I want to apologize at the top for the both length of this, we’ll settle on ‘piece,’ as well as my behavior before. I said a lot of things in rude ways that I regret. I think it’s obvious that we disagree on a lot of things, not least of all being the ways it’s appropriate to have conversations on the internet. I do, however, regret that that got in the way of what I thought was a very important conversation, and am genuinely sorry that my lack of restraint cost our ability to have it.

I am saying this for clarity’s sake so that you know where I’m coming from; I think the actual disagreement that we have is about what “why people think the things that they do” even means. You seem, again, I’m just telling you where I’m coming from not accusing you of a great moral or intellectual failing, to want to skip over the logic brain part of the equation and get to where the vibes are different. This is a philosophical difference, and one that, frankly, I think comes from ignorance in the field. For me, I don’t think that vibes matter more than reasoning from reasonable presuppositions, all of which necessarily trace back to metaphysics. If the God of the bible is real, that necessarily informs ethical systems, and the way that I feel about that doesn’t matter. If He is not and there are no metaphysics and the world is only composed of the matter inside of it, that also necessarily informs every subsequent philosophical position. Both of these answers to the question of what even is this thing necessarily inform every other possible philosophical question that you or I could ever have or want to answer. The reason that this matters is because I think that these philosophical positions, whether closely examined by yourself or not, inform the things that you think matter. And I think that we disagree about a lot of the underlying philosophy.

Making educated guesses based on past interactions, not accusing you of any kind of moral or intellectual failing, my guess is that you are a materialist, meaning the world is only the matter inside of it, emotivist, which is essentially the position that there is no objective morality, but that the way people feel about things in aggregate is sufficient for an internally coherent, consistent ethical system. As well as what I would call a soft-hedonist, which is essentially the position that the way that people feel is the most important thing for them.

Again, though, not accusing you of any kind of failing, I think that you would reject those labels because you don’t like labels. The reason I say all of that, however, is because I think that these are the disagreements that matter. I, obviously, do not hold any of those positions, for which I have good reasons, all of which are fundamental philosophy. Which is why I am always bringing them up, because the philosophy literally is the justification for me. I do not read a philosophical text and think about whether it comports with the kind of vibes I would prefer my life to have. I assess whether they make a good argument about why they are true or not, and if I’m convinced that they’re true, I simply treat them as such. I am certain that a case could be made that I only think that that’s what I’m doing and that actually my truth-judgement is based on preexisting vibe-preferences. But I think that that is an unfalsifiable and circular argument. And yet nonetheless, the one that we disagree on, as far as I can tell. Meaning: that the way the peoples’ brains work is more important than the things they believe. Which I am not accusing you of as some kind of malicious snipe, but rather, an honest assessment of where I think that you’re coming from so that you know and can correct me if I’m wrong, as well as, hopefully, an honest assessment of where I am coming from, so that you can, again, assess the differences for yourself.

To put it more simply: My opinions flow from my philosophy, which flows from things that I believe to be true. If you want to know my opinion, my opinion does not need to be sussed out through a series of vague questions, I can just tell you, and then I can tell you my philosophical justification for it. The vibes that I would prefer do not enter into whether or not I think something is good. I actually think that some of the vibes that I prefer are bad, and so I don’t act on them. Which is why it is frustrating for you to continually insist on only talking about the way that I feel, or the ‘gut answers’ to questions. Because the entire premise of literally my entire life is that I can actually reason to better answers that it is more important to live by than the first answer to a question that my brain can come up with, or even the answer that my brain would prefer to be the case.

And moreover, if you are going to change my opinion, you need to demonstrate that it does not comport with the underlying philosophy, or that the philosophy does not comport with the truth, or that the thing I think is true is not true. This is going to be basically impossible in conversation, however, especially with someone who is not knowledgeable in the field, because I have already spent a lot of time familiarizing myself with the arguments around the things I believe.

And this, actually, is why changing opinions in conversations basically never happens at all, because it’s not just me that has spent a lot more time outside of the conversation figuring out why I should think the things that I do, it’s literally everyone, yourself included. Do I feel like I am in a better place to critique and analyze opinions because I am more familiar with the underlying philosophy than pretty much everyone else in the cord? Yes. Because one of the very first suppositions of my philosophy is that not all philosophical positions are equally valid. The ones that are justified with logical coherence, and consistency with the real world, are more valid than those that do not. This is, of course, informed by even further back philosophical beliefs, like the law of non-contradiction, but I somehow doubt that the things we disagree about are the laws of logic.

All of that is to say, that if someone is convinced by bad philosophy, I’m going to tell them why their philosophy is bad. Which I think yours is.

My suspicion though is that the disagreements about “why people think the things that they do” might actually boil down even more though, to your framing of disagreements as fundamentally unpalatable. I also don’t want to frame conversations as having winners and losers, man! But I also think it’s 100% OK for conversations to end having not arrived at something that we, to quote no one in particular, “more importantly,” agree on. I actually think, despite what I suspect you think, that the discussion about the ICE shooting was productive and did succeed at the goal of collaborating with friends to build something between people who disagree. I think that Sempar, Derpy, Plissken, and I, actually did make it much more clear where all of us agreed and disagreed, and even actually moved one another around within our respective windows to the degree to which that was possible in the first place. And moreover, I think that at large, the discussions that I participate in with people who are willing to be wrong, mostly derpy, do actually succeed in moving our opinions around. Despite what he’s going to claim, I think that I have actually made him reconsider some things and softened his stance over time. And he’s done the same for me, though frankly I suspect to less of a degree. Which I do not say in order to accuse him of intellectual ineptitude, but rather, as an honest assessment of his success in the face of my having spent, not a brag to up myself, just an honest assessment: a lot more time thinking and learning about the entire chain of belief from metaphysics all the way up to the top.

So frankly, if impassioned disagreement isn’t your thing, which again I am not accusing you of as some kind of intellectual failing, and I think you would agree that you readily admit to in your post, why insert yourself into the conversation? There are loads and loads and loads of people in the cord who don’t talk about things they know they don’t like. Frankly, I think that it’s rude and disrespectful to insist on conversations having their fundamental fabric changed because of something that you admit to not wanting to participate in.

Except that I think that you, like me, think that what you’re doing is good and right because you value, again not accusing you of this as some kind of failing, being nice to people more than basically anything else. Which again is nice and noble and polite, but frankly, is not something that I can get behind, based on, going back to the top, philosophical differences. Again, I suspect that your behavior is based on underlying philosophical beliefs that simply do not comport with mine. Namely, I believe that there are things, that if they are true, are more important than the way that people feel about them. And that knowing what those things are is also more important than the way that people feel about them. And I don’t think that you agree with that. Not as some kind of gotcha that makes it easier to dunk on you, but as an honest assessment of where you are philosophically based on your words and actions.

And to illustrate why I believe this, I want to look at Socrates’ Apology,(I bring this up because it is highly poignant as the trial and reflections of a lifelong philosopher who, and is on trial for, and is eventually put to death for, operating in the vein that I think you would agree you aspire to, and I know that I certainly do) when he says that the unexamined life is not worth living,

Someone will say: Yes, Socrates, but cannot you hold your tongue, and then you may go into a foreign city, and no one will interfere with you? Now I have great difficulty in making you understand my answer to this. For if I tell you that this would be a disobedience to a divine command, and therefore that I cannot hold my tongue, you will not believe that I am serious; and if I say again that the greatest good of man is daily to converse about virtue, and all that concerning which you hear me examining myself and others, and that the life which is unexamined is not worth living – that you are still less likely to believe. And yet what I say is true, although a thing of which it is hard for me to persuade you.

One could read this and come away believing that Socrates was willing to die in order to dunk on peasants with facts and logic. Not only that, he refused exile so that he could do it in Athens. Except that he wasn’t actually dunking on peasants with facts and logic, he cast himself in the role of interlocutor such that he could demonstrate the philosophical failings of his good-faith opposition through rigorous examination. He didn’t do this with malice, he did it because he knew that many of the people of Athens were walking around, believing untrue things, and acting on those beliefs uncritically. And that that was wrong. Did Socrates, in every dialogue, succeed in demonstrating the failure of his interlocutor so completely that they began to believe as he did? No, absolutely not. In fact, the opposite. Nearly every dialogue ends with Socrates’ opposition more confused about what the the truth is, and yet with a very strong hunch that what they believed before was untrue.

I am not an acolyte of Socrates. Socrates is also famous for being declared the wisest man in the world by the Oracle of Delphi, and upon reflection, realizing that his wisdom was the result of his recognition of his own ignorance (Which is why I am not an acolyte of his, I could never have that honor; I think much too highly of myself). I think that much has been made of this, and frankly much misunderstood about it, such that very, very many people are confused about what this means. Socrates’ position was not that there is no truth, that truth is something one should not concern himself with, but rather, that if something is true, it must be able to stand up to serious, rigorous interrogation. And that if some proposition does not or can not, then it must not be true. Socrates, in this way, can be looked at as finding the truth through the Edison method. That being, by inventing a thousand light bulbs that don’t work, or finding a thousand philosophies that don’t work, you might get enough insight to invent one that does.

But, like I said, I am not an acolyte of Socrates. I believe that truth can also be reasoned to from first principles, and that if a logically consistent, coherent argument can be made from those principles, then it stands to reason that it can be true. Of course, one could and should interrogate these arguments seriously and rigorously. And I do. And when I fail to achieve any kind of incoherence or inconsistency, and the logic of the argument itself remains coherent and consistent, that’s enough for me to believe something is true.

And that, precisely, is I think where we differ. I think that you, based on this interaction and many others, and not as an accusation of any kind of moral failing, are perfectly happy not knowing what is true and what is not. Whether this comes from a solipsistic position of there literally being no such thing as truth, or a materialist one of merely most truth not existing, or just pure apathy, as far as I can tell, that’s it. As you say, you’re more interested in “the way peoples’ brains work” than, as far as I can tell, evaluating the truth-value of any of the things that they say or think.

And this is where we finally arrive at the hairy part, because while I do not think that it is any kind of personal failing for a person to believe that, or anything along those lines, I do think that it is just wrong. I think that virtue matters in life more than making sure that people are nice to each other. Or at least not mean. Or in fact, literally anything else that a person can do in their life. I can lay out a convincing, to myself at least, argument on every level of philosophical discourse, from metaphysics to pragmatism, for why I believe that that is true. And failing an absolute & comprehensive refutation of every part of that, you are not going to convince me otherwise. And frankly, I don’t think that you have the same level of justified certainty in your position as I have in mine. And, again frankly, I suspect that rigorous interrogation would reveal a lot of incoherence and inconsistency in your position. Which is precisely why I was so interested in doing so. Because I believe that here is where you are, and this is where I feel it’s my duty to be totally honest, actually failing ethically and intellectually.

And here is where I do actually want to circle back to a thing from one of the later posts in our exchange and examine it very closely, because I think that it is highly illustrative of what I’m talking about here.

Something that I have had on my mind a lot lately is personal responsibility, because in talking about it, it seems like a lot of people have some very strange attitudes toward it. My central contention is that people are, in fact, responsible for everything in their life even if they don’t want to be, and that an attitude in opposition to this is revealed in conversations about stuff, but not about personal responsibility directly.

A good, recent example was a conversation that Azure, Plissken, Craftkitty and I had about the absolute sham state that the modern automotive industry is. Craft’s position was that it was not the fault of the modern driver for buying the absolute garbage that modern automakers are selling, because cars are necessary for modern life, especially in America. With which, of course, the three of us all disagreed. The conversation then meandered away from the topic, and I didn’t press it back towards that because I know exactly how much Craft dislikes having people disagree with him strongly and repeatedly. But for me, I found this attitude totally perplexing. People spending heaps and heaps of money on actual garbage that will be off the road in five years, and all of the awful results of that is, in my opinion, the fault of the people buying the garbage. Does collusion in the auto industry create an environment where it’s easier to sell garbage? Absolutely, but that is 100% and exclusively the fault of the ignorant buyer who does not refuse to buy the garbage. The ignorance is not an excuse to continue to participate in a system that is totally and completely failing the participants.

This is an attitude that I hold universally, because I think it’s right and true and virtuous. Now does that mean that I view every person buying a new car as inherently a moral failure? No, not really, I just think that they’re ignorant, need to be informed, and if they remain willfully ignorant after being informed, then they have committed an ethical wrong.

This is actually a totally consistent position with other, frankly, more important systemic failures that I think the three of us, Craft, Kami, and I could agree on. But that something is not as important as say systemic racism, or sexism, or any other flavor of political activism, does not, for me, change the calculus one iota.

I realize that I am doing here your least favorite thing of assigning a belief to you that you have not explicitly stated, and yet, I think that it is illustrative of something that I suspect that you more or less believe. Mainly, that people are not exclusively responsible for everything in their lives, whether or not they want to be, and whether or not there are other, oppressive forces outside of their control making doing the best thing hard, or even sometimes, impossible.

I don’t think that you think that you actually think that, and yet, it is consistent with things that you say. Looking back to your post in response to Tabula Rasa, you say that It is merely “good” or, to substitute a term requiring less definition, “better” for a person to take responsibility for everything in their life. For me, it is actually a moral imperative, and failing to do so is a moral failure. Not necessarily one that needs to be condemned, especially in edge cases, but a failure nonetheless.

Now again, I absolutely AM NOT ascribing this position to you so that I can easily dunk on you and score points and feel all warm and fuzzy by winning an internet argument. I am telling you what I think that you believe, and what I believe, and where I think we disagree, so that you know and can correct me if I’m wrong. Or at least understand where the disagreement is if I’m right. If I am totally off-base, please, let me know.

But another point of contention I have with a pattern of your behavior is that merely saying, “I do not believe that” is actually completely insufficient for a serious discussion about beliefs. What do you actually believe then? The reason that I, in my response, asked the subsequent questions I did about your political and philosophical beliefs was because I think that they would have been actually revelatory of the things that you actually think, and if you simply do not hold any strong opinions either way, (which frankly I think is a lie, you’re very publicly opposed to a lot of things, for which you must have reasons, which if you refuse to elaborate on is fine, but becomes at that point, frankly, an intellectual and ethical failure) then simply say that. I’m not going to infer from a guy who has very strongly held and expressed opinions about the thing we’re talking about, that when I ask him about something and his answer is unclear, that he is being unclear because he doesn’t hold a very strong opinion.

And this is probably a good place to say that also, I absolutely, categorically, AM NOT, in any way, writing this whole thing because it makes me feel warm and fuzzy to win an internet debate with overwhelming force. I have written this thing not as a screed meant to overwhelm, but because conversation is evidently impossible, and if I lay out my thoughts as completely and unambiguously as I am capable of, then maybe, just maybe, you’ll be able to understand the things that I’m saying and where I’m coming from and yes, even how my brain works.

The fact that nobody in the cord just believes me when I say that, is just as depressing and saddening and makes me feel just as bad as you feel about all of this, man. It makes me feel like there’s no point in articulating all of the very complicated things that I think about all day, and inform all of the decisions that I make. And frankly, that there’s no point in even being friends with you guys when, if any disagreement ever comes up, you all see me trying my absolute hardest to be clear and cogent as just a twitter dunk in an internet debate. It’s depressing, and insulting, and pisses me off more than I think I can ever be allowed to articulate lest somebody get too mad to hear the thing that I’m trying to say.

And I’m also, frankly, going to give myself a little space to defend myself, too. I think that, honestly, you’re being highly disingenuous when you represent yourself as someone who is merely genuinely curious and is beset upon by me, a malevolent force. You’re also right there, every time, sniping with your own cutesy little typing quirks, smug and opaque comments, and belittling jeers. And not just directed at me, either, directed at my friends who absolutely do not treat you the same way. Which I have no problem with by the way, except for the hypocrisy of it all.

But more importantly you also contribute a lot to making discussion impossible, even when you know that I’m acting in good faith, by refusing, this whole thing being a continuous & prime example, to engage meaningfully with any of the original points I make and spiraling out into something totally unrelated.

A recent example; you called someone I was telling you I look up to (Saagar from Breaking Points) a fascist. And when I asked you why, you just shrugged your shoulders and refused to talk about it. As if any reciprocal curiosity, about something that I think we can all agree is a pretty loaded comment, was unreasonable. How does that make me feel man? I’ll tell you, it does not make me feel like I’m talking to a guy who’s just genuinely curious and wants to learn all about the way that my brain works. It feels a lot more like I’m talking to a guy who thinks I got duped by rhetoric that you don’t agree with, or even apparently remember, and decided it’s easier to give up entirely on the project than have any difficult conversation. Is that the fairest possible interpretation of your behavior? No, absolutely not, and it’s not even the one that I think is an accurate reflection of reality. But it is how that interaction makes me feel in the moment. And, frankly, how basically every interaction I have with you makes me feel. Like you think that you know something that you don’t, and aren’t willing to talk about it, because the conversation would be too hard or uncomfortable.

I never have conversations that feel like that with basically anyone except you and Craft, because you and Craft always seem to hold some secret, virtuous position that you are totally unwilling to talk about. If you don’t care, GOOD, then stop pretending that you do. And if you do actually care, then it’s actually your responsibility to put on your big boy pants and have a conversation about it if you feel like interjecting with your opinion. I actually don’t care if you guys say something insane and my response is to say, “that’s crazy lmao” and that makes you too upset to keep talking about it. Guess why nobody else in the cord feels like I’m a malevolent villainous force sniping at them all the time for their moral and intellectual failings? Because they know what they do and do not care about enough to talk about, and if they don’t care about it, they don’t put themselves in a position to have to talk about it.

And finally, on being and standing up for myself, yes, you have 100% hit the nail on the head that this is what’s changed. You have known me through two previous phases of my life, both of which have been totally ruinous; being too much of a pussy to disagree with people on substantive things that might jeopardize the vibes for a while, and actively trying not to disagree with people about substantive things that might jeopardize the vibes for a while. This is my final form: being willing to disagree with people about substantive things that might jeopardize the vibes for a while. Do I go about it in a suboptimal way? Yes, obviously, we’re here, aren’t we? Talking about something that I think is kind of silly but understand why you insist on talking about it? Do I wish in some ways that my default mode were not being totally straight shooting about things that I think and the way that I feel? Yes, obviously, I would have preferred to have had this conversation like grown ups. Do I do some things even worse than that? Yeah, absolutely, I’m an acerbic douchebag by nature. You should see the conversations me and my dad have together.

But, frankly, if all that my tone does is filter out people who would prefer to tone-police than talk about something that I thought we agreed was really important, maybe even more important than how either of us feel about it, then frankly, I am not going to lose sleep over it. Because I think that you are 100% right that if my tone of voice is a block for you, then I was never going to be able to convince you of anything anyway.

And that really bums me out, dude. Because I do actually respect the hell out of you, and think that you’re a really, really smart and talented guy. And it makes me sad when I see you making what I think are mistakes and we aren’t able to talk about them. And for all of my part in that, I’m sorry.

All of the rest of it said too, I’m sorry. For saying mean things. And for assuming that you think things that you may or may not think. But I am also, honestly, done. The fact that nothing meaningful ever gets said, and everything always has to spiral out into who is respecting whose preferred style of internet conversation more, is frankly depressing, exhausting, a waste of time, and just plain beneath both of us. So good luck man, nothing but love from here.