Philosophy Now Forum

A set of beliefs concerning the cause, nature, and purpose of the universe. Beliefs are thoughts. Thoughts are expressions being perceived. Perceptions are being expressed by nothing, for nothing, for there is no visible perceiver but the invisible thought. . The "universe" is a particular class of...

So if someone asked you whether or not there is a God, how would you respond? Is there a God, is there not a God or do you consider the question unknowable--at least from your place in the world? I'm very familiar with Husserl's use of the word "epoche" BTW. It's not the only way the word can be us...

When it comes to things that seem to be beyond all reasonable ability to know or verify--for example such as whether or not there is a God or whether or not there are "dimensions" to the world and our existences which transcend our average, every day experiences--do you have a belief one way or the...

... Were you at the time acquainted with the idea of substituting verbs for nouns and adjectives? ... No, and I dropped it - didn't pay it any mind until decades latter. Then I was having a debate over Dennet's American flag illusion. You stare at a screen for a while and then the image is turned o...

JustinTruth wrote: I believe that most statements in any language are meaningless without experiences that are not linguistic. Specifically I mean any statement that is not about language itself. In a very real sense, for a large class of utterances, the meaning of the utterance cannot be found in ...

Justintruth wrote: The answer to your own question is the sentence itself. Logik has a two word phrase for that and I forget what the phrase is. Every phrase in your sentence quoted above is conceptual language. For instance the very words "forward" and "cube" name concepts. If you were sleep walki...

Justintruth wrote: Take for example a line drawing of a cube. One looks at it and it seems that one or the other face is in the back. Then one might try to bring the other forward and suddenly it switches and the rear face is now forward. All that happens without language. When we say "think" do we...

It's not black and white matter. 'Language' might stand for any symbolic system, as I think you would agree as you previously listed digital languages. For instance Chinese script is pictorial sort of, and some art forms are particularly symbolist at some periods. 'Language ' might also include gru...

1) It's epistemic. Pride blinds. When you try to know you must let what is interrogated answer, and independent of what it says, believe it, instead of believing what *you* want out of pride that you "know better". The idea that you know better can come from pride and not from an epistemic foundatio...

... ...Pacifism is laudable, but I don't advocate it for my people in this age.... It is possible, given the lethality inherent in current, and, more criticaly, nascent, war technology that this idea will lead to species extinction. Oh, not the advocacy against pacifism... ...That is innocent enoug...

The Bolcheviks, Maoists, and Khemer Rouge, all demonstrate that this absence of matriarchy is not just religious. It is an instinctive human behavior that is implemented across both religious and secular ontology. But our biggest problem is an epistemic failure that leads to both secular and religio...

Time is fundamental variable of any dynamical theory. This means that time cannot be an emergent property of a dynamical theory since otherwise it has to be emergent property and fundamental variable of the theory at the same time. My understanding is that in our current dynamic theory, Einstein's ...

From the onset, mental phenomena like thoughts or sensations should never be substantiated, i.e. be regarded as things (as does the author). Rather we are talking about (biological) abilities, e.g. the ability to consciously process a part of the sensory input or to speak or to perceive. Mind is no...

Brain is an organ made of specialised nerve tissue. Ok. You mean an organic brain. But there may be other devices which don't have nerve tissue with which consciousness is associated. How do you know that all *possible* devices that experience have nerve tissue? If you want to reserve the word "bra...

JustInTruth wrote: I think I can prove that our consciousness cannot be just a part of our brain if by brain we mean a collection of particles behaving solely as defined by contemporary physics. "---- if by brain we mean a collection of particles behaving solely as defined by contemporary physics" ...