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Metaphysician Undercover

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Do you recognize that the point being made is the necessity of the assumption? You say,there is nothing inherently circular, "if we assume...". Theref...
April 07, 2018 at 22:05
Yes, this is the point. Without comparing it to "the standard unit of measurement", the measuring of the ruler's accuracy by measuring it with another...
April 07, 2018 at 15:51
Right, it is a convention, an arbitrary assumption adopted by human minds. Circles of logic, and infinite regress of justification are avoided by refe...
April 07, 2018 at 12:47
I've found Stanford expresses a materialist bias. A search through the credentials of the editorial board explains why this is the case. Their philoso...
April 07, 2018 at 12:33
To measure a ruler with another ruler, is to calibrate or justify it's reliability by comparing it to another ruler. What else could measuring a ruler...
April 06, 2018 at 23:38
True, measuring rulers with other rulers might just lead to an infinite regress, unless you come back to a prior ruler, then it's circular.
April 06, 2018 at 21:49
This is not at all true. Thales predicted a solar eclipse. Following motions, and predicting what will be where at a future time, does not conclude th...
April 06, 2018 at 21:17
The point though, is that measuring a ruler with another ruler really is circular. It is the calibration against the defined object which removes the ...
April 06, 2018 at 20:55
What you describe is a situation in which they are using their minds to study the brain, and making conclusions from this study, about the mind. To ma...
April 06, 2018 at 12:13
Right, there are assumptions made about the nature of space, the nature of time, the nature of living beings, etc., which form the fundamental convent...
April 06, 2018 at 11:25
The problem here is that things change as time passes. Ben 1 and Ben 2 might be "the same" at the precise moment in which you make them to be 'the sam...
April 05, 2018 at 17:41
You cannot found epistemology on commitment alone. And, commitment doesn't even give us an approach to ontology. We've already learned the latter from...
April 05, 2018 at 12:52
So all that fuss just concerns minor details? I don't think so. String theory is insufficient. Quantum loop gravity is insufficient. It looks more lik...
April 05, 2018 at 11:54
There is a much easier, and more efficient way of dealing with the function of the predicate, and that is to make it completely subjective, an imagina...
April 04, 2018 at 12:36
No? What did he propose then? \ I don't see how this would avoid the problems. Wouldn't the forces have to act within some kind of substance, like the...
April 04, 2018 at 12:12
I think the idea that reality is composed of fundamental and irreducible particles was proven as illogical by Aristotle. But if you allow for dualism,...
April 03, 2018 at 11:43
What do you think is the difference between "evolution" and "emergence"? Are they just two different words which refer to one and the same thing? Is e...
March 30, 2018 at 13:03
The ID example is different from the lottery example. One consists purely of odds, the other there is a person and ID to be judged. What justifies "th...
March 30, 2018 at 12:39
Language is a property of living beings, just like any of the various other properties. You can separate the property from the beings who possess the ...
March 29, 2018 at 12:04
There are different degrees of certainty which are appropriate for the different fields of study. Aristotle explained this in his Nicomachean Ethics. ...
March 29, 2018 at 11:44
Because you cannot rule out the possibility that any of these people have the ball you are not justified in believing that any one of them doesn't hav...
March 29, 2018 at 01:35
What the cosmological argument shows is that "infinite potentialities" (as infinite possibility) is physically impossible. Whatever has actual existen...
March 28, 2018 at 13:50
No. Do you think that being wrong could be reasonable? Isn't this how we define "unreasonable", as wrong? I think so. And if unreasonable is wrong, th...
March 27, 2018 at 02:01
That's irrelevant, what I'm talking about is when one believes that the premise is false, and also that the conclusion drawn from it is justified. Loo...
March 26, 2018 at 11:48
I think you'll have to lay out for me what you mean by "material implication". In any case, you don't seem to be getting at the point here. The issue ...
March 26, 2018 at 00:27
The issue with "potential" gets more complicated with Aristotle's cosmological argument. The argument is that no potential can be eternal, therefore t...
March 25, 2018 at 12:56
It's not the claim "this is justified" which makes a belief justified, it's to demonstrate the correctness of the belief to others and have them agree...
March 25, 2018 at 11:39
You could probably state such criteria, but you've already demonstrated that you'd be wrong. I prefer to maintain integrity, not insisting on the corr...
March 24, 2018 at 12:05
That tells me nothing. What we're talking about is falsities which support the conclusion. If someone is going to use a falsity to support a conclusio...
March 24, 2018 at 11:38
Then we ought to differentiate between these two. But Michael seems to be arguing that if there are reasons for a belief then the belief is reasonable...
March 24, 2018 at 00:51
Oh, sorry noAxioms, my mistake. I somehow misread your comment as saying that such a discussion doesn't belong in this thread. Read too fast sometimes...
March 23, 2018 at 12:24
So you're saying that if a person has reasons for one's belief, even if those reasons involve falsities, then that belief is reasonable? The problem i...
March 23, 2018 at 11:59
No it's not, that's the point, once the belief is exposed as false it cannot be considered reasonable to hold that belief. Furthermore, it would requi...
March 22, 2018 at 15:57
We might clear up the issue if we revisit the time factor. I submit that the judge might say "you were justified in your belief". But now, the truth i...
March 22, 2018 at 12:28
I agree that "justified" does not mean certain. However, demonstrating that a belief is "not wrong", does not demonstrate that it is correct. Nor does...
March 22, 2018 at 12:18
I'm not equivocating, because I've already said that your definition of "justified" is unacceptable. We ought to adhere to an acceptable definition of...
March 22, 2018 at 12:10
So how could one believe the same belief to be both justified and false?
March 22, 2018 at 12:05
Clearly he wasn't right in believing that she was sixteen, so he wasn't justified in believing that she was sixteen. Justification requires demonstrat...
March 22, 2018 at 12:04
So you have contradictory justified beliefs then. "God exists" and "God does not exist" are both justified. I think that an individual would necessari...
March 22, 2018 at 11:56
I think that's a very strange definition of "justified". If we go with "compelling evidence" as you suggest, then justification cannot be, as you sugg...
March 22, 2018 at 01:35
I don't believe that you believe my belief is justified. You know that the documents are falsified so you know that my belief is not justified, and yo...
March 22, 2018 at 00:11
You're conflating my belief with your belief. The point is that the same person cannot hold these two beliefs. That's what is stated in the op.
March 22, 2018 at 00:05
I disagree. How one views free will is a reflection on how one views the passing of time. And that is central to this issue.
March 22, 2018 at 00:02
If you believe it to be a forgery then you do not believe it to be conclusive evidence. This is irrelevant to my point, which is that you cannot belie...
March 21, 2018 at 23:57
I don't see the relevance. Showing her id. seems like conclusive evidence to me, so you'd be justified in believing her name is Sarah. The point I mad...
March 21, 2018 at 23:52
That's not true, evidence supports a theory, it doesn't necessarily justify the conclusion. It is false to say that any time there is evidence for a p...
March 21, 2018 at 23:30
I think that this is the most important aspect of the subject, how we relate to temporal continuity. We see that mass has a tendency to persist, to co...
March 21, 2018 at 12:48
If you think that the person did not commit the crime, then you believe that the conclusion that they did commit the crime is unjustified. Evidence ma...
March 21, 2018 at 11:41
You might think "they were justified in believing X". But this does not mean that you think that X is a justified belief. So if you do not think that ...
March 21, 2018 at 03:37