Reddit mentions of Ishmael: A Novel (Ishmael Series Book 1)

Man has lengthy conversation with gorilla in an abandoned office building.

Why is the truth being down-voted?

From the amazon description:

"The narrator of this extraordinary tale is a man in search for truth. He answers an ad in a local newspaper from a teacher looking for serious pupils, only to find himself alone in an abandoned office with a full-grown gorilla who is nibbling delicately on a slender branch. “You are the teacher?” he asks incredulously. “I am the teacher,” the gorilla replies. Ishmael is a creature of immense wisdom and he has a story to tell, one that no other human being has ever heard. It is a story that extends backward and forward over the lifespan of the earth from the birth of time to a future there is still time to save. Like all great teachers, Ishmael refuses to make the lesson easy; he demands the final illumination to come from within ourselves. Is it man’s destiny to rule the world? Or is it a higher destiny possible for him—one more wonderful than he has ever imagined?"

Source: Amazon

"Takers"

Off topic a bit, have you read Ishmael?

I mostly have a problem with how politicians use the homeless people as a sort of soap box or virtue signaling to get people to vote for them. Same with people who profit from, I'm talking about board members of non-profits, the tax money they have no idea how to spend to effectively help.

I grew up poor as dirt with a missionary for a dad. I was homeless a few months in my late teens. I've eaten out of dumpsters. Once when living in Arizona, I had an apartment just no money for food, I ran out of the food box I got from the food bank and went over to the KFC to see what was in the dumpster. I'd been kiting checks for KFC delivery for a week or so and they finally caught on. A car pulled up. I thought they were going to beat me up. They yelled at me and asked what I was doing and I said "looking for food". They gave me $20.00 and I went to the grocery store. I was 17. I went to AZ to try and go to MMI. It didn't work out. Finally, after working my way through college as an adult I'm finally doing well for myself in computer security. But now I'm a privileged "tech bro" who just doesn't get it and is selfish. It's not that my family is very poor, and I need to know that I will not go into a state home or die in the streets when I'm old. I just wonder to what end do these people want to extract money from people like me. People who finally broke free from low/no income. The first person in the family to graduate college. A person from a long line of laborers and small-time fishermen. But I can "afford it". I cannot afford to give my money away to bums. That will never be a thing I can afford.

My recommendation is "Ishmael" by Daniel Quinn. I received it at 17, it was incredible and made me rethink humanity and my role in it. 13 years later, I still credit it for making a dramatic shift in how I saw the world and have given copies to friends and family - all have loved it.

From Wikipedia: "It examines the mythological thinking at the heart of modern civilization, its effect on ethics, and how this relates to sustainability and societal collapse on the global scale. The novel uses a style of Socratic dialogue to deconstruct the notion that humans are the pinnacle of biological evolution. It posits that anthropocentrism and several other widely accepted modern ideas are actually cultural myths and that global civilization is enacting these myths with catastrophic consequences."

Ok, I'm sold.

If that type of stuff interests you I would HIGHLY reccommend that you read Ishmael, The Story of B and My Ishmael

Entertaining and mind blowing books.

Sounds like I'll be flying to the US around the same time as you! I'm actually leaving Monday the 14th.

Ishmael is a wonderful book. It's the book that started the tradition of my SO reading to me before bed. I cried like a baby at the end. It's amazing and I highly recommend it! (crying and all)

Ever read Ishmael? You might like it.

Perhaps the confusion lies with me. It has been a long time since anyone actually asked me to express my view "semi-rigorously". I will work backwards from your last two questions, so hopefully we go from more general to more specific. I truly hope I am not coming across as a follower of Protagoras.

>Are you of the opinion that non-human animals(in this case turtles), are worthy of moral consideration?

All organisms are under moral consideration. Single celled organisms up to carrots, then back down and up to animals. The issue that most people have with this view, is that I cannot express a stronger statement than "tread lightly and try not to kill things you don't plan on eating".

>Who/what is currently in your circle of moral consideration, and what characteristic(s) do they possess which afford them your consideration?

All things that qualify as living/alive and perhaps even Viruses.

>>Turtles have more inherent value than cardboard boxes
>Why do you suppose this is? What is the relevant distinction between turtles and cardboard boxes?

1. So the difference between turtles and cardboard boxes(I shall include non living self repairing chemical compounds with cardboard boxes) is that turtles are the result of a slow, gradual, process that not only selects for the most best "fit" traits (theory of evolution) but also works slowly towards more complex organisms (perhaps the divine of some sort). So I will feel no guilt in kicking a cardboard box across a room, but I will definitely stop and help a turtle cross a road (a weird intersection of society and nature crossing, which I expect to eventually sort itself out, but still cannot stand idly by and let a moral patient experience "stress"). However, I still cannot condemn another moral agent for choosing how treat another organism outside of society/laws. The best I can say is that they shouldn't do it, however if you could provide me with a better moral imperative given my previous statements that would be great.
   

   
   

   >>Thus, all turtles are “innocent moral patients”.
   

   >I take it you see turtles as one of these cases them, yes?
   

   
   

   Given the previous paragraph, let's call it 1., I treat all moral patients on a level playing field, and you might be wondering, "So, are humans more important than the E. Coli that inhabit your shit, or the another obligate organism such as those mites that hang out on our eyelashes?" Surely, I should try to not pull out any eyelash, if I value each mite on that eyelash as much as I value a human infant?
   

   
   

   So, the human infants are moral patients participating in "society" whether forced to do so, chosen of their own free will, or even if they just lucked into it (tuche). As such, they are the highest stepping stone to something greater chapter 3, except replace jellyfish/cnidaria with people. Each mite also has the potential to become the progenitor to the next dominate race on Earth, but since free will exists, those human infants are closer.
   

   
   

   I feel like there are two ways to view this outlook... Basically the pessimistic and the optimistic. The pessimistic view, is that "Shit, you treat all humans that aren't moral agents as well as you try to treat moral patient organisms" as opposed to the optimistic view, "Shit, you try to treat all moral patients as good as you treat moral patients". This may have just made the argument turn into a clusterfuck...
   

   
   

   So, important philosophical views:
   

   You should try not to hurt any moral patients.
   

   You should only hurt moral patients when it is necessary for the greater good(looking at moral agents that take a laxative or moral agents that take actions to decrease the "overall" quantity of life). This is truly what I believe, and how I live my life.
   

   
   

   >>I feel that there may be cases in organisms other than adult humans that may cause them to be moral patients
   

   >Which cases might those be, and why?
   

   I meant agents, sorry about the lack of sleep. I get cranky.
   

   
   

   Anytime we force "society" on other organisms or when those organisms end up being affected by it in a very direct way. Like Holmes Rolston III, feels that domesticated animals and "pariah species"(pigeons, rats, raccoons, and other species that saw humanity and was like "That's a good idea, let's take a piece of that", when I pushed HoRo III he definitely admitted his world view was lacking in context to pariah species). The best example of this would be Nim Chimpsky, while HoRo III agreed that (not a direct quote it has been 8+ years), some organisms are able to transcend and benefit from their interactions with society/culture such as Nim Chimpsky we shouldn't be forcing that progression(reading, writing, arithmetic) onto others. It would boil down to, some organisms/species which are "more complex" take part in the "divine" more than simpler organisms. So let's take domesticated dogs/cows, those species have traded organism autonomy for ensured specie success. Like, you can take humans/H. sapiens and realize that we would be nowhere near as dominant in the food chain if it wasn't for the species we domesticated/those that "decided"(I am not ready to declare species are sentient... yet) to join us.
   

   
   

   This is fun, haven't had anyone care about my views in a very long time.
   

   )

Would you recommend any of his other works in that "series" (I know its not a series per say). I have only read Ishmael itself and I quite enjoyed it but its been a while. (https://www.amazon.com/dp/B000SEFH6A/ref=dp-kindle-redirect?_encoding=UTF8&btkr=1)

Is there an order? Do they deal with the same ideas, expand on them or reach for something different?

Really appreciate your reply!