Janus

I like this: you can't ask 'Why?' of the final cause because the final cause is the final why in the series.

As I have already said, I think the very notion that reproduction requires moral justification is mistaken, the result of a category error. unless we ...

I'm not sure what you mean by "structurally necessary". Pain and pleasure are structurally, or perhaps better, functionally, necessary to the biologic...

There is no doubt that "life has suffering". Whether or not it is "predominately suffering" is simply not determinable; so, for that reason, I think o...

If the "meat of the argument" consists in making a blanket claim about the rightness or wrongness of life and/or reproduction, then any "sensible meat...

You don't have to reproduce if you don't want to. But there cannot be a universalization of any view concerning the moral rightness of reproduction, t...

And if the argument does consist in claiming it is the only correct view, what then? Are you suggesting that your "focusing on the meat of the argumen...

Some modern ethical views are subjectivist and others are objectivity; so I'm not entirely sure what you're getting at here. I would agree with you th...

Are you assuming that this subjectivism is the only correct view of the matter?

In some sense that's true enough, but schopenhauer1 does speak as though his or her view of the world is the only correct one. It might be OK to say t...

OK, but you said "the modern use of Stoicism would be stripped of this metaphysics and indeed be viewed in terms of spiritual exercises' which is not ...

What you fail to see is that what you say about the nature of human life does not present the one 'correct' view, but is merely the projection of your...

Regarding "self-sculpture" in the Stoics; I came across the idea in reading Pierre Hadot, that sculpting was not understood by the Greeks and Romans a...

So what exactly is it that determines this "numerical identity"? What is it, that is, other than some quality or other, that makes the scenario of the...

I don't see why a modern practice would necessarily be "stripped of this metaphysics"- at least when it comes to nature, and not even necessarily when...

I'm not too sure what you are driving at here 66. I haven't said that morality is subjective. I think there are objective facts about humans' moral na...

I don't this musical analogy is so apt; and it isn't true of musical harmony in any case. There is no perfect harmony, and there is no interesting har...

Isn't it an empirical matter as to what is natural to humans, even if it is difficult, or even impossible to establish what it is precisely? Social an...

The two cases you outline here seem to be just the same kinds of cases, differing only in terms of degree. If Paris had never been the capital of some...

This seems to be raising a kind of 'Sorites' problem. If we wanted to say that there could be an alternative France in another possible world, exactly...

From my point of view I haven't been putting my case more or less strongly; so I think it might have been a matter of how what I said was taken, rathe...

Definitely agree...

I think that's irrelevant; we find everything in experience, one way or the other. My point is merely that there are useful distinctions to be made be...

The point is that Paris being the capital of France could be changed by bestowing the meaning 'capital' on another city. Purely empirical truths canno...

A blind person can learn via the other senses: I did say the empirical is predominately a matter of visual observation, not solely. Much of what any o...

You're right, bachelors are unmarried men is analytic; whereas Paris is the capital of France is only quasi-analytic; which I what I said in my first ...

In terms of the centrality of observation in empirical pursuits, yes I do think so.

Why are we here arguing about, and trying to understand what constitutes the differences between analytic and synthetic? I'm just defending a point th...

I can accept that, insofar as it is analogous to a claim that no statement is analytical to any degree because the meanings of words might change. Bac...

How does he already know it is not true? Knowing that New York is not the capital of France is a complex semantical feat of understanding how humans d...

You wouldn't necessarily see "rays" (unless there were clouds or mist about), you'd see the sun shining if it was shining. Checking the news is fine, ...

Firstly, I haven't misread Kripke, since I haven't read him at all and have not mentioned him in any of my arguments. Secondly I haven't claimed that ...

Sure, but I am arguing that there can be non-basic empirical propositions or if you prefer propositions, the truth or falsity of which, may be more or...

If a proposition can be confirmed by merely looking then it is the most basic kind of empirical proposition. That's precisely what I have been saying ...

Are you denying that some kinds of propositions may be confirmed by merely looking and/ or are you claiming that Paris being the capital of France is ...

France would not cease to be France if the capital were changed. But the fact that Paris has been capital for the time that it has is essential to Fra...

Certainly there is an empirical component to such facts (of course because they are about real people and/ or places) but that doesn't change the fact...

You're still not getting the difference. There could be nothing immediately obvious to your eyes that would confirm that Paris is the capital, analogo...

If you go to Paris there is nothing you could see that could confirm that it is the capital of France. If you go outside and look you can confirm whet...

So you honestly can see no distinction between bare empirical propositions, and the empirical methods of confirming or dis-confirming them, and "Paris...

It is a designated fact not a merely empirical fact. What experiment could you run to determine its truth or falsity that did not involve reading some...

If you like; whereas "the sun is shining at some place and time" can be false given that it has nothing to do with what humans have designated in term...

I don't agree; under the current and past definition it is the capital of France. Definitions, just like designations, can change. It could never be t...

I'm talking about statements. It cannot be, strictly speaking, true or false that it is sunny right now in some location. It can be the case that it i...

Go and look up "Paris" in the dictionary then and see if "capital of France" is not one of the definitions you find there.

Yes, but you are avoiding the point that the proposition that the sun was shining at some place and time both can right now and could if the world wer...

Paris is designated the capital of France, and one of the definitions of the name 'Paris' is 'capital of France'. In any case you still haven't told u...

It is perfectly obvious how the empirical proposition that the sun was shining yesterday at 10 am Greenwich mean time at such and such coordinates can...

Is "epistemic modality" something different than "empirical terms"? It is relevant because Paris is defined as the capital of Paris in a way somewhat ...

I don't understand why you don't understand the question; it seems perfectly straightforward to me. :s