Tom Storm

We get it you're an angry theist. So?

I think we see this differently. Explanations are explanations. Besides religious explanations do not always provide comfort. They often provide fear ...

Well, you'll need to start by demonstrating evidence of your claim first. Not sure how you would do this - you'd probaly need to provide a list of all...

Yes, but isn't the point that science and religion are both in the explanation business? Religious explanations are often fixed and doctrinaire. Those...

I suspect Pasteur is wrong about this since many people who know a lot of science are still atheists. Possibly most. Maybe Pasteur should have said - ...

Religion has effectively died out amongst large groups of people in the west. The kinds of religion that is growing widely around the world - evangeli...

Is there a useful thread here on post modernism and truth? I would be keen to read something accessible on the subject.

I've made my point. You failed to define scientism correctly. The rest of this discussion is superfluous. But I still wonder if you appreciate the dif...

The syntax, I grant you, is inelegant and wordy, but it doesn't seem an especially strange series of questions, given variations of questions just lik...

Interestingly, I've noticed that a lot of public atheism in America is conducted by former evangelicals who no longer find the dubious stories in the ...

I think The Turn of the Screw is a little masterpiece but he is difficult for modern sensibilities.

You get used to it. But hats keep falling off.

I studied philosophy at university briefly in 1988 (I think). We didn't read books, we were given photocopied extracts to learn. I never read them. I ...

Start of winter here and it's Tuesday 8am. :wink:

Given what you say here, can you demonstrate the single source of authority on The Truth? I suspect a Noble Price might be waiting if you can do this.

Actually your account of scientism here seems erroneous: I understand scientism as the opposite of this. It is an unassailable certainty that science ...

I was merely pointing out the difference between scientism and science. An important distinction.

Thanks.

I have worked with many prisoners over the years. People who have done unspeakable things - murder, child abuse, kidnapping, maiming, arson, pyromania...

I get what you are saying. But I sometimes look at fish and wish more people were just like them. The no talking, swimming away bit is especially attr...

I think love and generosity and nurturing also frequently lead us astray. Hence the archaic expression that the road to hell is paved with good intent...

Can you expand on this, especially ignorance of self?

:up: Yes, the thing we are most familiar with is also the thing which seems strangest. Reminds me of Montaigne, 'We laugh and cry at the same thing.' ...

Indeed. It's interesting also to me that despite indirectly launching a million easy mystical solutions to the hard problem, Chalmers himself is witho...

Not sure this is right. Scientism says only physics can answer all questions and that the scientific method is a pathway to truth and understanding ho...

Neither. I don't really accept the notion of 'evil'. We use this word 'emotionally' to describe detrimental impact, but the person undertaking this 'e...

Very interesting theory and simply explained. Nice.

What you say is largely correct. My point is better described by journalist Glenn Greenwald who in 2013 wrote: ...one of the greatest and most shamefu...

Given the shrinking of religions (despite their popularity still amongst certain societies and subcultures) I suspect religions will disappear (unless...

Can't fit books, umbrellas, ipads, a sweater and bottles of hooch in a pocket, Man.

I have carried a satchel for 40 years - does that count as a handbag? When I was a drinker there was often a necessary bottle of scotch in the bag, al...

Lamb straps are from the back loin of the animal, running alongside the spine. They tell me there is little fat and the meat has full flavour. It's an...

As it happens, I'm about to sit down to lamb straps, marinated in olive oil, garlic and lemon, with organic tomatoes, tzatziki, cos lettuce, red onion...

You're probably right, I've never much thought about it - I prefer sausages and curries with lamb, Kangaroo or pork. But if idealism is true, then I g...

I hear this a lot. I don't much like the taste of steak or meat in general, unless the shit is cooked out of it. Blood red meat will make me puke. A f...

True. And neo-liberalism has been a huge subject of debate here in Australia for decades. We originally called it economic rationalism in the first ye...

No... he's a card shark.

And as Woody Allen observes, existence is like this too - "Life is full of misery, loneliness, and suffering - and it's all over much too soon."

:up:

You were fine. I'm just positing models. I think some forms of idealism hold to an account that suggests individual consciousness like yours and mine ...

Don't some forms of idealism work like this? Consciousness or will is fundamental (universal mind) and instantiations of conscious creatures, are diss...

How would we go about determining whether it is fundamental or emergent?

Nicely written piece of distilled information.

:fire: I love your notion of synthetic phenomenology.

Sure. Existentialism was big in my circle when I was young. But the abyss never really held much dread for me since we already seem to be living insid...

Sorry. I don't really get the abyss thing so I'm curious. A fifty year-old colleague of mine has recently gotten a motorbike and ridiculous jet black ...

What abyss? Death?

I can't say I remember a single event from when I was 26. It was 1992. I looked the year up on line to see if it brought back any memories. Nothing. W...

Fair. Yep. Thanks.

Isn't this generally tautological? All unmarried men are bachelors is saying unmarried men are unmarried men.