Why is Veeky Forums so quick to claim Sam Harris is for normies meanwhile he's one of the only contemporary...

Why is Veeky Forums so quick to claim Sam Harris is for normies meanwhile he's one of the only contemporary philosophers who uses both scientific evidence and philosophical discourse to arrive at so-called truths?

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Because he uses arbitrary scientific evidence and weak philosophical discourse.
He's like a shitty plumber who'll also fuck up your electrical if you ask him.

>contemporary
It was at this moment OP realized: he fucked up.

he's not a philosopher

>gives no real argument
>comes up with analogy to compensate
>still fucking fails

Clearly you guys have no argument. Veeky Forums is just one big circle joke

Is this all anyone ever fucking says anymore?

What a fantastic thread.
Thanks for making this, OP, really appreciate it.

leave

what truths?

he's confused

he thinks religious people think religion describes an IS and he personally thinks science describes an OUGHT

I like Sam Harris but I think he's overly optimistic about the general human's talent for rationality and good will and that makes him a naive globalist liberal.

He means well and his attempt at dialogue with Muslims is admirable in a way, but it's a futile effort. At this point even wanting to live in harmony with Muslims is a weakness that they will exploit.

Muslims are the only group not capable of living in peace with others. This will end in a major cleansing.

And where is the contingency with this?

Yeah I'm personally a conservative and don't believe islam is compatible with western culture. HOWEVER, aside from his political stances, his actual investigation into philosophical topics like free will or consciousness is well thought out and deserves more positive attention from this board.

He as well as every other Utilitarian has yet to come up with a reason of why I should care about "the greater good" or another persons safety.

Interesting, thanks for the real response

>his actual investigation into philosophical topics like free will or consciousness is well thought out
But it isn't. Not at all. His views on free will are the same as every freshman who's read about the topic for the first time. Same with his ethics. I dunno what his views on consciousness are.

What's wrong with his view on free will?

`Tis not contrary to reason to prefer the destruction of the whole world to the scratching of my finger. Heh..

He's actually stated he doesn't even call himself a consequentialist.

Here is just one reason why I don't like Sam Harris. He claims to appreciate the tremendous value of fiction and the literary canon yet I doubt a great work of fiction has ever had a profound effect on his beliefs. For him, all it fiction boils down to is 'entering a well imaged scenario'.
>fiction

He's not a scientist either

he's a philosopher and neuroscientist and accomplished author and meditation master you cuck

Science is trash, philosophy is trash.

science is bad

Ethics and Free will ain't quantum physics. Unless you have some background in neurosciences and can bring in relevant experiments, you're opinions is as correct as any other bozos. Chomsky's opinions on the topic is as valuable as Harris since arguing over ethics and free will don't produce anything of value except self wankery. It can't produce a vaccine or an atomic bombs. A freshmen can argue with the both of them and be "experts" if he can reason through his arguments and positions.

yeah i thought he was a lover of fiction because somebody once posted here a tweet of him saying kind of half-jokingly that he was so exasperated by what was going on in the real world that maybe he would just retire and write fiction.

but then on the second jordan peterson podcast peterson was talking about how classic literature is "true" and asked harris what we mean when we say a great novel by tolstoy or dostoevsky is "true," and harris agreed that they were true, for the reason that the storyline unfolds in a convincing way and the characters act in a way that seems consistent with the way we've seen people act, and so on, basically that classic literature was *plausible*, which seems to me to be an impoverished view of the "truth" of literature and fell short of what peterson was getting at.

then harris expanded on the value of literature, trying to convince peterson and the audience that he was not closed to its value, talking about how novels offer extraordinary vicarious experiences; he talked about how in real life you might not murder an old pawnbroker but that crime and punishment enables you to have that experience through the eyes of raskolnikov. which also seemed shallow.

i generally like sam harris, but his attitude about literature made me think he doesnt really get it.

Both Harris and Peterson fail to account for the fact that the "classic" literature was written in times where entertainment was lacking in form. Those classic literature was basically "true detectives" or game of thrones nowadays. Except they can't be too political or sexual otherwise the books would get banned.

Peterson need to shut the fuck up about his "truth" that is found in ancient stories. Basically he's doing pattern recognition where he takes different examples, find the pattern within them, and say the pattern he found is the truth. This is fine if he actually takes all examples but he cherry picks too much.

You just don't get it bro.

>uses... ...scientific evidence
He doesn't. he is not in the lab doing multiple-iteration data gathering, replication, and evaluation. His stuff isn't peer reviewed.
he isn't "doing science" and he isn't presenting "scientific evidence".
What he *is* doing is looking at portions of data sets gathered by scientists and forming opinions about what that data means in non-scientific areas, and then trying to convince people its is 'science'.
>who uses... ...philosophical discourse
No, he doesn't. he never presents his opinions in full philosophical form. he has never met the criteria for beign said to have made a philosophical position. Nor even a truly logical argument. He doesn't 'use philosophy', he refers to it.
--------------------------------------------
Sam Harris is a rhetorician who makes a good living convincing the semi-literate that he is a lot of things he isn't.

I find
Amusing - the OP is nothing more than an a broad generalization and unsupported assertion, but OP whines that others have no argument.

>well thought out
What?
His view of free will is self-contradictory and about as sophisticated as 'when I pull a weed out by the roots it shows I am stronger than the whole earth'.

>arguing over ethics and free will don't produce anything of value except self wankery.
*doesn't
An obviously false statement. Perhaps a short break to get an education is in order?

>Harris entirely evades philosophical criticism of his positions, on the simple grounds that he finds metaethics "boring." But he is a self-professed consequentialist -- a philosophical stance close to utilitarianism -- who simply ducks any discussion of the implications of that a priori choice, which informs his entire view of what counts for morality, happiness, well-being and so forth. He seems unaware (or doesn't care about) the serious philosophical objections that have been raised against consequentialism, and even less so of the various moves in logical space (some more convincing than others) that consequentialists have made to defend their position.

He's a hack.

You have to understand that Veeky Forums is mostly europoors.

Anglos reject continental 'philosophy' because it's obviously bullshit, but eurocucks embrace it out of a sense of inferiority towards Anglos, their natural superiors. Eurocuck thought is defined literally by a rejection of rational Anglo reality, whether it's denying that 'A' cannot be 'not A' ala Hegel/Marx and the corresponding replacement of that obvious logic with a contrived and nonsensical dialectical method, or the acceptance of Foucaultian/Derridian ideas that deny the reality of the individual and of a text, it's always literally against logic and politically motivated (this denial of reality is always in service of attacking the rationality and thus power of the Anglo).

I mean just the other day there was a thread where OP was reading a text that he said made him convinced of logical realism but he rejected that conclusion not based on logic but based on the reason that he just didn't want to believe it. You can pretty much assume any such post is made by a frog.

>His view of free will is self-contradictory
Free will is

Literally the worst exponents of continental philosophy are in America you mongoloid.

So, who's gonna blow his free will argument out of the water? Are you all just gonna say it's shit without providing an argument?

Not that guy, but I agree with him. General ethical argumentation doesn't yield any knowledge, it involves deductions drawn from assumed dogmas. It's essentially math without the numbers, or geometry that claims to prescribe certain general actions, which is why many mathematicians (e.g. Fidel) are tricked into grasping at a general ethics.

What I mean is, he presents himself as a very hard Determinist, but runs a lobbying firm, enters into debate, and talks about logic.

>General ethical argumentation doesn't yield any knowledge, it involves deductions drawn from assumed dogmas.

that isn't up to him

My point

A friend of mine told me to listen to him and I downloaded a podcast of his and listened to it for one hour and he didn't say a single thing the entire time that I would ever consider worth saying. It was the one with some hack talking about meditation and all he said was 'meditation isn't for everyone' and 'ego death sounds like psychopathology'.
I couldn't actually believe that I could listen to someone talk for an hour and by the end of it not have heard them say anything.

Determinism is not necessary to disprove free will.

You don't understand determinism, user, if you think these actions are some how at odds with the belief.

Also disbelief in free will isn't inherently predicated on determinism

Did I say that?

t. kpop poster with no arguments

>You don't understand determinism, user, if you think these actions are some how at odds with the belief.

*somehow
Oh, I am aware that hard determinism allows anything, really, but you do wonder why a guy that espouses hard determinism then works on ethics....
>Also disbelief in free will isn't inherently predicated on determinism
see

No - someone making fun of a blatantly false statement

Why does no one talk about John Barth on here?
I've read all of his works up to pic related, which I'm in the middle of currently, and have loved all of them.

The Sot-Weed Factor is one the funniest, most ambitiously conceived, and executed, books I've ever read.

The End of the Road and the Floating Opera are the best pithy, acerbic, black comedies I've ever read.

Now, reading pic related is immoderately satisfying. Barth reuses characters and fictitious institutes from his previous books, and he interacts with them all through a series of correspondence.

What does everyone here think about Barth?

"H-h-hey guys, if I repeat 'it's false' enough without making any actual points, people will surely believe me, r-r-right?"

Lol

Oh.
So you wrote
and
then?
Look, kid, this is Veeky Forums and most people here have actually read books. If you really, honestly sthink that the 8,000+ year old analyses and discussions of ethics has resulted in 'nothing but wankery' you either need to actually take 11th grade Civics or read these
>Gorgias, Nichomachean Ethics, Confessions, Proof of the Truthful, The Praise of Folly, Meditations on First Philosophy, Ethics, Theodicee, A Treatise of Human Nature, The Theory of Moral Sentiments, and Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals,
Once you have read and studied these you will look around the contemporary world with eyes finally opened to just how much you take for granted is based upon the discourses of great men on ethics.
For you see, just as engineers are no more than tradesmen and implement the theories of physicists the governments that rule you and the laws that encircle you are just the tradesman's application of the ethics of philosophers.
tl;dr: doubling down just proves your ignorance of the topic

Typical bessessenmensch, resorting to namedropping in place of actual argumentation. You can insult and belittle, and continue to assume I haven't read what I have if it makes you feel better, but if you don't provide a concrete point or position, this is your last (You).

I know the history of philosophy, mongoloid. Your use of condescension in discussion's place demonstrates exactly how bereft you are of your own ideas. No wonder you let Kant, Aristotle and Erasmus speak for you

>Typical bessessenmensch
followed *immediately* by
>resorting to namedropping in place of actual argumentation
+2 points, kid - well played!
BTW,
*besessenmensch
and
*name dropping
Here's the main problem, - there is nothing to argue *against*. The original statement is an unsupported assertion and your parade of butthurt is just a repetition of an unsupported assertion.
>but if you don't provide a concrete point or position
Yeah.... I did. You just aren't bright enough to see it. here - I'll C&P
>"...the governments that rule you and the laws that encircle you are just the tradesman's application of the ethics of philosophers."
Get it? Governments/political science and legal codes are the practical applications of ethics.
I just pointed that out in the post that prompted you to reply
>but if you don't provide a concrete point or position
So - you need to slow down and actually read, not skim so you can post more.
>I know the history of philosophy
Unlikely, if you believe
>Your use of condescension in discussion's place demonstrates exactly how bereft you are of your own ideas
Says the man that led with
>arguing over ethics and free will don't produce anything of value except self wankery.
...........
With the bonus points I'm scoring you 8/10 so far

Bessessenmensch is not a name, and governments do not universally apply the categorical imperative. You're literally relying on a defunct platonic metaphor as your entire argument, which is why it isn't one (an argument). A king is not equivalent to the captain of a ship because the existence of the ship and ship's crew already presuppose concrete ethical constraints, e.g. the deck should be kept as clear as possible. No such physical conditions can be applied to the "State," which is a notion in the head. There is no ship, and humans are not sailors. Again, stop regurgitating dead philosophy as original commentary, it's really quite depressing.

All of which has nothing at all to do with the main point, which is "there is no general ethics." Your task, then, is to provide proof for generally applicable ethics of any sort: a task that you're desperately avoiding. Your appropriation of a passage from "Republic" is a red-herring.

Also, I'm not the other user to whom you keep attributing my posts. But you are patently dishonest and not interested in discourse. You want to make yourself feel safer in your knowledge, so you use smugness as a defense mechanism. I used to do the same thing, it's nothing to be ashamed of.

>Bessessenmensch is not a name
I know besessenmensch isn't a name. That is because I can spell it properly.
>governments do not universally apply the categorical imperative
Why would they? A surprising amount of them are based upon Thomistic concepts, after all!
>You're literally relying on a defunct platonic metaphor
That isn't how you use the word 'literally'.
You say
>concrete ethical constraints
and follow it immediately with
>the deck should be kept as clear as possible
which is a practical consideration, not an ethical constraint, demonstrating you have no grasp of ethics
>No such physical conditions can be applied to the "State," which is a notion in the head.
And a defined territory, and semiotics, and a collection of laws, and a conglomeration of habits and culture, etc.
There is, indeed, quite a bit involved in the state that is not 'a notion in the head'. Try visiting your local prison for confirmation.
>stop regurgitating dead philosophy
Let me remind you - this is the topic at hand. The discussion is *about* philosophy.
>All of which has nothing at all to do with the main point, which is "there is no general ethics."
At best this is moving the goalposts. But it is more likely simply a lie. The original contention made was this
>arguing over ethics and free will don't produce anything of value except self wankery
Remember when you wrote that?
I have demonstrated that ethics *does* lead to concrete things of value (laws, governments, etc.) and now you want to pretend *I* brought up something no one mentioned until now?
FFS, kid - this is all written down in this thread! Anyone can see how you're refusing to admit that you were wrong!

I don't understand how you can take a moral highground on a culture and then advocate for ethnic and religious cleansing in the same breath. It seems hypocritical.

Of course, I'm sure you'll argue that every single Muslim person (children and women too I imagine) holds a threat that must be ended, and that Islamic culture is inherently dangerous due to terrorist threats (with little mention of white supremacist or buddhist or any other terror groups). But really, radical Islamic terrorism is as much a Mulsim invention as it is a Western one - America protects and funds the biggest funders of Wahabbism (which is an ideology that really should be destroyed) while continually kicking the hornet's nest to give them enough manpower to keep stinging.

I hate Islamism and think that's a cancer on the Middle-East, but as someone who has worked and lived in Cairo, I can tell you that you're really conflating a minority with the majority. A rapidly growing minority, yes, but one that is a response to Western actions, and nothing intrinsically worse or better than any Christian theology - an ideology, may I add, with much of the same heritage.

A text can be read in many ways, user, any good literature student would know that. There are warlike qualities to the Quran, but there are beautiful passages too. Sufism is an example of a truly peaceful religion that abides by the same book as any other Muslim, good or bad.

All dogmatic ideologies are cancer, some more so than others.
If I created a religion right now that preached the inferior condition of women and the aberration of the existence of homosexuality, I would find censorship. Forget "preached", it's only necessary that it hints those things. If you acknowledge Islam, Christianity, and so on, as nonsense, then you have no grounds to be an apologist for them, especially because "there are beautiful passages".

Harris clearly answers to the is-ought problem though, next you're gonna say Kantian ethics ignore is-ought.

>I don't understand how you can take a moral highground on a culture and then advocate for ethnic and religious cleansing in the same breath. It seems hypocritical.

My culture is superior. This other culture is an existential threat to my culture and morally bankrupt. It needs to be exterminated for my own survival. This is how Muslims view the West.

Then why is the mayor of London a Muslim? There are countless Muslims who don't see the West in that way, and there are countless people - including the post I was originally replying too - that see things in totally the same way, just with a different lens (American, Buddhist, Christian etc.).

What you're basically saying is that you are a racist (and I really rarely use that term) who can't separate the actions and culture of a group from the dynamics of an individual.

I'm not defending homophobia or sexism, I'm stating that it is just wrong to advocate for genocide.

If you hate dogmatism then you'd feel similarly to me. Islamic culture has a lot of problems. It has things to admire too. I think it should be critiqued and challenged, but never eradicated.

It's about wealth and expanding (and shrinking) populations. It was never about Islam.

Peterson is the kind of guy who you talk to for five minutes in line somewhere and he starts talking about the ancient ones and "great power". You just clench your jaw, turn away, and hope he stops.

I don't even get his point. Like what has he dedicated his life to?

I agree that it's wrong to advocate for genocide. Nonetheless, to advocate for the erradication of religion is not. Islam can survive as a cultural heritage in the same field of Norse mythology. Of course, there's no discernible way to do this right now; but I think it's important to define goals, even if platonic.

Oh yeah? clarionproject.org/factsheets-files/islamic-state-magazine-dabiq-fifteen-breaking-the-cross.pdf

The motivation of the leaders doesn't matter because Islam is being used effectively to recruit and motivate jihadists. The ones fighting are truly doing it for their beliefs. What's even more troubling is that the holy texts offer plausible justifications.

>Hard determinist
>addresses the is/ought problem
"Ought" implies the ability to choose....

Computers have the "ability" to choose, don't have free will.

>meditation master

That's the dumbest goddamn thing I've ever read. You described a retard this way, remember that

>"I have no fucking idea what 'hard Determinism' means"
FTFY

Irrelevant.

Very relevant
>of course, based on your earlier post, maybe you don't know what 'relevant' means, either

not an argument

Not my post.

Even worse for you

You identified a statement correctly! Good for you!
Care to define a gerund?

I think that's perfectly fine to think that - but I'd ask why? Do you think religion infringes on people's freedoms? What if someone believed in their faith at a purely personal and respectful level, with no interest in forcing people to see it their way? I'd argue Suffism is a great Islamic example of that.

By your logic, on the other hand, you're advancing your own beliefs on people who perhaps had no interest in doing otherwise - your own hatred against dogma, paradoxically, is just as dogmatic.

I'd like to hear what you'd have to say about this, truly curious.

I don't quite understand what you're arguing. You want Muslims dead because of population growth?

As I said earlier , the fault is not the text. A text can be used to justify anything. I could take fifteen passages from The Bible and read them in the most eccentric ways to justify absolute atrocity. John Lennon was assassinated by a man who claimed Catcher In The Rye motivated him to do so - is the fault in the book or the man?

In all these arguments, I don't particuarly like Islam or religion - but I respect elements of it and I think it's silly to want to eradicate something totally over preserving elements of the positive.

he's a slimey jew