From: Eliezer S. Yudkowsky (sentience@pobox.com)
Date: Wed Jan 15 2003 - 14:34:28 MST
gts wrote:
>
> Sophism, as it was understood in ancient times, was essentially the
> belief that "man is the measure of all things." This is, IMO, an
> arrogant and anthropocentric approach to understanding reality. It is
> also clearly Lee Corbin's philosophy with respect to human rights and
> many other things. In Lee's view a right is merely a matter of personal
> opinion and social convention -- something that he "approves of" and
> which other people also "approve of." This is in direct contrast to the
> more intellectually humbling beliefs of truth seekers such as Plato and
> Socrates (and Thomas Jefferson). These great men believed that objective
> truths of nature exist separate from any man's opinion.
Speaking of the great truthseekers, gts, you do realize that your post has
explained why you have a bad emotional reaction to Corbin, and which
famous figures have disagreed with him, but not why Corbin is actually
wrong? Though I haven't been following this whole thread, so if you've
already posted extensively on that, I beg your forgiveness.
-- Eliezer S. Yudkowsky http://singinst.org/ Research Fellow, Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence
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