viktor said:

thefloodbehind said:

curiously, eternal recurrence is the idea of his i like the most.

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What is it you like about it? The solace it gives you about death, or something else?

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viktor said:

thefloodbehind said:

curiously, eternal recurrence is the idea of his i like the most.

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What is it you like about it? The solace it gives you about death, or something else?

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it's a cosmological idea instead of his usual speculations about morality and religion. i'm simply more interested in it. i think the idea that gives me the most solace about death is the following:

thefloodbehind said:

only what i said has nothing to do with death ...

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as Russell observes, Nietzschean philosophy is grounded in universal hatred and fear. if we want to progress as a species, hatred and fear are not the way to go.

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Schopenhauer, whom Nietzsche regarded as his "educator," argues that morality is based on compassion, and i'm inclined to agree ... Nietzsche, however, radically denies compassion in favor of violent egotism. do you really think that this is a good idea for humankind?

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get these kinds of ideas in the wrong hands, e.g., the Nazis, and shit's gonna get shitty real quick. not to say that the Nazis are really Nietzsche's fault, but there is a connection, that is for certain. Heidegger (who is featured in the video i posted, after Bertrand Russell), for example, highly revered Nietzsche and was a Nazi.

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i don't think complete transcendence of our animal nature is possible (yet), what i was saying is that we can transcend our innate proclivity to violence. in fact, we already have to some degree. do you go around killing or hurting people you don't like? in the animal world, the biggest and strongest guy wins. not how it works with humans.

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It has everything to do with death. Death is what drives humans to search for higher meaning. People need a way to feel like they are more than a primate that is just killing time until it dies. All of your posts are full of such attempts at creating meaning.

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I don't care what Russell's take on Nietzsche is. And what is this progression you speak of? What is the end you are trying to meet, and why should we be trying to achieve this end in the first place? Why are hatred and fear not the way to go?

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the progression arising from continued cognitive evolution. the end is a utopia, a heaven on earth. we should be trying to achieve this because it will make "killing time until we die" more enjoyable. i thought you were a hedonist, you should agree with me here. hatred and fear aren't the way to go because they're destructive ...

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I don't give a fuck about the rest of humankind or whatever arbitrary end you hope humans reach in order to make yourself feel good. Nietzsche was all about the self, as am I. Why should I care about the games that people play when they have no effect on me? What reason do I have to put effort into making the world a more compassionate place?

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So what?

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First of all, we are part of the animal world. How can we escape what we are? And maybe the biggest and strongest guy doesn't necessarily win in a modern society, but the smartest guy will. I don't see how there is much of a difference.

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we can escape what we are with advances in biotechnology, i.e., by becoming cyborgs.

so wait ... biggest and strongest = smartest ...

really?

also, the smartest people aren't usually the most powerful in human societies ...

thefloodbehind said:

Nietzsche ... cool books, but his arguments are fueled by hatred and egotism, not reason.

Dennett is a complete dumbass.

As for me, hm ... Lao Tzu. Spinoza. Kant. Schopenhauer.

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thefloodbehind said:

Right, meaning they're just ideas that are not to be taken philosophically seriously. Nietzsche's struggle is a classic battle with the lower-self, a battle that he lost. There is to much to be gained educationally from reading Nietzsche, but it is our duty not to reside in his philosophy. It is true that violence is a part of our animal nature, but we are capable of transcending that.

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Samurai Drifter said:

thefloodbehind said:

Nietzsche ... cool books, but his arguments are fueled by hatred and egotism, not reason.

Dennett is a complete dumbass.

As for me, hm ... Lao Tzu. Spinoza. Kant. Schopenhauer.

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Explain how Nietzsche's arguments are fueled by hatred and how Dennett is a dumbass, otherwise I'm just going to have to assume you don't know WTF you're talking about.

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millzy said:

thefloodbehind said:

Right, meaning they're just ideas that are not to be taken philosophically seriously. Nietzsche's struggle is a classic battle with the lower-self, a battle that he lost. There is to much to be gained educationally from reading Nietzsche, but it is our duty not to reside in his philosophy. It is true that violence is a part of our animal nature, but we are capable of transcending that.

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"philosophically seriously"? i don't even think you've read nietzche.

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Icelander said:

Fear is far from just destructive.  In fact we have survived to this point due to our fear and acting on it, as much and likely more than anything else.

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Icelander said:

Actually I think you sorta did.

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thefloodbehind said:

I've never really studied Dennett in depth, just a few essays and some videos. He's neither a good writer nor speaker, that's where part of my sentiment comes from.

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Also his views on consciousness are just way too shortsighted. He refuses to take Chalmers' hard problem of consciousness into account, preferring instead to equate biochemistry with the subjective experience, which makes no sense.

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His whole point is that Chalmers' "hard problem" isn't a problem at all; it's just a circular argument because it's entirely based on the P-zombie thought experiment, which only begs the question. And associating biochemistry with subjective experience makes far more sense than associating it with mysterious mind-stuff that can fundamentally never be studied.

And really, even if you have valid, rational disagreements with his arguments, calling someone who's written a well-renowned and thoroughly argued philosophy book a "dumbass" after you've only seen a couple of videos and read an essay or two is just -worthy. Come on, man.