Sake White

These are two of the comments I wrote at Book’s Nihilism thread (which I strongly recommend for the 40 minute video that analyzes evil and annihilation)

In a philosophical sense, people have been trying to define what is evil and what is good, for a very long time. There are different definitions and standards, not only different ways of looking at things, but different states of consciousness even.

My personal views on this subject has a lot to do with my belief in God and a higher power that orders the universe. And therefore, by looking at the universe and the physical principles which power it and the laws that it functions under, I get a peculiar insight into human values.

The reason why evil is a concept that exists independent of the existence of humanity, is because evil is the human adaptation and application of a universal constant/function. A lot of narcisissts and self-aggrandizing libertarian/self-fish folks talk about evil being something that relies upon the existence of man. Meaning, if man were to disappear, then what would be around to even think about what is evil or not evil, if free will disappeared through the disappearance of humanity, then would not evil disappear as will? Not exactly. Technically, that would be true, if evil was nothing but a human construct. But it isn’t… and why it isn’t is precisely because our existence is a universal existence, it functions through universal laws like the Law of Conservation of Mass and Energy, or energy just for short.

Life is a struggle, it is an evolution of sorts, a constant reinvention of the self and continued adaptations in order to increase function and ability. We are part of this universe, regardless of whether you believe that a man is a self-contained island, that if he dies, the world dies with him. Our ethics, values, and whatever are NOT just made up because of “will” or “free will” or even desire. Some are, but not what I’m talking about. What I’m talking about is universal truth, things that are true throughout the universe. You could not explore this using scientific induction, there is no experiment to go looking around the universe for “data” about “things that apply universally”. So we must use deduction, which is not the same thing as gathering data scientifically.

One of the reasons humans don’t make things up as they go along according to their individual fancies, is because they can’t. They couldn’t do so even if they wanted to. I mean you could go to lalaland on 9/11 like John Kerry did, but reality is reality. You can’t breath under water just cause you desire to do so. You can’t win a war just because you desire to do so. There are realities and limits which everything must abide by, not just humans, but gods and energy as well. If we understand and accept this basic concept, then why don’t people extend it to ethics, good and evil?

In the end, I think it is a basic question of “what makes humanity good”. And I think the answer is, human progress via technology and social reforms are the good, because it allows more energy to be harnessed from individuals, more productivity, more efficiency, more creativity, and more usable energy to be used.

Tyranny is bad, and if you asked a religion or a human why it is bad, they might answer that it is bad because tyranny violates human rights or hurts people. But on a universal level, the answer for why tyranny is bad, then becomes, tyranny is bad because it doesn’t work, it isn’t as efficient as other methods of governance, and therefore force equals mass times velocity squared. When Tyranny hits freedom, tyranny loses, because tyranny sucks. This is not a human value we just created out of thin cloth, this actually exists. Meaning, centralized systems are weak. All you have to do is to blow up the brain and the whole edifice will collapse. The universe likes freedom, if only because of quantum mechanics. All things are possible, and all things have occured. The universe likes uncertainty too, and tyrannies are all too certain. Tyrannies are nearing the heat death of their closed system, which allows nothing in and nothing out. Closed systems either have a zero increase in entropy or an increase in entropy. Entropy never decreases in a closed system, just because. And so it makes sense why tyrannies are evil and become more evil, as time goes on, doesn’t it.

And entropy is bad, because the more entropy there is, the less life there is in the universe. This isn’t just planet earth. Entropy is also bad because if your universe has a high entropy, your technology won’t work. Or if it does work, your ability to extract energy will be slow and inefficient, meaning you will pay a lot of energy to extract a little bit more than a lot of energy.

And that’s bad because the heat death of the universe is also the equivalency of everything in it. Cold is no longer cold, hot is no longer hot. (The temperature of a room becoming moderate between any two extremes in temperature would be entropy, a bad thing. Not a bad thing for air conditioning, but a bad thing for ethics, which is not luxury btw. )

There would be no stars because stars are low in entropy. Maximum entropy when engaged in by human agents, is what I call evil. There are many ways to do so. Dictatorships, human rights violations, wars, peace, fighting, lack of fighting. There are all kinds of ways to limit the ability of the human race to extract usable energy out of our world and universe. Slavery being one of them.

And that in essence, is why good and evil are independent of the existence of humanity. Evil is universal across the universe, so long as you work from some basic deductive principles of how the universe functions.

PS.

I never was satisfied with people’s attempts to define entropy. Because it is not something that can be defined as a “thing”. It is not a thing, an entity so to speak. It is more like a function, a process. I think defining good and evil becomes harder if you think of them as entities and things. This brings up the subject of demon possession… instead of say desires and urges.

A lot of basic applications of thermodynamics in Wankel Engines used in UAVs and Sterling Engines and various other engines which convert one kind of energy to another kind of energy, really do help in understanding what entropy is.
Al,

It is easier to tell whether people are doing evil or not, as opposed to determining whether they are or are not evil. Being evil or not being evil, seems to me more like a religious question, and not a physics question.

The reason why I even had debates concerning whether evil was independent or dependent upon humanity, was because if evil depends upon our existence, then would it not be true that if you could wipe out humanity, global warming would not occur?

Oh wait, did I say global warming, I meant evil.

I don’t suppose I have to tell people that wiping out humanity is a bad thing, right? And that any motivations or philosophies that advocate it, are also a bad thing. That’s the worst case scenario in a way. But even the best case scenario is simple apathy. You just don’t care. Why defend the Iraqis from death squads if humanity’s very existence sustains eivl? Eh?

This was only a small segment of what I took from Book’s vid. It is piecing together the pacifist but sadistical savages on the Left, the anti-war yet vehemently violent and enraged people of that movement, and various other loose ends into a common whole. A common analytical model, an explanation.

I was going over this in my head and I think most people understand entropy intuitively, if not scientifically. Meaning, whenever we use up fuel or throw away something, that’s entropy in action. And understand what occurs, intuitively. If you throw something away, it is because you have used it up. Now it is useless. But why is it useless? Is it is useless because you have extracted the energy and so now it is in a form from which you cannot extract more energy. You could recycle it, which is reshaping the object into a form from which you could extract more energy, but do people really understand how much that costs?

In order to reshape something, you have to invest energy into reshaping it… so technically how much energy do you need to put into recycling before you can get back more than you spent? Remember that in a closed system, entropy never decreases. Just like time never goes backwards. It always goes forward, even by micro-seconds.

Recycling delays things, but it still produces wastes. So, does this mean the Islamic Jihad and the Europeans are right, that America the materialistic society is bad and evil and must be destroyed? No. Why? Because. Okay, if you aren’t satisfied with that argument, here’s a longer one.

I have just told you that everything and everyone in the universe uses up energy simply by existing, we further entropy simply by existing. Think about that for a second. It will give you an insight into why humans believe and prefer nihilism, and why others favor predestination and inevitable fate.

If our fate has been sealed and our ultimate destination is absolute destruction, then why prolong it with wars, suffering, and what not? Why not just get it over with, stop fighting, and lay down in eternal peace? Think about that, think about how seductive that is. No wars, no poverty, no struggling.. eternal peace. No pain, no agony… eternal tranquility. Your spear is heavy, your helmet stifling, your shield weighs as if it is a mountain… why don’t you surrender and drop your arms, Leonidas? Sparta will eventually be extinguished, its customs and people adrift in the sands of time and decay. Even if its name were to be remembered, why do you fight for so transient an object? Why don’t you simply enjoy life, while it lasts, and dominate your fellow inferiors, Greeks, and Athenian rivals?

What was Leonidas’ answer?

Leonidas fought against evil, have no doubts about that. He fought to preserve that which he knew would eventually become dust and faded. Only power mad tyrants believe their memories will be etched unto humanity for thousands of years… the thousand year Reich. Leonidas fought against entropy, as hard as he could. He would not allow entropy to take his loved ones away before their time.

Life is an eternal struggle. War is an eternal struggle. You can give up. Or you can fight. As I said before at Neo’s site, that is a choice made by nations as well as by individuals.

Good is the best in humanity. And is not attempting to preserve what you love, a virtue? Is not attempting to save guard the loves of children and their futures, a good thing to do?

The United States have brought order and stability to the world. Our technology introduces new energy into calcified and stagnant systems, economies, and cultures. Our military power preserves trade, free expression, peace, and prosperity on this planet of ours. It is the greatest country in the history of the world. It is great not because it uses up energy and lives, everything in the universe uses up energy and lives. Is is great not because it has power, for entropy is more powerful than all of us combined. It is great because the US fights against its fate, it fights to craft a new fate, an impossible fate, a fate from which entropy is held at bay. Held at Bay Consider what that means. It requires 100% efficiency, 100% dedication, and 100% loyalty. There can be no loss of will, no permanent defeat, no giving up, and no cowardice if a nation or people is to accomplish that goal.

Humans are both creatures of chaos and creatures of order. Life, evolution, and reason provides order in our lives. While our base desires waste resources, and thus mirrors entropy.

The only good that humans can achieve is to side with the light against the darkness. Not to destroy the darkness, but to keep it at bay, to resist it, to remain ever vigilant.

The Islamic Jihad and the Left will waste countless numbers of resources. There will be no paradise. They are the very agents of chaos and stagnancy. Their human slavery methods will destroy countless geniuses, ingenuities, and discoveries. They will set back human progress for centuries if not millenia should they succede.

That is evil. Our side is not evil, because we hurt people, our side is not evil, because we use air and resources. Our side is not all of those things because everyone hurts people, everyone uses air and resources. No, what makes the US different is that we resist the temptation of power, we resist the lure of time and decay, we resist as Leonidas resisted the force of destruction he sought to defeat.

The United States is good because we do not give in. And if you look back historically, giving in by the US usually meant a lot of evil unleashed in the world.

Ah, by now people might be wondering if entropy is such a powerful force, doesn’t this mean that the power of the US means the US is an agent of evil? That’s a good question, and therefore it should be addressed.

It is a truth that the Islamic Jihad uses chaos, disorder, killing and wasting of resources, in their eternal struggle. Doesn’t this mean that as agents of chaos, they become empowered by entropy? Hell No. They are cowards, they do not even understand the true meaning of hatred.

Remember, entropy isn’t power as we think of power. It isn’t the ability to “do things” and “extract energy out of matter and resources”. Entropy is the ABSENCE of energy and life. That’s why chaos is not even a good synonym for entropy, because maximum entropy is where even chaos is absent. True power comes from fighting to preserve people, fighting to preserve the potential of children, instead of wasting them in war.

The United States has achieved the military power it has right now because the US has understood the true wisdom of power, its true source (the people), and how to best organize and preserve its forces. The greater your ability to fight entropy and resist it, the more powerful you become, if only because you cannot resist something like entropy without power.

While entropy is a function and a process, it makes a lot more sense when thinking in human terms, to think of entropy as an entity that we fight against. An idea even.

In a sense, entropy is death. That is why the Islamic Jihad said they loved death while we loved life. We know the Islamic JIhad is a barbarian culture of failures and criminals. We know that they are evil. But knowing why they are evil and what evil really is… is even more beneficial.

I think the philosophical fields of ethics is too constrained by humanocentric beliefs concerning evil and good. Where evil is “hurting people” and “good is happiness”. It illuminates some of the truth, but I don’t believe it completely illuminates the truth. Not in the way that a cosmological system of belief could, where good and evil are seen as universal functions.

It is easy for the Islamic Jihad to say that the US is evil because we have killed civilians, so it makes us no better than them. They may even believe that. So if you base evil and good on utilitarian concerns, you will face problems such as this, where you can’t explain the “why”, therefore leaving you at a disadvantage.

Good people know that the Islamic Jihad is evil and that those who fight and resist them are good, but they can only explain it in events, by pointing to Islamic killing of children. Which the Islamic Jihad points back to us and says we have killed children in WWII as well. And we point back at them and say that they intentionally kill children….

Okay, fauk all that I say. The Islamic Jihad is evil simply because they serve entropy, and seek the ultimate death of the universe, by speeding entropy along. They are a danger to all of us, to every living thing in the universe. The United States cannot avoid killing and wasting of resources, because we are NOT entropy’s equal. Can we make time stand still? Not yet. Can we make death release its grasp on an individual’s life? Not really. We resist because we want to stop the loss of life, we want to stop or delay death, as humans with human motivations. The Islamic Jihad embraces it, they embrace it because they are not powerful enough to resist entropy’s corruption. The Islamic Jihad is weak, and can be destroyed easily by the United States, if we lower our limitations a bit. Limitations on what? Limitations on how much of entropy we use, limitations on how much energy and force we use and waste. You see… the only way you can master a force or an entity, is to become its equal or better. By resisting entropy, the United States is able to harness more and more of entropy’s abilities even if we are not entropy’s equal. The ability to destroy… increases more and more as we become entropy’s equal in the case of using energy. After all, the US has no interest in destroying entropy, we like our technology, we want to be able to use energy. But we are not greedy, we won’t use more than we need to. We are not the Islamic Jihad. And our differences in power proves that in a way that is irrevocable.