Sam Harris versus Free Will

[Parodite]

Parodite,

Four of my long term favorite quotes are:
"The greatest battles of life are fought out daily in the silent chambers of the soul."
"Just as the battle is within, so is the victory."
"Life seems like one long obstacle course, with me as the chief obstacle."
"Conquer yourself, not the world." **

Pretty good. I tend towards a zen-like framing (or whatever) where those battles are hard to battle because it would be a battle like any battle. And you cannot conquer yourself (let alone something big like the world) because then a new self queues up to conquer the new victorious self. One quote I like is:

"To be free from the need to be free".

The various wars against the ego as in Buddhism, or in the surrender of the self (tm) to some earthly or divine authority are particularly interesting. Or letting meditation and mindfulness dissolve the self-centered stumbling block. Me am a bit skeptical towards all these efforts. If somebody considers him/herself too egotistical I would not advice to fight it. A free narcissist is most likely better than the dictator who would conquer him.

Whether one has free will or not, does seems to be a personal choice. A godlike power indeed. As Kanye West so recently noted.

** - as one commentator noted, What Decartes meant at the base, is actually the same thing.

I like the idea of Viagara for one's ego. It is a billion $ idea. I would suggest it be offered in creams, pills, and liquid forms.

Indeed Grow that thing!

[Simple Minded]

Parodite,

Four of my long term favorite quotes are:
"The greatest battles of life are fought out daily in the silent chambers of the soul."
"Just as the battle is within, so is the victory."
"Life seems like one long obstacle course, with me as the chief obstacle."
"Conquer yourself, not the world." **

Pretty good. I tend towards a zen-like framing (or whatever) where those battles are hard to battle because it would be a battle like any battle. And you cannot conquer yourself (let alone something big like the world) because then a new self queues up to conquer the new victorious self. One quote I like is:

"To be free from the need to be free".

The various wars against the ego as in Buddhism, or in the surrender of the self (tm) to some earthly or divine authority are particularly interesting. Or letting meditation and mindfulness dissolve the self-centered stumbling block. Me am a bit skeptical towards all these efforts. If somebody considers him/herself too egotistical I would not advice to fight it. A free narcissist is most likely better than the dictator who would conquer him.

Whether one has free will or not, does seems to be a personal choice. A godlike power indeed. As Kanye West so recently noted.

** - as one commentator noted, What Decartes meant at the base, is actually the same thing.

I like the idea of Viagara for one's ego. It is a billion $ idea. I would suggest it be offered in creams, pills, and liquid forms.

Indeed Grow that thing!

Yep. Introspection is not for everyone. A lot of people won't like what they see and it will force them to perform massive rationalizations on regular basis.

[Parodite]

Had little conversation with MN about Sam Harris, who seems to be loosing it:

gFio_8aUS4I

Me: "I'm more and more disappointed in SH. His unhinged claims about free will, he now also seems to be suffering from the Trump Derangement Syndrome, a hole I don't see him climb out from ever! His coming talks with JBP will go flat dead as their previous encounters. Such a disappointment."

MN: "I know what you mean. Poor Sam. Don't be too disappointed or judgmental! He and JBP try to make sense of the bigger world, but like most people they talk about themselves without realizing it.

Of course Sam doesn't believe in free will, just look at him! The poor guy is frozen, only his eyes and intellect show movement. For him, there is very little wiggle room. You might as well put him in a wheel chair. How can he conclude differently than that free will must be an illusion? For him there are only a few square centimeters playing ground available. But he is a Master there! As limited as that space is.

Compare that to JBP who is very dynamic, his whole body, intellect and emotion are on the move constantly and he is not able to say things exactly the same way he said them before. He also talks about himself more than anything else: he is constantly dancing his order-vs-chaos tango.

How do you want a Rudolf Nureyev dance with a crippled genius in a wheel chair?"

[Nonc Hilaire]

Well put, Parodite.

[Mr. Perfect]

Wow. No kidding.

[Mr. Perfect]

Honestly Parodite is becoming one of my must read digital commenters. Something special going on there, I think you would bury Sargon of Akkad and many others. We might need a platform for you.

[Mr. Perfect]

The thing about Harris, is he presents himself as a God, who has all the answers for everything.

But the human reaction Master P alludes to is Sam Harris is someone who I would not ask where to get dinner. That guy literally provides no value to my life, while he believes himself to be God while not believing in God.

[Simple Minded]

Minutely different version of an earlier question:

Who is making Sam Harris post/broadcast/publish his opinions?

Why interviewers fail to ask such obvious questions eludes me.

[Parodite]

Thanks for appreciating.

SM, SH is an AI... perhaps. How would you Turing-test him? Or how should Dave Rubin have done it?

[Miss_Faucie_Fishtits]

Thoughts I've had on free will.......

For a Christian understanding, G_d is something beyond the Bible and when it comes down to it, understanding G_d takes priority over understanding the Bible. If you don't understand G_d properly, you don't and can't really understand the Bible. The notion of G_d is what sets Christianity apart from other faiths, the moral teachings of the various religions are more or less valid and more or less interchangeable. That's why I like reading works of comparative religions and theologian/philosophers rather than the Book....'>.......

Omniscience and omnipotence are manifestations of our human limitations. G_d is beyond all-seeing and all-knowing, He has an infinitude of options beyond our ken, so myriad limitations including self imposed ones don't affect His Being. The universe exists as His project given us, and we can either move towards integration and growth or disintegration and extinction. He created the world by accepting His self-limitations which increased over time and in response to our own moral development. G_d Himself evolves; when he set Man in the Garden He was the embodiment of the Divine Narcissist. When He sent down His Son to be Crucified, He served as the embodiment of the Divine Individual. Our actions judge us and G_d's plan is revealed in the natural laws of the universe. He doesn't sit judgement in the normal sense, grading on a curve or fixed letter grade. Rather, it's agree and amplify. If we seek chaos and annihilation we go to Hell, if we serve life through order attained through wisdom, we reach Paradise and then Heaven. G_d does not rule from Heaven but reveals Himself as The Model. The Model of our being, our hopes and aspirations.........

G_d's plan is effected through us. My not seeing G_d as the classic demiurge allows the Bible to be intelligible to me and to make sense. Free will is in the nature of G_d. He is the source of free will and our lives and destinies are our response........

[Mr. Perfect]

You are on the mark.

John 17:3 And this is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent.

Long story short, the whole point of the Bible is so that spiritually you will turn toward heaven and make contact with our Father who is in heaven. If you read it daily your whole life and fail to do that simple thing you missed the whole point.

It can be an awesome and terrible thing. Even though I have experienced God in my life countless times that instance when you know you have to do it again is almost terrifying. It's literally that step of faith into the unknown.

But, there is a lot of amazing stuff in the Bible, I recommend reading it thoroughly. But nothing compares to having your all powerful creator by your side guiding your footsteps.

[Mr. Perfect]

Personally I have always loved the God of the Old Testament. I always laugh, people think the OT God is different than the NT. Same guy.

The lesson of the OT God is how truly heinous sin is. How you cannot be saved with sin. It's not possible. All the carnage of animal sacrifice, tears and buckets of blood, all to show is how horrible it is to die in a state of sin. There is nothing to be done. God weeps and rages.

Then, the intermediary, the atoning sacrifice in Jesus Christ. He was always going to do it, but those gifts are only available to those who seek them.

[Simple Minded]

Thanks for appreciating.

SM, SH is an AI... perhaps. How would you Turing-test him? Or how should Dave Rubin have done it?

You are welcome. Any time I have encountered it, Fred's disbelief in freewill, has always been Fred's feeble attempt to avoid personal responsibility.

Flip Wison's routines of "The Devil make me do it!" come to mind.

Of course, in the modern era, the chic references are to the boogeymen of "society" or "group identity X."

Dave should have simply asked Sam "If free will does not exist who is pulling your strings and making you believe and say all these things?"

My personal preference is "My parents screwed me up." All that preaching about personal responsibility denied me a plethora of scapegoats! Even took white priveledge away from me....... I'm milking that one to my grave.

To date, none of the OTNOT posters have named who is making them post. Seems to me to be all the evidence needed that we all believe in freewill.

[Parodite]

I agree SM. It is a very bad idea to rob children of their need and right to feel and be responsible for their own actions. Especially when it is done making claims about science supposedly proving that free will is an illusion. I saw a statistic that 70% of adults in the West don't believe free will exists. Not sure how much of that is caused by weighty pseudo-scientists like SH promoting this idea in public.

[Simple Minded]

I agree SM. It is a very bad idea to rob children of their need and right to feel and be responsible for their own actions. Especially when it is done making claims about science supposedly proving that free will is an illusion. I saw a statistic that 70% of adults in the West don't believe free will exists. Not sure how much of that is caused by weighty pseudo-scientists like SH promoting this idea in public.

That agrees with my personal experience. Robbing someone (especially children) of the concept of freewill, and/or personal responsibility is robbing them of the sense of empowerment and the resultant sense of accomplishment and gratification. The logical result is self-pity and resentment.

While it is un-PC to say it, parents define culture for children more than society, at least for the parents who are actively engaged in raising their children. Sadly, many prosperous parents have chosen to sub-contract parenting out to the hired help.

Yesterday I heard Ben Shapiro interviewing Jonah Goldberg about his new book, Suicide of the West. Part of Goldberg's point was that gratitude is no longer being taught in schools, only that Western culture is bad and responsible for one's personal sense of butt-hurt.

Not sure if the SH types are much to fault, or it is just the result of several decades of prosperity. Interaction with nature is a good way to learn a sense of empowerment and accomplishment. Summer camps that duplicate the lifestyle of migrant farm workers, or life during the 1800's would probably be a wonderful learning experience for many urban yutes.

About 20 years ago my wife and I were fascinated by how much parents insulate their children from reality. It has only gotten more so since then. No wonder so many of today's teenagers are infantile, and so many of today's 30 somethings are teenagers emotionally. We see teenagers bored to tears shooting hoops while the parents are doing yard work, gardening, washing their cars, and doing other house hold chores.

All the parents today want their kids to be members of the Kennedy clan. Think of the Howells from the TV show Gilligan's Island. The little emperors all want to save the planet, but none of them want to take out the trash or mow the lawn. Not very surprising.

Very easy to turn the performance of life's mundane tasks (shoveling snow, raking leaves, cleaning gutters, maintaining a car or truck, mowing lawn, training a dog, etc.) into lesson in Physics, Entropy, Thermodynamics, and general examples of cause and effect. Many parents aren't doing that anymore.

"I'm in my 30's and I have not accomplished anything other than post on social media..... and you try to tell me free will exists? You're a racist, sexist, oppressor!"

IE: Sam Harris:
http://victorhanson.com/wordpress/we-ar ... rofessors/

[Apollonius]

Thanks, SM, for reminding me of this piece by VDH. I sometimes copy essays and articles I find on the internet that really speak to me and this one did.


I've worked in academic environments (you'd never guess that from my poor spelling skills), and Hanson described the situation well.

Oddly, considering how many liberal arts professors are attracted to collectivist ideologies, they are an intensely competitive bunch. If they were trying to write a better book, I guess I would feel like this is academic Darwinism, and we should simply accept that this is the price we pay for a better theory. But these days it appears that they have suffered too profoundly to offer us an original take on oppression and feel that the urgency of their misery (which they have little difficulty convincing their students and colleagues is really our misery) must take precedence over mere facts and that time would be better spent in classroom discussions, committee meetings, and professional development workshops where their wounds can be publicly displayed.

Some really old people may remember 'Queen for a Day', where each of three contestants were given an opportunity to tell TV Land how they survived multiple car crashes and a dozen different as yet incurable diseases. An Applause-o-Meter recorded audience response to who told the most heart wrenching story and the winner received a new refrigerator and an all expenses paid trip for two to Disneyland.

But these women were too ignorant and white to feel really sorry for, and furthermore, they couldn't even correctly identify the source of their hurt. No, it wasn't bad luck or bad decisions or God punishing them. It was capitalism, patriarchy, and a resurgent fascism. And only a shackled and beaten professor can really fuel our outrage and direct it to the noble ends and justice for all that will come when we acknowledge the depth of the intersectional cruelties imposed on them, the tyranny of house wifery, children, and mansplanations, and compensate them properly for these horrors.




Trapped in the closet - Charles Norman, Taki's Magazine, 15 June 2018
http://takimag.com/article/trapped_in_t ... z5IVVeB17l

... Most social justice warriors aren’t aware that most of their agitation is moralizing, and usually of the more bullying sort. Decades of the hypocritical slogan “You can’t legislate morality” (because that would be wrong?) left a vacuum, and now it’s finally being filled by immoral moralizers. The same people who mocked politeness, decency, and civility as being oppressive bourgeois constructs now say that political correctness is “just about being polite.” As if we can all agree what politeness is! And who appointed them Miss Manners, anyway?

And so the rebellious class clowns, believing themselves to now be society’s teachers, suddenly believe in moral education. They see themselves as endowed with the certain unalienable right to tell everyone how to live. You and I, and the rest of society? We’re all students in a class we never asked to be enrolled in. Hence the trendy phrase, seemingly popularized by Obama early in his first term, that something was a “teachable moment.” The subtext to most of their online struggle sessions seems to be, if you’ll let me quote a Tom Hanks film, “I am the captain now.” It was with good reason that Churchill called the Communist Russians “a gang of ruthless and bloody-minded professors” (emphasis mine).

[Simple Minded]

Apollonius,

Thanks. Glad you enjoyed it. VDH is a sage with which I would like to spend some time. I'm sure both on the farm and in the classroom would be equally enjoyable learning experiences. He reminds me of Thomas Sowell or Walter Williams. Both IMSMO, are men who did not let academic pursuits result in narrow mindedness.

As one who formal learning was in hard science, I was lucky. People who study the hard sciences seem more motivated by a desire to understand the world, rather than dominate other people thru words and ideas.

Thanks for the article, this part:
In one of the best books I’ve read in recent memory, worth quoting at length, Ryszard Legutko’s The Demon in Democracy, the Polish author compares the type of censorship he remembers from communism to the kind that passes in liberal democracies today:

" The characteristic feature of both societies—communist and liberal democratic—was that a lot of things simply could not be discussed because they were unquestionably bad or unquestionably good. Discussing them was tantamount to casting doubts on something whose value had been unequivocally determined......The language discipline is the first test for loyalty to the orthodoxy just as the neglect of this discipline is the beginning of all evil. "

http://takimag.com/article/trapped_in_t ... z5IjcEYXrf


Reminds me of this book, which I highly recommend:
https://www.amazon.com/Dogs-Daughter-Co ... 9812325514

My post might not be very applicable to Sam Harris' work, but as Parodite phrased it, it reminded me how prosperity enables one to be isolated, and isolation allows one to believe in any thing, no matter how absurd.

As a older, wiser, much more educated friend once remarked: "Half of being smart, is knowing what you're dumb at."

Damn shame so few smart people do.

BTW, us dyslexic types envy you poor spellers. We have no idea how words should be spelled..... even when we spell them correctly, they still look wrong. Except the four letter words...... those we master!

I have always admired Paul Johnson's take on history, another thing I learned from that article:

As Paul Johnson, who was the first major writer I know of to calmly and confidently predict that Trump would take the Republican nomination and then the presidency, said in 2016:

"...it’s good news that Donald Trump is doing so well in the American political primaries. He is vulgar, abusive, nasty, rude, boorish and outrageous. He is also saying what he thinks and, more important, teaching Americans how to think for themselves again. "

[Mr. Perfect]

The little emperors all want to save the planet, but none of them want to take out the trash or mow the lawn.

One of your better ones.

[Parodite]

I agree SM. It is a very bad idea to rob children of their need and right to feel and be responsible for their own actions. Especially when it is done making claims about science supposedly proving that free will is an illusion. I saw a statistic that 70% of adults in the West don't believe free will exists. Not sure how much of that is caused by weighty pseudo-scientists like SH promoting this idea in public.

That agrees with my personal experience. Robbing someone (especially children) of the concept of freewill, and/or personal responsibility is robbing them of the sense of empowerment and the resultant sense of accomplishment and gratification. The logical result is self-pity and resentment.

[...]

Self-pity and resentment are the fingerprint of a victim who gave up fighting, or at least isn't sure who or what to fight. At a cross road with more than one option:

a) seeking refuge and empowerment in a group where the individual becomes a soldier with a number, only there for a collective purpose under a central command, you the disposable ant
b) admit defeat and retire from it all doing no harm to self and others, just making sure to pay local bills without further pretense,
c) engage in whatever form of martial art or discipline to regain your powers as an individual divorced from any collective but willing to engage in battle or co-operate with anything or anybody in free association (after cleaning up your room of course) when the Great Spirit guides you there
d) none of the above and jump off a cliff.

Maybe it has never been any different. Nature can also be a bitch, class struggle between species who eat and are being eaten, the individual organism fighting for its life but "doomed" to serve some collective interests as well (even after reading Ayn Rand ) and death waiting at the end of every road just to make you sure will never have any serious delusions about yourself.

[Simple Minded]

Self-pity and resentment are the fingerprint of a victim who gave up fighting, or at least isn't sure who or what to fight. At a cross road with more than one option:

a) seeking refuge and empowerment in a group where the individual becomes a soldier with a number, only there for a collective purpose under a central command, you the disposable ant
b) admit defeat and retire from it all doing no harm to self and others, just making sure to pay local bills without further pretense,
c) engage in whatever form of martial art or discipline to regain your powers as an individual divorced from any collective but willing to engage in battle or co-operate with anything or anybody in free association (after cleaning up your room of course) when the Great Spirit guides you there
d) none of the above and jump off a cliff.

Maybe it has never been any different. Nature can also be a bitch, class struggle between species who eat and are being eaten, the individual organism fighting for its life but "doomed" to serve some collective interests as well (even after reading Ayn Rand ) and death waiting at the end of every road just to make you sure will never have any serious delusions about yourself.

Well said. Ayn Rand would be proud of you!

Other people's takes on her is one of the most fascinating things...... I'm not at all sure I read the same Ayn Rand as everyone/anyone else. Rationalization and self-delusion reign supreme (in all of us)!

I'm currently working with a very tortured soul. He needs to be the expert, who has the respect of others, but does not like dealing with people at all. Wants to be the white knight who can do anything and everything, but has so much on his plate, that he can't give any single task the time and focus it requires. Needs approval from others, but if he interacts with others, it takes away time from doing the other tasks he must perform to maintain Superman status.

A sad thing to witness. It is tough sometimes to balance our vane desires/needs for the approval from others, with our need to be true to ourselves.

No wonder so many religions and philosophers warned of the demon of vanity.

You would enjoy Carlos Castenada's tales of a medicine man's take on the value of keeping one's mortality in mind at all times.. Send me your email address in a PM and I will send you a collection of his quotes.

[Simple Minded]

The little emperors all want to save the planet, but none of them want to take out the trash or mow the lawn.

One of your better ones.

Even a blind hog finds an acorn every once in a while.....

[Parodite]

Well said. Ayn Rand would be proud of you!

Other people's takes on her is one of the most fascinating things...... I'm not at all sure I read the same Ayn Rand as everyone/anyone else. Rationalization and self-delusion reign supreme (in all of us)!

Will admit I didn't read any of her books, but my vanity prompted me to conclude from the bits and pieces I did digest that I will be in near total agreement with her observations and conclusions. Healthy selfishness in combination with our (very) local ability to empathize, possibility to freely associate, small central gvt, decentralized powers when and wherever possible, favoring charity over forced taxation.. i.e. maximum autonomy for the free individual serves best the common good.

But all that is 101 libertarian/classical liberal philosophy. Not sure how much she herself anticipated or had opinions about say financial globalization through deregulation, how small federal gvt is always able to still do corrupt oligarchy with the global corporate and financial powerhouses that have recently emerged, the autonomy of nation states versus supranational cancers like the EU, etc. A bit like the bible that gives some nice general guidelines... but how to translate them into modern day political choices ain't straightforward. She seems to me somebody who thinks first principles and not much beyond that. But rock solid they are.

I'm currently working with a very tortured soul. He needs to be the expert, who has the respect of others, but does not like dealing with people at all. Wants to be the white knight who can do anything and everything, but has so much on his plate, that he can't give any single task the time and focus it requires. Needs approval from others, but if he interacts with others, it takes away time from doing the other tasks he must perform to maintain Superman status.

A sad thing to witness. It is tough sometimes to balance our vane desires/needs for the approval from others, with our need to be true to ourselves.

No wonder so many religions and philosophers warned of the demon of vanity.

You would enjoy Carlos Castenada's tales of a medicine man's take on the value of keeping one's mortality in mind at all times.. Send me your email address in a PM and I will send you a collection of his quotes.

Will do Bru. I read Castaneda's The Teachings of Don Juan decades ago and enjoyed it a lot. Not remembering much but there was a lesson where he was told by the shaman to look for the perfect place to put his head to rest during a trip, that he would find it paying attention. In the end he reported back that he really tried and tried..but no place felt like being the exactly right place. Refusing to give up he went on and on trying. By sheer exhaustion he had to put his head to rest somewhere, to which the shaman replied: "You did find it in the end".

[Miss_Faucie_Fishtits]

Something about many secular humanist and atheist commentators and presenters do that irks me is something I'd like to call the "Dr. Who" ploy. A one-sided, all inclusive posture that elides responsibility for presenting a position and defending it. Things like, atheism isn't an idea, it's an anti-idea. It simply means there is No God and assumes no responsibility of what No God might mean to actual human lives. The ones that actually existed not the hypothetical ones. A 'no, it's not' riposte that removes the holder from assuming any responsibility for historic or logical contingency......

It's BOOP...... land in your Tardis to tell a Christian his position is irrational, unscientific and bad and BLEEP..... leave in your Tardis and not answer arguments that attach your opinion to a movement or a process that might relegate you to a timeline or a process or anything approaching a historical demonstration of the realities and possible consequenses of your conclusions. At least a few of them.......

Similar in spirit to the 'but that's not real Marxism' argument. Think Club's commentary in this 'Tube is rather cogent and Matt and the comments section provides all kinds of example of this ploy:

A4_UzWPnopQ

[Simple Minded]

Excellent video LG. Thanks for posting.

Good points. Science is science, religion is religion, and it is only when a practitioner/observer/JAFO decides that one can substitute for the other, or that either can be both that it gets messy.

Science seems a tool/discipline for understanding the hard aspects of life. Religion is the same applied to the softer/more subtle aspects of life.

Weird aspect of people is the laziness of one-size-fits all desire, or my belief system is the only true belief system.

Hopefully, God has a plan for sorting these people out.

[Parodite]

It seems to me that atheists (of sorts) and religious people (of sorts) have such a hard time debating... because it is wrongly assumed that it is clear and agreed upon what it means to be "a Christian", "an atheist", "God", "(not-) believing in God" etc.

Labels tend to be rather crude and cruel. They tend to also become tools of religious/philosophical group-think that can lead to authoritarianism and power abuse. Compelled speech like bill C16 in Canada ain't nice, compelled faith ain't so nice either.

You have to believe that Jesus walked on water, who was a miracle doctor and even raised some people from the dead, who was himself raised from the dead after three days of absolute physical death, who turned water into wine and by the way.. who was born from a virgin. Cause if you don't belive these things.. you are a lousy believer, an incomplete Christian at best, or simply doomed. But rest assured that those who do believe and are higher up in the Christian hierarchy will all pray for you that one day you be like them.

There are and have been endless in-fights among Christians about what it means to be a Christian. How does a Christian behave, what does he/she "typically" believe, how to understand religious literature, verses a/b/c/? Which experts on religious literature can, should be trusted? Should religious texts be used as living documents for continuous inspiration and reminding by means of a tradition, or does that get in the way of a true living faith that is from the heart unpolluted by the conceptual mind? Didn't Jesus himself warn against the holy text chewers, clergy who indulge way too much in what-is-written, training people to behave like circus puppets but whose hearts remain empty and wanting, where hypocrisy rules, not truth and love?

Atheists, in comparison, have an easy life. If it can't be empirically falsified/verified and if it is not your own genuine authentic natural experience.. then no need to bother. (If such a thing like an authentic/natural experience exists is up for debate.) But beware of the religious nuts who do almost nothing else but bother about the free of charge meta-physical.