The Dudeism Forum

I was thinking exactly along the same lines as RD when I read the 'doctors know what's best for you comment'. I remember some creepy doctor putting his hand up my wife on the pretext of checking her pregnancy and I just intuitively knew he was doing it for his own weird thrill. Later on my wife told me that she felt like she'd been abused by him. I worked at the same practice at the time and saw so many shit medical decisions it wasn't true. For the majority of non-surgical medical treatments you are far better off with herbal medicine. Acupuncture can be good too. Homeopathy probably useless but can be a superbly crafted placebo in skilled hands.

Point one- doctors

That is all anecdotal evidence, I was not referring to individual Drs., single fallible humans, but modern medicine in its entire scope. Vaccines verses voodoo dolls, which cured polio? Who you going to listen to, big tobacco or the surgeon general, when it comes to the health of your lungs? We no longer die at 24 from an infected scratch, our wives and children actually survive childbirth instead of the crap shoot it used to be. We no longer have to have 5 children in the hopes that two will live long enough to help out on the farm. Those doctors are what I am referring to, particularly in contrast to all the superstition that proceeded modern medicine and still seeks to derail it. But, remain skillful and aware, so you may catch any mistakes modern medicine may make, nothing is perfect, and to cling to modern medicine blindly is almost as bad as clinging to superstition.


Agreed, humans are near sighted.

Rand-
The absolutist statement for #7 "You hereby deauthorize and denounce any notion you have until now espoused which furthers in your mind the idea that the State is your Protector, because it is, in all
truth, the opposite".

Further, You beat me to my "that said" addition to my post. One has to be skillful, pick the right battles, you don't destroy the old lady's comfort to score atheist points, but when you sit across from a Michele Bachmann or Pat Robertson, have at it, full on intellectual warfare. We must engage the Ray Comforts and Popes of this world.

We can never know the truth of reality, we can however know the truth of OUR reality, we are always left with the brain in a vat hypothesis. But like the man said, even though the affliction is illusory and the cure is illusory, we still feel the suffering. That's what we have to deal with, not theorizing what might be on higher or lower or lateral levels of reality, the suffering that we face now is what matters.

Nothing is perfect, everything comes with a hidden mistake, the trick is to get the most benefits while committing the fewest mistakes. Or choosing the most acceptable mistake.

But the idea that you should accept some beliefs because to confront them is going to upset some individuals is still wrong. Surely MAMBLA, genital mutilation and burning witches are wrong beliefs, dangerous and destructive beliefs that cause unacceptable suffering. Beliefs such as those need to be exorcised from humanity.

Modern medicine can't take credit for the increase in life expentancy that is largely a result of better sanitation, public hygeine and what have you. You dismiss what I say on the basis that it is anecdotal and then go on to make numerous claims without a single reference to any evidence that supports your statements!

Not eveything that proceeded 'modern medicine' (as we think of it today) was superstitious. Modern medicine started at least as far back as 400BC with Hippocrates, when there were no allopathic drugs, only herbs.

Quote from: revgms on April 03, 2013, 09:56:54 AM
Vaccines verses voodoo dolls, which cured polio?

Is there room on the wall for another plaque? Such a stroke of literary genius truly does deserve to be immortalized. While I do wholeheartedly disagree with the point you're trying to make and the intellectual dishonesty employed in the attempt to make it, it is pure fucking genius to select, of all things, voodoo as a straw man argument. Voodoo... straw man... this old duder's head is bowed to you, man. I wish I'd thought of it first. I'd gladly publicly embarrass myself to pull something like that off. Fucking brilliant.

I didn't say shit about voodoo, or faith healing, or homeopathy, or the magical healing powers of magnetic fields and crystal vibrations. I never said shit about tobacco being good for you. Those are things I would not say, ever, to anyone. Thus, straw man. I'm really not into that "full on intellectual warfare" thing, but I know enough to observe that you're not very good at it. Don't use straw men if you want to be taken at all seriously by anyone who could pass the eighth grade without studying.

The point I was striving to explicitly make in that stretch of my response was this: When you directly assail someone's beliefs, absurd or not, you (perhaps unwittingly) strike a deep, primal chord that reflexively triggers a strong defense response. You get nowhere by it. I offer as evidence, sir, your strong rebuttal. Your own deep and primal chord was struck (though not unwittingly), and you defended your absurd belief with a fusillade of nonsense. First the straw men, then an untruth that is trivially easy to expose: People do in fact die of "an infected scratch", or at any rate relatively minor and otherwise easily treated, survivable wounds, scratches included. The modern medical establishment, reporting to itself, about itself, is quite open about the fact that hospital acquired infections by drug-resistant agents are a very serious and growing problem. It's been in the mainstream news, there are scads of articles about it on PubMed, the CDC web site, and so on. Contrary to your assertion, what immediately preceded modern medicine was absolutely not superstition. It was plant based medicine, and it is nowhere near obsolete -- as evidenced by the 1.3 billion Chinese who rely upon it as their primary treatment of disease. Primary, not only. They also avail themselves of the shit that we use in the western world, as do I, when it is warranted. It's just not so often warranted as we might believe it to be.

The referenced document, where it speaks to beliefs, says: "your beliefs are not inherently more valuable than other". Inherently. Inherently. Fucking inherently, man. Meaning, essentially, in that context, that your beliefs are not superior just because they're in your head. That was why I chose that particular document to expose to the fine and enlightened mind of our friend and fellow Dude, Boston Rockbury. He broached the subject, and being a feeling human being I thought, "Dude, I'll bet BR would like to see this". Then for whatever reason the septic tank exploded. What the fuck.

That whole Randian thing you're on about: Item 7 might have a Randian ring to it, but the statement is evidently true. Fuck theoretical, ideological bullshit about how reality ain't gotta be as fucked up as it is. All I have to do to become sickeningly reminded that the State is openly hostile to the best interests of the people is to go to the end of my street, turn right, and drive about 40 miles. When I do that, as I sometimes do out of necessity, I land right smack in the middle of one of the scenes from the documentary Gasland. It's my neighbors who are getting fucked because the oil and gas industry has been exempted from every meaningful environmental regulation of the last four decades. It's my neighbors who the industry and the government are fully intentionally fucking. It's my neighbors who have no recourse, at all, because the federal government made that fucking legal on purpose. They knew people's lives would be destroyed, their health ruined, their life savings depleted by huge medical bills, their property made worthless, their loved ones killed. This is not the first or only example that proves, beyond any doubt, that the State is hostile to the interests of the people and has always been so. It's just the one I chose this morning. The war for oil is now being fought in America, by Americans, against Americans. The State is NOT protecting them. It's on the other fucking side.

'Nuff sed. I don't do "full on intellectual warfare". I'm not trying to win anything. I'm not expecting to change your mind in the least. I'm not trying to piss anyone off. I did, I admit, try to trigger your primal defense response to make my point, and succeeded, but only for the purpose of the discussion. My own little piece of the world and my place in it are pretty darn pleasant, so it's of no concern at all to me what others think. I started out trying to be helpful, and I'm ending up trying to be helpful. Take 'er easy, Dude.

[edit: where the fuck that that strikethrough come from?!?!]

Quote from: RighteousDude on April 03, 2013, 12:58:50 PM

Quote from: revgms on April 03, 2013, 09:56:54 AM
Vaccines verses voodoo dolls, which cured polio?

I thought, "Dude, I'll bet BR would like to see this". Then for whatever reason the septic tank exploded. What the fuck.

Sorry man that was partly my fault. I was trying to be clever again - it's a disease!
"My name's Boston and I'm an arrogant prick. I have been clean for four hours."
"Welcome back to the group Boston. Would you like to share?"
"I'd like to share my intellectual brilliance, would that be okay?"
"Right that's enough, get out Boston you're banned!"
"Shit, did it again!"

Well I would attribute sanitation and hygiene to aspects of modern medicine, as they pertain to disease and how to prevent it. I would also argue that modern medicine is not exclusively a product of modern times, it has appeared and faded many times over the millennia. It is an understanding, a philosophy, so we have glimmers of modern medical thinking as far back as 4000 years, still the same philosophy.

'kay, I bring the sauce (used to call citation sources sauce as a funny play on words back at the Colbert Nation)


http://ije.oxfordjournals.org/content/30/6/1260.full
http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0005140.html
http://johnhawks.net/weblog/reviews/life_history/age-specific-mortality-lifespan-bad-science-2009.html

Do I need to cite that voodoo does not cure polio, or that smoking causes health problems, or that life sucked before antibiotics? The rest of my claims are more along the epistemology lines, so we are not going to settle this part of our arguments, if we did we'd get a Nobel Prize for doing what all the philosophers before us could not.

This is all wildly off topic, whether or not engaging the beliefs of others is 'right' or important, and I maintain that it is. The fact is we humans have never had it so good, this is the most peaceful, prosperous and healthy era in the whole of human history, we live longer, healthier more peaceful lives because we have abandoned wrong beliefs. It is true that some wrong beliefs have served us well in the past, and some still do have positive aspects today, the trick is knowing when their usefulness has waned and it is time to leave them behind.

QuoteThe fact is we humans have never had it so good, this is the most peaceful, prosperous and healthy era in the whole of human history, we live longer, healthier more peaceful lives because we have abandoned wrong beliefs.

I don't know if it's the media, but it seems we're taking some steps backwards, as the European and Western worlds lose grasp on the economic prowess they once had, and therefore societal influence. The point being that the middle east and China are rising super-powers, and their backwards religions and politics are slapping us in the face everywhere...

Quote from: revgms on April 03, 2013, 02:19:13 PM
Well I would attribute sanitation and hygiene to aspects of modern medicine, as they pertain to disease and how to prevent it. I would also argue that modern medicine is not exclusively a product of modern times, it has appeared and faded many times over the millennia. It is an understanding, a philosophy, so we have glimmers of modern medical thinking as far back as 4000 years, still the same philosophy.

'kay, I bring the sauce (used to call citation sources sauce as a funny play on words back at the Colbert Nation)


http://ije.oxfordjournals.org/content/30/6/1260.full
http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0005140.html
http://johnhawks.net/weblog/reviews/life_history/age-specific-mortality-lifespan-bad-science-2009.html

Do I need to cite that voodoo does not cure polio, or that smoking causes health problems, or that life sucked before antibiotics? The rest of my claims are more along the epistemology lines, so we are not going to settle this part of our arguments, if we did we'd get a Nobel Prize for doing what all the philosophers before us could not.

This is all wildly off topic, whether or not engaging the beliefs of others is 'right' or important, and I maintain that it is. The fact is we humans have never had it so good, this is the most peaceful, prosperous and healthy era in the whole of human history, we live longer, healthier more peaceful lives because we have abandoned wrong beliefs. It is true that some wrong beliefs have served us well in the past, and some still do have positive aspects today, the trick is knowing when their usefulness has waned and it is time to leave them behind.

Plenty of room here for lots of different opinions. I ain't gonna argue.

Nope not unwittingly, the more you perturb some one the more they will resort to the ridiculous to defend their position, then they have to face the words that actually come out of their mouth. Push them til the crazy comes out so loud and clear that they can not ignore it any longer. If that fails you have at least exposed them and their wrong beliefs.

We should not make the mistake of letting humanity's potential to be squandered because we may not reach a few individuals or we may harm their delicate sensibilities. We should continue to make the mistake of hurting a few feelings while promoting reason and human evolution. Like said before, pick your battles, the point to arguing against a Fred Phelps or Ken Ham is not to change their minds, it is to upset them, to make them keep talking so others can hear what is really rattling around in their heads. "that which dwells in darkness, perishes in the light"

But this is not to imply one should tell a grieving person that their loved one is not in heaven, not at that time or place man, be more skillful.

Besides, I seem to be outclassed, I bow to the person who can take a tiny scarecrow in a giant field and spin it into a rather large and pointed ad hominem attack. This is where I would like to point out that I am talking in the abstract here, not particularly aimed at any individual, just challenging ideas here folks.

Quote from: Hominid on April 03, 2013, 02:27:44 PM

QuoteThe fact is we humans have never had it so good, this is the most peaceful, prosperous and healthy era in the whole of human history, we live longer, healthier more peaceful lives because we have abandoned wrong beliefs.

I don't know if it's the media, but it seems we're taking some steps backwards, as the European and Western worlds lose grasp on the economic prowess they once had, and therefore societal influence. The point being that the middle east and China are rising super-powers, and their backwards religions and politics are slapping us in the face everywhere...

And we are moving forward on gay marriage, ending cannabis prohibition and more people are aware of the negative impact private prisons are having. It's the media dude, they are in the business of selling, and ugly, sexy and voyeuristic sell better than "shit's not too bad folks".

Yeah there are still problems, gun violence is disturbing, but it is also true it is receding, and fewer and fewer people keep guns, this is the most crime free we have ever been especially in regards to violent crime. It is just not a straight line, things are getting better and worse simultaneously all the time. The media just makes more money from talking about how bad it is, that is Fox News' business model right there.

Quote from: revgms on April 03, 2013, 03:14:41 PM

Quote from: Hominid on April 03, 2013, 02:27:44 PM

QuoteThe fact is we humans have never had it so good, this is the most peaceful, prosperous and healthy era in the whole of human history, we live longer, healthier more peaceful lives because we have abandoned wrong beliefs.

I don't know if it's the media, but it seems we're taking some steps backwards, as the European and Western worlds lose grasp on the economic prowess they once had, and therefore societal influence. The point being that the middle east and China are rising super-powers, and their backwards religions and politics are slapping us in the face everywhere...

And we are moving forward on gay marriage, ending cannabis prohibition and more people are aware of the negative impact private prisons are having. It's the media dude, they are in the business of selling, and ugly, sexy and voyeuristic sell better than "shit's not too bad folks".

Yeah there are still problems, gun violence is disturbing, but it is also true it is receding, and fewer and fewer people keep guns, this is the most crime free we have ever been especially in regards to violent crime. It is just not a straight line, things are getting better and worse simultaneously all the time. The media just makes more money from talking about how bad it is, that is Fox News' business model right there.

Yes, but.........

Slavery By Consent: Understanding The Human Farm - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5HiSBneEGN4

Hey DB, what's the gist of the movie?  It's kinda long!

Hey Righteous Dude, tone it down man. You claim not to do full intellectual warfare, but when challenged a bit you break out the Uzi. Rev GMS didn't come out swinging. He just made a valid point, and rather politely.

I rarely step in to police things here but personally I see a growing tendency for Dudes here to get arrogant and aggressive and dogmatic about their beliefs. I don't want this forum to go the way of other forums. One of the great things about it is that people here are generally able to argue without resorting to personal attacks or over the top sarcasm. Nothing wrong with a little sarcasm. Just don't go over the line.

Okay, Pubic Service Announcement over.

My own two cents on the debate (two baht, actually, since I'm in Thailand):

I've lived in the States for half my life, and abroad for the other half (mostly in Asia, but considered moving to Spain after spending a year there). What I see in the US when it comes to health seems to me to be the product of lifestyle choices. People eat too goddamn much and generally get most of their happiness from consumption. Restaurants are recreation. The solution is always more consumption, so it makes sense to consume pills to fight the problems. Everything is about filling filling filling. Fill belly with food, fill house with stuff, fill mind with passive entertainments, fill veins with medicine. Everyone is afraid of emptiness, space, quietude, vacations (Americans don't take them). I agree that Western Medicine today is more about treating symptoms of a much greater psychosomatic problem - the inability to live in a way that makes you feel good naturally, at baseline, not propped up by external additives.

My expat friends here are all in remarkably good health - and most of them are in their 60s. They don't take any medicines (one friend can't kick nicotine gum though). Most don't have health insurance. I don't know what it is. Most people I know in the States have chronic this and that and whether they treat it with alternative meds or allopathic meds, they never really overcome it. And of course the Thais seem far healthier as well. You don't see any old fat Thais on a mobility scooter. They're riding motorcycles and bicycles and bartering hard in markets well into their 80s. I have no data to support anything in this paragraph but that's my impression.

Let's not be disingenuous about Western medicine. There's an avalanche of data to suggest that western medicine (vaccination, antibiotics, epidemiology, sanitation) has given us longer lifespans. But I agree that the current state of pharmaceutical overprescribing is a huge problem and probably does more harm than good. But that's a completely different issue. 

I see the US in time lapse photography and so I notice changes more acutely than most. The commercials for prescription drugs have multiplied like crazy over the last 20 years. It's a horror show. Not to mention that all commercials have eaten into our psychic health, which I secretly suspect are at the root of all our medical problems (well, part anyway). Remember when you could go see a movie and the only ads were for coming attractions? In the Netherlands there are only 10 minutes of commercials an hour on TV. In the states it's more than double that. I can't read Thai so I'm immune to them here. Thank Buddha.

Quote from: forumdude on April 03, 2013, 11:30:20 PM
My own two cents on the debate (two baht, actually, since I'm in Thailand):

I've lived in the States for half my life, and abroad for the other half (mostly in Asia, but considered moving to Spain after spending a year there). What I see in the US when it comes to health seems to me to be the product of lifestyle choices. People eat too goddamn much and generally get most of their happiness from consumption. Restaurants are recreation. The solution is always more consumption, so it makes sense to consume pills to fight the problems. Everything is about filling filling filling. Fill belly with food, fill house with stuff, fill mind with passive entertainments, fill veins with medicine. Everyone is afraid of emptiness, space, quietude, vacations (Americans don't take them). I agree that Western Medicine today is more about treating symptoms of a much greater psychosomatic problem - the inability to live in a way that makes you feel good naturally, at baseline, not propped up by external additives.

My expat friends here are all in remarkably good health - and most of them are in their 60s. They don't take any medicines (one friend can't kick nicotine gum though). Most don't have health insurance. I don't know what it is. Most people I know in the States have chronic this and that and whether they treat it with alternative meds or allopathic meds, they never really overcome it. And of course the Thais seem far healthier as well. You don't see any old fat Thais on a mobility scooter. They're riding motorcycles and bicycles and bartering hard in markets well into their 80s. I have no data to support anything in this paragraph but that's my impression.

Let's not be disingenuous about Western medicine. There's an avalanche of data to suggest that western medicine (vaccination, antibiotics, epidemiology, sanitation) has given us longer lifespans. But I agree that the current state of pharmaceutical overprescribing is a huge problem and probably does more harm than good. But that's a completely different issue. 

I see the US in time lapse photography and so I notice changes more acutely than most. The commercials for prescription drugs have multiplied like crazy over the last 20 years. It's a horror show. Not to mention that all commercials have eaten into our psychic health, which I secretly suspect are at the root of all our medical problems (well, part anyway). Remember when you could go see a movie and the only ads were for coming attractions? In the Netherlands there are only 10 minutes of commercials an hour on TV. In the states it's more than double that. I can't read Thai so I'm immune to them here. Thank Buddha.

RE: "People eat too goddamn much and generally get most of their happiness from consumption. Restaurants are recreation."

Dude, that is for damn sure!! Fuckin' eh!