Philosophy Now Forum

One must know in order to know not, therefore one cannot know. Knowing not cannot result in knowing, therfore one can only know. You are confusing knowing and believing. As an atheist I merely state the impossibility of knowing god exists. As a theist I state a belief in god which I cannot know

Deaths Door wrote:Stumbled upon your site while researching stuff on respect for the dead. Just want to say I like what I see and hope to get involved in some of the discussions here.

Welcome. The more the merrier. Do you have any background in philosophy?

Should I write down a deduction for you given some premises? Would it help? I am fully aware of the Paradox of Ravens. Example for your thoughts: You look for a highly valuable object on a public square. Well, the square is empty. There is nothing there that's highly valuable to you ie. golden neck...

Our philosophical science correspondent Massimo Pigliucci. http://philosophynow.org/issues/80/On_Xenophobia This approach simply demonstrate the paucity of the evolutionary type explanation. I've no need to reiterate Darwin's Natural Selection, so suffice it to say that traits are adaptive in the b...

Hmmm, see if I can drag you back in ;) Okay last word.. Of course energy has something to do with evolution! I've already said it is part of everything. But then the fact that I enjoyed walking the dog has something to do with energy, but you can't understand anything about why I enjoyed it because...

Perhaps the lesson here is not to expect philosophy from a man tutored in science? What does make sense is that he is basically saying that what we can understand of the world is that what we can find out is commensurate with what the world seems to be; that there is no ghost behind the machine; no...

Of course everything boils down to matter in motion, and energy. Does it? Says who? The physical reality we can observe and measure does. Is that everything? The boiling down does not describe it, help us to understand or provide information that shows what is going on in a pragmatic way. Why do I ...

"A theory that explains everything, explains nothing" Popper In other words, the 'process' we describe as evolution is, at the end of the day, a specific and circumstantial abstraction of the 'process' we describe as physics. Both describe what we see in nature, neither can be said to 'ex...

I have to side with chaz though in terms of this energy business. When bytesplicer says "energy accounts for all physical phenomenon," I can only interpret this as unnecessarily reductionist. How do you propose that energy is relevant to natural selection, other than that NS may select fo...

Challenging authority is a completely essential element of democratic thinking and the democratic process. Without this we live in a dictatorship. Laws need to be in place and acted upon which protect the individual from 'authority' figures from overstepping their powers. You may think that a dead ...

[quote="tbieter"]"certainly people (regardless of issues of determinism) have to be held responsible for their actions. In this way -whether you believe in free-will or are a determinist - people will know there are consequences and behaviour can be modified" chaz, I'll take your...

]chaz, Are any of Joey's actions blameworthy? Why or why not? Of course. Vandalism , the destruction of property is worthy of punishment. That would be an arrest, a fair trial and some remedial sentence. As he was a minor, the possibility that his mental state might be examined too. Summary executi...

Why are you assuming that the policeman has to be in the right? I am assuming nothing. Are you saying he's guilty until proven innocent? Let the courts decide. You seem to have this cop already convicted in your mind from what I've read. Slow down...have you ever been in such a situation before? Th...

Try and use your imagination! My imagination works fine. I could ruin someone's day with just a baseball bat. Are you claiming a bat isn't potentially fatal? Maybe the kid commited suicde by cop...who knows? The police officer was inside the car- cars which have locks to prevent entry. But even if ...

]chaz, Are any of Joey's actions blameworthy? Why or why not? Of course. Vandalism , the destruction of property is worthy of punishment. That would be an arrest, a fair trial and some remedial sentence. As he was a minor, the possibility that his mental state might be examined too. Summary executi...