Phi for All

Most of what makes the Abrahamic religions horrible is the vertical morality they push on everyone. It implies there is a hierarchy of moral character that must be earned in artificial, hypocritical ways (attending church takes precedent over kindness to someone of another faith, for instance). It's difficult for humans to stand together when some of them want to be elevated above the rest. In my opinion, the key to a modern human society is a focus on helping each other rather than on helping ourselves, something religion only claims to be interested in. We've been fooled into thinking rugged individualism is the epitome of human behavior, but it's only made us weak and isolated, perfect prey for those who want to control us. I think calling it Utopia is misguided. If we can have a society where we don't stupidly ignore the worst pressures and stresses so an elite can have more than others, it's not going to be perfect for everyone, but hopefully it can have far fewer people barely clinging to their existence and also far fewer people buying shadow yachts with servants and toys trailing the main yacht. I think removing the concept that there are people who are more worthy than you will have a dramatic effect on our humanity. If the only help we can expect is from each other, I think others will have much more value. I also think bad human nature will no longer have a pious place to hide. Really? The first four are about their god being jealous. The fifth assumes your parents knew exactly what they were doing, and helps set up the vertical morality the church wants. The rest all focus on negative aspects of our existence, rather than a more positive, uplifting, I don't know... spiritual stance. We're commanded not to kill instead of being commanded to honor life. We're commanded not to steal rather than being commanded to respect the property of others. Modern psychology has a LOT to say about focusing on the negative, none of it good. And for a list of things our very souls rely on, it has no nuance for situations where we might need to kill in self-defense, or end a life for medical reasons, or help a woman leave a dangerous husband. Lies have been judged to save lives in certain circumstances, but they're all against the Commandments. But those specific tribal practices are just as vertically arranged as Christianity. They're looking for authoritarian leaders because in general they don't know what the hell they're doing. If we can promote the idea that nobody is better than anyone else and therefore we need to help each other, I think we can eventually remove this idea that we all need to look out for #1 because nobody else will.

I do. I think religion is the single most dangerous, evil, superstitious, dehumanizing practice we have ever allowed to be perpetrated on decent humans, and I think the vertical morality it engenders has held us back for millenia. I would argue that the Abrahamic religions alone have stunted our growth as moral intellectuals, and that without them we'd have a much firmer grasp of the importance of this very thin band of atmosphere that holds every bit of life we know about.

Perhaps mar_mar doesn't understand that we can take apart the eye of an animal and compare it with other eyes we've taken apart, including human eyes. Perhaps they think it's too far a leap to find the same rods and cones and then test to see if that animal can distinguish the same colors we do. Perhaps they've never seen any of the excellent nature shows that allow us to observe how important color is in the animal world. It's a given that they haven't studied enough evolution to understand how eyes developed among the various species. I also think they believe humans are unique rather than distinctive on this planet, most probably because of some religious contamination.

OK, you really don't understand science. Perhaps study and come back, but you're just wasting time with this garbage, mostly yours. Such a shame!

Nobody is criticizing YOU, it's your idea that people have problems with. We told you exactly what was wrong with the idea, but you either didn't like the criticism or didn't understand it. It's not about banning you. We're here to have meaningful discussions about science. What you're arguing isn't science, and we tried to help you see that. It's very obvious that animals can distinguish colors, and there is a LOT of documentation about it. But here comes YOU, saying they can't, and we know they can. Is that arrogant? I don't think so. I think you're wrong, I think we've shown that, and again you either don't like what you're hearing or you don't understand what you're hearing. Also, you didn't seem to understand that Guardian article you linked to. It doesn't support your claims. You didn't want to support an assertion you made on a science forum? Then don't make them in the first place. Boy, talk about arrogant.

This is not exactly true, is it? You talked about it for several pages, couldn't support it, made up some weird semantic reasons, wasted a LOT of time for many people, and so ultimately your other thread was closed, and you were told not to bring it up again BECAUSE IT'S A WASTE OF TIME!

Is "old world", defined in this way, something others have used or did you make it up? Either way, I don't think it's a good term. We already use it to mean "traditional", and it can also imply that a world is well established or hasn't changed fundamentally in a long time. I also object to using "old" as a synonym for "used up and long ago depleted" for personal reasons.

It still seems like you're thinking this would all be a slide backwards, but there's no reason why we have to go back to using fire when we still have modern energy sources. We wouldn't be using less of Earth's resources necessarily, but the resources could be used MUCH more efficiently. It doesn't necessarily use more resources to distribute food where it's needed rather than letting it rot on a dock. There are tons of things we do wrong in modern agriculture, imo. I think monocrop yields blind us to the concerns about crop rotation, overuse of pesticides and fertilizers, and overall quality of the food we grow. I'd love to see the US in particular adopt more indigenous practices, such as food forests where multiple layers of crops protect each other from pests, naturally fertilize the ground and keep it full of nutrients, and give depth and sophistication to the taste of the foods we eat. And none of this means we have to take a single step backwards.

I think if the second sentence above were to happen, it might help with the first sentence above. You probably think of "tribal way of living" as a bad thing; I see it as a way for humans to work together for their own ends, to be able to realize 100% of their work efforts, rather than working to make others wealthy. One of our biggest problems today is we think rugged individualism is attractive, when we really need to pull together and stop isolating ourselves in small family units. The resources aren't being depleted so much as they're being hoarded by the wealthy, who recognize that we're stronger in numbers.

! Moderator Note You were warned about hijacking other people's threads with this inanity. If it continues, your account will be banned. You couldn't support this garbage in its own thread, so please stop messing up the work of others!

Apparently, a mordant is used to fix dyes, and too much heat can break down the mordant and release the dyes. Anything that isn't white should probably be washed in cold.

Here's a Venn diagram explaining why Marjorie Taylor Greene's book isn't selling well:

! Moderator Note Too many people put too much time into trying to help you see your error, so we won't be deleting all that work. But I can certainly close this. Don't bring this idea up again in other threads.

! Moderator Note Perhaps you need to take a break and review? Back off the personal attacks? Answer clarifying questions so a reasonable conversation can happen?

Fortunately, you admitted to it very recently: It has been obvious and it's time to stop it. It boils down to "Why does mistermack get to make assertions, refuse to back them up, and later claim they're just his opinion and conjecture?" You should know by now how sloppy gets jumped on here. I don't think we're asking too much of you.

The way discussion works here is you should be able to cough up the evidence that supports any stance you assert if someone questions it. Now that you've questioned my stance, I'm prepared to defend the assertion I made. This is what you fail to do often enough that it's been a problem. You adamantly refuse to support some of the stuff you claim, and it gets pointed out on the regular. You claim it's your opinion, yet you refuse to state it that way. You seem to want a way to make your assertions without earning the right. My assertion was "If religious faith disappeared, the rest of us could progress and create heaven here on Earth." Organized Christians in the US are preparing to take steps to remove our current democracy, supporting Christian Nationalism through Project 2025. Some believe their religious goals can only be achieved by the destruction of human society and Armageddon. Religious faith seems to be undermining democracy in most areas. They object to science, to progress, to healthcare, birth control, and social spending. They insist on tiered morality with their god and them at the top and the rest of us somewhere below them. Without their obvious blockades the rest of us could create a remarkable society where it actually looked like people cared for all other people. All you have to do is ask me to support my stances. If I posted it here, I'm willing to defend it. And you can make damn sure that if I offer my opinion, it's going to sound like one. It'll be something inconsequential, like "Man, I think metallic lime green is the most obnoxious color on the planet!"

I can provide my evidence on request, and I knew I could BEFORE I posted. I didn't make this statement blindly, IOW.

Did you read what you wrote in that post? It was garbage from one end to the other, got reported multiple times, so you got a warning point for it, and an admonition to argue in good faith rather than insult us with word salad. Humans are conscious because they're material?! Give me a break. I'm a moderator who enforces the rules the site owners have. Your post was reported as spamming the Philosophy boards. You broke a rule, and now you think it was rude, arrogant, and insulting to hold you to the same standards as other members. It's not up to me to judge popularity or controversial topics. I just enforce the rules, which you broke. Take some responsibility, please. Who is calling for you to be banned? Objecting to your breaking the rules is NOT calling for a ban. Also, please be aware you just claimed you've always behaved perfectly, and it's always others who are wrong. Why didn't you report the person who used "autistic" as an insult, or called you "mentally ill"? Report it now, and I'll deal with the problem, since that's unacceptable. And where were you censored? Staff can see when posts have been edited and who did the edits. All your words seem to be intact. Can you point to where you've been censored?

Crap, is this your argument, that color doesn't exist for animals because you don't think they know what colors are? Holy moley, if I'd known that I wouldn't have bothered. I don't appreciate willful ignorance and purposeful obfuscation. It shows you aren't arguing in good faith.

And yet we see tigers in their garish orange color trying to sneak up on their prey. They're successful because their prey's eyes only have cones that see blue and green, so orange registers as green, so the orange tiger blends in with the green foliage. Tigers evolved this coloration in part because mammals have no green pigmentation. Tell me again how "there's no colour in the nature". Humans have trichromatic color vision, so we see more colors, but mammals still see colors. They just don't have cones for red.

If religious faith disappeared, the rest of us could progress and create heaven here on Earth.

How do you think you would have explained color to this man? If he'd never seen anything in his life, what could you say that to help him understand such a bizarre concept?

! Moderator Note Folks, let's not take professional disagreement personally. The science can be discussed without hurt feelings, can't it? I've read this thread through twice now and don't see anything other than disagreement, no vendettas or obsessions. Please carry on.

! Moderator Note It's been painfully obvious for a LONG time, but it's still frustrating that you don't bother to source your conjecture the way others do. You seem to think your raw opinions are meaningful without facts and evidential support. This has allowed you to post a whole lot of crap in otherwise scientific threads. You need to stop it. You seem very smart, and you often represent a POV that we need to see, but you ruin it with unevidenced opinion that you assert like it's fact. We can start trashing bad faith posts like that if you can't stop yourself, but we want to let you know our thinking on this.

How can the whole be correct if the particulars aren't? Nobody is trying to "catch you up", we just want you to explain this concept, and parts of your explanation don't make sense. How can colors be a factor to someone who's never seen them? How could someone explain what colors are to someone who's never seen them?