Clearbury

Cheers, though I can't really take any credit as others have made it and I too just find it to illustrate the point quite vividly. I believe it was Lo...

I'm sorry, but I don't think anything you just said addresses anything I said.

Upon further reflection, I think this evolutionary vindication of solipsism can be simplified further. All that needs to be supposed in order to be ab...

The problem, as I see it, with this line of reasoning is that it will discredit too much. For everything I have just said about the impression there a...

To elaborate further, consider the difference between the size, shape and location of physical things versus their colour. It would have conferred a r...

I do not think there exist any moral principles if an entirely evolutionary account of our development is true. This is because of a distinction - oft...

I have certainly assumed a mind. And perhaps time too - though I am not sure it was essential that I do so, as I think time too can probably be given ...

I am not sure I follow your point.

Yes, I think simplicity demands it must be a mind without a physical body, as a physical body would be less simple than a mind that had no body.

Yes. If you start out with an idea about this person's personality and desires, then you've rigged things. So, you have to ask 'what are the odds that...

I don't see how that will affect the argument. If the odds, given certain background assumptions, of this world arising by chance are 1 in a million, ...

I don't see how you're addressing my criticism. Yes, if we have already established that this world is the product of an intelligence, then one can in...

I agree. The concept of the good and the concept of the right are clearly distinct, even though something's being good can sometimes - not always - be...

You don't seem to be following the example. There's a car. It contains two people. One of them decides to kill themselves by means of crashing the car...

I still don't see how they're entitled to make that inference. For any universe that exists - whatever it may contain - it is possible a mind wished t...

Yes, I think that's what they'd try and argue.....but I don't think they're entitled to make those moves. It's true that when we look at the intellige...

I think there is another, quite independent, way of undermining the argument from fine-tuning. First, for any number of ways the universe could have t...

The monkey case is not an article of faith. It's just an upshot of the probabilities. It is not an article of faith that if you toss a coin long enoug...

Sorry, I don't follow your point. In the suicidal driver case there is no fetus involved. There's just a driver and a passenger. In that case, it seem...

A monkey randomly hitting the keys of a typewriter will eventually produce something resembling all the works of Shakespeare. Similarly, if we assume ...

So we'd be entitled to shoot the pregnant woman dead to stop her jumping off the building? My reason tells me that this would not be permitted. Wherea...

Yes, good point - I think using a child versus fetus example would probably have been better.

Imagine a fully informed adult wishes to kill themselves. Are we entitled to stop them from doing so? I think most would say not. Remonstrate with the...

'Intuitions' are what all cases appeal to. It is by intuition - which is used by philosophers to mean something very specific, namely a representation...

i also pointed out that whether the mind is immaterial or not has no bearing - none - on the abortion issue.

I made a CASE for the immateriality of the mind. If the mind is material, then slowly transferring the bits of material constituting it to another pla...

That was the point. I made a case. You didn't.

And no doubt another. This barely improves on a youtube comment section tbh.

Ah, another person who doesn't know how to argue

No, that's just plain untrue. There are lots of arguments for the soul - philosophy is full of them - and no good one against the view. if the mind is...

Yes, i agree that consciousness's continuation is not necessary for a mind to remain where it is, for we are unconscious every day and yet the same mi...

I think it's about the one described as there seems to be a radical difference between what our reason tells us about where the valuable machine goes,...

Here is a thought experiment - I do not think it is mine, but I cannot remember whose it is - that seems to imply something important about the nature...

Yes, the state's existence depends on fear and people's misguided assumption that there are some things - protecting our basic rights - that the state...

No, some people aren't worth discussing things with. For example, someone who only attacks strawmen or who thinks everything is just a matter of opini...

It's in the opening post. It's not mine, it's a published and respected one.

Omg! Apply it to them. As I said, I can't really discuss things with someone like you.

Price wars is what you'll get. Those are a lot nicer than bullety ones. And they drive down prices and drive up efficiency. But you run to big daddy s...

Battles are expensive. The private sector hates them. Politicians love them.

yes, because those street battles between competing supermarket chains and banks are really common

Nothing. But nothing stops someone else setting up a company that doesn't do that - and they'd mop up all the business. It's the government that allow...

When it comes to financial crises, governments stepped in. They gave gamblers giant amounts of other people's money. Was that a good thing? Such crise...

I am not really sure I understand the question. The private sector will provide all of those things. Anything a government provides, the private secto...

Imagine there are two supermarkets near you, one is run by a really nasty piece of work. It pays its employees poorly and has a reputation for treatin...

Well upon realizing that governments are unjust and bad at everything they do, this changes one's attitude. If that happens in enough people, then gov...

Nobody is lobbying for there to be one mega supermarket that has a monopoly on selling us food. The state's power rests in the hands of individuals an...

If one privatized the police, then the police would simply become a private company bidding for business. Let's say I am a private security firm and m...

Whatever malevolent forces you think are at play in private companies are amplified - not reduced - at the level of the state. The logic is very simpl...

So having one mega-warlord is better than lots? Food's really important. We die without it. There are loads and loads of food providers. Would it be b...

The solution: let's say we agree that all governments are fundamentally unjust as they are all composed of people who've decided they are entitled to ...