We can't form an image of a square circle, but we can add the modifying concept <square> (not just the word "square") to the concept <circle>. I mean ...
In my view, which is based on Aristotle, Aquinas and John of St. Thomas, the rules of logic are not given a priori, but are abstracted from experience...
Not quite. I want to know what is. I see processes, and processes coming to completion. Plants sprout, grow, disseminate seed and die. People are conc...
Were I a fundamentalist, I would not accept evolution as sound science. I think what you find unusual in my style is the open, rational consideration ...
Aristotle would, I think, say that you were the efficient cause (having actualized the relevant potentials) and that the dynamite was an instrumental ...
This does not argue intentionality. Looking for predators, food and water is adaptive behavior selected by evolution. It is not evidence of a rational...
1. That does not say what you claimed I said, i.e. that evolution is purely random. When you take one sentence out of context, you can twist its meani...
Yes, data is the given, but it is not a cognitive given for the computer, but for to us. As you note, someone, some human, has keyed it in or arranged...
Data means something to humans, not in its physical representations. Data in a computer is simply a physical state, typically accumulations of electro...
I have read Dawkins, and I stand by my claim. I said neither that evolution is entirely random, nor that Dawkins claimed that it was. If you read my p...
Data processing contains no reference whatsoever. It is simply the physical manipulation of input signals to produce output signals. Evolution selects...
I think I said in the OP that essential and accidental are two types of efficient causality. The difference Aristotle is illustrating is that while ac...
I suggest you read the works of naturalists such as Huxley and Dawkins, who explicitly argue that we do not need mind in nature as evolution exemplifi...
Not at all. Despite free will, we should feel very uncomfortable in administering punishment. 1. The act we might punish might not be a free act. For ...
Definitions: Free will: While this is not a definition, it implies the kind of free will I am defending, i.e. one that sees acts as having their causa...
That is my preferred term. While I agree with the evolutionary advantages of cephalization for ambulatory organisms, there is no reason to think that ...
I accept the modern evolutionary synthesis as sound science. What have I said that would make you think otherwise? I would like to read the reasoning ...
As you are unwilling to engage in rational discourse or even point out anything I wrote that is factually wrong, there is no point in responding to yo...
It is amazing how the conversation ceases to be rational when I challenge cherished beliefs. If you think I am in error, make a case -- otherwise you ...
Obviously you are continuing to criticize what you have not read. The paper affirms all the science in the contemporary evolutionary synthesis. If you...
I see none of the defining characteristics of Aristotle's essential causality in this quotation. Do you? Kant is only claiming the will causes differe...
On the other hand is on the other hand, but it is used to argue that there is an "antimony" involving univocally predicated "causality," and not that ...
You are assuming, quite irrationally, that Chalmers' Hard Problem is not a chimera, but has a solution. In other words, you have faith that intentiona...
There are no classical states in quantum superposition, only the sum of eigenfunctions correlative to eigenvalues, and the set of eigenfunctions super...
This is a common confusion with regard to quantum theory. Quantum theory sees all unobserved processes as fully deterministic. It's only when we stick...
I was speaking of how Hume and Kant contributed to the contemporary use of "cause," not of Kant's moral philosophy. Also, it is not rules that are seq...
I would not call these "concepts." Rather, interpretations always involve judgements, i.e. thinking this is that. A concept is more fundamental, it is...
We agree -- in reference to your first response on consciousness. On your second, I need more time to understand what you are saying and formulate a r...
Let me suggest this is the wrong question, because it assumes, on pure faith, that brain cells produce qualia, as opposed to qualia signifying the con...
Compatibilism is bait and switch applied to moral philosophy. The bait is that you can have your moral cake (responsibility stemming from free-will) a...
That is not the point. I can take your experience and state multiple possibilities: (1) The observation was properly reported, (2) There was interfere...
That is irrelevant to the way you assign probability numbers. Is your principle that "the truth of (A or not A) => P(A)=50% and P(not A)=50%", or not?...
It is highly relevant as it relies on the same principle you use to assign a 50% probability to your alternatives. If we can have either A or not A, y...
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