Video: "Christian Debate?" About the Morality of Nominal Sophistry

(Commentary by Roger Erickson)

Data is meaningless without context. So before viewing the video below, please consider it's context, and the parameters which allow us to assess REAL vs only nominal success in a given context.

Many have heard of the origins of the phenomenon named "sophistry" by the Greeks.

2300 years ago, Greeks noting and naming the structure of language, immediately also noticed the fluidity and gradual change of what they named grammar, vocabulary, semantics and sophistry.

Semantic plasticity - the function of letting the same word imply different things in different contexts or usage patterns - allows a relatively small number of words to describe an unlimited set of concepts, when specified by context, word order, or many other linguistic tools (prefixes, suffixes, and noun/verb/other variants).

Sophistry was one, early form of humor noted, used and abused by various people. It use is described in the dialogues of Socrates.

"Is that YOUR dog?" 'Yes.'
"And is YOUR dog a mother?" 'Yes, she has puppies.'
"Then that dog is YOUR mother!" :)     Socrates noted two general classes of responses.
      Intelligent people: '[Greek equivalent of "bug off."]'
      Naive youth: "Oh my gosh. My dog is my mother!" Fear. Panic.

This brings up a moral dilemma. Or does it?

Maybe not in the same way for all people. The early sophists were soon reviled, for their irritating habit of practicing and refining ancient methods for confusing, dividing and 'conquering' naive targets, so that they could be more easily tricking into being the object of ridicule. Worse, sophists were soon followed by others who refined their methods of cheating at wagers, or even robbing people. Sophistry has long been associated with subterfuge, propaganda, and looting.

So, is it immoral for a person to have a dog as "their" mother? What if they own multiple dogs with puppies? How immoral is it to have multiple mothers, and that they are all dogs? :(

Or is this all a lot of data, and semantic descriptors, uselessly applied completely out of context, and therefore contravening a basic, hierarchical rule of language utilization ... i.e., that it be applied to orient to REAL, not just imaginary, nominal or nonexistent scenarios?


Let's take another example.

"Is that YOUR fiat currency?" 'Yes.'
"And in purely nominal, double-entry accounting ... fiat currency creation has to be balanced with an equal entry labeled, purely for form, a 'deficit' or 'debt?' " 'Yes.'
"Then that nominal metric is YOUR real debt!" :)

Just like with Socrates, we're seeing two general classes of responses.
   Intelligent people: '[Get lost.]'
   Naive people unaware of basic banking operations: "Oh my gosh! Our nation is in DEBT!!!' Fear. Panic

Is it only nominally immoral for a population to have a purely semantic 'debt' to itself? What if that population grows AND the transaction rate of each resident increases! Is it immoral to allow increasing use of nominal or fiat measuring units for our growing populace to denominate necessary transactions with - i.e., an increasing volume of fiat currency?

Or is the only functional immorality that of an electorate leaving itself unaware of basic operations, unable to discriminate sophistry from functional semantics, and flat out unaware of actual context?

Now, please watch this video and the 2nd link, to see how it is promoted. Then please comment below.

"Christian" Debate About the Morality of Nominal Sophistry

Government Debt is 'Idolatry,' Hurts the Poor, Future Generations, Christian Panelists Argue

The immediate issue here is confusion over the dual roles of any currency system, and conflating two separate needs.

1) denominating any and all, unpredictably needed transactions, WHENEVER they need to be denominated (tempo is paramount for group agility)

2) short term vs long term stable store of value. (Value is ultimately dictated by context, not by denominating units.)

The deeper issue is basic need to maintain situational awareness, as the threshold for survival of a functioning democracy.

Since tempo is critically important, we really need to address our electorate's situational awareness, ASAP - before we're robbed again, or confused and divided enough to be conquered? What else could be more important for National Security?

Reality - As Context Awareness - Is Seeping In? Yet Is Cultural Diffusion Fast Enough To Keep Up With The Parasites, As They Propagate?

Commentary by Roger Erickson

Unanswerable questions from a new FT reader
           (extended text, below)

From Mr Joe Rooney.

Sir, It was the wrong day for my wife to start reading the Financial Times. After some period of time she turned to me and said: “Why is George Osborne taking legal action against the EU cap on bankers’ bonuses when it says here that these chaps at ICAP were demanding bonuses in return for manipulating the Libor market?” All I could muster in response was that you would have to ask the chancellor himself to explain that.

A brief period ensued before she came back with: “If these three ICAP chaps are to be extradited to the US to face criminal charges and ICAP settled a civil investigation for £55m, then judging by this article that says JPMorgan are going to settle for $11bn I can only imagine that tens if not hundreds of their employees are facing similar criminal charges?” Somewhat exasperated I said I simply did not know.

After another pause she continued with another question: “Does it really need so many different regulatory agencies to deal with a single bank?” I could only reply that I had read somewhere that banks prefer to deal with lots of different regulatory agencies.

She was not finished, however. “Look,” she said, “in this article it says that New York gives Wall Street about $3bn a year in tax breaks and other incentives. All of this does not make any sense.”

I was about to tell her that she needed to go to business school to understand how free markets efficiently allocate scarce resources, but instead I picked up the sports section of my white paper and left the room quickly.

Joe Rooney, Brussels, Belgium

                ....

If such simple questions can't be answered with adequate tempo then, yes, the USA is a failing state too, not just the UK. None of us can simply sweep fundamental question under the sports page, or Madame LaGarde's rug. We owe simple, timely answers to our families, not to mention the 7th generation yet unborn. It's our national survival we're talking about.