Nayib Bukele, current president of El Salvador, describes himself as a philosopher king on his Twitter/X account.

I don’t remember the scene, but the caption and something about it makes it feel like decisiveness, maybe frustration finally made into a plan.

Creatine instead of collagen, if you ask me. Creatine helps build muscle. Muscles keep everything in place (which is especially important in case of hypermobility) and they relieve work from other parts.

Contemporary philosophy and sciences are different from religion in some aspects. One important aspect is that these academic fields rely on rational arguments, while religion today mostly relies on traditional beliefs and faith.

Let’s say a philosopher is pondering the idea that direct experience is not necessary for knowledge. The only way to go and declare this publicly is to elaborate why, how, in a rational and rigorous manner. Most scientists work with objects that admit replicated experimentation, so they must do that, let’s say in their case, to demonstrate that a rain frog only comes out with heavy rain, but not with light rain. In contrast to these two, a religious or spiritual person might give “arguments”, but this argumentation is never to see if their belief resists examination, it is only to convince others of this belief that has been established as truth before everything else. In other words, philosophy and sciences examine their thesis (hypothesis, theory, etc.) and never assume they have the ultimate truth; on the contrary, they keep searching and exploring possibilities. Talking here about the disciplines and not the individuals who can be different from this from time to time (e.g., a dogmatic professor). Meanwhile, religion and spirituality do not have thesis or any beliefs that are susceptible to drastic change. They establish core beliefs or dogmas, and only later might try to prove them or not, depending if they find this exercise important.

Are they all ultimately unprovable statements? I guess so, but we should care how these statements come to be and how we justify them. To me, it makes an enormous difference.
I rather believe in climate change in which human action is definitely affecting the Earth (source: sciences) and the importance of stopping it as we seem to have a responsibility to others and to ourselves (source: ethics, a branch of philosophy), than to believe that there is a conspiracy to make us believe about climate change (source: perhaps imagination) and that we shouldn’t do anything anyway because there is no reason to (source: ignorance or dogmatism, honestly).

I try to remain critical of rational disciplines too, but that’s ironically done with more rationality. And here I do not mean “cold” and rigid pseudo logical analysis, but something that admits different approaches as long as they are solidly justified.

I guess it comes down to who we are. I simply cannot be convinced without this I explained. I cannot believe in religion or spiritual beliefs. I sometimes get short videos about people telling many different stories, about ghosts, ayahuasca trips where they talked to superior entities, gods and the way they know they’re real, etc. How can I believe what they perceive is real? Mere “leap of faith”? And why choose one over the other? Just because I like a particular system or because it benefits me in some way? Sorry, too arbitrary even for me that I sometimes act impulsively and capriciously. As I said, I guess the way we are allows us to accept or to deny different ways to approach existence. This is me.

Thank you for reading my stupidly long comment.

I hate these generational divides. Are we really supposed to think that a person from 1982 and a person from 1994 (both millennials) have more in common than a person from 1994 and one from 1997 (one millennial and one zoomer)? It makes no sense.

If I had to answer, I guess the closest would be Zillenial: born around the mid 90s.

My understanding is that tankies believe that groups that have partially or completely followed far-left principles should be exempt from all criticism. I disagree. As long as it is honest criticism, it should not only be allowed but encouraged.

I’ve also heard that tankies are historic revisionists to an extreme. While I agree Western history is not telling us the real version of things, I don’t think other countries are either. I won’t say that an event happened one way or the other just because country A or country B says so. If historians and other experts are still debating an event and its details, I prefer to watch from a distance as I have no way to contribute to those debates.

So… no.

You’re thinking of April Jesus. This is December Jesus.

I am going to make some very broad strokes here. So no armchair quarterbacking me. I know it’s way more nuanced but I’m not writing an essay on Lemmy.

In general Western philosophies always have a “goal.”

I know you said it was a broad stroke, and that in general is that way, but I kind of disagree still. I think Western philosophy is about finding if we have a purpose and what is it, and many philosophers since Greek antiquity to today have answered they are skeptic of it existing or it being able to be known. From Pyrrho of Elis and Hegesias of Cyrene to Arthur Schopenhauer and Slavoj Žižek.

The word we are looking for is teleology (not to be confused with theology). It refers to finality, that there is a goal. Many philosophers did not subscribe to a teolology.

Your human life is to prove your worthiness.

Same thing as before.

You need to look back and atone for your past mistakes. You need to look forward so you can do the right things to be worthy. It is very little about being in the now.

I agree a little more with this, there are many Western philosophers preoccupied with ethics. But that’s why I think they were talking of different dimensions. It was not that existentially you should roam the past or future, that your mental activity should be there. It was about being responsible in the now for the future, and to be held accountable for your past. It was a morality thing, not a conscious/existential thing.

In this case tacos are the moment. So next time you’re eating a delicious taco. Spend that moment to be one with your taco. Concentrate on the smell. Then feel the texture as you pick it up. How the various colors interact with each other. Then as you bite off some, feel the textures in your mouth and how the flavors interact. Watch yourself, be aware of every time you chew. Remember there is no past there’s no future there is only tacos.

Hey! Go away with that mindful nonsense. If I do that, I spend too much time with a single bite and I cannot eat as much (/s).

Most psychologists […].

And yet for some reason philosophers […] and artists […].

Why are you careful/nuanced with psychologists but dump philosophers and artists in the same bag as if they all do the same?

I see this a lot. The other day, I was watching a science video. Same thing: “some physicists believe…”, “other physicists…”, but “philosophers say…”.

Do you think philosophy and art (disciplines that by their very nature are diverse and creative) create only one type of people? I mean, Karl Popper is a philosopher against Freud, you just said it. You could find many philosophers opposed to Freud, indifferent, critical, in agreement, etc. Artists are the same, very different people among them.

Now, the real question should be why is Freud popular amongst some artists and philosophers and other non-psychologists, especially in certain regions like France and Argentina, or certain traditions like old continental philosophy. And that’s probably the beginning of an answer at the same time: a strong tradition of psychoanalysis within certain circles. Also, a matter of coherence or lack of. For example, if you start reading French existentialism and keep reframing certain aspects of reality, you may find yourself inclined to epistemological paradigms that do not oppose psychoanalytical theories, so you could combine them if you want to. If you start denying materialism in some ways, you may end up denying biological explanations of psychopathological phenomena, so Freud could be a good substitute (or not, depending on the person).

I guess if I were to give a psychological reductionist answer, Freud and similar authors appeal to part of the population that is skeptical of conventional models, the status quo, scientism, hard materialism, etc.

French and Spanish would have been better.

I don’t know, the world is depressing. Recently, details about Palestine have been disheartening…

Communities for underground music and the one for roller skating.

The suicide rates have become one of the most popular arguments, which is a shame because it is incomplete. More men complete the suicidal act, but more women attempt it (apparently, they just own less guns, less substances in the garage, etc.). In other words—because I explain like sh*t in English: women are more suicidal, but less lethal in their attempts.

Both sexes, and intersex people, suffer a lot. The various genders suffer a lot.

I know influencers that talk about this problem without being Andrew Tate, but when I recommend them, I get downvoted as if they were worth nothing. I disagree. Of course, it is not a solution because life is always hard and confusing, but to listen to leftist men who understand feminism and other current social movements, and speak of the role of masculinity today considering those is very refreshing and it definitely helps and it is a step forward.

In a nutshell, they talk about caring about mental health. Many of them already are through their own journeys via psychotherapy or other means of introspection and emotional awareness. They talk about feelings and beliefs within the people that were told that they need to be a cartoon, an action figure, because vulnerability is for the lesser sex and a real man™ despises those things. They talk about healing, understanding, cooperation, etc. I don’t know if you’re a leftist, but that’s behind other concepts such as anarchy or social welfare. It is nice to see the line of thought from healing the personal to healing the communal, and viceversa.

So… yeah, ostracism is not the solution. It’s funny because I’ve suffered from agoraphobia and things like that in other moments of my life, and I understand the dysphoric feeling brought by just thinking about society. I have rejected society time and time again, but we are social creatures and we need each other.
I need you because writing this comment is something that I feel I have to do. You’re giving me some minutes of purpose and even hope that I can make you feel less alone in this world. We both need the person that is making Lemmy possible, and our instances, and many other people on that chain. We like having friends and romantic relationships and random interactions on social media. We like going to events and activities in our towns or cities.

As I see it, If society is not ‘rejectable’ without hurting ourselves and others, the next thing to do would be to interact healthily with our fellow human beings. It is an available journey, there are people willing to help in each step, but you need to trust and trust is hard as f*ck.

I’ve heard the argument based not on structural power but average physical capabilities and biological structures. [I’m going to use the terms meaning sex and not gender]. The man is most likely the person that can gain control during the act, and he doesn’t risk being in pain as much as the woman. Therefore, the man holds more power and is more of a threat on average.

This is also technically true, and I don’t think it is about consent but freedom. [I’ll keep using the words for sex and not gender]. Sexuality becomes another form in which women can become subjugated, so it’s a matter of precaution, I guess (especially since men are being socialized to be entitled or even violent, which is the other part of the picture).

I’ve also heard the extreme version of this argument saying that penetration is what I just described, always, without exception.

In both cases and in yours and in others, I don’t think the meme is correct because the reasons are very different from puritanism.

Also a video about how that’s the worst thing you can do for your health with no actual advice to correct it.

I get rather irritated with those arguments because they only return to the start. “Here, a world”. “Is it how we experience it, though, and why and how; if not, what’s behind?”. “Bullshit, a world”. That’s hardly an answer. And, personally, it feels intellectually dishonest because the question was larger than just “is there a world?”.

I prefer an answer like saying that doubting the world in any form might be a mistake on its own because [reasons]. I do not agree, but at least there’s explanations and communication.

Also, I think they are fighting a straw man. For instance, I doubt many things about the Universe, our knowledge, our minds, etc. Yet, I accept there are phenomena which appear to me. This has been the case since the ancient school of skepticism, and I have yet to meet a person which declares themself a skeptic and does not do this to some degree. For example, I know I’m hungry right now. I don’t know if the pain is real in any other deeper level, or if it is like the pain in a dream that goes away when one wakes up, or a delusion that is felt without external stimuli, or whatever. I don’t know the nature of it, yet it is an experience I must attend. I can even add that the mechanisms behind, the anatomical knowledge and such is useful, but it might be entirely wrong or be as illusory as the pain itself. The straw man is that skeptics would say: “I don’t know if I’m really feeling hungry”, “I don’t know if I want to eat” or something like that.

Why does it matter, then? Because it changes everything. In my case, it made me go from a realist teenager to an instrumentalist adult in science. From an atheist teenager to an agnostic adult.

The discussion derives in many interesting branches too. The mere “does it matter if the world is different from what we perceive if we cannot perceive it in any other way?” is an example. Many people answer yes or no without justifying it. And, at this point, some people might be wondering why we need to justify every single belief we hold and every single thing we say, like the ones throughout my comment, and that in itself is a new good question that emerges. The possibility of having any of these conversations is also a good question, and so on…

So philosophy is not going too far, in my opinion. Some philosophers might go too far, but I really think they are rare (or misunderstood).

Exactly. I often post walls of text, and it is probably because it takes me a lot of words to express ideas in English, but I also feel like I cannot discuss something deeply in whatever number of characters are admitted now on microblogging. Forums and such are great and I love reading long posts and comments. Also, I get lost in who is replying to what on those sites, but here it is literally linear!

I used to play paper Magic the Gathering; I liked the game, but it became unaffordable after a while. Magic the Gathering Arena has been a good alternative. You don’t have to spend money (nor much time) to get good things, and you can easily find players in formats that accept old and new sets, for example, Historic mode which accepts everything that has been playable in Arena, except for some banned cards.

About D&D being fun… I have played Dungeons and Dragons only a couple times in my life, but some friends invited me to Baldur’s Gate 3 and it is a great game that has a lot of the things I remember from the tabletop game. However, this is entirely subjective, so I am just sharing my experience.

My point is not to defend the Wizards of the Coast executives, as I have heard they are terrible. I guess my point is that there are still options to enjoy their games or the essence of their games (Arena, BG3) without falling into their cash grabbing.

I am inclined to think that easy entertainment and a devaluation of the intellectual life (it is no longer admirable nor sufficiently valuable being an intellectual) can be a partial explanation. The first one leads to distractions and our time being occupied by mindless activities. The second keeps us there as people are indifferent to studying and asking questions. It has become a personal choice, a kind of hobby or trait of certain individuals, and not something that we all should be doing. And I’m not saying that everyone should be a Leonardo da Vinci excelling in philosophy, sciences, arts, etc.; but I do believe we should be thinking critically and informing ourselves to the extent possible, otherwise, our reading comprehension and many other things get affected.

I’m sorry if my grammar betrays my words, I am not a native speaker.

That said, I think these are some of our obstacles, but other times had had their own obstacles. I’m sure the average citizen from, I don’t know, Istanbul, London, Tokyo, some centuries ago was also very opinionated and ignorant of many things. It has been the constant, the rule, for millennia.