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I’m often reminded of a bit on Top Gear years ago, when they were talking about “turbo” as a marketing tool in the 80s, when you could buy “turbo” sunglasses or “turbo” watches or “turbo” after-shave.

One month is not a “trend.”

This is like compulsive gambler logic - 48 losses in a row followed by 1 win - “Woohoo! I’m on a winning streak now!”

At this point - no - probably not.

I think he should have stepped down weeks ago. Framed correctly (something along the lines of "I still want to believe I’m the best possible candidate, but I can’t deny that there’s significant doubt about that, and this is a point in history that’s far too important to allow for doubt), AND accompanied by the DNC (acting entirely out of character and) simply throwing open the nomination and going with whoever proved to be the most popular candidate, I think that would’ve generated enthusiasm that Biden never has, and would’ve led to Trump getting his flabby ass handed to him.

But I worry that it’s too late for that now - that at this point there’s been too much fiddling around, too much dissension and too much astroturf to allow for the sort of spontaneous rally 'round a candidate that would’ve worked so well. And I worry that if he does drop out still, it’s not going to be so that the voters can get a candiadte they’ll rally around, but so that the DNC can just saddle us with some other drab establishment hack who’ll likely end up being even less popular than Biden.

So no - at this point, I think the best strategy is to stop bitching about it and focus on beating the fucking wannabe dictator in clown makeup and his christofascist coattail-riders. It really doesn’t matter who wins, so long as it’s not that foul piece of shit Trump.

The Song That Doesn’t End

How is it that the world is so deeply insane?

Surely I’m not the only one who sees it, right?

I mean - as just one example, we have here a country that launched a military invasion of another country, and is now trying to characterize attempts by that country to defend itself as “escalation.”

The only possible “logic” behind that is that the Russian position is that the only acceptable thing for Ukraine to do is to meekly submit to Russian rule, and that anything else is such an affront that it justifies even more violence and murder.

That’s stark, raving, bug-eyed insane. And it’s not some derelict on a street corner spouting that insanity - it’s s nation. And it’s not the only national level insanity happening - hell - it’s not even the only national level insanity happening today. Even as I type this, it’s guaranteed that some country or some national level politician somewhere, and probably more than one, is doing or saying something at least as mind-boggling insane as that, and it just keeps going, moment-to-moment, day-to-day.

How does that even work? Seriously - is it some sort of conspiracy of silence or something? Some (potentially unspoken) agreement around the world that yeah, we know that these people are stark staring mad, but let’s just pretend that the shit they spew has some merit, mmkay?

Or is it that the rest of the world is so insane that they don’t even notice? (Or, it suddenly struck me, so drunk that they don’t?)

I just don’t get it. It’s not even just countries and their leaders doing and saying things that are a bit questionable, but countries and their leaders doing and saying things that are screechingly insane - that don’t even bear a passing resemblance to logic, reason, truth or reality. Day in and day out, and without even a whisper about how patently insane it all is.

I don’t understand how that’s even possible.

I wonder if that’s now another of the Biden-era policy decisions Trump plans on overturning…

Just the first of many, MANY more to come.

The Republican plan, rather obviously, is to take this election by whatever means necessary - fairly, or if that fails fraudulently, or if that fails by judicial fiat, or if that fails by force.

That’s the biggest reason I don’t even call this a revolution. It’s a coup.

Yeah - I hesitated to post that, since even with the clearly negative characterization of all of the clearly negative aspects of it, it still sort of sounds as if not defending democracy is the right thing to do, when it’s really only “right” in an extremely narrow, warped, relativistic and brazenly evil sense.

Still though…

That’s a fascinating concept.

And yes - though a yank, I know Doctor Who. ;)

(And this is the point at which I accidentally tapped “Reply” last time through, which is why there’s a deleted post before this one)

Anyway…

My first reaction was that it didn’t make sense that a consciousness could find itself attached to (hosted by?) a different mind and just blithely continue on.

But the more I think about it, the more I think that’s at least reasonable, and possibly even likely.

A consciousness might be comparable to a highly sophisticated and self-aware frontend. Any range of data or software can be stored and run through it, and when new data or even a new piece of software is introduced, the frontend/consciousness can and will (if it’s working correctly) integrate it with the system, and it can review the data and software it’s overseeing and find flaws and (unless the ego subsystem intervenes) amend or replace it, and so on.

And viewed that way, and taking into account the likely mechanics of the whole thing, it really is possible and arguably even likely that it would be essentially content-neutral. It would make sense that while the experience of “I the audience” is itself a distinct thing, the specific details - the beliefs and values and memories and such that make it up - are just data pulled from memory, and it could just as easily pull any other data from any other memory (if it had access to it).

Fascinating…

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The really disturbing part is that he’s technically correct.

At this point in history, supporting democracy really is a partisan position, since the Republicans uniformly and adamantly oppose it, and intend to impose christofascist autocracy in its place.

Fight the urge to immediately get off the train.

Even with as many episodes of Star Trek as I’ve seen, I’m sure I’d want to rush right out and start exploring.

Neither really. Sort of.

There are certainly inherently repugnant beliefs, but beliefs in and of themselves are harmless - they’re just a particular pattern of firing neurons in a brain. They literally cannot bring harm to others just in and of themselves.

The thing that makes some beliefs horrible is not the mere holding of them, but the things one who holds them is likely to do. It’s those acts that are the real evil - the beliefs are just a foundation, or a trigger.

Now, all that said, I would hazard that it’s exceedingly rare at best (and arguably impossible) for anyone to hold noxious beliefs without them in some way affecting their behavior, so the mere holding of noxious beliefs can certainly serve as a justification for the conclusion that the person in question is in fact horrible. Still though, to be (perhaps overly) precise, I’d say that it’s not the belief itself that makes them a horrible person, but merely that the belief makes it quite likely that they’ll act in ways that make them (or reveal them to be) horrible people.

I get where you’re going with that analogy. It’s a bit awkward, just because, as you did, you have to stipulate shelter as opposed to the sheltered area, but with that stipulation it does work, and quite well really.

And as analogies should be, it’s intriguing.

But…

My first reaction is that it’s sort of similar to the “consciousness is an illusion” concept in that it appears to just move the problem back one step rather than solve it.

It seems to me that what you’re describing is the “space” (or maybe "framework would be better) in which consciousness takes place, but not consciousness itself.

The problem then (as is the problem with the consciousness is an illusion idea) is that that space/framework/whatever is only of note if a consciousness is introduced.

At the risk of bringing in too many metaphors, it’s akin to the “tree falling in a forest” thought experiment. The tree falling in the forest certainly generates disturbances in the air that, were there ears to hear them, would register as sound. But without ears to hear them, they’re just disturbances in the air. Similarly, it seems to me that the “shelter” that’s apparently intrinsic to the brain is only rightly considered “shelter” if there’s a consciousness to experience it. Without a consciousness to experience it, it’s just a space/framework/whatever.

Anyway, do you believe there is any ingredient to consciousness other than the physically of the brain?

I believe that consciousness in and of itself is obviously that.

I probably should’ve clarified - when I say “consciouness,” I’m referring to the state/process that’s at least one step removed from immediate perception.

I see a round red thing and recognize it to be food. That’s just perception.

I also recognize it to be the thing called an “apple” (in English - other languages have other words). I know that they grow on trees and come in many varieties, and I remember the tree in the side yard of the house I grew up in and how the apples were small and yellow and very good, but I had to generally get a ladder to get any apples, since the deer ate the ones close to the ground (and the ones on the ground, which at least meant I didn’t have to worry about cleaning them up), oh yeah and mom had a recipe for raw apple cake and it was delicious, but she bought the apples for that because the ones from the tree were too firm and tangy to bake with… and so on.

That’s the part that, to me, corresponds with the “shelter” in your analogy.

But that’s still not consciousness.

Consciousness is the apparently entirely non-physical “audience” to all of that - the “I” that’s aware of the process as it’s happening.

For example, it’s not the part that recognizes an apple, or the part that categorizes it as food, or even the part that remembers the apple tree and the cake and feels nostalgia - it’s the part that’s one step removed from all of that - the internal “audience” (of one) that observes that “I” am experiencing all of that.

And it seems to me that your view accounts for all of those subsidiary things, but doesn’t account for the “audience” - consciousness. Consciousness is distinct from, and at least one step removed from, all of those things.

And finally (though this has already gone on quite long) -

I don’t believe that consciouness is a manifestation of some “spark” or “soul” or anything else external. I think it’s really a relatively mundane function of the brain that we simply haven’t come to understand yet (and for as long as “science” remains blinkered by reductive physicalism, likely won’t be able to come to understand). The key, and the thing (to go all the way back) that ties it in with free will, is that I believe that (as I mentioned before) the communication between brain and consciousness is bidirectional - that there’s some mechanism by which conscious thought alone can at least affect if not wholly direct the path along which neurons fire, and likely not only pioneer new paths, but in some way “flag” them, such that the new path is (nominally) properly fitted into the whole.

And again - thanks. This is some of the most rewarding mental exercise I’ve had in a long time.

No shit?

They didn’t buy Trump for no reason

It’s a hosting site for free ebooks.

The site admins don’t provide any of the ebooks themselves - they just host files that are uploaded by whoever wishes, and provide for downloads for whoever wishes. (Not that that alters its legal status - just by way of explanation).

It’s notably popular among college students, as a source to download free versions of obscenely overpriced textbooks.

That consciousness is (theoretically) an emergent property of the brain doesn’t make it indistinguishable from the brain. I would say that it’s self-evidently a thing unto itself - while consciousness appears to be (and logically is) a manifestation of brain activity, it is not that brain activity in and of itself. My experience of consciousness undoubtedly manifests via the firing of neurons and release of chemicals, but it is not merely the firing of neurons and release of chemicals - it’s an experience unto itself.

To use a potentially poor analogy, consciousness might be viewed as the fruit of the plant of the brain. While the fruit comes to be solely through the workings of the plant, it still, fully formed, has an existence outside of, and even to some degree independent of, the plant.

Or something like that…

And this neatly illustrates the grotesquely destructive delusion that lies at the heart of religious fundamentalism - it’s ultimately, and I’m tempted to say without exception, an attempt by overtly evil people to place the blame for their evil on others, or on society as a whole.

The underlying issue is not that other people feel lust, for instance, but that they themselves feel lust, and they consider that to be so shameful that their self-images cannot tolerate the idea that it’s a part of their own makeup. It must and can only be, to them, a thing that’s been imposed on them by “evil” people or an “evil” society, so the solution, to them, is to stamp out that “evil.” Solely in the belief, ultimately, that if that “evil” could somehow be made to not exist, it would no longer plague them.