Arkady

I think that getting down in the muck with the GOP only makes both of you dirty, and will do even more lasting damage to the country's institutions.

Yes, for a party which proclaims to "love this country," the GOP is surely fond of shitting on its democratic institutions. The incident with the Nati...

Plenty of other people seem to think such things are important, including those on the Left, who are seemingly obsessed with identity politics-related...

Suit yourself. I agree that it's a quirk of our language that "people of color" is somehow acceptable, but "colored people" is antiquated; I'm just sa...

I don't know if you are an American yourself, but "colored people" is a somewhat antiquated term to refer to certain ethnic minorities (especially bla...

Not to quibble, but I'm not sure it's correct to say that no conceivable result could falsify (or verify) string theory: it's just that the energy lev...

I'm not sure I follow this. This seems a circuitous way of affirming what I'm claiming, which is that certain sciences, e.g. paleontology do make onto...

I don't intend to wade too far into this swamp, but I will just say that, while science generally adheres to methodological naturalism, that stance do...

Whether or not paleontological theories rely on a "temporal theory", they make claims about what does, or at least what has existed, ergo, they make o...

No: my understanding of the use of the term "ontological" is in line with the very first sentence of the OP: "I understand an ontological claim to mea...

The US voted against the resolution because of concerns that it contains language which may condemn the death penalty generally, a position the US (wh...

As in many discussions of this sort, you pose a question about the philosophy of science, and then seamlessly slip into discussing physics (and only p...

Do you have something against "alternative facts"?

His 80s metal band hairdo is a bit dated, though.

Well, they're not that insular any more: they're pretty much letting their freak flag fly in public with the prominently-displayed signs at Trump rall...

Some QAnon people have accused liberal opponents of posing as Q members on message boards and whatnot and saying crazy shit to discredit Q people. Whi...

It's hard to quantify, but quite a lot, probably. It's at the point where he is clearly shown on video saying something unambiguous, then backpedals w...

I don't know if you're American, but even if not, the shit going on in this sub Reddit alone should scare you. "Those who can make you believe absurdi...

Yea, in all fairness to Google, now that I think about it, I believe I did watch a brief clip of Tucker Carlson about a week ago pertaining to Guilian...

My YouTube feed seems to be under the impression that I'd want to watch Tucker Carlson. Did Google let a bunch of drunken colobus monkeys rewrite its ...

Someone actually claimed that Trump is always honest? Wow: we are truly through the looking glass now. (For what it's worth, I do think that the "chil...

Of course. What won't his supporters explain away or ignore? How many of his supporters on this forum, for instance, have criticized anything he's don...

Perhaps most disturbing (not really) about Trump to me is that he apparently has no idea how capitalization in the English language works. Why in the ...

I agree with most of what you're saying, but the "easy question" pertains to consciousness. I agree that first-person, subjective experience is not so...

Sorry, but none of this explains why one cannot use one ruler to measure another. Yes, measurement standards are arbitrary, but once selected, it is n...

We cannot even determine what someone is thinking about by interpreting what they are saying? I'm going to stop this farce right here, because this is...

Sorry, but you totally lost me here. I have no idea what you're getting at. Firstly, it's not necessarily the case that "what a given proposition mean...

That Caribbean resort? I heard that place is a ripoff. This time of year, it's probably teeming with spring breakers, anyway.

And how does measuring a ruler with a ruler assume what is to be proven or demonstrated, which is the definition of circular reasoning? Again, if this...

I don't know about that. Classic playboys don't generally seek to be the leader of the free world. Trump clearly had larger plans. He has been vocal a...

I don't even accept the premise that using a ruler to measure another ruler is circular per se. I agree that using one ruler to measure another in ord...

You'd have to ask him, I suppose. It's not anything I said. I don't think Trump and Putin are even that different ideologically: I think that Putin (o...

I see. Good luck with all that. <slowly backs away with smile frozen on face>

A bit of an overstatement. Trump and Putin are not exactly best buds lately. Did Putin tell the Trump administration to impose sanctions on Russian ci...

If there are conditions under which using one ruler to measure another is not circular (which you concede that there are), then the act is not inheren...

I don't think Trump would accidentally order a nuclear strike, no. But, I don't presume that he knows what he's doing with regard to possessing expert...

Of course. As I've twice pointed out, there's no problem using one ruler to measure another (even for calibration purposes), if we assume that one rul...

Sure. Humans have culture, not all of which is likely reducible to evolutionary explanations. Nothing shocking about that. Most scientists would proba...

Nope. You can measure a ruler for any reason whatsoever: for shits and giggles, because the hash marks have worn off and you no longer know how long i...

Not at all. I just presume that he doesn't want to be the President who ended civilization.

Yup. I just don't see the circularity or regress that Metaphysician Undercover posited.

True, he is probably less likely to start WWIII than Trump, but I don't think even Trump is likely to start WWIII (if only because his ego won't let h...

I don't see why it should be either circular or lead to an infinite regress. Again, we are not trying to calibrate or justify the reliability of a giv...

To those who wish to see Trump impeached (or otherwise removed from office), I have two words for you: President Pence. I'm not sure that that is pref...

Perhaps, but I wouldn't bet too much on it. His core supporters seem unfazed by whatever his administration does, either defending his more execrable ...

Exactly the point I made above: Calibrating one ruler by means of another may well be circular, but it doesn't follow that measuring a ruler with anot...

Best of luck to you and your family.

Sure, and once the ruler we use for measuring is calibrated against the defined object, we can happily use it for measuring other things, including ot...

Again, you are fulminating against an empirical demonstration on the basis of a priori arguments. The fact of the matter is that we can, through techn...