What was Western Rome like in the last hundred years or so before it fell?
had a lot of germanic refugees
>>792008
Like Yurop today
>>792008
Harsh taxes on the poor, widening gap between rich and poor, settled foreigners in your local town, Christianity going from just being that of the urban poor to even people out in the countryside, walls being built around all the towns again, soldiers being stationed on the walls with heavy artillery, peasants being tied to the land in a form of proto-serfdom.
How do you justify being a materialist?
>The doctrine that the world is made up of objects whose existence is independent of human consciousness turns out to be in conflict with quantum mechanics and with facts established by experiment.
https://www.theguardian.com/science/blog/2009/mar/17/templeton-quantum-entanglement
And don't tell me "Occam's Razor", because: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boltzmann_brain
>>791980
>journalists in charge of understanding quantum mechanics
This is fucking babby tier. No, reality doesn't depend on human consciousness. Boltzmann brains have nothing to do with that.
>>791980
>the guardian
why don't you post a reputable news organization?
>>791986
>Bernard d'Espagnat
>journalist
Ceci n'est pas un pays.
>>791948
Quelle partie? Wallonie ou tous Belgium?
>>792686
L'entierete de la Belgique.
C'est un etat artificiel ayant a sa creation pour seul but d'empecher les Francais de tapper les Allemands et les Hollandais, et vice-versa.
C'est une relique d'un temps passe, il est grand temps qu'elle rejoigne la France.
>>791948
t. butthurt dutchman
I'd like to make an official thread about Plotinus so here's one.
Since many years i'm attracted by religion, mysticism, mystic philosophy like Vedanta, and stuff... I've been interesting in Orthodox Christianity, sufism, and else for a lot of time because muh mystic god.
Maybe one and a half year ago i've discovered Plotinos ( his greek name in biography ) and i litteraly fell in love with him, it took me a lot of time to read and understand him, but this man is litteraly diamond.
I think he was the smartest guy of late antiquity ( because this century was shitty, you know, with gnostics and all else ). He managed to gather the best of platonism, aristotelicism, stoicism in one monistic rational spiritual and poetic philsophy. And his thought is so optimistic ! No sin ! No hell ! No right and wrong ! Everything is already given to us, the One is already inside of us, all we need to do is to change our consciousness, to get the real right divine view that allows us to the intellect and, finally, the One himself.
For years I've been looking for spirituality in order to fullfill my empty life, but not with christianity, not with islam, hinduism, bouddhism or else.
Today and forever, i know that my wholre life belongs to the philosophy of Plotinos, this man gave me every answer i've been always looking for.
Please, read this man and don't forget what he said, he's worth it.
And sorry for language, english is not my native tong.
been reading Enneads after some light exposure to his philosophy. reading his work with a solid background in mysticism/religion has been fucking awesome.
he's probably one of the smartest individuals I've ever, ever read, the guy is a treasure. he really was on to something. i don't think i have a single problem with any of his philosophy anywhere
Nice blog. Subscribed.
What stuck out to me while reading his Enneads:
>the soul is only evil "when it thinks the body's thoughts"
>the soul understood almost as a shaft of light that falls on matter, as an impersonal, "natural" process, and less some vague force with aims and aspirations of its own (except for the Good)
>Happiness as being not a life of pleasure, but living life through and in "the faculty competent enough to announce pleasure's value [in the first place]", in other words, unconditional happiness stems from being grateful for even being alive in the first place, and being able to apprehend this life's transcendent Source
>on evil being more like Murphy's Law than the devil
>chronic pain in the virtuous man: "And so in all his pain he asks not pity: there is always the radiance in the inner soul of man, untroubled like the light in a lantern when fierce gusts beat about it in a wild turmoil of wind and tempest."
>Absolute evil being "utter dearth", the "ever-needy", compared to the Good, which is totally "self-sufficing, self-possessed"
>"There is no power that can wrest anything of its distinct nature."
>After WW2, America tries to spread freedom and democracy for the next 60 years
>fails
>tries again
>fails
>tries again
>fails
>tries again
>fails
>tries again
>fails
>tries again
>fails
>keeps doing the same thing now in Syria
>fail in progress
I really don't get this /his/. Why doesn't America learn from its past mistakes???
How are they failing? They've effectively established Pax Americana without the need of forcing their ideology of others. That's soft power projection at its finest. On top of their apex military, what's left to secure their seat at the top? They're doing everything advantageously.
>>791435
It never tried to spread freedom and democracy, just its own hegemony
>>791435
>America tries to spread freedom and democracy
You don't actually believe that do you?
The last millennium of the Roman Empire might as well have been a Christian caliphate run by Armenians (proto-Turks). Why is this Byzantium so glorified by Hellenists and Classicists here, when the actual Hellenes lost power.
Pic related: average Byzantine.
The Turks also called themselves "Romans," lol.
really good thread
>>791290
>Christian caliphate
The Caliphate was an Islamic copy of the Empire, so kind of?
Why do normies consider Rome to only be an empire starting from when Augustus was named Princeps? I don't understand this. What do you consider the definition of an "empire", /hist/ and would you agree that Rome started as an empire even if it was a republican society well before Augustus's reign?
The distinction between the Roman "Republic" and the Roman "Empire" is meant to differentiate between their forms of government. It's pretty significant, seeing as how in the Roman Republic, there was no permanent autocrat in charge of the government (hence Republic) and in the Roman Empire, an emperor stood as the head of the government (hence Empire). It really isn't hard to understand.
>>791035
>If the emperor calls himself princeps he isn't an emperor
Anon he was called imperator anyway. The word just means "leader"
Is there any chance the Roman empire would have done better if Julius Caesar had just cleared out the corruption from the Republic instead of declaring himself dictator?
What are the best arguments against reductive materialism?
>>791013
It's just a perspective.
Science has yet to prove the nature of reality and mind to be reducible to natural processes -- although it certainly seems to hint toward that. Even if it were true, moreover, the language of cognitive science is young and the brain is a very complex organ and it might be more useful and expedient to talk about minds using older more time-tested conceptual terminology from other schools of philosophy.
Platonic forms.
In WW2, considering all ammunitions, from those of handguns to the main cannons of battleships, a total of 42.6 billion shots were fired.
>>790762
British forces in North Africa faced a perennial struggle to keep sand out of vital equipment. After almost a year and a half of testing various solutions, they came to the conclusion in late 1941 that condoms worked best to keep machinery free of sand.
Mozart was black
>hitler started his own culture/church
>christians and jews btfo
>christians and jews use the new jer u.s.a. lem to kill hitlers church
>europe btfo
>better make all reports and facts surrounding the war as trivial, hazy, revisionist as possible.
>goyim_can_never_know.jpg
>???
>profit
What does /his/ think of Jimmy Carter?
Peanut farmer.
Not the president we needed but the one we deserved. Fantastic human being.
Good guy, smart guy, bad president.
Best move: DoE.
So you're saying
> *adjust beret*
You are saying
> *smoke heavily*
At least I think you're saying
> *drink wine*
Well maybe I'm wrong but you're saying
> *smoke even harder*
You're saying we were
> *create freedoms*
we were something like, you know like
> *accept muslims migrants*
you're saying we were
> *put a cigarette in all holes*
WE WERE EMPERORS AND SHIT ?
>>790704
But he was Italian so your entire thing doesn't work.
>>790715
How so ?
PROPOSISION
EXCEPCIONELLE
The Roman Empire under Augustus in its prime or the chinese empire under Qin Shi Huang.
>>790575
Romans die swarmed by zergs
>>790575
In terms of ancient empires, Chinese win battles, Romans win wars.
>>790575
>Roman Empire under Augustus
>in its prime
/his/ redpill me on domestic slavery in the ottoman empire.
There were yearly thousands of slaves bought and sold from europe to africa so there must have been many customers outside of the royal palace but for what were they mainly used by just the pasha's and their families or was buying slaves also common with the merchant class ? Also pic is unrelated.
>>790375
>those dudes kissing
kek
>>790378
Yeah its a picture celebrating the constitution of 1880 which made homosexuality legal before that it had to be kept secret.
>>790381
Is that why they're chaining that poor woman to that rock?
What was serfdom?
>>790146
Feudal ownership of peasants as property.
The middle ground between slavery and wage slavery.
>>790146
The thing that kept peasants alive.
Many like to forget that self sufficient people (note, I did not say societies) are a relatively new concept.
ITT: Interesting gods and goddesses
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mictlantecuhtli
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vahagn
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hayk
>>790125
Me
>>790125
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ixtab
![civ1[1].jpg](https://i.imgur.com/lK8tqbu.jpg "civ1[1]")
