Billy Goat Gruff -
Is that you tip tapping on my bridge with your cloven hooves?
Hi, John
Your first example, getting advice from a Ouija board because one
believes it to be Infallible illustrates the basic problem of the
triumphant declaration of our friam colleagues that right-wingers are
irrational. I think that Peirce believed that all thought was
rational because rationality was built into the nervous system.
Induction, deduction, and abduction is just what nervous systems DO!
We call it conditioning. And at the very minimum, one can tell a
story make any behavior, however aberrant to appear rational.
I like that you juxtapose "aberrant" with "rational"... we *often* use
"irrational" when we mean "aberrant", and *methinks* abberant is in the
eyes of the beholder, while rational/irrational is less subjective?
I am not sure how to judge the rationality of behavior. Doesn't
rationality really apply to propositions I suppose that "I should
punch the wall" might be said to be rational if it follows from,
Punching walls cures itchy knuckles, my knuckles are itching,
therefore I should punch the wall."
To call the rightwing irrational is to way-underestimate the problem
we have as a nation. If the problem were rationality, we could give
everybody a short course in practical logic, and our national
nightmare would be over. But the different parties are reasoning from
vastly different facts and values, and we have no mechanism come to an
agreement on which facts are true and which values we want to live by.
Certainly, I believe that *both* extrema of the left/right continua
would insist that the *other* extrema is *irrational*, and being
extremists, possibly *everyone* left/right of their position as well?
My son called my attention to an excellent aphorism, something like:
*/Conservatives get upset when somebody gets something they earned;
Liberals get upset when somebody doesn't get something they did earn. /*
I'm pretty sure that an "error" was introduced into this aphorism
right from the start... it would be a specifically *left biased and
cynical* version of the less-obviously-biased original:
*/Conservatives get upset when somebody gets something they earned;
Liberals get upset when somebody doesn't get something they did earn. /*
/should read/*/
/*
*/Conservatives get upset when somebody gets something they
/*_/didn't earn/_*/; Liberals get upset when somebody doesn't get
something they did earn. /*
*//*
Wouldn't be wonderful if one of the right wingers on the list would
agree to explore the foundations of this value difference.
Again, standing in: If we are willing to discuss my "rewrite" (or more
to the point? my "un" rewrite) then the issue seems to be almost the
false-positive V the false-negative. Conservatives feel that
government social programs (aka handouts) for "underprivileged" people
are giving them something they didn't earn, while Liberals feel that it
is important to step in and make sure that people *do* get what they
*did* earn (e.g. social security/medicare benefits, minimum wage standards.
I would say that many liberals would be willing to risk a few murderers
and rapists be left on the loose to avoid hanging even *one* innocent
person, while most conservatives (and libertarians?) would be willing to
risk hanging a few innocent persons (as long as they don't look too
much like themselves) to avoid allowing anyone to go unpunished for
their sins.
If we replace "a few" with "any number of" in the above, we have the
extremist versions.
But I don't think that is going to happen. For years, I have wanted
somebody to create a website .... Call it PurpleAmerica.com. It would
have two subsites, "Argue.with.a.Liberal.com and
argue.with.a.conservative.com. It would be like a dating service, but
once two arguers were "mated" the site would guide them through the
argument by asking questions, such as, "Please state all the says in
which you and your fell-arguer AGREE. And when you had typed in your
answer, the website would send it to the other guy with the
instruction, "Are these premises you share with your fellow-arguer? "
Etc. In my wildest dream, the whole thing would be automated, but to
start, I thought I would pretend that it was automated, and provide
the questions myself ...Like the Turk, I would lurk inside the
machine. The reason you are not ALL pig-rich with google ad money is
that you did not take me up on this suggestion.
Damn... I knew I missed a beat in there somewhere... pig-rich? Then I'd
have to be a Republican, right? No, maybe I could be Warren Buffet.
No, I want to be Elon Musk!
By the way, did you understand why I closed my argument with the
words, "Who's that going over my bridge?" Apparently nobody did.
Ach! This younger generation.
Kids these days! Get off my Lawn! Billy Goat Gruff!
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