You are viewing the historical archive of The Philosophy Forum.
For current discussions, visit the live forum.
Go to live forum

BC

Comments

It does. Building a rapid transit line (not a whole system) is likely to cost 1 or 2 billion dollars--a level of expense that counties and cities can ...
September 06, 2017 at 01:30
It should be apparent that people need the government as a vehicle to execute their desires to care for one another. Government is a critical institut...
September 06, 2017 at 01:21
Trump has only been in office 8 months; give him time. With any luck, he'll take the Republicans down with him.
September 06, 2017 at 01:14
Cutting 31% of the Environmental Protection Agency helps which state program for the disadvantaged? You understand, don't you, that cutting 100% of th...
September 06, 2017 at 01:11
I agree. One of the things that makes it possible for the tough to get going when the going gets rough is rehearsal of hypotheticals. Of course, fire-...
September 05, 2017 at 22:01
I understand your forced-choice set up here, but we are not in forced-choice situations. In our ordinary unforced choice situations people don't rigor...
September 05, 2017 at 18:25
Me? Ironic?
September 05, 2017 at 17:55
Being immaterial beings, angels wouldn't need -- and wouldn't have -- any organs at all. They would be no-brainers. No liver, no spleen, no teeth, no ...
September 05, 2017 at 17:54
I didn't think you had made it up, I just wondered where the information came from. I don't recollect there being that much about it in the Bible.
September 05, 2017 at 17:39
He might appear in drag, but the archangels Michael and Gabriel are definitely both male.
September 05, 2017 at 04:55
Over at the Great Chain of Being thread, it has come to light that all angels are male--seraphim through guardian angels. I'm surprised feminist haven...
September 05, 2017 at 04:19
I am sure some people would prioritize their dog over some humans, and nothing as bad as the adult Hitler. Like Donald Trump, for example. I might pri...
September 05, 2017 at 04:13
It does seem to be the case that angels are male. Fine by me, but doesn't it piss off feminists that there are no divine female beings?. However, are ...
September 05, 2017 at 04:03
Back in the late 70s, a gay Harvard guy (Charles Shively) proposed that promiscuous sex should be obligatory. If everyone engaged in promiscuous sex, ...
September 05, 2017 at 02:04
Because, Agustino, it's your Christian duty to contribute to the supply of happiness, and every man has to do his share. The truth is, you are contrib...
September 05, 2017 at 01:53
DB, are you talking about humans or fruit flies here? What you say seems to be true for fruit flies. Some experiments have been done to test the theor...
September 05, 2017 at 01:30
I doubt that very much.
September 04, 2017 at 22:43
When you get tired of Burning Man, visit the Folsom Street Fair in San Francisco (Alas, I've never attended). For one day Folsom Street abounds in S&M...
September 04, 2017 at 20:32
Myth Busters demonstrated that it is easy to shoot fish in a barrel: point the gun at the barrel and pull the trigger. What the bullet doesn't hit, th...
September 04, 2017 at 20:02
It isn't clear to me what "that suggestion" is. A good share of homeless youth are kicked out by their families. This isn't all that new a phenomena; ...
September 04, 2017 at 19:02
Couldn't we all!!! I was an active Methodist up until about 1966 (I was about 20 then). Nothing dramatic happened; I was active in the campus Wesley F...
September 04, 2017 at 18:57
Well, what would you call her? A "not-enthusiastic about homos"? A "hetero-preferer"? "Homo annoyed"? Look, if you are willing to slam the door on you...
September 04, 2017 at 18:17
Her testimony convicts her and her church's teachers. They are certainly "sharp, shocking, and grim". I do not doubt that she feels a great deal of pa...
September 04, 2017 at 18:13
Right. If I lived out there and had the money I'd enjoy it for a day or two -- looks totally groovy. However, 70,000 groovy humans is too much groovin...
September 04, 2017 at 04:56
Life expectancy was so short in centuries past because so many children died in the first few years of life. That drove the average down. Many women d...
September 04, 2017 at 04:41
The author says she is a Third Wave Feminist and effectively demonstrates the ideological flavor of 3WF. Feminism, some other sweeping 'isms' demonstr...
September 04, 2017 at 04:19
It's a whole series of things, not one thing. Among them... hand washing and antiseptics trained midwives pre-natal care antibiotics C-sections can he...
September 04, 2017 at 03:47
I saw Solaris a long time ago; didn't do much for me. I must not be a fan, just going by that. Anti-mimesis is a philosophical position that holds the...
September 04, 2017 at 03:37
Sorry about that. I can be a little dense sometimes. I must have had an attack of deadly literalism.
September 04, 2017 at 03:35
Franklin might have said sell the sizzle, but I kind of doubt it. First, Google Ngrams reports no use of 'sizzle' before 1840. That probably because n...
September 04, 2017 at 02:34
Life imitates art. It's probably time to put burning man on ice. Not because of the actual burning man (sadly inevitable) but because it appears to ha...
September 04, 2017 at 01:40
It is my understanding that when Thomas Jefferson was working on the Declaration of Independence, he had first written "life, liberty, and the pursuit...
September 04, 2017 at 01:21
Computers certainly alter the quality of life, not necessarily in a positive way. But what do we count as "a computer"? Are we counting Hollerith's pu...
September 04, 2017 at 00:44
Ya, I'm not sure either. Birth rates in poorer countries are better than they were, but they're still too high. China's growth rate is 0.43% while Ind...
September 04, 2017 at 00:20
Nice graph. I do love me a nice curve. Thanks.
September 04, 2017 at 00:12
Good point. Here's another good point... It doesn't have anything to do with anything--I just came across it in the New York Times review of a book ab...
September 04, 2017 at 00:11
Are you sure we are out of it?
September 03, 2017 at 22:54
Writing?
September 03, 2017 at 22:53
Photography was pretty important --1839-- without it, scratch cameras, movies, Kodak, great and fine art photography, snapshots, porn, and National Ge...
September 03, 2017 at 22:52
than what?
September 03, 2017 at 22:36
Electricity, Crop Rotation, Sanitation Systems, Penicillin, Printing Press, Mathematics, Haber Process, Fire, Steam and the Internal Combustion Engine...
September 03, 2017 at 22:03
She's sincere, I suspect. If a belief system can be "sociopathic" (the term applies to persons) it's for providing a strong incentive to disassociate ...
September 03, 2017 at 20:01
Of course there are good hearted Christians -- millions, I would guess. Yes, religiosity is indeed most often the product of upbringing (and maybe geo...
September 03, 2017 at 19:55
Money mindedness is pretty common among all religious, pretty much. Most churches are effectively real estate operations. The needs of the edifice dri...
September 03, 2017 at 19:41
I did read your reply in the other thread which had risen about to my eyebrows, and is now over my head. Thanks, however, for your further comments. O...
September 03, 2017 at 19:21
The US may have a very high level of GDP, but very large numbers of Americans (as a group and individually) have a very small share of that largesse. ...
September 03, 2017 at 17:32
Here are the most salient of the 16 characteristics of sociopathy referenced in the Psychology Today article: (my emphasis) Superficial charm and good...
September 03, 2017 at 17:18
OK, 60 minutes has elapsed, and no one objected to me stealing Jorndoe's lunch. Guess everybody is at church, appropriately for the topic of
September 03, 2017 at 16:59
I think Jorndoe's post deserves a thread of its own. I'll start one, unless you, Jorndoe, want to claim it.
September 03, 2017 at 15:59
Would you elaborate a bit on this, please.
September 03, 2017 at 06:16