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Wayfarer

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Not at all. But it is meaningful and intelligible to an observer. It is empirically the case that the world existed prior to any observer, but there i...
December 18, 2023 at 10:43
Indeed it is, but neither objectivity or independence are absolute, but dependent. Persons may be, of course, more or less objective, or more and less...
December 18, 2023 at 10:01
Another fact to reflect on is that every being occurs as 'me' from their first person point of view. Every living being experiences themself as 'me' b...
December 18, 2023 at 09:33
Maybe because with the emergence of organisms, there is an exponential increase in possibilities. And that in order to exist as an organism, the very ...
December 18, 2023 at 09:17
According to Lloyd Gerson in Platonism and Naturalism, universals are the only means of preserving realistic identity, because they provide the means ...
December 18, 2023 at 07:11
Because they're insufficiently defined. Our understanding of nature changes every day. Likewise what 'divine creation' means is far from obvious. Here...
December 18, 2023 at 03:07
I can see why you say that, but it's because they are a source of explanatory frameworks and metaphors which are largely absent in modern discouse.I m...
December 17, 2023 at 22:57
Not in the least, not the slightest. I feel my side-comments are derailing the thread.
December 17, 2023 at 22:54
To describe it in terms of "qualia" trivialises the issue. "Qualia" is jargon used in contemporary philosophy of mind to try and describe the irreduci...
December 17, 2023 at 22:12
:up: The idea of self as a unified and unifying process rather than as an unchanging entity is realistic in my view. The process view goes back to Her...
December 17, 2023 at 21:53
Here I would like to add a point about making distinction between 'subjectivity' and 'subjecthood'. It's an awkward distinction to make, but it attemp...
December 17, 2023 at 21:09
What I was referring to as oxymoron, or self-contradictory, was 'Objective and independent' stands in contradiction to 'within language'. We cannot co...
December 17, 2023 at 20:44
Do you mean there are people who don't?
December 16, 2023 at 22:22
Mind you, if you consider the net of the awards to Dominion Voting and this case alone, Trump's lies have cost various parties around a billion dollar...
December 16, 2023 at 21:37
But that is an oxymoron (although I am totally sympathetic to your struggles in these deep and difficult matters). It is a matter of contention whethe...
December 16, 2023 at 21:00
Oh well at least I'm not mining bitcoins. :yikes:
December 16, 2023 at 20:26
It beggars belief that he will still maintain this obvious lie in the face of all that is happening. And thanks once again for the detailed breakdown,...
December 16, 2023 at 20:25
Although the magnitude of the award is plainly absurd. How is a man of Guiliani’s much-depleted means supposed to actually shell out such an amount? I...
December 16, 2023 at 03:01
December 16, 2023 at 02:46
I read recently (but can’t remember where) that prior to Descartes, ‘ideas’ were not understood as the prerogative of individuals, and that the meanin...
December 16, 2023 at 02:08
I'm often painfully aware of that need. Right - and this is the sense in which Aquinas is a representative of the philosophia perennis. Don't let the ...
December 15, 2023 at 22:09
I don't think your depiction of a priori as subjective is correct. A priori facts don't need to be validated against experience, they are known to be ...
December 15, 2023 at 22:05
You will encounter an expression in various schools of philosophical spirituality, 'the union of knower and known'. It is interpreted very differently...
December 15, 2023 at 20:51
Excellent question, but I don't think there has to be a 'pure logical contradiction' between creation natural and divine. I think it's pretty unsure w...
December 15, 2023 at 10:15
That reminds me of a long-ago book, Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance. In it, Pirsig argues that Western metaphysics too often focuses on the ...
December 15, 2023 at 01:23
Thanks for that thorough report, it is comforting to know that there are substantive issues.
December 14, 2023 at 20:05
I don't think it's the burden of proof, as much as the request to explain what you mean. And this if from someone who has a very similar philosophical...
December 14, 2023 at 12:13
Objective, measurable, repeatable. Keywords of scientific method.
December 14, 2023 at 06:53
well if he wins at least I’ll be able to tell my grandkids that I saw democracy die. If I’m allowed.
December 14, 2023 at 06:00
‘Hunter Biden is the son that Donald Trump never had’ ~ Jimmy Kimmel (commenting on the content of Hunter Biden's indictment documents.) I mentioned a...
December 14, 2023 at 03:18
Disgraceful, vindictive gutter politics from the do-nothing MAGA Congress in passing the motion for a meritless impeachment today. American politics a...
December 14, 2023 at 01:46
I re-read William James from time to time. He was from a different epoch in history, very much idealist in today's terms, before Western philosophy tu...
December 14, 2023 at 01:07
Too many double negatives in that to make sense of. But according to this blog post by Sean Carroll the question is undecideable. Makes me wonder if i...
December 14, 2023 at 00:52
...at least as far as objects are concerned..... The thought crossed my mind that mention might be made of William James 'radical empiricism', so I as...
December 13, 2023 at 22:18
Totally agree. My remarks about the ineffectiveness of empiricism with respect to grasping the profound philosophical truths of Advaita were not meant...
December 13, 2023 at 20:22
:100:
December 13, 2023 at 11:18
I'll give you an example of what I mean. Say that someone says that they have life-altering insights through meditation or spiritual philosophy. How c...
December 13, 2023 at 10:59
That itself is not an empirical statement. Not that I want to pick nits with an otherwise kindred spirit. :chin:
December 13, 2023 at 10:51
Not factual in the sense of being about objective things or states-of-affairs. I don't mean it in the sense of not being true - far from it! - but not...
December 13, 2023 at 10:42
I'm very much influenced by my encounter with Advaita and (also Buddhist) non-dualism, although that mostly amounts to reading about it, with some reg...
December 13, 2023 at 10:08
:up:
December 13, 2023 at 09:59
Not a perspective of philosophical interest, I'm afraid. I'm genuinely interested in the philosophical implications. As I said already, what is ostens...
December 13, 2023 at 09:56
That's right! As it stands, it is still an open question, something many here seem not to notice. The three main popular books I have read on it the l...
December 12, 2023 at 22:43
I do notice that you’re working through all these ideas here. Which is just what this forum is for. :ok:
December 12, 2023 at 22:29
As I said in the post you're responding to But plainly we're not going to agree on that. Thanks for your considered and thoughtful responses.
December 12, 2023 at 19:38
It doesn’t seem an apt analogy to me. At issue is the nature of the object in question and what it is that transforms it from a possibility to an actu...
December 12, 2023 at 10:58
That is true, but the nature of the object who's existence is only possible is not. And that is the point at issue in this context, as the putative ob...
December 12, 2023 at 09:35
Read one book, ages and ages ago, but really stayed with me. I loved the idea that you go into alternate realities through dreams. Although otherwise ...
December 12, 2023 at 09:06
By the way, for those reading this thread, an interesting article by Ray Monk (known as Wittgenstein's biographer) on Gilbert Ryle, R G Collingwood, a...
December 12, 2023 at 08:45
'Like myself' :wink:
December 12, 2023 at 08:32