Count Timothy von Icarus

Race isn't something it's possible to define using biology, that's for sure. But it is something based in biology, and has real uses in the biological...

The usefulness of terms in analysis and debates is tied to their communicative power. There has been an attempt to redefine racism racism as "race-bas...

There's a plenty of papers on people's preferences for people who are genetically and/or phenotypically similar to them, if that's what you're getting...

Yes. Other developed countries don't allow the sort of massive sentences for low level crimes that prosecutors rely on to get pleas in most cases. Hen...

Of course it's outdated. No modern algorithms work like that. They feed you what you'll keep watching. This means that you'll be recommended videos fr...

Nothing. I just found a thread to shoehorn that in because I found the idea of being haunted by Hume on a nightly basis both surreal and funny.

Just wait until you encounter a truly numinous event and your dreams are haunted. Then you'll wish you had some Jung-fu.... https://i.ibb.co/r7PyXv3/1...

Thanks. I keep telling myself I'll read one SEP article a day, but some are pretty wrong and the random article button has sent me to some places so r...

It's also a useful dichotomy for examining the history of the philosophy of science, since the scientific method reached maturity almost entirely in t...

It's a useful dichotomy because the different traditions weren't in regular conversation with each other for thousands of years. Yes, Eastern and West...

I'd say Descartes is the beginning of modern mind -body dualism, but Aristotle and Medieval philosophers distinguish the intellect, that function capa...

You're correct if you expand the definition of "pleasure" under hedonism to "everything that is good." It seems like you're expanding your definition ...

I'm a big fan of the American and internet meme versions of these I've found. https://i.warosu.org/data/lit/img/0163/93/1600529243003.png https://i.im...

I have a very basic question: how readable is Wittgenstein? I am familiar with his ideas from various summaries I've read and Great Courses lectures I...

The idea that God is good is often taken to mean God posseses no darkness. Indeed, Saint John contrasts the Light with the Darkness in the Gospel and ...

Several things that I can be sure of. The call that fouled out Paul Pierce in Game Seven of the 2010 NBA finals was total garbage, and was what allowe...

Interesting question. I'm assuming you don't age, but aren't invulnerable. Do you still need food and water to live? If so, I might abstain for the sa...

Your description is quite good, but I don't think it follows that the reasons are reducible to hedonism. For example, my wife has grown in her faith a...

There are four reasons. I. The practical material. It's a tough world and the weak are trampled under foot. Negative feedback works as a learning mech...

I don't get how anyone can be a pure hedonist. Pain is essential to personal growth, and pleasurable qualia are only part of what makes life worth liv...

Of course, one of the more scientifically compelling answers to the mysteries is: God: no Free Will: no Life after death: no Conciousness is illusory,...

I don't disagree with most of your points. The issue is that: A. I doubt that neuroscience will produce satisfactory answers to some of these mysterie...

That's interesting, since I have the same academic background and slowly have been coming to the conclusion that neuroscience can currently tell us fa...

He was probably cheating and just reading the Bloom's Notes summaries...:grin:

I'd focus more of the morality of subjectivity. Is it moral to embrace actions based only in your own experiences, or should you strive to tie them to...

Well you got your answers: Appears it is solved.

The management of the US dollar didn't double the price of GPUs right before I was planning on buying a new computer or getting one of the new Xbox/So...

Christianity has always been about doctrine. I feel like a lot of its problems come from taking the Bible, which is essentially a humanist text writte...

I believe I understand the paradox in that sense. It seems to presuppose some sort of observer, other than God, who stands inside the limits of time a...

I'll just leave this here for the universalists. What color is the dress? https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/a/a8/The_Dress_%28viral_phen...

Dan Simmons has a pair of sci-fi books on just this topic. It imagined a transhumanist society on Earth, filled with plenty, as well as an even more e...

I recognize this is an old post, but the whole "all religions are fairy tales made to make people feel they have meaning," thing doesn't work with all...

God is infinite. God is also omniscient, meaning God posseses perfect knowledge of all things to come. "Perfect" knowledge denote that nothing is left...

Fascinating thread. I don't have much to add, having only read Man and his Symbols and a good deal of Psychology and Alchemy. A lot of Jung's ideas se...

An interesting addenda to the way capital allows you to do more work with less labor is theories on labor substitution. Major construction projects in...

I don't believe so. People were always very ignorant. Go look at the graffiti of Pompeii or the descriptions of the crowds by Greek and Roman historia...

Heard this several times. It is recency bias. The El Paso, Dayton, and Garlic festival shootings were right on top of each other. Las Vegas, etc. Mone...

Spinning roundhouse kicks? :chin:

There is a wide body of literature in the foreign policy and security studies fields that shows that norms (e.g. rule of law, honor culture, etc.) sha...

I'm not aware of anything explicitly about this, but this is generally how citizenship in Greek city states worked. The polis' most important function...

Re: Judaism and Hellenic thought, it's interesting to note that Plato's Theory of Forms has been discovered in Memphite Theology in Egypt a few centur...

The Bible came down as a single document at one point, but I know the individual stories are far older than the Tanakh. One of the earliest examples o...

Rereading this is an object lesson in why you shouldn't write multi-paragraph statements on your phone. Oh well. Anyhow, I saw this recently. Maybe th...

The event was planned and advertised across a variety of far right platforms, including 4chan's /pol/, 8kun, the_Donald, and greatawakening.win. Aside...

It's an extremely popular conception of the world. Even if it has broken down at upon close analysis, it allows for enough practical answers that I do...

Gotcha. Yes, there is a sense in which Gnosticism, or at least, some forms can be elitist, since with transmigration you are born into different bodie...

All the advances of the industrial revolution, a direct outcome of advances in philosophy, have meant that there are now a lot more people on Earth. P...

That's interesting. I've had a similar experience vis-a-vis Gnosticism. Not that there isn't a focus on practical experience in churches I've attended...

I believe you chronology is a bit off. Kabbalah was developed centuries after the Gnostics were genocided by their coreligionists out of existence. Sc...

Bit of a caveat, Thomas was discovered in it entirety in 1945 but scholars knew about it long before. Thomas likely predates a the later synoptic gosp...