The sort of thing that clearly has had a "start" are merely configurations of fundamental stuff. The fundamental stuff itself has no apparent "start",...
Your first sentence is a definition: a brute fact is something that exists without a reason for existing. But why believe that brute facts can only ex...
I grant that (in principle) God could have created the universe 6000 years ago (or 6 seconds ago, for that matter) but this historical explanation doe...
Your focus on "explanation" seems a red-herring. Explanations are post-hoc semantic descriptions. The leap to a conclusion that explainability is a me...
IMO, the difficulty is due to the vagueness of the term "consciousness". Broadly speaking, we can consider Data, my cat, and myself to each possess a ...
If it is ever acheived, a ToE will be a theory that describes the most fundamental structure of material reality and how higher levels of structure (e...
I object to your claim that "explanation must exist". First, I'll note that this contradicts your definition of existence (" Existence adds a new note...
It is presumptuous to assume there's a reason for consciousness BESIDES the how. Why think that? Are you looking for an excuse to believe it "had to b...
Words refer to concepts, most of which are fuzzy, but still have a core of agreed meaning. You noted the biological definition of life - and I see not...
But he wasn't under oath, so that's OK....that seems to be the way Trumpists view it. Even if no crime is ever charged, and no impeachment ever procee...
It's not moot, because the fundamental components of the world are particles that do not behave as we'd expect from our experience in the macro world....
Determined does not equate to intended. Although it may be reasonable to assume the past is finite, the future is potentially infinite - so even this ...
You're attacking a poorly constructed strawman. Physicalism does not entail objects being contained in the mind. [ "Solve the unresolved questions..."...
You"re going to need more than this: 1. If Physicalism then not(teleology) 2. Teleology 3. Therefore not(physicalism) Physicalism needn't even be true...
Two problems with this: 1) You are assuming there exist final causes, and then accounting for "will" with that paradigm. This does not establish it. 2...
Because it prima facie violates the law of non-contradiction. Justification of belief in the Trinity requires ad hoc metaphysical assumptions that lac...
I somewhat agree that "final cause" connotes teleology, and teleology connotes intentionality. However, I see no reason to think there is any reason t...
I believe original sin was a Christian invention, a narrative to rationalize the execution of Jesus - making it a "sacrifice", just like sacrificing a...
The ostensible existence of a "trinity" is a good reason to doubt the truth of Christianity. I agree that the doctrine derived from the need to reconc...
My views are rooted in the failure to pass the Immigration Bill of 2013. It wasn't perfect, but it was a good start. It passed the Senate (14 of 46 Re...
News to me, and sounds like an odd definition. Determinism, as typically used, is ontological or metaphysical. You're defining it epistemologically. I...
False. You are simply redefining the cosmological model I defined. Here's a paper in which Cosmologist Alexander Vilenkin discusses the general progra...
It is false to claim "SOA0 must have permanent existence else its something from nothing." I've demonstrated it multiple times, but you just continue ...
It's argument from ignorance to insist there are no causes just because we're ignorant of them. You're focusing too much on the unobservable. I also s...
No it doesn't. The behavior may be due to a complex set of factors that are unobserved or unobservable. As an extreme example, consider a deterministi...
OK, I can accept the possibility of such an intelligence being metaphysically possible. No. Please consider my description of SOA0: it exists uncaused...
That sounds like a confusion of ontology and epistemology. Things exist irrespective of whether anyone has experienced, and labelled, them. Things hav...
It is indeed something like a dumb version of your first cause. There's no example of an intelligence existing independently of something physical. A ...
I can't consider existence a property, because that would imply there are objects that don't happen to have the property "existence". But there are no...
All cosmological theories that explain the big bang agree that there would be multiple big bangs. Is there evidence? Maybe, maybe not. Here's an examp...
So your issue is specifically the high energy/low entropy state at the big bang. i.e.: you're pointing to the need to explain the big bang. I've point...
The results of evolution are not the product of necessity, but regardless, free will is not an illusion- it just isn't what you think it is. Free will...
That everyday experience is entropy. What's the problem? My model is consistent with it. I noted that the initial state was unstable, consequently it ...
Not at all. Striking down Roe v Wade does not outlaw abortion, it just permits individual states to do so. Trump and Kavanaugh can fly their Alabama g...
This was passed for one reason: to make its way to the Supreme Court, to give them an opportunity to strike down Roe v Wade. Pat Robertson thinks this...
I suggest D.M. Armstrong's Sketch for a Systematic Metaphysics. Armstrong was an influential materialist philosopher who developed a comprehensive mat...
OK, but if you're going to claim A is more probable than B, you have to analyze both A and B - seriously entertain both possibilities. You didn't; you...
You ignored my response: 1) moving toward higher entropy is irrelevant. This view of "equilibrium" is a future state, and consistent with my model. 2)...
Are you referring to entropy? How is that a problem? Are you overlooking that the total energy of the universe and/or multiverse is zero? Overlooking ...
Hume's beliefs about causation are antiquated. He didn't consider that there might actually exist natural law. Modern physicalist philosophers (e.g. A...
IMO, Trump is the apotheosis of narcissism. He wants to "win", and will cheat to do so. This alone doesn't imply he will harm the U.S. The bigger dang...
Stating "I think your model leads to equilibrium" is worthless unless you can make a case for that necessarily being the case. Every cosmological hypo...
You are still making the unsupported assertion that everything that exists has a cause of its existence. That is an assumption that cannot be shown to...
You are supposed to be finding a logical flaw in my account, but you are again just reasserting your own assumptions. You seem to accept that there is...
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