Are Skeptics Shitcunts?

>>9247508

Not sure where he was going with that stuff about Descartes but I don't completely disagree with the first part. If somebody is gonna be a stickler about how I use my time, I have to admit that not every philosophical idea I've ever grappled with has practical value, or at least the practical value wasn't apparent to me. Sometimes philosophy really is just mental masturbation. I'm not convinced that this is some terrible thing for philosophy, but it's a reasonable criticism

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>>9247577
Cookie-cutter response desu

>>9247508
Why would anyone care to improve your shitty life?

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>>9247648

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>>9247709

>>9247508
>Descartes
>Scepticism
No.

>Let's say there's a demon, which is 50% (for there is none and there is one)

Woah... really makes you think.

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>>9247764

>>9247508
>writing an essay to ``prove'' deliberating on x is a ``waste of time''

>>9247508
>a teacher had to read that essay

I'm feeling bad for him.

>>9247577
Why do you think a "practical" line of thought is better than an "unpractical" one?

>>9248299

I can convince myself that knowledge for the sake of knowledge is meaningless, but I can't convince myself that technology, infrastructure, social skills, and other more concrete areas of inquiry are also meaningless. They are directly relevant to my daily life.

Knowledge for the sake of knowledge might be a worthy goal too but there's at least some doubt about that for me.

I think a better line of polemical, ad hominem argument against skeptics is that historically they've invariably ended up defending plain old dogma. The Pyrrhonians, from their conclusion that nothing can be known for sure, decided that the most virtuous path is just to "go with the flow" and let things happen as they may. Descartes supposedly went down to solely the things that could not be doubted and from there he derived as certain all the things that everyone already believed anyway. It's just a historical fact that skepticism is reactionary.

>>9247508
The irritating thing about this skepticism is it assumes some things are more practical than others but doesn't admit to a huge host of biases and assumptions inherent in this worldview of theirs.

For instance, the belief that material progress is the only progress, that all humans need to be altruistic or something has to be explicitly serving humanity by creating technology or contributing to the economy etc. to have worth, that happiness is based on things like
-food
-technology
-infrastructure
-and everything that might be seen as contributing to a high standard of life
and that if one has a life full of happiness from these, one's life is inherently worthy and meaningful.

In fact, such a materialistically happy life creates human vegetables as opposed to human-humans. But then, you can't claim skeptical/rationalistic "human" vegetables for being that way, they simply are.

>>9248413
>you can't claim skeptical
blame, not claim, my mistake

I'm not sure what any of this has to do with literature, but...

>>9248413
What does that have to do with skepticism? Is there a new definition of skeptics people use? I'm kinda out of the loop culture-wise, but it sounds like you're describing consumerism and saying it's what skeptics advocate. Skepticism is just questioning things. I'm confused.

>>9248434
I mean the nu-atheism/scientism/rationalism/"skepticism" complex. Questioning things is generally good if done in the right way, of course.

>>9248557
What is the right way, and what is the wrong way?

>>9248573
the right way: approaching philosophy with intellectual humility and an eagerness to learn, while maintaining a critical eye and ear to be able to discern rhetoric from substance.

the wrong way: "hurr durr you can't PROVE that" *invents a ridiculous hypothetical scenario* "just like you can't PROVE this isn't the case!" *sticks head in sand*

>>9248363
Actually a good response, thanks anon.

>>9248615
Except new atheists like Dan Dennett and Sam Harris try to explain consciousness - the most unexplainable problem imo

There is one little trick about the aggregates that might cause misunderstandings. They can be seen in 2 ways:

Consciousness + namarupa = contact. From contact we get: feeling, volition, perception. These 3 depend on contact.

But we know that feeling, volition, perception are part of the "nama" from namarupa. This is because consciousness can be consciouss of all the 5 aggregates, including consciousness itself.

From a technical point of view, feeling-perception-volition technically depend on contact between consciousness and namarupa.(witch includes them in "name") But things do not happen in a cronological order because the 5 aggregates exist at the same time since beginingless times. It is more like descring how an engine already built functions, not like how an engine is built in a chronological order.

In a way we can say that consciousness + the other 4 aggregates = contact, on witch 3 of these "other 4" aggregates depend on.

Aggregates can be described in multiple ways because they are like an engine already built. We see interactions between them described in different ways in the suttas.

In my opinion, what is important is to get the idea about no-self by seen how this "sense of self" is just a phenomenon, a feeling, a thing that has arisen in that moment based on conditions. Like the smoke produced by a car, or a new window that popped up on a computer screen, or the sound produced by a musical instrument. One of my favorite suttas is about this feeling of "this body is mine" that arises at a particular moment been just a feeling, just a phenomenon arisen like the sound from a musical instrument dependent on conditions present at that particular time. (like being human, attention directed at that in that particular moment etc. ) If someone would say "enough with the instrument, bring me just the sound" that would be impossible.
The main idea about the aggregates is not to get ultra-technical (like abbhidhama tries to do most of the time with everything and fail) but to get the idea, to get familiar with how the complicated instrument/machine works so we can eventually understand how a particular feeling that has arisen such as "this thought is my thought" is just like the sound of an instrument arisen dependent on conditions. It is not "my thought" any more than a window popping on a computer is "mine" or the branches and leaves scattered in a forest. (to quote suttas). That feeling of something being mine is just a feeling dependently arisen like a window popping up on a computer.

>>9247737
>what is Cartesian doubt

>>9248323
I'm pretty sure that the modern level of technological development didn't come to be because of people who were only satisfied to think of what is practical. By what standards do you determine which truth is inherently more worthy of knowing than another?

>>9250513
Ha.
Descartes doesn't doubt shit. He's a Christian all along. Reread it and think critically this time