"Also that whole thing where you need to reach a dream telephone to get out...maybe just think about that a bit more before you go repeating it to people."
When The Matrix came out, the New York Times reached out to philosopher of mind John Searle to write an article about the philosophical implications of the movie, most likely expecting some kind of bland article about how it was a recreation of Descartes. Instead John Searle wrote them saying the movie was incoherent, for the reasons outlined in the comic. The article was never published on account of the fact that no one wanted to read that the movie was incoherent, not to mention most viewers probably wouldn't share Searle's intuitions about its incoherence. Ironic, since John Searle is one of the only modern philosophers to hold seriously the position that most people hold without any philosophical training - naive realism. That is to say, the belief that we experience reality directly. If this belief is true, of course, he is perfectly correct to say that the Matrix is incoherent, because a dream would be separated from reality via a causal connection, so we could have no interactive component.
Most people reject this upon further thought however, after all massively multiplayer video games, where the game world is experienced by each player independently but kept track of my a central computer, are perfectly coherent to most people. Philosophers usually reject this because they read Kant, which John Searle certainly did, but as far as I know he never played WoW so that's probably where he went astray.
Most people reject this upon further thought however, after all massively multiplayer video games, where the game world is experienced by each player independently but kept track of my a central computer, are perfectly coherent to most people. Philosophers usually reject this because they read Kant, which John Searle certainly did, but as far as I know he never played WoW so that's probably where he went astray.
"Of course I think I'm the only one who should be able to be a hypocrite, what's inauthentic about that?"
Utilitarianism: "do everything you can to prevent it from spreading."
Deontology: "do everything you can to prevent it from spreading."
Virtue Ethics: "do everything you can to prevent it from spreading."
Deontology: "do everything you can to prevent it from spreading."
Virtue Ethics: "do everything you can to prevent it from spreading."
Now is not the time for moral weakness. Times of crisis are not times to let things casually slide and priorizing our petty pleasures over our civic duty. Do not go out unless you need to, practice social distancing, wash your hands after everything. Carelessness will kill people, and pandemics must be slowed at the beginning, not at the end. Follow the WHO guildlines on how to protect against coronavirus.
Oh, and if you lost your income from the pandemic, you should not be paying rent. Workers can't be the only ones to have their savings wiped out from a public health crisis. When all is said and done we have to reflect on what caused us to be so unprepared to organize society to act on everyone's behalf (hint: it might have something to do with having all of our institutions based solely around enriching the property owning elite, but hey, who knows).
Oh, and if you lost your income from the pandemic, you should not be paying rent. Workers can't be the only ones to have their savings wiped out from a public health crisis. When all is said and done we have to reflect on what caused us to be so unprepared to organize society to act on everyone's behalf (hint: it might have something to do with having all of our institutions based solely around enriching the property owning elite, but hey, who knows).
Now is not the time for moral weakness. Times of crisis are not times to let things casually slide and priorizing our petty pleasures over our civic duty. Do not go out unless you need to, practice social distancing, wash your hands after everything. Carelessness will kill people, and pandemics must be slowed at the beginning, not at the end. Follow the WHO guildlines on how to protect against coronavirus.
Oh, and if you lost your income from the pandemic, you should not be paying rent. Think about organizing with your follow tenants to go on a rent strike. Workers can't be the only ones to have their savings wiped out from a public health crisis. When all is said and done we have to reflect on what caused us to be so unprepared to organize society to act on everyone's behalf (hint: it might have something to do with having all of our institutions based solely around enriching the property owning elite, but hey, who knows).
Oh, and if you lost your income from the pandemic, you should not be paying rent. Think about organizing with your follow tenants to go on a rent strike. Workers can't be the only ones to have their savings wiped out from a public health crisis. When all is said and done we have to reflect on what caused us to be so unprepared to organize society to act on everyone's behalf (hint: it might have something to do with having all of our institutions based solely around enriching the property owning elite, but hey, who knows).