Wayfarer

Although women became part of the Buddhist sangha in the Buddha’s lifetime. Yes, more rules to observe than the men, but even so, hard to make the cas...

I had always rather liked the idea that 'gist' - as in, 'getting the gist' - was related to geist - as in zeitgeist. That would tie 'meaning' (gist) t...

That they all face moral problems, and that their evolutionary history doesn't necessarily help them to deal with them.

Thank you. But, what are the first things that the renunciate has to give up? I mean, easy for me to say, in my nice suburban house with cars and pool...

I think Meister Eckhardt said ‘God is your being, but you are not his’. It’s like that. We think what is real is what we can conceptualise and compreh...

‘Tis not. It’s a reasoned judgement about the correct action. And attributing its development to evolution is indeed very close to the naturalistic fa...

It’s unclear how truth as an attribute of propositions does. But there’s a lived truth, a truth you feel in your bones, that has a bearing.

Not so. It’s the naturalistic fallacy, that because something occurs in nature, then it’s necessarily good, or a guide to what is good. Evolutionary s...

Hey I’m not wanting to pick on you, but it’s a philosophy forum. You may have had or be having a really bad experience and I’m sorry if you are, but i...

In the case of morality and ethics, actions always speak louder than words.

There's no possibility that Hamas is deliberately eliciting violent reprisals so as to mobilize world opinion against Israel, is there? Would they eve...

The problem with this is that for most creatures, survival is an imperative that can never be questioned. For h. Sapiens, existence itself is a predic...

Looks a fascinating course. Amazing, the resources you can find nowadays. Best.

That's a good interpretation. But the problem is, I think, the obvious fact of the karma that we're born with. Even if it's a metaphor, in effect it's...

Incidentally Closer to Truth has a long series of video interviews on the anthropic principle https://www.closertotruth.com/topics/cosmos/our-special-...

That said, I agree the OP is very sketchy. I actually bought the Barrow and Tipler book The Anthropic Cosmological Principle from Amazon recently, jus...

However, had not the Big Bang resulted in precisely the balance of atomic forces that eventuated then there would be no matter, therefore no universe....

that dictionary definition is quite useful. I've often mused on the German word Geist, as in zeitgeist, 'the spirit of the age'. It's close in meaning...

That's a sweeping statement, which I don't think has any grounds, although I suppose it depends on what you take 'idealism' to mean.

Perhaps we can discuss that if we move on to The Apology after this (which would seem a logical progression.)

Agree. Which raises the question, maybe not relevant to this particular passage, why Socrates was accused of atheism, if he saw himself as a disciple ...

'In literature and myth, the swan symbolizes light, purity, transformation, intuition, grace. In Ancient Greece the swan stood for the soul and was li...

The reference to 'my master' caught my attention because of the suggestion that he was referring to his spiritual master. (In Asiatic traditions, one'...

That is a very interesting comment. Thanks for opening up that perspective. I guess what caught my attention was the way that the interdependent natur...

So - who is the reference to?

His 'daemon'?

No, I think that argument fails. People might believe all kinds of nonsensical claims with complete conviction. Trump has been making incredible claim...

To all empirical claims. I asked, what could be the empirical evidence for the claim that 'it is better to give than to receive?' How you could test t...

It’s a discussion about philosophy, epistemology and religious faith. If you read the article I linked to, Tertullian’s alleged saying ‘I believe beca...

No Christian would say that.

I think a lot of popular atheism has made mileage out of that Tertullian quote along the lines of 'look, see how Christians cling to absurdities! They...

The Argument from Opposites I'd like to see what others make of the 'argument from opposites' (70c-72e). It seems to operate on the presumption that '...

The reputed last words of the Buddha were 'all compound things are subject to decay. Ardently seek your own salvation'. viz. the Indo-European myth of...

From my armchair amateur perch, I don’t think so. The equations of quantum mechanics predict and describe the motions of sub-atomic particles at every...

No argument from me! Only a vague sense of guilt .

Probably not, to be honest. Just ordered a cheap drone from Amazon which is no doubt made in China

It’s bloody scary. What gives me some hope is that the Chinese up until now have never shown much of a tendency to try and subjugate through force so ...

Mathematical Platonism is, and it’s strongly rejected by many modern philosophers on those very grounds. I agree that Plato would of course not have u...

‘Kill me, and the iron mine gets it!’ :grimace:

True on all counts. It's a very intractable problem. Let's hope it doesn't result in actual war or that in due course the PRC's leadership is changed.

So, what do you mean when you say Socrates 'demystifies' these virtues etc?

I think it’s better described as objective idealism. That is, Ideas or Forms are real, in that they’re not dependent on your or my mind, but they’re o...

I think public pressure has to be applied however possible. It’s completely unrealistic to avoid Chinese production altogether, they’re ‘the world’s f...

I don't agree that his intent is to demystify. Typical modernist secular analysis, making Plato safe for the secular academy. (We find exact parallels...

This is a digression, but I’m very interested in the later conception of ‘the rational soul’. Very briefly - just as the Ideas of things are their rea...

I will acknowledge that I have been much influenced by Christian Platonism, in the context of which Socrates and Plato have been described as ‘Christi...

Evolution could just has easily ended with blue-green algae if survival was the sole criteria. Conversely, if survival is the only aim, then man’s abi...

Actually I notice now that I look again that I posted a quote from the report as the opening paragraph but as I didn’t put quotes around it, it does l...

Well - interesting question. There was a fair-trade advocate on the ABC last night saying that shoppers ought to be more aware of where their clothes ...

That's the million-dollar question, isn't it? How would we find out? However, naturalism tends to disregard the sense of there being a reason in any g...