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Antero wrote:

matthew wrote:It's good you mention entropy here, Kerble, because in an entropic universe biological macroevolution cannot occur. Entropy entails the winding down of matter/energy, thus how would it be possibly for great, complex things such as organisms to evolve if matter/energy were burning themselves out?

Man, that's just plain stupid. Let me lay it out in simple terms.

A) If the earth was a closed system with no inputs, it would use up its energy damn fast.

B) BUT

C) The earth is not a closed system. It has a great big motherfucking energy input that it circles around... which provides energy that powers wind, waves, plant life, and the basic cellular organisms that all life evolved from.

You don't know thermodynamics, you passed it in the hall while it was talking with its more popular friends.

-The system I was referring to was the entire cosmos.....the universe as a whole, not merely the planet earth

-The second law of thermodynamics has some problems. More later.

-Finally, no amount of sheer energy input from the sun could ever produce the variety of living things that there is today. No way, man. Not a chance in hell. Refer to what I said to Steve re the beans thing.

Andrew L. wrote:I know what you're saying. Here's my response. I think the "eternal return" is very deceptive at first or even multiple blushes (in a similar way that Nietzsche's anti-nihilism passes casual readers by (not saying you're such a reader, Sunlore)). The eternal return is not about a repetition of the same that becomes self-referential. It's an ethical principle of affirmation and becoming (against ressentiment). It's about embracing chance and rather than getting tied up in a particular investment in the past or future, embracing the transformative potential of whatever outcome. The "eternal return" elevates the refusal of resignation and ressentiment to an ontological status. Zarusthustra invokes an image of a tangled web of forces within which particularities cannot be abstracted from the web of life. As an ethics the eternal return sets about transmuting a negative, reactionary will to power into an affirmative embrace of singularities that are 'beyond good and evil.'

I see what you're saying here about Nietzsche. However, it is utterly irrational.

If there is no "good and evil" why not embrace the maggoty ressentiment? Why not? You might even gain something if you build upon the Socratic/Christian ressentiment....sort of. I mean, there's nothing lost and nothing gained here. Why NOT have ressentiment??? (for the record, a true Christian has no ressentiment because he loves.).

In the midst of a post, Andrew L. wrote:...I'm the board's Marx-Nazi. Say anything about the swarthy old turdburgler and I'm bound to show up to defend, rebuke, or "problematize."

You really think Karl Marx is worth defending? Nietzsche too? I have read and studied Nietzsche extensively in a formal academic setting. In fact I wrote a 35 page paper about eternal recurrance (mostly Zarathustra) If you think eternal recurrance is a reality, then are contradicting yourself in terms.

Why do do think that Marx and Nietzsche are worth defending? Because they were merely different? That seems to be your only defence for their ideas from what I have read here on this forum. Be more specfiic.

Karl Marx was a man who tried to immanentize the eschaton through economics and politics. Fritz Nietzsche tried to do the same through philosophy. They have both failed. They are both being refuted academically and socially as I speak.

jlamour wrote:Okay, Nietzsche attempted to negate Plato's ideas but that doesn't mean he completely succeeded in doing this. No doubt he attacked his ideas and tried to counterpoint them, but when you still hold the same FUNDEMENTAL position on metaphysics you will only do so superficially. I'm really looking at Nietzsche's ideas based on his metaphysics which is still metaphysically dualistic, fundamentally in step with Plato and Kant. You have metaphysical duality or you don't and Nietzsche has it. The idea of "becoming"? From what to what? Where to where? Blank out. Nothing. Nihilism.

Same thing with his take on Nihilism. You can hate it, refute it, but if you have a hint of it in your view of reality, you will ultimately yield to some sort of a nihilist philosophy. You cannot, CANNOT isolate Kant from the philosophical atmosphere of Germany in the 1800's. No philosopher in Northern Europe stood a chance against this mental juggernaut(whom I reject). I do not want to even get into the devlopment of realism and nominalism which is where I think our(Andrew) portion of this thread is headed. Save that for another topic. But whatever. I will make a personal attack on a few posts that quoted myself and other people which won't be a simple insult, I promise. But I find it is typical of philosophical discussions I encounter. A lot of statements(myself, others and especially, Nietzsche) are easy to take OUT OF CONTEXT and simply say they are wrong with no explanation whatsoever. Check out how I was quoted in the last few postings:

jlamour wrote:Blah, bullshit, taco, etc.

jlamour, wrong. With no reasons why.

or

jlamour wrote:Crap, stab, shoot, spit

jlamour, right. With no reasons why.

Come on. And proclaiming your self to be the EA high and mighty expert on Marx or whatever doesn't have me shaking in my spike-heeled boots. Give me something to chew on. I'm going to continue with this forum because I'm a huge fan of the music culture that surrounds this studio. Notice how innocently this thread started and how it's developed. The title itself is a contradiction: "Science is crazy." But it had to lead into a discussion on philosophy since science is merely an extension of philosphy. Nihilism has no place in science, lord the human race would be extinct already.

How old are you, jlamour?

matthew wrote:-The system I was referring to was the entire cosmos.....the universe as a whole, not merely the planet earth

WE already know that that's going to burn itself out eventually.

-The second law of thermodynamics has some problems. More later.

-Finally, no amount of sheer energy input from the sun could ever produce the variety of living things that there is today. No way, man. Not a chance in hell. Refer to what I said to Steve re the beans thing.

"I AVOID ACTUAL ARGUMENTATION WHENEVER POSSIBLE."

Seriously, "No way, man"?

"Yes way!"

"No waaaay!"

"YES way!"

sunlore wrote:I gotta get me to read some Deleuze, I guess (I'll gladly take recommendations).

he's got a couple books on film, Cinema 1 and Cinema 2. i own them but have yet to read more than a four or five pages without wondering why the fuck i'm bothering at all to read them.

(there's a User's Guide to Capitalism and Schizophrenia that's probably more "useful" than the two books he and Guattari did together, but even then, i can't help but feel it's all a waste of time. i knew a old guy during my early twenties who was super into deleuze and he (the former) was basically a fuckin' nut case. a really ugly guy who always commented on the way people looked, as if he was some sort of arbiter of beauty. last thing i heard he was "seeing" transients and trying to legally adopt this sixteen year old kid so he could have sex with him on regular basis. )

matthew wrote:
I see what you're saying here about Nietzsche. However, it is utterly irrational.

If it wasn't for your lack of playfulness, Mattheus, you would be a true master of irony.

If there is no "good and evil" why not embrace the maggoty ressentiment? Why not? You might even gain something if you build upon the Socratic/Christian ressentiment....sort of. I mean, there's nothing lost and nothing gained here. Why NOT have ressentiment???

Provided you have a basic understanding of Nietzsche, like you claim you do, you would be able to answer this question for yourself. So I'm not sure whether you are sincere here. But I'm going to pretend that you are.

What Nietzsche was attacking in the Genealogy of Morals were specific thought processes and perceptions underlying the moral of good and evil. That is to say, "good" and "evil" have a specific meaning in Nietzsche's discourse. They are fixed concepts, and they are, therefore, explicitly (conceptually) separated from the ideas of "good" and "bad", ideas that still have a place in Nietzsche's ethics.

I'll pass the mic to the man himself:

On the other hand, imagine the "enemy" as the resentful man conceives him—and it is here exactly that we see his work, his creativeness; he has conceived "the evil enemy," the "evil one," and indeed that is the root idea from which he now evolves as a contrasting and corresponding figure a "good one," himself—his very self!

...

The method of this man is quite contrary to that of the aristocratic man, who conceives the root idea "good" spontaneously and straight away, that is to say, out of himself, and from that material then creates for himself a concept of "bad"! This "bad" of aristocratic origin and that "evil" out of the cauldron of unsatisfied hatred—the former an imitation, an "extra," an additional nuance; the latter, on the other hand, the original, the beginning, the essential act in the conception of a slave-morality—these two words "bad " and "evil," how great a difference do they mark, in spite of the fact that they have an identical contrary in the idea "good."

You see how he untangles the concepts of "bad" (as opposed to "good") and "evil" (as an outcome of a moral of ressentiment)? There is good and bad in Nietzsche. There is a moral. His ethics are not gratuit (now there's a word you're likely to enjoy).

All this formal academic education, and yet you failed to understand this Nietzsche 101. Boy, am I glad I didn't go to your school.

Eksvplot wrote:

sunlore wrote:I gotta get me to read some Deleuze, I guess (I'll gladly take recommendations).

he's got a couple books on film, Cinema 1 and Cinema 2. i own them but have yet to read more than a four or five pages without wondering why the fuck i'm bothering at all to read them.

Don't let this fellow discourage you, Deleuze is 100% awesome. He plays, karu? It's not that sort of philsophy where someone is trying to come up with a fixed theory that explains a fixed reality. He jumps around and tosses fifty thousand ideas up in the air and kicks them at you as they come down.

Some of these old bastards I read because I've been assigned to read them. Deleuze (and Nietzsche!) I can read for enjoyment.

Andrew L. wrote:My honest advice is not to read any Deleuze though. Better to go for a walk or have sex. It's pretty much the same thing.

That's a pretty odd comment, but I think I agree with it...

steve wrote:

Mr. Binary wrote:ps. Is there some sort of argument here about whether there is such a thing as the "unknown"? This, for reasons which I would like to think are obvious, would be a stupid thing to argue about.

There is a presumption among the spiritual that there is an awful lot out there that isn't part of the natural world, and we can't know about it conventionally. An eternity of it. They say it hides in the unknown.

I want to know why there is a presumption (insistence even) that there is something there, rather than the more commonsense presumption that there isn't. Certainly there are unknown things. Why suggest that the supernatural is one of them?

Why is there a bias toward magic and against reason?

Blind faith is easy - you just let someone beat it into your brains for long enough and avoid asking questions. Reason requires intellect, discipline and insight. Its far easier to beleive a simple story of creation that places us at the centre of existence than a rather complicated and still incomplete scientific account of the universe creation and evolution that affords us no special position in an uncaring cosmos. Only a tiny fraction of the population will ever understand concepts such as general relativity, the algorithms and information flow of evolution etc. If something can only be understood by a few people in detail then the majority who dont will prefer to beleive their simple story is correct so that they dont have to feel inferior. Its part of western culture to resent intellect or sucess rather than aspire to it. Or they try and mystify science and use pseuodo science it to justify religion - like nonsense about telepathy being substantiated by action at a distance. No intelligent designer is required to explain the world - apply Occams principle. It is only invoked becuase of peoples lack of imagination and intellect. The universe can self organise with increasing complexity without outside help, and give rise to all the rich self emergent behaviour we observe.

Matthew - you are looking niavely at raw probability. If you consider conditional prior proability over vast amounts of time and space then it not only becomes possible it becomes probable. It just looks unlikely to you as you examine the end result and not the billions of intermediate steps.

Organised religion is an unfortunate by product of certain evolutionary characteristics humans have acquired that now operate well outside their original context of small tribes on the african plains. Much like we suffer from appendicitus now that we no longer adhere to the diet and lifestyle that we evolved to match.

Sunlore - I dont think he meant eternal recurrence in the sense of reincarnation or literal replaying. I think its a statement of existence - that only striving for the overman is desirable. To move beyond this cycle by what you become internally and to find transcendent joy in the cycle thereafter.

Antero wrote:

Andrew L. wrote:My honest advice is not to read any Deleuze though. Better to go for a walk or have sex. It's pretty much the same thing.

That's a pretty odd comment, but I think I agree with it...

I assumed it was a Deleuze-ian (delusion) thing to say. Also, tres LAD. So nice, when these little bits of temperament and personality shine through in such a stylized environment as a message board.

Actually, I had been planning on reading some Deleuze for a while. Although I have to say I've been firmly disappointed with other French attempts to ass-fuck philosophy (and that means you, George Bataille).

Tidbits, by the way!

"De Leuze" means "the maxim" in Dutch.

"Nietzsche -vo" means "nothing" in Russian.