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I'm about one third of the way through, but I was turned off by him dismissing Kant and Bentham's moral theories because they are autistic ("diagnosed" on the b

I'm about one third of the way through, but I was turned off by him dismissing Kant and Bentham's moral theories because they are autistic ("diagnosed" on the basis of circumstantial evidence). I see the value of bringing systematizing vs empathizing in the picture, but you can do that without character-assassinating them. It was really bizarre to read him bring up their autism, then insist he didn't commit Ad Hominem, then continue on as if he had invalidated Kant's view (without actually making any substantive argument).

Danihan 9y ago
I had forgotten about that... it did rub me the wrong way as well. Generally speaking, I am a fan of Kantian philosophy. That being said, it didn't really detract from the overall messages of the book. Just a strange one-off.
ethbro 9y ago
So much of modern philosophy seems like the task of obfuscating an illogical argument with unrelated logical ones until the reader forgets and assumed the original argument must have been proved logically. I believe it was Apollo Robbins who said one of the brainjacks he uses is the "A, B, C, 7" pattern, where people with distracted attention tend to leap to assuming the next object is like the former ones.
- qntty 9y ago
  >So much of modern philosophy seems like the task of obfuscating an illogical argument with unrelated logical ones until the reader forgets and assumed the original argument must have been proved logically. Can you give an example of this?
  - ethbro 9y ago
    Other than parent's gripe, nothing modern comes to mind as I haven't read modern philosophy since college (for reasons mentioned). But I'd cite some of Aquinas' work as evidence of incredibly logically stout edifaces built on top of a single suspect assumption.
baldfat 9y ago
As a person who has a son named Soren in honor of Kierkegaard YEAH! Kant was and is still the enemy of thought for individualism.
- Danihan 9y ago
  Could you expand a bit on this comment?
  - baldfat 9y ago
    I'm sorry. Soren Kierkegaard's philosophy a big response against Hegel and German rationalist which Kant fell into that school. People like to think that SK had a debt to Kant, but in no way would ever acknowledge it if he did. Personally I imagine SK hated Kant's philosophy and thought it was incomplete and was apart of the "Speculative Rationalist" that he despised. So I am one of the few who also feels that Kant's concussions were incomplete.

Danihan 9y ago

I had forgotten about that... it did rub me the wrong way as well. Generally speaking, I am a fan of Kantian philosophy. That being said, it didn't really detract from the overall messages of the book. Just a strange one-off.

ethbro 9y ago

So much of modern philosophy seems like the task of obfuscating an illogical argument with unrelated logical ones until the reader forgets and assumed the original argument must have been proved logically. I believe it was Apollo Robbins who said one of the brainjacks he uses is the "A, B, C, 7" pattern, where people with distracted attention tend to leap to assuming the next object is like the former ones.

qntty 9y ago
>So much of modern philosophy seems like the task of obfuscating an illogical argument with unrelated logical ones until the reader forgets and assumed the original argument must have been proved logically. Can you give an example of this?
- ethbro 9y ago
  Other than parent's gripe, nothing modern comes to mind as I haven't read modern philosophy since college (for reasons mentioned). But I'd cite some of Aquinas' work as evidence of incredibly logically stout edifaces built on top of a single suspect assumption.

baldfat 9y ago

As a person who has a son named Soren in honor of Kierkegaard YEAH! Kant was and is still the enemy of thought for individualism.

Danihan 9y ago
Could you expand a bit on this comment?
- baldfat 9y ago
  I'm sorry. Soren Kierkegaard's philosophy a big response against Hegel and German rationalist which Kant fell into that school. People like to think that SK had a debt to Kant, but in no way would ever acknowledge it if he did. Personally I imagine SK hated Kant's philosophy and thought it was incomplete and was apart of the "Speculative Rationalist" that he despised. So I am one of the few who also feels that Kant's concussions were incomplete.