Redditor since 08/03/2016 (5977 link karma, 116949 comment karma)
Repeated mail theft due to HOA/Property Management Company failing to secure mailboxes
created by mediaisdelicious on 28/06/2024 at 14:44 UTC - 1 upvotes (https, www.reddit.com)
Requesting top mod position from automod - top human mod left, need automod moved down in privilege
created by mediaisdelicious on 19/08/2023 at 20:57 UTC - 1 upvotes (http, www.Reddit.com)
r/philosophy will be joining the subreddit blackout June 12-14 in protest of the planned API changes
created by mediaisdelicious on 08/06/2023 at 20:30 UTC - 6265 upvotes (https, www.reddit.com)
Tenure in Texas - not very banned, but a bit muddied
created by mediaisdelicious on 28/05/2023 at 15:11 UTC - 42 upvotes (https, www.texastribune.org)
Supporing a 10ft shelf and closet rod
created by mediaisdelicious on 23/05/2023 at 14:18 UTC* - 227 upvotes (https, www.reddit.com)
Anyone made physical or digital Ship / Station Tiles
created by mediaisdelicious on 11/05/2023 at 15:14 UTC - 17 upvotes (https, www.reddit.com)
DIY Mothership terrain tile - UDT style, painted XPS foam
created by mediaisdelicious on 21/04/2023 at 20:11 UTC - 36 upvotes (https, i.redd.it)
DIY Mothership terrain tile - UDT style, painted XPS foam
created by mediaisdelicious on 21/04/2023 at 20:09 UTC - 44 upvotes (https, i.redd.it)
Mod Podge application tips for flat, gridded terrain - how to avoid bubbling?
created by mediaisdelicious on 12/04/2023 at 18:00 UTC - 3 upvotes (https, www.reddit.com)
"First Time DM" and Other Short Questions Megathread
created by mediaisdelicious on 22/12/2022 at 17:01 UTC - 16 upvotes (https, www.reddit.com)
"First Time DM" and Other Short Questions Megathread
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OXO On 9-cup - how do you clean the carafe top?
created by mediaisdelicious on 14/12/2022 at 18:22 UTC - 3 upvotes (https, www.reddit.com)
"First Time DM" and Other Short Questions Megathread
created by mediaisdelicious on 08/12/2022 at 17:01 UTC - 59 upvotes (https, www.reddit.com)
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created by mediaisdelicious on 27/10/2022 at 16:01 UTC - 45 upvotes (https, www.reddit.com)
Google Home Integration: I can add Wyze bulbs to Home, but cannot add them to a Room.
created by mediaisdelicious on 26/10/2022 at 12:34 UTC - 1 upvotes (https, www.reddit.com)
"First Time DM" and Other Short Questions Megathread
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"First Time DM" and Other Short Questions Megathread
created by mediaisdelicious on 22/09/2022 at 16:01 UTC - 36 upvotes (https, www.reddit.com)
Comment by mediaisdelicious at 13/07/2024 at 20:11 UTC
10 upvotes
People ask this exact question on the sub all the time. I've never seen it removed for this reason.
Comment by mediaisdelicious at 08/07/2024 at 00:21 UTC
1 upvotes
I think there are plenty of prima facie reasons to expect fancy schools to produce a higher level of academic competence on average.
I think this is true IFF what we mean by "academic competence" ends up being something really really narrow in the way that ends up being even stronger than *prima facie*.
Surely it's no surprise that UG programs in departments that themselves have high ranking PhD programs end up producing students who can place well into departments with similar sorts of PhD programs. Such students are being taught by faculty who are in many respects very similar to the faculty at the programs they're applying into and, unsurprisingly, can pretty reliably replicate the sorts of students they themselves regularly accept into their own PhD program. Relatedly, it's no surprise that people who never get to sit on Grad Admissions committees (i.e. faculty at colleges who have no graduate program) are more likely just not to have great advice or much relevant, recent experience relevant to the process. So, what we see is pretty predictable - migration patterns between similarly ranked programs both in grad admissions and for faculty.
Job placement is a bit dicier, though, but when you start listening to people talk about it, it becomes easy to see why. Lots of folks don't seem to get very much training on how to do it at all, and lots of faculty just don't have a lot of experience hiring anywhere except within their super narrow context at similar programs (since programs who offer PhDs are in the minority of all programs in the US).
So, whereas faculty in PhD programs are really well-situated to help you get into grad school just by virtue of their position, faculty in PhD programs are not well situated to help you get a job.
Comment by mediaisdelicious at 07/07/2024 at 22:44 UTC
3 upvotes
It's not about realistic or unrealistic in the sense of being fictional or imagined, but about what we can reasonably know in the context of action.
What the Kantian wants to say, more generally, about consequentialist ethics are two things: (1) they can't be properly grounded and (2) their supposed practical defenses don't really do what they claim in many various cases.
In the specific kinds of cases like the murderer, we have to be really specific about what we're imagining both for the sake of seeing how the Kantian will reason about it (since Kantian ethics demands a lot of specificity) and for the sake of seeing how the supposed consequentialist justification will go. This is why we're encouraged to imagine a case where the beneficent liar has accidentally told the truth and, while he lies, his friend runs out of the house in the exact direction that the liar has beneficently re-directed the murderer.
Comment by mediaisdelicious at 07/07/2024 at 22:40 UTC
2 upvotes
Well, we don't need to redefine lie here - in the specific context of the murderer at the door, a lie is something really specific already - it's a spoken assertion which the speaker believes is false and hopes the recipient will take to be said sincerely. This means saying things like, "How dare you, sir!" is substantively different from saying, "I have not hidden any Jews." Not a few people have suggested that this is the general way that we should respond to people who don't deserve answers to questions - i.e. not answer them.
Comment by mediaisdelicious at 02/07/2024 at 18:23 UTC
0 upvotes
What if they didn’t? Are we talking about a real example or are we not?
Comment by mediaisdelicious at 02/07/2024 at 18:23 UTC
1 upvotes
Why can’t I posit the existence of a Nazi who seems very gullible, but isn’t?
The point is, that we can posit all kinds of cases, but it seems like positing cases just doesn’t actually do the work. What we need are good reasons in real situations.
Comment by mediaisdelicious at 02/07/2024 at 18:15 UTC
1 upvotes
Yeah, absolutely I do. I’m in the whole idea. Here is that the consequence of the life is supposed to justify the light itself. If that’s the case, it seems really important that the lie actually leads to the consequences in a relatively reliable way. (Whenever Kant responds to these kinds of problems, this is usually his strategy.)
Comment by mediaisdelicious at 02/07/2024 at 18:14 UTC
1 upvotes
Assuming what you say above is a quote, is the speaker telling a lie?
Comment by mediaisdelicious at 02/07/2024 at 16:51 UTC
1 upvotes
So, just to track the example - are we to imagine a case where we tell the Nazis “oh no way, totally no Jews here” and this reliably causes them to peace out?
Comment by mediaisdelicious at 01/07/2024 at 16:50 UTC
5 upvotes
Maybe there is some kind of underlying issue that causes this problem (as might be the case if you have ADHD), but often even people who don't have such challenges just need some reading habits and systems to keep themselves useful grounded in a good reading practice. Lots of people's approach to reading is just "well I open the book and my eyes move back and forth for a bit," and this generally doesn't suffice for primary sources in philosophy. We need to read intentionally, take notes both on and off the page, and, eventually, do something with the material to incorporate it and keep it in our brain.
Comment by mediaisdelicious at 01/07/2024 at 16:44 UTC
2 upvotes
Well, that's certainly what they'd need us to believe in order for them to successfully do it, isn't it!
Comment by mediaisdelicious at 29/06/2024 at 20:48 UTC
3 upvotes
I think all the “color” series are good, save for the one that is basically a vampire space marine shoot em up. Y14, Moonbase, and Green tomb are all great to start.
Comment by mediaisdelicious at 29/06/2024 at 20:40 UTC
1 upvotes
Graduate school aka “postgraduate study” involves earning a degree past your BA (which is an undergraduate degree which you tea drinkers sometimes call “uni”). Such degrees include MA, MSc, MPhil, or PhD / DPhil degrees.
Comment by mediaisdelicious at 29/06/2024 at 18:17 UTC
5 upvotes
What ended up being the total solution was listening to how the Warden for Nobody Wake The Bugbear (the podcast) ran a few good starter modules.
Comment by mediaisdelicious at 29/06/2024 at 15:50 UTC
1 upvotes
Are you just asking how to improve your chances of getting into graduate school?
Comment by mediaisdelicious at 29/06/2024 at 00:45 UTC
2 upvotes
No, that’s not right.
First, they are responsible for them - they acknowledge this, the management group does, USPS does, etc. This isn’t an assumption, it’s just how my mailbox works.
Second, I didn’t state they were liable - I asked. That was the whole basis for my question here.
Comment by mediaisdelicious at 28/06/2024 at 21:09 UTC
1 upvotes
That makes sense, though so far it seems like basically nothing is effective. Everyone just says they’re working on it - for years.
Comment by mediaisdelicious at 28/06/2024 at 21:07 UTC
1 upvotes
I’m not sure what “assumptions” I’ve made. Sure, obviously I could pay the USPS to securely deliver me regular mail. I knew this already.
Comment by mediaisdelicious at 28/06/2024 at 16:43 UTC
3 upvotes
I confess that I don’t really understand anything that you’re saying here.
I certainly think that asking why truthfulness is good is a difficult question, asking what Aristotle is talking about when he discusses truthfulness is utterly simple and basically assumed by the way you are asking the question. Do you know what it means to boast - To tell a story about you doing a great thing that you never did? If so, you already know exactly what he is talking about.
Comment by mediaisdelicious at 28/06/2024 at 15:31 UTC
6 upvotes
The way that Aristotle treats this is complicated by the fact that he seems to think truthfulness is heterogenous and, so too, dishonesty. Consider, for instance, this bit from NE:
In the field of social life those who make the giving of pleasure or
pain their object in associating with others have been described; let us now describe those who pursue truth or falsehood alike in words and deeds and in the claims they put forward. The boastful man, then, is thought to be apt to claim the things that bring glory, when he has not got them, or to claim more of them than he has, and the mock-modest man on the other hand to disclaim what he has or belittle it, while the man who observes the mean is one who calls a thing by its own name, being truthful both in life and in word, owning to what he has, and neither more nor less. Now each of these courses may be adopted either with or without an object. But each man speaks and acts and lives in accordance with his character, if he is not acting for some ulterior object. And falsehood is in itself mean and culpable, and truth noble and worthy of praise. Thus the truthful man is another case of a man who, being in the mean, is worthy of praise, and both forms of untruthful man are culpable, and particularly the boastful man.
Here we see Aristotle cash out a very specific kind of lying - lying about oneself - as being a specific kinds of viciousness - boastfulness, false modesty, being cruel, and so on.
Let us discuss them both, but first of all the truthful man. We are
not speaking of the man who keeps faith in his agreements, i.e. in the things that pertain to justice or injustice (for this would belong to another virtue), but the man who in the matters in which nothing of this sort is at stake is true both in word and in life because his character is such. But such a man would seem to be as a matter of fact equitable. For the man who loves truth, and is truthful where nothing is at stake, will still more be truthful where something is at stake; he will avoid falsehood as something base, seeing that he avoided it even for its own sake; and such a man is worthy of praise. He inclines rather to understate the truth; for this seems in better taste because exaggerations are wearisome.
Yet, here, we find two different kinds of things - dishonesty which is essentially injustice and then dishonesty (in the form of exaggeration) which is just, apparently, annoying and tiresome interpersonally.
You might think this is just sort of inadequate to give an answer of the sort you're after because maybe this seems sort of circular since it seems like what Aristotle returns to in each case is that the person who is concerned with the truth is concerned with the right thing. If that's how things seem, then you might ask, well, what are they concerned with *instead* and then check your intuitions about whether or not that thing is better? It seems like (perhaps because of how Aristotle begins his analysis), he often thinks that the other kinds of competing lives are the life of pleasure and the life of glory he often returns to those at this point in the treatise as being contrast classes.
It seems like the boastful person, for instance, is either motivated by (false) glory or the pleasure of being approved of. We might apply some Socratic logic here and ask, well, what's *really* good - any glory or *deserved* glory? *Felling* good or actually being of the sort who *is* excellent? It seems like the boastful person knows that the subjects of boasting value the excellent things the boaster claims to, and this already might give us a reason to doubt that boasting could be more virtuous than the alternative (actually being excellent and not having to lie about it).
Each different application of truthfulness is going to have a similar structure, but the details work differently. Acquiring external goods is certainly good, but acquiring what you don't deserve is unjust. Is it good to be unjust? Well, virtue ethicists think it isn't (rf-Plato's Republic). Moreover, is possessing external goods good in itself? Well, virtue ethicists think it isn't (rf - the earlier books of NE).
Comment by mediaisdelicious at 25/06/2024 at 14:49 UTC
2 upvotes
I think one common "pull" that people who are into philosophy feel is that, in the end, all the fields are related to philosophy if you're into philosophy enough. During my long academic journey I was a tourist in a lot of fields - biophysics, evolutionary biology, history, literature, classics, and communication - and basically all of them seem now or seemed then related to philosophy. I do a lot of higher ed admin and teamwork/management type stuff now and even that stuff seems related to philosophy.
Comment by mediaisdelicious at 25/06/2024 at 14:43 UTC
6 upvotes
/u/anarchreest gives a good and clear gloss of the fallacy, but I think it might help your broader understanding (given what you say in the follow up comments) to see the problem in a slightly different way.
It is super important to know that "fallacies" are theoretical constructs. This is not to say that they aren't "real" (or whatever spooky bullshit), but that what is and isn't a fallacy is a matter of some broader theory about wtf a fallacy *is*.
Very broadly construed, we give different kinds of arguments in different kinds of contexts and within those contexts you can think of certain kinds of things as being appropriate or inappropriate. A "fallacy" is just a name for a kind of inappropriate move *in a given context*. Think of a fallacy like a foul. In soccer/football, most of the time picking up the ball is a foul. Yet, in a sporting goods store, I can pick up a soccer ball / football without some rules lawyer running up to me and yelling "foul!" So too when we do a throw in or when we're playing goalie (or playing basketball), and so on. Fallacies are just like this - they are argumentative fouls which are context sensitive. You can't usefully adjudicate them without all the context, but often we talk about them in the abstract (using like 1-3 sentences ripped from a non-existent conversation) for educational purposes. This has utility, but it often gives a bad impression that fallacy theory actually works that way. It doesn't work that way anymore than the rules for when you can touch the ball with your hands in a soccer/football match.
One model for how this goes is formal logic (which is like math but for arguments). In any given system of formal logic there are rules that say how you can safely (validly) make truth-preserving inferences. This makes sorting out fallacies really easy and, as a result, you can track the historical development and utility of formal fallacy theory more or less with the development of different logical systems. Today the most commonly taught formal fallacies are probably affirming the consequent and denying the antecedent, yet those fallacies didn't exist in ancient logic. Why not? Well, because those fallacies are mostly helpful in logic that had conditionals and Aristotle's logic didn't primarily rely on those. Anyway, the list of formal fallacies ends up being pretty conservative because formal logic is very bounded.
Unfortunately, most discourse does not happen in formal logic and very little of it happens in natural language which can be easily reduced to formalism! So, formal fallacies are pretty useless to the average discourse user and the average discourse user is understandably greedy about wanting to make use of good rules for arguing. In response to this really reasonable need people started to create systems for talking about fallacies that occur in different kinds of natural language disputation - and probably Aristotle is the famous person to put this down on paper in the west in a form which we still have today (the *On Sophistical Refutations* and *Topics*). Even in those works, though Aristotle seems to be assuming rather a lot about how arguments might go and how people might respond to one another.
Starting in the 17th century stuff really starts to pop-off in fallacy theory and people begin to make really impressive and lasting changes to how we conceive of natural language argumentation. In a certain respect this comes to a screeching halt at the start of the 20th century where we get what is sometimes today (paradoxcially) called "classical fallacy theory" (which isn't classical at all and is instead thoroughly modern). The popularization of this theory is usually credited to Irving Copi, a logician, who didn't invent it but seems to be remembered for doing so because of how popular his textbooks are/were. (Copi is a great communicator of logic, but, unfortunately, this leaves us with a weird version of fallacy theory which is strangely modeled after formal logic.)
Anyway, you hear people talk about fallacies today out in the world, mostly they are talking about a kind of mish-mash of "classical" fallacy theory explained through the lens of an intro to logic class and then kind of squished up with contemporary advancements in things like bias studies in psychology and different kinds of "tricks" in applied communication. (Thankfully things got very exciting again at the end of the 20th century and a lot of new and interesting work was done on fallacies, basically none of which has bled out in the popular discourse on fallacies.)
All of this is to say that what is and isn't a fallacy is a matter of (1) context and (2) theory, which is why Anarchreest's advice is very safe, especially if we make one amendment.
In short: you have to judge it on the premises. Nothing...makes an argument automatically fallacious.
And, to add, meaningfully judging this *in relation to fallacies* requires attention to context and some theoretical artifice which meaningfully applies to that context.
Comment by mediaisdelicious at 25/06/2024 at 14:18 UTC
2 upvotes
If other fallacies could be used correctly, does it mean even ad hominem could be used correctly?
Comment by mediaisdelicious at 21/06/2024 at 15:00 UTC
2 upvotes
Compatibilism is thousands of years old. If anyone is redefining anything, everyone is more or less constantly engaged in the process of redefining (sometimes by refining, sometimes by tracking empirical or conceptual progress).
Comment by mediaisdelicious at 21/06/2024 at 14:58 UTC
1 upvotes
Like there are philosophies that change how you live life (e.g. ethics). But this is not the case where the meaning of fact or truth really matter at all. Like whatever your interpretation of these words, it doesnt actually change any other theories (like whether it is a fact that murder is wrong or it is true that murder is wrong).
Maybe not immediately or obviously, but it's definitely the case that how you think about facts *generally* and, as a subset, *empirical* facts in contradistinction from other kinds of facts (if non-empirical facts exist) will affect all sorts of meaningful things - in particular, they might affect the way in which you're able to maintain that *moral* facts exist or normative facts more generally.
Furthermore, could I get a link explaining this distinction (preferably a link that explains it as simply and shortly as you guys did). I swear every website I look at has the fact = empirical truth and truth can have subjectivity.
You can read about facts here: https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/facts/
