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Pantagruel

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It is my opinion that, if my mind were constrained in the way you describe, I would not be capable of having the fundamental experience of consciousne...
July 23, 2019 at 11:48
I too feel that it is very much a 'community project.'
July 23, 2019 at 11:39
I'd agree entirely, we are born into a context. But it is my opinion, based on the sum total of my reading and experience, that with time, knowledge, ...
July 23, 2019 at 11:37
Again, I am effecting a definition of the domain which for which this assertion is fundamental. Consistent with the reality that most people, includin...
July 23, 2019 at 10:11
I think the subject of the thread says it all. A reasoned opinion is exactly that, an opinion, for which one has reasons. The opinion should be able t...
July 23, 2019 at 00:29
It's Descartes. I assumed it would require no elaboration. Transcendental argument: If A does x, A must be free to do X. Asserting A is not free to do...
July 22, 2019 at 23:51
I can't fathom how anyone can believe that you could do something, and not be free to do it? It's a fundamental transcendental argument. I guess I tho...
July 22, 2019 at 22:34
Boy, that's a whole lot of criticism without much substance. Pot meet kettle. For, to take an example, if I consider the faculty of understanding whic...
July 22, 2019 at 22:21
LOL! I'm pretty sure Heidegger talks about a 'community of rational beings' who participate in the project of textual creation of meaning 'outside of ...
July 22, 2019 at 19:20
Just to muddy the waters even further....doesn't hermeneutics describe in some detail why ongoing interpretations actually contribute to the meaning o...
July 22, 2019 at 16:20
Agree with this 100% This is an excellent pragmatic approach, and I am fundamentally a pragmatist. Ultimately, if I act with epistemic irresponsibilit...
July 21, 2019 at 17:29
As I mentioned, there are a wide variety of explanatory frameworks. The discipline of intertheoretic reduction explores various ways in which these di...
July 21, 2019 at 17:12
So what you are saying is your explanatory framework has no correlate for "whatever links subjectivity and objectivity". That's fine. My framework doe...
July 21, 2019 at 14:54
I am not denying the reality of physical mechanisms, far from it. But what you are doing is denying the reality of subjectivity because you cannot exp...
July 21, 2019 at 13:05
Information is non-physical. The exact same information can be embedded in completely different physical forms. But information is the sense or meanin...
July 21, 2019 at 12:28
If consciousness does anything at all, it must be because it is free to have done so, otherwise it would not be responsible for what it had done. As f...
July 21, 2019 at 11:04
LOL!
July 20, 2019 at 16:55
"This is patently false. If you believe you have free will, but you don't, you were caused to believe that you have free will. There is no magic about...
July 20, 2019 at 14:45
"I figured you’d say that. You still haven’t chosen not to exist in the initial situation - you’ve chosen to take steps to not continue to live from t...
July 20, 2019 at 14:43
Free will certainly equates with free choice, as Possibility started out. Sartre gives the compelling example (I think) of the attempt to compel someo...
July 20, 2019 at 11:59
I guess you would commit suicide?
July 20, 2019 at 11:55
I don't know if it relates but there is lots of evidence of the effects of quantum tunneling in biological systems, including higher animals, helping ...
July 20, 2019 at 01:45
I don't understand why I cannot choose consciously to exist in this situation?
July 20, 2019 at 01:39
Yes, it doesn't explain exactly how that behaviour was happening, but presumably a similar set of brain mechanisms to other behaviours, and aligned wi...
July 19, 2019 at 18:50
Flocking behaviour can be simulated pretty easily using the principles of alignment, cohesion, and separation. Since brains do function computationall...
July 19, 2019 at 17:27
Ultimately, this is really just a question of how you choose to define it. Cognitive science can demonstrate experimentally that even phenomena like c...
July 19, 2019 at 14:03
Ethics is the branch of philosophy that deals with human actions. Usually inquiries like this differentiate between hedonism (pleasure), eudaimonism (...
July 18, 2019 at 09:53
"It is better to be a human being dissatisfied than a pig satisfied; better to be Socrates dissatisfied than a fool satisfied. And if the fool, or the...
July 17, 2019 at 19:38
Sure. And if I may be allowed my final say. The definition of altruism is "the belief in or practice of disinterested and selfless concern for the wel...
July 17, 2019 at 15:17
But isn't belief itself the ultimate imbuer of value? If a person chooses to believe in something, presumably they commit to the enaction of that beli...
July 17, 2019 at 13:15
Ok, so lets look at it like this. Normative ethics is what people ought to do, which implies and entails that people have a choice in that action. Now...
July 17, 2019 at 09:54
Well it is a disagreement about what evidence means, which I would say is the same thing. Clearly, there is lots of evidence for altruism. It seems th...
July 16, 2019 at 21:48
Ultimately this is a question of a fundamental belief. Either you think people can only act in a self-serving manner, or you believe that people have ...
July 16, 2019 at 16:49
The only reason to outright reject a theory is that it is not coherent, or that it disagrees with established facts. It is an established fact that ma...
July 15, 2019 at 09:58
Well, you are essentially espousing psychological egoism, which is the belief that human beings are so constructed as to always act in a way which is ...
July 14, 2019 at 13:07
Ethics, in the sense that it is most often employed, "normative" ethics, is the study what people "ought" to do. What is "right," what is "wrong." Usu...
July 13, 2019 at 14:17
It is my belief that the greatest unity is the one which supports the greatest diversity. It is one of my core precepts.
July 04, 2019 at 15:35
I understand, you have a unique perspective. But there are aspects of reality which are common, and it is our misconceptions about these which need to...
July 04, 2019 at 15:06
Well, a prejudice could be accurate or valid in the sense that you prejudge something and it turns out to be correct. In general though, the terms "pr...
July 04, 2019 at 14:27
Agree wholeheartedly with the limitations of scientific theory. Science operates specifically by restricting an inquiry to a specific domain or subset...
July 04, 2019 at 12:32
How is a language expression not a real-world phenomenon? The essence of ostensive definition is language binding itself to the real world. If I utter...
July 04, 2019 at 12:12
Ironically, some of the most well-educated people can have the biggest blind spots. Subject-matter experts can become siloed in their specialties and ...
July 03, 2019 at 21:27
That sounds more like a definition of Rationalism....
July 03, 2019 at 19:44
If you are asking whether much of our cognitive processing is "pre-formatted" then the answer is most certainly yes. Presumably the goal of things lik...
July 03, 2019 at 18:29
Very different cultures attach very different values to certain ideas or concepts. Death in many eastern cultures is viewed quite differently from tho...
July 03, 2019 at 15:41
I guess we can ask, is the meaning of "philosophy" the same now as it has always been? As our knowledge of external reality has exploded, the nature o...
July 03, 2019 at 13:12
I wouldn't necessarily, just noting that was essentially Mach's principle. In a more abstract sense, however, things always exist in contexts, and con...
July 02, 2019 at 22:43
That would be Mach's Principle. It's a compelling view. Things enjoy discrete identity within specific spatio-temporal contexts and scales. Radically ...
July 02, 2019 at 22:20
Is the question about the existence of God, or the nature of God? If you ask, are there things which are Real which I am not able to imagine, the answ...
July 02, 2019 at 21:19