Curt Doolittle

Theme: Agency

  • BELONGING We want to belong to the group. Some of us less or more than others. B

    BELONGING

    We want to belong to the group. Some of us less or more than others. But few of us want to ostracized from it.

    We can that sense of belonging through empathy if we are similar, and duty if we are not. Empathy through shared interpretation. Duty through shared action in pursuit of mutually beneficial ends.

    Women vary less. They sense more. At least, on average, they tend to belong through empathy. Men vary more. They sense less. They are action rather than perception oriented.

    Dominance is the corollary of empathy. We must learn to use our dominance against the physical world, and in defense of life and property, and not as a means of self expression or control of others.

    Misused empathy is just as dangerous as misused dominance. The damage we have done to the world by our supposedly charitable activities is as great as the damage we have done by war.

    We have lost the ancient understanding of our dual natures.

    To cohabitate and to cooperate politically we must master both empathy and dominance in relation to how we possess them.

    And in doing so create belonging by both empathy and duty.

    Source date (UTC): 2012-06-30 07:04:00 UTC

  • The Meaning of “Utility” In The Context Of Philosophical Inquiry

    I keep running into questions over the meaning of ‘utility’. It means only that all actions are in the pursuit of ends. The end might be just the emotional reward that comes from an experience like learning, or a flavor, or the elegance of a composition, or the pleasure of interacting with others. This approach, the analysis of actions and ends, avoids any number of errors in casual philosophizing. Not the least of which is confusing reactions to arbitrary norms with objective truths. Philosophy is a process. It can be constructed an aesthetic religion as if our tastes are a truth rather than a learned response. It can, and usually is, used to construct a religion of norms: a means of coercing others to adopt the same values under the presumption of equality of abilities and desires. It can be used as a means of constructing institutions and processes so that people can cooperate despite having different abilities, desires, and norms. (I’m avoiding the term knowledge and use the term norms, since I break knowledge into aesthetic/experiential, prescriptive/how and propositional/what categories, and it’s communicability into tacit, explicit and normative — which is why our arguments get lost: assuming it’s just one state rathe than a spectrum. Likewise, philosophy can be used to describe the spectrum of ethics from the aesthetic to the personal to the political. But spectra emerge only in the context of action. I am never sure whether the desire to define a philosophical concept as a state rather than a spectrum is a means of coercion — of either the self or others — or as a means for AVOIDING UNDERSTANDING AND AVOIDING ACTION. Which is, for example the purpose of most religions. Hinduism, buddhism and Islam have all succeeded in calcifying because of this error. So I am not relying on ‘utilitarianism’ as an aesethetic philosophy, which Is what I think a few people hear. I’m relying upon action as a means of avoiding errors in reasoning that come from the desire to create states rather than spectra. Where states are largely the regurgitation of static norms, and spectra allow us access to the aesthetic, normative and political. And where my interest is the political, because I do not believe it is possible to create a universal set of norms. Not that anyone cares. But that’s why use or utility is important: as the object of action, where action is a test of our philosophical reasoning, as something other than the coercion of the self or others in order to avoid the problem of gaining knowledge by which to improve our actions, which in turn improve our experiences. Arguably this is a matter of time preference but that’s another topic altogether. – Thanks

  • Mises On Determinism: An Agnostic.

    His argument is that the human mind must determine action or the human creature cannot survive as an acting animal, And the human mind therefore is incapable of seeing the universe as anything other than a sequence of causes. It is a criticism of the tendency of the human mind to err.

    Quote: “It is impossible, … for the human mind to think of any event as uncaused. The concepts of chance and contingency, if properly analyzed, do not refer ultimately to the course of events in the universe. They refer to human knowledge, prevision, and action. They have a praxeological, not an ontological connotation.”

    [callout]The universe cannot observe itself, predict it’s own movements, and construct a plan by which it may alter events. It consists of constant categories. The categories used by human beings are limited only by their desired actions, and their desired actions, in collective permutation, are less limited than those of the physical universe.[/callout]

    In other words, any notion of determinism is an artifact of the human mind. He goes on to give examples of how different fields err. He summarizes by saying we just don’t know whether it is or not, and that we may be prevented from understanding whether it is or not, simply because we cannot conceive of it otherwise. He’s agnostic. He’s not a determinist. He says we just don’t know, and in all the examples that we have tried so far, none of them survive critical analysis. He argues that the use of numerical aggregates and statistics only reinforce that issue. I can see how someone would not understand his argument if they didn’t read it carefully. But his first paragraph makes the entire argument:

    Quote “Whatever the true nature of the universe and of reality may be, man can learn about it only what the logical structure of his mind makes comprehensible to him. Reason, the sole instrument of human science and philosophy, does not convey absolute knowledge and final wisdom. It is vain to speculate about ultimate things. What appears to man’s inquiry as an ultimate given, defying further analysis and reduction to something more fundamental, may or may not appear such to a more perfect intellect. We do not know.”

    He’s an agnostic, not a determinist: “WE DO NOT KNOW.” And any illusion that we can know is a byproduct of the structure of the human mind. Therefore by occam’s razor, it’s more likely that we’re simply WRONG whenever we have deterministic ideas. So Mises was not a determinist. Since his time, we have learned enough, that it is possible to defeat the argument to physical determinism in human action, if not the physical world. What arguments to Determinism that remain, are artifacts of religious mysticism and the structure of our minds. 1) Causality Exists 2) Determinism doesn’t. (Unless there is a god who determines everything.)

    “RE: “Like “Existence”, “Causation” is, as Gian-Carlo Rota might have said, a folie. There is only direction of entropy as measured by gradients of correlation. It is one of those dirty secrets of philosophy of science.” – A Critic

    This view of causality is only true in the abstract, special case of relations in the physical universe which exist independently of human action. When instead, we consider that category of relations which are the result of human action, and where such action requires information necessary to plan, and where such information is of necessity a generalization of the complexity of the physical universe, and as such where a loss of information is necessitated by such acts of generalization, and where such a loss of information is necessary in order to compose an action which will alter the existing course of events using a process of heuristic calculation, where that calculation is made with fragmentary information, and where actions are limited to the possible scope of human actions. Then by necessity causation consists of a set of actions that are observable, and categorically definable both individually, and in the aggregate, by observation of those actions. Actions which produce patterns of outcome which are distinguishable from the entropic limitations of the physical universe. A physical universe to which calculation and aggregation are impossible concepts. The universe cannot observe itself, predict it’s own movements, and construct a plan by which it may alter events. It consists of constant categories. The categories used by human beings are limited only by their desired actions, and their desired actions, in collective permutation, are less limited than those of the physical universe. Anyway, I think I might understand the suggestion that mises was a causal determinist at this point as saying: a) State t1 is the product of prior states tn{..}. b) each state in tn{} is the product of human naming and identity. BUT c) this is not to say that tn{} is complete. d) this is not to say that tn+1 must occur, only that tn+1 can be described by tn+1{…} In this sense, human action is not deterministic, it is however causally determinable. If the question of determinism is metaphysical, then: a) Mises has made no statements to metaphysical determinism, only that humans think in deterministic terms and are incapable of doing otherwise. This is a statement about human beings, not the physical universe. b) If instead of a metaphysical question, it is a question of praxeological action, then all human actions have causes, moreover, all actions are rational (in the broader sense of the term). c) causality is separate from determinacy. That all events have enumerable causes is separate and distinct from the assertion that all causes produce fixed ends. In this sense, the term causal (praxeological) determinism can have meaning separate from Fatalism, Predeterminism, or Predictability, as well as causal (metaphysical) determinism. Mises may have ben a praxeological determinist but not a metaphysical determinist. Clear as mud I’m sure. 🙂

  • Why Are Conservatives Happier?

    Because the reality of imperfect human nature doesn’t trouble them. They don’t want to change the impossible. The universe is not something they struggle with. It’s something to appreciate. They celebrate present goods over future fantasies. They struggle to improve their their family and career, not the lives of others. They break the problem of life into small pieces. Each family doing the yeoman’s labor of creating the smallest tribe possible:the family. And by creating a multitude of those successful small tribes, the greater tribe emerges from the sum of its parts, not the pursuit of an idealistic folly: an attempt to obtain universal homogenous belief in the pursuit of shared feelings, ideas, and goals. The progressive instead, runs on a squirrel cage, attempting to gain consensus from the multitude, never getting there, and feeling frustrated for having failed. Human nature is all but immutable. Our preferences are genetic. They are determined by the difference in mating strategy between the genders and the imprecision of the gender creation process caused by the difference in in-utero concentrations of hormones that enhance or diminish those gender-based emotional biases. Conservatives are happier because they are more successful at life itself. No human can be happy when he struggles against the universe. It is an exercise in perpetual frustration.

  • WHY ARE CONSERVATIVES HAPPIER? Because the reality of imperfect human nature doe

    WHY ARE CONSERVATIVES HAPPIER?

    Because the reality of imperfect human nature doesn’t trouble them. They don’t want to change the impossible. The universe is not something they struggle with. It’s something to appreciate. They celebrate present goods over future fantasies. They struggle to improve their their family and career, not the lives of others. They break the problem of life into small pieces. Each family doing the yeoman’s labor of creating the smallest tribe possible:the family. And by creating a multitude of those successful small tribes, the greater tribe emerges from the sum of its parts, not the pursuit of an idealistic folly: an attempt to obtain universal homogenous belief in the pursuit of shared feelings, ideas, and goals. The progressive instead, runs on a squirrel cage, attempting to gain consensus from the multitude, never getting there, and feeling frustrated for having failed. Human nature is all but immutable. Our preferences are genetic. They are determined by the difference in mating strategy between the genders and the imprecision of the gender creation process caused by the difference in in-utero concentrations of hormones that enhance or diminish those gender-based emotional biases.

    Source date (UTC): 2012-04-16 09:56:00 UTC

  • A Heretical Question? Do Women Have Too Much Power?

    GIVENS: Given that women control access to sex and access to reproduction. Given that women have a different mating strategy from men. Given that women determine the outcome of elections. Given that women prefer anti-liberty policies. Given that in the modern economy women are more easily employable than men. (Or rather, that the distribution of women is heavier in the middle, to the disadvantage of men in the lower two quintiles.) Given that women are financially capable of raising children on their own, and are doing so in record numbers. Given that the only sector in which women do not dominate is in the upper quintile of intellectual ability, and therefore the upper incomes in the private sector. Do women not have both in logic and in practice, the power to effectively enslave men by legislative means? Women evolved in order to manipulate one group of men in order to gain control of another group of men. The agrarian order changed that for a short time. Women evolved to seek the best alpha mates that they could obtain, then use sex to gain the resources and cooperation of beta males, once they have their children. Men could cooperate politically because they only differ in ability. But women differ from men in that they do not seek liberty to succeed in order to obtain access to sex and reproduction. Women already control access to sex and reproduction. So can men and women cooperate in a democratic order if it is possible within that political order to conduct involuntary transfers?

  • A Heretical Question? Do Women Have Too Much Power?

    GIVENS: Given that women control access to sex and access to reproduction. Given that women have a different mating strategy from men. Given that women determine the outcome of elections. Given that women prefer anti-liberty policies. Given that in the modern economy women are more easily employable than men. (Or rather, that the distribution of women is heavier in the middle, to the disadvantage of men in the lower two quintiles.) Given that women are financially capable of raising children on their own, and are doing so in record numbers. Given that the only sector in which women do not dominate is in the upper quintile of intellectual ability, and therefore the upper incomes in the private sector. Do women not have both in logic and in practice, the power to effectively enslave men by legislative means? Women evolved in order to manipulate one group of men in order to gain control of another group of men. The agrarian order changed that for a short time. Women evolved to seek the best alpha mates that they could obtain, then use sex to gain the resources and cooperation of beta males, once they have their children. Men could cooperate politically because they only differ in ability. But women differ from men in that they do not seek liberty to succeed in order to obtain access to sex and reproduction. Women already control access to sex and reproduction. So can men and women cooperate in a democratic order if it is possible within that political order to conduct involuntary transfers?

  • MOTIVATIONS We make arguments to test our ideas. We don’t know if they will succ

    MOTIVATIONS

    We make arguments to test our ideas. We don’t know if they will succeed or not until we make them. And even then, until they’re refuted. The only way to know if you’re argument stands is if you can’t, and others can’t, refute it. All arguments are hypotheses open to refutation. If not, then they are simply tautologies. That’s the only scientific proposition to hold.

    In the sciences we make hypothesis and subject them to scrutiny. That is not true in politics. Where we establish our wants, and then simply argue for them.

    This creates a problem in political discourse, because it is very difficult to tell the difference between hypotheses as requests for criticism, and propaganda as a means of building consensus. The first seeks the truth. The second is purely utilitarian.

    My hypothesis is that prosperity is what we desire. And prosperity is a rarity that is produced by complex circumstances. It can be produced by accident (finding oil). It can be produced by conquest (theft). It can be produced organically (the evolution of certain norms – property, reason and hard work). It can be produced by intention (setting up property rights, investing in education, developing good industrial policy, and creating sound money).

    And prosperity is fragile because of its rarity and complexity. This is the essential principle of conservatism. The only persistent form of prosperity comes from technical innovation. Conquest and resources are not something we can be proud of — they tell us nothing about our actions. The first is a harm, the second is an accident. Neither are virtues. And of the two, only conquest is reproducible. — hence the fall of the islamic empire, and the exhaustion of the roman. And unlike commercial productivity wich is mutually beneficial, in conquest, each gain is someone else’s loss.

    Source date (UTC): 2012-04-13 17:05:00 UTC

  • Analogies are the core of cognition: Hofstadter

    (Thanks to Skye for pointer) RE: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n8m7lFQ3njk&feature=related The attempt to better understand the physical structure of our brains doesn’t seem to have produced anything more useful than the philosophical insight that precise definitions, deduction in its three forms, and the syllogism as a means of comparing those definitions, and the use of analogies in their multitude of forms, are the minimum reducible objects of cognition and calculation by that process we call reason. (Note: here are notes on deduction etc: Section III: Types of Analogical Argument) The major improvement to human cognition have been: First the development of writing and accounting that allow us to communicate an idea consistently, and to perceive and compare what we cannot with our senses alone. And second, the use of statistics to create categories we could not perceive with our senses, and calculus to allow us compare multiple axis of causal properties, both of which draw upon our accumulated record of financial information — information that makes economic assessment, and therefore tests of our moral narratives, finally possible by other than purely philosophical means. But in the end, empirical observation must be reduced to some categorical type which is in itself an analogy — and must be. Because we cannot perceive it by our senses alone.

  • HUMAN ACTION AS A SOLUTION TO PHILOSOPHICAL PROBLEMS OF CAUSATION (Had To Captur

    HUMAN ACTION AS A SOLUTION TO PHILOSOPHICAL PROBLEMS OF CAUSATION

    (Had To Capture This one – although I belabored the middle part a bit)

    RE: “Like “Existence”, “Causation” is, as Gian-Carlo Rota might have said, a folie. There is only direction of entropy as measured by gradients of correlation. It is one of those dirty secrets of philosophy of science.” – A Critic

    This is only true in the abstract, special case of relations in the physical universe which exist independently of human action. When instead, we consider that category of relations which are the result of human action, and where such action requires information necessary to plan, and where such information is of necessity a generalization of the complexity of the physical universe, and as such where a loss of information is necessitated by such acts of generalization, and where such a loss of information is necessary in order to compose an action which will alter the course of events through a process of heuristic calculation, and where actions are limited to the possible scope of human actions, then by necessity causation consists of a set of actions that are observable, and categorically definable both individually, and in the aggregate, by observation of those actions, which because of the information loss aforementioned, produce patterns of outcome which are distinguishable from the entropic limitations of the physical universe to which calculation and aggregation are impossible concepts. The universe cannot observe itself, predict it’s own movements, and construct a plan by which it may alter events. It consists of constant categories. The categories used by human beings are limited only by their desired actions, and their desired actions, in collective permutation, are less limited than those of the physical universe.

    This paragraph, should you care to wade through it, answers the question of causation, and most likely imposes sufficient constraints upon the metaphysical nature of existence, and limits the problem of determinism and free will enough to reduce all problems to solvable problems. Humans must act.

    Science is more simplistic than human cooperation. That is why we solved it first.

    🙂

    Source date (UTC): 2012-04-06 16:24:00 UTC