Jack Cummins

I think the tension which I see in the various replies is over the whole level of expertise. As Toothymaw points to issue of seriousness. Personally, ...

Yes, this site is a treasure and it gives an unofficial platform for philosophy. However, I imagine that there some people on the site who are publish...

I think that the internet just becomes an available outlet for finding all information, whether it is porn or factual. But what I think is happening i...

I think so many people see porn as a way of exploiting people, but I am not sure that the people who are involved feel exploited. I do believe that ma...

Thanks, you are quite right. I think that there has been some interesting discussion with you and the few others who have replied. Generally, I was pr...

I am not really too bothered about tangents, but I just can't speak or read Spanish. However, I guess it is possible that there may be some Spanish sp...

The link on Freemasonary symbolism looked interesting but it was not in English, so I don't know if you sent the wrong version by accident. Generally,...

It is interesting that you can think how you began playing the warrior role and how it is connected to fighting. One aspect of my playing rockstars wh...

You speak of the architect as a fantasist dangerous to authority and I wonder where the Freemasons lie in that picture because I understand that they ...

It is interesting that you speak of escaping outwards to reality. I am not convinced that the outer or inner aspects of life are more real. I think th...

I do think that we are constantly living fantasies and many people don't stop and think about that. Life is constant myth making. When I was studying ...

Thanks for the further details of Scheler's ideas. It does seem that the themes on the various threads overlap frequently. I am also quite interested ...

There is a big difference between wishing and willing. It makes sense that it is in earlier and later life that most people stuck with wishes. It prob...

I imagine that differences lie with how we are socialised and it seems likely that play is a big factor. I have heard that some children believe in fa...

The book which you refer to sounds interesting and the quote which you give. It seems useful to think about fantasy in relation to the what is conside...

You suggest that 'when you get older you start losing the ability of dream/having fantasies'. I know that I fantasise in the same way that I did when ...

I think that your suggestions of suggesting that older people should lie down and just allow for younger people to thrive would be asking for them to ...

I do see positives in Christianity, and I do go to church with one friend at times, but sometimes I do find this difficult. I once went to a Quaker me...

I didn't think that you meant that one should just abandon pleasure arbitrarily. I think that what happens when I read these sort of ideas they collud...

I do feel that what you have said about denial of pleasure as the path to truth is so wrong. Not on the basis of Plato, but when I was going to a fund...

Success may also be an attitude of mind towards achievement and, this involves the basis from which we decide whether we are successful or not.

I have just read your post again and you are asking at the end about how you would approach your own experience. Of course, I don't know if you are sp...

Probably in the midst of an extreme mystical experience a person would be so absorbed that that wouldn't be the moment to describe it. One thing that ...

I think that the reductionist model of psychology developed by B F Skinner has played a critical role in the current thinking about mental states, bec...

I am not sure that Plato's ideas can be applied so easily to the life which many are expected to lead. You speak of the idea of striving not to be an ...

On what basis do you think that it is pursuit of pleasure that makes us mistake our opinions for truth? I am not sure that the two are related in that...

Perhaps it is a matter of many people needing a better understanding of pleasure. The people who are caught up in acts such as genocide are not necess...

It could be that rather than intentional sacrifice of pleasure being needed, as the starting point for the quest for truth, that the actual experience...

I think that you are right to suggest that 'philosophy is not superseded by science any more than a mother is superseded by her children'. Perhaps, th...

Do you think that pleasure and truth should be seen as being in conflict with one another?This tension existed within Kant's philosophy, but it may ha...

I am thinking how you(synthesis) spoke of the idea of the ineffable at some point in your discussion of the relative and the absolute thread. Obviousl...

I don't see why science should be given the authority and power to answer all the big questions leaving philosophy like an abandoned vagrant sitting i...

I don't know why you seem to think that exploring the limitations of language is 'impossible'. You speak of the idea of taboos of people not wishing t...

I do believe that the question 'why is there something ?' is an important one, which leads onto another one: why did any form of life come into existe...

I sometimes think that the way religious and mystical writers speak of the 'ineffable' to be some lack of willingness to explore further. I am not sur...

It seems that you are trying to see actions as 'good' and 'bad' and even if there are objective moral systems, it is likely that good and bad are own ...

Do you think that it depends on one's focus, as well? I think that it does, because on some days my thinking seems clearer. In understanding others wr...

It probably depends on how one considers the idea of the ineffable. Is it beyond words at all, or just beyond a certain person's ability to articulate...

I don't see why we can't use language to remark on the limitations of our language. That would seem like saying we can't use our minds to think about ...

Perhaps, one of the problems is if thoughts which are expressed in language are taken too concretely when they are only representations. Art is anothe...

Are you not worried if you think that totalitarianism is here..? I feel that I am watching it arise and I am wondering if I am imagining it. When I th...

I think that your thread discussion may be clearer with that point made. But, of course, it may be that others see the implications differently. Many ...

Its not so much that I think that you are in favour of it, but I do believe that it is on it's way and I am extremely worried about it because I think...

I am not suggesting that people should not have debates but I just don't think that in speaking of the loss of freedom advocated I don't think people ...

] I think that you are missing the point that Nicholas was making. Surely, we need to hold onto the freedom to develop our human qualities. Reading th...

I am inclined to think that the worthwhile discussion may be reflection upon the ontological point. If we are the only form of consciousness, what doe...

Perhaps, we can go as far as saying that it appears that humanity is the most intelligent form of life in the universe, based on our present state of ...

I am replying to your couple of posts previous to the last. When you suggested on what important idea stands out, I did reflect on what I thought abou...

One book which I have read which is relevant to the discussion which you have raised is, 'The Corpernicus Complex:The Quest for Our Cosmic (In)Signifi...

If humanity is the centre of consciousness in the universe, it raise the question of what is our role in it.? It would almost seem to make us like god...