Astrophel

But the term as "the rock bottom foundation of awareness" has no value in a discussion about ethics if there is nothing IN the term that is inherently...

This seems right to me, and I have no issues with this kind of thinking at all. Just as I have no issues with science. But then, what good is survival...

I am reminded of Zeno's paradox of the arrow never arriving at its target. The iterable "moment" itself analytically reducible to constitutive iterabi...

But it is not a historical claim, that is, it is saying nothing about ethics as it is entangled within a culture, generating rules of behavior and spe...

But it is not a historical claim, that is, it is saying nothing about ethics as it is entangled within a culture, generating rules of behavior and spe...

If you give an exhaustive account of what a toothache is, then yes, end of. Here is the problem spelled out: There are two kind of good and bad, the c...

Not a special preference, but an equal one, or nearly so. I think animals are just as important as we are, yet we have always ignored this. I suspect ...

Yes, it is that simple. Stick my hand in boiling water, and the pain has nothing at all to do with beliefs, opinions, etc. Animals are in their own wa...

Or just think of the strong examples themselves and their content. If you are in very intense agony, then do what a good scientist does, which is obse...

And yet, here we are, existing out of context, notwithstanding the context of saying this. There is in this, some elusive and profound affirmation tha...

I incidentally noticed I said "ethics IS what ethics is about." Meant to say, "this dimension of our existence is what ethics is about."

So with climate change and the rest, it is not just us, but the many animals that live on this earth also, and this is what you have in mind, right? I...

I asked what value was. You mentioned the "collective emotional discomfort" as being foundational, and I asked what this emotional discomfort was all ...

not my original intention, but then you did say, "Yep. Morals are emotional positions and nought else, on my view." Which I couldn't help wondering ab...

If I have a moral regard for something, some issue about acquiring something, preventing something, and so on, I have an interest in that thing. Not s...

So the ethical prohibition against torture is all about my emotional regard for torture, the empathy, compassion and so forth that step forward when s...

Well, herein lies the rub: You seem to be saying that the world of animals and their lack of ethical principles provides the substratum for the analys...

For this, one need only look at a given ethical situation and discover its essence. I don't think this is a very demanding analysis. Begin with strong...

So ethics really has no foundation at all? "Outmoded" and "counterproductive" confer nothing beyond utility of ethics. But principles of utility have ...

Closeted alcoholism, perhaps. But who lives like this? Some, yes. Off they go, then. But most bring their issues into this public arena, and this is w...

But how does one separate what is "merely" said from what has a grounding apart from the mere saying? The mere saying includes attitudes, historically...

That is a loaded statement. If true, then one would have to identify something that is good or bad "outside" of social contexts, but how is this possi...

But if his neighbor was okay with it, and this has happened, then part of the immorality of this vanishes, for certainly consent is mitigating. All we...

But it really doesn't get interesting until one brings up the hard cases that challenge our collective comfort. I recall a philosophy class in ethics ...

There is an uncanny space that opens up when the chatter stops for some people. While for others, most, it is simply the same old perceptual encounter...

You at the very least begin with the groundwork of scientific inquiry. This has nothing to do with what science says.

No, no. Sorry about that. I did forget previous things mentioned.

I think this taboo on speaking is overplayed, and yet, not played enough. One can speak anything, its just that there has to be a shared experience. Y...

But I can't imagine Dennett arguing the way Henry does. I read his, or read through it, Consciousness Explained. Dennett It does a good job of showing...

There are other yogas. Jnana yoga is also very effective if it cuts through the mass of presuppositions that rule our thinking in a default way. As I ...

Just to add: illusion and time, these are the same. Time is anticipation, a "not yet" at the ready when one sees an object, and when the object is con...

I think of sunyata as an absence of knowledge claims in the perceptual event, knowledge that is "always already" in normal experience, and is the esse...

There is the self and then there is the "self". One is the everyday self, and this suspended in meditation, and I think this is likely not in dispute ...

You know, I agree with this. The trouble comes in several places, but the one that stands out for me is agency. Though there is "no thought whether th...

You mean how the child emerges from innocence and in receiving the world's language and culture, the "sin" of the race, discovers freedom and guilt. V...

Far be it for me to be father confessor. But I can say with considerable thought behind it, that many of the things we are told are taboo are just his...

Well, you'd have to put aside ideas like our organic nature, as well as any naturalistic assumptions about the world. It's not that these are not true...

Well, let's not forget the presence of divinity, a metaphysical term that refers to love. As a term, it is woefully inadequate, for it has a lot of co...

No, to be honest. I don't think it is the lack of a religous orientation. If anything, this is an advantage. His most serious work is not about this a...

Yeah. I think this right. Gotta have a lot of respect for a person who insisted on going to the front lines in WWI because he wanted to know what it m...

Because of the good and the bad. Take an ethical case, one particularly striking to make the point. I am given the choice, either torture an innocent ...

Interesting to see how language falls apart when these threshold experiences call for expression. But it is not language as such that is at fault. Rat...

Buddhists are a strange bunch. I have read of those who are buried alive breathing through straws. There is that story of the sequestered monk asked b...

I tend to agree with most of this. But I would just add that it is just a beginning. Certainly, ethics emerges out of a culture full of nuanced thinki...

I don't think this is all right. Just a few things: He did his dissertation, The Concept of Irony, on Socrates, and he was completely aware of the phi...

Here is a question: what is the self? There is the thick theory and the thin theory, as a philosopher might put it (discussing issues like euthanasia ...

Dostoevsky opens the mind to miserable frustrations of reconciling faith with the world. If you read D. then you are already exercising the disillusio...

Of course you are sincere about wanting spiritual understanding. But is it the kind of sincerity that motivates you to make the painful decisions to a...

You said: "My basic point is that I always have a deep spiritual concern for morality and values." There are genuine ways to approach this issue philo...

Yes, I am aware this sounds high minded, but there is nothing to stop one from second guessing philosophers. Everyone does this all the time. Why Witt...