Popper (as I explained yesterday) devised the criterion of falsifiability specifically for the kinds of empirical claims that science is suited to exa...
Evidently. You asked, and I answered. I mentioned Steve Pinker. He's a prominent popular intellectual (and one whom I think has a lot of worthwhile an...
If you mean this question: Some of my contemporaries went into politics; one became a leader of a State Greens party. No, all I’m doing is discussing ...
Agree with every word. Perceptive observation. My approach has always been the quest for enlightenment, commencing with the 60's counter-culture. (Spe...
It’s a philosophy forum. In light of me being accused of recklessly attacking science, I will come back to this remark, which really started the excha...
I'm really not 'caricaturing science' in the least. What I am saying is that many people derive beliefs or ideas from evolutionary theory that are bey...
I criticise the influence of evolutionary materialism on philosophy and culture because it is pervasive, persuasive and pernicious. I will continue to...
In your case, there is a type of passive-aggressive tone - that I’m being disingenuous, that I’ve been ‘wasting my time’ repeating the same ‘tired old...
Many of your criticisms of my posts are based largely on not understanding what I'm talking about. You 'fail to see why such and such' is the point, t...
Surely a 'civil society' is one in which you're not required to carry deadly weapons on the grounds that you're frightened that the person next to you...
Right - I perfectly agree. But it is writ large in cultural discourse, regardless. You see that in many comments and posts on this Forum - posters fre...
It’s not a ‘ far cry’ - it’s the same thing. The rest of the post builds on this false premise. The point at issue, is the extent to which science doe...
Right. That is what I mean by ‘the scientific worldview’. Because science isn’t ‘a worldview’ - it’s a methodology, a way of doing things, and also a ...
The philosophical issue I see is not to do with scientific method so much as with ‘the scientific worldview’. I would never disparage scientific metho...
That is an insightful comment. What you’re touching on here is the relationship between ‘the uncreated’ and the phenomenal domain - the domain of sens...
I do get that. Mysticism is usually shorthand for 'not being able to really understand anything', and that is often true. But in the case of Plotinus,...
This is where the 'perspectival' nature of Eirugena's argument is significant: things that exist on one level, do not exist on another. There is a Zen...
Disingenuous: 'not candid or sincere, typically by pretending that one knows less about something than one really does'. Why do you think my posts are...
The ontological status of mathematics is not something that has been resolved; this is the age-old question of whether maths is invented or discovered...
:ok: :groan: Because modern science insists that only what is sensible (sense-able) is real, whereas for the ancients, mathematical intuition was a me...
Russell wrote somewhere that the more general a term is, the harder to define. Very specific things are very easy to define - screwdrivers, oranges, r...
The point I am grappling with is that there are ‘degrees of reality’, which I don’t think is recognised in modern philosophy. The only place I see it ...
The meaning of 'secular' is strictly speaking, simply a system of governance that provides a framework without making any judgement about matters spir...
I will. That passage you quoted certainly resonates. I have read bits and pieces of Heidegger, but I've been put off by his political affiliations, an...
Well, thank for the feedback, and also the compliment. So, I could re-phrase it as follows: 'However what has become very contentious, in current cult...
Don’t worry, I have callouses. Husserl, I like, I frequently refer to his critique of natualism. Heidegger, not so much, although I’ve been reading a ...
The reason animal behaviour can generally be described in terms of stimulus and response, is because animal behaviour is generaly circumscribed by beh...
It will be interesting to see how big an impact this protest movement growing out the Parklands atrocity will have. These students are really, really ...
Well, they are defined entirely by their value. 7=VII=Seven - all of which are different expressions denoting exactly the same value. General observat...
I'm rather ambivalent (or maybe just confused) about the philosophical notion of substantia. As I've noted previously, the philosophical meaning of 's...
It's disgusting (if one hadn't gone beyond disgust already) how Trump's sole preoccupation, his only concern, the only thing that matters to him, is h...
Distinguishing 'reality', 'being', and 'existence' is practically impossible in the current English philosophical lexicon, because they are usually co...
Well, Protestantism had a particular perspective on it, based on 'sola scriptura' and the relationship of the believer and Jesus Christ as Saviour. Bu...
The Christian and Buddhist understanding is that the only way to realise the higher life is to lose the self altogether, so a fundamental, and probabl...
According to Joshia Royce, 19th c American philosopher, paraphrased by Bill Vallicella, the basis of religion is like this. ‘a) There is a paramount e...
Actually, FWIW, Michael did post a link to a Supreme Court decision which effectively ruled against the idea that individual gun ownership ought to be...
Regarding Trump’s ‘billions’ - it ought to be recalled he has been involved in six four bankruptcies and literally thousands of lawsuits many over unp...
Well, I’ll have to go back to my copy of Shape of Ancient Thought to recall the details of the arguments, which are essentially Buddhist (as atomism w...
I presume you will have been given a copy of Lucretius’ De Rerum Natura? That is one of the classic texts of atomism. One objection to Lucretius’ theo...
Their frequency is far higher in the USA than elsewhere. https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/I9MBI1pLT_enJDoy4Pp2FK-Xy9s=/800x0/filters:no_upscale()/cdn.v...
you might, though. It’s only a matter of translation. Polynesians are humans. Unlike, say, lions. Find me a thermostat which suspects you’re materiali...
Comments