Saga The Dark Side - Define it

There is certainly a lot of variation in individual Sith Lords' beliefs. Darth Traya believed the Force as a whole had a will, and she hated it for it.

Either way, Sith as a whole do certainly seem to pay less heed to the will of the Force or even the will of the dark side, even if they believe in the existence or validity of such concepts, in favour of imposing their own will on the Force. I suppose said imposition could be said to be of the dark side and thus of the 'will of the dark side,' if you really wanted to.

 

Edit: Oops, double post.

I'll use the opportunity to ask: What do y'all think of the idea, presented in the Tales of the Jedi Companion, that the original Sith (the species) made some sort of alliance with the dark side due to "mutual goals?" Certainly one of the most overt indications that the dark side, at least, has some sort of agency.

 

This simply isn't the case. In quantum mechanics there is no 'pre-existing' state that would be an 'inevitable result' (Bell's theorem has not been falsified) - so that the outcome of process, at a quantum level, is indeed 'random'. Of course there are propositions of hidden variables but one would wonder how they could be considered as logical positivist or (particularly) logical empirical given that they fly in the face of all the empirical data and tests that we have.

Here you put the cart before the horse. While phlogiston was a theory it was overturned by later theories, precisely because those other theories made more sense - ie were empirically and observable distinct from. What you appear to be arguing is that you have some prior knowledge of which empirically and observably similar theory will be discovered to be more precise.

So, you are making an argument that you can see into the future, and another that flies in the face of the observable and empirical data - and you would still argue that 'logical positivism' isn't a philosophical conception? (you can no longer claim 'logical empiricism' as you make an argument in-spite of empirical evidence.)

Except to say that your consideration of the existence or otherwise of 'flgjgjfjfjdj', and therefore it's relevance or otherwise, is based upon false logic - in as much as the argument fails to consider itself as simply a philosophical position rather than an empirical fact...yes yes, a flaw more and more common among scientific thinkers...

 

I think we're talking past each other. I'm not talking about wave function collapse, although I will nonetheless dispute the word 'random' here. Quantum mechanics aren't random, and any measurement of a quantum system are probabilistic, following the Born rule of distribution. But that's even more off-track than this discussion has already gone, so let's not go there...

What I was stating was that the hypothetical existence of Everett branches has no bearing on fatalism.

That's not at all what I'm arguing. As I said, the belief that phlogiston caused fire did not entail any advance predictions; the link from phlogiston to empirical observation was configured after the observation. Thus, modern understanding is not in fact empirically observably distinct, as the belief phlogiston caused fire did not constrain any observation of fire in advance anyway! In other words, if some ancient alchemist were to be resurrected, he could still go around touting his belief in phlogiston, and as said belief fails the verification and falsification principles, modern understanding wouldn't necessarily overturn his belief; he can still tack on the phlogiston concept to the actual process of fire, because his 'theory' does not make empirically distinct (or even similar) predictions, it makes no predictions at all.

It's one of many examples. Phlogiston, the anima, an undetectable dragon in the basement... What experience must befall us to make us believe in any of the above? It is even better to ask: what experience must not? Do you believe that elan vital explains the mysterious aliveness of living beings? Then what does this belief not allow to happen - what would definitely falsify this belief? A null answer means that this belief does not constrain experience; it permits anything to happen.

Belief in free will falls in the same category.

To be perfectly honest, you lost me when you said I was making arguments that I can see into the future and/or that contradict empirical data, so you'll have to clarify. I think you misunderstood something, somewhere.

However, of course I wouldn't argue that logical positivism isn't a philosophical conception. Logical positivism goes one step further than what I was saying, which was that phlogiston, an analogy for free will here, has no place in a scientific textbook. Both beliefs make no advance predictions of empirical observations that could be verified or falsified, so I would have nothing to say to anyone believing in them beyond "good for you, now back to what we have empirically observed to cause fire..." Logical positivism doesn't merely comment on the usefulness of such beliefs, but furthermore would contend that free will, for example, is a cognitively meaningless concept and literally nonsensical. I merely contend that proposing the existence of free will is useless.

Which argument? What are you talking about?

Belief in the existence of 'flgjgjfjfjdj' (let us in fact say that 'flgjgjfjfjdj' has the dictionary definition of an undetectable dragon) is right up there with belief in the existence of elan vital, phlogiston, or free will as beliefs that make no advance predictions about the empirically observable universe being distinct from a universe lacking these things. Thus if I were to say 'flgjgjfjfjdj' exists in the Dreadwar universe, I'm not contributing any new meaningful information about reality, and I'd say it'd be best for my statement to be ignored in a discussion about certain aspects of the Dreadwar universe.

And hey, no need for snippiness, even if it is a vitiated Yoda quote.

 

But you were talking about wave function collapse. You were arguing that even at the molecular level things have a pre-existing and inevitable state. I was pointing out that they don't, that to suggest so is simply incorrect. I don't know why you would object to 'random' when the apostrophes surround it precisely to avoid it being taken as random.

And I have no interest in Everett branches, or any 'many worlds' interpretation - which I see as simply the ultimate expression of an extreme form of logical positivism - simply an inability to conceptualise an event as being only probabilistic (and therefore not 'real' and measurable), a reaction to such a conception as being 'thought-like'

What may have an effect on fatalism is quantum sampling, of the kind seen in - for example - photosynthesis, whereby the entanglement of protein clusters 'chooses' through quantum sampling the most efficient route by which to utilise the energy of the incoming photon.

And...while I agree that it is a little off-track I only responded initially to a logical fallacy, and then you started arguing the 'fatalism' at a quantum level.....like a red rag to a bull.

Bottom line. There is a distinction (hence why phlogiston is now only an addendum in the history of science). What you described was a situation where two conceptions result in the same observed reality and have the same predictive capacity. It is only on the basis of a-priori belief that one is preferred above the other.

No it doesn't. You keep addressing it as if it does, as if such is evidenced but it is not. It is a philosophical proposition, a belief.

You used phlogiston as an example, as if it were a similar situation. It is not. Phlogiston is an addendum in the history of science because we learned and observed a more useful model. There is a distinction between phlogiston and our current knowledge of what actually causes matter to burn. What you described was a situation whereby currently there is no distinction between one way of looking at the observed reality and another. Your exact words were;

"it is neither falsifiable nor verifiable. I could point to a fatalist reality in which everything, including one's decisions and thoughts, are entirely set in stone from the beginning, and there'd be no empirically observable difference between agents within this reality and an agent that could be described in a supposedly non-fatalist (if such a thing is possible) reality as having free will."


What I said in response was simply that neither the fatalist nor the free will conception are falsifiable nor verifiable then there is no logical argument to prefer one over the other.

Your suggestion that the question is alike the historical dismissal of phlogiston can only mean that you know of some future knowledge that renders one of them as more or less falsifiable or verifiable. You also seemed to describe quantum events as having a pre-exisitng and "inevitable" outcome. Hence my suggestion that you must be able to see into the future and that you would appear to diagree with empirical data.

You appear to be arguing against yourself now. The argument was, actually, about what can exist in the Star Wars universe. So, if the said proposition was an undetectable dragon then....in the Star Wars universe there is an undetectable dragon. So....what were you arguing?

Oh, and I wasn't being 'snippy'. I'm assuming you think I was referring to arrogance? Not at all. I really do see this same error in scientific communities - whereby what is actually a held belief is seen as actually being a fact. It has a deal to do with how science is taught, I think.

 

I sense, here, and I could be entirely misreading you, an all too common and terrible misunderstanding of quantum mechanics associated with dualism, the kind of thinking that's resulted in people going around thinking consciousness causes collapse. Suffice it to say that the vast majority of physicists presuppose materialism, and that the Copenhagen interpretaton being misunderstood in popular accounts as to indicate consciousness plays a role is such a notorious misunderstanding that it's been the subject of numerous polls.

And whether or not you are interested in it, MWI remains a compelling interpretation. Nonetheless, I do certainly agree with you that events being solely probabilistic is difficult to conceptualise. However to say they are not real or not measurable is a fundamental misunderstanding, which must prompt me to ask what your definition of real or measurable is so that wave function collapse falls outside of them. We are talking about events that follow the Born rule - as inevitable as pretty much anything else. Quantum mechanics is often perceived to be this great mystery which physicists are stumped by. Sure, if you back to early last century. Not so anymore, and it has no bearing on dualism, nothing 'thought-like' about quantum processes, and nothing weirdly different from the rest of the universe in terms of quantum events not being the inevitable result of a pre-existing state. If MWI is correct, there's the addendum that there are many inevitable results of said state, and we are victims of a massive selection bias when making any quantum measurement that make it seem the outcome was random and not inevitable.

I am interested in which interpretation you prefer, however.

You're going to have to clarify what you mean by "a distinction." A distinction in prediction about observable reality? In that case, no there is not. Phlogiston is an addendum in the history of science because it is useless, supposing additional causes for fire beyond what is empirically observed and what is empirically observable, failing in light of Solomonoff's theory of inductive inference.

Exactly. It is a belief, which is exactly what I was talking about. Unless one's belief in free will is particularly unique in making an empirically falsifiable or verifiable prediction, in which case I'm very curious as to which prediction that is, then it does fall in the same category of beliefs that are neither empirically falsifiable or verifiable.

No, phlogiston is dismissed not because it is any more or less falsifiable or verifiable, it is because it assumes more causes than the minimum necessary to solve the problem of "what causes fire?" Free will supposes there is something extra, some additional, undetectable element of agency, something that belongs right up there with elan vital explaining the mysterious aliveness of living beings. Free will should obviously not be preferred as a belief to be held, as it assumes more causes than are necessary to find a cause for the computational processes in human brains that we dub 'choice.'

Not at all. It is precisely my contention that Lucas can say an undetectable dragon exists in the Star Wars universe all he likes, but that statement is useless and irrelevant at best, completely nonsensical and meaningless (and thus outside of his 'authority' to make claims regarding existence) at worst. Either way, any statement regarding the existence of an undetectable dragon, or free will, can be safely ignored in a discussion about the nature of the dark side of the Force.

And it wasn't really what I was arguing. You challenged my reference to logical positivism, so I'm waiting to see what overall point you're getting at, or what beliefs you hold. To fall back on one of my favourites, "What do you think you know, and why do you think you know it?"

Apologies, I was perceiving an overall increase in aggression when attacking my arguments, verging on implications of personal flaws in thinking, compared to previous posts, but... Your post... that misread could have been.

 

Darth_Dreadwar you have made so many epistemolical and ontological errors in the last post that I do not a) know where to begin and b)wish to bog down this thread any further.

Suffice it to say I hold to no dualist formulation of reality, nor does my argument require such - yet you seem to have an argument in your head that does, that you think has anything to do with what I have said. It follows, of course, that the argument that 'free will' requires 'something else', something 'additional' is (as it is percolative of the imagined dualist proposition) in error. This all comes down to a form of thinking (a form of logical positivism which might be rendered empirical realism) which has come to be understood as actually being , in some way, scientific thought - as if it is one and the same with science. As I said before this comes down to the way science is taught, without a grounding in critical analysis and logical thinking (by which I mean to say, without the philosophical grounding necessary to distinguish that the 'logical' point you are at will have an assumed basis). Logic, like any computation, is rendered meaningless if the initial information is not checked for errors. CRAP in, CRAP out.

A couple of errors off the top of my head. You claim that; "We are talking about events that follow the Born rule - as inevitable as pretty much anything else." At what point point does probabilistic=inevitable, especially in a discussion about determinism.

You also say that "...a cause for the computational processes in human brains"...but the processes in human brains are not computational; they cannot be mapped as algorithmic (computational) processes

To the main point

"No, phlogiston is dismissed not because it is any more or less falsifiable or verifiable, it is because it assumes more causes than the minimum necessary to solve the problem of "what causes fire?""

Irrelevant to the discussion (and actually a bit of a red herring. 'Phlogiston is dismissed because phogiston doesn't exist' is actually a more concise statement of the facts). What matters is that there is a distinction. If there were no distinction then we would still consider phlogiston as an acceptable scientific theory. What you described initially was a situation where two propositions are empirically and observably exactly the same. That you later added the point that one of those requires "some additional element" is a conception you have imposed upon the situation. That you can only see the argument that way says nothing, actually, about the proposition - only how you have defined it.

And, if Lucas said that an undetectable dragon is the source of the darkside, then it would be. That he has said free will exists is not irrelevant to the discussion of the darkside within the setting of Star Wars, as some consider free will to be an aspect of the darkside.

 

Definitely behavior, it's what happens when an impatient force user's emotions take complete control and not only destroy themself but everything around them. Fear, anger, hate radiates and attracts negative energy amplifying this in the force user who chooses the "quick and easy" path.

 

Guys can we address the point of the thread and not address whether the Dark Side is Jedi subjectivity...

 

Insubstantial. Point out said errors, or have it be left assumed you have no more retorts than the scant few below.

Forgive me, but this is a highly rambling paragraph. Instead of offering discrete counterarguments, we merely see discrediting of how science is taught - claims which are not backed up with any evidence either. I shall try my best to address some of the vague points anyway.

I am not claiming you hold a dualist formulation of reality, merely picking up on some fundamental misinterpretations of quantum mechanics that are shared by and oft associated with dualists who believe consciousness causes collapse. But again, I am left confused as to what formulations you actually hold, and what your argument actually is.

And I notice you say "It follows, of course, that the arguent that 'free will' requires 'something else' ... is ... in error," and for someone skim reading this exchange they would be left with the impression that you had outlined some compelling argument of many paragraphs that gave rise to this conclusion. But in fact you merely state the conclusion with a casual "of course" without any preceding argument. Explain why it is in error, and I can attempt to refute whichever erroneous lines of thinking gave rise to this conclusion.

This is where I must simply and hopefully inoffensively ask how acquainted with the Born rule you are?

I'll try putting it another way. Quantum outcomes are beholden to the Born rule. The movement of planets are beholden to the gravitational pull of their star. There is nothing greatly mysterious, magical, thought-like, or truly random about quantum processes. In so much as the human mind can ill conceptualise the true maths of quantum mechanics, it is expedient to say that the pre-existing state of reality inevitably results in a successive observable state. Meshing the common meanings of words like "inevitable" to quantum processes is always going to be somewhat tricky, but if we're going to use phrases like "states of reality," or even words like "particles," I'm going to use "inevitable." However, since you've raised objection to this, how do I put it... common, yes, slightly inaccurate linguistic landscape of the macroscopic world, then I'm inclined to write out what I originally didn't want to:

Particles is a misnomer as much as inevitable, there are just clouds of amplitude in a multiparticle configuration space and what you perceive as any macroscopic matter is merely a gigantic factor in a wavefunction that happened to factorise. It doesn't have a separate existence any more than there was a particular solid factor of three hidden inside the number six.

Don't state minority opinions as facts. The computational theory of mind does have detractors, true, but it is the dominant model in the scientific community, and any Serlean arguments such as your own were rather nicely overtuned over two decades ago by first-person operationalism as described in the Multiple Drafts Model.

Incorrect, as phlogiston's existence has not been falsified, as it is unfalsifiable.

Furthermore, you're completely missing the point. Phlogiston is an analogy, but one example of an unfalsifiable, unverifiable belief. If you don't like the phlogiston example because you (incorrectly) think it is somehow falsifiable, then use one of the many other examples given, otherwise the discussion is bogged down in needless quibbling.

Yes, some additional element which is not empirically observable - not falsifiable, not verifiable. You are essentially making my argument for me here; there are beliefs in "some additional elements" that are empirically and observably indistinct from beliefs that do not so unecessarily include additional elements. Such as the belief in free will. "Oh, everything modern science tells us about the brain is true, and there's also this thing called free will which is why we can make genuine choices, and hey, probably elan vital too which is why living beings are alive... oh and if you ask for how any of these concepts are empirically verifiable or falsifiable, I'm gonna be drawing a blank."

Now we're getting somewhere, as at least here I can ask, "why do you think it would be relevant?" and "how would it be relevant?" You're doing too much nitpicking, and too little explaining of what your formulations are, or indeed what your overall point is at all, if you had to sum it up in a sentence or two.

 

"Only by probing the dark side can we see."

 

Quantum randomness =/= common-sense concept of "free will".

Yeah. This reconciliation of scientific reality and common sense doesn't exactly work - the more we know about ourselves, the less intuitive sense it makes to us. It's just obvious common sense to anyone that we all have free choices, because we feel it's obvious, no matter all the proof to the contrary. So you get a whole bunch of people who try to combine the scientific view that they know is right with the whole "free will" idea that they feel is right.

The obvious answer is what any brain scientist would tell you - that our common sense is really flawed (and sometimes just plain wrong) because the human brain is a survival engine, not a truth-detector.

 

Firstly it's not 'brain scientists' who say this (might be worth reading what someone like, for instance, Dr Karl Pribram has to say on the matter - a good starting point), it is actually an argument made primarily by those working on AIs and robotics. Secondly...just take a little time to understand the ludicrous circular conundrum this afflicts; If the brain is flawed (and the corollary is we can't actually be capable of considering anything, that whatever 'we' think 'we' know is ultimately flawed) as a 'truth-detector' then anything that brain might conceive is ultimately flawed and thus can say nothing of the world, thus an understanding of this (supposedly) scientific view is meaningless - having been filtered through the unreliable brains of whatever scientist (or other) that argues it.

I might also add that this is, in fact, the dualist proposition, because it relies on a 'self' that is 'fooled' by the brain - so a kind of 'ghost in the machine', a viewer of, but separate from, the process of mind.

 

Actually there are some brain scientists who dispute the fact that we do actually have free will... just putting it out there, not saying I agree...

Anyway can we answer the point of the thread?

 

I am fully aware of the Born rule. The Born rule offers a probabilistic range of outcomes (including such actual outcomes as quantum tunneling, for instance) which is not equivalent to the computation of gravitational effects of two bodies upon each other. More specifically there is no 'inevitable' outcome. But let me address your alleged use of the term here. You say that you used the term 'inevitable' a) as a response to my terminology and b) that you meant it only to avoid confusion'

"In so much as the human mind can ill conceptualise the true maths of quantum mechanics, it is expedient to say that the pre-existing state of reality inevitably results in a successive observable state. Meshing the common meanings of words like "inevitable" to quantum processes is always going to be somewhat tricky, but if we're going to use phrases like "states of reality," or even words like "particles," I'm going to use "inevitable."


Firslty I used no such terms prior to your use of the term "inevitable" but, secondly, you actually, in your initial argument, used two adjectival clauses (thus emphasising what you actually suggested); 'inevitable' was followed by 'pre-existing'. But this gets to the heart of the ill-considered logical conception of your argument.

All logical arguments have a base precept - the foundation of the argument. If the foundation is weak the logical argument that flows from it collapses. You revealed the basis of your argument. It is this. That the basis of reality is deterministic, and that anything other than that must (therefore) require something additional. This is a false precept on two counts. Firstly, without empirical evidence either way then deterministic and non-deterministic are actually just two alternative and equal propositions. But worse is that empirically the universe is not deterministic - so you have to argue that it is (hence using "pre-existing" and "inevitable"). I would hazard a guess that you believe that there will be discovered a 'hidden variables' notion of quantum mechanics.

Your argument, despite you thinking it is based on empirical evidence, is actually a denial of empirical evidence and a belief. You say a 'minority' opinion (and then claim "everything modern science tells us about the brain is true", as if there is actually a working model of 'how th brain works') I prefer to say peer reviewed papers and understand how little we understand, actually (how does one explain that certain brain activity relies upon cohesive firing of neurons that cannot be mapped temporally or physically by synaptic connectivity, for example; or addressing that neuronal activity dos not rely on simple 'on/off' mechanisms) and also what background those making the arguments are actually working in - but of course you have to resort to 'democracy' as science rather than empirical evidence because actually there is no empirical argument.

I'll note also that you introduce a number of elements into the argument which are strawman (elan vital, for example) - talk about misleading through skim-reading.

 

There's more cognitive scientists around than Pribram. Check out Owen Flanagan, for example.

That's the difference between science and belief, pretty much.

One is based in empirical proof, the other is just what we intuitively see as true.

Lol, no. I never said there is a ghostly "self" that is separate from the brain, just that our conscious brain processes are often unreliable. The conscious "self" only perceives a tiny sliver of the brain; think of it like a blind spot in middle of your sight.

Dualism is "I think, therefore I am". The honest scientific view is more like "something exists, therefore I think."

 

I feel like the Dark Side is presented from the monk view of the Jedi, and therefore isn't quite fully understood. As Yoda says, "Anger, fear, aggression, the Dark Side are they."

However, ROTJ gives us a new perspective on it. When facing Vader, Luke does use anger when his father threatens to turn Leia to the Dark Side. During this part of the duel, the background music is ominous to indicate that it is uncertain whether Luke will give into the Dark Side.

By not letting anger turn into murderous rage, Luke resisted the Dark Side. In this case, we see an instance of righteous anger. Because of anger's natural volatility, it's difficult for one's anger to remain righteous forever.

So I would define the Dark Side as the following: "Giving into anger, fear, & aggression instead of tempering it with righteous restraint."

 

Absolutely (and thanks for the link). I said that Pribram was a good place to start becuase, quite simply, he is very good at underlining some oft made errors in 'brain science'. He underlines, for instance, the distinction between corrolation and cause. In other words that a firing neuron is not a thought but is only an aspect of 'mind' (as a very coarse explanation) and as an aspect of that his insistence on not confusing 'mind' (a process) with brain (a material depository of information and action). I highly recommend his writings as he has a very insightful perspective.

He has also actively been involved in neurosurgery, not simply theories of mind and psychology (it was his work that showed that the pre-frontal cortex is the basis of executive brain function) and is fully appraised of brain function. He is a proper 'brain scientist'.

Another fundamental error of logic. All logical arguments begin from an axiom which must be accepted. (and no I'm not suggesting science is like a religion simply because at base it relies upon the acceptance of an axiom - but it is important to be aware that there is that base spring-off point, and also the inferences that sneak into arguments)

The axiom is, essentially, that through empirical observations - data, we are more likely to come to a true picture of reality than by simply imagining how things work. However science is not simply the accrual of evidence it is also then the testing of hypotheses about what that data means. Believing in science does not bypass the human brain, the human brain is fundamental to science - both in terms of the basic axiom (and even the conception of logic) and the conceptual framing of data.

Where poor logic becomes dangerous is when people start arguing beyond the empirical evidence. For instance, the idea that the brain is like a computer is not empirically 'verified' (as in, arguments can be shown that falsifies that proposition) and so as a statement should actually be 'I believe we will find evidence that....'. That is where it gets dangerous, because some argue that what they believe is the scientific position, when it is not - they simply haven't checked their logical arguments for intrusive inferences and false precepts.

Not really. That is simply a catchphrase of a strong dual-ist argument made by Descartes. The argument is dual-ist, the phrase itself is not. I would argue though that 'I experience' is the nearest thing to a 'truth' that anybody will ever have.

 

Hmmm. An interesting thought. Doesn't he, though, actually 'catch' himself? By which I mean, he acts in anger and - upon seeing Vader's mechanical hand and looking to his own hand and sees then his experience in the cabe on Dagobah. He checks himself at that point. It's not like he makes a conscious decision to be angry and full of rage and knows prior to that at what point he will stop.

In other words, he realises at that point that in his anger, his rage, in his hatred of Vader he is no different to Vader. He understands that and rejects that (hence throwing down his lightsabre). Isn't that why the music is so 'ominous' - that he is here succumbing to the darkside (his darkside).

 

I definitely see what you are saying. According to the teachings of the Jedi, anger itself is part of a person's dark side. In that sense, Jedi are like Monks in that they suppress their emotions.

My personal interpretation of that scene is that anger itself doesn't have to be evil; if controlled, it can be righteous. To me, the ominous music is conveying a dangerous uncertainty that Luke is almost about to succumb to the dark side. Luke didn't plan to unleash anger and then restrain it, but the fact that he was able to shows a strong light side trait.

It's an idiosyncratic viewpoint certainly, but the OP said to define the dark side, and that's my personal definition of it.

 

Shouldn't those who have spent 800 years studying the Force be granted some degree of credibility on the subject? Especially given the fact that, barring opening crawls, Lucas is dependent on character dialogue when it comes to providing exposition about the Force? This is why we have been told in the past that the Jedi view is correct.

Yet Ben also says that giving in to hate leads to the dark side. So how can something both lead to the dark side and be the dark side at the same time?

 

It's a follow up on "If you choose the quick and easy path (as Vader did) you will become an agent of evil"

Ben's "That leads to the Dark Side" is roughly synonymous with "you will become an agent of evil" and "Consume you it (the Dark Side) will"

So, if Luke "gives in to hate" he will become an agent of evil, be consumed by the Dark Side, etc.

 

"Yet Ben also says that giving in to hate leads to the dark side. So how can something both lead to the dark side and be the dark side at the same time?"

^^ You make a good point with this statement, Arwan. It seems that Ben and Yoda give us two slightly conflicting viewpoints of the Force. As Iron_lord said in the previous post, leading to the dark side is the rough approximate of "you will become an agent of evil".

Which is why when Luke was fighting Vader, he didn't choose the easy path of hatred; he saw that he was losing control of his anger and chose the harder path of the light.

 

only one kenobi

I notice you've still yet to outline your own stance, and thus seem to be dragging this on for the sake of nitpicking (e.g. the implications of "us[ing] two adjectival clauses" in prior posts of mine, or Aeternum 's obvious meaning by casual use of the term "brain scientist"). This leaves me a very sad man, as while I love a good old philosophical argument, I can do nothing more than repeat my prior formulations if the opponent isn't willing to present their own.

However, the author of this thread has kindly asked us to get back on topic, so if you wish to pursue this discussion, perhaps sending a reply via PM would be best.

If I may be forgiven for a few 'parting shots,' however, I do find that you frequently extrapolate, for lack of a better word, the meanings of various concepts to their utmost extreme so as to nitpick certain aspects which thus appear absurd. For example, Aeturnum's point regarding the human brain being a survival machine and not a truth detactor is an entirely valid one.

Our brain is beset by certain cognitive biases that arise from the fact that natural selection has optimised for brains that are good at passing on the genes that built them, not for epistemic superiority. We don't have to be ridiculous here, and doubt all data as if it were the result of Descartes' evil demon, nor does such a point presuppose dualism; the point is obvious, that as we find out more about the Universe, we should expect to encounter certain facts about reality that run counter to our intuitions. For example, we are very good at making a mental map of the massively complex entity that is another mind (something we simply know as the feeling of empathy), because that was useful in the ancestral environment, but evidently not so good at comprehending things like the Born probabilities, or marrying feelings like "duh, we have free will" with what science tells us, because our brains weren't optimised for the latter.

I'm very tempted to nitpick your nitpicking, particularly when I find myself bewildered by such warped interpretations of my arguments such as that I use the term inevitable only as a response to your terminology and to avoid confusing you - no, I was merely making Aeternum's point in another manner, that things like common sense or the common meanings of words often fail us when talking about the nitty gritties of science like quantum mechanics - but as I said, this discussion has gone far off-track. I'd love to challenge your underestimation of neurophysiological knowledge - no, of course neurons don't operate 'on/off,' because neuronal computation isn't binary. Similarly, I balk at your misuse of the term strawman argument (which is strictly a misrepresentation of an opponent's argument, which is in fact what you're more demonstrating here), a misuse because phlogiston and elan vital are all expressly examples of the unfalsifiable and unverifiable, mere analogies that do not need to have their nits picked. You'd service your own argument better by attacking the underlying thrust of my own - that 'free will' is unverifiable, unfalsifiable and, yes, linguistically, an unnecessary addition.

But most of all I'd appreciate it if you, again, outlined your own stance, otherwise this thread is derailed by posts orthogonal to the original argument (like your last), and by the harrying of your own tangential attacks (which I must confess this post is guilty of, in part).

 

Well, here's the Jedi answer:

The spectrum between the "light side" and "dark side" is basically the contrast of order and entropy. Light is order, civilization, differentiation, flourishing, peace, and life. Dark is chaos, entropy, sameness, decay, destruction and death. (There's obviously no such entity as "the dark side", it's just a fairytale metaphor for these aspects of nature.)

IIRC, this was Matt Stover's definition as well - at least from what I gathered in Traitor and ROTS. The dark is not "created" by the Sith, they just draw upon the darkness that's already there in nature. That means the Sith are a lot more like a virus, a cancer, or a force of nature than a specialized predator. The dark side is a manifestation of entropy on a human scale, on a civilizational scale, on a cosmic scale. Entropy is an inherent property of the universe, and so's the dark side. In the end, the dark can never be defeated or conquered. Nobody can run from entropy. The Jedi's struggle against the dark side is never-ending and inescapable.

Being a Jedi is the harder path, as Star Wars tells us over and over. Giving in to your selfish impulses is always easier. The omnipresent "darkness in the jungle" (as Stover poetically put it) is always there, lurking in the lowest reptilian parts of our brain. Aggression and fear and jealousy are natural to all living beings.

For the Jedi dealing with the ever-present "dark side", rather than attitude of violent anger (which only feeds their own darkness), a cool-headed zen attitude of sanitation is the goal.