[henry quirk]

"Peace, equality, justice, morality, ethics (did you skip 'love' on purpose?). They aren't fictions. They're quite important. They're just hard to define in concrete terms."


In a philosophical sense they are fictions: peace, equality, justice, morality, ethics, these and others, only exist as compact or agreement between individuals. That is: for peace, equality, justice, morality, ethics to exist they must cudgeled together by individuals, then, agreed upon. To agree upon something requires at least two individuals.

Love too is a fiction, but a slightly different order of fiction, one that requires only 'one'. For example: if I'm right and dogs can't love, then the wholly reasonable love you feel for Fido is not reciprocated. This one-way love doesn't invalidate the love. Your love is something 'you' do whether or not the object (or subject) of your love feels, or is capable of feeling, the same.

What makes them all fiction (philosophically) is -- again -- the necessity that 'you' and/or 'me' 'do' them.

Also: peace, equality, justice, morality, ethics, democracy, etc., I maintain, are essentially unobtainable because each requires at least two to agree. Plenty of agreement there is, in the short-term...

Love (along with hate) has the virtue (or vice), being as it is 'done' by one, of potentially existing as long as the one does.

Nonetheless: kill all humans, everywhere, one minute from now, and peace, equality, justice, morality, ethics, love, democracy, hate, etc. (all esoterica) die with us.

The world has an objective reality independent of what you or I think or feel about it. But only you and me, him and her, and them, bring subjectivity (meaning) to the world.

So: forgive my imprecision. I don't mean to denigrate these 'fictions', only to label them as such and to place them properly 'within' 'you' and 'me'. That is: peace, equality, justice, morality, ethics, love and all the others are what we, as individuals, 'do'.

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"If what dogs do isn't love (or at least companionship), then it's a really good imitation."


Dogs make great companions! For reasons that have nothing to do with love as you 'do' it.

And: computers can be made to be quite convincing in text responses to questions, so much so that, initially, it's hard to tell if the 'person' on the other end is a person or not.

A prepared response (a programmed computer or informally trained dog) does not a person or lover make...