@georgetakei The full quote: "The first step in a fascist movement is the combination under an energetic leader of a number of men who possess more than the average share of leisure, brutality, and stupidity. The next step is to fascinate fools and muzzle the intelligent, by emotional excitement on the one hand and terrorism on the other.

This technique is as old as the hills; it was practiced in almost every Greek city, and the moderns have only enlarged its scale."

-- Bertrand Russell, 1940

@ApostateEnglishman @georgetakei Also from 1940: ‘If, however, we assert positively that there are true propositions that are not verifiable, we abandon pure empiricism. Pure empiricism, finally, is believed by no one, and if we are to retain beliefs that we regard as valid, we must allow principles of inference which are neither demonstrative nor derivable from experience.’ From ‘Truth and Verification’ The William James Lectures, Harvard University.

So it’s agreed, the analytic philosophy of British and Austrian German logicians have no right to be imposed by the elite and neither do dialecticians, with their speculative philosophy to be denied to the people? #Logicians vs #Dialecticians

@Dialectician @georgetakei Or we can go with Scottish-born David Hume or Austrian-heritage Karl Popper's rejection of inductive reasoning and "empiricism", if you really want to get into it. Hopefully the sheer speed with which I replied convinces you that I've read all the books and don't need to consult a search engine.

Reply Guying me on epistemology isn't helpful to anyone.

I will take your point about calling people fools because they were hoodwinked is perhaps also not helpful.