LacklustreFriend
37 Pieces of Flair Minimum
No bio...
User ID: 657
LacklustreFriend
37 Pieces of Flair Minimum
8mo ago
Do you really need a degree in 'library science' to achieve this?
It seems like the activities you're describing have little to do with the library themselves and could be performed by anyone with pedagogical experience (or any other 'social' type work with kids) and not necessarily a 'proper' librarian with a degree in 'library science' (this is your tiny school library, not the Library of Congress). Of course, modern pedagogy has also been overrun with woke ideology but that's a discussion for another time.
LacklustreFriend
37 Pieces of Flair Minimum
9mo ago
All the Greek words I dropped being Logos, and... all the other ones?
Even if I had "dropped" a bunch of Greek words, how is this a rebuttal? Greek terminology is extremely commonly used in Western philosophy in general and a basic Greek vocabulary is useful for anyone wanting to engage with it.
LacklustreFriend
37 Pieces of Flair Minimum
9mo ago
I also have sympathy for that view, and it's refreshing to see the discussion around religion evolve from 'religion is stupid and holding us back from rational utopia' to 'religion does have some real social utility'. However, it's hard for me to take this claim of wanting to believe seriously from some people who make this claim when I see a dismissal of all metaphysics out of hand from those same people, from what I believe is not from a serious consideration of metaphysics but a reflexive dismissal of anything that isn't materialist (scientism).
At the same time, I see a lot of what I'll perhaps uncharitably describe as 'playing' at atheism. That is, a refusal to engage with the actual consequences or logic conclusion of atheism, as outlined by philosophers like Nietzsche and Sartre - perhaps because the conclusion is so undesirable. Instead, we see this glossy and superficial atheism professed by the New Atheists, whose critics I think quite rightly point out are attacking Christianity while relying on an underlying implicit Christian morality in practice. They profess a rationalistic/scientific approach to moral issues which I think is a fool's errand - the scientism I was criticising in my original post.
The point of my original post is not to 'attack' atheists, but rather quite the opposite, rather to reconcile belief in science and belief in religion (or belief in God in the general sense). I only 'attack' atheists insofar as I am arguing against scientism which atheists may or may not believe in. Even then, 'attacking' is a pretty uncharitable description of arguing against something.
I think part of the rhetorical divide is that atheists implicitly think that 'faith' is a dirty word. I don't have such a view of the word or meaning behind faith. When I use the word 'faith' here, I'm being quite sincere.
You're also skipping a step with your stand-in empiricist - the empiricist has to first believe it is possible to observe the ordered and knowable universe in first place, and the observations he's make necessary correspond to an objective reality and not, say, it's all in his head to be a bit facetious. This axiomatic foundation is completely foundational religious thought (i.e. a belief in God), and one might argue tends to believe or even necessarily leads to belief in God. This is what Christians mean by God being Logos and God's Logos - that there is an inherent order/structure to the universe and this structure is discernable by Reason (which is one of the possible ways of translating of Logos along with Word). God is identified with this inherent (divine) structure of the universe.
Unfortunately it's just extremely difficult to reconcile modern scientific knowledge with old religious worldviews. I think what many religious people, especially on this forum, miss is that for many agnostics or athiests it's not that they don't want to believe, rather that they find it practically impossible to believe in a religion which demands they lay down the rules of science and empiricism.
Only because of an implicit scientism that is pervasive in our society, which is particularly popular among liberal atheistic/agnostic types. I can't speak for every religion but the Catholic Church believes that there is no conflict between (Catholic Christian) religion and science, a belief I share.
The issue with this scientism is really quite obvious when you ask a straight-forward question: is all knowledge (or all truths) discernable via science or the scientific method? The answer to this question to me is clearly no, and that some truths (e.g. moral truths) cannot be discerned through science, and this enters the realm of philosophy and ultimately religion or faith. Many a philosopher has attempted derive moral truths through scientific/materialist means (including atheist star Sam Harris, if we want to call him a philosopher), but these projects inevitably end up as failures trying to square the circle. The alternative is moral nihilism and a completely materialist outlook, but very few atheists seem to actually want to bite that bullet.
Many philosophers have identified religion has giving rise to science in the first place. Because at the most basic, fundamental level, believe in natural science assumes a priori that that reality is ordered and knowable, a proposition one must take on faith.
LacklustreFriend
37 Pieces of Flair Minimum
9mo ago
There's not really a joke per se, but I found the directness and bluntness of the response to your (kinda gotcha) question amusing, and felt a bit like stating the obvious.
Yes, of course public school have used their institutional power to cover up scandals that occur within their institutions.
LacklustreFriend
37 Pieces of Flair Minimum
9mo ago
This response made me laugh so hard (in agreement).
This really is a matter of preference. Some people, like you and Tretiak, prefer the authoritarian blend, others like me prefer the liberal blend.
I can't speak for the others, but I think characterising this distinction as 'authoritarian' or 'liberal' misses the point. It's not freedom or lack of freedom, but rather one conception of freedom verses a different conception of freedom.
There's two very brought conceptions of freedom, which the first of which I'll label the British/empirical/analytical (liberal) conception of freedom, and the second I'll label the continental conception of freedom.
The analytical conception of freedom is the one that people in the Anglosphere are most familiar with, given that its modern form was born out of the English philosophical tradition. Locke, Mills, and of course the American Founding Fathers. Simplifying greatly, their conception of freedom is one where the external tyrannies of government (or some other external authority) be limited to allow individual freedom and human flourishing. In the extreme, individual rights only end where they infringe upon another person's rights, only as a matter of practically managing conflicting individual rights. Again, something that I'm sure pretty much everyone here will be familiar with.
The continental conception of freedom, for which I name after the poorly defined school of continental philosophy, has a very much different conception of freedom. For the continental philosophers (and I am painting with a really broad brush here), the true constraint on freedom was not some external tyranny or power structure, but yourself. To the continental philosopher, the most shackled man was one who was a slave to his own desires and unable to pursue the "Good" ("Good" here is a big placeholder for any given philosopher to insert his own conception, often it was capital-R Reason, or God, or something else). The continental philosopher looks at a man who wantonly satisfies all his baser instincts as no better than an animal. Consider a man who just fulfills all his most base and carnal desires today - maybe this man sits in his parents basement all day, eating junkfood, smoking weed, playing video games and jacking off to porn all day. Is this man truly free? From a liberal perspective, yes he is. He can do whatever wants with no authority to constrain his behaviour. But to the continental philosopher, this man is a wretched beast in full thrall of his desires. He has no capacity to reason, to think, to act. He's not a moral agent in the same way an animal isn't a moral agent.
Instead, a man truly becomes free when (in one conception) he is able to use Reason to overcome his desires and fulfil a higher purpose. Freedom then, paradoxically, comes from restraint, and restraint from your base desires most of all. A man who commits himself to Reason, or God, or some other higher purpose is infinitely more free than the man who jacks off all day in the basement, even when that commitment requires some external restraint and authority imposed upon him. Actually, even that's not completely accurate. It's more that the continental philosopher sees no distinction between freedom and external restraint. If you're a Kantian, to be free is to use Reason, which is to follow the categorical imperative. The categorical imperative isn't so much an external constraint on behaviour but the natural outcome of someone who is truly committed to Reason and is liberated by it.
Edit: To clarify, the continental conception of freedom believes that true freedom is the ability (granted by Reason, or God, etc) to make a choice: live your life for the purpose of the Good, or live fulfilling your base desires. Obviously choosing the former is the correct choice, virtually by definition. Those who are slaves to their desires don't even get to make this choice, thus aren't free.
The continental conception of freedom has been in many cases criticised (typically by those who believe in an analytic/liberal conception of freedom) as leading to authoritarian tendences. This is not an unfounded criticism. Because this conception of freedom comes by serving the Good, sometimes this means that people have to be made free. Not in the liberal sense, but people must be forced to act in such a way that they will eventually become liberated. This is where you get things like the wonky Marxist conceptions of freedom. To the Marxist, man is not truly free in a liberal society, he is a slave to the capitalist socialisation. Only when man achieves critical consciousness and and achieves the Marxist Good (communist utopia), will he be truly free. Which is why one-party authoritarian Marxist states can claim to be more free than liberal democracies, because they see themselves further along that path than liberal democracies.
However, I think the idea that the continental conception of freedom must necessarily lead to authoritarianism to be unhelpful and untrue. I would say it's about as equally true to say that the analytical/liberal conception of freedom must necessarily lead to moral nihilism, hedonism and solipsism. That is to say, neither of them are true, but they contain an element of truth to them.
And while I have framed the above as an Enlightenment phenomenon, really these ideas are much older than that. In Plato's The Republic, the old man Cephalus cites the poet Sophocles who says*, to paraphrase, he is glad to have become old where his desires (eros) has diminished, and that his desires were like a harsh and cruel mistress which he is now free of. His base desires having left him, he has now truly become free. And similarly, St Augustine's doctrine of original sin. We are all sinful, miserable creatures. It is only by the grace of God which allows us to overcome our sinful nature, our sinful instincts, do we truly become free.
I think what "authoritarian"-preferring commentors (as you are describing them) are saying is that that is a clear void in our society where the continental conception of freedom is concerned. This void was traditionally filled by traditional religion and traditional morality, something that has been dying a slow and painful death. I tend to agree with these commentors that the liberal conception of freedom alone isn't sufficient and is a strong source of societal decay. Actually - there is a form of continental freedom that is gaining traction nowadays, an old friend back in a new skin: Critical Marxism/Neo-Marxism/Western Marxism aka the woke or whatever you want to call them. I believe to truly stop the tide of the woke you need to offer an alternative form of continental freedom. Liberalism isn't enough.
*Translated in the version on Project Gutenberg as: "How well I remember the aged poet Sophocles, when in answer to the question, How does love suit with age, Sophocles,—are you still the man you were? Peace, he replied; most gladly have I escaped the thing of which you speak; I feel as if I had escaped from a mad and furious master."
LacklustreFriend
37 Pieces of Flair Minimum
10mo ago
I guess moving theMotte off Reddit has proven itself more and more to be a good decision
LacklustreFriend
37 Pieces of Flair Minimum
10mo ago
Many Islamic empires was overthrown this way. The (Egyptian) Mamluks, the Seljuks, Ghaznavids of the top of my head all orginally gain power as the "barbarian" slave armies of previous Islamic dynasties. Even the Ottoman Empire towards the end of its life was engaged in a power struggle with the Janissaries, which were made up of Slavs who were kidnapped as children.
There are probably other examples.
LacklustreFriend
37 Pieces of Flair Minimum
10mo ago
Don't have any specific references to if you, but just wanted to comment that the concept of 'natural monopolies' is closely related to what you are describing.
LacklustreFriend
37 Pieces of Flair Minimum
10mo ago
It's almost always framed in how it's bad for women though, typically 'college graduated women can't find husbands (because they will never marry down).'
LacklustreFriend
37 Pieces of Flair Minimum
10mo ago
Very similar to the situation in academia.
Academia ultimately is the root cause though, at least from a practical perspective and not counting abstract social forces.
LacklustreFriend
37 Pieces of Flair Minimum
11mo ago
I mean, that's true, but I have two comments:
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Even if the APS is left-leaning, which it is, there is a commitment to impartiality that is clearly being eroded when events like above are allowed to pass, something that didn't happen before.
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The APS is become decidedly MORE left wing and woke than it has ever been. This is mostly a flow on effect from the universities and academia. Most non-clerical or mid-high level APS employees are university educated, so as the academy becomes more left wing and woke, so does the APS, and all other instutions which take university/college grads (which turns out to be basically everything). Which is why I maintain the root issue is the academy and the key way to fix this issue is to target them.
LacklustreFriend
37 Pieces of Flair Minimum
11mo ago
These people even manage to infiltrate the elected offices of government too. You of course would've heard of the many astonishing deeds of Lidia Thorpe but I doubt anyone else would've.
In Thorpe's defense, she is an elected politican, so it's explicitedly her job to be political, even if those politics are extremely radical and unsavoury.
What is a bit a disgrace is her leaving the party that got her elected less than a year after the election because they weren't radical enough for her, and now she's going to sit on the crossbench for the next five years while I would argue not really having the democratic legitimacy to do so.
You also missed one juicy Lidia Thorpe controversy that happened just very recently, where she got into a huge argument with Labor Indigenous Senator McCarthy during this same round of Senate Estimates, both of them calling each other disgraces to the Indigenous community and resulting in Senator Thorpe storming out of the proceedings.
LacklustreFriend
37 Pieces of Flair Minimum
11mo ago
Indigenous ethnicity in Australia is more a cultural thing than a literal biological genetic thing. The reality is that the majority of Indigenous people in Australia are heavily genetically European due to generations of interracial marriage, Stolen Generation etc. Many urban Indigenous are physically indistinguishable from whites (they basically are white, genetically). But this is not disqualifying. The only Indigenous who are pure Indigenous ethnically are a small minority located in very remote Australia.
In this context, Lidia Thorpe is 100% indigenous, there's really no argument given the current way Indigenous is defined/percieved. She has the credentials too, as her grandmother was a prominent Indigenous activist in her own right.
Diamonds suck and are boring. Aesthetically they're really uninteresting, extremely expensive pink diamonds etc not withstanding.Hopefully, (and she sounds like she isn't) your girlfriend isn't the kind of woman who just wants a real big diamond for supeficial reasons cause that's what you're meant to do.
For a yellow gemstone I recommend a yellow sapphire/corundum. They are nearly as hard and wear resistant as diamond, and are only a fraction of the cost, and can be quite beautiful. You can use extra budget to get a really large stone and/or have multiple stones in a nice custom design that symbolises something meaningful to both of you. Maybe even go a multicolour arrangement with different coloured sapphires with a large yellow sapphire in the middle. If you put a lot of thought into coming up with a beautiful custom multigem design, that will just as or more meaningful then shelling out many thousands on a big diamond.
Ultimately, it's up to you, you know your girlfriend best. Don't worry about what other people will think, just get something your girlfriend will love and appreciate (within budget of course!)
LacklustreFriend
37 Pieces of Flair Minimum
11mo ago
I would like to bring attention to a small but significant culture war kerfuffle that occurred on Monday, during the Australian Parliament Senate Estimates.
For those of you who are not aware, Senate Estimates is a series of hearings held by the Senate standing committees originally meant to scrutinise the budget and spending of the executive government and its agencies (budget estimates), but in practice is used to scrutinise all activities of the executive government, not just budget and financing.
The exchange I want to discuss occurred on Monday 22 May earlier this week, when the Department of Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development, Communications and the Arts (it's a weird combination I know) was being question by the Rural, Regional Affairs and Transport Committee.
In the exchange, Senator McKenzie and Senator Canavan (both Nationals) question Mr Jim Betts, the Secretary of the Department (i.e. the most senior (non-ministerial/partisan) public servant and head of the Department). The Senators question Mr Betts over an alleged event where Mr Betts wore a Black Power t-shirt during an official address to departmental staff. The exchange is too lengthy to quote the whole thing here, so I recommend everyone read the Hansard (transcript) of the exchange.
To summarise the exchange briefly, Mr Betts is questioned on whether he wore a Black Power t-shirt during an official department briefing, Mr Betts is evasive with his answers before it is revealed that the t-shirt in question contained an Aboriginal flag in clenched fist, he claims that the symbol is merely a symbol of "solidarity" with Aboriginal staff and that it has no relevance to Black Power, and continues to be evasive when pressed by the Senators on whether this constitutes a political statement breaching the standards of impartiality of the Australian Public Service. The exchange ends with Mr Betts essentially challenging the Senators to report him to the Australian Public Service Commission for breaching the code of conduct.
It's also difficult to convey the tone of the conversation (unfortunately, I don't believe the video recording of the hearing is yet online), but I have to point out that Mr Betts is dressed in a very casual short sleeve shirt and not a business suit (as would be appropriate for this event, as is sarcastically mentioned by Senator McKenzie), and is wearing a rainbow lanyard (as he will mention). Mr Betts talks in a very condescending but hushed and rushed tone, showing no respect for the Senators, and the Senators, for their part, talked in a generally aggressive, and particularly in Senator McKenzie's case, sarcastic tone.
The reason I wanted to highlight this exchange is because it highlights the woke institutional capture of Australian government institutions, though I suspect this is representative of countries in the Anglosphere. To make it abundantly clear, the clenched fist in Australia is absolutely a symbol of Black Power imported into Australia from America, and used by the "Black/Indigenous sovereignty" movement within Australia. Mr Betts would absolutely know this, and I feel fairly confident in saying he is outright lying here. In fact, the fist was prominently used last year when Senator Lidia Thorpe (radical left Indigenous activist) made the fist and called the Queen a coloniser during her swearing in ceremony, an event I discussed back on the old subreddit.
So the head of a major Australian Government Department (who is allegedly an anarcho-communist, an allegation he doesn't explicitly deny but merely sidesteps) wears t-shirt with a radically left-wing/woke symbol while addressing staff, and he feels reasonably confident that he is going to suffer no consequences for it. If this does not represent a capturing of an institution by woke ideology, I don't know what does. What I also find really interesting is how Mr Betts attempts to argue his way out the questioning by equating his black power t-shirt with his rainbow LGBT lanyard as just symbols of support and solidarity - a false equivalency because the black power symbol remains far more explicitly political in the way LGBT rainbow is not - but this attempted defence does seem to have some strength. But the conservative Nationals Senators were unable or unwilling to make the affirmative case that yes, LGBT lanyards and flags also do constitute a political statement. Even they had to dance around this issue. They have become so normalised and part of the 'new sensibility' that LGBT flags hanging in government offices is perfectly fine, and desirable even, it's simply about promoting a safe and inclusive culture and it is in no way political! (unless you oppose it then you're the one being political).
LacklustreFriend
37 Pieces of Flair Minimum
11mo ago
Either grey or dark navy blue suit as a general purpose business suit. Up to personal taste. Though apparently there's a cultural element where like Southern europeans prefer lighter grey, and north Europeans and Anglos prefer dark blues but idk if this is true.
LacklustreFriend
37 Pieces of Flair Minimum
11mo ago
These kinds of leaks just reinforce my postion that woke corporations aren't just acting woke to 'respond to the market' or to cover their own asses from regulation (i.e. that corporations are only acting woke for sound, economically rational reasons), but that corporations have been subjected to entryism much the same as any other insitution and that market forces and competition aren't some impenetrable bulwark against woke entryism.
LacklustreFriend
37 Pieces of Flair Minimum
11mo ago
What intellectual basis do random youtubers have to talk about instrumental convergence and so on?
About as much as any one of us do on this forum. Ross is by no means an expert, but he is decidedly (for lack of a better term) a 'weird' guy who discusses all kinds of weird stuff through his videos, they aren't exactly stardard game reviews/retrospectives, and he does it reasonably compellingly too. His unique, even if non-expert, outlook alone I think justifies some interest in what he thinks (I say this as a admitted fan of his videos)
LacklustreFriend
37 Pieces of Flair Minimum
11mo ago
You won't update; nobody ever does.
I don't know, I think my political views have changed somewhat in recent years. Less than a decade ago (I am relatively young) I would describe myself not dissimilar to OP, as a social democrat, albeit I never was 'woke'.
However, I find myself nowdays identifying far more with Catholic social teaching and political theory (e.g. Chesterton and distributionism, at least as ideals). I guess means I have become more conservative, though it's a very specific kind of conservative that's heterodox in modern political discourse.
LacklustreFriend
37 Pieces of Flair Minimum
11mo ago
I wear a (casual?) business suit (no tie) most days. Also I have I guess what you would call casual formal wear.
I don't have anything super formal as a tuxedo.
LacklustreFriend
37 Pieces of Flair Minimum
11mo ago
K-pop is apparently popular enough that K-pop groups like BTS were doing ads and promo deals with McDonalds that made it onto primetime TV.
Was the article edited after publishing? I can't find this quote in the article. I was going to write a comment criticising the article but I would rather make sure we're all on the same page with the article first.
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