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And once again, optimism and pessimism are comparative terms. So your argument against antinatalism is based on a dubious empirical prediction about t...
March 03, 2017 at 01:24
The point is that it's actually not all that fun or meaningful, but a certain aesthetic can be cultivated in the absurdity alongside the occasional mo...
March 03, 2017 at 00:01
Except your revisionary history leaves out the pessimists of the ancient world...try again I guess. I don't expect it to be anything. That's you putti...
March 02, 2017 at 21:58
Antinatalism is never going to be accepted, so the next-best thing is to promote the legalization of assisted suicide for those who aren't satisfied w...
March 02, 2017 at 21:13
False dichotomy. This whole white-grey-black thing is an oversimplification. The good parts of life are not illusory (non-existent) themselves (rather...
March 02, 2017 at 21:08
I already explained this already, try to keep up.
March 02, 2017 at 20:45
But I never said I see only grey. And I never said the world was black through and through. I said it was structurally negative. Take, for example, ho...
March 02, 2017 at 20:36
If we ask ourselves, "what makes that telescope that particular telescope?", we have already assumed that there are such things as telescopes. We alre...
March 02, 2017 at 19:49
For a different, idiosyncratic perspective: Utilitarianism as virtue ethics.
March 02, 2017 at 19:27
False. Getting real tired of you setting people up only to claim victory when you switch the bait. I have no idea what you mean when you say my percep...
March 02, 2017 at 04:11
But I don't see the world as generically grey, I see it as structurally black. How I act upon this belief is entirely different. There is nothing stop...
March 02, 2017 at 03:22
Mood enhancement is hardly a genuine solution to anything pessimism focuses on (or really anything for that matter, apart from maybe glaucoma or somet...
March 02, 2017 at 00:22
But why should I see this as the "height" of consciousness? Are you saying that this is consciousness at its most effective, as a well-oiled cog in th...
March 01, 2017 at 07:20
Isn't this just begging the question, though, by implicitly assuming consciousness is akin to the effects of a physical reaction? Consciousness isn't ...
March 01, 2017 at 06:55
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AVkf0QhiIdY
March 01, 2017 at 01:22
I don't see how this is relevant. Dude, I did it once. It was alright. I'm not a pothead, sheesh.
February 28, 2017 at 21:58
If I may interject here, it seems to me that the job of the mind (or any organ for that matter) is to provide the organism the necessary nutrients to ...
February 28, 2017 at 21:53
I'm legitimately curious as to why you think it's alright to blatantly ignore everything I just wrote by pretending it's the words of a seasoned stone...
February 28, 2017 at 21:14
What?
February 28, 2017 at 19:18
Empowering, yet false. Again this comes back to the whole schpeel about the requirement of illusions for personal security and optimism. Pessimism is ...
February 28, 2017 at 03:20
Nope.
February 28, 2017 at 03:15
No, I think what makes pessimism so idiosyncratic is how easy and obvious it is but how paradoxically difficult it is to accept. Whereas other philoso...
February 28, 2017 at 00:37
Smoked some weed for the first time last night at a concert. Fun time, I understand now why it has such a good reputation. Living in Colorado definite...
February 28, 2017 at 00:32
Exactly why I believe naturalism is insufficient grounds to justify moral realism.
February 26, 2017 at 19:29
I think the moral realism/anti-realism debate can be approached in a different angle: moral realists typically believe moral truths can be discovered,...
February 26, 2017 at 19:13
My position is that the common conception of morality is that morality is an objective and mind-independent source of guidelines for living, and that ...
February 26, 2017 at 18:32
Ideally, meta-ethics shouldn't interfere with the practice of normative ethics. We're moral beings, even if morality is ultimately groundless. We'll c...
February 26, 2017 at 09:12
The relevance is that morality by and large is phenomenologically experienced as a sort of command structure from elsewhere, a series of hypothetical ...
February 26, 2017 at 08:49
Because that's the whole issue at stake here, whether or not moral propositions are in some way dependent on the mind or not for their truth. People t...
February 26, 2017 at 08:32
I don't think there is any legitimate ground for the proposition that torturing children is wrong that isn't dependent on the mind, particularly the u...
February 26, 2017 at 08:22
It means that I have the preference, or attitude, that looks down on torturing children (non-cognitivism), or it means that I legitimately believe tha...
February 26, 2017 at 08:12
I deny the ultimate truth aptness of this claim. It's not that torturing children is actually okay or righteous, but that there is no actual real mora...
February 26, 2017 at 08:03
Dean Zimmerman has an interesting essay about what it would take and mean to survive after death. http://fas-philosophy.rutgers.edu/zimmerman/pitsod.p...
February 26, 2017 at 07:44
But moral realism isn't simply about the semantics of normative propositions, otherwise there wouldn't be any difference between error theory and non-...
February 26, 2017 at 07:41
Why is this, and why do you assume my life is not a vale of tears? And why is the existence of lives that are vales of tears not important?
February 26, 2017 at 05:57
Yes, indeed, one of the most deceptive aspects of positive psychology is the emphasis on the apparent compatibility between freedom and happiness (and...
February 26, 2017 at 00:37
I've said it before: civilization may thrive but only at the expense of its constituents.
February 25, 2017 at 21:54
For as much time as I spend reading and studying metaphysics, I have a comparatively low amount of metaphysical commitments. Those that I do have don'...
February 25, 2017 at 18:57
If the religious folks are right, then the continuation of the species might have a reason going for it. But religious ethics is nevertheless almost u...
February 25, 2017 at 18:52
Essentially, yes. Nietzsche's Will-to-Power, a supposed-denial of the Will is nevertheless a form of willing (even Schopenhauer recognized this when h...
February 25, 2017 at 04:19
One can also go the path of questioning whether institutions, hierarchies, governments, etc are justified to begin with. Is any harm or manipulation o...
February 24, 2017 at 20:08
Right, but to live in society requires one to make compromises. I could just as easily say that I am offended and scared by followers of x-religion, a...
February 24, 2017 at 07:09
To ask such a question seems to presuppose not only that we have an adequate understanding of what personal identity is, but also that personal identi...
February 22, 2017 at 19:48
I suspect this may be the case. Yes, interesting point. It is quite strange that we normally would be insulted by an attack on our personal dignity (s...
February 21, 2017 at 17:00
I remember reading this in an SEP article on a Buddhist philosopher, but I can't remember which one.
February 20, 2017 at 00:39
Story time! I've actually been interested in the problem of universals for a while now, it was my very first substantial issue introduced to me when I...
February 19, 2017 at 19:58
It means I'm not a nominalist. I'm not sure what universals exist or how they instantiate themselves but I do believe that universals do actually exis...
February 19, 2017 at 18:56
No, because it begs the question. You claim one cannot understand God's mind. Yet by saying so, you claim to understand an aspect of God's mind - it's...
February 18, 2017 at 18:53
Some of us might be willing to bite the bullet and accept that the serial murderer's apparent happiness is "good" - at least, it's intrinsically good ...
February 18, 2017 at 18:45
But evidence is only strong when it is pieced together through rational deliberation. Observation doesn't just magically lead to knowledge. What we pe...
February 18, 2017 at 06:18