>try to read Zizek >immediately starts using different

>>9275618
So?

>>9275739
It's a fundamental flaw in his writing.

>>9275618
>>9275618

Younger minds typically have the problem of trying to argue with everyone instead of trying to understand them. Understanding must occur prior to argument.

>>9275798
You're meritocrising the age there, buddy.

>>9275821

Young people are also astonishingly sensitive to their lack of knowledge and experience. You learn as you age, thats just how it is my man.

>>9275826
You're still doing it.

>>9275618
>what is continental philosophy

PURE sniff IDEOLOGY

>>9275618

>start reading OP's thread
>immediately begins by portraying himself as a qt anime girl with an endearing facial expression in order to cheaply induce in the reader sympathy for his ideological attack

>>9275974
dude, back the FUCK off. Never insult OP again.

There was a scene in perverts guide to cinema where he's on a boat in the middle of a lake, and instead of saying "I'm lost" he says "I have spontaneously misconstrued directions" That's when I turned off the TV.

>>9275618
>immediately starts using different definitions for common words
This is literally the common thread between most intellectuals in the sphere of communism.
They change the definitions of words so you can't argue with them. It's literally their fucking MO.

>>9275618
>>immediately starts using different definitions for common words
Maybe he's talking about something else than you think he is, if you're not familiar with philosophy, the context of the definitions will be lost to you.

>>9276227
He's using Hegelian definitions, mostly, I think. But it's annoying because, in the sciences, clarity is paramount, but Zizek is more concerned with spinning a tale than explaining his thesis.

>>9275739
>>9275798
>>9275826
>>9275974
>>9276227

>HE'S A COMMIE SO HE IS ALWAYS RIGHT AND EVERYTHING ABOUT IS PERFECT!

grow up

>>9275618
Capitalised nouns are used for emphasis as Concepts in their own right, like Law, Cause, Other, borrowing from psychoanalysis.

Different definitions? I don't see what you mean there.

Misunderstanding scientific theories... If anything he works by analogy, and this is the only way to explain things clearly, scientists themselves are the first to use goofy analogies and they use them all the time in their writing.

Now his prose isn't a work of art and isn't bon mots and it's written in enormous discipline and constancy and at a formal level is very thematically organised. Sorry if his discoursing isn't interesting to you.

>>9276231
>JustSimpletonThings

Zizek is a very likable and funny guy, but my gott he needs to be avoided and so on and so on!

>>9276405
But he's not just a funny guy.

He's to be taken intensely seriously.

>>9276410
>He's to be taken intensely seriously.
I cannot take him seriously, not because him being funny, but because I cannot take his foundations seriously

>>9276420
Something funny or unserious about Hegel and German philosophy and Freud and psychoanalysis to you? Because those are his two foundations (he's said it himself) Way to go dismissing the founders of our intellectual life and history.

>he is this anti-intellectual

>>9276234
>HE'S A COMMIE CULTURAL MARXIST POSTMODERNIST SO HE IS EVIL
nice try /pol/
read adorno

>>9276392
In the introduction of of The Sublime Object of Ideology he invokes string theory, but completely misunderstands it. Sad!

>>9276431
Psychoanalysis was discredited more than half a century ago.

>>9276464
your mom was discredited more than half a century ago

>>9276470
OK, brainlet.

>>9276436
Stop trying to turn me into one of you commie sjw faggots, fucker. Its not gonna work. Capitalism is the only economic system that lets us be free! The harder you work the higher in the system you are, it is perfect!

>>9276461
He simply uses it as an example of a field becoming more and more contrived in order to avoid changing the fundamentals and uses this as an analogy against contemporary social science, that's not even his opinion on string theory, he quotes an established physicist for that view.

Sounds like someone's a little threatened by the pretty in depth preface essay at the beginning of SOI...

>Wtf continentals don't know science
>žižek gives the view of a respected physicist in brief in order to borrow a concept
>wtf!!he can't do that!!

Give me a break.

>>9276461
>Completely misunderstands it
TIL Lee Smolin doesn't know physics but /pol/ does, thanks for this red pill

>>9276464
60PharmaCoins have been deposited into your account.

Thanks for your support.

----- American Psychiatric Association and your friends at Eli Lilly

>>9276493
He didn't quote him, he tried to explain string theory and fucked it up because he doesn't understand the theory at all.
>>9276506
Not everyone who disagrees with you is a boogeyman.
>>9276511
Is this supposed to be an argument in support of psychoanalysis?

>>9276518
Psychoanalysis has been proven in repeated studies to be vastly more effective than any supposedly scientific drug or even CBT; and has a far more rigorous and extensive theoretical corpus and practice than any supposedly scientific psychology. So I don't think you know what you're attacking here, perhaps the popular media caricature of psychoanalysis.

>>9276518
When a discipline is in crisis, attempts are made to change or supplement its theses within the terms of its basic framework – a procedure one might call ‘Ptolemization’ (since when data poured in which clashed with Ptolemy’s earth-centred astronomy, his partisans introduced additional complications to account for the anomalies). But the true ‘Copernican’ revolution takes place when, instead of just adding complications and changing minor premises, the basic framework itself undergoes a transformation. So, when we are dealing with a self-professed ‘scientific revolution’, the question to ask is always: is this truly a Copernican revolution, or merely a Ptolemization of the old paradigm?

Two examples of Ptolemization: there are good reasons to claim that ‘string theory’, which claims to provide the foundations for a unified theory (a single theoretical framework describing the four fundamental interactions between subatomic particles that were previously explained separately by relativity theory or quantum physics), remains an attempt at Ptolemization, and that we are still waiting for a new beginning which will require an even more radical change in the basic presuppositions (something like abandoning time or space as the basic constituent of reality).1 Likewise, in social theory, there are good reasons to claim that all the ‘new paradigm’ proposals about the nature of the contemporary world (that we are entering a post-industrial society, a postmodern society, a risk society, an informational society . . . ) remain so many Ptolemizations of the ‘old paradigm’ of classic sociological models.

Footnotes

See Lee Smolin, The Trouble with Physics, New York: Houghton Mifflin Company 2006.


Woah, SHOCKING!! What a total fraud! You red pilled me on this hack here. How dare he. Žižek just got
B
T
F
O
By this smarmy smartass Anon who supposedly knows String Theory, opened the first page of the preface and couldn't wait to come back to /lit/ to profess your hate for žižek, what an iconoclast you are, destroying such an author by reading only two introductory paragraphs of the first page of the preface to one of his books.

This is what /lit/ has become.

>>9275798
>>9275826

This man is correct.

>>9275618
>Anime
This is like you know a literature board
You guys already have your own board, >>>/his/, faggot.

>>9276563
[citation needed]
>>9276593
>how dare someone show how little muh precious demigogue knows about scientific theory. Anyone who posts here must be as scientifically illiterate as me!

>>9276684
Ok you angsty little faggot, ants in your pants?

>/pol/

>>9276684
Lol, you've got nothing. That anon totally destroyed you

>>9276745
How? One posted a baseless claim and one proved my point. Begone, brainlet.

>>9276753
>Begone, brainlet

>>9276753
Zizek has not given any of his opinions about the inner workings of string theory, rather he talked about the relationship between ST and physics at large.
That's not a misunderstanding of scientific theories, it's about understanding the context in which these theories take place.

>>9276755
>>Begone, brainlet

>>9275618
You just aren't smart enough for philosophy. Don't feel too bad, most STEMlords aren't.

>>9276759
If you think string theory claims to provide the foundations for a unified theory you are misinformed.

>>9276765
It's more a matter of learning a few more definitions of established words and terms. Otherwise it's easy to discern the quainthalf truths and sophistry that make up the bulk of Zizek's "work".

>>9276769
What are you even talking about now? Gone off topic to show off your dilettante knowledge, cretin?

>>9276784
Reread what you c/p'd from Zizek.

>>9276781
Fine enough if you don't like it, so fuck off and don't read him rather than coming here to score Zingers against some random author. Is this autism? Are you 15?

>>9276769
But that's the actual aim of string theory.

>>9276769
If you think that the sky is made of air you are misinformed.

>>9276769
>If you think string theory claims to provide the foundations for a unified theory you are misinformed.
That's exactly what the goal of string theory is. Whether or not is can be said to have achieved that goal is another matter (it hasn't, yet), but the goal of string theory is absolutely a theory of everything.

>>9276791
Why Did You Capitalise Zingers?
>>9276793
Shoo, shoo, brainlet.

>>9276806
>/lit/ wants to be taken seriously when posts like this exist

>>9276812
>you guys are stupid but I won't tell you why

>>9276812
How dare a creative writing and literature board not know the intricacies of physics.

Thinking everybody else shared your interests is a symptom of autism you know.

>>9276815
I wouldn't explain the non-existence of god to a 4 year old, why would I likewise crush you?

>All this teenage autism ITT

>>9276684

you've been exposed as illiterate. yield.

>>9276831
t. brainlet with no understanding of string theory

>>9276823

your projection of an imaginary toddler only serves to expose your insecurity about having a sub-adolescent intellectual life and capacity

>>9276838

i may not be a theoretical physicist, but at least i can read

>a/sci/berger reduced to nothing keeps fighting for superiority on /lit/ and climbs into string theory island as a last resort
>on a literature board
>in a žižek thread

Holy..... I want more

>>9276839
Your deflection of your scientific illiteracy shows your insecurity about your lack of manhood.
>>9276843
No you can't.

>>9276852
Scientists are just too stupid for philosophy. Theoretical physics is the domain of brainlets too stupid for Lacan, Deleuze and Guattari, and the like.

not for nothing but the fact that the anon thinks the intricacies of string theory are at all relevant to zizeks argument in that preface beyond the context of theoretical stagnation generally is a plain example of illiteracy: for perhaps he can parse a sentence or even a paragraph, but he has amply demonstrated that after a few pages his ability to continually expand his comprehension completely breaks down—so he appeals to his wikipedian nuances of string theory and invents "fundamental flaws" in zizek's writing like "invented definitions" to avoid engaging the subject matter that is beyond his grasp.

>>9276852
In a thread about, in part, Zizek's inability to comprehend scientific theories.

>>9276487
>The harder you work the higher in the system you are,
Nothing wrong with this.

And of the proposed system capitalism is the only stable enough, unlike commienism.

>>9276864
More like /sci/ducks' inability to understand Zizek.

>>9276860
>>9276863
>m-muh posturing charlatans are j-j-just too s-smart for you. S-so what if I owe my entire life t-to scientific advances, t-they d-don't tell me about Lacan's Big Other.

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145KB, 646x267px

>>9276864
OK our little Einstein! One day people will care about your string theoretical train sets!

>>9276873
Zizek cared enough to attempt an explanation of it.

>>9276871

i don't owe theoretical physicists shit lol

>>9276870
Maybe Zizek is wrong.
>>9276877
What would you do without gravity?

>>9276871

no one is saying zizek is "too smart." i'm saying that you seem to be illiterate. it's not that anyone is too smart. it's that you're too dumb compared with everyone.

>>9276871
Those "charlatans" will give you a far better understanding of the world than any autistic scientific theory ever will. Scientists are just autistic slaves of global capitalism and should be ridiculed.

>>9276876
Again
>reading comprehension

>>9276887
I think you misread my post, brainlet.
>>9276888
>>>/pol/

>>9276882

are you asking me the practical benefit to my personal life of a semiclassical or quantum mechanical explanation of the force of gravity which will continue to operate without regard to its status as a scientific object? there is none.

>>9276860
>>9276888
False flaggers posing as the science-hating reality denying leftist strawman

>>9276889
Comprehended perfectly. You are wrong.
>>9276898
Autism.

>>9276899

this. let it be known that no one here is crusading against science, only against refusal to comprehend

>>9276902

but anon physicists don't guarantee the existence of gravity! it continues to keep me near the earth with or without them!

>>9276910
Can you read?

>It's a /sci/ /pol/ /v/ r/The_Donald loser wanders into /lit/ episode again

>>9276921
All the boogeymen at once!

>>9276921
We are all /lit/izens retard, this board is too irrelevant to be gate holder for /pol/ or /sci/

>>9276919
>why does STEM trigger so many leftards and sjws, as evident by taking a look at this thread?
STEM isn't bad, scientism is bad. Many scientists are autistic enablers of global capitalism who simultaneously denigrate philosophy as a word game by charlatans with nothing to offer the world. Meanwhile, there is no shortage of charlatans in science, as shown by the existence of string theory, reproduction failures in psychology and biology, and so on.

>>9276938
Stop conflating the scientific method with politics, you identarian autist.

>>9276938
define scientism and why it's bad.

scientific method the base of science is a great, valuable tool for explaining the world and keeps on giving like never ending fountain

>>9276943
>Stop conflating the scientific method with politics, you identarian autist.
Not possible. Everything is political.

>>9276953
That's your autism.

>>9276919
Lack of reading comprehension and autistic sensationalist outbursts might 'trigger' people who actually read books and articles to learn about things rather than 4chan and video games yes.

This little spat is nothing to do with science and everything to do with some low reading comprehension autistic's attempts to bash Le Leftists

>>9276956
Do you support third world immigration into European countries?

>>9276956
>autistic attempts to bash le leftist
holy shit I found the redditor now fuck off

>>9276945
A good example of scientism is when Sam Harris says that there are scientifically correct moral values.

>>9276945
What a corny little simile. Revulting.

>>9276962
>>9276964
*stifles laugh*

>>9276945

The scientific method is great when it comes to science.
What does it tell you about ethics? About how to set a government? About aesthetics?
Nothing, it only gives you more informations that you can use when doing philosophy, but that's it.

Scientism is exactly this: thinking that if it's not science it is not worth talking about, while ignoring that comtemporary science can't give any sort of answer to these questions.
You can wait 1000 years for neuroscience to complete epistemology, or 500 years for technology to solve all those problems that nowaday requires ethics. Too bad that we're in. 2017.

>>9276971
But that isn't scientific, so you can't call it "scientism".

>>9275798
/thread

>>9276977
Nobody claimed science is applicable to the subjective.

>>9276976
>being an actual leftcuck
>identifiying with people like Merkel who are destroying the European continent

Aint much to the racewar traitor

>>9276978
He dismisses any sort of metaphysical foundations, using instead rudimentary neuroscience to justify his claims.

This blind dismissal of neuroscience, without the finesse that a real positivist philosopher could have, can be called scientism. It's basically what dumb redditors and 4channers believe in.

>>9276977
Stfu, scientism-Anon, nobody cares about this lame topic of scientism anymore, back to r/badphilosophy with you!

The only good thing in this thread is how this other guy is giving us all a good laugh.

>>9276988
> believing memes and breitbart propaganda

>>9276990
Positivism died in the fourties.
How can it be scientism when it isn't scientific?

>>9276996
Mass immigration is a tool of big business to hurt workers.

>>9276996
The fuck? Are you a leftcuck that has not listened to a single Merkel press interview where she blabbers about open borders and immigraiton being great for Europe?

Goddamn you people are ridiculous, you dont even need to read right-leaning sources when you can get it directly from Spiegel

>>9277000
>"Scientism is a term used to describe the universal applicability of the scientific method and approach, and the view that empirical science constitutes the most authoritative worldview or the most valuable part of human learning—to the exclusion of other viewpoints."

Here is the definition. Now stop being pedantic.

>>9277000
your reading comprehension sucks. I refuse to explain it to you a third time.

>>9275798
>>9275826
I love you.

>>9277009
Ok, then that isn't what Harris is claiming.
>>9277011
You just don't know what science is.

>>9276994
>still not realizing that virtually everyone, even on this thread, is a slave of scientism

I guess you're part of the herd too.

>>9277006
Your understanding of politics is pretty surface level

>>9277006
>muh leftcucks
The workers of the world have no country. We have no right to tell people that they can't move somewhere to sell their labor, as we are all equally without a country. It's the responsibility of rich countries to take as many immigrants as is environmentally possible and give them a chance at earning a better life, while also actually making them comply with Western laws and not simply giving them a pass for bad behavior.

>>9277018
Do we need more immigrants?

>>9277018
That's your fucking retort after you get called out on being ignorant about Merkel's (and Germany's) own policies?

Might try reading before posting next time, Jamal.

>>9277021
Fuck off, liberal. Nobody is buying your Marxist strawman.

>>9277016
>Ok, then that isn't what Harris is claiming.
It's literally what he's claiming.

>You just don't know what science is.
Scientism is not science. Science is the attempt of channeling science into every field of study, metaphysical ones (such as the already cited morality) included.
At this point your beef is not even semantic, you're just mad about the fact that scientific and scientism sound similar.

>>9277027
>this anon assign no value to the wellbeing of those people only because they were born in another country

>>9277031
>this anon is likely to be a crypto-nazi


I want the old /lit/ back.

>>9277031
Nope, try again. Of course, you'll blame the Jews for everything wrong with your life instead of abolishing capitalism.

>>9277027
>Marxist
>Pro-State when dissolving the State is a crucial part of Communism, as is free association of labor
>Thinking borders exist without a State
?

>>9277030
No, he is not using science. To be a proponent of scientism, as you defined it, he needs to be claiming the superiority of science in all fields. He is not because he isn't using science. Whether he says it is or not.

>>9277016
>that isn't what Harris is claiming

He is claiming the universal applicability of the scientific method and approach.

If he didn't, he wouldn't write a book on how we can have a science of morality.

>>9277040
So bringing in more exploitation is better? That makes no sense.
>>9277041
He is trying to stawman Marxists as pro-immigration, which is not true.

>>9277043
Which is why we call it scientism. Had it used correctly the scientific method we would simply call it science.
You fucking retard.

>>9277045
No he isn't. He claims he his, but what he describes doesn't match.

>>9277041
Capitalism is a great system when not-left-unchecked, but what Merkel and by extension Germanic European Union is doing has nothing to do with capitalism.

>>9277047
>So bringing in more exploitation is better? That makes no sense.

>implying that exploitstion in Nigeria is more lenient than the exploitation in France

I guess there is no difference between literally starving and living a miserable life.

>>9277023
My first post in the thread m8. Of course Merkel would praise immigration, she couldn't do much to stop it when that first wave of "refugees" came. What would you have her do? Leave them in Hungary and Serbia? That leads to a disaster, guaranteed.

>>9277022
No, we need fewer immigrants as far as I´m concerned but that's not the point.
Free movement of capital necessarily brings with it free movement of "labour" (that is, people). Can't have one without the other

>>9277053
What does dragging them into France solve? Nigeria isn't that bad, either.

>>9277055
Should've been stopped by a common unified effort of EU and Europe at the outer borders and ship them with trains and shit to Russian or Turkish borders.

Now my country is paying billions for this crap while our own economy looks like tanking and natives are without job and those natives on welfare get like 2/3 of the support that immigrants (read: welfare immigrants from Africa) get.

It's fucking disgusting.

>>9277060
It massively improves their lives at a minimal cost for French people.

>>9277047
>He is trying to stawman Marxists as pro-immigration, which is not true.
Marxists are pro-immigration. It's not as if Marxists don't recognize that immigration from poor countries decreases wages in rich countries. Marxists advocate abolishing capitalism, where this would be a non-issue because the law of value would cease to hold and wage labor is abolished.

But it's not as if we advocate banning immigration to accelerate capitalism's demise and protect workers from capitalism, and then opening the gates once capitalism is abolished. Similarly, Marxists advocate free trade as being more revolutionary than protectionism, even though no one doubts that free trade has reduced wages for manual laborers in rich countries.

>>9277064
>at a minimal cost.
HAHAHAHASHHAHAHAHH AH AHA H

I mean
AHAHHAHAHAHahAH

>>9277063
>common unified effort of EU and Europe

Hhahahaha

>>9277051
>Capitalism is a great system when not-left-unchecked, but what Merkel and by extension Germanic European Union is doing has nothing to do with capitalism.
The EU has everything to do with capitalism. The EU basically serves to enable German economic domination of Europe. This requires strong international institutions.

>>9277064
Such a minimal cost that the British decided to fuck off from EU, USA went "GET OUT OF HERE" mode, European parliaments ACROSS THE EUROPE are turning more right wing by the day (and elections too), that its the hot topic of every political discussion, that every populist party can get easy support because of it.

the minimal cost of allowing masses and hordes of absolute garbage humans to Europe.

>>9277069
That is the great irony.

>>9277064
So did colonialism.
>>9277065
Resources would be strained once capitalism is abolished, not even mentioning the social cost of replacing the native population.

>>9277071
>EU has everything to do with capitalism.
With a really corrupt version of capitalism, as you clearly point out yourself it has created a self-interest monopoly where it is clearly driving the goals of one nation at the expense of others.

>>9276985

nobody claims that, but a lot of uninformed dolts who don't understand the epistemological limits empirical science and the scientific method WILLINGLY IMPOSE ON THEMSELVES in order to make certain truth claims—when people who don't understand that start making ethical claims based on their second hand understanding of evolutionary psychology or neuroscience, and when ideologues like de Grasse and Dawkins happily reinforce that opinion through their anti-intellectual rhetoric, THEN you have scientism.

>>9277066
>ameritards still think that Europe is a dystopian continent

>>9277075
So we should let people starve re are other ignorant people who will get swayed by these weak arguments?
Refugees brings to Europe more money than what we spend on refugee policies and there are countless studies proving that the majority of jobs taken by immigrants would not be filled by autochthonous citizens.

>>9277086
That's not actually science, so the definition of scientism doesn't fit.

>>9277078
>Resources would be strained once capitalism is abolished
Not really.

>>9277081
Why is the EU any more corrupt than the German state? The German state was insufficient for German capitalism to continue forever. It MUST financially dominate other states. The EU is another form of imperialism.

>>9277078
>So did colonialism.

Fucking /pol/.
I can't stand them anymore.

>>9277093

the whole point of scientism is that it has nothing to do with legitimate scientific practice

My God, that humiliated autist has brought his cronies!

>>9277100
Drop it, he's obviously baiting

>>9277089
We should not let floods of immigrants in. They should've been turned away at every border.

I don't care if they die in Turkey or Russia. I don't want them here.

>>9277104
Wtf I love slavery now

>>9277100
Change the definition, then.

>>9277108

read the post

nuke this thread already mods

>>9277107
Slavery was far more prominent pre-colonial. It was largely abolished by colonial rulers.

>>9277089
>Refugees brings to Europe more money than what we spend on refugee policies

A blatant lie.
>would not be fileld
can't prove a negative.

>>9277094
EU is more corrupt because it's a supranational being that is completely detached from responsibilities and democratic power of the people. Absolute power corrupts absolutely. Do you know, you probably didn't, that EU investigates its own crimes and doesn't allow the Court of Human Rights or anyone external to do it for example? And that hundreds of millions of euros just vanish yearly in its depths without a trace. Like the funding to South Italy in 2012, it was a good couple hundred millions to revive its economy and it fucking poofed without a paper trace.

Plus EU is breaking its own Lisbon treaty every single day they spent doing PPP agreements with banks about financing the collapse of the economy and ECB is breaking its constitution when it allows for funding of private banks so they can buy debt ponds?

It does not even respect its own treaties, the same ones it holds over the nations subscribed to them.

>>9277104
>indians now have some roads, so all the slavery and mass murdering is fine

>>9277114
Read the definition.

>>9277117
<wow people are discussing about things that my little brain cant understand wtf mods nuke the thread pol is scaring me.

fucking close the thread and filter it if it triggers your shit for brains this much

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177KB, 900x920px

>>9275618
>try to read Joyce
>immediately starts using different definitions for common words, misunderstanding scientific theories and applying them to social concepts, and capitalising words that don't need to be capitalised

Holyshit what a hack

>>9277122
There was more slavery and mass murder before European colonialism. Europeans stamped most of it out.

>>9277119
...Centuries later

Am I wrong to think that you're twisting history just a little bit here? What a superb sophism.

>>9277132
Prove it

This thread makes me want to carve out my eyes like Oedipus

>>9277132
[citation needed]

>>9277132
There is more slavery today than during colonialism

>>9277133
Does colonialism begin and end when you say?

>>9277137
A cursory glance at history proves it.

>>9277143
Colonialism has a very clearly defined end point.

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>>9277145
>A cursory glance at history

File: 1408077722244.jpg (62KB, 400x300px) Image search: [Google]

62KB, 400x300px

>>9276234
I think you might be having some kind of delusional episode.

>>9276962
>>9276988
>>9277006

not even an avid /pol/ lyncher but holy fuck you're literally copping it

>um im literally a brainlet that cant argue uhh i know /lit/'s full of 'leftist' right?

>>9277146
And in the time it began and ended slavery was abolished and quality of life increased. It has only ceased since colonialism ended.

>>9277148
If you condemn colonialism you must more fervently condemn pre-colonialism.

>>9277146

>THIS uninformed

>>9277156
You're negating to mention the massive increase in demand for slaves due to European and Arab influence in the region that pre-empted any large scale occupation missions

>>9277161
Duh ok, don't enslave and kill people dudes

>>9277164
Europeans did not enslave, it must be mentioned, unlike Arabs. Europeans only traded slaves and abolished slavery.

>>9277170
Oh horseshit, if you have a shared enterprise in dealing slavers you are responsible. Its like saying Pablo Escobar was only a humble commodities trader

This thread is cancer.

>>9277178
Pablo Escobar did what he was tasked to do by CIA for the benefit of the US government though.

>>9277178
Which is worse, enslaving people or abolishing slavery?

>>9277186
Being responsible for enslaving vast amounts of people is indeed worse than making illegal an activity that would have extremely less rampent had you not profiteered from it in the first place

>>9277202
>capitalism did nothing wrong the people did
nice one

>>9277202
Why would it become more rampent? Tribal wars, where slaves were captured, were all but eradicated once colonialism was in full swing.

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>>9276988
>>9277006
Pro-immigration is a right-wing stance because uneducated immigrants serve as cheap labor for the bourgeoisie.

Any serious leftist (and not big business mouthpiece 'leftist') opposes mass immigration

>>9277208
Are you just going to say no when they try to enter?

>>9277204
I'm not the one who started creating juvenile moral arguments about historic practices, I'm just here to correct the record.

>>9277206
>Why would it become more rampent?

Because there was nowhere near the same economic utility available to African societies for slaves as there were in European plantations, its simple supply and demand.

>>9277208
Pro-immigration can be whatever the fuck wing depending of its use and arguments for it.

>Any SERIOUS LEFTIST
muh no true scottsman

leftist germany is bringing them to Europe, thus you are wrong.

>>9277214
>germany is leftist
germany is pure neoliberalism
or are you one of those ancaps who believe that everything the government does is communism?

>>9277208
>>9277216
Non sequitor, regardless of immigration occuring for the benefit of Capitalists you have to first give a reason to oppose it that doesn't rest on spooks

>>9277210
Yes. And also make an end to this symptomal healing bullshit where we don't deal with the causes of mass immigration. Like, stop fighting proxy wars for oil

>>9277212
But it didn't become more rampent and that's not how supply and demand works.

>>9277220
Lower wages as a result of the flooding of the labor market by immigrants has a direct influence on your material conditions and thus is not a spook. Opposing mass immigration because 'muh niggers' is spooky as fuck though.

>>9277220
is not economically sustainable.
is taking jobs away from native people.
is giving populist right wing parties great power.
they should fix their own countries instead of being welfare immigrants

nobody wants dead, uneducated brain matter to come and leech of their country, if they want, they are enemy of your country

>>9277227
This. Most 'far left' (AKA actually left and not social liberals) parties in Europe oppose immigration and the EU.

>>9277225
>labor market.
LOL. They are not FLOODING labor market. 99% of the immigrants wont get a fucking job. They will come and leech of whatever they can from the public welfare system.

And they create a lot of crime, see Sweden the rape capital of Europe with fucking grenade attacks being a top trending thing.

>>9277223
>that's not how supply and demand works.

How dense are you? Europeans increased the demand for slaves and then those who produced the slaves will increased the supply, what about this equation is confusing for you?

>>9277221
But then oil prices will rise. How do you deal with that?

>>9277234
Read a supply and demand chart for once.
That isn't even how it worked, because no one ever increased the supply of slaves.

>>9277225
>>9277227
Even accepting the notion that immigration lowers wages and doesn't lead to economic growth, that doesn't make it an essential Leftist position but a position out of mere immediate personal interest

>>9277236
Bomb the living shit out of Saudi Arabia and put men on the ground and stop oil coercion by them.

ez.

>>9277230
No, workers parties oppose immigration. Leftists don't give a fuck about workers.

>>9277249
>leftiest don't give a fuck about worker.s
this. see for example Clinton 2016 campaign where she took shit on the workers by parading the facts that 10% of people in US would lose jobs.

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>>9277238
>Read a supply and demand chart for once.

Wrong.

>because no one ever increased the supply of slaves.

Again citation needed. The fact all these slaves were being bought for a new market indicates they did

>>9277255
The supply of slaves was already high enough. Slavery was rampent in pre-colonial territories.
You made that yourself? It's wrong.

>>9277232
>Schrödinger's immigrant: simultaneously taking your job and leeching off welfare
eitherway you will NEVER EVER blame the capitalist urging politicians to reel these people in
>made up shit about Sweden
Stop reading the daily mail. Sweden's rape statistics are so high cause they have the broadest definition of rape in the world, look it up. A woman who has had sex with her husband 100s of times can suddenly decide afterwards it was rape anyway and all those incidents are counted separately instead of one like in most countries. Touching strangers on the street=rape. This definition is because Sweden has been drinking the feminism kool-aid too much. Why don't you blame feminism instead?

>>9277249
Worker's parties are leftist.

>>9277251
>Clinton is leftist
Let me guess, you're an american? Democrats have the same economic policy as the republicans but drown themselves in identity politics to create a false dichotomy between the two parties. FDR was the last 'leftist' president, and even that is stretching it.

>>9277259
I see absolutely no reason why you would assume the supply of slaves had already reached maximum potential by the time Europeans entered the market. Again where's the numbers buddy

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>>9276593
Kek anon will NEVER recover from this.

>>9277260
You can leech welfare without a job or with a job. You can also go to work and not leech welfare. . Are you pretending to be stupid?

>Made up shit about Sweden.
lmao, PLEASE, fucking KYS yourself stupid shit.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_grenade_attacks_in_Sweden

Also you'd have a point with the Sweden rape definition if the same statistics wouldn't match with Finland's capital (Helsinki) and Oslo.

Fucking dumbshit.

Your precious dumb as shit jobless, uneducated people bring economic instability and crime. And increase of power for populist parties. There's no benefit unless you are great german capitalist firm

>>9277255
You're baselessly assuming that is what the supply chart of slaves looked like
Not saying it isn't, but that picture proves nothing

>>9277267
Enslavement of natives was not practiced by Europeans, they did not increase the supply of slaves.

>>9277271
I provided it only because the other Anon erroniously claimed I had a misunderstanding of how Supply and Demand charts work in abstract for which I demonstrated for this situation.
I'm well aware its not exact representation of historical reality

>>9277260
Then why would leftists support immigration? It only hurts workers.

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>>9277275
Right I'm done talking to you, I have an 80 IQ minimum bar for who I try to educate. Have a nice day mate.

>>9277276
The supply line could be highly inelastic

>>9277278
Because they aren't leftists. They're bourgs putting on a mask of identity politics to wreck workers. The labor movement has been in ruins since the 70s because of these cunts.

>>9277280
Then don't go to Africa, the average IQ is in the mid 70s or lower.

>>9277282
Naturally but I think the scale of how many slaves were transported would suggest that it was at the very least not completely inelestic as has been suggested

>>9277290
What percentage of the population was transported?

>>9277280

Tough talk for an Australian.

>>9277296
No idea, I doubt such a number could be discernable in any confidence

>>9277300
How many slaves were transported, then?

>>9277278
Factually, the only thing that hurts workers is capitalist control of the economy.

>>9277304
Factually, mass immigration hurts workers in a multitude of ways.

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>>9277255
You could just as easily make the argument that this is good for slaves since large numbers of them were being enslaved before Europeans ever got involved

>>9277308
Factually, any economy controlled by the working class benefits the working class from a surplus of workers in a multitude of ways.

>>9277303
That we can know in far accurately due to the records, at least 12 million people survived the journey accross the Atlantic itself

>>9277314
If it's controlled by the working class then everyone is working class. Immigrants bring crime and harm social bonds.

>>9277309
>You could just as easily make the argument that this is good for slaves since large numbers of them were being enslaved before Europeans ever got involved

I have no idea what unorthodox conception of reality you're basing such a proposition on

>>9277317
Oh, you mean America? They were all purchased from tribal leaders. They were already slaves. I thought you were referring to the time when slaves were more sparse.

>>9276392
Not that I have a problem with the use of analogy, especially in Continental philosophy, but as a STEMfag, I can definitively say that it is almost never used is academic scientific writing. I'm afraid you're confusing popsci/science journalism with actual science.

>>9277327
Again you're just completely ignoring what should be a straightfoward assumption that a sudden massive market opening up for slaves would not lead to Warlords gathering more slaves to sell them.
Its not like there was 12 million slaves just sitting around when White people bought them at once.

>>9277337
There were a lot of slaves around, actually, generations worth across wide areas with many tribes. 12 million is plausible.

>>9277318
>If it's controlled by the working class then everyone is working class.
Not at first, but eventually yes. First the working class must oppress the former class, seize their property, transfer it to the commons, and reform the former bourgeoisie into workers.

>Immigrants bring crime
Under the conditions of capitalism immigrants are encouraged to take up economic opportunities that aren't afforded to them in the legal economy. Realize that crime is a word meaning unsanctioned business. Again, an economy controlled by the working class doesn't have this problem. Only capitalists benefit from an unorganized and dis-unified ("competitive") workforce.

>and harm social bonds.
Immigrant populations tend to be insular for a number of reasons so, no, they don't. Hmm, I wonder who's behind this post.

>>9276436
thank you to confirm my theory. op made a stylistic and structural critique to zizek and you went after le alt right boogeyman.
consider suicide

>>9277343
If thats the lengths you want to go through to imagine a world in which Europeans didn't do anything wrong more power to you brother but I don't see cultures with only primitive aggricultural economies at best being able to support such a number of coerced labor

>>9277347
immigrant populations are insular and thus for ghetthos as evidenced by Malmö, some Netherland shit hole towns, and German city parts that are completely ridden with crime.

thus harming social bonds in their respective areas.

>inb4 ahbloo ahbgloo because stupid faggot wont go and use google himself
even wikileaks had this shit on record from DNC

>>9277347
Once workers take over they are, by definition, no longer bourgeoisie.
Africa seemed like a very violent place before capitalism. Maybe they're naturally inclined towards violence.
They group together based on similar characteristics, namely race.

>>9277343
Look, no one (at least based on skimming this conversation) is saying that slavery never existed prior to the slave trade. The point is that the slave trade made the seizure of persons into a very viable venture. Where is the source showing that everyone traded was in fact a slave prior to being sold by local traders?

>>9277360
Why do you assume Europeans are evil?

>>9277363
It was already a very viable venture prior to Europeans.

Europeans just took them away from the shit hole to the New World.

They should be considered saviors if anything.

>>9277366
WHITE PEOPLE
TOO POWERFUL

EVIL

>>9277363
How was it more valuable than before? It was a consequence of war.

>>9277369
>How was it more valuable than before?

Because Africans didn't have giant cotton plantations to utilize slaves on.
Do you not realize the amount of technology, investment and effort that needs to be involved in forcing huge amounts of people to work for you without them killing you in your sleep?

> It was a consequence of war.

Wars are often fought on the basis of profit or potential loss at stake. More prizes to be gained from war means more war.

>>9277386
They still had the utility of slave workers. It seemed to work for them.
Wars to them were for territory, slaves, and women. You're looking at this from a European perspective.

The idiot claiming that string theory doesn't want to be a theory of everything is plainly wrong. But Zizek is also wrong in lambasting string theory (and, yes, I also think Smolin is wrong). Anybody who knows anything about mathematics will agree that the enormity of the Langlands program, when translated over properly to physics, can do nothing but serve as the foundations of a great unifying theory, finishing the deciphering of the "Rosetta stone" upon which Andre Weil worked years ago. It must be so, because of how beautiful and all encompassing the Langlands conjectures are.

>>9277394
>Wars to them were for territory, slaves, and women.

Yeah and do the math, if you fund more soldiers to fight for you with the money gained from slaves you can gain more of all three. The sudden rise of massive warbands like the Zulu are known to be a product of the distabilization of the balance of power in Africa.

>>9277362
>Once workers take over they are, by definition, no longer bourgeoisie.
This depends on what you mean by "once they take over". As in, once the working class has full control of society and have dissolved all classes, then sure. If you mean the initial seizure of the means of production and the process to get to the point of dissolving all class relations, then no. Previous examples show, I think, that class conflict persists in the process.

>>9277369
I'll respond to this since it's actually a well stated question.

The African societies of this period didn't function on the scale or kind of economics Europeans had developed. We actually can see the same development in the Americas: a preexisting institution of slavery transforms via the force of a new market. Slavery as a consequence of war is different from slavery as a consequence of trade. The former is based on glory, subjugation, inner social relations (having a slave from another tribe/group means I'm powerful in battle and it raises my standing in society, for example). One can trade slaves with this understanding but the return is minor (clothing, goods, animals, a woman). Europeans could however supply what to them is a much larger payoff. The incentive then is to form large scale hunting parties for slaves /completely outside/ of warfare. If there is some evidence to the contrary, that a significant number of slaves being traded to Europeans were in fact slaves prior to being trades, I'd like to see it.

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>>9277397
>It must be so
>because of how beautiful and all encompassing the Langlands conjectures are.

Geocentrism was beautiful and all encompassing at one time.

>>9277093
How can you be this retarded. I'm not even one of the anti-science posters in here - my undergrad was in math and philosophy. Scientism isn't the same thing as science, it's a philosophical and ideological position regarding the significance and applicability of scientific discourse to philosophical and cultural issues and topics.

>>9277408
Which Harris isn't trying to do, because what he tries to apply to culture and philosophy is not science.

>>9277419
He believes it is however

>>9277423
If I thought my mortar was milk it wouldn't make it so.

>>9277426
To you it would though

>Thread about Zizek's punctuation goes through the colonialism done by Europe, the slave trade done by Europe-Africa-USA and the modern socio-political climate of European democracies.

ok? nice.

>>9277427
No it wouldn't, as those are physical things which are defined independently of my perception.

>>9277156
Well, when slavery ended in my country at least (I'm brazilian, one of the countries which had most slave trade if not THE most, idk), quality of life only improved for the old slavelords who could now have immigrants as quasi-slaves while also relegating their completely uneducated slaves, some of which could barely speak portuguese, to slums and homelesness.

>>9277401
So it's a stalemate, then. No evidence either way.

>>9277443
>Brazil.
can you go to favela and just buy AK in there?

>>9277404
Obviously it's deeper than that. But I can't communicate the enormity of the Langlands conjecture or indicate to you how much evidence has been amassing in their favor without writing pages, pages, pages -- it's literally impossible. Every mathematician will tell you the same thing, look it up if you don't believe me, but you'll also never find a short explanation of them, because none exists.

Technical people might also be interested in https://plus.google.com/105310723317889913825/posts/E51JTSCgLwB and http://www.ams.org/notices/200503/fea-weil.pdf

>>9277438
Yeah but to you it would be so by definition of thinking of it as such. As much as you will be prone to be corrected

>>9277448
Not were I live (Belo Horizonte, which is the third or fourth bigger capital), most bandits use shit revolvers (which you can, indeed, buy for cheap) or actual pistols if they're bad enough (which are either expensive or sold without ammo, which will be expensive).

If you guys wanna check how favelas came to be, check out the Slum, by Aluisio de Azevedo.

>>9277461
I'm sure you're conception of it is correct but that still doesn't warrent speaking of it as necessity

>>9277462
But it IS not milk, it IS mortar. I do not define these things, they are pre-defined by external forces.

>read a continental
>he's an obscurantist
Wow, who could have known.....

>>9277464
Ive watched City of God and both Tropa De Elite films. Any more like them?

>>9277491
Sort of, there's plenty of "realist" cinema but lots of it are really bad, you should look into Pixote if you want more social denounce shit, but my top 3 brazilian movies are Deus e o Diabo na Terra do Sol, Macunaíma and O Auto da Compadecida (last two of them are also very good books).

Now, for those people claiming that literally everyone who ever got enslaved by europeans was already a slave:
Why the fuck would them wait until they were on the ships or even in the fucking Americas to suicide or go on hunger strikes or whatever?

Perhaps, not only you're operating on very false assumptions, you're also conflating the regime of slavery enforced by colonial powers with different regimes of slavery enforced by tribal societies.

There have been plenty of different slavery regimes (two that come to mind are the roman and the pirate caliphs) which aimed to integrate slaves at least partially integrate the slave in society, which is something american slavers not only ignored, they actively opposed.

>>9277478
>obscurantist

He's not though

>>9277506
ty. for the film and book suggestions.

>>9277446
Not at all, the understanding is that the slave trade did generate a surplus of slave capturing to accommodate high European demand. The onus is on yourself to prove that the market always before European trade opened. The sheer scale of the TAST at this prime alone (nevermind its significant timeline) puts doubt on your claims, which necessarily assumes that Africa had a gigantic already existing chattel (as opposed to indentured) slave population that simply transfers from African to European ownership.

>>9277524
>Not at all, the understanding is that the slave trade did generate a surplus of slave capturing to accommodate high European demand
No it isn't. Cite a source.

>>9277517
You're welcome m8, I'm not a huge fan of a lot of brazilian art but as far as I care, our cinema is top notch

>>9277208

Oh, hey, look at the WSWS.org faggot.

>>9277543
>No it isn't.
You insist, and yet you yourself say you have no basis on which to prove it. During their debates on the abolition of slavery (early 1800s, records still exist) it was a matter as to whether this was the case. Proponents of slavery (the ones that benefited from it) were adamant that they didn't create an immoral market, but the court itself disagreed. It was well understood that it's ideologically important to maintain that Europeans simply stumbled into something already existing and never affected it in any way, but, again, this is a bizarre argument when they made the seaboard of an entire continent and much of its islands into slave-powered colonies, which has a scale of impossible relation to anything existing in the Mediterranean or West Asia.

You can't have the cake and eat it too.

>>9277611
And by "their debates" I mean the British.

>>9277611
Even once you get the "african slavers" you have A) a largely mulatto population and B) one that's armed with modern weaponry by europeans against tribes with spears and bows.

But no, white people never did anything wrong through all of history.

>>9275618

Obscurantism has become the norm. Whereas math bends over backwards trying to clarify itself and be understood by discussing the various effects of different notation and such, some philosophers do not care about such things and are happy to leave unrefined unclear sentences.

>>9277611
Far from slave powered colonies, as by the time they were established slavery was abolished.

>>9277695
What are you talking about? Even if we're only going to talk about the British involvement in the Transatlantic, we're still talking about 1602-1843: 241 years of colonization, during which time slavery was legal. Even if you ONLY want to talk about slave trade, that's still up to 1807. What do you think Africans were doing in these colonies all this time? Obviously this is post-colonial, but why in hell would the Americans fight a civil war if they hadn't already established some time ago the vital importance of slavery to their economy?

>>9279140
The colonies were never really established until the mid 18th century, which was when the slave trade picked up.

>>9277362
>Africa seemed like a very violent place before capitalism

Any good books or resources on this? Because I can barely find a course on Africa before capitalism in a large university history department, and even people I know who are history experts for every other field know shit about this region & time period. Partly because so little was written down and we genuinely don't know very much. A lot of people seem to have a lot of assumptions about it though.

>>9279380
>by the time the colonies were established slavery was abolished
>The colonies were never really established until the slave trade picked up.

Stop

>>9279524
Depends on the colonial power you refer to.

>>9275618
>I don't understand Zizek so it must be Zizek that's dumb right guise, not me though I'm smart

>>9275618
Used to be, and to some extent still am, a big fan of Zizek. I typically take everything he says for granted and he has really informed and helped cultivate my reading of philosophy over the past few years. However, I've always had this sneaking suspicion with his usage of Lacan. Like, when Zizek seems to find himself in new theoretical territory or whatever, he dogmatically inserts Lacan to explain things. I know this is his whole shtick and all, and he would be the first to admit he is a 'card-carrying Lacanian,' but I feel this limits his position and he remains in a kind of, what Derrida would call, a 'metaphysics of language.'

In some recent and past lectures that I've watched on YouTube, Zizek always seems to mention a need to 'go beyond' the transcendentalism that contemporary philosophy seems to be stuck in, his typical example always being Heidegger's transcendentalism. I'm thinking more and more that Zizek's own attachment to Lacan is keeping him from making this very same 'move beyond.'

>>9280200
Yeah, so Zizek's misunderstanding of scientific theories is my fault now?

>>9276684
>Demigogue
Is this a play on words or stupidity?

>>9277093
This guy was best bait ITT
Subtle but persevering, I like it

>>9277430
He would be proud

>>9277565
I'm glad you suggested actual literature since we're in /lit/ but some /his/ books would also help immensely.
What's your take on the cinema novo?

>>9281297
I'm using the Jonesian definition of demigogue, actually. Learn the definitions before you post.

>>9281481
Lmao

>>9275826
I disagree with what you wrote, but you wrote it so beautifully and shut that anon down that i have to express my admiration.