In my fourth dialogue, I talk to Ștefan Mironescu about Câlin Georgescu. Ștefan studied cinema at the National University of Theatre and Film in Bucharest and works as a video producer. He’s also a member of the Party of Young People in Romania, one of the main parties behind Câlin Georgescu. Ștefan thinks Western values such as secularism, LGBT+ rights, and support for vaccine compulsion are harming Romania, and that the country needs a strong leader to preserve Romanian sovereignty and national values such as Christianity, traditional families, and the freedom to not vaccinate. Although I agree that there are legitimate reasons to be frustrated with the liberal world order, I think populists politicians are capitalizing on this frustration to promote an ideology that will ultimately harm Romania even more. Problems such as rising social inequality and the cost-of-living crisis are not going to be solved by scapegoating minorities, but by resisting culture wars and focusing on evidence-based policy. What do you think? Should Romania remain aligned with the EU and try to solve its problems within this paradigm? Or does it need a strong leader to fix the problems that liberal democracy has failed to address?

Glossary:

- PSD ("pe se de"): Partidul Social Democrat (Social Democratic Party)

- USR ("uh se re"): Uniunea Salvați România (Save Romania Union)

- AUR: Alianța pentru Unirea Românilor (Alliance for the Union of Romanians)

- SENS: Sănătate, Educație, Natură, Sustenabilitate (Health Education Nature Sustainability Party)

Intro

00:00 Teaser

00:42 The importance of dialogue

Discussion

08:33 Introducing Ștefan Mironescu

17:22 Reasons for opposing/supporting Georgescu

21:16 The legionary movement

23:43 Ciolacu (PSD) vs. Lasconi (USR)

25:03 Christian values and the state

26:05 Most pressing problems in Romania

32:12 Is religion at risk?

41:24 What specific AUR policy proposals do you support?

42:05 Same-sex marriage vs. civil partnership

42:47 S3x education

45:55 Does voting conservative increase well-being for Romanians?

50:26 Shouldn't we trust science?

54:23 If fighting poverty is a priority, shouldn't we support parties like SENS?

57:17 How confident are you that Georgescu would be good for Romania?

58:19 Are you concerned about Russia's influence on Romania?

01:03:38 What would change your mind?

01:04:20 What does it mean to be leftist?

01:05:25 Polarizing language vs. real fascism

01:07:37 Biden, Trump & American Democracy

01:12:56 Aggressive/tribal leftists

01:13:15 Being controlled, billionaires, and trans rights

01:20:05 What would change your mind about the "left"?

01:23:21 What about the "right"? Abortion rights?

01:25:17 What would change my mind

01:30:47 What is the social cost of changing our minds?

If you want to be up to date with Ștefan and his views, you can follow him on Instagram or Facebook.

And if you like my content, make sure to follow me:

- Website/Mailing list: http://ghostlessmachine.com/

- YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@ghostless.machine

- Facebook: https://facebook.com/ghostlessmachineblog

- Instagram: https://instagram.com/arielpontes

- Twitter: https://twitter.com/arielpontes

- Medium: https://medium.com/@arielpontes

- Ko-Fi: https://ko-fi.com/arielpontes

You can check the vegan strategist post about the "activist sweetspot" here.

In my third dialogue, I talk to Adrian Cotora about astrology. Adrian is the vice-president of the Romanian Astrologer's association and, as you can imagine, he believes the position of planets in the sky at the time of our birth correlate with different personality traits. I, on the other hand, as a naturalistic atheist, don't believe the position of planets correlate in any way with our personality. In this conversation we discuss how our different epistemic values lead us to these different conclusions, and we also discuss the possibility of a reformed astrology that focuses on its value as a potential psychological tool for exploring our relationships with different archetypes while avoiding untestable claims about the nature of the universe. So, what do you think? Is astrology real?

In the second Ghostless Machine dialogue, I talk to Kitty about verbal vs. nonverbal consent. Kitty jokingly refers to herself as a “consent-nazi”, meaning she thinks the only legitimate way to obtain consent is verbally. I, on the other hand, tend to think that such an approach fails to take into consideration the full complexity of human behavior and sexuality. Because of that I tend to favor alternative ways to tackle the issue of accidental violations of consent. So what do you think? Is nonverbal consent ever enough?

00:00:00 Teaser

00:00:42 Intro

00:01:50 Kitty's intro

00:02:30 Where do we agree and disagree?

00:06:47 How to ethically make a move on the first date?

00:08:35 Are there legitimate alternatives to verbal consent?

00:12:26 Steelmanning

00:15:59 What about people who are turned off by verbal requests for consent?

00:16:53 Nurture vs. Nature

00:33:43 How plausible it is that asking for verbal consent could become a dominant social norm?

00:39:36 If verbal consent wasn't an option, what would be the second best alternative?

00:43:23 Should we promote verbal consent as an admirable option rather than an obligation?

00:44:59 How confident are we about your opinion?

00:46:42 How confident am I?

00:47:20 Asking for consent in a non-robotic way

00:51:23 Why do guys reject the idea of asking for consent verbally?

00:55:33 What would make you change your mind?

00:57:25 What would make me change my mind?

01:00:20 Tips and final thoughts from Kitty

01:01:30 Do you think being dogmatic about verbal consent risks backfiring?

If you’re interested in Kitty’s work, you can learn more about it in the following links:

- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thekittyrea/

- Podcast: https://eropedia.ro/

- Influx: https://influx.events/

If you’re interested in tips about relationships, dating, and masculinity from her recommended sources, you can check them out here:

- https://www.tiktok.com/@mattcama23

- https://www.tiktok.com/@justinbaldoni

- https://www.tiktok.com/@remasculine

- https://www.tiktok.com/@watchfulcoyote

And finally, if you like my content, you can always follow me here:

- Website/Newsletter: http://ghostlessmachine.com/

- Podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/ghostlessmachine

- Facebook: https://facebook.com/ghostlessmachineblog

- Instagram: https://instagram.com/ghostlessmachine

- Twitter: https://twitter.com/arielpontes

- Medium: https://medium.com/@arielpontes

- Ko-Fi: https://ko-fi.com/arielpontes

I think political polarization is one of the biggest problems in our society right now. That's why I started a series of dialogues where I have friendly disagreements over controversial topics with a variety of guests. These conversations are guided by three core principles: scout mindset, non-violent communication, and radical honesty.

In the first episode of the series, I talk to Jamie Woodhouse about the ethics of veganism. Jamie tends to believe veganism is a moral obligation, while I tend to believe there is no such thing as moral obligations, only better and worse actions.

00:00:00 Teaser

00:00:22 Intro

00:02:29 Jamie’s intro

00:03:39 Where we agree

00:07:02 Where we disagree

00:11:58 Moral obligations

00:19:09 Analogy with tallness 

00:24:11 Levels of confidence

00:30:23 Is it natural to eat meat?

00:35:45 Does it matter?

00:43:03 Moral conventions 

00:49:12 Individual vs. systemic change

00:55:27 Reducetarianism vs. abolitionism

01:00:45 Virtue ethics and rule-based utilitarianism

01:07:27 Jamie’s criticism of utilitarianism

01:11:33 Would this change your mind?

01:17:04 Is humane farming possible?

01:21:14 Jamie’s final message

01:24:46 Ending

If you’re interested in Sentientism, you can learn more in the following links:

And if you like my content, you can follow me on these links:

nYEfE6n65x1FOQAXXHTj

This is the second of a series of articles defending a compatibilist interpretation of utilitarianism, which can be reconciled with all major moral theories. In this article I explain why intentions are important even for consequentialists. You can read the written article here.

Cultivating virtues is utilitarian

This is the second of a series of articles defending a compatibilist interpretation of utilitarianism, which can be reconciled with all major moral theories. In this article I explain how utilitarianism is compatible with virtue ethics. You can read the written article here.

This is the first of a series of articles defending a compatibilist interpretation of utilitarianism, which can be reconciled with all major moral theories in Western moral philosophy. In this article I explain what utilitarians mean by "pleasure" and "pain" and debunk a few myths that result from a misunderstanding of these terms.

Original article: https://medium.com/humanist-voices/are-pain-and-pleasure-all-that-matters-4d45ac0a3e18

"Abortion should be legal. It is immoral to make it illegal. But is that because women have a fundamental right to do whatever they want with their bodies? No. This is simply an invalid argument, and in part the reason we fail to make progress on the abortion debate. Arguments matter. Sure, people are emotional and some are so blinded by their religion that they will not be persuaded by any arguments. But in any debate, there will always be persuadables. If we manage to spread a pro-choice narrative that appeals to universal moral intuitions rather than to the gut feelings of certain political groups or religious confessions, we might have a chance to make that narrative viral and persuade a critical mass of people. So what is the reason abortion should be legal?"