, not negatives. They would be good reasons for Mike Pence to not be a progressive role model, but are no obstacle to being a conservative role model.
FlyingLionWithABook
Has a C. S. Lewis quote for that.
2mo ago
The "I know this will cost me my political future, but I'm not going to subvert the Constitution" Mike Pence.
FlyingLionWithABook
Has a C. S. Lewis quote for that.
2mo ago
How broad is too broad to be considered "elite"? If you told me that 10% of a population were elites, that doesn't sound too weird to me.
Let me run a quick sanity check. Hmm, 30 seconds of Googling is telling me that in Medieval Europe the nobility were around 1-3% of the population (except in Castille where it was around 10% at certain times, but that seems to be an outlier). So perhaps 9% is too broad.
FlyingLionWithABook
Has a C. S. Lewis quote for that.
2mo ago
It's a fair cop. I'll do better.
FlyingLionWithABook
Has a C. S. Lewis quote for that.
2mo ago
It's peaked, in as much as they can't get any more liberal and have nowhere to go but down.
FlyingLionWithABook
Has a C. S. Lewis quote for that.
3mo ago
That is true. I remember walking from the Seattle Science Center to the waterfront around 2012 or so, and there were some stretches that were deserted. And pretty creepy, with the towering office buildings and no people in sight.
No homeless people either though.
FlyingLionWithABook
Has a C. S. Lewis quote for that.
3mo ago
I don't know what it would be cope for. I agree completely that local politics can make things much worse or much better, but it is still the fact that the 9th Circuit has tied the hands of any polity that wants to do something about the problem.
FlyingLionWithABook
Has a C. S. Lewis quote for that.
3mo ago
New York has 5 times as many homeless people as Washington: even if weather is harsher in NYC, they still have an enormous population of homeless and manage them better than any city in the 9th Circuit's jurisdiction. 39% of the total number of homeless people in America live in the 9th Circuit's jurisdiction, despite those states making up only 19% of the United States by population.
I don't deny that local politics can make the situation much better or much worse despite the 9th Circuit: but it is clear to me that the 9th Circuit has had a powerful effect on making the problem worse.
FlyingLionWithABook
Has a C. S. Lewis quote for that.
3mo ago
Yes, true: however, I think the ruling must be having a strong effect because you are not seeing the same street people crises in very left wing cities outside of the 9th Circuit's jurisdiction. The East Coast doesn't have this problem, even though they have quite a few activist DAs.
FlyingLionWithABook
Has a C. S. Lewis quote for that.
3mo ago
It's not just this one ruling, but this ruling is tying the hands of anyone who tries to fix the problem: letting those who prefer not to fix it free reign to make things worse.
FlyingLionWithABook
Has a C. S. Lewis quote for that.
3mo ago
I have lived in King County for the vast majority of my life. I have never lived in Seattle. I can vote for King County Council, and King County Executive, and for State Senator and Representatives, and Governor. And for my entire voting life, and for considerable time before that, every single person in every single one of those positions has been a Democrat.
Perhaps Dino Rossi was our last chance for salvation.
If there is anything beyond our character and history and circumstances that informs our choices (personality, perhaps? Ineffable soul?), then it would still be the case that if I was him (in other words, had his character, his history, his circumstances, and his everything else that makes him him) I would be him and not me.
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