rone: (Default)
entombed in the shrine of zeroes and ones ([personal profile] rone) wrote2005-01-20 10:09 pm
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"it's not that i'm lazy, it's that i don't care."

Thanks go to [livejournal.com profile] extempore for giving me a label i can sew onto my ontological hat.

[identity profile] littleamerica.livejournal.com 2005-01-21 07:05 am (UTC)(link)
Apatheism is so basic, even non-human animals and plants practice it. "Observe how the lilies of the field grow, they do not toil nor do they spin." That's because they do not care, either.

Believe it or not, this has already been claimed by Islam. Plants and animals practice Islam by following their true nature to the fullest. I don't think the question of whether they care or not has been discussed.

By they way -- is it "uh-pay-thee-ist" or "ah-path-ee-ist?"

ext_8707: Taken in front of Carnegie Hall (monterey)

[identity profile] ronebofh.livejournal.com 2005-01-21 07:07 am (UTC)(link)
The latter sounds correct to me; it's more about the apathy than the theism.
ext_8707: Taken in front of Carnegie Hall (monterey)

[identity profile] ronebofh.livejournal.com 2005-01-21 07:08 am (UTC)(link)
And, really, it oughta be ath-ee-ism, not ayyyyy-thee-ism, like the Fonz.

[identity profile] nothings.livejournal.com 2005-01-21 10:47 am (UTC)(link)
Hmm, weird. I'm all for not caring, but it's not really an ontological position. (My god-belief litmus test is to do a s/god/unicorns/. I don't care about discussions about whether unicorns exist or not, because that's pretty damn pointless. I have a pretty clear ontological stance, though. In fact, the effort to make that page shows more interest in the problem on the part of its author than I have.)
ext_8707: Taken in front of Carnegie Hall (LISA `97)

[identity profile] ronebofh.livejournal.com 2005-01-21 05:39 pm (UTC)(link)
Yes, it is likely that word doesn't mean what i thought it meant. I kinda thought about looking for something more accurate, but i gave up.

[identity profile] nothings.livejournal.com 2005-01-21 06:09 pm (UTC)(link)
I'm not sure there's a better word; it's just that ontologicality isn't something very flexible. Either something exists, or it doesn't. You can believe that something exists, believe that something doesn't exist, believe there's no evidence to decide, or, roughly, refuse to consider the issue. (I'm sure there are other gradiations of belief.) I just don't think said refusal is an ontological stance so much as a refusal to consider ontology.

This may seem to be kind of quibbling, but this kind of game with what ontology is is essential to, say, Anselm's Ontological Proof of the Existence of God, which, man, as I look it up, this one page claims "has fascinated philosophers, and even today there are respectable philosophers who accept it". But of course, this paragraph, you don't care about, because you are an apatheist.
ext_8707: Taken in front of Carnegie Hall (cornholio)

[identity profile] ronebofh.livejournal.com 2005-01-21 07:20 pm (UTC)(link)
I refuse to care about whether i care about it!

[identity profile] peglegpete.livejournal.com 2005-01-22 03:03 am (UTC)(link)
The ! represents caring. The hounds have been released.

[identity profile] yong-mi.livejournal.com 2005-01-21 12:53 pm (UTC)(link)
There was a professor back at Maryland who wore a t-shirt that said "I don't know and I don't care"