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Their approach and our response is a fertile topic in science fiction. Were you beamed aboard the alien ship from earth by the aliens to provide guida...

Earth will probably be irrelevant to those on board. This is a one-way trip. There is an overwhelming chance they won't be able to go back whence they...

\ Both things happen, true enough. I'd say that solid artistic productions (not necessarily "art house" fare) can provide as much escape-from-the-horr...

In my head, pigs symbolize earthiness. They are of the earth more than goats or eagles. They are a symbol of enthusiastic generative life. On the farm...

That will happen from time to time. I didn't find Campbell very interesting. Every now and then people will fail to find famous intellectuals interest...

Dear Shawn, an interesting poem about pigs: Us all sore cement was we. Not warmed then with glares. Not glutting mush under that pole the lightning's ...

Oh dear, instantiations of Jungian archetypes, post modern multi-faceted interpretations... what muck! While one CAN play those sorts of word games, i...

The older I get, the less certain I am of what I was like or who I was when I was young. It is not a memory problem--it is one of interpretation.

. Wikipedia I guess if you really like a story set in the distant future, far far away, with some military hocus pocus, then it's a space opera instea...

Middle-aged people thinking they can discover/recover their authentic selves (whatever those are) with Star Wars paraphernalia (or any other stuff) is...

Dune follows a very rococo plot. I've been rereadng the series (the 5 plus prequels and sequels) for decades. Some parts are definitely better than ot...

I recommend Brandon Q. Morris ((pen name of Matthias Matting)--a German physicist and space specialist. He's published around 45 sci-fi novels (freque...

1) What am I? If I behave in a selfish, greedy, vindictive, manner am I then a selfish, greedy, vindictive person? Am I something other than how I beh...

Absolutely! I'm 76; the more I read history, the clearer it is that "The good old days were terrible!" The rich and powerful have always led (or at le...

Oh, there you are. I was wondering about you. Glad you're still wallowing.

That's more like it.

It's been FIVE HOURS since I posted one of my best puns--based on your post to Metaphysician Undercover. Your indifference leaves me even more unsent ...

Welcome to The Philosophy Forum. My poor understanding is that protons and neutrons are actual matter. In turn, they are composed of subatomic particl...

the judgernaut.

I don't know. I read somewhere that people are stupid.

I also prefer the print media's self-regulation--in an open atmosphere where the quality of self-regulation can be publicly examined. Noam Chomsky spe...

As always, inattentive Minnesotans feel the first cold snap and follow the urge to walk on water. Then they fall through the thin layer of ice and, of...

Let it be (cue the Beatles). It's perfectly normal for there to be a time when our fecund brains need to rest. All of humanity's problems stem from ma...

At least some present day Wampanoag people have said they regret their ancestors helping the Pilgrims.

Joy and gratitude don't seem to be the salient features of antinatalism. They probably are equally unmoved by Christmas, Halloween, Easter, and the 4t...

You express antipathy to states and the violence they might, may, will, or already have deployed, and you are quite right that states employ force. (W...

It is neither the function of the state to be loving and nurturing, nor can the state BE loving and naturing. Why not? Because states are not families...

Headline in today's Guardian: "‘Dangerously out-of-control cow’ tramples elderly man in Wales" As an elderly man myself, I understand how serious cow-...

No. Without a functioning social contract, you have chaos, and all you can do is try to stay alive. No. Your approach resembles the antinatalist appro...

Because a society is not the same as a family. I grew up in a family where confrontations were rare. We seven children behaved ourselves without viole...

I'd also call that abusive parenting; societies are not families, though. Despotic regimes employ violence on similar terms: IF you do not obey the Ma...

Governments have violence as the last resort, but have several options before the beating and shooting begin. Do people, individual and collective, NO...

As topics go, whether or not we have "free will" might be unanswerable. A lot of our mental activity goes on outside of the portion that we are consci...

I accept that. No, I do not think most politicians are nefarious. Many politicians are well-motivated, with the intention to perform good public servi...

I suppose I can spell it out for you. Once upon a time, decades ago, I had a disagreement with someone about philosophy, politics, or religion (can't ...

One can imagine many schemes that could/would/might thwart partisan politics. We could, for instance, select people at random to fill seats in Congres...

It's a mistake to think that conservatives are all better now, having gotten Trump out of their system. Conservative interests and politics have been ...

I am very pessimistic about our collective future with respect to global warming. In vernacular terms, we are totally screwed. Perhaps if Europe, Chin...

The Census Bureau provides quite a bit of demographic detail on each congressional district. It is easy to use,

The PF of which we speak (back in '27) ran on the dark telegraph. Teenagers had figured out how to send telegraph messages to each other for free. If ...

Immanuel Kant: What can I know? What should I do? What may I hope? Just thought I'd throw that in; I don't know if Kant came up with a satisfactory an...

Of course, it may be an etiological fable. It is still a story that can be interpreted, rather than having an obvious literal meaning. I think it's wo...

here the Chad Mitchel Trio satirizes the John Birch Society, a far right political group from the 1960s: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l5f1KpfngH4 H...

There is no comfort or justification in it, but the fact is that the United States has had some outstanding episodes of violence and threats of violen...

I haven't read Spong recently, but have in the 'distant past'. Original Sin is, at the very least, an unnecessary doctrine. Presumably God does not ne...

Never mind Genesis; the gospels contain plenty of stories that are problematic, starting with the immaculate conception of Mary's mother, Elizabeth; M...

One way to atheism is through study; religions contain contradictions and these may prove fatal to the faith of the scholar. Another way to atheism is...

Your posts are not "provocations". You avoid inflammatory words; you don't call religious people imbeciles, for instance. Even if they hold stupid ide...

Steal this book, but give the bookstore credit as the source.

War, oppression, and a lot of other nasty stuff goes on in the world. Theism, Deism, Atheism, and every other religious 'ism' will be pressed into ser...