What Happened in Dubai?
I am in Dubai, and Kant’s understanding of ethics revisited me. He said “If you believe that an action is right if everybody else does it, it is ethical for you” for example if you believe that it is ok for everybody to throw garbage on the street, and you accept the repercussion, it is ethical for you.
This definition was appealing to me but then I visited a broker’s home in Dubai. I have seen his car, his house, his booze, and the restaurants, bars and night clubs he goes to. I was worried that I didn’t see in myself any glimpse of wanting to be him. Even though I know that his life would be very appealing to any other guy.
Let’s apply Kant’s rule of ethics on “me not wanting the broker’s life”. If everybody was me, we would not reach the level of technology we have now. I cannot accept the repercussion of my desire, therefore to me “not wanting the broker’s life” is Not Ethical! From this point I reject Kant’s definition because I think personal desires of life style cannot be unethical.
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To Chocolate and Espresso
Two weeks ago I went with a good friend to a chocolate place, and Starbucks in khobar’s korniche. I had too much chocolate and coffee in my system. When we started walking on the korniche, I had the feeling that everybody around me was an illusion, people, objects, and myself. I touched a guy with my finger to make sure that he is real, but the feeling did not convince me. I was in an utter state of madness, according to the normal general consensus.
I started asking random people about general philosophical questions like “What is the purpose of life” and I got interesting answers like “ I don’t know” or “ to leave life”. Those answers convinced me more that we might not exist; we might be a creation of some dreamer
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I reached the conclusion that if I can prove my existence I might be able to prove God’s existence with logic rather than mere belief. I discovered that my existence cannot be proven or disprove. I could be a dream in somebody else’ mind, created by his brain just like God might be created by our brain.
I think we live under the illusion of having a solid ground under our feet. I did skydive, I know that after some time of falling, a man lose the sense of going down and it starts to seem normal. Allow yourself to feel the wind playing with your hair while you are falling down… scary, most people would rather believe in the illusion of stability they put themselves into… are they right? Am I right? I don’t know!
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Transition: fowl thieves, God, and Ethics.
I discovered that current writers steal old philosophers’ ideas without referencing to them. I thought the following thieves were significant before I discovered their misconduct:
1- Nassim Talib: the black Swan.. The whole story of a Christmas turkey not knowing that the everyday food it is provided with will end by a knife was first made up by Hume. The fact that Talib took “Chicken” and put “Turkey” does not make him the inventor.
2- Abdulkareem Surush: in his book “Brain and freedom; العقل والحرية” surush talked about freedom and how freedom will allow only the good idea to survive. This idea was first made up by Hegel.
Philosophy is bringing me closer to God but further from religion.
A prayer for money, cure, driving Satan away from your food, protect you in the bathroom..etc. Those makes sense in the uncertain world we used to live in. Imaging if a lot of people die in the bathroom, wouldn’t you like to know that God is watching over you there because you read the prayer? Is this real comfort or only the illusion of comfort? Do you know? I don’t...
In my opinion they turned God to a grocery keeper. Somebody needs to speak up and reform Islam; otherwise we will face an ethic-less generation soon. I think people will start taking off the religious clothes, as with more education liberalism prevails. The problem strikes when liberalism comes without a notion of ethics.
I fear the generation that believes liberalism means drinking, clubbing, and sex even though the ability to do that is part of liberalism. We need a generation that believes in the liberalism of ideas, and knowledge and produce work out of that liberalism.
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Tigger, The bouncy tiger
I visited Shaikh Numor Al Numor in Awamia this weekend. The Shaikh is known to be an extreme form of Shia opposition in Saudi Arabia. He is very oriented and very smart, even though the Sunni-Shia divide is engraved in his brain. He sees it everywhere but he did not fight back when I discussed with him that the divide in Saudi is not Sunni-Shia, it is more government-people. The idea of Shia integral tendency to fight opposition is another issue we discussed. He is too smart to believe in the crap people demand to hear from him. The dirt of politics…
