60 thoughts on “Monday Message Board”

  1. I’m a recent reader of your blog. Having very much enjoyed your entries and archives, I thought I’d throw a controversial topic into the ring for discussion. Hopefully the howls and flames won’t get out of hand.

    Recently, I’ve seen several TV shows and books on the triumph but also weaknesses of democracy. Is democracy really the end-all be-all form of government that the US empire claims it is? Is there maybe some alternative to government that would be more fair to all involved (i.e., an alternative to today’s conventional form of government as opposed to just going back to a theocracy, monarchy, autocracy… whatever)? Is the US right to introduce democracy by use of force in other countries? When does one country have the right to tell other countries what to do? If we take it a look at democracy, you might say when one country is bigger than another, majority rules and the smaller one should acquiesce to the larger’s wishes. Sound preposterous? And yet simplistically, that’s kind of how democracy works. We accept at face value that the majority’s rule is what’s best for all. In another way, we could say that if a majority of countries deem a certain behavior necessary, then they have the right to enforce that decision on the minority of countries. Personally, I don’t buy this at all. But if you look at how the US, and even Europe operate, then it’s evident that they believe they’ve got all the answers and others should follow their lead, with the very important difference that the US uses its armed forces to get the job done when necessary.

    Democracy has been called the oppression of the majority over the minority. The majority can in essence do whatever it likes and alter laws as necessary to make whatever they want “legal”. Immature democracies (and even some that aren’t so immature) have engaged in legalised theft, persecution, and genocide of minority groups, all in the name of the greater good. The result is violence and increasing poverty as the rule of law degenerates into the rule of the majority.

    In developed and well-functioning democracies, myopic politicians have incentives to waste and burn resources in the here and now to get re-elected rather than make decisions for the long term. What we get is ever expanding government, which might not be a bad thing, but it does seem to lead to uniform mediocrity. Fellow socialists would point out, I think, that it’s better to have safe mediocrity than unfair and risky capitalism where huge gaps exist between rich and poor (or maybe not even poor, but middle class?).

    I certainly don’t have the answers, but I think as political thinking evolves this topic will increasingly come into discussion. How can we improve on modern democracy?

  2. It is evident that the city-state is a creation of nature, and that man is by nature a political animal.

    I will start on a ‘unitary gubmint’ article after i finish my condorcet article today.

    In regards to that interesting post, do you think ‘the greatest good for the greatest many’ (many sics) is relevant? Even if it means outlawing Homosexuality for the piece of mind of the closet rugby playing yobbo majority? Previously it has been majority power rules, now it is majority votes rules, any sort of government really needs to have some sort of majority to continue so you can only really fiddle with what sort of majority. It may be majority consensus debating, or majority expert-intelligence, or majoity ethnic cleansing.

    By the way, when is ethnic cleansing going to stop? After targetting a strategic minority in where ever you have control, what’s next once they’re all gone? Minoritys and racial subsets can be divided done to infinity (with reaching it of course). We could argue ‘positive descrimination quotas for womem in parliament’, but then we can say ‘positive discrimination quotas for single mothers in parliament’, then we could say ‘positive discrimination quotas for lesbian single mothers of eyptain-irish distraction who speak more than 3 languages, but not direlects’. The problem is what if two such women were skilled enough to be pre-selected, but due to all the quotas there was only room for one?

    I am clearly insane.

  3. I pre-emptively made my usual Monday comment on the Weekend thread, so let me just say one word here:

    Tahs!

  4. Rene Rivkin.

    I know he was mentally ill, and his life was in ruins, but I have no feelings of pity for him whatsoever.

    I wonder if Richo will go his funeral.

  5. Interesting hypothetical for people here… well, it’s not hypothetical, because it happened to me last week:

    What does someone say to a person (in this case, my father) who has voted Liberal his entire life, as he did at the last election, and then suddenly says, when watching a news report that the Coalition will control the Senate in July, that it’s “very, very worrying” – when you know that this person has every intention of voting Liberal again at the next election, in both houses?

    It left me utterly gobsmacked, especially given the criticism I received from him for voting Democrat or Green the past few elections.

  6. Paul, amateurs like your father act without thinking of the consequences. And in any case the relationship between their act (voting for a certain party) and the consequences (unwelcome political consequences) is mediated through so many circumstances and accidents as to be almost random.

    On the other hand, the Victorian Branco of the ALP, supposedly political professionals and boastfully self-proclaimed disciples of Macchiavelli, manufacture the conditions that give the Family First Party the balance of power in the Senate.

    In short, don’t blame your father too much.

  7. Control in both houses is a heavy burden to carry.

    In my view it is unlikely the coalition will retain power in the Senate for a second term. They possibly could loose it in the lower house as well after having to ram through their unpalatable agenda. It will be hard for them to shift the blame for their actions.

    The bickering between Howard and Costello might be irrelevant.

  9. Dave,

    I pity Rene and liked the little that I saw (mainly a couple of interviews with the intermitently perspecacious and simpering Denton). But we’re all guessing out here in television land. Maybe he was a nasty piece of work.

    But even then, on a day like today, he has my sympathy. Driven by depression and failure to suicide. There but for the grace of God . . .

  10. Just wondering what the event was that made Australia send out special forces from WA, a while back.

    Howard says he wont negotiate with terrorists re the aussie hostage but will do what he can to get him out in today’s papers.

  11. Suicide is the ultimate form of selfishness.
    You kill yourself without giving a toss for anyone else however as Nicholas rightly says there but for the grace of God go I.

  13. Yes Homer, I agree with you also.

    I thought it might have been a good thing if people had been a good deal more censorious of Paul Hester. Unforgiveable to leave behind young children.

    I presume Rivkin hasn’t had a child in a long while – but I don’t know.

  14. Econowit, the States are all Labor…

    Homer & Nicholas, I don’t think suicide is the ultimate form of selfishness. Anyone who says that shows that they do not understand the mind of the suicidal. Suicide ideation is essentially the ultimate form of mental illness. The term ‘selfishness’ needs to be applied differently to those on the brink of taking their own lives. Okay yes, in part (or even in main) they are doing it for themselves, but it is qualitatively different from taking the bigger piece of cake and it is incredibly unfair to suggest otherwise. Also, they aren’t usually doing it in main for themselves; their delusions lead them to honestly believe that the world and those they love would be better off without them.

    If I loved my children, and I was honestly deluded into thinking that every moment I lived I was harming them and driving them to the same forms of dispair as I currently experienced, would not the selfless thing then be to kill myself? Considering my current state of delusion, it would be selfish to keep myself alive!

    Also, regardless of your beliefs I think you are doing no good to the world by uttering that opinion in public; words cannot describe with any hope of accuracy the amount it pains me to read it; worse that it’s a common thought. Such comments are only likely to sway those who aren’t going to kill themselves anyway. Be glad I am not (yet) Indisputable Overlord of the Whole World, else I would hold you partially responsible for anyone who commit suicide after reading this page (even thirty years after).

  15. Paul —

    I disagree with Katz, who calls your father an amateur. One can believe in a certain ideology (as your father appears to do in supporting the Liberal Party) and still feel that unchecked power is worrying. Indeed, more than this, one can believe in an ideology and believe that its implementation is improved by it having to be modified to account for the views of its opponents. Checks and balances are not only negative things, stopping abuses of power, but may also be positive, improving legislation and policies.

    No side of politicis has all the answers, or even realizes what all the important questions are. Arguably the ship of state is steered best by having multiple hands on the tiller.

    JQ — Your new blog design does not number comments. Makes it hard to refer to any but the latest.

  16. Hi Peter,

    This is the default for WP 1.5, but I hope to restore the nice aspects of my old design before too long.

  17. I realise my topic is not exactly dominating this thread today, but in case anyone was wondering, yes, I now have my tickets to Sydney Stadium for Friday night’s Great Queensland Massacre.

  18. The British General Election is turning out to be a nice application of game theory, with feints and counter-feints.

    The British Labour Party believes that most of its normal supporters believe it will win easily, and so believes that they feel able to protest against the war in Iraq (by either staying at home, or voting for an opposition candidate). If enought people do this, the Labour Party will lose. So the Labour Party is trying to convince its supporters it is about to lose, in order to motivate them to vote Labour. The Labor Party’s most recent poster comprises almost entirely a large photo of Michael Howard, the Opposition Leader.

    Photos of Tony Blair meanwhile appear on Conservative posters. The Opposition Conservatives know that most voters still detest them (this is what the polls say), and so they are urging people to vote for them not in order for them to win, but to send a protest message to Tony Blair (about the War, about immigration, about the National Health Service, you name it).

    The third party, the Liberal Democrats, was the only major party publicly opposed to the War, and they seem likely to gather lots of protest votes. But they, and everyone, know that these won’t be enough to win, or even to hold the balance of power. So, they are also seeking votes as a protest against the other two parties, with no prospects of being able to implement any policies.

    So, at this stage (4 days before polling), all three parties have the same campaign strategy: Vote for us because we are not going to win! (Or, with apologies to the Commonwealth Bank, “Get with the weakness!”)

  20. There has been a lack of comment about the Australian hostage in Iraq. Mr Douglas Wood, who according to his neighbour, is a nuclear engineer, and has been working on American construction projects.

    The government has sent off an “emergency response team”. Fair enough, when an Australian citizens pleads, “Please help me. I don’t want to die”, then help should be given. But what was he doing in Iraq, who was he working for, who was responsible for his safety, and who in there right mind would be there in the first place.?

    Perhaps, this is the perfect example, to apply the principle of mutual responsibility? There, afterall, is a considerable cost to be borne by the taxpayer.

  21. hmm, makes one wonder if Joe Cambria and those string of initials (dc, ac, sb, etc) in that Ratzinger thread were all the same people. they are all spinning the same line (‘hate speech’, etc)
    and is Joe Cambria just Gerard Jackson?

  23. Tristan, My problem with what you are saying is that you are making excuses for people to be totally self absorbed ineed encouraging to continue this selfish behaviour.

  24. Interesting about that on BrookesNews, I’m just wondering whether the person got approval from the Professor to publish that and if not, does it breach copyright in any way?

    If not, thats fine, the person is entitled to their views just as is the Professor and every other commentor.

  25. Is it hate speech to make the observation that “Joe Cambria’s” prose style is almost identical to B.A. Santamaria’s?

    Is this evidence for reincarnation? Does the Catholic Church endorse reincarnation? If not, Joe Cambria could be facing trouble from Propaganda Fide, and through no fault of his own!

  26. I would like to repeat that I did not intend to attack Catholicism or Catholics. Many Catholics shared my dismay at Ratzinger’s election, which seemed like a signal that the church was going to take an authoritarian line of crushing internal dissent. As I noted in the update to the post, there are some signs that he may be better as Pope than he was as a Cardinal.

  27. Re Paul’s father: It is absolutely rational to be a committed Liberal and be dismayed by Howard taking the balance of power in the Senate. You just have to believe that a political party is mostly on the side of the angels but contains strands of nutterdom that are not part of the reality based community.

    For instance, I once interviewed Sir Rupert Hamer (about the history of some planning issues) just after Kennett took power in Victoria. He was a very unhappy camper, who clearly felt that maddies had stolen his party. It took a while, but the Libs were ultimately devasted by JK ideological purit.

  28. Pauls says “What does someone say to a person (in this case, my father) who has voted Liberal his entire life, as he did at the last election, and then suddenly says, when watching a news report that the Coalition will control the Senate in July, that it’s “very, very worryingâ€? – when you know that this person has every intention of voting Liberal again at the next election, in both houses?”

    I would say, yes it is very worrying. Hopefully they wil grasp the opportunity with two hands and jump in boots and all and get on with the job of governing and reforming. Something they have been unable to truly effectively do up to this point. Don’t bugger it up like Fraser did.

  29. They will do nothing of the sort. The Liberal Party will sit on their Senate majority and try to win future Senate majorities. That’s what the Liberal Party does. The coming budget will be a peanut.

  30. Homer said: “Suicide is the ultimate form of selfishness.
    You kill yourself without giving a toss for anyone….”

    The causes of suicide are very complex and only in the last few years have become better understood. Many people that commit suicide have suffered long periods of depression, which itself can arise from many causes. Some of these are physiological and require chemical treatment.

    When a depressed person gets to the stage of thinking that everyone will be better off without them and so commits suicide, they are not acting from selfish motives, even though it may seem like it to those remaining.

  31. No Mark they are selfish because they don’t think of anyone else.
    How many times has a suicide happened and the friends and relatives say why didn’t he say.

    The person assumes from his own self absorption.

  32. Mark and Tristan,

    I’m afraid that I’ve begun every comment in this thread by agreeing with someone – the main problem being that they were disagreeing with something I had said before.

    I’m afraid I’m going to do it again. I agree with both of you disagreeing with me! I should have shut my mouth about suicide about which I know very little.

    I will make one plea which is that I do think that how we speak of suicide is important – even us people who don’t know much about it. Paul Hester deserves our pity I am sure. But if not expressing that pity – when it is palpably too late in any event – might save some children’s fathers from doing what he did, then there might be something to be said for hard heartedness.

  33. right homer
    i guess we won’t be expecting any ‘christian’ charity from you then!

    let me put this in as stark terms as possible, homer – most people who commit suicide have a few roos loose in the top paddock. they’re not likely to be in a position to think straight just before topping themselves.

  34. Jason. You said “most people who commit suicide have a few roos loose in the top paddock. they’re not likely to be in a position to think straight just before topping themselves”.

    I can see what you are getting at, and it is a reasonable response to Homer’s view that all that suicide is is about self-absorption. But it is still a slighly unsympathetic view of suicide and its causes. At present, while we have some idea of the causes of depression, we cannot successfully predict that someone in particular circumstances will get it. And we have even less ability to tell whether a particular case of depression will lead to suicide.

  35. fair enough Mark. no malice intended – just a little sarcasm aimed at Homer

  36. suicide is the ultimate expression of control, it is taking back control and asserting your dominance over yourself, or something.

    Now nobody can argue with that because it is a tautology: either it is raining, or something. I love this atheistic relativist world.

  37. Nicholas, I think your comment about not expressing the pity to save someone committing suicide because of selfishness and so forth is a bit of a catch-22. If it is selfish because, as Homer says, they’re not considering other people, then they won’t consider your pity anyway, so the expression or otherwise of the pity is unlikely to matter. Or maybe it’s like Pascal’s wager: If they’re selfish, not expressing pity to discourage the selfish behavior will be of no value; but if they’re not selfish, then they might stand to benefit from pity, so is it not better to pity?

    I would think that, regardless of whether suicide is selfish, expressing pity about some other suicide is not going to help. Why should the fact that you hold him in contempt make me feel any better, when I like him am considering offing myself? Evidently you already hate me & my kind, and the world would be a better place without me. At least I can’t consider your contempt of me when I’m dead; at least I can’t consider anything when I’m dead.

    I spose I’m spending rather a long time convincing someone who already agrees with me to my viewpoint; but maybe I’m just talking to someone else who disagrees with me, or perhaps I just want to talk 😛

    Homer, I don’t think that you understand the nature of the delusion. As Jason says, they have a few roos loose, though they are able to think straight. It’s just that their inputs are all wonky. If you strongly believe the world would be a better place without you, and you wanted to do best by the world, wouldn’t you kill youself? (if you answer ‘no’ to that, then you aren’t strongly believing enough; try harder).

  38. Benno, it could be nothing. Nothing is not something; it is the absence of something; it is nothing. I admit that it would be difficult to argue that suicide is nothing, but clearly it’s an alternative position that contradicts your view.

  39. Tristan, I don’t think I expressed contempt, and I’m sorry if you think I did. (This isn’t being said in a combative way).

    I tried to do something like the opposite of express contempt.

  40. Nothing doesn’t exist, show me nothing and I will believe you.

    But seriously there is always something, even in a ‘vacuum’, even if you removed somehow the energy and pressure of hydrogen in a small section of space ‘heisenberg’s uncertainty’ will magic into existance for small ammounts of time all sorts of matter and anti matter and energy and anti energy. Ever since Since (otherwise known as the big bang), there has always been something, or something, but never ‘,or nothing’, or something.

    I rulez 2004, send in the philosophy posts Quiggin, I need to rehash some philosophy in a book i read and pass it off as my own, or something.

    I have developed the most powerful arguments and statements in the world, or something. Nobody can ever question my authority again, or something.

  41. I’m not saying there’s something that exists which is nothing, because otherwise I’d have no argument (if nothing is something, then if suicide is nothing, it’s something, so you’re right). I’m saying that nothing isn’t something, so suicide could be nothing, and if suicide is nothing and nothing isn’t something, then suicide isn’t something. What does the empty set contain? Suicide. Total nonsense, but still logically inconsistent with your position. Actually, there may even be multiple different ways of not being something … just because I can’t conceive of the difference doesn’t mean it’s not possible.

    In any case, it’s evident that (nothing doesn’t exist) is false, though, or else I’m wondering where my bank account full of millions of dollars is!

  42. In support of Benno, who said suicide is the ultimate expression of control: This is close to the position Albert Camus argued in “The Myth of Sisyphus”: Because we live in a world without meaning, and at the mercy of the fates, the *only* control we have over our fate is by deciding when to end our life ourselves.

    Thus, suicide is not necessarily an act of desperation or madness, as the earlier posts would indicate. It may be act of rational defiance, undertaken in full awareness of the consequences and not in a state of despair. I don’t think any one of us, no matter how close we are to another person, really can say why that person commits suicide (or, for that matter, does any other thing).

    Let’s not cover every suicide with sentimentalizing pity. Some at least deserve our respect and our admiration for their courage.

  43. Nick is it not that democracy is a failed system, rather does the following quote from Robert Geyer and Samir Rihani gel at all with what you are thinking.
    At the dawn of the 21stcentury, a fundamental consensus appears to have emerged regarding the success of liberal democracy and economics. Underlying this consensus is the Newtonian (linear) paradigm which assumes that societies and social organisations reach “end states� of near perfection and then cease to evolve….
    These guys argue “that democracy is a continuously evolving social construct. Further, attempts to freeze its evolution in some “consensual� position (or “third way�) actually undermine democracy’s ability to evolve and grow and are the real threats to 21stcentury democracy.�
    The threats to democracy that they see and believe should be confronted. are: “(1) the continuing belief in and pursuit of an “end� state for democracy based on Western
    experience, (2) economic globalisation and associated inequalities, and (3) the
    internationalisation and imposition of preconceived models of democracy.�
    There are a range of views on democracy as a complex adaptive system and how it should be considered. But all consider the increasing complexity of societies and the global world, the reducing control, the inherent unpredictability and the limitations of the decision makers in representative democracies. There does appear to be a general belief in the robustness of democracy.
    Your question is democracy the be all and end all or rather an end state for democracy is obviously questioned by many.. A radically different system that would deliver as well as or better I cannot imagine however. An adapting democracy inherently unpredictable but robust enough to deal with extreme events accompanied by an understanding that it is possible to predict novel phenomena but the basic understanding is that most can only be known as they evolve makes sense to me though I don’t think it makes me feel particularly secure. And I struggle with the challenge of considering forms other than representative democracy But the discussions need to be had I would agree. The UN has considered the need to move towards or look at greater participative democracy for example. See the UN’s eminent persons group. In their report they ask, have traditional models of democracy outlived their usefulness and state that analysis of the governance of complex systems where politics takes precedence over economics is no longer geared to the homogenization of the political corpus.
    Not keen on their solutions if I understand them however. That there should be a greater role for and authority for NGOs and civil society. The first because it is enough for me that the Holy See has it’s position and I don’t see the likes of fundamentalist protestants or Greenpeace for example as reducing rather than increasing the democracy deficit. And I don’t get how the civil society bit would work but can see the value in an approach that would be better able to deal with evolving problems and emerging phenomena and the different agents that relate to each different event.

    I would agree with a lot of what you say but would disagree with your identification of the problem. But maybe we would both agree with this view
    Every determinate system must change as time passes so that its structure is characterised by the lessons of its experiences, by the information it generates – not by its initial state. If change does not occur,… it will assume an immunity from error that is guaranteed to produce catastrophe

  44. First of all I never said or have believed that ‘nothing is something’.

    Suicide could be nothing if and only if absence of everything is possible. Therefore my brilliant covering-of-all-bases statement which I will shortly use to take over the world with, is potentially false if and only if absence of everything is possible.

    Now from your bank account example what I think you’re saying is that: ‘something can occur in greater and smaller amounts, therefore something can occur numerically and logically zero, therefore not occuring, therefore being described by the phrase ‘absence of everything’.’

    But does it logically follow that: if something can occur in greater and smaller amounts, then it can occur as nothing thereby not occuring?

    I think not. Even forgetting heisenbergs uncertainty principle, there are forces and energy that permeate the universe. So it is my contention that the state of nothingness is unattainable. Alright John, enough is enough we need a philosophy post about something cool like the ‘tendency toward complexity’ and how that relates to an objective moral framework from which to base all decisions. Book reading is ‘shantaram’ by gregory david roberts.

  46. For some people, being suicidal seems to be about not being able to hear the outside world, while being enveloped and beaten down by an internal self which is accusing and masochistic.

    For other people it is about a condition of terror caused by boundary collapse – it is no longer possible to defend yourself, to feel remotely safe, or under control or able to regulate emotions.

    For other people it is about sitting in the car feeling like you are going to drive into a wall and knowing that your conscious self is unable to stop it, even if you have the pictures of your kids glued to the dashboard.

    For other people it is about thinking you are crazy and you will never feel any better and you are completely worthless.

    For other people, it is about knowing the cancer is just going to grow. Or you are too old, too needy, too ugly and too broke to ever make contact, and you are too lonely and humiliated to want to keep on.

    Sometimes the smack just makes you feel good, and no-one can hurt you for a while.

    I actually don’t think it is ever selfish. To me, selfishness is a condition of egomania, in which the other is just an emotional food supply, a toy for entertainment and ego-gratification. In that state of mind, suicide would not be an option unless you are crouched in the bunker with the tanks grinding overhead.

  48. The absence of anything is not required for nothing to be valid; if you can point to it (‘there’s somewhere where there isn’t anything’), it isn’t nothing. Even if there’s something that permeates the universe, that doesn’t mean nothing is invalid. ‘Nothing’ isn’t something you can study in physics. Nothing isn’t a thing. There’s not some state known as ‘nothingness’. Nothing doesn’t even just is; nothing isn’t. If you had a great Something Machine that converts everything into TRUE: x = TRUE, then nothing is what it converts into FALSE. If suicide is nothing, suicide is also what converts into FALSE.

    (My bank account example was a tongue-in-cheek comment and did not reflect my argument. I just want a few million dollars 😉

  49. I am sorry Tristian but my poor weak brain cannot follow your argument(s).

    Ok what about this. I said that ‘X, or something’ covers every base. But you are saying that nothing isn’t something (it is either absense of something or absense of everything). So you are saying that nothing is neither something nor is it X. And thus it contradicts my thingo. OK understood.

    So ‘nothing’ cannot exist, nor can it not exist, is this last bit true? If it is then I see your point, but while it contradicts my ‘X is true, or something’, it does not prevent it from still being a tautology (if ‘nothing cannot exist, nor can it not exist’ is true). If it doesn’t prevent it from being a tautology then I can still use it to take over the world. MUha ha ha ha ha.

    as for your ontology PML.

    Here’s a short, and very general description of the ontological argument:

    1) God is the greatest possible being and thus possesses all perfections.
    2) Existence is a perfection.
    3) God exists.

    this is silly because number three actually comes before number one. Reordering this sensibly:

    1) If god exists he is the greatest possible being
    2) Therefore he possesses all perfections
    3) If existence is a perfection
    4) Then God exists

    so before you can really satisfy “1) God is the greatest possible being and thus possesses all perfections. ” you have to have already proved gods existence a priori before you can begin to prove his existence a priori. So belief and existence of god comes back to not science or reason but to faith, where it belongs in the gutter from whence it came.

    All of these stupid god things are stupid because the end conclusions are the same as the preliminary assumptions. So they are all saying essentially either one of two things, or somthing.

    idiotic god statement type 1. God exists therefore he exists

    idiodic god statement type 2. God doesn’t exist, therefore he doesn’t exist.

  50. Your second/first paragraph is basically right, at least in the logic. The bit in the brackets about the definition of nothing isn’t quite right, but ‘nothing isn’t something’ is quite accurate.

    The third paragraph is a bit iffy tho. Existence is not something that can be applied to nothing. (That sentence, like most discussing nothing, is probably a bit hard to parse … you know what I mean?) If we create a machine which takes inputs and converts them into either ‘exists’ or ‘does not exist’, then when we feed it my computer, it churns out ‘exists’; when we feed it my bank account with a million dollars, it churns out ‘does not exist’; when we feed it nothing, it doesn’t do anything. If we modify it so it does ‘can/could exist’ and ‘can’t/couldn’t exist’, if you feed it almost anything will it churn out ‘can/could exist’, but if you feed it nothing, it won’t give you a result.

    So lets take another machine which takes inputs and, if the input is nothing, gives true, otherwise gives false. So if you feed it something, it keeps giving you ‘false’. If you feed it anything, it gives you ‘false’. But if you feed it nothing, it gives you ‘true’ (this step may be subtly different from not feeding it anything). Given our machine is perfectly constructed, what does it mean if when we fed it ‘suicide’, it gave us ‘true’?

    I suppose that in the sense that if suicide is anything, then it’s something, so your statement is a tautology. But clearly nothing isn’t something, and if suicide and nothing are the same thing, then suicide isn’t something, so your statement isn’t a tautology when we considers things outside the domain on which it operates. Perhaps, if your statement is a machine that returns true if something is ‘taking back control and asserting your dominance over yourself, or something’, then the response to feeding in nothing or suicide isn’t false, it’s nothing, so you can’t see it, so there’s no response different from ‘true’ (because everything’s something), so there’s no way to consider it…

    Did that make any form of sense? (I’m tempted to tag ‘or something’ to the end of that, but then I mightn’t get a response 😉

    I’m not sure if this helps you take over the world, but I am the inevitable Indisputable Overlord of the Whole World. Your rule might be short. (Which would help me; you have my full blessing in your plot. Just realise that your inevitable overthrow may result in your death.

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