Curt Doolittle

Author: Curt Doolittle

  • Spinoza: Philosophers Should Have A Trade

    [I]’m not a big fan of Spinoza’s ideas, but am very much a fan both his writing style and his work ethic. Spinoza earned his living as a lens-grinder. He wrote his extremely parsimonious book, taking most of his life, from a musty apartment. It’s what, 200 pages long? A brutally concise work of numbered and ordered sentences. The first statement that struck me was ‘endeavor to speak in a manner comprehensible to the common people’. I’ve always viewed this as my curse. Which is why I work so hard at it. Because I’m aware of my frame of reference, and my near absence of conceptual empathy. The other influential thing that he said, can be roughly translated as “Every man who does not have a trade must eventually become a rogue”. A sentiment I agree with. And have tried to imitate. I’ve always tried to earn enough money that I could research and write either part time or full time. I don’t like the idea of philosophers trying to earn money from their work. I don’t trust it at all. I can barely respect teaching as a way to pay for writing. Nassim Nicholas Taleb reflects this same sentiment when he says: “…as a practitioner, my thinking is rooted in the belief that you cannot go from books to problems, but the reverse, from problems to books.” And I practice philosophy the same way. I’m trying to find a solution to the problem of ethics. In particular, the problem of deception in ethics, politics, and economics. Learn a trade so that you experience the real world. Identify a problem that exists in the real world. Use the accumulated wisdom of centuries to solve a problem in the real world. Otherwise you invent a mystical hammer and go on and endless search for the appropriate nails – which you seem to find all over the place. Curt Doolittle

    COMMENTS by Roman Skaskiw 3 QUOTES ABOUT ACADEMIA ” Learn a trade so that you experience the real world. Identify a problem that exists in the real world. . . . Otherwise you invent a mystical hammer and go on and endless search for the appropriate nails – which you seem to find all over the place.” ~ Curt Doolittle “Every man who does not have a trade must eventually become a rogue” ~ Baruch Spinoza “…as a practitioner, my thinking is rooted in the belief that you cannot go from books to problems, but the reverse, from problems to books.” ~ Nassim Nicholas Taleb

  • Tarski Is Specifically Referring To Formal Languages – Only Formal Languages

    [F]ormal languages are subsets of our full language. They are platonic (imaginary and symbolic) by definition and intent. Operational language is not platonic, but extant and demonstrated in real time and space, and can be used to describe actions in time and space, and if constrained to the description of actions in time and space, are open to observation, and confirmation, and falsification. This is why science requires operational language. This is why ethics MUST require operational language. Otherwise deception, self deception and error are obscured by the fungibility of language. Tarski, Alfred, “The Semantic Conception of Truth and the Foundations of Semantics”, in Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, 4 (1944). Tarski, Alfred. “The Concept of Truth in Formalized Languages”, in Logic, Semantics, Metamathematics, Clarendon Press, 1956.

  • Tarski Is Specifically Referring To Formal Languages – Only Formal Languages

    [F]ormal languages are subsets of our full language. They are platonic (imaginary and symbolic) by definition and intent. Operational language is not platonic, but extant and demonstrated in real time and space, and can be used to describe actions in time and space, and if constrained to the description of actions in time and space, are open to observation, and confirmation, and falsification. This is why science requires operational language. This is why ethics MUST require operational language. Otherwise deception, self deception and error are obscured by the fungibility of language. Tarski, Alfred, “The Semantic Conception of Truth and the Foundations of Semantics”, in Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, 4 (1944). Tarski, Alfred. “The Concept of Truth in Formalized Languages”, in Logic, Semantics, Metamathematics, Clarendon Press, 1956.

  • The Problem Of Correcting Philosophical And Scientific 'truth'.

    [I]t’s interesting that philosophical truth is problematic simply because it was scientists and philosophers of science which succeeded MOST in cleansing philosophy of magic, mysticism and platonism. (I am trying to additionally cleanse philosophy of deceptive obscurantism so that we can repair the ethics of cooperation and politics.) But they left logical and mathematical platonism in the philosophy of science. So we have this well respected and highly successful methodology that has drastically improved our understanding of, and ability to interact with physical reality. But in order to correct ethics, I have to FURTHER cleanse scientific philosophy of platonism, and ethics of obscurantism. And I think I have it figured out. The confusion resulted from philosophy’s history as an attempt to create an authoritarian common good via consensual belief, rather than simply improve the means of cooperation by formal institutions. On need not believe in anything. One need only construct formal institutions that eliminate all free riding – or at least, the maximum elimination of free riding that the current family structure and structure of production require. Unfortunately the contract for meaning of terms sometimes needs correction. One can correct meaning out of preference, out of influence on ends, for scientific accuracy, or for ethical reasons. And unfortunately , the meaning of ‘truth’ must be corrected from it’s platonic common usage to its performative and therefore accurate usage. And all other various analogies to truth as made use of in the different methodological disciplines ,demonstrated to be subtractive properties. To some degree, mathematics has already partly acknowledged this problem by calling it’s work ‘proofs’ not ‘truths’. We must unfortunately, get science to do the same as mathematics has done. For ethical reasons. Because it is a moral hazard for science to persist in the platonic use of the term truth instead of performative truth and the completeness of correspondence with reality.

  • The Problem Of Correcting Philosophical And Scientific ‘truth’.

    [I]t’s interesting that philosophical truth is problematic simply because it was scientists and philosophers of science which succeeded MOST in cleansing philosophy of magic, mysticism and platonism. (I am trying to additionally cleanse philosophy of deceptive obscurantism so that we can repair the ethics of cooperation and politics.) But they left logical and mathematical platonism in the philosophy of science. So we have this well respected and highly successful methodology that has drastically improved our understanding of, and ability to interact with physical reality. But in order to correct ethics, I have to FURTHER cleanse scientific philosophy of platonism, and ethics of obscurantism. And I think I have it figured out. The confusion resulted from philosophy’s history as an attempt to create an authoritarian common good via consensual belief, rather than simply improve the means of cooperation by formal institutions. On need not believe in anything. One need only construct formal institutions that eliminate all free riding – or at least, the maximum elimination of free riding that the current family structure and structure of production require. Unfortunately the contract for meaning of terms sometimes needs correction. One can correct meaning out of preference, out of influence on ends, for scientific accuracy, or for ethical reasons. And unfortunately , the meaning of ‘truth’ must be corrected from it’s platonic common usage to its performative and therefore accurate usage. And all other various analogies to truth as made use of in the different methodological disciplines ,demonstrated to be subtractive properties. To some degree, mathematics has already partly acknowledged this problem by calling it’s work ‘proofs’ not ‘truths’. We must unfortunately, get science to do the same as mathematics has done. For ethical reasons. Because it is a moral hazard for science to persist in the platonic use of the term truth instead of performative truth and the completeness of correspondence with reality.

  • The Problem Of Correcting Philosophical And Scientific 'truth'.

    [I]t’s interesting that philosophical truth is problematic simply because it was scientists and philosophers of science which succeeded MOST in cleansing philosophy of magic, mysticism and platonism. (I am trying to additionally cleanse philosophy of deceptive obscurantism so that we can repair the ethics of cooperation and politics.) But they left logical and mathematical platonism in the philosophy of science. So we have this well respected and highly successful methodology that has drastically improved our understanding of, and ability to interact with physical reality. But in order to correct ethics, I have to FURTHER cleanse scientific philosophy of platonism, and ethics of obscurantism. And I think I have it figured out. The confusion resulted from philosophy’s history as an attempt to create an authoritarian common good via consensual belief, rather than simply improve the means of cooperation by formal institutions. On need not believe in anything. One need only construct formal institutions that eliminate all free riding – or at least, the maximum elimination of free riding that the current family structure and structure of production require. Unfortunately the contract for meaning of terms sometimes needs correction. One can correct meaning out of preference, out of influence on ends, for scientific accuracy, or for ethical reasons. And unfortunately , the meaning of ‘truth’ must be corrected from it’s platonic common usage to its performative and therefore accurate usage. And all other various analogies to truth as made use of in the different methodological disciplines ,demonstrated to be subtractive properties. To some degree, mathematics has already partly acknowledged this problem by calling it’s work ‘proofs’ not ‘truths’. We must unfortunately, get science to do the same as mathematics has done. For ethical reasons. Because it is a moral hazard for science to persist in the platonic use of the term truth instead of performative truth and the completeness of correspondence with reality.

  • The Problem Of Correcting Philosophical And Scientific ‘truth’.

    [I]t’s interesting that philosophical truth is problematic simply because it was scientists and philosophers of science which succeeded MOST in cleansing philosophy of magic, mysticism and platonism. (I am trying to additionally cleanse philosophy of deceptive obscurantism so that we can repair the ethics of cooperation and politics.) But they left logical and mathematical platonism in the philosophy of science. So we have this well respected and highly successful methodology that has drastically improved our understanding of, and ability to interact with physical reality. But in order to correct ethics, I have to FURTHER cleanse scientific philosophy of platonism, and ethics of obscurantism. And I think I have it figured out. The confusion resulted from philosophy’s history as an attempt to create an authoritarian common good via consensual belief, rather than simply improve the means of cooperation by formal institutions. On need not believe in anything. One need only construct formal institutions that eliminate all free riding – or at least, the maximum elimination of free riding that the current family structure and structure of production require. Unfortunately the contract for meaning of terms sometimes needs correction. One can correct meaning out of preference, out of influence on ends, for scientific accuracy, or for ethical reasons. And unfortunately , the meaning of ‘truth’ must be corrected from it’s platonic common usage to its performative and therefore accurate usage. And all other various analogies to truth as made use of in the different methodological disciplines ,demonstrated to be subtractive properties. To some degree, mathematics has already partly acknowledged this problem by calling it’s work ‘proofs’ not ‘truths’. We must unfortunately, get science to do the same as mathematics has done. For ethical reasons. Because it is a moral hazard for science to persist in the platonic use of the term truth instead of performative truth and the completeness of correspondence with reality.

  • Why Squander Inheritance Through Redistribution?

    [W]hy should I squander my earnings through redistribution? Why should I squander my savings through redistribution? Why should I squander my culture’s high trust norms through redistribution? And why should I squander my genes through dysgenic redistribution? If you claim to have rights to your earnings, to your life, and to your property, then why do you only have those rights and not the right to your other forms of capital? My purpose is to promote my genes, even at the expense of others genes. If we can cooperate while I do that then that’s fine. But if we cannot cooperate while I do that, then there is no point in cooperation. We all demonstrate our time preference. That’s mine. That’s everyone on earth’s preference other than W.E.I.R.D’s – who are demonstrably suicidal. Squandering your inheritance is suicidal.

  • Why Squander Inheritance Through Redistribution?

    [W]hy should I squander my earnings through redistribution? Why should I squander my savings through redistribution? Why should I squander my culture’s high trust norms through redistribution? And why should I squander my genes through dysgenic redistribution? If you claim to have rights to your earnings, to your life, and to your property, then why do you only have those rights and not the right to your other forms of capital? My purpose is to promote my genes, even at the expense of others genes. If we can cooperate while I do that then that’s fine. But if we cannot cooperate while I do that, then there is no point in cooperation. We all demonstrate our time preference. That’s mine. That’s everyone on earth’s preference other than W.E.I.R.D’s – who are demonstrably suicidal. Squandering your inheritance is suicidal.

  • Caplan's Dishonest Redistributive Argument In Favor Of Open Immigration

    [C]aplan’s argument does not account for costs. He’s wrong. Always has been. This argument is just an extension of Cosmopolitan justification for identitarian incorporation of subgroups into host countries. It is simple literary and economic obscurantism that seeks to ignore the costs of heterogeneity on a population. In an homogenous population under universal absolute nuclear families, we still see high costs of relocation of individuals to changes in capital centers that doe NOT offset the increases in productivity – which are merely artifacts of the change in prices as demand increases in geographies. In homogenous populations containing ANF families, it takes time for the introduction of heterogeneous forces to play out, but temporary increases do simply to increases in demand for consumption due to relocation are not increases in production, and those costs have to measured against the long term decline of the trust as well as socialistic costs of incorporating lower trust groups into the society. Trust and homogeneity of high trust, is the most expensive capital to create. And heterogeneity consumes that capital asset – rapidly. The fallacy of the economic benefit of immigration is that there is no cost to norms. If high trust ethics were fully codified in law, then we could enforce high trust ethics at low cost. However, the immigration of low trust peoples has produced precisely the erosion of our constitution and our liberties that the protestants predicted would happen. The majority does not desire liberty. The minority desires liberty. And the aristocratic (noble) minority imposed high trust ethics upon the northern european peoples by force. It was that forcible imposition that caused the high trust society, plus the restoration of science, that resulted in european miracle – the only people to possess liberty. I don’t want to say Caplan is a LIAR, so much as engaged in intentional deception, but he’s no better than the progressives who abuse statistics to tout changes family incomes instead of individual incomes. Its sort of like his arguments as to why he’s not an austrian. They’re just word games. (There is no difference between the argument for prices and incentives. Obverse and Reverse of the same concept.) My purpose is to promote my genes, even at the expense of others genes. If we can cooperate while I do that then that’s fine. But if we cannot cooperate while I do that, then there is no point in cooperation. We all demonstrate our time preference. That’s mine. That’s everyone other than W.E.I.R.D’s – who are demonstrably suicidal. You don’t get to determine what my preference is. Thats totalitarian. If you dictate my preferences that is by definition not a state of liberty. I agree to cooperate if it’s beneficial to my ends, but not if it is not. That is all that can be said. I don’t subscribe to the leftist proposal of Rawls, nor the left libertarian position of open borders. I subscribe to the aristocratic proposal that if cooperation is beneficial to me and mine then we should cooperate, but if it’s not then no. I don’t know what’s libertarian about favoring dysgenics. I mean, why should I squander my earnings through redistribution? Why should I squander my culture’s high trust norms through redistribution? And why should I squander my genes through dysgenic redistribution? I mean, if you’re a libertarian and you claim to have rights to your earnings, then why do you only have rights to your earnings and not the right to your other forms of capital? I can spend my inheritance too. That isn’t an increase in production, that’s just rapid destruction of accumulated capital.