Posts by RedEastWood

    Because for almost the entirety of human history there were no such thing as school

    Although I can sympathise with your reasoning here, it is fundamentally flawed on two accounts.

    1. Schools have been a dominant part of human history, and can be dated back to ancient civilisations in Asia and Greece. The earliest recorded schooling system was in 2000 BC.

    You are correct in claiming that for a lot of human history there were no schools - the first humans existed around 2.5 million years ago. However, their priorities contrast quite considerably with out own priorities. Pre-historic humans fought for food, space and mates; modern humans compete for jobs, money, space and mates.

    2. The shift in priorities also entails a shift in the means to acquire these priorities. Pre-historic humans used strength, size and speed to compete for their needs, whilst modern day humans use intelligence, skills and charisma to compete for theirs.

    Your line of reasoning here is very surface level, if you dive deeper into the reasons for the creation of schooling systems you’ll find that individuals much smarter than both of us combined supported it (for good reason).

    However, very recently at some point, it was decided that people must go to school. There is no basis for doing so, it was just arbitrary decided.

    Source?

    I am 99% sure that you have pulled this out of your ass.

    but now a 10 minute YouTube video teaches you more than a year of school.

    This is a point that I see some merit in. The education system is outdated, and I have personally used YouTube and other online resources to achieve a great deal in terms of my eduction.

    Despite that, the ability to ask your teachers questions and receive an accurate answer (ideally) is a hallmark of the concept of education, and it is not something that can be replaced by a YouTube video or any alternative.

    English language (if you live in a non-English speaking country) - this could be the one thing to justify school, since it is actually useful.

    Are you claiming that English is the only important language? If so, why?

    Other foreign languages - let's be honest, they won't be used and will be forgotten

    Again, do you really think that English is the only important language? You sound incredibly entitled in this section of your post, because you give the impression that you do not care for other languages or understanding the value in being able to communicate with others effectively.

    If you only know English, not only are your job prospects reduced significantly, you are also limiting yourself to only interacting with about 16% of the population. Consider how many people you will have absolutely no chance of speaking to because of a language barrier - because you do not consider alternate languages to be important.

    Biology, geography, history - these could be interesting subjects if someone likes them. But they are not essential for daily life, and therefore should not be required.


    Physical education - kids would do their own activity if you just left them the alone. And it would be more fun for them, too, since it could include things like climbing trees.


    Mathematics - most of it can be done by computers. And again, most of the more advanced maths will be forgotten since it is not that useful in daily life. The basics could be taught by parents.


    Chemistry, physics - useless, hard to understand, and will be forgotten. Again, if an adult likes them or needs them for their jobs (this will be very rare), they can learn them at that point. But there is no need to shove them onto kids.

    Learning about STEM is imperative to the human race continuing to evolve. It drives change and creates the conditions for individuals to pioneer new inventions that could revolutionise the way we live. Fionn has made a similar point, which I agree with.

    Just think, the people that discovered electricity wasn't taught about electricity in school.

    “weren’t”

    The people that discovered electricity did so on a foundation of chemical understanding. Had they not been taught chemistry, they would not have discovered that specific chemical reactions produced electrical outputs.

    All inventions come from an understanding of prior knowledge. You seem to think that people come up with new ideas from nothing (ex nihilo), which is a very unusual stance to take because it has been disproven anytime anyone has ever come up with anything.

    If is my fault for not paying attention, then I challenge you to draw the entire world map, including the names of every country, without looking it up on the internet. Go on, you have seen it bunch of times in school, so this should be easy for you.

    I don’t understand this analogy. If someone has learnt the world map in school, they would have a better idea of what it looks like than someone who has not studied it in school.

    So you’ve (inadvertently) asked quite an important philosophical question. The question is whether God is the first necessarily existent being, as opposed to a being who’s existence is contingent.

    Contingent existence refers to something that might not have existed, for example this post would not have existed had I not written. This post is contingently dependant on may writing it. Necessary existence refers to something that must always exist and can’t go out of existence.

    A great philosopher who wrote on this question is St Thomas Aquinas (1225-1274), and he documented five ways in which God created the universe and was the first necessary being. I’ll briefly summarise three.

    I have put important pieces of information in bold.

    Aquinas’ First Way

    His first way is an argument from motion-

    P1. Some things in the world are in motion.

    P1a. For example, a cricket ball moving towards the batsman.

    P2. Whatever is in motion must have been put in motion by something else.

    P2a. For example, the bowler.

    P3. If A is put in motion by B, then something else (C) must have caused B’s motion… and so on.

    P4. If this chain goes on infinitely, then there is no first mover.

    P5. If there is no first mover, then there are no subsequent movers, and so nothing would ever be in motion.

    P6. Things are in motion

    C1. There must be a first mover

    C2. This first mover is God

    This argument should sufficiently answer your question, because whatever the first mover is - that entity is God. The first mover must be God, because their existence is necessary not contingent.

    So, if something created “God”, then that being is in fact not God. The entity that created “God” is the real God.

    Aquinas’ Second Way

    Aquinas’ second way is an argument from causation, which is actually quite similar to his argument from motion -

    P1. Everything in the universe is subject to cause and effect.

    P1a. For example, throwing a rock caused a window to smash

    P2. C is caused by B, and B is caused by A.

    P3. If there is an infinite chain of causation, there would be no first cause.

    P4. If there is no first cause, there would be no subsequent causes or effects.

    P5. There are causes and effects.

    C1. There must have been a first cause

    C2. This first cause is God.

    The analysis for this way is identical to my analysis for Aquinas’ first way, just replace “motion” with “causation”.

    Aquinas’ Third Way

    Aquinas’s third way relies on the use of contingent and necessary existences -

    P1. Everything that exists contingently did not exist at some point

    P1a. For example, this post would not exist had I not written it.

    P2. If everything exists contingently, then at some point nothing existed.

    P3. If nothing existed at one point, then nothing could begin to exist.

    P4. Since things did begin to exist, there was never nothing in existence.

    C1. Therefore, there must be something that does not exist contingently, but exists necessarily.

    C2. This necessary being is God.

    Here Aquinas argues that the fact that we have an existence, albeit a contingent one, is proof enough that there was an initial necessary being. Your initial question should be answered if not by Aquinas’ first way, then by his third way.

    The Flaw in your Question

    In your post, you describe God as being a contingent being by suggesting that it is possible that something created him. God is actually a necessary being, which means that He does not rely on anything to be created. This is what Aquinas attempts to prove in his third way.

    Hopefully this helps, if you (or anyone) has any questions just reply and I’ll answer them. There are also quite a few objections to Aquinas’ arguments, I can go over them if people are interested.

    The drastic changes you are claiming to represent in this quote are missing from your examples of changes you support. You have referenced menial changes that are either already being implemented, or are so grossly misinformed that they become laughable. Your suggestions for deleting the Plots Server and publicising the senior voting debates show how illiterate you are on how TF works and the culture of this community.

    A second (and somewhat personal) point against you is that I take offence to your attitude that you should be the person to initiate such change. You are relatively new here, and as already established do not know the community as well as you think you do. This is server has been around for twelve years, and within that time an organic and strong community has grown. Whatever is working for the community should be what we take forward, not the views of one individual because “its 2022”.

    Instead of this, we should employ the political concept of “collective wisdom”. Your attitude and message here is overtly revolutionary, and we prefer to make gradual change over time. The fact that you think that we would consider rethinking every single thing illustrates your lack of understanding on our community.

    Your opinions aren’t the cause of objection. Its your lack of understanding of the kind of community we are, your white-knight complex in which you seem to want to ‘save’ TF by modernising it, and the fact that we don’t believe you’ll get along well with other admins.

    May you please train me so I can be more informed in how TotalFreedom works?

    once i reinstate and get my rank back, ill think more seriously about taking you under my wing. i like quite a few things about you, but there are glaring negatives that need ironing out.

    However, I believe that if we want to grow as a server, we need to make very drastic changes, we need to completely change the standards here, we need to completely change the precedent we have set.

    The drastic changes you are claiming to represent in this quote are missing from your examples of changes you support. You have referenced menial changes that are either already being implemented, or are so grossly misinformed that they become laughable. Your suggestions for deleting the Plots Server and publicising the senior voting debates show how illiterate you are on how TF works and the culture of this community.

    A second (and somewhat personal) point against you is that I take offence to your attitude that you should be the person to initiate such change. You are relatively new here, and as already established do not know the community as well as you think you do. This is server has been around for twelve years, and within that time an organic and strong community has grown. Whatever is working for the community should be what we take forward, not the views of one individual because “its 2022”.

    We should rethink every single thing, every single feature, every single standard, every single precedent. From the very start of the server to right here present day, even if it means making very drastic changes for stuff we have done since 11 years ago.

    Instead of this, we should employ the political concept of “collective wisdom”. Your attitude and message here is overtly revolutionary, and we prefer to make gradual change over time. The fact that you think that we would consider rethinking every single thing illustrates your lack of understanding on our community.

    My opinions may be unpopular, but it shouldn't prevent me from becoming admin.

    Your opinions aren’t the cause of objection. Its your lack of understanding of the kind of community we are, your white-knight complex in which you seem to want to ‘save’ TF by modernising it, and the fact that we don’t believe you’ll get along well with other admins.

    40+ year cold war, where, especially at the start of which, both the US and USSR were flooding tons of money into developing nuclear warheads they never actually fired at anyone in a war that never technically had any fatalities.

    this is because the war was fought via proxy, and there were indeed many fatalities (malayan emergency, korean war, nam).

    i don’t think its fair to compare the cold war (a proxy war situation) to the present climate (active battle).

    i don’t really think that Putin will ever use a nuke, but I am almost positive that he will launch various missiles if Ukraine ends up joining NATO and/or resisting Russian control.

    zelensky wants nato to do preemptive strikes

    this will never happen; NATO doesn’t want to get physically involved in the Russo-Ukrainian conflict. if push comes to shove i have no doubt that they will let Putin take what he wants from Ukraine (although this raises questions about how China will respond in relation to Taiwan).

    in an attempt to make yet another Soviet Union.

    this isn’t why Putin is doing what he’s doing.

    putins got a fuckin nostalgia boner for pre 1991

    putin has more of a boner for the security of Russia; although I do accept that his execution was incredibly flawed and has started a humanitarian crisis