Chany

If U can't be known at all, then how can we talk about U?

U contradicts itself. "U is something about which nothing can be known" tells us something about U. In other words, I gain knowledge about U and what ...

I have not read the essay, but I will tomorrow. However, I have a feeling Van Inwagen is responding to the Problem of Evil as an argument against the ...

The Kalaam faces many issues. There are two big issues for me. First, because of premise 2, the argument is tied heavily with science and scientific d...

How does the fact that the premise used is specifically picked to make the argument work make the argument any less valid or sound? Let's say that Cra...

I never said China doesn't have interests in the region. I said that China has no reason to invade or somehow take control over North Korea. They have...

The problem being that China has no reason to invade, as the costs outweigh the benefits. What does China get out of it besides a bunch of dead soldie...

There is a difference between logical fatalism and determinism. It is logically possible that the past could have been different. There is nothing log...

I am familiar with this notion, but what they are discussing is logical possibility. It is logically possible that the universe had a different starti...

I do not like the disinction between determinism and fatalism that much either. There is a difference under certain definitions. For example, one coul...

Sorry, I completely wasn't thinking and didn't put a sarcasm indicator. It is really just supposed to be stupud and take the thread title literally in...

Is evil necessary? In response, I say: does there exist a possible world in which evil exists? If yes, then evil is not necessary. If no, then evil is...

Free will libertarians usually believe a combination of (a) and (b). They think agents can, in some situations, choose between different options. If f...

God, in their minds, does not decide what they will do, at least in the sense that precludes moral responsibility. God could determine actions, but re...

It is not. Free will libertarians do not believe in pure freedom. I am not free to gain magic powers if I will them, for example. Just because I am in...

This is insulting to the religious person, even to the more Calvinistic Christians I know. Some religious folk are compatibilists; they think responsi...

What is the importance of the free will debate, in your eyes? In mine it is one of responsibility- the metaphysics only interest me insofar as they in...

Because hard determinists and hard indeterminists have not noticed the problem with both sides of the debate for a long time. I do not think the compa...

Do you have the actual power to do otherwise and believe this power to do otherwise is somehow necessary for moral responsibility? Then you are not a ...

Regarding moral responsibility- first, the issue is not whether morality exists, but whether we are morally responsible for our actions. In other word...

It is irrelevant that the claim is an empirical one, as the point was to show that, sometimes, it is rational to suspend judgement and claim one does ...

The question of knowledge is from Michael's perspective, not some hypothetical person who has access to the empirical evidence. Yes, someone really di...

But why is splitting sufficient? Consider the following scenarios: 1) Yesterday, I had a full brain. Today, I have a full brain. I am the same person ...

How do you handle splitting problems when it comes to personal identity? For example, it is theoretically possible to split the brain and put them int...

I don't know. I just wish everyone would come around and agree with my excellently reasoned viewpoint.

Define "God." Gods that require free will in order to be internally coherent. No. Gods that are like what Calvinists believe in? Completely fine.

Miracles presuppose a natural order to violate though. You can't ignore big differences between statements; you can only apply a negation in logic if ...

It should be clear that I do not think the analogy holds and that the situation of teleogical arguments and arguments from miracles are not mutally ex...

Your reasoning. A god creates order. The teological argument states that this order indicates an intelligent being created it (often it is argued this...

I never said that the arguments were convincing or good. The teleological argument is, in my opinion, the weakest "official" argument for some type of...

Not really. The teleological argument says that the high amount of order in the universe (i.e. scientific laws) implies an intelligence designed the u...

No. The entire point behind Gettier cases is to show situations in which someone meets the three conditions for the JTB theory of knowledge, yet it ap...

I'm not entirely sure what you mean by this. Do you mean that Dawkins could change his views or that Dawkins' comment about deism is irrelevant to his...

Really? I am not trying to be mean, but you just listed a theist who came up with the modal ontological argument and believes we are justified in beli...

Premise 1 is false. Not all good reasons for belief are scientific reasons. They can't be, otherwise there would be no basis for science.

I would probably label myself agnostic, though I may start saying I am an atheist to people I know are religious because I have found, personally, tha...

Though I hope the woman gets help and guidance in order to get better, she cannot force her issues on everyone else. It is not cold or even rude to re...

I did a relatively light reading on my phone right now, a couple of things: 1) Your argument needs to define what consciosness is and when it becomes ...

Some people do think too much, in the sense that they either 1)over-complicate existing issues or 2)completely block out competing views.

Actually, to be quite honest, there are only really two motivations for believing in libertarian free will in terms of how we choose things- 1) it sat...

First, the reason why we talk about the paradoxes so much is that they are interesting precisely because we cannot readily solve them. We ignore all t...

You're taking the literal definition of philosophy to be what it is about. You're ignoring the plethora of philosophers who reach conclusions that we ...

"Choice" is the term used to describe the product our minds generate when presented with multiple options, given the circumstances surrounding the sce...

Can we define "truth"? Also, I am pretty sure that when most people claim to be relativists, the are saying they do not believe in morals or find them...

First sentence is an assertion. Why should I accept that to be is the same thing as logical conherence?

The concept of unicorns is logically coherent. It is not like the concept of a square circle and does not automatically self-contradict itself, thus m...

I'm not entirely sure what you mean by the last sentence. Could you please explain?

Do abstract objects (the form of square) exist? Do unicorns, in some ontologically relevant sense, exist?

I would like to preface this with saying that is one of the issues in philosophy that I get worked up over and I have strong personal feelings over, e...

We want something to obtain in the world. The will can be said to represent that desire. The will can be said to be powerless because it cannot actual...