Musings on Justice

[Moonbeam]

CycloWizard: Your version of justice involves rewarding those who don't do their job, whether because they can't or won't.

M: My dear Sir, I said in my post that competition is evil, that it leads to violence and injustice. I didn't say that it was justice what unions do, only the inevitable results of the violence done to workers that caused unions to exist. I only said that workers will protect themselves in any way they can just as business owners and management will do anything they can to maximize their own ends. It's war and war justifies anything.

CW: My version of justice wears a blindfold and uses objective measures of whether someone is or is not getting their job done.

M: Your version of justice attempts to be blind after the injustice is institutionalized, after competition and all the sickness it creates is in place. It's rules that begin after one side has been knocked to the ground just like calling affirmative action racist.

CW: Your premise is faulty in claiming that one should not be fired because they need to eat: what about the next in line to do that job who would do it well and also needs to eat? You have left the latter out in the cold while preparing a fire for the former.

M: Exactly, what about them. Who gives a fuck in a competitive system. You don't fucking worry about the hungry when somebody's trying to take your meal. This is what you love, this disgusting world of self interest. Look in the mirror. What you see is yourself here.

CW: Again I reject your premise. The issue of determining the distribution of wealth only exists in a totalitarian state. Until you ask the right question, you will never find the right answer.

M: You can't reject my premise without rejecting the world you love, the disgusting world where everybody looks out for himself and nobody else. I hope you get fucked by a union while you cry about paying your taxes.

Your world is pigs at a trough. Be grateful for the slop.


This thread was created from off-topic posts inappropriately contributed to the 'Teacher of the Year' gets pink slip amid budget cuts thread.

Please do not derail threads, make your own thread.

Administrator Idontcare

 

[CycloWizard]

You can't reject my premise without rejecting the world you love, the disgusting world where everybody looks out for himself and nobody else. I hope you get fucked by a union while you cry about paying your taxes.

Your world is pigs at a trough. Be grateful for the slop.

I live in reality where competition allows one to earn his keep. In your fantasy world where "earn" is not in the lexicon, you end up with a philosophy where everything occurs due to chance. This is a lazy philosophy which is easy to accept when you are lazy and/or feel worthless. It has the corollary that one who sleeps on the couch all day might win the olympic marathon. You reject the idea of causality because it helps you sleep at night. Or is it simply that I am programmed by chance to work my ass off to get ahead and that is an unfair advantage I have over someone who is programmed to be a lazy slob?

 

[Moonbeam]

I live in reality where competition allows one to earn his keep. In your fantasy world where "earn" is not in the lexicon, you end up with a philosophy where everything occurs due to chance. This is a lazy philosophy which is easy to accept when you are lazy and/or feel worthless. It has the corollary that one who sleeps on the couch all day might win the olympic marathon. You reject the idea of causality because it helps you sleep at night. Or is it simply that I am programmed by chance to work my ass off to get ahead and that is an unfair advantage I have over someone who is programmed to be a lazy slob?

It is not an unfair advantage. It is simple an advantage you have by chance and for which you express no real gratitude. You are advantaged purely by chance and for which you arrogantly take personal credit. I am doubtless luckier even than you are but I take no personal credit. I can't help it if I have everything I want and more. I want nothing from you and only seek to give you more than you can imagine. For example when you got all wound up about 1500 in damage by an idiot driver, the important thing was that you were alive enough to get pissed. Thankfulness was the order of the day. It's not that I can't appreciate your rage, I just know what rage gets me. A belly ache and hardening of the arteries and a piss poor attitude as seen by others.

 

[CycloWizard]

It is not an unfair advantage. It is simple and advantage you have by chance and for which you express no real gratitude. You are advantaged purely by chance and for which you arrogantly take personal credit. I am doubtless luckier even than you are but I take no personal credit. I can't help it if I have everything I want and more. I want nothing from you and only seek to give you more than you can imagine. For example when you got all wound up about 1500 in damage by an idiot driver, the important thing was that you were alive enough to get pissed. Thankfulness was the order of the day. It's not that I can't appreciate your rage, I just know what rage gets me. A belly ache and hardening of the arteries and a piss poor attitude as seen by others.

Your argument is predicated on complete predetermination and the absence of free will or, at the very least, a complete absence of causality. If you're right, your arguments are completely useless since I will either change my viewpoint or not. If you're wrong, then your worldview is completely broken and you are a cheap tyrant. That's some corner you've painted yourself into. If your worldview is correct, then I have no reason to be thankful for being alive because I'm not alive - I'm just a robot busting my ass to support the deadwood of society.

 

[Moonbeam]

CycloWizard: Your argument is predicated on complete predetermination and the absence of free will or, at the very least, a complete absence of causality.

M: Silence your mind, die to all this horse shit and be. You are not when you contend. You were born, maybe got slapped, cried your first breath, all perfectly as your being has been ever sense, breathing to the rhythm of life. Cause and effect are not in the now. There is only the flow which you go with or contend. To enter the flow is to find grace.

CW: If you're right, your arguments are completely useless since I will either change my viewpoint or not. If you're wrong, then your worldview is completely broken and you are a cheap tyrant. That's some corner you've painted yourself into. If your worldview is correct, then I have no reason to be thankful for being alive because I'm not alive - I'm just a robot busting my ass to support the deadwood of society.

M: You're not busting your hump when the feeling of gratitude is real. Many of the freest minds that ever lived were slaves. We are the world, it is our creation and what we make it is all in attitude. Thank God and He will thank you. You know all this because you're a good person.

 

[CycloWizard]

M: You're not busting your hump when the feeling of gratitude is real. Many of the freest minds that ever lived were slaves. We are the world, it is our creation and what we make it is all in attitude. Thank God and He will thank you. You know all this because you're a good person.

I know quite well I'm free. That's why I resist your efforts to enslave me. I am either free to give or not free to give. You simply want to take the choice away from me because you lust for control over what you consider nothing but a game of chance. You realize deep down somewhere that it may be possible to control the game - that it may not be all chance after all. This doesn't sit well with you because your facade is built on a foundation of irresponsibility.

 

[Moonbeam]

I know quite well I'm free. That's why I resist your efforts to enslave me. I am either free to give or not free to give. You simply want to take the choice away from me because you lust for control over what you consider nothing but a game of chance. You realize deep down somewhere that it may be possible to control the game - that it may not be all chance after all. This doesn't sit well with you because your facade is built on a foundation of irresponsibility.

Your brain weighs maybe 3 lb and a cc contains more connections than there are stars in the galaxy. A tiny fraction of your brain creates your sense of 'I'. The huge majority of it processes information beyond your conscious awareness and informs your 'I' of results. You can will almost nothing, all your notions of reality are served up to you by chance. Please don't flatter yourself that you I is worth shit. It is totally derivative. Why indulge in the fantasy that the you you call you is capable of anything. You live in total separation from your real self arrogantly taking credit for the work of an incredibly powerful processor that works without your conscious awareness.

 

[CycloWizard]

Your brain weighs maybe 3 lb and a cc contains more connections than there are stars in the galaxy. A tiny fraction of your brain creates your sense of 'I'. The huge majority of it processes information beyond your conscious awareness and informs your 'I' of results. You can will almost nothing, all your notions of reality are served up to you by chance. Please don't flatter yourself that you I is worth shit. It is totally derivative. Why indulge in the fantasy that the you you call you is capable of anything. You live in total separation from your real self arrogantly taking credit for the work of an incredibly powerful processor that works without your conscious awareness.

That's a very appealing philosophy for someone who is lazy and irresponsible, but it is merely a premise. Perhaps you have become the automaton you have always dreamed of becoming, but you'll find scant evidence to support your premise and plenty to the contrary if only your program would allow you to look.

 

[Moonbeam]

That's a very appealing philosophy for someone who is lazy and irresponsible, but it is merely a premise. Perhaps you have become the automaton you have always dreamed of becoming, but you'll find scant evidence to support your premise and plenty to the contrary if only your program would allow you to look.

Too bad your self hate won't let you be a nobody. It was much easier for me. I got burned to death in the fires of suffering. I was a prince that couldn't sleep with a pea under the 39th mattress.

 

[cybrsage]

Your brain weighs maybe 3 lb and a cc contains more ...

Just so you know, you are posting Off Topic and derailing posts in the thread. Be careful.

 

[Idontcare]

This thread was created from off-topic posts inappropriately contributed to the 'Teacher of the Year' gets pink slip amid budget cuts thread.

Please do not derail threads, make your own thread.

Administrator Idontcare

 

[CycloWizard]

Too bad your self hate won't let you be a nobody. It was much easier for me. I got burned to death in the fires of suffering. I was a prince that couldn't sleep with a pea under the 39th mattress.

If your premise were correct, then the conclusions derived from it might also be correct. However, a logical conclusion based on a faulty premise is still a faulty conclusion. Were you really programmed to believe that you were programmed?

 

[Moonbeam]

Just so you know, you are posting Off Topic and derailing posts in the thread. Be careful.

As you can see, you are right. Unfortunately, and this time, of course, for me, the topic of 'Teacher of the Year gets pink slip amid budget cuts' means nothing to me. I can't help the teacher, I can't fix the budget and whatever I say on that will not change a single thing. For these and other reasons politics bores me silly, is a complete and total waste of time, is an empty endeavor. There is only one thing in the world you can change and that is the self and that is a something that can only happen by grace, when enough pieces of real and relevant data have been fed into the brain that the spark of transformative insight can take place. I try to plant seeds.

So perhaps you can see that I am always on topic for me, shining a light where there is darkness according to my understanding of what illumination is. It happens that I like CW for a bunch of reasons I won't go into, but I see in him what I think is a lot of useless bitterness and resentment of other people. He is what matters to me, how he reacts to the thread, what he says and what I think it means, what I think I can offer that I think he and others like him are missing. This is what the thread is about for me, and for any other thread. Now that I see I can't do that here now, I will leave. It's not thread topics that are relevant to me, only people.

"Seventy-three men sailed up from the San Francisco Bay
Rolled off of their ship, and here's what they had to say
"We're callin' everyone to ride along to another shore
We can laugh our lives away and be free once more"

But no one heard them callin', no one came at all
'Cause they were too busy watchin' those old raindrops fall
As a storm was blowin' out on the peaceful sea
Seventy-three men sailed off into history

Ride, captain ride upon your mystery ship
Be amazed at the friends you have here on your trip
Ride captain ride upon your mystery ship
On your way to a world that others might have missed"

Interesting that 73 is one plus ennea times an octave. But then if it walks like a duck and is male, maybe is only just what you would think.........

'The world is magic but my shoe is stuck in the mud.' Always a problem for folk who have shoes. All my life I've been told I'm one giant infraction. Hehehehe. I have a brain defect, I suspect. I can't be any other way.

"In the deep rolling hills of old Virginia
There's a place that I love so well
Where I spent many days of my childhood
In a cabin where we loved to dwell

White dove will mourn in sorrow
The willows will hang their heads
I'll live my life in sorrow
Since mother and daddy are dead

We were all so happy there together
In our peaceful little mountain home
But the Savior needs angels up in heaven
Now they sing 'round the great white throne

White dove will mourn in sorrow
The willows will hang their heads
I'll live my life in sorrow
Since mother and daddy are dead

As the years roll by I often wonder
If we will all be together someday
And each night as I wander through the graveyard
Darkness finds me as I kneel to pray

White dove will mourn in sorrow
The willows will hang their heads
I'll live my life in sorrow
Since mother and daddy are dead
I'll live my life in sorrow
Since mother and daddy are dead"


"I've seen things you people wouldn't believe. Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion. I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhauser gate. All those moments will be lost in time... like tears in rain... Time to die."

PS: Since you posted this while I was writing this post let me try to answer your question but maybe from a different angle. Have you seen the Matrix Trilogy? Where do you think the notion that the matrix is based on came from? How did these two brothers come up with a concept that everything is a program and that people are actually asleep being fed on by a machine? Where do you think the notion if Forbidden Planet, that a monster of the Id destroyed an alien race might have had it's origin? I say these concepts arise because they are cognates of a truth some people intuitively feel. They are messages to the mind of what goes on at a deeper level, a truth that can be discovered more nakedly if you dive. I dove off the deep end. But I had help after I hit the water. I met a deep sea diver extraordinaire who found a whole world of underwater treasure. It's not that I was programmed to believe I was programmed but deprogrammed enough to see it. I got flushed by the red pill of merciless honesty that tore down everything I was taught to believe at the price of black suffering, or so I believe. I had to abandon all the shit my ego wanted to believe. This is why I also see all the great hero myths as cognates of an altered reality, the idea that the door to heaven is in hell, that the magical music of Orpheus is needed, that the dogs who guard the door bark away the delusional by screaming at them their own self hate, that to face the hydra you need a mirror and a sword, that the cornucopia of wealth is the love that shines in the soul. A man wealthy beyond measure with the infinite riches of God doesn't much notice his taxes.

 

[Perknose]

Well, dang, I love Moonbeam's OP even if Moonie didn't create this thread.

Cyclo says: The issue of determining the distribution of wealth only exists in a totalitarian state. Until you ask the right question, you will never find the right answer.

In his angry, ugly world, Sweden and Denmark and Germany and France and Italy are all totalitarian states.

But he's certainly right that if he doesn't ask the right question, he'll never find the right answer.

CW: Your premise is faulty in claiming that one should not be fired because they need to eat: what about the next in line to do that job who would do it well and also needs to eat? You have left the latter out in the cold while preparing a fire for the former.

I think I'll let a smarter and far more profound man than I give him the answer to his patently false dichotomy wherein we should let any citizen starve, since it is already pre-existing in my sig:

"A human being is a part of the whole, called by us the 'Universe', a part limited in time and space. He experiences himself, his thoughts and feelings, as something separate from the rest - a kind of optical delusion of his consciousness. This delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for a few persons nearest to us. Our task must be to free ourselves from this prison by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty."
-- Albert Einstein

 

[CycloWizard]

Well, dang, I love Moonbeam's OP even if Moonie didn't create this thread.

Cyclo says: The issue of determining the distribution of wealth only exists in a totalitarian state. Until you ask the right question, you will never find the right answer.

In his angry, ugly world, Sweden and Denmark and Germany and France and Italy are all totalitarian states.

Do those distribute the wealth of their citizens? If so, by Thomas Jefferson's definition of government, they are acting in a totalitarian fashion. A government cannot simultaneously exist to protect its citizens' right to property while taking that property and giving it to someone else. That's a contradiction. If a government does not exist to protect the right to property, then it will be very difficult for it to protect the right to liberty since my right to accumulate property directly influences my freedom to choose my actions. If I am not free to enjoy the fruits of my labor, then I am a slave and have no freedom to begin with. If government allows me to keep some of my property but takes other parts, then it has the power to take it all at any time. Strangely enough, the only time when this is not the case is in a constitutional monarchy where the paradox of government dissolving itself exists. Someone already wrote a book on this, so I'll stop there.

But he's certainly right that if he doesn't ask the right question, he'll never find the right answer.

I think I'll let a smarter and far more profound man than I give him the answer to his patently false dichotomy wherein we should let any citizen starve, since it is already pre-existing in my sig:

Einstein's quote has nothing to do with my statement, at least not on any level that my rudimentary programming allows me to comprehend.

 

[CycloWizard]

PS: Since you posted this while I was writing this post let me try to answer your question but maybe from a different angle. Have you seen the Matrix Trilogy? Where do you think the notion that the matrix is based on came from? How did these two brothers come up with a concept that everything is a program and that people are actually asleep being fed on by a machine? Where do you think the notion if Forbidden Planet, that a monster of the Id destroyed an alien race might have had it's origin? I say these concepts arise because they are cognates of a truth some people intuitively feel. They are messages to the mind of what goes on at a deeper level, a truth that can be discovered more nakedly if you dive. I dove off the deep end. But I had help after I hit the water. I met a deep sea diver extraordinaire who found a whole world of underwater treasure. It's not that I was programmed to believe I was programmed but deprogrammed enough to see it. I got flushed by the red pill of merciless honesty that tore down everything I was taught to believe at the price of black suffering, or so I believe. I had to abandon all the shit my ego wanted to believe. This is why I also see all the great hero myths as cognates of an altered reality, the idea that the door to heaven is in hell, that the magical music of Orpheus is needed, that the dogs who guard the door bark away the delusional by screaming at them their own self hate, that to face the hydra you need a mirror and a sword, that the cornucopia of wealth is the love that shines in the soul. A man wealthy beyond measure with the infinite riches of God doesn't much notice his taxes.

I think you should finish watching the trilogy. When you do, you'll see that choice (i.e. free will) broke the spell. Free will is both the devil and the angel, depending on how it is used. Assuming that you have no free will is simply to enslave yourself to biology. On the other hand, if I assume that I have free will, I am empowered and gain purpose. To follow Perknose's lead, I'll also quote Einstein:

There are only two ways to live your life. One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as though everything is a miracle.

You assume that everything occurs by mere chance, thereby making chance your scapegoat. This is appealing to you because you have no interest in holding anyone accountable for his actions. Unfortunately, you've confused lack of accountability with true freedom. Anyone I wrong that cannot hold me accountable is my slave. Justice is simply the assurance that we all play by the same rules - not the complete absence of rules.

 

[Pr0d1gy]

The problem is you are both arguing beliefs and nobody has any new ideas. This is the same problem that is festering in this country and threatening to swallow it whole. If you embrace one side of an argument you have to completely deny the validity of the other, which is the problem with belief.

It is my party's belief in Greenspan and deregulated capitalism that has failed this country so horribly the last 10-20 years and why you now pay $4ish for a gallon of gas. I now understand and accept this to be the truth, not because I wanted it to be but because it became obvious to me as thousands of people lost their jobs as Romney and his friends paid themselves $80million a year in salary to run KayBee Toys into the ground.

The truth does not care about your beliefs but it hides itself away for fear that many will learn it and revolt.

 

[LunarRay]

The problem is you are both arguing beliefs and nobody has any new ideas. This is the same problem that is festering in this country and threatening to swallow it whole. If you embrace one side of an argument you have to completely deny the validity of the other, which is the problem with belief.

It is my party's belief in Greenspan and deregulated capitalism that has failed this country so horribly the last 10-20 years and why you now pay $4ish for a gallon of gas. I now understand and accept this to be the truth, not because I wanted it to be but because it became obvious to me as thousands of people lost their jobs as Romney and his friends paid themselves $80million a year in salary to run KayBee Toys into the ground.

The truth does not care about your beliefs but it hides itself away for fear that many will learn it and revolt.

Call it a 'Working Hypothesis'. When dealing with Physics, I'd say the Universe was created from nothing... and Time is irrelevant to that creation... However, when dealing with Economics we have a Social Science and I'd say... One hypothesis for each Economist who cares to spout off... The similarity between the two is found in the notion that repeating the event is part of the method to justify the salient bits of the hypothesis and in neither case can that be done... Nothing is ever able to be held constant in Economics and while quantum physics might prove out at the LHC to be the culprit in Universe creation nothing there recreates our universe. AND, in both cases we might end up with a singularity of devastation to the reality we share.

In other words.... The best guess at the time produced the best possible action with the possibility of being right... And, as unlikely as it may seem... Assumptions fill in the blanks of the missing facts.

 

[CycloWizard]

The problem is you are both arguing beliefs and nobody has any new ideas. This is the same problem that is festering in this country and threatening to swallow it whole. If you embrace one side of an argument you have to completely deny the validity of the other, which is the problem with belief.

It is my party's belief in Greenspan and deregulated capitalism that has failed this country so horribly the last 10-20 years and why you now pay $4ish for a gallon of gas. I now understand and accept this to be the truth, not because I wanted it to be but because it became obvious to me as thousands of people lost their jobs as Romney and his friends paid themselves $80million a year in salary to run KayBee Toys into the ground.

The truth does not care about your beliefs but it hides itself away for fear that many will learn it and revolt.

In politics, there often may be no right or wrong answer. However, in terms of justice, there are absolute standards that have been derived based purely on logic. Throwing those out the window to rely on relativism is effectively resorting to anarchy. None of this is based on my personal beliefs except inasmuch as I assume that logic should be used as an objective standard.

 

[piasabird]

Without competition what do you have? Communism? Socialism?

I might have a tendency to give someone with seniority or who is an older worker and is at a physical disadvantage a fair chance for employment. Even in the army older soldiers are not expected to run as fast as an 18 year old recruit.

At 40 people's bodies start to fall apart. It is a natural part of life.

 

[CycloWizard]

Without competition what do you have? Communism? Socialism?.

In theory you have utopia. In practice, you have hell on earth. Competition brings out both the best and worst in people, but things tend to get done: people get fed, medical breakthroughs occur, and quality of life improves continuously. In the absence of competition, you have the opposite of all of those things. How many people starve in the US compared to nations with less competitive systems? How many medical breakthroughs have come from the US relative to these other places? What is the quality of life in the US relative to these other places? Competition is the carrot. In the absence of it, we are left only with the stick to get things done.