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What is the meaning of friendship? (pg. 5)
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| Halcyon+On+On |
| Why bother responding to him? System-J has already expressed that the topic is far too broad to even bother discussing, like most every thread he graces us with his opinion in, and certainly won't end up being the most frequent commentator in this one either. Like he already is. |
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| SYSTEM-J |
You need to learn to count, Hal. Only one subordinate clause, though - gold star for that. I try and take the time to reply to my fans, hence my continued posts here. Although I am, actually, holding out for the OP to make his question more specific.
Woscar: your amateur interests certainly aren't on display when replying to me, unless your appeal to authority a few pages back counts as interesting and relevant. |
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| Halcyon+On+On |
| Are we friends now? I'm just not sure on what it means!! |
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| woscar |
:stongue:
"Appeal to authority"? How can I be appealing to authority as proof of the veracity of my arguments when I haven't made a single argument in this thread? All I've contributed to the thread was the point of view of one of my favorite ancient philosophers. This is exactly what happens when a person memorizes a list of logical fallacies but fails to transfer them into the context of an actual discussion. An appeal to authority is only fallacious when it's implying that a person is infallible and thus his argument is true and exempt from all criticism.
The point of asking that question was to see just how arrogant and pedantic you can be. While the fact that Aristotle spent valuable time philosophizing on friendship doesn't automatically validate the worthiness of such an endeavor, saying that you are more "enlightened" than such a venerable figure exposes a gargantuan degree of arrogance. I wasn't here when you replied, as I was busy on other tasks, but Lira called you in on it in such a magnificent fashion that replying to it would have been utterly redundant.
Now, how about making an actual contribution to the discussion instead of the faux-intellectual diatribe you've spewed to avoid it altogether? |
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| EddieZilker |
| quote: | Originally posted by Lira
True that, but I'm not sure this happens to each and everyone of them, as I know very little about this issue.
What I mean to ask it: do you think alcoholics in general lack the drive to bond with other people? |
To your point about alcoholics and their capacity for humanity/lack there of. Naturally, it depends on the alcoholic. What exists as a virtual certainty is that they wind up in fairly horrendous straights - sometimes compelling them to stop drinking, altogether, but more often than not, compelling them to drink again.
One alcoholic I knew was possibly one of the nicest persons I've ever met. He was considerate to a fault. His compassion was grounds for a debacle in a hotel room in which he'd invited another homeless man in for a night of cold weather. Eventually, he blacked out but remembers glimpses of the man masturbating on the bed above him, as he lay on the floor, virtually catatonic. He woke up, the next day, to an empty room in complete disarray. There was no way of knowing what had happened other than the awful feeling greeting him, that morning.
Certainly, not everyone is going to have such stark black and white experiences. Some people never make it that far down the ladder. Others are just lucky. What is certain, however, is that there is a fundamental shift in consciousness which I would consider a chemically induced dissociative state. Fragments of the original person are there but, as time passes on, little by little they are replaced by the raw ingredients of the person subjected to a repeated process of psychological fractional distillation.
To your question as to whether alcoholics lack the drive to form bonds with others: Again, it depends on the alcoholic and how far down they've descended but there is a reason alcoholism is considered an isolating disease. For starters, the alcoholic's behavior, particularly when drinking, tends to alienate others, including his or her fellow drinkers.
Certain alcoholics are prone to physical violence while others become emotionally and psychologically abusive. Just as capricious is the alcoholic's tendency to form bonds - often on the spur of the moment and with consequences just as unpredictable. Some eventually wind up getting burned in the myriad exchanges with others and choose, absolutely willfully and with certain resolution, to abandon any faction of society which does not cater to their needs.
Those who choose isolation are only regulars at the liquor store and work, where the animosity they extend to coworkers functions for the drinker as a no-trespassing sign, and for the coworker, a very real warning. They drink in complete isolation. This situation occurs long after their list of friends has dwindled under the strain of the multitudinous, lost chances to straighten up and fly right. Even the bonds of family aren't enough.
To say, however, that the alcoholic's isolation is the result of his unwillingness to form bonds would be to misunderstand the complexity. Here, Maslow's hierarchy of needs meets a meet grinder. There were many stages prior to the self-imposed isolation where the alcoholic learned that his desire to form bonds would wind up causing him unjust (for the alcoholic is hard pressed to actually accept responsibility) and egregious pain.
The short answer to your question is an unequivocal no - the alcoholic does have the drive to form bonds. His ability and method, however, are both misguided and retarded. Only when this drive has put him in conflict with others to his abnormal detriment will he choose to do without such pursuits. |
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| Lira |
Very interesting, Eddie :)
| quote: | Originally posted by SYSTEM-J
Lira, to make it clear: I'm not saying I can't see the reason why anyone would ask the question, I'm saying I can't see the reason why someone has asked the question. At the moment this thread is serving as a Rorschach test, and I'm questioning the point of the ink blot. |
Entertaining banter? |
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| SYSTEM-J |
| quote: | Originally posted by woscar
"Appeal to authority"? How can I be appealing to authority as proof of the veracity of my arguments when I haven't made a single argument in this thread? |
You do realise that a logical fallacy doesn't have to serve that function? You can commit a logical fallacy in place of any independent argument at all. In this instance, I was asking the point of this question and your entire line of response appeared to be "Several renowned philosophers mused about friendship => this question is valid". The fact you have displayed no other argument doesn't make that any less of a fallacy. Quite the opposite.
| quote: | | While the fact that Aristotle spent valuable time philosophizing on friendship doesn't automatically validate the worthiness of such an endeavor, saying that you are more "enlightened" than such a venerable figure exposes a gargantuan degree of arrogance. |
I love how you've "quoted" a word I haven't actually used. Argument buster right there. Although I've already made exceptionally clear the difference between saying "Aristotle was wasting his time" and what I'm actually saying in this thread. |
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| woscar |
| quote: | Originally posted by SYSTEM-J
You do realise that a logical fallacy doesn't have to serve that function? You can commit a logical fallacy in place of any independent argument at all. In this instance, I was asking the point of this question and your entire line of response appeared to be "Several renowned philosophers mused about friendship => this question is valid". The fact you have displayed no other argument doesn't make that any less of a fallacy. Quite the opposite. |
Is your cherry-picking intentional or accidental? I explained the exact intention of the question here:
| quote: | Originally posted by woscar
The point of asking that question was to see just how arrogant and pedantic you can be. While the fact that Aristotle spent valuable time philosophizing on friendship doesn't automatically validate the worthiness of such an endeavor, saying that you are more "enlightened" than such a venerable figure exposes a gargantuan degree of arrogance. I wasn't here when you replied, as I was busy on other tasks, but Lira called you in on it in such a magnificent fashion that replying to it would have been utterly redundant. |
Like I said, this is exactly what happens when someone just memorizes a list of logical fallacies and then ignores context when engaged in an actual discussion or simply reading a block of text. Of course, there's also the possibility that you're doing it on purpose, which is quite childish.
It's also about time that you realize that your demeanor in this forum in general is one gigantic, living, breathing logical fallacy. You keep operating under the assumption that since things don't matter to you then it also must apply to the other 6 billion inhabitants of planet Earth. Resulting in post after post after post of demeaning remarks.
| quote: | Originally posted by SYSTEM-J
I love how you've "quoted" a word I haven't actually used. Argument buster right there. |
You keep using this in arguments and it's quite embarrassing because it denotes either a deliberate intention to distort or a complete ignorance of the various uses that quotation marks have in the English language (although not exclusive to it). In this case, I'm using it with the intention of indicating a special/unusual sense of use for a word (See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quotat...g_unusual_usage).
I'll say it again:
| quote: | Originally posted by woscar
Now, how about making an actual contribution to the discussion instead of the faux-intellectual diatribe you've spewed to avoid it altogether? |
If you have something interesting to say about the topic at hand, I'm more than delighted to maintain a discussion with you. If all you're going to do is keep spewing you arrogant, pedantic, self-aggrandizing, faux-intellectual discourse than I'm not interested in wasting my time with you any longer. |
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| epicaricacy |
ask yourself how many people you know that would suck the poison from a snakebite on the tip of your penis.
divide by two and that is how many friends you have, the other half is just in it because they like cocks. |
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| Halcyon+On+On |
| Does my pet snake count if it's the one that bit me in the first place? I'd be up to half a friend by then. |
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| epicaricacy |
| i would file him under "in it for the cock.". |
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