RESPONDENT: Environmental conditioning may be the active factor that tips humans and animals into destructive behaviours later (or sooner!) in life. Some subsystems due to genetic coding may be present that are neutral until they encounter conditions which trigger destructive reactions. The instincts may well be hardwired. Richard may have dealt with the conditioning that triggers destructive reactions. He may well have dealt with the finger that pulls the trigger but the trigger may still be intact. Deal with the finger or the trigger and the effect would be the same – harmlessness. I fail to see how a subjective observation could deliver a definitive answer to the question though. Watching your kids and animals may be explainable by your theory but it could be explained by other theories too. Self observation cannot yield much in the way of internal physiological data. I cannot yet see the factors that make your theory necessarily true.

PETER: I see from other posts to this list that you hold it to be a fact that nothing can be known for a fact. Holding such a stance makes a nonsense of trying to conduct a sensible conversation, let alone come to a sensible conclusion, about anything at all … let alone a subject so close to the bone as to why malice and sorrow is intrinsic to the human condition and, as archaeological evidence reveals, always has been.

RESPONDENT: You are kidding me, right? You are shutting down conversation based on another discussion between me and Richard? You are also going to take what I said at the level of parody, as Richard did, and that’s the end of the discussion? I am amazed.

PETER: I don’t take what you have said at the level of parody, I assumed you meant to write what you wrote.

On more than a few occasions, I have spent hours in conversation with people about the human condition, only to have them bring an end to any sensible conversation by declaring that New Age theoretical scientists and mathematicians, having been seduced by Eastern Mysticism hypothesize that matter at the sub-microscopic level (as in beyond observation) doesn’t have a definitive existence and its very existence is so uncertain that we could well regard it as being illusory and that space and time are not constants but have an existence that is relative (as in relative to a human observer) thereby opening the door to all sorts of imaginative theorizing such as Big Bangs, parallel universes, black holes and so on.

Here are but two examples I have written about in the past where people have reverted to playing the no-such-thing-as-a-fact card in order to thwart the possibility of engaging in, or continuing on a sensible down-to-earth conversation about the lot we humans unwittingly have found ourselves born into.

[Co-Respondent]: Hi Peter, when you say ‘the world as-it-is’ what do you mean ... the actual world or the world as it is perceived by ‘me’?

[Peter]: I remember having a discussion with a spiritualist about this very topic soon after I abandoned spiritualism to become an actualist. He believed that the fact that everyone has a self-centred affective perception of the world meant that the physical world was a self-created illusion. We happened to be standing in front of his car at the time and I reached out and touched the glass of the headlight and asked whether or not the headlight existed in fact given that we could both see it and both touch it. He said that while we could both see it, we saw it from different perspectives, he from one angle, me from another, therefore we perceived it differently. I then realized that pursuing the matter was a waste of both his time and mine because here was a man who refused to talk sense and was determined to live, and remain living, in a world entirely of his own making.

This incident, coming as it did in my early years of investigating the human condition, highlighted the fact that in my spiritual years I had also retreated from the world as-it-is – the world of interactions with fellow flesh and blood human, of tangible palpable things and actually occurring events – into an utterly self-centred world – a world of affective interactions like-feeling souls, of ethereal non-substantial things and supposedly illusionary non-consequential events. It was then that I realized that I had in fact wasted a good many years of my life trying to be anywhere but here and anywhen but now.

But then again, it was hardly a waste of time because I know by experience the seduction of dissociation and lure of dissociative states. Peter to No 32, Re: A perception, 25.3.2005

And …

[Peter to Alan]: He and I chatted socially for a while, catching up on the last 12 months and he asked if I was still writing. I said I was, explaining that I was corresponding on two mailing lists at the moment, one of which was a spiritual list. He said he wasn’t into spiritual things lately but was reading a book about one of Ramana Maharshi’s devotees. He then proceeded to tell me a particular anecdote about Maharshi reported in the book that had appealed to him. A woman had evidently asked Maharshi a question about the ‘self’ and he had picked up a piece of fruit from a nearby bowl. Holding the fruit up in his hand he said

[Ramana Maharshi]: ‘Here is a piece of fruit, here is my hand, I see it and it is registered in my mind as a thought. Therefore I think I see my hand with a piece of fruit in it, but it is not real as it is only a product of the mind – only the self, who is watching this thought arising is real.’ [endquote].

I looked at him and tapped the wooden table we were sitting at and said ‘Are you telling me that this table is not real, not actual in that I can tap it, feel it, see it?’ He said he had no trouble with that, so I pointed to a tree across the road and said that if I died tomorrow that tree would still be there unless someone chopped it down in the meantime. He started to look like he was willing to engage in an intellectual argument about my statement. I realized I had once spent an evening with this same man going around his belief-system in ever-broadening and erratic circles and I saw no sense in continuing the conversation about what is illusionary and what is actual on such a delightful afternoon. As the sun was setting behind some buildings and it was a good time to go anyway, I abandoned him in mid-objections and we paid up and left.

Later that evening, while musing about my quick departure, I saw that it simply made no sense to continue a discussion with someone who was hooked on solipsism. Of course, he wasn’t fully convinced, nor fully deluded, but he liked the appeal of a way of looking at things that made him the centre of all that was happening. So, for a little solace and respite from the real world he would indulge in a little ‘self’-ish escapist fantasy by reading spiritual books and, no doubt, a bit of going-in-and-getting-lost meditation. A few years ago I would have stayed to try and convince him of the madness of solipsism but those days of needing to convince others are long passed. The conversation did, however, remind me as to how far I have come to being seen as mad from both a real-world and spiritual-world viewpoint. I see ever more clearly how no one wants to be here and everyone is frantically and desperately trying to be ‘there’. Those who fail on the spiritual path to get so far out there that they never come back spend their lives straddling both worlds, occasionally grateful for brief moments of being ‘Present’ there but generally resentful at having to be here at all. Peter to Alan, Re: illusion vs actual, 4.6.2000

RESPONDENT: Before you go can you answer one question?

PETER: I am not going anywhere as you put it – it’s you who are playing the cards, it’s you who are steering the conversation in the way you want to (as you are doing in this post).

I am simply pointing out that playing the card you are currently playing,

[Peter]: ‘makes a nonsense of trying to conduct a sensible conversation, let alone come to a sensible conclusion, about anything at all … let alone a subject so close to the bone as to why malice and sorrow is intrinsic to the human condition and, as archaeological evidence reveals, always has been.’ [endquote].

RESPONDENT: Before you go can you answer one question? Q: If an observation comes along that contradicts what you call a fact, what happens to your fact?

PETER: Given that this is your speculation, could you explain what other observation would possibly come along that would contradict the fact that human beings are instinctually-driven animals and that this instinctual program manifests itself in homo sapiens as instinctual passions mainly those of fear, aggression, nurture and desire – given that this is the topic we are talking about. An observation that we are not of-the-earth animals, but made in the likeness of some God, perhaps? An observation that we are indeed aliens seeded here by an alien not-of-earth civilization from a yet to be discovered planet perhaps? These are amongst the common ones – or did you have something else in mind?

RESPONDENT: This is what I said – some theories are so good that they might as well be called fact ... with the proviso that a single contrary observation can render your fact into falsehood at any time. What on earth is so reprehensible about that statement that you would abort a conversation in which you were happy to engage in before you read something ... what ... offensive? ... in another conversation? Or is this all just to avoid answering my previous point? I do wonder.

PETER: As far as I can see I have answered all your points, but just to make it clear, the topic of this conversation is nurture vs. nature, specifically the question as to whether the deep seated passions such as fear, aggression, nurture and desire are caused by imperfect nurturing/ environment or are biologically inherited?

Your stance is that one can never know which is a fact in this case because a single contrary observation can render the fact into falsehood at any time – thus it is that you bring an end to the discussion by evoking the mind-numbing over-arching, all-consuming principle that one can never know anything for certain.

*

RESPONDENT: I fail to see how a subjective observation could deliver a definitive answer to the question though. Watching your kids and animals may be explainable by your theory but it could be explained by other theories too. Self observation cannot yield much in the way of internal physiological data. I cannot yet see the factors that make your theory necessarily true.

PETER: My suggestion is that, provided you are old enough to have experienced puberty, you too have sufficient life experience to be able to make up your own mind on this issue based on your own experience of how ‘you’ yourself tick and your own observations of other animals, be they non-sentient or sentient, rather than having a subjective opinion one way or the other based solely on what others believe to be true or false.

RESPONDENT: Quite right.

PETER: I am left wondering what it is you are acknowledging as being ‘quite right’ … purely because your philosophical conviction that nothing can ever be know to be a fact would inevitable prevent you from seeing a fact, let alone acknowledge that a fact is a fact even if it was staring you in the face as it were. With this as a mindset, it would obviously be impossible for you to make up your mind about anything.

RESPONDENT: You are so wrong. This must be a joke. You really don’t seem to understand my position, do you? If I didn’t work with facts I would be dead by now (eg ‘the bus is bearing down on you’).

PETER: Look, if you are now changing your position then fine – I have spent years divesting myself of so many beliefs, opinions, platitudes, opinions, truths, psittacisms and the like which I unwittingly took to be fact. T’is par for the course in the becoming free of the human condition.

If a bus is indeed a fact to you, as in being a physical object that has an independent tangible existence in its own right, irregardless of whether a human being is observing it or not, then why should not the chair be a fact and that it is blue in the electromagnetic wavelengths ranging from approximately 780 nanometer (7.80 x 10-7 m) down to 390 nanometer (3.90 x 10-7 m10-7 m) be a fact, irregardless of whether a human being is observing it. If you regard these as facts, in that a hypothetical contrary observation does not turn the big metal box on wheels into a falsehood and nor can it turn a blue chair white let alone make it invisible, then why not apply similar down-to earth evidentiary observations in the matter of determining for yourself as to wether or not the deep-seated passions of fear aggression, nurture and desire are indeed genetically encoded.

PETER: I notice since writing this post that Richard has since covered the same ground in his most recent post to you, but I will send it off anyway.

RESPONDENT: Can we forget Aristotle for a moment? The point I was really interested in seeing you address was this one:

[Respondent]: ‘Environmental conditioning may be the active factor that tips humans and animals into destructive behaviours later (or sooner!) in life. Some subsystems due to genetic coding may be present that are neutral until they encounter conditions which trigger destructive reactions. The instincts may well be hardwired. Richard may have dealt with the conditioning that triggers destructive reactions. He may well have dealt with the finger that pulls the trigger but the trigger may still be intact. Deal with the finger or the trigger and the effect would be the same – harmlessness. I fail to see how a subjective observation could deliver a definitive answer to the question though. Watching your kids and animals may be explainable by your theory but it could be explained by other theories too. Self observation cannot yield much in the way of internal physiological data. I cannot yet see the factors that make your theory necessarily true.’ (17.1.2006)

Can you address my point above, despite what you think of my position on facts?

PETER: And yet I have addressed precisely this point, vis.–

{Peter]: ‘My suggestion is that, provided you are old enough to have experienced puberty, you too have sufficient life experience to be able to make up your own mind on this issue based on your own experience of how ‘you’ yourself tick and your own observations of other animals, be they non-sentient or sentient, rather than having a subjective opinion one way or the other based solely on what others believe to be true or false.’ [endquote].

And not only did I address it, but you yourself succinctly agreed with my response, vis –

{Respondent]: Quite right. [endquote].

RESPONDENT: Try looking at it this way – it may not just be me you’re answering. Others may be interested.

PETER: I am always cognizant of the fact that although I am having a personal conversation with you, we are having this conversation on an Internet mailing list and as such even if you are not interested in what I have to say then it may well be of interest to others who are reading.

*

PETER: I see from other posts to this list that you hold it to be a fact that nothing can be known for a fact. Holding such a stance makes a nonsense of trying to conduct a sensible conversation, let alone come to a sensible conclusion, about anything at all … let alone a subject so close to the bone as to why malice and sorrow is intrinsic to the human condition and, as archaeological evidence reveals, always has been.

RESPONDENT: You are kidding me, right? You are shutting down conversation based on another discussion between me and Richard? You are also going to take what I said at the level of parody, as Richard did, and that’s the end of the discussion? I am amazed.

PETER: I don’t take what you have said at the level of parody, I assumed you meant to write what you wrote.

On more than a few occasions, I have spent hours in conversation with people about the human condition, only to have them bring an end to any sensible conversation by declaring that New Age theoretical scientists and mathematicians, having been seduced by Eastern Mysticism hypothesize that matter at the sub-microscopic level (as in beyond observation) doesn’t have a definitive existence and its very existence is so uncertain that we could well regard it as being illusory and that space and time are not constants but have an existence that is relative (as in relative to a human observer) thereby opening the door to all sorts of imaginative theorizing such as Big Bangs, parallel universes, black holes and so on

RESPONDENT: To use a well worn phrase ... may I interject? You’re not currently in discussion with those people you have locked in your memory! I have hardly had a chance to get beyond this silly objection of yours to see if we can have a sensible discussion.

PETER: And yet they are not people I have ‘locked in my memory’ as you put it, I still meet and no doubt will continue to meet people whose intelligence is similarly hobbled by such beliefs on a reasonably regular basis, indeed some of them correspond to this very mailing list.

By the way, it was you who introduced the notion that is impossible to know something to be a fact because there always must be a proviso, not me.

*

PETER: Here are but two examples I have written about in the past where people have reverted to playing the no-such-thing-as-a-fact card in order to thwart the possibility of engaging in, or continuing on a sensible down-to-earth conversation about the lot we humans unwittingly have found ourselves born into.

RESPONDENT: <snip 1009 words(!) about Peter’s past encounters with soliptical scammers that I have no interest in and wonder why it is being brought up so strongly, I’m not one of them so let’s get out of the past!>

PETER: Although I suspect you will have no interest in this response either I shall take your advice and go ahead anyway as others who read this may find it to be of interest.

Recently I happened to have a conversation with a man of similar age as I am about the generational changes that have occurred in the things that were once regarded as facts and ‘givens’ as opposed to what is being taught to the current generations. What we both observed was that there had been a marked swing from an empirical, pragmatic view of the world of people, things and events towards what has been termed a post-modern view of the world – a view that includes such notions as relativism, subjectivism, reductionism, anti-foundationalism, existentialism, deconstructionism, scepticism, nihilism and so on.

Broadly speaking, postmodernism thinking has it that knowledge can only be subjective in that an individual can only construct their own view of knowledge relative to their own particular time, place, social position, etc., or to put succinctly that there is no such thing as objective knowledge and universally-verifiable facts because knowledge can only ever be subjective.

With the majority of the people in the world being taught this view by their parents, peers and teachers, it is little wonder that people have such difficulty in understanding something as objective, simple, straightforward, pragmatic and down-to-earth as actualism is.

*

RESPONDENT: Before you go can you answer one question?

PETER: I am not going anywhere as you put it – it’s you who are playing the cards, it’s you who are steering the conversation in the way you want to (as you are doing in this post).

RESPONDENT: Okay, okay – are you able to translate my colloquial speech into whatever you prefer ... silently?

PETER: ……………….

*

PETER: I am simply pointing out that playing the card you are currently playing,

Peter]: ‘(...) makes a nonsense of trying to conduct a sensible conversation, let alone come to a sensible conclusion, about anything at all … let alone a subject so close to the bone as to why malice and sorrow is intrinsic to the human condition and, as archaeological evidence reveals, always has been.’ [endquote].

RESPONDENT: Before you go can you answer one question? Q: If an observation comes along that contradicts what you call a fact, what happens to your fact?

PETER: Given that this is your speculation,

RESPONDENT: This is not a speculation, it’s a question and you haven’t answered it.

PETER: The reason I didn’t answer your question was that I was seeking clarification as to what specific observation you had in mind that would contradict the fact that human beings are instinctually-driven animals, i.e. I was trying to keep the conversation on topic rather than have it degenerate into vague generalities.

RESPONDENT: Surely you have experienced this scenario before or are you infallible?

PETER: This was my response to a similar and similarly-loaded question from my previous post –

[Peter]: ‘I have spent years divesting myself of so many beliefs, opinions, platitudes, opinions, truths, psittacisms and the like which I unwittingly took to be fact. T’is par for the course in the becoming free of the human condition.’ [endquote].

As such, I do find it somewhat bewildering that many people who write to this mailing list have such difficulty in divesting themselves of even one single belief masquerading as a fact … let alone be able to put sufficient of them on the table for scrutiny such that one is eventually able to break free of the ingrained habit of believing.

*

PETER: Given that this is your speculation, could you explain what other observation would possibly come along that would contradict the fact that human beings are instinctually-driven animals and that this instinctual program manifests itself in homo sapiens as instinctual passions mainly those of fear, aggression, nurture and desire – given that this is the topic we are talking about.

RESPONDENT: Though you haven’t answered my question I will try to answer yours: The way you have expressed your question shows how certain you are of your position, but other just-as-intelligent human beings are not as convinced as you. I dare say they have thought as deeply about the issues as you. Here are some quotes and their sources:

• [Dr. David Adams]: ‘The statements on this Website are based on over 20 years of laboratory research on the evolution, brain mechanisms and dynamics of aggressive behavior in animals and humans...

...This book is a scientific rebuttal of those who claim that war is inherent in human nature. It provides extensive scientific evidence on the nature of the aggression systems which shows that war and other institutional behaviors have no direct genetic or neurophysiological basis. Next time you hear some expert expound on the biological basis of warfare, ask him or her if they have recorded from single neurons or isolated single genes of aggressive behavior as in the data provided here. And ask if they have tried using methods such as cross-cultural anthropology as done here to get at the prehistoric cultural origins of these behaviors.’ http://www.culture-of-peace.info/aggression-intro.html

• [Dr. David Adams et al]: ‘IT IS SCIENTIFICALLY INCORRECT to say that war or any other violent behaviour is genetically programmed into our human nature. While genes are involved at all levels of nervous system function, they provide a developmental potential that can be actualized only in conjunction with the ecological and social environment.’

‘IT IS SCIENTIFICALLY INCORRECT to say that in the course of human evolution there has been a selection for aggressive behaviour more than for other kinds of behaviour. In all well-studied species, status within the group is achieved by the ability to co-operate and to fulfil social functions relevant to the structure of that group.’ http://portal.unesco.org/education/en/ev.php-URL_ID=3247&URL_DO=DO_TOPIC&URL_SECTION=201.html

• [Dr. David Adams et al]: ‘IT IS SCIENTIFICALLY INCORRECT to say that war is caused by ‘instinct’ or any single motivation. The emergence of modern warfare has been a journey from the primacy of emotional and motivational factors, sometimes called ‘instincts’, to the primacy of cognitive factors.’ (ibid)

These are strongly backed statements, far stronger than anything you have come up with so far.

PETER: I don’t know how discerning you were in selecting the quotes but this is the author’s stated position with regard to aggression from the preface of the book you quoted –

[Dr. David Adams]: ‘Aggression, in the form of anger against injustice, is a critical and valuable component of consciousness development. I suspect that my readers will find that they, too, must undergo such a change of mind if they are to fully appreciate the positive value of aggressive behaviour.’ www.culture-of-peace.info/aggression/human3.html

And from a section of the website entitled ‘The Anger of Activists as a Basis for Optimism’

[Dr. David Adams]: ‘It would appear from my preliminary work that anger is positive and constructive for the motivation of peace movement activists when it is collectively harnessed and directed against the agents of militarism themselves or the system of political-economic relations in which they function. As one noted religious pacifist told me. ‘We must love the good and hate the evil.’’ www.culture-of-peace.info/anger/chapter6-6.html

Personally, I fail to appreciate anything positive at all in aggressive behaviour nor do I see the anger of those who rile against some ideology, belief, political viewpoint, culture or creed that contradicts their own as being either positive or constructive, I simply see it for what it is – people being angry.

As for your second link to a UNESCO website, the manifesto – apparently based on the same author’s ‘over-20-years-of-laboratory-research’ – is offered as supporting evidence for a program to teach non-violence to children. The obvious question that arises is – do they also teach the children that they should ‘fully appreciate the value of aggressive behaviour’ given that it is part and parcel of the same author’s thinking on the subject?

RESPONDENT: I am aware that there are plenty of people who support your position and you could dig up relevant quotes.

PETER: Actually there are very few who publicly dissent from the popular view but here is a quote from one man who has had over 30 years of on-the-ground research studying the physical evidence of human beings’ violence towards other human beings since the very beginnings of the emergence of homo sapiens –

[Steven A Le Blanc]: ‘Prehistoric warfare was common and deadly, and no time span or geographical region seems to have been immune. We need to recognize and accept the idea of a non-peaceful past for the entire time of human existence. Though there were certainly times and places during which peace prevailed, overall such interludes seem to have been short-lived and infrequent. People in the past were in conflict and competition much of the time. Which groups prevailed and survived, and how people interacted with their neighbours, had a great impact on the way we humans organized our societies, how we spread over Earth, and why people settled as they did. Today in parts of the world, things are much the same – war is a constant and critical part of their lives. These wars are not an aberration, but a continuation of behaviour stretching back deep into the past. To understand much of today’s war, we must see it as a common and almost universal human behaviour that has been with us as we went from ape to human’. ‘Constant Battles. The Myth of the Peaceful, Noble Savage’ Steven A. LeBlanc with Katherine E. Register, p8

RESPONDENT: My purpose in providing these quotes is to amplify my point – nothing you have said so far has the ring of necessity about it. I’m not saying that my mind is settled either way.

PETER: If the purpose of the quotes was to support a case for lack of proper nurture being the cause of human aggression, I can only suggest you do a little more reading before firing them off, but then again your concern is apparently not so much about the veracity of any contradictory observations but more about the fact that contradictory observations exist.

RESPONDENT: I’m pointing out that to settle my mind (and many others) you would have to come up with evidence that would silence the whole nature vs nurture debate without recourse to ad hominem techniques such as ‘I came to understand that the so-called ‘experts’ who taught me the things they had been taught had little to no practical hands-on experience’.

PETER: I have not the slightest interest in silencing the whole nature vs. nurture debate for that is an impossibility.

And since when has an observation about the essential difference between theoreticians and hands-on practitioners been an ‘ad hominem technique’?

*

RESPONDENT: Before you go can you answer one question? Q: If an observation comes along that contradicts what you call a fact, what happens to your fact?]

PETER: Given that this is your speculation, could you explain what other observation would possibly come along that would contradict the fact that human beings are instinctually-driven animals and that this instinctual program manifests itself in homo sapiens as instinctual passions mainly those of fear, aggression, nurture and desire – given that this is the topic we are talking about. An observation that we are not of-the-earth animals, but made in the likeness of some God, perhaps? An observation that we are indeed aliens seeded here by an alien not-of-earth civilization from a yet to be discovered planet perhaps? These are amongst the common ones – or did you have something else in mind?

RESPONDENT: That’s a vivid imagination you are exercising. Did I even suggest such things or are you debating with your memories again?

PETER: The answer to your loaded question is neither. I was simply seeking clarification as to what specific observation you had in mind when you asked [Respondent]: ‘if an observation comes along that contradicts what you call a fact, what happens to your fact?’ [endquote] – i.e. I was trying to keep the conversation on topic rather than have it degenerate into vague generalities.

*

RESPONDENT: This is what I said – some theories are so good that they might as well be called fact ... with the proviso that a single contrary observation can render your fact into falsehood at any time. What on earth is so reprehensible about that statement that you would abort a conversation in which you were happy to engage in before you read something ... what ... offensive? ... in another conversation? Or is this all just to avoid answering my previous point? I do wonder.

PETER: As far as I can see I have answered all your points, but just to make it clear, the topic of this conversation is nurture vs. nature, specifically the question as to whether the deep seated passions such as fear, aggression, nurture and desire are caused by imperfect nurturing/ environment or are biologically inherited?

Your stance is that one can never know which is a fact, in this case because a single contrary observation can render the fact into falsehood at any time – thus it is that you bring an end to the discussion by evoking the mind-numbing over-arching, all-consuming principle that one can never know anything for certain.

RESPONDENT: This is a mockery and you have no real idea of my position. There are indeed positions I hold as fact ... but I hold my facts only until they are contradicted! So far you haven’t indicated what you do with your facts beyond holding them to be absolute truth.

PETER: First of all, facts pre se are neither ‘my facts’ nor ‘your facts’ –

Fact – ‘What has really happened or is the case; truth; reality: in fact rather than theory, the fact of the matter is; something known to have happened; a truth known by actual experience or observation: scientists work with facts.’ Oxford Dictionary

Secondly, I fail to see the difference between holding a position that facts are only facts until they are contradicted and holding a position that one can never know anything for certain – but then again I am neither a relativist, nor a subjectivist.

Thirdly, I do not regard a verifiable objective fact as being an ‘absolute truth’ – as you are most probably aware, this is a derogatory term that subjectivists often revert to when describing facts and actuality.

Subjectivism – The doctrine that knowledge, perception, morality, etc., is merely subjective and relative and that there is no objective truth; a theory or method based exclusively on subjective facts; the quality or condition of being subjective. Oxford Dictionary

Subjectivist – an adherent or advocate of subjectivism. Oxford Dictionary

RESPONDENT: Does this mean you hold them even if contradicted or do you never make mistakes?

PETER: As I don’t hold verifiable objective facts to be ‘my’ facts let alone to be ‘absolute truths’ you are doing nothing but creating an argument that appears to be solely based on the currently-fashionable view about facts and knowledge, as I have made clear to you above – in short it’s a beat up.

RESPONDENT: Can we please leave this little cul de sac? <snip more of the cul de sac>

PETER: It’s entirely up to you, after all it’s your cul de sac – I left it behind long ago.

*

PETER: My suggestion is that, provided you are old enough to have experienced puberty, you too have sufficient life experience to be able to make up your own mind on this issue based on your own experience of how ‘you’ yourself tick and your own observations of other animals, be they non-sentient or sentient, rather than having a subjective opinion one way or the other based solely on what others believe to be true or false.

RESPONDENT: Quite right.

PETER: I am left wondering what it is you are acknowledging as being ‘quite right’ … purely because your philosophical conviction that nothing can ever be know to be a fact would inevitable prevent you from seeing a fact, let alone acknowledge that a fact is a fact even if it was staring you in the face as it were. With this as a mindset, it would obviously be impossible for you to make up your mind about anything.

RESPONDENT: You are so wrong. This must be a joke. You really don’t seem to understand my position, do you? If I didn’t work with facts I would be dead by now (eg ‘the bus is bearing down on you’).

PETER: Look, if you are now changing your position then fine –

RESPONDENT: So you get a glimmer of understanding about my position and interpret that as a change in my position?

PETER: I was simply acknowledging that at least you do acknowledge that there are such things as facts – and apparently without your stock-standard conditional qualifier in this case, although it was obviously somewhat premature in my observation given your reversion to your stock-standard qualifier in as in ‘I hold my facts only until they are contradicted’ and ‘facts can be highly contextual’.

*

PETER: [Look, if you are now changing your position then fine] – I have spent years divesting myself of so many beliefs, opinions, platitudes, opinions, truths, psittacisms and the like which I unwittingly took to be fact. T’is par for the course in the becoming free of the human condition.

RESPONDENT: So you have had the capacity to change what you have mistakenly call fact. The question is – are you still capable of doing so?

PETER: I don’t know how much of the archived correspondence you have read on the Actual Freedom Trust website, but a common theme can be discerned in a good deal of it. Some of the people who come across the Actual Freedom Trust website are apparently sufficiently intrigued by what is written that they then subscribe to this mailing list and enter into a discussion with the authors based on a single point of contention they have about what they have read. Very often the correspondents steer these discussions into a who-is-right-and-who-is-wrong, ‘t is, ‘t isn’t discussion, with the result that the correspondent leaves in a huff having failed to get the author in question to admit that the correspondent is right, gets very angry at the author in question and leaves, or hangs around in order to support any other similarly motivated correspondent irregardless of whether or not they hold to the correspondent’s belief or viewpoint.

*

PETER: If a bus is indeed a fact to you, as in being a physical object that has an independent tangible existence in its own right, irregardless of whether a human being is observing it or not, then why should not the chair be a fact and that it is blue in the electromagnetic wavelengths ranging from approximately 780 nanometer (7.80 x 10-7 m) down to 390 nanometer (3.90 x 10-7 m10-7 m) be a fact, irregardless of whether a human being is observing it.

RESPONDENT: Okay, so let’s put the chair in a dark room. Is it still blue? Let’s put it under green light. Is it still blue? It’s a fact that the chair is blue in certain conditions – i.e. in white light. Do you understand why I raised such an example? I was trying to demonstrate that facts can be highly contextual and that we need to be careful of what we label as fact. You’re not dealing with your straw-man solipsist here.

PETER: Indeed not. If I were to label you, I think secular subjectivist might well be appropriate given that a solipsist would say that the chair is blue is a subjective judgement and that the chair has no substantive existence because only a ‘self’ can have a substantive existence whereas a secular subjectivist would say that the chair is blue is conditional, and that the chair has no objective existence in that its existence can only be known and experienced relative to an observer, i.e. subjectively.

To put it more generally, a subjectivist interprets the world of people, things and events via the perception and subsequent interpretation of ‘self’ whereas a solipsist is convinced that the world of people, things and events is but a creation of ‘self’ – the distinction being a matter of degree, not of kind in that both interpretations are completely self-centred.

Look, I am not apportioning personal fault and blame here, far from it. All I am endeavouring to make clear is that the current conditioning, which almost all human beings now living in the what is often referred to as the post-modern era have unwittingly had foisted upon them – through no fault of their own or anyone else specifically for that matter – is one that is but a short step away from being full-blown solipsism.

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PETER: If you regard these as facts, in that a hypothetical contrary observation does not turn the big metal box on wheels into a falsehood and nor can it turn a blue chair white let alone make it invisible, then why not apply similar down-to earth evidentiary observations in the matter of determining for yourself as to wether or not the deep-seated passions of fear aggression, nurture and desire are indeed genetically encoded.

RESPONDENT: Yes, Peter, if it were only that simple. Let’s see what we can do to make it simple ... we could just insist that it is so. That would make it very simple indeed.

PETER: I do acknowledge that there is a price to be paid for not being a follower of one or other of the currently fashionable philosophies, beliefs or convictions – the loss of pride in giving up one of one’s dearly held convictions and the loss of the feeling of belonging to a group that has similar convictions, and so on – but the benefit gained is tangible and of no little consequence in that one is indeed taking the first tentative steps to beginning to exercise autonomous thinking for the first time in one’s life.

No 95 to Peter: I fail to see how a subjective observation could deliver a definitive answer to the question though. Watching your kids and animals may be explainable by your theory but it could be explained by other theories too. Self observation cannot yield much in the way of internal physiological data. I cannot yet see the factors that make your theory necessarily true.

My suggestion is that, provided you are old enough to have experienced puberty, you too have sufficient life experience to be able to make up your own mind on this issue based on your own experience of how ‘you’ yourself tick and your own observations of other animals, be they non-sentient or sentient, rather than having a subjective opinion one way or the other based solely on what others believe to be true or false.

No 95: Quite right.

Facts in themselves are always susceptible of diverse explanations and so never have been and never will be able to guarantee the truth of any theory.

You can trot all the theories you want about the truths of theories but I live in a world of fact, a world inexorably based on the surety of cause and effect.

If the roof of any building I design or build leaks, the fact is that the occupants and/or their possessions will enviably get wet when it rains. If I design or build a building on ground that is susceptible to movement, as all ground is to varying extent, then the foundations of the building needs to be strong enough not to break in order that the building does not crack or the foundations and building need to be designed and constructed in such a way that any movement that does occur, occurs in a way that does not damage the building or impact on its functionality.

None of these facts are ‘susceptible of diverse explanations’, none of this requires a guarantee of ‘the truth of … theory’ – these are facts or givens that are known by any adult hands-on building practitioner, regardless of their age, gender or culture, no matter where the building is located on the planet.

Now the topic of this conversation is whether the deep-seated emotions of fear and aggression, nurture and desire are instinctual, as in biologically inherited, or whether they are the result of imperfect nurturing/environment. Your contribution to this discussion is presumably that one can never know which is fact given that –

‘Facts in themselves are always susceptible of diverse explanations and so never have been and never will be able to guarantee the truth of any theory’.

This in effect means you are, exactly as the previous correspondence has done, sidelining yourself in any discussion about the means to bringing an end to the deep-seated emotions of fear and aggression, nurture and desire that are the root cause of human misery.

The other thing that is worth noting is that whilst you are busy telling me that it is impossible for me to know – by my own observation and my own experience and verified by the observations and experiences of others – that something is a fact, you are busy challenging someone else on the list to disprove that what you say is not fact. Vis –

‘I made factual statements, or didn’t I?’ Re: Peter perceives a solipsist, has an allergic reaction, 23.1.2006

Nothing like telling someone one thing and then telling another something entirely contradictory, hey.

Or put it differently: Such hypotheses as ‘genetic coding’ of instincts are really not inspired by the result of experience to nearly the same extent as they are by certain ‘preconceived ideas’.

Indeed they are not – personal experience and global-wide experience is most often ignored or in many cases even denied in favour of ‘preconceived ideas’, as the following illustrates –

‘Now the actualists’ hold it true that the ‘feeling being’ arises out of the ‘soul’. For the ‘true initiate’ it arises out of the ‘Power of Imagination’. The ‘Power of Imagination’, symbolically depicted as a dragon or monster and also identified with ‘Satan’ (literally ‘adversary’) *is, in fact, the energy of the instincts*, which give rise to ‘self-will’ (ego)’. [emphasis added] RE: The Confusion of the Psychic and the Spiritual, 23.1.2006

I’ll try and stop whistling ‘Give me that old time religion’ long enough to relate to you another personal on-the-ground observation I made that demonstrated that the instinctual passions are universal to all human beings on the planet and have existed for as long as human beings have existed – in other words, that fear, aggression, nurture and desire are biological inherited. As a somewhat callow young man aged 20, I went to Europe for the first time and was particularly struck by the fact that literally every square metre of Europe had been soaked in human blood at some stage in history, be it in pre-historic times, the stone age, the iron age, the bronze age, medieval times or modern times, given that World War Two had only ended less than a quarter of a century prior to my visit.

Wherever I went I found monuments to some battle or other and remnants of defensive walls and embattlements from all cultures and all epochs and visited field upon field, village upon village, and city upon city where hundreds, thousands and sometimes millions of human beings had either deliberately killed and maimed their fellow human beings or had been deliberately killed and maimed by their fellow human beings. I was also struck by the fact that these same disputes, skirmishes, battles and wars are still being waged all over the planet, either overtly or covertly, and will keep on doing so for no other reason that it is human nature for human beings to keep doing so. Faced by the utter futility of ever being able to do anything about the situation, I, like countless others before and since, learned to turn a blind eye to what I had seen with my own eyes and in doing so desensitised myself from feeling such feelings as sorrow, grief, despair and hopelessness when confronted with the extent of human beings’ perpetual animosity towards other human beings.

Richard claims to report ‘direct experiences’ and not expounding ‘theory’ or ‘hypotheses’. I don’t have to say anything anymore about the validity of these ‘reports’.

And yet immediately after this declaration ‘I don’t have to say anything anymore about the validity of these ‘reports’, you were busy telling someone else on the list –

‘First he mistook the psychic for the spiritual and, after he successfully freed himself from the psychic influences by means of ‘self-immolation’, he brought down the spiritual to the psychic. In other words: First he fell for a delusion of false spirituality and then he simply denied the spiritual.’ RE: The Confusion of the Psychic and the Spiritual, 23.1.2006

Nothing like telling someone one thing and then telling another something entirely contradictory, hey.

But one thing is for sure: Unless you are Richard, all you do is turning his ‘reports’ into preconceived ideas, which, because you lack his ‘direct experiences’, you subsequently use as interpretative filters for your experiences and observations to make them fit to them.

That’s a crock argument if ever I have heard one. I have just related to you the observations I made and the conclusions I drew from these observations about human nature that I had in Europe as a young man in my twenties – some 15 years before I fell under the influence of Eastern religious dogma and some 30 years before I had ever met Richard.

For all I know, you may well have made similar observations as I did as a youth – given that I have met only a few people who have not been interested in peace on earth at some stage in their lifetimes – and it is clear that you also have subsequently settled on an explanation for the underlying cause for all the mayhem and carnage that human beings have and continue to inflict upon each other –

‘The ‘Power of Imagination’, symbolically depicted as a dragon or monster and also identified with ‘Satan’ (literally ‘adversary’) is, in fact, the energy of the instincts.’

If that is the conclusion you have come to, then fair enough, but you are wasting your time trying to convince me that human beings are meant to forever wage war against an imaginary Evil satanic force, be it imaginary, mythical, symbolic, psychic, psychological, spirit-ual, formless or whatever.

We are not at all talking about a ‘fact’ when we talk about ‘genetically encoded instincts’ and we also don’t talk about a report of a ‘direct experience’; what we discuss here is a so-called scientific theory and weigh its evidence; it goes without saying that such a theory can necessarily never be more than hypothetical.

Rephrasing your crock argument using ‘we’ instead of ‘I’ and repeating makes it no less of a crock.

Perhaps I can summarize what your current proposition is to this mailing list is – on the one hand that the deep-seated emotions of fear, aggression, nurture and desire are not in fact instinctual passions because ‘facts in themselves are always susceptible of diverse explanations’ and on the other that ‘ …‘Satan’ (literally ‘adversary’) is, in fact, the energy of the instincts’. Is that not the gist of it?

And in the meantime the suggestion that twigged you to write this post to me remains unaddressed by you –

‘My suggestion is that, provided you are old enough to have experienced puberty, you too have sufficient life experience to be able to make up your own mind on this issue based on your own experience of how ‘you’ yourself tick and your own observations of other animals, be they non-sentient or sentient, rather than having a subjective opinion one way or the other based solely on what others believe to be true or false’.

At least my previous correspondent responded to my suggestion before grasping for an intellectual get-out.

I find it very odd indeed when I reflect back to the start of the mailing list and recall what a good opportunity it offered for people from all over the world to have a free-ranging down-to-earth discussion about bringing an to human malice and sorrow to nowadays finding myself having discussions with people who refuse to discuss the issue of personally actualizing peace on earth because they are so convinced that it is a fact that nothing at all can be known for a fact about any issues concerning peace on earth and that any experiences relating to the issue of peace on earth can be summarily dismissed as being relative/ subjective.

RESPONDENT: When No 95 talks about genetically coded instincts, is No 95 talking about (a) a fact or (b) a direct experience or c) a so-called scientific theory?

PETER: No 95 has been quite adamant that he has no certainty, no personal experience, no theories nor any conviction about the source of the deep-seated human emotions of fear, aggression, nurture and desire, rather he made clear what his motive was in writing to me about the subject in his last comment to me –

[Respondent No 95]: ‘I’m not trying to give up a conviction. I’m trying to see where yours comes from’. Peter Re: Peter perceives a solipsist 23/1/06

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PETER: Perhaps I can summarize what your current proposition is to this mailing list is – on the one hand that the deep-seated emotions of fear, aggression, nurture and desire are not in fact instinctual passions because ‘facts in themselves are always susceptible of diverse explanations’ and on the other that ‘ … ‘Satan’ (literally ‘adversary’) is, in fact, the energy of the instincts’. Is that not the gist of it?

RESPONDENT: No, it is not. However you like to call it, ‘instinctual passions’ or the ‘Power of Imagination’ it is just a name for the phenomenon that people become angry. These words are not explanations; they are the name of the phenomenon. The Ancients called the phenomenon ‘Satan’; you call it ‘instinctual passions’. The fact that people get angry is in no way effected by the names we give to the phenomenon.

PETER: Has it ever occurred to you that homilies such as ‘the word is not the thing so it doesn’t matter what name we give to a thing’ is nothing but a platitude and a ploy – a platitude in that it is oft trotted out without any thought as to sensibility and consequence of what is being said and a ploy in that it makes nonsense of the commonplace convention of using different words to describe different things and as such ends the possibility of being able to have a sensible conversation with anybody about anything.

Meanwhile back in the real world, you yourself have acknowledged that anger is a fact, and whether or not the energy of that anger is called ‘Satan’ or is in fact a biological imperative that has its roots in instinctual animal behaviour does indeed matter in that it affects people’s attitude and approach to dealing with the fact that people do get angry from time to time. Those who believe passions such as anger and sorrow are synonymous with the ‘Power of Imagination’, aka ‘Satan’, are prone to seek repentance, forgiveness and solace in religious belief whereas those not so inclined may well be open to what is being said on the Actual Freedom Trust website site and may even be capable of taking what is said at face value.

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PETER: And in the meantime the suggestion that twigged you to write this post to me remains unaddressed by you –

[Peter]: ‘My suggestion is that, provided you are old enough to have experienced puberty, you too have sufficient life experience to be able to make up your own mind on this issue based on your own experience of how ‘you’ yourself tick and your own observations of other animals, be they non-sentient or sentient, rather than having a subjective opinion one way or the other based solely on what others believe to be true or false’. [endquote].

At least my previous correspondent responded to my suggestion succinctly before grasping for an intellectual get-out.

RESPONDENT: It was not my intention to address your piece of writing.

PETER: Obviously not.

RESPONDENT: Besides, you can be as mature and grown up as you possibly can imagine and you can have so many experiences of how you ‘tick’, somebody else ticks, animals behave etc.

PETER: And yet you yourself make definitive explanations about how other people tick ‘… ‘Satan’ (literally ‘adversary’) is, in fact, the energy of the instincts’ and the ‘Power of Imagination’ it is just a name for the phenomenon that people become angry’. May I ask what is the source for your explanation of the fact that people get angry, given that it is apparently not based on empirical research?

Empirical: Based on, guided by, or employing observation and experiment rather than theory; derived from or verifiable by experience, esp. sense-experience Oxford Dictionary

RESPONDENT: All your empirical research will never ever turn the explanation of a fact into a fact.

PETER: But then again a clear eyed, non-philosophical observation meant that you were able to explain to me that the reason your wife was in the kitchen was that she cooking tea. If you want to ascertain the difference between fact on one hand and theory, belief and hypothesis on the other, then down-to-earth observations such as these are the very place to start.

A word of warning though, if you make such clear-eyed down-to-earth observations your prime business in life, you will be on the slippery slope to the ending of ‘me’.

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PETER: I find it very odd indeed when I reflect back to the start of the mailing list and recall what a good opportunity it offered for people from all over the world to have a free-ranging down-to-earth discussion about bringing an to human malice and sorrow to nowadays finding myself having discussions with people who refuse to discuss the issue of personally actualizing peace on earth because they are so convinced that it is a fact that nothing at all can be known for a fact about any issues concerning peace on earth and that any experiences relating to the issue of peace on earth can be summarily dismissed as being relative/ subjective.

RESPONDENT: Yes, that is indeed odd but it is totally off topic and irrelevant to my statement that ‘Facts in themselves are always susceptible of diverse explanations’ etc.

PETER: You might have missed the sign on the door before you chose to subscribe to this mailing list –

Richard: ‘The Actual Freedom Trust is currently maintaining a Mailing-List so as to facilitate a sharing of experience and understanding and to assist in elucidating just what is entailed in becoming free of the human condition’. [...] Welcome Message to The Actual Freedom Trust Mailing List

Given that what is on offer here is a *non-spiritual* and down-to-earth freedom from the human condition of malice and sorrow your explanation that the fact that people get angry is synonymous with ‘The Power of Imagination’, aka ‘Satan’, is so far off topic I’m inclined to start singing ‘Give me that olde time religion, give me that olde, time religion, it’s good enough for me’ and wander off and make myself a cup of coffee.

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