From: dnomhcir@gmx.com   
      
   Ed Cryer  writes:   
      
   > Richmond wrote:   
   >> Ed Cryer  writes:   
   >>   
   >>> oldernow wrote:   
   >>>> On 2025-03-16, Ed Cryer  wrote:   
   >>>>   
   >>>>>> The internet cuts peoples' heads off on a regular basis,   
   >>>>>> leaving people running around spewing liberal nonsense   
   >>>>>> between screams of "HITLER!" and "FASCIST!"....   
   >>>>>   
   >>>>> Well, I have a head to cut off.  From your posts, I gather   
   >>>>> that you don't.  Maybe that's got its benefits. Your   
   >>>>> lonely isolation in your ivory tower safeguards you from   
   >>>>> the natural shocks that flesh is heir unto.   
   >>>> Indeed is identification with the idea of a free-willed   
   >>>> being lonely isolation!   
   >>>>   
   >>>   
   >>> You seem to me to be fighting for a widely held philosophical idea;   
   >>> that mind is on its own, uncaused, unattached and free as the wind   
   >>> swell.   
   >>> OK, so I won't take you up on that. As John Milton put it "the mind is   
   >>> its own place, and in itself can make a heaven of hell, a hell of   
   >>> heaven".   
   >>>   
   >>> But that seems to be the end of your campaign. A battle in the realm   
   >>> of metaphysics; a battle to establish the autonomy of mind.   
   >>> Me, I love battling. But I'd never battle to be alone. I fight for my   
   >>> rights; my convictions; my political goals. They keep me in the world,   
   >>> attached to other people.   
   >>>   
   >>> I won't fight for empiricism, I won't fight for idealism, I won't   
   >>> fight to grind myself into a corner. Philosophy is interesting, but   
   >>> it's a hobby, not an ideology.   
   >>>   
   >> Who gives you rights? Fighting for your rights sounds a bit   
   >> idealistic.   
   >>   
   >   
   > Look up the word "idealism" in a good dictionary. I was using it in   
   > the philosophical sense, while you seem to be using it here in the   
   > vulgar one.   
      
   No, I am using it in the philosophical sense of Moral or Ethical   
   Idealism. (Amusing that you say 'good' dictionary, like those adverts   
   that say 'available now in all good bookshops' i.e. if it isn't in a   
   bookshop then it is the bookshop which is bad, not the book.   
      
   >   
   > Fighting for rights. How else does one acquire rights? A simple study   
   > of history shows how hard they have been to acquire.   
   > It's not as if there's been a committee around a table dishing them   
   > out. Nor as if some philosopher said we should have them, and the   
   > whole world agreed. You're up against power blocks; vested interest;   
   > class differences; and often (as my dad used to proclaim) simple human   
   > greed.   
   > I'd add ignorance to that list. Racialism, anti-semitism, anti- {add   
   > many a word here}, hatred, fear.   
   > The history of the world over the last 250 or so years displays this   
   > truth adequately. You don't need to go back 2,000 years to   
   > Spartacus. We live post-Enlightenment. And we honour the memory of the   
   > leaders of the struggles.   
   >   
      
   If you live in the USA the constitution says you have a right to this or   
   that. So the right is given to you by the government. And upheld by law   
   enforcement. But rights are idealistic in the sense that each ones right   
   is anothers restriction. And they are subject to practical matters, like   
   the right to own property doesn't stop you being robbed.   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)