[Levyathan]

Originally posted by CP5670
I did not assume this one; I derived it from a list of other goals and propositions. I will not go into all of the details of the argument concerning knowledge itself (it's very long), but I can quickly tell you why survival alone is insufficient. Survival cannot be the objective alone, because what exactly defines "us" anyway? At the most fundamental level, there is and can be no difference between us and the nearest particle carrying energy until specifically proven otherwise due to the principle of induction. Since we know it is not possible for the particles to be completely destroyed, we do not need to do anything specifically to survive; anything we do will guarantee it. This means that no options have been exhausted yet despite our attempts at reasoning. Now you will probably say that we need to survive and still retain our current form of existence, but is that even possible? If we examine it more carefully, it can be seen that it is not. On one side, remember that change is always there, and probably inevitable; if we stay completely static, at some point, we would have evolved into something new anyway. (it has been scientifically shown that our civilization, or rather, our rate of change, is primarily what has allowed us to stall the progress of evolution) On the other hand, if we continue progressing as we are today, we will still keep evolving, except in the other direction, because this progress of science/technology and knowledge in general is itself a form of evolution. At some point we would have become as completely different and unrecognizable as being actual humans as the humans of today are from, say, rocks, and so it would make no difference which evolutionary path we take unless we consider further objectives. Now how does distinguish between the different "forms" of existence? You will see that it is not possible to lay down anything other than randomly-chosen arbitrary boundaries between one form and another, which have no meaning in the absolute material reality. This completes the deduction. (I dropped the details, but you can get a general idea)

To start of, by surviving I mean staying alive. If you die, you're no longer staying alive. If doing nothing guaranteed that we wouldn't die, I think it's perfectly possible that we wouldn't have started persuing knowledge in the first place.

If we're nothing more than the particles that form our bodies, we would be able to become anything over time. If an alien race showed up and started living here, and the particles of our old bodies formed new aliens, would they become human? Following the principle that the sum of the parts alone doesn't make the whole, the answer would have to be negative. So I still don't see how that proves that our principal objective is to obtain knowledge and not to survive.

Originally posted by CP5670
Alright, I will agree there. I was trying to throw in a bit of humor into an otherwise serious-sounding post to balance things out.

Good, keep that in mind.

Originally posted by CP5670
And the necessity arises from the objective of having fun; what's your point?

Nope, the necessity arises from the objective of sharing another point of view. That doesn't mean I think it's fun.

Originally posted by CP5670
Unless you can logically argue your point, it is for all purposes incorrect. I could just as easily say that you are the one with the "disturbed mind" without changing any of the words around and so it is effectively a petty insult.

And I could just as easily say that you're the one not worth it, it's as much of a petty insult as anything else you might want to call me. Good thing I managed to make you be the one saying it.

Originally posted by CP5670
When people resort to such arguments as "more experience" and "comfort of home" (trust me, I have heard this many, many times), it is because they are running out of other, more sensible arguments. I have no reason to think that this case is any different.Better think up of some new arguments...

When people resort to merely saying that they heard something many times before without actually saying anything new, it's probably due to the same reason.

Originally posted by CP5670
Okay, I was laughing for some time when I saw this one.

Good. Now remember that thing I told you to keep in mind.

Originally posted by CP5670
And I suppose bin Laden is also helping everyone in the world by killing them in the name of Allah.

If our goal is to obtain knowledge, not to survive, I don't see how he is doing any harm.

Originally posted by CP5670
Regarding bias, why don't you practice what you preach?

I can't see how what I said is untrue. We're all biased in some way. I never said I wasn't.

Originally posted by CP5670
If that is more fun, why are you not doing it? Nobody is telling you to come here instead.

Nobody is, indeed. I just consider an obligation to show that I don't and never will accept/agree with certain things.

Originally posted by CP5670
I do indeed consider this subject fun, which is why I am into general philosophy in the first place. And tell me what exactly defines this distinction you are making between serious things and fun things; I try to take everything in life with the same amount of seriousness/humor, and so it means nothing to me.

Strange. A couple of quotes ago you were saying that this was a serious-sounding subject. Suit yourself, is it serious or not?

As to what defines the distinction between serious and fun things it is, again, something called morals and ethics. Would you consider fun talking about the death of your parents?

Originally posted by CP5670
(hey, even your brother Styxx doesn't take these arguments seriously; follow his example)

Give me a good reason and I will.

Originally posted by CP5670
In other words, you concede my point. Now get someone else who understood your one-sentence posts and have them explain it.

I concede your right not to believe what I'm saying, it's your choice. I never said anything about agreeing that my posts didn't make any sense. If someone wanted to explain them to you, you would know.

Originally posted by CP5670
If it was not related to the argument, why was it in there in the first place?

It was there for the purpose you quoted.

Originally posted by CP5670
The very likely reason as stated above is that you ran out of other arguments to put in.

If I had run out of arguments you would have won. The fact that you didn't proves that I hadn't.

Originally posted by CP5670
I am not talking about external, but internal maintenance. It would need more resources to keep running, but humans, while providing for the objective, also take up resources to operate.

Now now, I see you forgot something. After the organism obtained a sufficient amount of knowledge (which is its principal objective, by your line of thought), each one of the individuals that formed it would have to be able to produce all and any resources it takes to keep them operating, at the same time as contributing normally to the persuit of more knowledge.

Originally posted by CP5670
Besides, I am not sure that after a point it would even use humans anymore, or it would use a different kind of sub-organism (a "new" human) and produce more as necessary. (and upgrading an existing one might actually be more costly than just cloning an existing one from scratch, just like personal computers today)

With enough knowledge (if it is its objective, it should have plenty of it) the organism could both keep cloning more individuals and assimilating already existant ones, upgrading them without costs to obtain power at a higher rate. I had already said this, maybe you weren't paying attention.

Originally posted by CP5670
Eventually, the super-organism may indeed end up engulfing the entire universe, but by that time it would have grown powerful enough compared to the individuals that there would really be nothing to stop it.

If it had engulfed the entire universe there would be no individuals to compare it with. Unless you mean engulfed in some other sense.

Originally posted by CP5670
State your better option and reasons, then.

Right now I can't think of any. It doesn't mean the super organism is the best option, though. I think you agree that a best option may not be chosen without knowing all the options.

Originally posted by CP5670
Although actually, I had these ideas before I ever heard of the game.

Yeah, the Borg is another example. It's not hard to find similar ideas in almost every sci fi universe. Styxx had something to the effect of a super organism in an old project, and some other people too.

Originally posted by CP5670
And how does losing all freedom imply the absence of that power?

The loss of all freedom implies exactly the absence of power, although the loss of some freedom doesn't imply the loss of some power. It's possible to lose freedom and gain power at the same time, but you'll need some level of freedom to have power.

Originally posted by CP5670
I say they are ready to forsake any and all freedom, because they have already forsaken a lot, and if only these variables are taken into account, the induction procedure of science would suggest it as so.

So the fact that people usually cut their hair and nails also means that they're ready to cut their heads off?

Originally posted by CP5670
The commitment grew over time as people got used to it and thus started to believe it was the only "natural thing" to do; they did not have any commitment when the system first started, but a mutual interest and a mutual interest alone.

The commitment was what formed it in the first place. When the first two people started living together, they were committed to protect (if possible) and help each other. When the first two families started living next to each other, it was also because of this commitment. There was a mutual interest, but the very reason this interest existed at all was because they were ready to help each other in times of need. If they didn't care for the other, there would be no gain in living together, thus no mutual interest. They were committed by ethics and morals.

Originally posted by CP5670
That might be the case, but the hard truth is that the individuals did not have this commitment to each other, and no amount of simple coaxing is going to get them to do it today either. (that is, everyone)

I think I just replied to that, but I'll add something. Even if back then they didn't have the commitment, now many, many people do. There are more people who do have it than people who don't, that's for sure. The ones who have it (if it ever happens) will certainly be the ones trying to unite the species with a closer bound, such as the one required to form the organism.

Originally posted by CP5670
Yes it would, and it would come out victorious. Think of this: suppose a group of ten or fifteen scientists get together and try to build a new super-weapon to take out the planet, along with a super-shield that can fully stand up to the weapon. They work in total secrecy, and when they are finished, they give all world governments an ultimatum to surrender unconditionally to their purposes in X number of days or they will detonate the superbomb and destroy everything else on the Earth. Nobody knows where they are, and time is running out; whether or not they give in to the demands or not, they will lose. (either way) I have said this many times before here: one man with the appropriate technology is a god compared one without it, and this man can take on the entire remainder of the world.

That is a great analogy, but unfortunately it doesn't serve the purpose of this discussion. The organism, after being formed, would not become immediately invulnerable and immortal. It would need time to gain power, specially right in the beggining. In this time a force a thousand times greater than the organism would have no trouble in eliminating every trace of it.

Originally posted by CP5670
That is not exactly the case; look at all of human history, not just that of today. And the only reason they have the "absolute morals" is that the people are moralistic and will take it better if the ideas exist in the laws as well. (in the same religious form) Suppose, over a period of many decades, you change around the existing culture with heavy propagandic conditioning so that no morals exist. The people then will not like the morals anymore in that sense and will not care if they are removed from the government as well.

That would be a government which would accept things such as violence, robbery and murder, it seems. I honestly don't see how that would be any better than the current system, or how it could be called government at all. I can already imagine how that marketing campaign would be. "Too much noise at night? Kill your neighbour. The simplest solution is right next to you!"

What I see, though, is that governments some day might not be needed at all. If the whole species follow morals and ethics, there would be no crime, no violence, no agressions to the others. That might happen if a real threat against humankind is made, like the appearance of a hostile alien species. It seems to me that there are more advantages in ethics growing stronger than in disappearing at all.

Originally posted by CP5670
If ethics is a "natural survival strategy," then so it must be for religion as well, or at least certain religions, because quite frankly, ethics in taken in the absolute is a religion, and of the worst sort too.

If you take the beliefs that actually matter and throw the unnecessary stuff out, religion would actually be a very good survival strategy. But then it would be the same thing as ethics and morals, because all beliefs that matter are already included in those. In this sense ethics can be a religion, but a purely beneficial one, one that spreads the survival of the species and not the need to believe in things such as God or a bunch of gods. I don't see how that's not beneficial.

Originally posted by CP5670
And now each individual chooses what they "should" believe in, eh? This ties in to another sub-argument below; what if the child "believes" in eating dirt?

If someone is forced to believe in something, that's not a beneficial religion. I did say some religions are beneficial, if you remember. If a child believes in eating dirt, that's simply not a beneficial belief (or religion, if you want to consider it so), nothing more.

Originally posted by CP5670
Morals and ethics taken in a religious sense may represent whatever, but they simply do not work so nicely in reality. They will only contribute to the survival of the species if everyone without exception abides by them, and even then only as a general rule and not an absolute limitation. (they need to be ready to break all the moral rules at any time) They will not work otherwise; in fact, they will lead to the destruction of those who do abide by them (1930s India, anyone?), and so they are actually an impairment in any such situation. Since the condition stated earlier of having everyone go by the morals reliably while still retaining "individual choice" is next to impossible, the morals can go out the window.

Hm, in that first part you agreed with me, or conceded my point, as you like to say. Later on, though, you seemed to change your mind. Yes, everyone has to abide by ethics for it to work properly, and no, they don't have to be ready to break moral rules at any time. They will work otherwise, just not as well as if everyone did abide by them. Everyone already does, anyway, just not at the same level. It's just a little something that has to be worked on; I'm certain it wouldn't be as hard as trying to eliminate them completely. Oh, and people do have individual choice, but ethics is a part of the essence that makes us human.

Originally posted by CP5670
And if ethics can be "generalized" so nicely, why cannot other religions as well?

Because, as I already said, moral rules form one single principle, while religions spread a whole lot of different principles. Each one has its own, almost. And I did notice you referred to ethics as being a religion, don't worry.

Originally posted by CP5670
They become gods compared to everyone who is not part of the large unit since they can leave behind much of their lives' cares and can concentrate on pursuing a common objective

Oh, compared to something. So it's relative! What if there is another organism with equal power, would the individuals that formed the first one be gods compared to the ones that formed the second?

Originally posted by CP5670
and they do not have free will because their so-called will is completely determined by their surrounding culture as they live their lives along with the laws of science.

Tell me again how that will part works, because as I see it, if they have no will at all they don't have the power to do anything. And is living their lives a reason not to have a free will? Doesn't everyone live their lives by the laws of science?

Originally posted by CP5670
And the last statement depends on how you define a "very serious" argument.

Logically speaking, a very serious argument is one which is neither fun nor just serious. But that doesn't add anything to the discussion.

Originally posted by CP5670
Actually, these guys would technically be an amalgamation of both humans and monkeys and thereby retain characteristics of both, although they would still predominantly be monkey descendants because materially speaking, that is what they came from.

So your answer is no, they wouldn't be humans even though they have a better understanding of reality and come from the same ancestors as the human species as it is today. This means, at the most basic level, that your concept of human is incorrect.

Originally posted by CP5670
See below for the top part; see above for the bottom part.

You didn't reply to the specific subject. If you think having a productive life doesn't offer more advantages than dying, why shouldn't we kill ourselves?

Originally posted by CP5670
Who are we to decide that what we consider an advantage is also considered as such by the child? The parents are helping themselves here, because they are attaining their own objective of keeping the child safe.

By keeping the child safe they're helping him/her. I think that's even one of the definitions of the word help. What you lack is just a more advanced concept of helping, nothing more. In your view, killing someone who wants to die is helpful (hm, I realized just now that you're certainly pro-euthanasia). You don't consider that people's desires and objectives aren't static, they change relatively often. Someone who wants to die today might be the greater admirer of life tomorrow. Kill him/her today, tomorrow he/she will hate you for your judgement and for your help.

Originally posted by CP5670
Yes they are, because the whole concept of benefit (and loss) only has any meaning when an objective is first defined.

And as the principal objective of the human being is to survive (you consider it being to attain knowledge, in this case it doesn't matter), he wouldn't be attaining his objective (he would both cease to survive and to attain knowledge). So his objectives aren't beneficial to him.

Originally posted by CP5670
And how is this any more "proper" than letting him die?

I already know what you're going to say after reading this, but try it nonetheless. You have to ask yourself that same question. If you are still unable to come to a decision, ask you parents, and maybe your brothers/sisters (if you have any). The answer they'll give will appeal to you much more than anything I could say, even though they're the same.

Already replying to the next thing you'll say (about me running out of more sensitive, precise arguments), I'll answer your previous question. It's more proper to him because you're offering him a new chance to attain his real objective of surviving (again, in this case you're free to consider the objective being to attain knowledge, it doesn't matter). What you have to understand now is the concept of relevance. Let's use an analogy, it might be better this way. Suppose a man has been wanting to buy a shiny red car since he was a child. This man, one day, decides he wants a colored pencil too. It's a real, but vanishable desire. Would you be helping him more by giving him a colored pencil or a shiny red car? Remember, just because he wants a pencil it doesn't mean he doesn't want the car anymore, he just doesn't remember as much as before that he wants the car more than anything else.

Originally posted by CP5670
No, I would not say that, because the child's objective might be to eat everything he/she sees, so he/she is working towards attaining the objective by eating the dirt. Therefore, it is beneficial. And yes, this is my "real opinion;" note that I also said that individual objectives/benefits have no meaning in an absolute sense.

But the objective of eating dirt is conflicting with the real objective of [insert whatever you think the real objective is here], so it's beneficial in a low level, and not beneficial in the highest level. As in the previous case, the concept of relevance must be fully applied here.

Originally posted by CP5670
And how would you be helping them otherwise?

I don't think I need to go over it again, after explaining the reason two or three times just in this post. If you want it again, re-read the previous paragraph.

Originally posted by CP5670
Is it worth all the trouble of explaining all this to them to have a few more lower-class job positions filled up, where they would still not really be reliable and trustworthy citizens due to their previous records and thus would need to be kept under constant surveillance? I think not.

They might not be just filling lower-class job positions. Each human individual is unique, each has a (relatively) different way of thinking. You said this yourself, if I'm not confusing things. Some, or many, of the people that would be killed by your system could have incredible revolutionary ideas if they were given another chance to stay alive. We will never know if we don't try.

You also said earlier that all things change, nothing stays the same for long. How can you be sure they wouldn't be as reliable and trustworthy as any other regular citizen? The fact they did something wrong in the past doesn't make sure they'll do it again, neither that there are more chances of them committing a crime than any other person. You're treating them like black people were treated centuries ago (some still are, unfortunately).

Originally posted by CP5670
I suppose that if you were alive 60 years ago, you would have also tried to "convince" Hitler that he is "wrong" while he goes about destroying everything.

If I could mantain communication with him like I can with you, you bet I would. Do you think he was right, maybe? And don't talk relatively, either you think he was right or his enemies were right.

Originally posted by CP5670
Keep those arguments coming!

As long as I have the time to, you shoulnd't be worried.

Originally posted by CP5670
(this has to be one of the longest posts I have ever written, even by my standards)

By my standards, these last posts I made were freaking huge!

[Sandwich]

Originally posted by Levyathan
By my standards, these last posts I made were freaking huge!

You guys are lucky we don't have a character limit in posts.

[CP5670]

To start of, by surviving I mean staying alive. If you die, you're no longer staying alive. If doing nothing guaranteed that we wouldn't die, I think it's perfectly possible that we wouldn't have started persuing knowledge in the first place.

You need to define "staying alive" more precisely here. As far as we know yet, we cannot extend a human to eternal life. The species (going by your definition) as a whole cannot live forever and will eventually evolve into something new anyway.

If we're nothing more than the particles that form our bodies, we would be able to become anything over time. If an alien race showed up and started living here, and the particles of our old bodies formed new aliens, would they become human? Following the principle that the sum of the parts alone doesn't make the whole, the answer would have to be negative. So I still don't see how that proves that our principal objective is to obtain knowledge and not to survive.

Sure they would. This is what the holistic philosophers meant when they said that "all is one, one without a second," or in other words, all distinctions are arbitrary and are only good for deductive purposes. And following that principle, the answer would not automatically become negative; it would now be undetermined. Since when we are at this level of thought, there is nothing else to compare with, and so whether the species are humans or aliens is of no importance, since the alien and the human are the same thing.

Nope, the necessity arises from the objective of sharing another point of view. That doesn't mean I think it's fun.

And where does the objective of sharing another point of view come from? From the one of having fun. In the end you must boil everything to one objective, or you have not completed the deduction, and for individual humans, this is the one of having fun and nothing more. (I can reduce any objective you can think of to one of some form of happiness)

And I could just as easily say that you're the one not worth it, it's as much of a petty insult as anything else you might want to call me. Good thing I managed to make you be the one saying it.

Yup, we have both traded petty insults so far. However, yours have been quite a bit more numerous than mine, so you have less room to talk about that.

When people resort to merely saying that they heard something many times before without actually saying anything new, it's probably due to the same reason.

Actually, if I have heard it several times and gotten the same result every time, then the induction procedure would certainly suggest the truth of my comment from the available information. Rather than "merely saying" the given facts, I induced a new statement here, which may or may not be true, but given what I know, the chances of it being true are high. Also, my comment would have been quite valid had I not written that bit in the parenthesis. Lastly, how would you know how much "experience" I have (whatever that means) and whether or not I have always sat in the "comfort of home?"

Good. Now remember that thing I told you to keep in mind.

Guess what: I'm trying to help you too! Let's all help each other!

If our goal is to obtain knowledge, not to survive, I don't see how he is doing any harm.

It would be fine if, after killing all his enemies, he would bring about a new system in which the same objective was king, but that is not really the case here. Besides, the survival is of course good insofar as it contributes to learning (not all survival does, as we saw earlier), which in our current state is necessary.

I can't see how what I said is untrue. We're all biased in some way. I never said I wasn't.

Here is the bias: if I asked another person (e.g. Arafat) of their idea of good/bad, it may well differ from yours. Therefore, your idea is untrue in the absolute. (as is his) All of our statements are biased to some extent, but some arguments are definitely more so than others.

Nobody is, indeed. I just consider an obligation to show that I don't and never will accept/agree with certain things.

In other words, you find it fun. The fact that you have an "obligation" in the first place means that you like this. And also, if you really think that you will truly never accept any idea out there, you have a rather narrow mind, and this is going to make it more difficult for you to learn new things. I am quite ready to accept the existence of universal morals, if they are proved to me as such.

Strange. A couple of quotes ago you were saying that this was a serious-sounding subject. Suit yourself, is it serious or not?

I can use the same rules that others use to determine what they would called serious and fun because I have been brought up learning them, but for my own purposes I use different rules. For me, it is not serious at all, but that is not the case for most people. Therefore, it is both serious and not so, depending on the observer.

As to what defines the distinction between serious and fun things it is, again, something called morals and ethics. Would you consider fun talking about the death of your parents?

Sure, why not? In fact, as long as the emotions do not overtake me, that is exactly what I would do, and it is exactly what I plan to do. (and you might find it interesting to know that most of the authorities on philosophy throughout human history counseled exactly this; go take it up with them )

Give me a good reason and I will.

It would be more enjoyable for you, unless of course you take "fun" and "serious" things with equal seriousness like I do but still prefer to call them as such. Other than that, I don't care; do what you want.

I concede your right not to believe what I'm saying, it's your choice. I never said anything about agreeing that my posts didn't make any sense. If someone wanted to explain them to you, you would know.

You concede my point that the sentence was not related to the argument. Is it not also equally likely that no explanation exists at all? (and the facts are rather suggestive, too)

It was there for the purpose you quoted.

But why was it there instead of something else as well? Why not alongside a normal argument?

If I had run out of arguments you would have won. The fact that you didn't proves that I hadn't.

You really need to learn some formal logic, don't you? X implying Y does not say anything at all about Y implying X.

Now now, I see you forgot something. After the organism obtained a sufficient amount of knowledge (which is its principal objective, by your line of thought), each one of the individuals that formed it would have to be able to produce all and any resources it takes to keep them operating, at the same time as contributing normally to the persuit of more knowledge.

With enough knowledge (if it is its objective, it should have plenty of it) the organism could both keep cloning more individuals and assimilating already existant ones, upgrading them without costs to obtain power at a higher rate. I had already said this, maybe you weren't paying attention.

Ah I see; look at my last statement in that "paragraph." At the point when it does reach this level of intelligence, it might well take in all the humans, but they wouldn't be able to stop it, so it would not really matter anymore.

If it had engulfed the entire universe there would be no individuals to compare it with. Unless you mean engulfed in some other sense.

Yes, you are correct there.

Right now I can't think of any. It doesn't mean the super organism is the best option, though. I think you agree that a best option may not be chosen without knowing all the options.

It indeed does. We do not need to know all the options to choose a best one out of the ones we have, and for all our purposes, that is the "best one."

The loss of all freedom implies exactly the absence of power, although the loss of some freedom doesn't imply the loss of some power. It's possible to lose freedom and gain power at the same time, but you'll need some level of freedom to have power.

I cannot see why that last statement has to be true; provide some supports, or something at least.

So the fact that people usually cut their hair and nails also means that they're ready to cut their heads off?

No, because there are other variables known to be involved here. On the other hand, you have not been able to provide any hard evidence that humans want to retain their so-called freedom in the long run.

The commitment was what formed it in the first place. When the first two people started living together, they were committed to protect (if possible) and help each other. When the first two families started living next to each other, it was also because of this commitment. There was a mutual interest, but the very reason this interest existed at all was because they were ready to help each other in times of need. If they didn't care for the other, there would be no gain in living together, thus no mutual interest. They were committed by ethics and morals.

Where did that second-to-last statement come from? The gains in living together would be something like what I described in that old thread linked from here. They did not start off caring about the others; they started off caring about only themselves. The "commitment" grew over time for the reasons described earlier.

I think I just replied to that, but I'll add something. Even if back then they didn't have the commitment, now many, many people do. There are more people who do have it than people who don't, that's for sure. The ones who have it (if it ever happens) will certainly be the ones trying to unite the species with a closer bound, such as the one required to form the organism.

And as I pointed out earlier, if only some people have the commitment, that is even worse than nobody having it (if they have the objective of "survival" ) because those who do not have this commitment would quickly ruin everyone else.

That is a great analogy, but unfortunately it doesn't serve the purpose of this discussion. The organism, after being formed, would not become immediately invulnerable and immortal. It would need time to gain power, specially right in the beggining. In this time a force a thousand times greater than the organism would have no trouble in eliminating every trace of it.

Suppose then, that the aforementioned scientists build the super-organism instead in the same manner as described earlier, and this super-organism stays hidden until it has gained enough strength and knowledge to take on the world. It would indeed need time to gain power, but it has all the time in the universe.

That would be a government which would accept things such as violence, robbery and murder, it seems. I honestly don't see how that would be any better than the current system, or how it could be called government at all. I can already imagine how that marketing campaign would be. "Too much noise at night? Kill your neighbour. The simplest solution is right next to you!"

Actually, the government itself would work a bit like those of today do, since many of the ethics can be derived from the axioms and objectives. But as I said, in the event that an unexpected situation comes up, the people need to be always ready to completely abandon the all of ethics, which they will not be able to if they follow them like a religion.

What I see, though, is that governments some day might not be needed at all. If the whole species follow morals and ethics, there would be no crime, no violence, no agressions to the others. That might happen if a real threat against humankind is made, like the appearance of a hostile alien species. It seems to me that there are more advantages in ethics growing stronger than in disappearing at all.

I don't agree with that for the reasons stated above, but it is of little importance what is advantageous and what is not. What matters is what will happen, and the simple fact remains that ethics are slowly fading away alongside religion by means of moral "divisions."

If you take the beliefs that actually matter and throw the unnecessary stuff out, religion would actually be a very good survival strategy. But then it would be the same thing as ethics and morals, because all beliefs that matter are already included in those. In this sense ethics can be a religion, but a purely beneficial one, one that spreads the survival of the species and not the need to believe in things such as God or a bunch of gods. I don't see how that's not beneficial.

If you take that which "actually matters" (i.e. is logically correct) and throw everything else out, in most cases you will be left with nothing. If you do the same for the ethics, you will be left with maybe about half of the stuff. And it is not beneficial because they will start thinking that the universe operates on it in an absolute sense, which will prevent them from ever finding the actual truth.

If someone is forced to believe in something, that's not a beneficial religion. I did say some religions are beneficial, if you remember. If a child believes in eating dirt, that's simply not a beneficial belief (or religion, if you want to consider it so), nothing more.

I suppose you agree with me now from the first statement, and as for rest I will talk about it below.

Hm, in that first part you agreed with me, or conceded my point, as you like to say. Later on, though, you seemed to change your mind. Yes, everyone has to abide by ethics for it to work properly, and no, they don't have to be ready to break moral rules at any time. They will work otherwise, just not as well as if everyone did abide by them. Everyone already does, anyway, just not at the same level. It's just a little something that has to be worked on; I'm certain it wouldn't be as hard as trying to eliminate them completely. Oh, and people do have individual choice, but ethics is a part of the essence that makes us human.

Actually, I meant the first sentence in the way that they came up over time for "good" reasons and thus were "intended" to be useful but they actually are useless, even in theory. (I did phrase it poorly, though) They do need to be ready to break the rules, because the rules are a general guideline and do not apply to every situation. About them "working otherwise" in such a situation, I once again present you with the 1930s India example. Everyone already does, huh? How would you explain all the "bad" people throughout history? More recently, you have what people explained in this thread: people are in trouble, and nobody nearby helps. As for the last part, see what I said to Bobboau earlier: if our ancestors had bashed their heads against the wall as described there, we would do exactly the same, and it would become "human."

Because, as I already said, moral rules form one single principle, while religions spread a whole lot of different principles. Each one has its own, almost. And I did notice you referred to ethics as being a religion, don't worry.

Since when did moral rules form "one single principle?" There are a number of versions of morals out there today, all of which are equally "correct."

As for the last part, I would be rather surprised if you had not noticed; I intended you to notice, hence why I wrote it in the first place.

Oh, compared to something. So it's relative! What if there is another organism with equal power, would the individuals that formed the first one be gods compared to the ones that formed the second?

Of course it is relative. No they would not, but the two would merge anyway as soon as each learned of the other's existence.

Tell me again how that will part works, because as I see it, if they have no will at all they don't have the power to do anything. And is living their lives a reason not to have a free will? Doesn't everyone live their lives by the laws of science?

Think about it this way: do they have the power to do anything even today? Are they not completely subject to the physical and social laws and thus cannot do anything in any case? (e.g. psychologists have found that people frequently think that something is a conscious free choice when it was really just determined by their surroundings as they grew up)

Logically speaking, a very serious argument is one which is neither fun nor just serious. But that doesn't add anything to the discussion.

Well, yeah of course, but tell me what it is, not what it isn't.

So your answer is no, they wouldn't be humans even though they have a better understanding of reality and come from the same ancestors as the human species as it is today. This means, at the most basic level, that your concept of human is incorrect.

Oh...they came from the same ancestors, which I believe there is some technical term for. (primates or something?) They came from the same things that the humans came from, but they did not come from humans. Therefore, all humans are also monkeys, but monkeys are not also humans.

You didn't reply to the specific subject. If you think having a productive life doesn't offer more advantages than dying, why shouldn't we kill ourselves?

It offers more advantages from my point of view, so I would stay alive, but that means nothing outside of my thinking. For them, a productive life is one of crime, and some would indeed actually rather die than give up that life for a "normal" life. Also, I already stated why we are unable to kill ourselves.

By keeping the child safe they're helping him/her. I think that's even one of the definitions of the word help. What you lack is just a more advanced concept of helping, nothing more. In your view, killing someone who wants to die is helpful (hm, I realized just now that you're certainly pro-euthanasia). You don't consider that people's desires and objectives aren't static, they change relatively often. Someone who wants to die today might be the greater admirer of life tomorrow. Kill him/her today, tomorrow he/she will hate you for your judgement and for your help.

Of course, the desires are constantly changing, as are the methods of help. You can only be helping them in attaining their goal at that time. You may indeed help them and have them hate you the next day, but that is simply the way life works. Frankly, there is no more universal and objective definition of "help" that is not something similar to this. Also, they cannot hate you if they are dead.

And as the principal objective of the human being is to survive (you consider it being to attain knowledge, in this case it doesn't matter), he wouldn't be attaining his objective (he would both cease to survive and to attain knowledge). So his objectives aren't beneficial to him.

When did I say that? That is the principal objective of humanity. I said a bit later that the individual human's objective is whatever he/she defines it to be, and that is the only correct one.

I already know what you're going to say after reading this, but try it nonetheless. You have to ask yourself that same question. If you are still unable to come to a decision, ask you parents, and maybe your brothers/sisters (if you have any). The answer they'll give will appeal to you much more than anything I could say, even though they're the same.

I already asked myself the same question, which is how I obtained a result in the first place. I asked my dad (with whom I frequently bounce my ideas), who gave a similar response to yours but also agreed that there is no universally correct properness. But asking people is no substitute for absolutely rational deduction.

Already replying to the next thing you'll say (about me running out of more sensitive, precise arguments), I'll answer your previous question. It's more proper to him because you're offering him a new chance to attain his real objective of surviving (again, in this case you're free to consider the objective being to attain knowledge, it doesn't matter). What you have to understand now is the concept of relevance. Let's use an analogy, it might be better this way. Suppose a man has been wanting to buy a shiny red car since he was a child. This man, one day, decides he wants a colored pencil too. It's a real, but vanishable desire. Would you be helping him more by giving him a colored pencil or a shiny red car? Remember, just because he wants a pencil it doesn't mean he doesn't want the car anymore, he just doesn't remember as much as before that he wants the car more than anything else.

See above; that is not his objective. The pencil, of course. As I said, that is the way individual existence works and the only way it can work. You give me a more objective definition of "helping" and I will readily accept it.

But the objective of eating dirt is conflicting with the real objective of [insert whatever you think the real objective is here], so it's beneficial in a low level, and not beneficial in the highest level. As in the previous case, the concept of relevance must be fully applied here.

No, there is no real objective for the individual, as I said before.

They might not be just filling lower-class job positions. Each human individual is unique, each has a (relatively) different way of thinking. You said this yourself, if I'm not confusing things. Some, or many, of the people that would be killed by your system could have incredible revolutionary ideas if they were given another chance to stay alive. We will never know if we don't try.

They may indeed have incredibly revolutionary ideas, but at some point someone else will probably come up with similar ideas, and this has been shown again and again throughout the history of science. They may be unique to some extent, but not nearly as much you are making them out to be. In any case, why take the risk?

You also said earlier that all things change, nothing stays the same for long. How can you be sure they wouldn't be as reliable and trustworthy as any other regular citizen? The fact they did something wrong in the past doesn't make sure they'll do it again, neither that there are more chances of them committing a crime than any other person. You're treating them like black people were treated centuries ago (some still are, unfortunately).

Once again, induction. The fact that they did "wrong" in the past does of course not ensure anything, but it does indeed increase the probability of them doing something. That probability wanes over time, but it cannot ever be truly equal to a citizen who has never committed a crime. (you can learn about this in a course in mathematical probability) And blacks are not really a good example here, since the laws were changed after they were violated, so that resetted all the probabilities. Regarding the change, I was talking about the universe as a whole, not individual people; again, these larger rules may or may not apply to individual people and you cannot really use them with any accuracy there.

If I could mantain communication with him like I can with you, you bet I would. Do you think he was right, maybe? And don't talk relatively, either you think he was right or his enemies were right.

Depends, in some ways he was rational and in other ways he was not. An interesting fellow, at any rate. But, as Blue Lion said earlier in the thread, it does not matter one bit what I personally think for the purposes of this discussion except where you can derive further evidence that directly pertains to the argument from my response; the fact remains that this is completely subjective.

Now I will ask you this: if some thug tackles you on the streets and starts landing punches on you, will you try to explain to him why he is "wrong" (as he beats you up) or fight back? Almost everyone in the world would fight back, even if they say otherwise while speaking in theory, but I would like to know your answer.

As long as I have the time to, you shoulnd't be worried.

That's good to hear. But keep things reasonable; don't put in some stuff just for the sake of keeping the argument running (that just wastes both my and your time), since remember, we can both learn something out of this.

[Levyathan]

Originally posted by CP5670
You need to define "staying alive" more precisely here.

I said exactly what I mean by staying alive in the part you quoted. Knowledge merely keep us from no longer staying alive, so it's just one more of those less relevant. I think I might be repeating this too much, but if our objective was anything other than survival, we wouldn't even try to attain knowledge.

Originally posted by CP5670
As far as we know yet, we cannot extend a human to eternal life. The species (going by your definition) as a whole cannot live forever and will eventually evolve into something new anyway.

But someday we will be able to extend life forever, with the proper knowledge. That's why we want it in the first place, to stay alive longer - and, some day, infinitely. By that time, the species would have already evolved into something new (immortal humans), so I'm not sure what you mean by that last sentence.

Originally posted by CP5670
Sure they would. This is what the holistic philosophers meant when they said that "all is one, one without a second," or in other words, all distinctions are arbitrary and are only good for deductive purposes. And following that principle, the answer would not automatically become negative; it would now be undetermined. Since when we are at this level of thought, there is nothing else to compare with, and so whether the species are humans or aliens is of no importance, since the alien and the human are the same thing.

Then you mean that not even we are humans. The particles that form our current body one day might have formed trees, or dinossaurs (who said dinossaurs were extinct?!). The thing is, these aliens wouldn't have our conscience; if they're not everything that once was us, they can't be us.

I also see that you changed your mind about the concept of human. Some time ago you said that human was the entity which had the best view of reality and was descended from the same ancestors as us. Now human is anything the particles of our bodies might form in the future. Let me ask you another question. If these aliens were to live at the same time as the super engineered monkeys, which of them would be more human?

One sentence in particular grabbed my attention, if you agree with it, then you're contradicting yourself.

Originally posted by CP5670
all is one, one without a second

If all is one, you're the same one as those people that are suffering from violence, poverty, and hunger. Why do you insist in not helping them, if by doing so you'd be helping yourself too? Now, if you don't agree with it, you shouldn't be using it as a mean to try to prove your own argument correct.

Originally posted by CP5670
And where does the objective of sharing another point of view come from?

I'd have to say it obviously comes from the original objective of staying alive.

Originally posted by CP5670
From the one of having fun. In the end you must boil everything to one objective, or you have not completed the deduction, and for individual humans, this is the one of having fun and nothing more. (I can reduce any objective you can think of to one of some form of happiness)

But to be happy (and have fun) you need to be alive (as far as our current knowledge goes). If one single objective must exist, then it's the one of staying alive, not of being happy. By that you agreed in part that the objective of the species is to survive. Do we attain knowledge to stay alive or stay alive to attain knowledge? Considering that we still can stay alive without attaining knowledge but can't attain knowledge if we're not alive, the obvious choice is the first one.

Originally posted by CP5670
Yup, we have both traded petty insults so far. However, yours have been quite a bit more numerous than mine, so you have less room to talk about that.

If we both did it, it doesn't matter who did more, neither of us have any room to talk about it. Did you really understand why I called you that? If you did, you wouldn't have been trapped into it.

Originally posted by CP5670
Actually, if I have heard it several times and gotten the same result every time, then the induction procedure would certainly suggest the truth of my comment from the available information. Rather than "merely saying" the given facts, I induced a new statement here, which may or may not be true, but given what I know, the chances of it being true are high. Also, my comment would have been quite valid had I not written that bit in the parenthesis.

A high chance of something being true doesn't ever mean it is true, no matter how much you think you know. And I hardly think of saying that you heard something many times before as a valid argument. It is a valid comment, of course, but not an argument; maybe you're running out of those?

Originally posted by CP5670
Lastly, how would you know how much "experience" I have (whatever that means) and whether or not I have always sat in the "comfort of home?"

Experience has a wide variety of meanings, sure, but I precisely said that I was talking about experience in the area of Third World countries' people. As to your question, your comments and opinions make it obvious, although it's all relative in this subject. Now I feel I have the right to ask you that same question; how would you know how much experience you have?

Originally posted by CP5670
Guess what: I'm trying to help you too! Let's all help each other!

If it wasn't for the smilies, sarcasm and irony, I'd have considered my job here done, and would even let you think you had won. Too bad you still try to make fun of this, it's making it all harder than it should be.

Originally posted by CP5670
It would be fine if, after killing all his enemies, he would bring about a new system in which the same objective was king, but that is not really the case here.

How can you assume he wouldn't do that, has he killed all his enemies already? He might be providing humanity with the greatest opportunity to attain knowledge while we're here saying bad things about his purposes.

Originally posted by CP5670
Besides, the survival is of course good insofar as it contributes to learning (not all survival does, as we saw earlier), which in our current state is necessary.

Is it really not the other way around, I mean, isn't learning only good as long as it contributes to survival? What is the purpose of learning otherwise?

Originally posted by CP5670
Here is the bias: if I asked another person (e.g. Arafat) of their idea of good/bad, it may well differ from yours. Therefore, your idea is untrue in the absolute. (as is his) All of our statements are biased to some extent, but some arguments are definitely more so than others.

If you think that way, no arguments are more or less biased than others, you just think so because you are biased by your surroundings yourself. If all arguments are untrue, it means there's no absolute truth, thus they're all equally untrue.

Originally posted by CP5670
In other words, you find it fun. The fact that you have an "obligation" in the first place means that you like this.

How does having an obligation mean I like it? Citizens have an obligation to pay taxes, does this mean they like it? They might accept it, but they don't need to like it.

Originally posted by CP5670
And also, if you really think that you will truly never accept any idea out there, you have a rather narrow mind, and this is going to make it more difficult for you to learn new things.

Oh wait, never accept any idea? I never said that. If you had payed attention, you'd have noticed I said I would never accept certain ideas, which doesn't mean I have a narrow mind, but rather that I have integrity (which is another relative term). With it, it might be more difficult for me to accept certain things as normal, such as murder (it's just an example), but it will never be a barrier to learning.

Originally posted by CP5670
I am quite ready to accept the existence of universal morals, if they are proved to me as such.

No, you're not. Just the fact that you don't want to accept it guarantees you never will, and if you truly wanted to accept it you already would have. Any and all arguments regarding morals and ethics are immediately rejected by you, it doesn't matter how much evidence of the existence of ethics they provide. I already made obvious it's beneficial for humanity to have a high level of ethics/morals, but you simply don't accept it.

To prove my point, answer me this. If every human individual had as much ethics and morals as normal people (meaning citizens that don't commit crimes and try to help others whenever possible), would it be beneficial for humanity or not?

Originally posted by CP5670
I can use the same rules that others use to determine what they would called serious and fun because I have been brought up learning them, but for my own purposes I use different rules. For me, it is not serious at all, but that is not the case for most people. Therefore, it is both serious and not so, depending on the observer.

Why do you think your own rules are any better than the others'? What's the rule you use to determine whether this or that rule is better suited for you?

Originally posted by CP5670
For me, it is not serious at all, but that is not the case for most people.

So now it's not serious at all? In that other post you said you tried to take everything in life with the same amount of seriousness and fun, but now you seem to take this only with a good deal of fun. It's contradictory, to say the least. Again.

Originally posted by CP5670
Therefore, it is both serious and not so, depending on the observer.

If now that's your opinion, why didn't you accept it when I said I didn't find it fun, but serious instead? Were you just trying to find an error in my logic?

Originally posted by CP5670
Sure, why not? In fact, as long as the emotions do not overtake me, that is exactly what I would do, and it is exactly what I plan to do. (and you might find it interesting to know that most of the authorities on philosophy throughout human history counseled exactly this; go take it up with them )

I didn't mean being fun talking about their lives after they're dead, but about the exact way they died. You'd go like "How fun is dying from a cancer in the throat! My mom didn't even seem like she was alive the last few days, all yellowish and stuff! It was pretty funny!" Would you?

And I did find that parenthesis part interesting. It helped to make even lower the little respect I had for philosophers.

Originally posted by CP5670
It would be more enjoyable for you, unless of course you take "fun" and "serious" things with equal seriousness like I do but still prefer to call them as such. Other than that, I don't care; do what you want.

So you concede my point not to follow his example? Good.

Originally posted by CP5670
You concede my point that the sentence was not related to the argument. Is it not also equally likely that no explanation exists at all? (and the facts are rather suggestive, too)

By saying it wasn't related to the argument I'm not conceding your point, your point was that it didn't make sense. If it didn't make sense, I wouldn't have posted it in the first place; I'm not one to post meaningless crap (as many other things, this too is relative). My conclusion right now is that you did understand what it meant (you seem pretty smart), but felt like you were in such a delicate situation that considered better to make others think you were confused. I know you don't like to lose (another relative term) arguments, but you couldn't do anything about that one anymore; I mean, other people saying "ownage" has got to mean something.

Originally posted by CP5670
But why was it there instead of something else as well? Why not alongside a normal argument?

Because I felt like that way was easier to attain my objective.

Originally posted by CP5670
You really need to learn some formal logic, don't you? X implying Y does not say anything at all about Y implying X.

And you really need to put formal logic where it belongs. Look at it this way. Let's assume for one moment that you didn't win the discussion. Now, if I didn't have a good argument, you would have won. So, if I won it, it either means I hadn't run out of good arguments or that yours were even worse (in which case you shouldn't be saying I had run out of them in the first place). If that's not logical then screw logic, it doesn't work anymore.

Originally posted by CP5670
Ah I see; look at my last statement in that "paragraph."

I didn't find anything relevant to the present discussion there, unless you mean the engulfed part, which I quoted separately.

Originally posted by CP5670
At the point when it does reach this level of intelligence, it might well take in all the humans, but they wouldn't be able to stop it, so it would not really matter anymore.

The rest of humanity could not be able to stop it, but what if there was a new very powerful (not united in a sigle organism) species? The organism would then have to upgrade the already existant humans without costs and clone new ones to be able to survive the new threat. So it would matter to do both those things at the same time, and it would not need any internal maintenance whatsoever.

Originally posted by CP5670
Yes, you are correct there.

Not just there, it just might be a little (or a lot) harder than that to make it obvious in the rest of the discussion.

Originally posted by CP5670
It indeed does. We do not need to know all the options to choose a best one out of the ones we have, and for all our purposes, that is the "best one."

Well, if you're racing alone it isn't hard to come out as the winner.

Originally posted by CP5670
I cannot see why that last statement has to be true; provide some supports, or something at least.

Sure, no problem. Freedom is the power we have to do things. We all have a certain amount of freedom, no matter what our current condition/situation is. People can trade some extent of freedom for other kinds of power, thus losing freedom and gaining power at the same time. If you trade all of your freedom for any amount of power, you're no longer gaining power, but just losing it. Without any freedom you can't do anything, not even have (or make use of) the power you traded your freedom for. Using an analogy, it's like if, first, you cut off your finger for some money, then, you kill yourself for a lot of money (and no, in this analogy you just recieve the money exactly when you kill yourself, not a few days before).

Originally posted by CP5670
No, because there are other variables known to be involved here. On the other hand, you have not been able to provide any hard evidence that humans want to retain their so-called freedom in the long run.

I don't see how these variables don't exist in losing all freedom. And it depends on what you consider a hard evidence.

Originally posted by CP5670
Where did that second-to-last statement come from? The gains in living together would be something like what I described in that old thread linked from here. They did not start off caring about the others; they started off caring about only themselves. The "commitment" grew over time for the reasons described earlier.

If the two families didn't care for each other in the beggining, why would it be beneficial for them to start living together? Suppose a bunch of wolves attacked one of them and the other simply run away without helping, would the attacked family keep their interest in living together? No, because there was no gain in doing so. Now, if they cared to each other and the second family helped in the time of need there would be gain in living together, and the mutual interest would grow stronger.

Originally posted by CP5670
And as I pointed out earlier, if only some people have the commitment, that is even worse than nobody having it (if they have the objective of "survival" ) because those who do not have this commitment would quickly ruin everyone else.

That's why government is still needed, to prevent the ones who have it in a higher level from being destroyed by the ones who have it in a lower level. Once an effort is made to equilibrate ethics and morals in a high level, government is pretty much useless.

I realized you didn't say anything about the possibility of those who have more ethics and morals forming the single organism being greater, though. Can I assume you agree with it?

Originally posted by CP5670
Suppose then, that the aforementioned scientists build the super-organism instead in the same manner as described earlier, and this super-organism stays hidden until it has gained enough strength and knowledge to take on the world. It would indeed need time to gain power, but it has all the time in the universe.

I'm assuming that by strenght, you mean power. Unfortunately it can't stay hidden from everyone else and gain power at the same time. With a limited amount of individuals, it would gain a limited amount of knowledge, and consequently a limited amount of power. It could clone its members to gain more power, but then these new individuals would have the same capacities of the ones already existant, and would not contribute any further. The only possible way would be to genetically modify the way they think, having a wider variety of knowledge. But to do this they would need to consume a great deal of resources, which can't be infinitely harvested in secrecy. During all this time, the rest of humanity too would be growing advanced, maybe even faster due to its massively greater number of individuals (which reproduce fast compared to the joined ones, gaining more variety in less time), and when the organism finally has the need to reveal itself, the results could be catastrophic. Most likely the rest of humanity would be able to discover it before it's even ready, which would be even worse.

Originally posted by CP5670
Actually, the government itself would work a bit like those of today do, since many of the ethics can be derived from the axioms and objectives.

I don't see how a government which doesn't abide by ethics would be able to stand being like that for a long time. It would change, no matter what its objectives are. When people change in such a drastic way (as by the loss of all ethics), they force this change in their surroundings (which would affect the government directly). As this happens, the need for moral rules would once again exist, and they'd form from scratch, almost exactly as before.

If this government no longer abides by ethics but the law system is kept the same way, people will still need ethics, as to not break rules without the intent to.

Originally posted by CP5670
But as I said, in the event that an unexpected situation comes up, the people need to be always ready to completely abandon the all of ethics, which they will not be able to if they follow them like a religion.

If all people equally abide by ethics, no unexpected situation would make them have to abandon them. And they wouldn't be following them like a religion, just to the point where it best balances between providing contribution for the continued survival of the species and mantaining some amount of individual freedom.

Originally posted by CP5670
I don't agree with that for the reasons stated above, but it is of little importance what is advantageous and what is not. What matters is what will happen, and the simple fact remains that ethics are slowly fading away alongside religion by means of moral "divisions."

If it is of little importance the factor of advantage, why would a single organism be formed? You say it's because of mutual interest, but that mutual interest only exists because it offers advantages for the individuals. You don't and can't know what will happen, thus the best system is the one which offers more advantages than any of the others. On the last part, why do you think ethics are fading away? I don't think they were ever as strong as today. Do you not see the world surrounding you? Different peoples are uniting to help others with no distinction, no matter if they're part of the same nation or find themselves in the other side of the globe. What I see is that ethics are growing powerful, a phenomenon which will probably continue to a point we don't even think is possible today. Few people still don't care for others, and this is one of the reason this whole discussion started.

Originally posted by CP5670
If you take that which "actually matters" (i.e. is logically correct) and throw everything else out, in most cases you will be left with nothing. If you do the same for the ethics, you will be left with maybe about half of the stuff.

By things which actually matter I didn't mean logically speaking (as the logical thing to do would be to kill ourselves - we're going to die someday anyway), but principles which contribute directly for the survival of the species. Almost every religion has some amount of them, and ethics aren't anything else.

Originally posted by CP5670
And it is not beneficial because they will start thinking that the universe operates on it in an absolute sense, which will prevent them from ever finding the actual truth.

You're assuming that once everyone has the same level of ethics we're going to lose the knowledge  (or forget) that there was a time in the past when we didn't, which doesn't have (nor is it likely) to be true.

Originally posted by CP5670
I suppose you agree with me now from the first statement, and as for rest I will talk about it below.

With what part of your arguments did I agree, exactly?

Originally posted by CP5670
Actually, I meant the first sentence in the way that they came up over time for "good" reasons and thus were "intended" to be useful but they actually are useless, even in theory. (I did phrase it poorly, though)

If they weren't useful at all, why do people still abide by them?

Originally posted by CP5670
They do need to be ready to break the rules, because the rules are a general guideline and do not apply to every situation. About them "working otherwise" in such a situation, I once again present you with the 1930s India example.

By working otherwise I meant that they could work even if not all people abide by them, not that they could work if people weren'r ready to break the rules (which is also true). Now present me with one situation in which, if all people abided by ethics, they'd have to break the rules. Keep in mind that ethics do not keep people from defending themselves from threats (the only threats possible would be a hostile alien species).

Originally posted by CP5670
Everyone already does, huh? How would you explain all the "bad" people throughout history? More recently, you have what people explained in this thread: people are in trouble, and nobody nearby helps. As for the last part, see what I said to Bobboau earlier: if our ancestors had bashed their heads against the wall as described there, we would do exactly the same, and it would become "human."

Answering your first question, yes. Everybody abides by ethics in some level, which doesn't mean it's a high level (a high level would be defined by contributing more directly to the well being of the species in general). As to your second question, I think the first answer already explained it. About people not helping others (the case of the raping comes to mind), it's because either their ethics level is lower than the fear of retaliation or simply they have a very low ethics level. The last part is almost true. The only problem with it is that I (or anyone, for that matter) don't see how bashing their own heads is beneficial for people. It's the opposite of beneficial, actually, because it contradicts the principal objective of survival (serious wounds could be caused to the skull).

Originally posted by CP5670
Since when did moral rules form "one single principle?" There are a number of versions of morals out there today, all of which are equally "correct."

Since all ethical and moral rules contribute directly to one single objective: the survival of the species. Give me one example of a version of morals that contradict this one rule, and I'll happily say I was wrong. Or rather I'll say it shouldn't be called morals.

Originally posted by CP5670
As for the last part, I would be rather surprised if you had not noticed; I intended you to notice, hence why I wrote it in the first place.

That's why I said "don't worry", I obviously knew your objective was for me to notice. To add something not related to this specific argument, I could say that, by your concept of the word, I have helped you. Your objective was to make me notice, I noticed, therefore I contributed to your objective. You're welcome.

Originally posted by CP5670
Of course it is relative. No they would not, but the two would merge anyway as soon as each learned of the other's existence.

But the point is, they wouldn't be absolute gods. If they're not gods in the absolute meaning of the word, then they aren't gods. Or else you could say we are gods, compared to ants or some even less powerful being. And ants would be gods too, compared to molecules of water. Practically anything would be a god, so it has no real meaning except when used in the absolute meaning.

Originally posted by CP5670
Think about it this way: do they have the power to do anything even today? Are they not completely subject to the physical and social laws and thus cannot do anything in any case? (e.g. psychologists have found that people frequently think that something is a conscious free choice when it was really just determined by their surroundings as they grew up)

I like to think we do have the power to make decisions and free choices. If we didn't, then all of this wouldn't mean anything at all, because all things until the end of time (or forever, whether you think is going to happen) would already be previously defined. Unless there was an alien species which did have free will, fact which would put us in a very disadvantageous situation (given that they were hostile to us, of course) and would probably lead to the end of the human species.

Originally posted by CP5670
Well, yeah of course, but tell me what it is, not what it isn't.

By the principle of deduction it is everything which isn't something it isn't.

Originally posted by CP5670
Oh...they came from the same ancestors, which I believe there is some technical term for. (primates or something?) They came from the same things that the humans came from, but they did not come from humans. Therefore, all humans are also monkeys, but monkeys are not also humans.

Well, they did come from humans, just not humans as they are today. That's exactly the point of this. You said human is the entity which has a better understanding of reality and was descended from the same ancestors as us. Those monkeys have a better understanding of reality and are descended from the same ancestors as us, therefore they're human and we're not. Unless you want to review your concept of human.

Originally posted by CP5670
It offers more advantages from my point of view, so I would stay alive, but that means nothing outside of my thinking. For them, a productive life is one of crime, and some would indeed actually rather die than give up that life for a "normal" life.

If your point of view means absolutely nothing outside of your thinking, why are we even having this discussion? The last part I'll deal with later on.

Originally posted by CP5670
Also, I already stated why we are unable to kill ourselves.

Hmm, I must have missed that part. I'll look for it later, though (it's a pretty big thread, it'll be a while before I find it).

Originally posted by CP5670
Of course, the desires are constantly changing, as are the methods of help. You can only be helping them in attaining their goal at that time. You may indeed help them and have them hate you the next day, but that is simply the way life works. Frankly, there is no more universal and objective definition of "help" that is not something similar to this. Also, they cannot hate you if they are dead.

For the last sentence, you know I was speaking hypothetically. If they could be killed and keep their conscience, then they'd hate you. The rest of it will be dealt with right after the next quote.

Originally posted by CP5670
When did I say that? That is the principal objective of humanity. I said a bit later that the individual human's objective is whatever he/she defines it to be, and that is the only correct one.

We might be almost nearing a conclusion, now. The principal objective of humanity is automatically the principal objective of every individual that is a part of humanity, since humanity doesn't have a conscience of itself and merely exists as the imaginary amalgamation of every human's existence. This objective is going to remain active for the whole period of existence of each individual human. The primary objective of each human is the survival of the species, which makes the secondary the survival of itself. These two objectives are what keep us alive, and only their existence makes possible the existence of ethics and moral rules. The nature of these objectives also make possible the presence of other less relevant objectives, which might not always be beneficial for the individual; they're beneficial just as long as don't contradict the two original objectives of a human.

By helping human beings you are contributing to one of their beneficial objectives. By contributing to one of the non beneficial objectives or by impeding one of the beneficial objectives from being realized you're causing the human beings harm, and is, thus, breaking ethical and moral rules.

Originally posted by CP5670
I already asked myself the same question, which is how I obtained a result in the first place. I asked my dad (with whom I frequently bounce my ideas), who gave a similar response to yours but also agreed that there is no universally correct properness. But asking people is no substitute for absolutely rational deduction.

See above; that is not his objective. The pencil, of course. As I said, that is the way individual existence works and the only way it can work. You give me a more objective definition of "helping" and I will readily accept it.

That is one of his objectives, it's just not as relevant as the one of buying a car, so the most proper help in this case would be to contribute to his objective of buying a car. The points I previously made apply here to.

Originally posted by CP5670
No, there is no real objective for the individual, as I said before.

You also said that individuals' objectives don't matter. wouldn't you like to support your opinion?

Originally posted by CP5670
They may indeed have incredibly revolutionary ideas, but at some point someone else will probably come up with similar ideas, and this has been shown again and again throughout the history of science. They may be unique to some extent, but not nearly as much you are making them out to be. In any case, why take the risk?

How can you say that something like that has been shown many times in history? We only get to know the cases that someone did have a similar idea, not the ones that faded into oblivion because no one else had any similar ideas. Comparing the amount of unique ideas with the amount of ideas that multiple people had, I think you can't consider the latter as many.

Why take the risk? Why not take the risk? If risks weren't taken, where would we be now? Using wooden sticks to defend ourselves from bears, probably.

Originally posted by CP5670
Once again, induction. The fact that they did "wrong" in the past does of course not ensure anything, but it does indeed increase the probability of them doing something. That probability wanes over time, but it cannot ever be truly equal to a citizen who has never committed a crime. (you can learn about this in a course in mathematical probability)

Each case is different from the others. If you knew the reasons that made these people criminals, you could then have a better idea of whether they're likely to commit crimes again or not than any mathematical course will ever teach you. There could be so many reasons people would commit one single crime and no more that it's better not even start giving examples.

Originally posted by CP5670
And blacks are not really a good example here, since the laws were changed after they were violated, so that resetted all the probabilities.

The point is that they were treated differently from other citizens when they should have the right to be treated equally. Former prisoners do have this right (at least here), but it seems people still aren't respecting it.

Originally posted by CP5670
Regarding the change, I was talking about the universe as a whole, not individual people; again, these larger rules may or may not apply to individual people and you cannot really use them with any accuracy there.

Ack! Maybe it was someone else who said that nothing stays the same for long. I probably confused the two of you.

Originally posted by CP5670
Depends, in some ways he was rational and in other ways he was not. An interesting fellow, at any rate. But, as Blue Lion said earlier in the thread, it does not matter one bit what I personally think for the purposes of this discussion except where you can derive further evidence that directly pertains to the argument from my response; the fact remains that this is completely subjective.

Oh, so it depends, eh? I did not ask if he was rational or not, in an absolute sense or compared to something else. I asked if you considered either him or his enemies as being right. And if personal opinions don't matter, this thread shouldn't have a single reply; almost everything here is personal opinion and nothing more.

Originally posted by CP5670
Now I will ask you this: if some thug tackles you on the streets and starts landing punches on you, will you try to explain to him why he is "wrong" (as he beats you up) or fight back? Almost everyone in the world would fight back, even if they say otherwise while speaking in theory, but I would like to know your answer.

Fair enough, I asked you a question (which you haven't replied yet), you have the right to ask me a question. I have no problem in expressing my opinions in public, and, if I did, I shouldn't be in a forum in the first place.

Answering your question, I'd have to say I'd fight him back for sure. Before you say I'm wrong, let me explain why. First, he would be wrong, because he would be trying to keep me from attaining my objective of staying alive, and therefore he would be causing me harm, which breaks a moral rule. Now, you'll say that by fighting him I'd be breaking a moral rule myself, but that's not true. It would be, actually, the most ethically correct thing I could possibly do. By defending myself, I'd be contributing to my primary and secondary objectives of survival of the species and my own, which is ethically correct. By fighting him back, I'd be keeping him from attaining one of his less relevant objectives of causing harm to other people, which contradicts the principal objective of survival of the species (making it not beneficial to himself), therefore I'd be actually helping him. So I'd be both helping him and myself. That proves self defence doesn't break any moral rules, it seems, but is rather something mutually beneficial.

Originally posted by CP5670
That's good to hear. But keep things reasonable; don't put in some stuff just for the sake of keeping the argument running (that just wastes both my and your time), since remember, we can both learn something out of this.

When I run out of arguments I'll say so and then stop posting here. If I just don't post anything in a day or two, it's because I didn't have the time to reply. And I'm learning from this more than I thought I would (it doesn't mean either that I agree learning is the principal objective of the species nor that I think this is fun - I think of learning in general as the opposite of fun, actually).

[CP5670]

I said exactly what I mean by staying alive in the part you quoted. Knowledge merely keep us from no longer staying alive, so it's just one more of those less relevant. I think I might be repeating this too much, but if our objective was anything other than survival, we wouldn't even try to attain knowledge.

See my original post on this sub-topic for more information on this part. You see, going by one definition of "survival" in which we talk of the existence of the individual particles, we would survive regardless of what we did. (conservation of energy) Going by the other definition, in which we define a state of complete stasis in the relative positions of the particles, we would die out, once again in spite of anything we try, since we cannot completely stop the change. There can be nothing in between the two that does not rely on perceptual, non-absolute distinctions, and thus is useless for our purposes. I will henceforth refer to the first definition as survival 1 and the other as survival 2 for brevity.

But someday we will be able to extend life forever, with the proper knowledge. That's why we want it in the first place, to stay alive longer - and, some day, infinitely. By that time, the species would have already evolved into something new (immortal humans), so I'm not sure what you mean by that last sentence.

However, if we have evolved into something new, then we will no longer be humans in the static sense anyway, so we would already have died out. (see below) Besides, here is the real problem: what do we do after we achieve this immortality?

I also see that you changed your mind about the concept of human. Some time ago you said that human was the entity which had the best view of reality and was descended from the same ancestors as us. Now human is anything the particles of our bodies might form in the future. Let me ask you another question. If these aliens were to live at the same time as the super engineered monkeys, which of them would be more human?

Yes, I was trying to slightly expand upon the same definition you were using before for the sake of comprehensibility, whereas I used my own this time around. I will try to be more precise from now on: human 1 will mean anything that has certain defined characteristics (let's call them the human characteristics) at a specified point in time, while human 2 will symbolize the changing human in all time. The aliens under the given conditions would not be human 1s, but they would be human 2s.

Then you mean that not even we are humans. The particles that form our current body one day might have formed trees, or dinossaurs (who said dinossaurs were extinct?!). The thing is, these aliens wouldn't have our conscience; if they're not everything that once was us, they can't be us.

If we follow the last line of reasoning, even we today are not human 1s as the "original" human 1s were. We are certainly quite different from what the original human 1s were, in terms of characteristic behaviors, likes/dislikes, and so on. And we are human 2s no matter what.

If all is one, you're the same one as those people that are suffering from violence, poverty, and hunger. Why do you insist in not helping them, if by doing so you'd be helping yourself too? Now, if you don't agree with it, you shouldn't be using it as a mean to try to prove your own argument correct.

Glad you brought this up, as it is an important point. Extending this concept only to other humans is not enough; we must include in it everything, including animals, nonliving objects, universal laws, and all absolute ideas. As I pointed out earlier, the whole concept of the individual goal is subjective and thus means nothing in the absolute. In a universal sense, I could neither help them nor hurt them no matter how hard I try either way. If objective is survival 1, you can give them no help because they already have the goal ensured, and if it is survival 2, you can still give no help because it is all futile. Another way to think of this is to consider the following: could you help (or hurt) a rock? How would one go about doing so? If the rocks and the humans are really the same things at their cores, one cannot say that it is only possible to help one and not the other in an absolute sense. Even the objective I have formulated earlier is not really one in the usual sense of the word, but rather a theoretical principle stating what we probably will do. (not what we should do)

I'd have to say it obviously comes from the original objective of staying alive.

I would certainly like to hear your point of view, but I'm not sure what it has to do with either form of survival noted above.

But to be happy (and have fun) you need to be alive (as far as our current knowledge goes). If one single objective must exist, then it's the one of staying alive, not of being happy. By that you agreed in part that the objective of the species is to survive. Do we attain knowledge to stay alive or stay alive to attain knowledge? Considering that we still can stay alive without attaining knowledge but can't attain knowledge if we're not alive, the obvious choice is the first one.

Well, there are certainly people today who try to attain happiness by killing themselves, usually because they are frustrated with their life. Actually, this brings up something else important: by being happy, do you mean actually feeling the pleasure or working in a way so that it might be felt in the future (in other words, the change in levels of happiness)? I myself have not quite decided yet on which one of these is the individual's final objective from his point of view. As for the last statement, nothing would ensure survival 2 while everything would ensure survival 1, so no decision can be made from that.

If we both did it, it doesn't matter who did more, neither of us have any room to talk about it. Did you really understand why I called you that? If you did, you wouldn't have been trapped into it.

To obtain happiness; that is why anyone throws around insults at all. It makes them feel better.

A high chance of something being true doesn't ever mean it is true, no matter how much you think you know.

I never claimed that it was true; all I said was that there is a high chance of it being so from what I have seen.

And I hardly think of saying that you heard something many times before as a valid argument. It is a valid comment, of course, but not an argument; maybe you're running out of those?

Technically, if you had some way of ensuring that I was telling the truth, it would actually be quite valid, since it follows directly from the induction assumption. As I said in the part you quoted, it was not intended as an argument; it was intended as a comment, and the post would have been fine without in included at all. As for the last part, we will see how things progress...

Experience has a wide variety of meanings, sure, but I precisely said that I was talking about experience in the area of Third World countries' people. As to your question, your comments and opinions make it obvious, although it's all relative in this subject. Now I feel I have the right to ask you that same question; how would you know how much experience you have?

Actually, I am find the affairs in any third world nations quite interesting and follow them closely. (especially the Asian countries, since my parents are from India) Now can you be more specific as to what part of the people you are talking about and what you mean by experience? As to how I would know how much experience I have, I am the one who has experienced it and theorized upon it; if you mean experience relative to that of others, I of course could not know for sure, but then again I never claimed that. Regardless of that though, I think I would still know "how much" experience I have better than you would know how much I have, just as the same goes for your level of experience.

If it wasn't for the smilies, sarcasm and irony, I'd have considered my job here done, and would even let you think you had won. Too bad you still try to make fun of this, it's making it all harder than it should be.

Like I said before, I like to make fun out of everything; what is wrong with that?

How can you assume he wouldn't do that, has he killed all his enemies already? He might be providing humanity with the greatest opportunity to attain knowledge while we're here saying bad things about his purposes.

We can of course not know for sure, but then again we cannot know anything with absolute certainty. Looks at the facts though: are his men exactly at the cutting edge of scientific research and pioneering humanity into new technological eras? They are about as backward as one can get today, knowledge-wise.

Is it really not the other way around, I mean, isn't learning only good as long as it contributes to survival? What is the purpose of learning otherwise?

See what I wrote earlier for this, as it is similar to something you said before. As for its purposes otherwise, they don't exist; it is its own purpose. We define the so-called objective because we cannot determine anything without starting somewhere. Why this purpose was chosen over the others is because it offers the least overall contradictions and perhaps more importantly, is also a self-proving assumption.

If you think that way, no arguments are more or less biased than others, you just think so because you are biased by your surroundings yourself. If all arguments are untrue, it means there's no absolute truth, thus they're all equally untrue.

Wait, I am not sure what you are trying to say here; any arguments are equally biased simply because the people that they came from all exist in reality? And where did I say that all arguments are untrue? (incidentally, this would mean the same thing as saying that all arguments are true)

How does having an obligation mean I like it? Citizens have an obligation to pay taxes, does this mean they like it? They might accept it, but they don't need to like it.

No, they do not truly have to. They do it (in most cases) to avoid getting in trouble with the government, which would make them less happy. They are just trying to maintain their level of happiness. Therefore, they must like it, however indirectly, and the same goes for you or I.

Oh wait, never accept any idea? I never said that. If you had payed attention, you'd have noticed I said I would never accept certain ideas, which doesn't mean I have a narrow mind, but rather that I have integrity (which is another relative term). With it, it might be more difficult for me to accept certain things as normal, such as murder (it's just an example), but it will never be a barrier to learning.

I should have rephrased that; by "any" I meant any one given idea, no matter how absurd it may be. And since you restated that you would never accept certain ideas, I stand by my previous statement that you have a narrow mind. What if it happens to be the truth that murder is indeed normal? That sort of thinking will then become a barrier to learning, and you just as much said so yourself in the next quoted part.

No, you're not. Just the fact that you don't want to accept it guarantees you never will, and if you truly wanted to accept it you already would have. Any and all arguments regarding morals and ethics are immediately rejected by you, it doesn't matter how much evidence of the existence of ethics they provide. I already made obvious it's beneficial for humanity to have a high level of ethics/morals, but you simply don't accept it.

When did I say I did not want to accept it? I said that I would prefer it being false to true. However, I am pretty sure that this is what you meant to say instead, and so I will assume that here. Since when do people not accept things just because they do not like them? For example, Einstein did eventually end up accepting quantum mechanics as being true despite that he found the probabilistic idea very repulsive. (btw I have some sympathy for his thoughts here, actually) Now, more to the point, you are completely confusing what is beneficial (we will assume for the moment that this is indeed beneficial to whatever goal) and what is universally true. In other words, can ethics ever be made into as absolute a quantity as say, mass? i.e. We can objectively say how much mass an object has and nobody can dispute that, but can we say how ethical an idea is with the same scientific accuracy? I doubt it. Since the concepts of benefit arises from an objective (and without which it has no meaning), which itself is a non-absolute quantity, the same goes for ethics.

To prove my point, answer me this. If every human individual had as much ethics and morals as normal people (meaning citizens that don't commit crimes and try to help others whenever possible), would it be beneficial for humanity or not?

Certainly, as long as they are consciously aware that the ethics are not an absolute quantity and they are ready to break the ethics at any time if other circumstances change.

Why do you think your own rules are any better than the others'? What's the rule you use to determine whether this or that rule is better suited for you?

Where the heck did I say that? I want to be happy, and so I am using the rule that everything is equally fun/serious (more on the fun side, of course) to not have to deal with things seriously.

So now it's not serious at all? In that other post you said you tried to take everything in life with the same amount of seriousness and fun, but now you seem to take this only with a good deal of fun. It's contradictory, to say the least. Again.

You really don't know what you are talking about, do you? Seriousness and fun (as a noun) mean the same thing, a particular quantity, and serious and fun (as an adjective) are words used to describe opposite extremes of that same quantity, let us call it X here. (just as hot and cold are the extremes of the quantity of temperature) What I am saying is that I take everything in life with the same amount of X.

If now that's your opinion, why didn't you accept it when I said I didn't find it fun, but serious instead? Were you just trying to find an error in my logic?

You did not say that you found it serious; you said that it is serious, and you were trying to convince me that there is an inherent seriousness involved in this topic.

I didn't mean being fun talking about their lives after they're dead, but about the exact way they died. You'd go like "How fun is dying from a cancer in the throat! My mom didn't even seem like she was alive the last few days, all yellowish and stuff! It was pretty funny!" Would you?

Again, of course. Now, whether I actually find it funny or not is completely determined by my likes and dislikes, which in turn all come out of my upbringing. I have the moral disease, so I may not find it funny, but I would not think it unusual or anything if someone does find it funny, as we all have our own tastes. However, if you think there is anything "inherently wrong" with doing exactly what you described there, you're the one with the problem.

And I did find that parenthesis part interesting. It helped to make even lower the little respect I had for philosophers.

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Now this was quite a ridiculous statement in such a generaliztion; if you actually agree with that, you are certainly not worth all this.

So you concede my point not to follow his example? Good.

No, I merely stated that on a personal level it does not matter to me what you do.

I'm trying to help you, though.

By saying it wasn't related to the argument I'm not conceding your point, your point was that it didn't make sense. If it didn't make sense, I wouldn't have posted it in the first place; I'm not one to post meaningless crap (as many other things, this too is relative). My conclusion right now is that you did understand what it meant (you seem pretty smart), but felt like you were in such a delicate situation that considered better to make others think you were confused. I know you don't like to lose (another relative term) arguments, but you couldn't do anything about that one anymore; I mean, other people saying "ownage" has got to mean something.

Yes, I am pretty certain that, as I said before, it was an inside joke that only certain people would understand. The only one who said "ownage" was Styxx, and being your brother I assume you know him well, so it could have been something that just the two of you would understand. However, it is possible that I am wrong here, since I am not at all well-versed in any of the common slang and this wouldn't be the first time I did not get a joke. If you think I already know, why are you so adverse to telling me? I of course do not like to lose (who does) but at least I have the sense to admit defeat instead of dragging the argument on into absurdity just to cover up a loss.

Because I felt like that way was easier to attain my objective.

Which was what? Helping me, surviving, voicing out your opinion, or something else?

And you really need to put formal logic where it belongs. Look at it this way. Let's assume for one moment that you didn't win the discussion. Now, if I didn't have a good argument, you would have won. So, if I won it, it either means I hadn't run out of good arguments or that yours were even worse (in which case you shouldn't be saying I had run out of them in the first place). If that's not logical then screw logic, it doesn't work anymore.

It belongs everywhere, so I could not do otherwise. The fourth sentence is an incorrect deduction; you could well have run out of good arguments and still keep continuing on with something just to keep the argument going, so I would technically not have won.

I didn't find anything relevant to the present discussion there, unless you mean the engulfed part, which I quoted separately.

That is what I meant.

The rest of humanity could not be able to stop it, but what if there was a new very powerful (not united in a sigle organism) species? The organism would then have to upgrade the already existant humans without costs and clone new ones to be able to survive the new threat. So it would matter to do both those things at the same time, and it would not need any internal maintenance whatsoever.

If the species was not united in a single organism, it wouldn't be much of a threat in the first place, and if it was, the two would merge. As for the last statement, I don't know what exactly you are trying to say; it would need internal maintenance simply because it exists.

Not just there, it just might be a little (or a lot) harder than that to make it obvious in the rest of the discussion.

We will see.

Well, if you're racing alone it isn't hard to come out as the winner.

That is my point. The concept of "best" only has meaning when the data exists.

Sure, no problem. Freedom is the power we have to do things. We all have a certain amount of freedom, no matter what our current condition/situation is. People can trade some extent of freedom for other kinds of power, thus losing freedom and gaining power at the same time. If you trade all of your freedom for any amount of power, you're no longer gaining power, but just losing it. Without any freedom you can't do anything, not even have (or make use of) the power you traded your freedom for. Using an analogy, it's like if, first, you cut off your finger for some money, then, you kill yourself for a lot of money (and no, in this analogy you just recieve the money exactly when you kill yourself, not a few days before).

I said this three times already: do we actually have all that freedom? From what psychologists have been continually discovering in the last few decades, it seems that much of what we think is a conscious decision is actually almost completely determined by outside factors. You are not trading in freedom because you have none in the first place.

I don't see how these variables don't exist in losing all freedom. And it depends on what you consider a hard evidence.

Well, give me the variables; you have not done that, whereas I already said why I think it is likely so.

If the two families didn't care for each other in the beggining, why would it be beneficial for them to start living together? Suppose a bunch of wolves attacked one of them and the other simply run away without helping, would the attacked family keep their interest in living together? No, because there was no gain in doing so. Now, if they cared to each other and the second family helped in the time of need there would be gain in living together, and the mutual interest would grow stronger.

Can't you see the obvious benefit involved here? The other family would be grateful to them and would be more likely to help out the first one in a similar situation, or would probably do whatever other favor in return.

That's why government is still needed, to prevent the ones who have it in a higher level from being destroyed by the ones who have it in a lower level. Once an effort is made to equilibrate ethics and morals in a high level, government is pretty much useless.

How would you go about carrying out that "effort" anyway, though?

I realized you didn't say anything about the possibility of those who have more ethics and morals forming the single organism being greater, though. Can I assume you agree with it?

The "greatness," if you want to call it that, would be determined by how much they contribute the objective, or how much new stuff their brains discover. However, nobody would really care about greatness over the other components at that point.

I'm assuming that by strenght, you mean power. Unfortunately it can't stay hidden from everyone else and gain power at the same time. With a limited amount of individuals, it would gain a limited amount of knowledge, and consequently a limited amount of power. It could clone its members to gain more power, but then these new individuals would have the same capacities of the ones already existant, and would not contribute any further. The only possible way would be to genetically modify the way they think, having a wider variety of knowledge. But to do this they would need to consume a great deal of resources, which can't be infinitely harvested in secrecy. During all this time, the rest of humanity too would be growing advanced, maybe even faster due to its massively greater number of individuals (which reproduce fast compared to the joined ones, gaining more variety in less time), and when the organism finally has the need to reveal itself, the results could be catastrophic. Most likely the rest of humanity would be able to discover it before it's even ready, which would be even worse.

How would it use a higher quantity of individuals to gain knowledge, especially if the ten or so guys who started it were some of the top minds of that time? And why would it be so difficult to genetically modify the way they think? By the time such a thing actually happens, modifying brains would have become quite commonplace. Instead, how about this: just take the first analogy I gave you about the superweapon and supershield, except let's assume that the super-organism builds it up. Some people will accept to becoming a part of it when it sends it out its ultimatum, and the rest will die, so there would be no remaining resistance for a while.

I don't see how a government which doesn't abide by ethics would be able to stand being like that for a long time. It would change, no matter what its objectives are. When people change in such a drastic way (as by the loss of all ethics), they force this change in their surroundings (which would affect the government directly). As this happens, the need for moral rules would once again exist, and they'd form from scratch, almost exactly as before.

If this government no longer abides by ethics but the law system is kept the same way, people will still need ethics, as to not break rules without the intent to.

By law system I meant the actual laws, not the way in which they are enforced. The people can be made to obey the rules by a more effective law, i.e. by fear of punishment. Why would they need the full ethics anymore if they already have the necessary parts of it from the law?

If all people equally abide by ethics, no unexpected situation would make them have to abandon them. And they wouldn't be following them like a religion, just to the point where it best balances between providing contribution for the continued survival of the species and mantaining some amount of individual freedom.

How can they know what unexpected situation will come up? They have to be prepared to ditch everything immediately if necessary. And yes, they would be following religiously if they are not willing to quickly abandon them at a moment's notice; this is exactly what forms a belief.

If it is of little importance the factor of advantage, why would a single organism be formed? You say it's because of mutual interest, but that mutual interest only exists because it offers advantages for the individuals. You don't and can't know what will happen, thus the best system is the one which offers more advantages than any of the others. On the last part, why do you think ethics are fading away? I don't think they were ever as strong as today. Do you not see the world surrounding you? Different peoples are uniting to help others with no distinction, no matter if they're part of the same nation or find themselves in the other side of the globe. What I see is that ethics are growing powerful, a phenomenon which will probably continue to a point we don't even think is possible today. Few people still don't care for others, and this is one of the reason this whole discussion started.

I am talking about what is advantageous to the society as a whole, and that does not necessarily have anything to do with what is advantageous to the people. I do not know what will happen, but I can know what will happen. And do you not see the world surrounding you too? Similar people are breaking away just as different people are uniting, with the former going quite a bit faster. (you can ask a political scientist or sociologist for the statistics) For example, take a look at the Israel/Palestine conflict; both parties truly think they are morally correct by attempting to eliminate the other one because they both feel that they have been "unjustly" treated by the other. Look what people were saying throughout this thread: when someone was in trouble, not one other person moved to help, and this is a pretty common thing actually. In the past, people used to rally together to fight wars by means of nationalism or patriotism of some sort, and today, they fight wars on the ideological grounds of right and wrong, and this can be seen all over the world.

By things which actually matter I didn't mean logically speaking (as the logical thing to do would be to kill ourselves - we're going to die someday anyway), but principles which contribute directly for the survival of the species. Almost every religion has some amount of them, and ethics aren't anything else.

How would that be the logical thing to do? (or that is, more so than anything else) Killing ourselves would be just as much of an action as anything else; that is no substitute for a true state of indeterminacy. And I never said that ethics were completely useless; what I am saying is useless is your religious manner of clinging to them unquestioningly despite any new developments.

You're assuming that once everyone has the same level of ethics we're going to lose the knowledge (or forget) that there was a time in the past when we didn't, which doesn't have (nor is it likely) to be true.

eh? This is what I was thinking of: suppose a guy formulates a new physics equation for analyzing some natural phenomenon, let's say for the fusion processes inside a star, and he then tries to incorporate the ethical concepts of "good" and "bad" into the formula because he has been tricked into the believing that morals are absolute. He will just end up with nonsense.

With what part of your arguments did I agree, exactly?

If people are "forced" to "believe" things, then it is no longer "beneficial" to them. (your own words) Therefore, if the child is "forced" to believe that eating dirt is bad, it is no longer beneficial.

If they weren't useful at all, why do people still abide by them?

Are you kidding? Why do people still go by religions then, or why do people still engage in "immoral" acts at all?

By working otherwise I meant that they could work even if not all people abide by them, not that they could work if people weren'r ready to break the rules (which is also true). Now present me with one situation in which, if all people abided by ethics, they'd have to break the rules. Keep in mind that ethics do not keep people from defending themselves from threats (the only threats possible would be a hostile alien species).

Let's say, a brain-related genetic mutation of some sort occurs in one of the people and he gains a pathological hatred for all of humanity. Now further suppose that the guy has an incredible talent for convincing masses of his ideas (just like Hitler), and we know that a human's ideas can be changed around pretty easily. The guy then goes around preaching his ideas like a new religion, claiming that the morals themselves are what has destroyed "what makes us human" or some other such emotionally appealing ideas. If this guy starts a war and leaves destruction in his path everywhere, the people he has not convinced would be powerless to stop him because their own ethics prevent them from striking out against his forces.

Answering your first question, yes. Everybody abides by ethics in some level, which doesn't mean it's a high level (a high level would be defined by contributing more directly to the well being of the species in general). As to your second question, I think the first answer already explained it. About people not helping others (the case of the raping comes to mind), it's because either their ethics level is lower than the fear of retaliation or simply they have a very low ethics level. The last part is almost true. The only problem with it is that I (or anyone, for that matter) don't see how bashing their own heads is beneficial for people. It's the opposite of beneficial, actually, because it contradicts the principal objective of survival (serious wounds could be caused to the skull).

How does everybody abide by ethics? Maybe to some level, but that level is frequently so low that it can be considered as nonexistant for our purposes. If they somehow found it beneficial though (let's just imagine), you would too, and you would have trouble thinking otherwise, just as you are with the morals. Also, it is not important whether ot not it is actually beneficial; you were saying that it alone defines us as "human" or something like that, and that is quite obviously not so, since anything our ancestors did would amount to the same thing.

Since all ethical and moral rules contribute directly to one single objective: the survival of the species. Give me one example of a version of morals that contradict this one rule, and I'll happily say I was wrong. Or rather I'll say it shouldn't be called morals.

Actually all of them, because there is nothing that clearly defines a species. But anyway, how about the one you mentioned earlier about making jokes over the deaths of people? Tell me how that contributes to this "survival." Here is another one: it was being claimed in that other thread that torturing prisoners to get information is "immoral;" tell me why.

That's why I said "don't worry", I obviously knew your objective was for me to notice. To add something not related to this specific argument, I could say that, by your concept of the word, I have helped you. Your objective was to make me notice, I noticed, therefore I contributed to your objective. You're welcome.

Yes, you did help me. But why did you specifically say so here?

But the point is, they wouldn't be absolute gods. If they're not gods in the absolute meaning of the word, then they aren't gods. Or else you could say we are gods, compared to ants or some even less powerful being. And ants would be gods too, compared to molecules of water. Practically anything would be a god, so it has no real meaning except when used in the absolute meaning.

You are quite correct here, but I cannot see how this does anything for your argument. I said that they are gods compared to the individuals for a certain purpose, and that is certainly an absolute statement.

I like to think we do have the power to make decisions and free choices. If we didn't, then all of this wouldn't mean anything at all, because all things until the end of time (or forever, whether you think is going to happen) would already be previously defined. Unless there was an alien species which did have free will, fact which would put us in a very disadvantageous situation (given that they were hostile to us, of course) and would probably lead to the end of the human species.

Well, we all like to think that, but as I remarked before, many recent psychological studies have shown our "free decisions" are quite subject to external conditions. It does not have to be previously defined at all - the abscence of determinism by no means implies the existence of a free will - and that does not automatically imply a fully fatalistic existence.

By the principle of deduction it is everything which isn't something it isn't.

So now are you going to list everything it is not? This is a waste of time.

Well, they did come from humans, just not humans as they are today. That's exactly the point of this. You said human is the entity which has a better understanding of reality and was descended from the same ancestors as us. Those monkeys have a better understanding of reality and are descended from the same ancestors as us, therefore they're human and we're not. Unless you want to review your concept of human.

Yes, I said before, I was using two different versions of "human," and that was a silly idea. They are not human 1s relative to anything but themselves, and they are human 2s. But even supposing we are going by that old definition of human, I would still be right there. I said this already: they may be descended from the same ancestors, but if we define a human to have "started off" (i.e. evolved far enough that it can be considered its own species) at some arbitrary point in time, then only that which comes from this species and after this species is also human. They are the "real" monkeys more than we are, but they cannot be humans because we came from them, not the other way around.

If your point of view means absolutely nothing outside of your thinking, why are we even having this discussion? The last part I'll deal with later on.

I was talking about that particular statement there, not everything in the entire argument.

We might be almost nearing a conclusion, now. The principal objective of humanity is automatically the principal objective of every individual that is a part of humanity, since humanity doesn't have a conscience of itself and merely exists as the imaginary amalgamation of every human's existence. This objective is going to remain active for the whole period of existence of each individual human. The primary objective of each human is the survival of the species, which makes the secondary the survival of itself. These two objectives are what keep us alive, and only their existence makes possible the existence of ethics and moral rules. The nature of these objectives also make possible the presence of other less relevant objectives, which might not always be beneficial for the individual; they're beneficial just as long as don't contradict the two original objectives of a human.

No, no...the humanity can actually be thought of as having just as much of an existence as the human does. Think of it this way: how do the humans have a "conscience" of themselves? One could say that they are also just as much of an "imaginary amalgamation" of the cells that make them up. And we could go on like this to the individual particles. This is merely one way of thinking about the situation - there exist an infinite number of such methods - but if we do not want to think of a "humanity," we cannot have any other distinctions either all the way down to the particles. Now, the objective of the individual human may not (and in most cases does not) have anything to do with the objective of the entire species. The objective of humanity materializes out of the objectives of all humans in a continuous interplay reaction with each other; this is very similar to the way that statistical mechanics works in quantum physics, where individual particles follow pretty much random paths, but when billions of them do this at the same time in series, new patterns start to manifest themselves.

That is one of his objectives, it's just not as relevant as the one of buying a car, so the most proper help in this case would be to contribute to his objective of buying a car. The points I previously made apply here to.

How would you know what he considers "more" relevant? You could try reminding him of the car, and if he forgets about the pencil, then I guess you could say that it is now more relevant. Other than that, the concept of relevance (as we are talking about it here) only means anything when both a person (i.e. point of view) and a point in time is specified.

You also said that individuals' objectives don't matter. wouldn't you like to support your opinion?

They do not "matter" because they are not absolute; as I said, every individual has his/her own objective, and it only applies to that particular person.

How can you say that something like that has been shown many times in history? We only get to know the cases that someone did have a similar idea, not the ones that faded into oblivion because no one else had any similar ideas. Comparing the amount of unique ideas with the amount of ideas that multiple people had, I think you can't consider the latter as many.

What are you exactly defining as a "unique idea?" Of course, there are an infinite number of distinct ones as far as we know, but there is an infinite number of time as well, so that does not mean anything; it is equally possible that someone will discover them in the future. And what I meant when I said that it has been shown before is that there have been a large number of incidents in the history of science where one guy came up with some idea and another guy came up with almost exactly the same idea a bit later; in fact, there have been more discoveries made in this simultaneous manner than those that have not. Given what we have considered so far, there are equal benefits in making them into normal citizens and eliminating them. Now consider this: is it easier and quicker for us to convince them or to kill them? Furthermore, if we make an example out of them, it will discourage others from criminal activity and would therefore drastically lower the number of crimes in the future, so we would be effectively rid of the problem soon after anyway, which would be better in the long run. (if people find that they can still become normal citizens after criminal activity, you are going to get a lot, lot more crime)

Why take the risk? Why not take the risk? If risks weren't taken, where would we be now? Using wooden sticks to defend ourselves from bears, probably.

Let me rephrase myself: why take the risk when the probability of the benefits even being there is so low? And once again, this can be seen from previous experience: find me some criminals who have turned into Newtons later on, as almost all criminals today are set free at some point and definitely do have the chance (and this has been the case for centuries), whereas I can find you thousands of cases where convicts who were released from prison went on to commit far greater crimes out of a resentment towards the society that held them captive.

Each case is different from the others. If you knew the reasons that made these people criminals, you could then have a better idea of whether they're likely to commit crimes again or not than any mathematical course will ever teach you. There could be so many reasons people would commit one single crime and no more that it's better not even start giving examples.

And there are far many more reasons that people would commit more crimes instead if they already got away with one, whereas if they did not get away with it, they would not have accomplished whatever their objective was in the first place, so it quite possible that they would give it a try again. Like I said earlier,

The point is that they were treated differently from other citizens when they should have the right to be treated equally. Former prisoners do have this right (at least here), but it seems people still aren't respecting it.

Who says they have this right? For that matter, how does anyone have any rights whatsoever other than that which they are capable of upholding?

Oh, so it depends, eh? I did not ask if he was rational or not, in an absolute sense or compared to something else. I asked if you considered either him or his enemies as being right. And if personal opinions don't matter, this thread shouldn't have a single reply; almost everything here is personal opinion and nothing more.

Alright, if you want to put it that way, I think he was right in some ways and wrong in other ways; means the same thing. And if you really agree with that last sentence, you are going down the existentialist route, in which case all deduction is completely futile and we are left at a dead end. The opinion is just a like or dislike and therefore is perceptual; if it can be defended with rationality, it is an objective fact.

Answering your question, I'd have to say I'd fight him back for sure. Before you say I'm wrong, let me explain why. First, he would be wrong, because he would be trying to keep me from attaining my objective of staying alive, and therefore he would be causing me harm, which breaks a moral rule. Now, you'll say that by fighting him I'd be breaking a moral rule myself, but that's not true. It would be, actually, the most ethically correct thing I could possibly do. By defending myself, I'd be contributing to my primary and secondary objectives of survival of the species and my own, which is ethically correct. By fighting him back, I'd be keeping him from attaining one of his less relevant objectives of causing harm to other people, which contradicts the principal objective of survival of the species (making it not beneficial to himself), therefore I'd be actually helping him. So I'd be both helping him and myself. That proves self defence doesn't break any moral rules, it seems, but is rather something mutually beneficial.

However, by fighting him back you would also be causing him physical harm. Whether or not this is contributing to the "survival" of the species can be debated, but you are saying that the individual objective is also survival, and so you are most certainly not helping him there (going by either meaning of "help"). What I am trying to say here is that regardless of the choice you make here, the average amount of benefit for both of you would be equal either way.

When I run out of arguments I'll say so and then stop posting here. If I just don't post anything in a day or two, it's because I didn't have the time to reply. And I'm learning from this more than I thought I would (it doesn't mean either that I agree learning is the principal objective of the species nor that I think this is fun - I think of learning in general as the opposite of fun, actually).

This one took me almost six hours to write up, and I unfortunately do not think I have the time to write more of this in the future since I am rather busy with real life these days. Just about everything relevant to the topic has already been said, and it seems to me that we are just repeating the same ideas in different words; I would still continue on anyway since this is sort of fun, but as I said I don't have the time, especially since I probably will not have any computer for the next few days. (I am currently on may dad's work laptop since my main machine is out for repairs, but I do not always have that at home) I probably will not be able to do much more than read small parts of your posts, let alone respond to them. However, this has been quite instructive to me so far and I think I have learned a lot (although what I have learned has made me think much more strongly in the same direction), and I certainly thank you for that.

[Levyathan]

I could quote every single sentence of your post, but let's get it down to what actually matters.

Originally posted by CP5670
This one took me almost six hours to write up, and I unfortunately do not think I have the time to write more of this in the future since I am rather busy with real life these days. Just about everything relevant to the topic has already been said, and it seems to me that we are just repeating the same ideas in different words; I would still continue on anyway since this is sort of fun, but as I said I don't have the time, especially since I probably will not have any computer for the next few days. (I am currently on may dad's work laptop since my main machine is out for repairs, but I do not always have that at home) I probably will not be able to do much more than read small parts of your posts, let alone respond to them. However, this has been quite instructive to me so far and I think I have learned a lot (although what I have learned has made me think much more strongly in the same direction), and I certainly thank you for that.

It's your choice. But you probably shouldn't say you won this one (I'm not saying that I did either), since you're the one who decided to stop it. Whenever you want to resume it, just let me know and I'll do it with no problem. I feel like having to thank you too, before this discussion I didn't know my ideas actually made that much sense (maybe not to you - or everyone else - but to me), and I'm glad to know they do.

Now, I just want to quote one more part of your post. I'll not even say anything about it, I just feel it's rather important for the original purpose of this thread, and maybe some people will find in the simple act of helping others an advantage to themselves.

Originally posted by CP5670
Can't you see the obvious benefit involved here? The other family would be grateful to them and would be more likely to help out the first one in a similar situation, or would probably do whatever other favor in return.