You need oxygen to produce it. Philosophy would have the same value as air, which is an important component of O2. Anyway I got bored with this mental exercise. Time to meditate. I suggest you the same. Bai bai
From a quick look back at things I've said recently, it seems I've already specifically said what the point of the thread was at LEAST 5 times. How diabolically slippery of you. So when you're bored, you sit around and do nothing? Oh man, I couldn't resist.
I point out your age because your method of debate is sooooooooo typical of someone of your age, not that I'm saying that all children are incapable of courtesy or reasonable debate, rather that anyone who adopts your approach ussually matures and changes by the time they get older. Your age is relevant, thats the reason that so many on this thread are trying to give you constructive advice.
You've made a mistake in saying the above if you aim for constructive advice. Arguing against someone by attacking their age makes you look like a fool and makes them want to ignore everything you have to say.
gerards "witty" posts aside... soc (if I may call you that...) Geo made some very valid points that made sense to me... you just need to think about them... they were tangental at all... Once again you make a mistake and misinterperate what I am saying... (perhaps its the way I am saying it...not clearly...???) I am not saying its rude that you dont see many people dont know what phil is I am saying its rude et al, of you to see YOUR defintion as being the only one and then refusing to entertain the idea that there just may be other ideas out there... the reason I presented the dictionary meaning (well one that I found anyway) is because it doesnt mention defining "philosophy as rationally questioning ideas, so if someone is rationally questioning ideas, they are philosophizing." That is your defintition and some may have different ideas and these seem to be the things that you are unwilling to admit differences in... Just as a little experiment could you please answer the following honestly.. 1. have you travelled... outside your own country...?? 2. Ben & Jerrys or Haagan Daaz...?? Also Psin isnt attacking your age... though it is relevant as he suggests but what you say is true in that someone of your age is prone to not listening if someone mentions that... hell I was the same at 20... ok and 25...
You can call me Soc, or you can call me Sock as do the folks on PF In fact for a couple weeks on there I switched my avatar out with a new picture of a sock every single day, once the name started to stick Anyway.... Shadowdh, I must stress again, I don't have a problem with other people's definitions of philosophy, and I don't have a problem with acknowledging them as valid (Assuming someone doesn't make some ridiculous comment, like philosophy = moldy cheese). I never said that my definition is the only one, or the best one, or the most rational one, or the only good one, or the only valid one, or any such thing. I said it's my personal take on the word philosophy. I really, really don't understand why you and others keep saying I'm being so stubborn and arrogant with my definition of philosophy, this is simply not the case. I've gone back and looked at where I mentioned it, more than a few times, and nowhere do I say any of the things you guys say I did. 1. No, not outside the US. I have travelled extensively within the US though, and depending on where you go it can feel like a completely foreign land... take for instance, the deep south 2. I get my ice cream in big gallon buckets, so I guess I'm not in a position to answer that question. I can say vanilla is better than chocolate though Yes, Shadow, I very much think psin is attacking my age, or at least attacking me because of my age. Whenever you mention someone's age, and someone's actions/intelligence/etc. in the same context to establish a negative attack, you're ad hom'ing that person. Like I've said in this thread (I think) and I know I've said in other threads directly to psin, always attack the arguments, never the man. By bringing my age into the discussing, he's getting away from my arguments (Since my arguments have had nothing to do with how old I am) and attacking me personally. That's really a dumb move. If I was 50 years old and said everything I've said in this thread, my age would be no more or less relevent. If I were 10 years old, if I were 100 years old, age should never factor into a debate the way psin is doing. It's pathetic, and cruel. For some reason that reminds me, did Psin ever get back to me on all the times I'd called people who disagree with me stupid? I asked him for some evidence, I don't remember seeing any. Was it left to the wind to be forgotten when he realized he had been wrong, or did he just decide it wasn't worth his time to pursue? And if GEO's posts made sense to you, maybe you could help me out, cause I have been consistently having trouble with them since he first responded to me in, I believe, my thread on refuting the first cause argument. For some reason, I read his posts and I understand the words by themselves, but they don't string together well in my head. I'm not trying to insult him, it's likely my stupidity more than his incoherence, since it's not like he uses a bunch of big words or crazy syntax or anything like that.
That was a good post... explaining stuff and not defensively attacking or aggressively defending or oh well I hope you get the pic... Ok the reason the age thing is relavant is mainly due to (imho and poss not what Psin is getting at) is that with age (and usually therefore experience) comes wisdom and more tolerance (although that is not always the case... just ask my wife... )... thus by saying that your age is a factor its implying that at that age in general most have the same view... ie I am right... (just as the old saying goes... "teenagers leave home NOW while you still know everything" )... any who... Regarding Geos posts... if youre not joking then I will try to explain them if you like... Take care..
I'm glad we got the thing about me trying to bully my definition around cleared up. I'm sorry I wasn't more clear, I didn't mean to come across as a jerk. As well, I couldn't tell if you were actually getting bad "vibes" from me and thus thinking I was saying things I wasn't, or if you knew I wasn't saying them and were just attacking me, so that made for my getting very defensive assuming it was the latter, and I assumed it was the latter because I had no idea I was coming across in such a way. Oh well, let sleeping dogs (or is it dead dogs?) lay. And I didn't know they made orange chocolate chip. I'd have to say vanilla sherbert is one of my faves, cause if you mix it up in your bowel until it becomes a paste, the combined flavor is just awesomely good. Well then this is at worst an attack on me personally, and at best a completely irrelevent point. Either way, it's just not fair. I could just as easily say the same thing about psin couldn't I? He's 40 years old, and by that age most people think they have everything figured out and they're unwilling to change their minds. So would it be fair for me to bring his age into the discussion, and saying something like "Well too bad you didn't open your mind at a younger age, cause now it doesn't matter what I say since you're just a know-it-all curmudgeon"? I don't think it would. Like I said, age should never ever factor into a debate in such a way. Not only is it fallacious to make any connection whatsoever between age and the reason someone is arguing X point of view (It's an ad hominem attack, which I'm pretty sure are against the rules on this site, like they are on every forum I've been to, of the poisoning the well class) it's also simply rude. You can say I've got something of a chip on my shoulder which probably isn't fair to psin, but I'm especially "touchy" about people condescending to my age. I've had it done to me SO many times that I just can't stand it anymore. There have been so many times where I have been debating some issue with someone older than me, and it seems that whenever they run out of arguments they resort to just saying "Well you're only a kid so you don't know what the hell you're talking about" or "Typical teen thinking he knows everything, wait a few years and you'll realize how wrong you are". If I don't know what I'm talking about, attack my arguments, NOT my age. If you think I'm wrong and I'm too stubborn to realize it, attack my arguments, NOT my age. I hope that clears up the issue I have with psin's comments and similiar one's from anyone else. It's because of such comments that I almost always keep my age anonymous on a discussion forum. I decided to let my age be known on this forum after browsing around cause I figured people were nice enough that it wouldn't ever come back to haunt me, and then it did
Don't worry about it happening all the time it will decrease as your behaviour gets more mature and you gain more experience in life. When I was younger I was able to assimilate new knowledge with a lot more ease than my ageing brain is now able to do. You are correct its a fact of life. However, you are already well on your way down that slope of flexibility, your capacity to learn has already plummeted to a shadow of its former self. Infants are possessed of the ability to absorb knowledge like sponges, some are even blessed with eidetic memories. Their capacity to learn new languages puts normal infants on a par with the most gifted adult linguists. Infants are so incredibly smart, they have such open minds. We should bow to their superior ability and give them authority over us. So this week I'm not going to pay the mortgage or any of the bills, I'm going to spend all the money on chocolate ice cream that we are going to live off for the rest of the month. I'm going to tell my boss that I'm not coming in to work but he should carry on paying me, on the advice of a three year old I just asked. It is possible to convince a young child of almost anything, particularly if they trust you. Hence Father Christmas, the Tooth Fairy and the extreme stretching of reality that occurs in most children's stories. Maybe its not such a good idea to put the infants in charge. Maybe as well as being able to learn and change your thinking there needs to be another ingredient in the forumula? Could it be that experience of life is that essential missing ingredient? Could it be that all those people who you complain about telling you that you are young and impressionable could be right. Could it be that they remember how certain that they were about life at 19 and now look back a realise how little they knew? Yes Socrastein, much to learn you still have.
Your patronization has destroyed what respect I had left for you. Well done. I now know that I can never find a place with enough rational people that it's safe to disclose my age, thanks to people like you. By the way, with all the effort you've put into convincing me that I'm an irrational close-minded teenager who doesn't know what he's talking about, you cannot hope to convince me of such if you display such irrationality as is evident in the above post. I will not bring myself to place trust in the judgement of anyone who would say such assanine things as you just did, and as such, I will have no trouble assuming you were being just as assainine when you said I was this or that.
Obviously you are not a Taoist. Movement within stillness: Read the I Ching: extremes lead to the opposite. Extreme Yin (stillness) leads to Yang (movement). Nothing happens in the outside but a lot is happening inside. TAO.
Gerard, I understand these concepts very much. I was trying (and failing it seems) to be funny. I meditate too, don't take it personally
