I'm mostly joking.

10/10

nearly put a hammer through my laptop and murdered my family

They're not wrong. Obviously you need some sensitivity training. The hallways of your school are not The Flood.

Please tell me you aren't fucking serious.

wouldnt a technocracy accomplish the same thing with less room for error?

Only if it were a very minimalist/conservative technocracy.

You can't have experts running all or even most aspects of society and the economy, because it just doesn't work.

Someone humble me plz.

- You're pretty easy to get along with, really. You're amicable and treat others with respect.

- You take your faith way too seriously.

First, genetic engineering limits children’s autonomy to shape their own destinies. Writer Dinesh D’Souza articulates this position in a 2001 National Review Online article: “If parents are able to remake a child’s genetic makeup, they are in a sense writing the genetic instructions that shape his entire life. If my parents give me blue eyes instead of brown eyes, if they make me tall instead of medium height, if they choose a passive over an aggressive personality, their choices will have a direct, lifelong effect on me.” In other words, genetic enhancement is immoral because it artificially molds people’s lives, often pointing their destinies in directions that they themselves would not freely choose. Therefore, it represents a fundamental violation of their rights as human beings.

Well that's an utterly retarded argument so I won't even address it.

Second, some fear that genetic engineering will lead to eugenics [. . .] [Prenatal] testing, combined with abortion-on-demand, has made people with Down syndrome an endangered population…This utilitarian view of life inevitably leads us exactly where the Nazis were creating a master race.

Again, fucking retarded.

A third argument is that genetic engineering will lead to vast social inequalities.

This is essentially the same as the first argument in that it ignores the fact this already happens. People with certain genetic predispositions because insanely more likely to end up in prison or dead. I agree that this could exacerbate the problem, but I'm sure it's no reason to just completely stifle the practice.

I like to know what I'm getting.

10/10

Morality is ambiguously defined, by well-being and by idealism (correct me if I'm wrong). Why can't the idealism be something other than human well-being?

Like what?

All areas of study have to make some sort of "first assumption"--it's the reason all knowledge is, in essence, conjectural. Human well-being may be ambiguous, but it's literally the only thing that makes any possible sense when you're considering what we ought to do as moral agents.

I should say, however, that "human well-being" is--and should be--expanded to the well-being of conscious creatures in general. If, for instance, we knew pigs suffered a lot more than cows we would--and should--have a higher degree of compassion for them.

Quote from: Meta Cognition on January 09, 2015, 12:43:29 PM

Quote from: Korra Valentine on January 09, 2015, 12:40:02 PM

Do me! Do me!

- Fun to talk to.

- But you avoid serious discussions.

I've been told, any suggestions?

Not especially; you can't make yourself be interested in something which doesn't especially interest you. It's not a personality-breaking flaw, of course, so you needn't really worry.

Do me! Do me!

- Fun to talk to.

- But you avoid serious discussions.

And no one of importance was lost.

I'm going to need to properly teach you how morality is objective, one day. Then you'll be able to judge these things without needing an emotional response.

You little quasi-psychopathic scamp you.

Bad qualities:
Maybe a little too confident in your belief system. A little doubt can do a lot of good.

Yeah, I worry about that sometimes. Pretty much any time I change my mind it's due to internal considerations, as opposed to having my mind changed by other people.

I actually want this to be at least semi-constructive, so if you're going to get butthurt about what people say then just don't come into the fucking thread.

For every fault you name for a specific user, you must name also a good quality in them. Also, to prove I'm not just trying to start a shitstorm, you have my express consent to begin with me. I, for the meantime, will hold off against other users until some initial replies have come in.

Again, if you're going to get butthurt: fuck off.

Well shit.

As new details are revealed in the investigation of the Islamic State (ISIS) terror cell in Hevron, security officials estimate that hundreds of Hamas terrorists are leaving the "moderate" terrorist group in favor of ISIS to wage war on Israel - and the Palestinian Authority (PA).

The leader of the Hevron ISIS cell, Ahmed Wadah Salah Shehada (22), admitted under Israel Security Agency (ISA, or Shin Bet) investigation that he switched from Hamas to ISIS in recent years because it was too "moderate" for him, in that Hamas didn't compel Sharia Islamic law, reports Channel 2.

Reportedly the security system assesses that hundreds of other terrorists have made the move to ISIS like Shehada, and are in contact with the terrorist organization through online social media.

"This cell was just the tip of the iceberg," a security source was quoted as saying. "There are terrorists who are tired of Hamas because it is portrayed as moderate and not aggressive and extremist enough against Israel."

He continued "there they see ISIS as an organization that implements the Islamic laws - Sharia. Hamas is under great pressure from this phenomenon which is slowly eating into its power. ISIS is entering into this vacuum."

Indeed, ISIS already reportedly has a foothold in Gaza where it took an active part in last summer's terror war against Israel, and where it claimed a bombing attack on the French Cultural Center last October.

Already as of last October 30 Arab citizens of Israel had reportedly joined ISIS.

ISA has cyber units working around the clock to locate the new ISIS cells online and take them out before they take lethal action against Israeli targets. However, some would argue Israel isn't taking stringent enough counter-measures; an Arab citizen of Israel was given a temporary permit to return to Israel on Wednesday after leaving to join ISIS in Syria.

Recruiting for ISIS in Israel - on Facebook

New details of how ISIS's hold in Israel is being expanded were revealed in the ISA investigation of the terror cell in Hevron that was nabbed last November, details which were recently published.

In investigation, the cell leader Shehada admitted "it started around a year ago. I contacted Al-Nusra Front and ISIS activists through their Facebook pages."

"My intention was to join them in the fighting in Syria, against the (Bashar) Assad regime. After several talks that I had with my friends in Hevron, I decided not to fly there, and (instead) establish an ISIS cell in Hevron," said Shehada.

"Our goal was to establish a cell that would conduct attacks against the IDF and the Palestinian Authority," said Shehada, noting that Israel wasn't the only target. "We understood that Hamas isn't doing the job. We downloaded from the ISIS site posters and pictures and distributed them to residents."

That recruitment also included indoctrination and propaganda through Facebook, he admitted, while noting his cell's goal was to abduct and murder an IDF soldier during the Muslim month of Ramadan.

"The plan was to take (a soldier's) rifle, to hide his body in a water hole and to take his uniform to conduct a shooting attack against soldiers," said Shehada.

He revealed that one night as the three-man cell conducted surveillance runs around Hevron armed with a rope to tie up a soldier, "we saw a soldier who said 'good night' to us, but we went home without abducting him."

Speaking about the switch to Hamas, another cell member said "we believe that ISIS is better than Hamas and the Palestinian Authority, who don't do anything for the residents."

"We held a few meetings in Hevron, with the goal being to acquire rifles and pipe bombs that we could use against soldiers and Palestinian police stations in Bab el-Alzawiya," he said. "We looked at all kinds of websites and learned how to produce pipe bombs."

I really hope this doesn't grow. Moving away from a quasi-nationalistic and towards a hardline Salafist motivation will make it even harder to establish a two-state solution.

singling out Islam was wrong.

Except it wasn't, because I've already told you I'd say the same about any other religion given the right circumstances.

How could I not single out Islam in that conversation? I was talking about a fucking Islamic attack. I'm not going to censor my speech, when it's factually correct, for the sake of sparing some feelings. These people were twisted, horrible individuals no doubt, but that doesn't alter the values and beliefs which motivated them.

I don't hate all Muslims--fuck, I don't even hate Jihadists--and I certainly don't judge Muslims on the basis of their doctrine. But I do dislike religion and its claims, especially Islam and Catholicism, and I recognise that its doctrine can motivate people to do horrible, horrible things. I've already talked about neurocognitive imaging research which has shown how religious (or political) propositions are psychologically equivalent to facts, so it's not just that these groups like ISIS and al-Qaeda are acting as bug-lights for the world's psychopaths--the content of their beliefs is actively damaging.

For instance--Islam is totally off the hook when it comes to stem-cell research. Muslims don't believe the soul is gifted at conception, so they don't oppose so they're not responsible for it. But I don't think anybody would call Christians who oppose stem-cell research "twisted" in the traditional sense, they just have damaging beliefs.

The fact that I was talking about Islamic motivations corresponding to a specific atrocity doesn't mean I "single-out" Islam as I go through my daily life, nor does it mean I refuse to recognise other corrosive motivations like--as you say--power and money and the like.

Lol

What's so funny?