Wayfarer

Sorry, I don't think this is correct. It starts with what is knowable. 'To be, is to be intelligible', according to Platonist metaphysics. And what is...

Another, related-but-not-the-same argument is the appeal of the many-worlds interpretation of quantum physics. In this interpretation of quantum physi...

Google ‘the popperazi’. Suggests that ‘string theory’ comprises ‘science overstepping its mark’.

There’s the biological theory of the evolution of species. Then there’s Darwinism as a philosophy. Sometimes, there’s a connection.

I think the fact that it can’t be introduced without causing confusion is because we’re confused.

There was a Japanese intellectual movement called the Kyoto School, ‘a group of 20th century Japanese thinkers who developed original philosophies by ...

:up: Good to hear!

I agree with the sentiment, but I don’t know if even the firmest propagandists of ‘scientism’ would put it that way. It’s more the way that the ‘scien...

It’s entailed by the philosophy, though. We actually owe all those people, for making explicit the absurd consequences of philosophical materialism. I...

Sure. Well, the very worst thing about modern philosophy is NOT differentiating beings from things. Objectification, in other words. Daniel Dennett is...

Peter Kingsley’s wiki entry https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Kingsley

I agree, and often spell out, that the philosophical use of the term 'substance' is problematical, because of it's conflation with the every day sense...

We're doing philosophy. I'm interested in ontological distinctions.

I think you've failed to see the point. An 'ontological distinction' means 'a difference in kind'. I'm saying, there are differences in kind between m...

Far simpler not bother with any of your contemptuous verbiage.

The other historical scholar you should read about (if you haven't already) is Max Muller, who was a pioneering Sanskritist - almost became the first ...

:up: That text, known in Pali as the Milinda-panha, is one of the world's oldest written texts, and a splendid historical example of philosophical dia...

As @"Possibility" pointed out, in the context of a global culture, it distinguishes the European philosophical tradition, commencing with Greek Philos...

I guess by 'appeasing', I meant 'going along with'. Nature herself is not dead. Matter is arguably dead, or the least alive part of nature. 'Matter is...

We're not 'back' in it, we're trapped in it, and the task of philosophy is not to appease the machine, but to see through it.

OK, backtracking again. The point I was making in respect of rational ability - nous, actually! - is that the human mind possesses that innate ability...

Ah yes! Solovyev is someone else I encountered on these forums. https://prabook.com/web/show-photo-icon.jpg?id=1574181&width=220&cache=false (I have p...

There's a definition, I think from Buddhism, that 'intelligence is the ability to make distinctions'.

there's an excellent book called The Shape of Ancient Thought, by art historian Thomas McEvilly. It was published around late 2000's - he has since di...

I wonder if he had engaged with Jasper's idea of the 'axial age' and the purported appearance of many of the seminal wisdom traditions (and sages!) al...

Shaping arrows is a skill. Reasoning is an ability which can be used to greater or lesser extent but without that ability, there is no way to develop ...

There's a paragraph on the IEP entry on Pierre Hadot under the heading Askesis of Desire: Bolds added.

Well, I'm not afraid to do that. All indications are the Plato was an Orphic initiate, and as the original definition of 'mystic' was 'an initiate int...

That they’re not reducible or explainable in other terms; that they’re the terminus of explanation.

I'm inclined to accept Platonic realism - that numbers, concepts, ideas, are real in their own right, not because someone thinks them, and not because...

Yes, that passage is highly relevant. That's also what I'm grappling with. I think the 'ideas' are something very like 'intellectual principles', and ...

Just because we don’t have it, doesn’t mean it isn’t real. So that is rather like an argument from ignorance. I hasten to add, I don’t claim to posses...

I think there is a tendency to deprecate the mystical aspects of Plato, as it sits uncomfortably with naturalism, but as Plato is such an important fi...

I think your reading is tendentious, I'm sorry. Socrates is saying that the knowledge of 'what things really are' is attained 'by dialectic' i.e. by p...

I think the 'ideal of the Sage' is one who has transcended fallible human nature. Philosophically speaking, the point of dualism is that the human is ...

I'd say very rarely. The 'culture war' between religion and science, is mostly a conflict between scientific materialism, on the one side, and religio...

Osho was bogus. Try googling Ramana Maharishi. He wasn't.

Creationism and intellgent design are both instances of religious fundamentalism. They're as far from esoterica as you can get. The Copenhagen Interpr...

A note from the IEP article on Pierre Hadot about the figure of the sage Again similar to the conception of the enlightened being in Buddhism.

But the implication is, Socrates has proceeded beyond 'image and symbol' - has indeed made that ascent - but that Glaucon cannot 'follow' him, i.e. is...

The wiki article on the Analogy of the Divided Line has a table: /uploads/resized/files/ht/ioqc433e8lqiycer.jpg So - isn't the whole task of the philo...

It’s still not the point at issue. The reason that secular philosophy is lacking in self-awareness is precisely that it has bracketed the subject out ...

It is in the hands of philosophers. But not in the hands of scientific secularism. Me too, for sure. Interesting my post provokes that reaction. Makes...

I think I pointed out above that the original derivation of Upani?ad was 'sitting close'. In other words, those discourses - they're somewhat similar ...

OK, sorry, that was a reflexive post. What I mean is, that esoteric teachings are NOT simply just-so stories. They relay something crucial - vital inf...

Consider this a correction :brow:

Sure. Actually I did know that about him. I spent a long time hanging out at Adyar Bookshop & Library, so am well acquainted with Mdme. Nevertheless i...

By the way Jack - look into that book mentioned above, Between the Lines. I have a few of Lachmann’s books, including the Secret Teachers of the West ...

:clap: