Submitted by philosophybreak t3_y9ndt3 in philosophy
Reply to comment by MyNameIsNonYaBizniz in The real practical value of philosophy comes not through focusing on the ‘ideal’ life, but through helping us deal with life’s inevitable suffering: MIT professor Kieran Setiya on how philosophy can help us navigate loneliness, grief, failure, injustice, & the absurd. by philosophybreak
What are you saying leads to pessimism here, the acknowledgement that suffering is inevitable? Because I doubt there's any philosophy in existence that completely denies the existence of suffering at all, and most philosophies are not pessimistic in the sense here, so the acknowledgement definitely doesn't lead to that.
As for philosophies that speak to the suffering of all and not just some, there are a lot that do, but it's mostly just paper thin arguments about why those suffering the most implicitly deserve it because they don't play by society's rules. I suspect speaking about suffering in general is too abstract to really examine those most suffering in society in a way that's meant to be integrated into a larger sociopolitical philosophy.
Basically we have no answer, the unluck minority still suffers and no philosophy could make them feel like their suffering is worth it, because honestly its not, this is why we have suicide and people begging for their lives to end.
Maybe we need a philosophy that could accept this unchanging fact of existence and somehow still able to justify the existence of the lucky majority at the expense of the few, statistically speaking. Its the eternal trolley problem of existence, but somehow make it ok to sacrifice some people for the many, even if the victims strongly protest it.
Otherwise we'd end up with Antinatalism, Pro mortalism and Efilism, quite depressing.
>Maybe we need a philosophy that could accept this unchanging fact of existence and somehow still able to justify the existence of the lucky majority at the expense of the few, statistically speaking.
we already do.
look at the dialogue surrounding the poor and unemployed, or even more relevant that attitudes of people from America in regards to climate change and China. or the West vs the 3rd world, funny how the ones most suited to change the climate routinely do the least.
majority of humanity is perfectly happy to stack piles of corpses as long as they dont have to do it or see it directly (see: every single person on reddit. if you live a middle class lifestyle you are living on the backs of 10,000s, all the things we own are only cheap because the people making it are borderline slaves).
Biggest BS of all time: Reddit blaming corporations for producing 80% of global pollution without a fucking hint of irony. its the same as addicts putting all the blame of the dealer ''oh i buy drugs all the time but its the dealers fault i keep coming back!''
In some way, this is the default philosophy of humanity and the strongest counter argument against pessimistic philosophies, though I personally dont think its a strong argument.
"We keep going at the expense of the unlucky few because majority rule, has been and will always be." -- is their strongest argument, which is hard to challenge if they truly believe in it.
Personally, I think we need a better philosophy that gives the victims of existence more consideration that they deserve, because they most definitely have a vote in this human experiment, since they have paid the highest price for it, by suffering lives that are not worth living.
I hope we can develop such a philosophy soon, because many are giving up and flocking to pessimism.
If we want to be morally consistent, to not just shout slogans about individual well being and actually care for the victims, then we better do something about it soon. Majority rule is just not a good moral stance.
>make it ok to sacrifice some people for the many, even if the victims strongly protest it.
Hitler has entered the chat...
and left because bad luck is not genocide.
It's just that any philosophy which allows for justifying genocide... tends to go that way.
Accepting bad luck is not justifying genocide, what the eff are you talking about? lol
But it's not really "bad luck" at all, is it? Accepting a philosophy that "makes it ok [...]" is a choice, both individually and collectively. Practically speaking, there are some major pitfalls to such, amongst them: people will compete to be immune to such "sacrifice", people will fight for control of the power to decide, and any group which is consistent immune by such means will tend to start viewing itself as superior to the rest.
errrr, ok.
and?
you act like theres any actual alternative, 'needs of the many' is how we have done pretty much all of civilised history.
the hitler example above is perfect, the nazis believed the needs of the many would be served by genocide and we decided the needs of the many were served by destroying the nazis (luckily we won)
And?
That proves the philosophical "toolset" you propose is flawed. It allows you to derive both. A premise that leads to Hitler being justified is problematic, to say the least.
A philosophy that relies on luck, rather than shared principles, also has little value. It requires accepting an unjust world - not just that we live in one, but also that we needn't do anything about it.
I don't see how any philosophy which allows such cavalier treatment of human lives, which consciences the unjust suffering of your peers for the sake of your own gain, can ever be morally useful.
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