Recent Responses
If we assert that aesthetic experience has no definable cognitive component what makes it an important subject of philosophical interest?
Andrew Pessin
June 20, 2013
(changed June 20, 2013)
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Presumably it's only the philosophical interest which leads to the conclusion that it has no cognitive component in the first place ... Or rather, it's a matter of philosophical debate whether it does ... But if you are suggesting (as you seem to) that once a philosopher decides that aesthetic ex... Read more
In roles where individuals have a lot of responsibility (e.g. the direct protection of others) how can the idea of a 'learning curve' be tolerated? It seems to me that there are always situations in which people, like doctors or soldiers, must make judgement calls, but if such decisions - though rational and educated - don't achieve the desired outcome (e.g a patient dies, a fellow soldier is put in harm's way), how can the decision makers tolerate having made them? Are there certain roles (like being an emergency room doctor or president) in which the individual filling that role has to accept that despite their best efforts they are very likely to cause others harm or to contribute to it? Is that a risk that just goes with the job?
Miriam Solomon
June 20, 2013
(changed June 20, 2013)
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This is a timely question, since medical residencies typically begin on July 1, so we will soon have some new MDs starting the learning curve! If we don't permit the inexperienced to treat patients we will not be able to train the next generation. To keep saving lives, then, we will have to to... Read more
Does the amount of suffering in the world that is caused by man's misbehavior towards each other indicative of a failure of philosophy to create meaningful solutions or rather an ignorance of philosophy?
Allen Stairs
June 20, 2013
(changed June 20, 2013)
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I'd say neither.
Ideas can inspire, but knowing philosophy doesn't mean you won't be cruel. Theoretical understanding need not change our dispositions and sympathies. The extent to which it does is an empirical matter, but I'd guess that a sociopath could also be a skilled and brilliant philosoph... Read more
Is the only ethical indicator of degrees of moral correctness or wrongness utilitarianism? For instance, how would Kant or Aristotle argue that robbing two people is MORE immoral than robbing one? What if the robber needed that money to feed his family?
David Brink
June 19, 2013
(changed June 19, 2013)
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Utilitarianism, or more generally consequentialism, is one way to register the scalar character of morality, because actions will be more or less right depending on their proximity to the best. But other moral theories might also represent moral assessment as scalar. For instance, consequences wi... Read more
Wikipedia has an interesting (for me, at least) definition of question: "A question is a linguistic expression used to make a request for information, or the request made using such an expression." This means that there are two senses of the word "question": one very general and abstract (a question is an abstract sequence of words, even it no one asks it), the other one concrete (a question is a concrete asking for information). In the abstract sense, all persons who have ever asked, say, what's the capital of Portugal, they were asking the same question. But here is my problem: in this abstract sense (or perhaps in another possible abstract sense), a question is not a linguistic expression (although Wikipedia says so...), since the same question can be formulated in any language or in different ways within the same language: many linguistic expressions can formulate the same question. A question is an abstraction, something like a thought (that many people can think). What is special about (abstract) questions is that they are not "declarative thoughts", but "interrogative thoughts". Could you tell me more exactly what kind of abstraction (abstract) questions are? (By the way, does it work for orders and requests too?)
Gabriel Segal
June 19, 2013
(changed June 19, 2013)
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You might find it useful to think of question as a set of propositions. E.g. 'Is Paris the capital of France?' would correspond to the propositions: Paris is the capital of France and It is not the case that Paris is the capital of France. 'What is the capital of France?' would correspond to a... Read more
Is it unethical to avoid watching or reading the news?
Charles Taliaferro
June 15, 2013
(changed June 15, 2013)
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What a great question! Though (fair warning): I may not be the most impartial panelist to reply as I come from a family that helped start a modest, and yet municipal newspaper, and I was brought up with being instructed by parents that, no matter what my politics, I should read at least on... Read more
Is 0 really a fraction? Because some do not agree that it is not a fraction. But I have a thought Fraction=no. of equal parts considered/total no. of parts So if I divide a chocolate in 4 parts and eat no parts then I can associate with no part the no. zero and so 0/4 a fraction. Am I right?
William Rapaport
June 15, 2013
(changed June 15, 2013)
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I don't know anybody who claims that 0 is not a fraction. But I suppose it depends on what you mean by "fraction". If you mean a numeral (that is, a name or description of a number) that is normally written in the format: (integer numeral)/(integer numeral), e.g., 3/4, then, I suppose, stri... Read more
Can paradoxes actually happen?
Stephen Maitzen
June 13, 2013
(changed June 13, 2013)
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Yes! But bear in mind that a paradox is an apparent contradiction, an apparent inconsistency, that we're tasked with trying to resolve in a consistent way. For example, a particular argument implies that the Liar sentence ("This sentence is false") is both true and false, and a similar argument... Read more
Why is murder (irrespective of special circumstances such as war or self-defense) immoral? Many people consider abortion, euthanasia, and suicide to not be immoral. This would indicate that "the good life" is moral, making "good" an ideal greater than life. What's to stop a murderer deciding that eliminating someone would result in greater "good?"
Allen Stairs
June 13, 2013
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First, a quibble: "murder" usually is taken to mean wrongful killing. But we can set the quibble aside.
I'm inclined to turn your question around. I take it to be as plausible as any moral claim gets to be that in general killing people is wrong. Philosophers have had various things to say about w... Read more
One can say something mixing words from two languages (say, English and Ukrainian), and make good, clear and exact sense. One can even mix parts of words, or structures, and make perfect sense. My problem is that such an invented sentence wouldn't be meaningful according to any one of the "previously existing" languages. But, since it has linguistic meaning, it seems that it should have meaning according to some language. What language is that? The "sum" (what is that?) of the two used languages? The sum of all the existing languages in the world (since we can mix words from whatever language)? A new language created just by saying or thinking (one doesn't have to say it) the mixed sentence? And what about sentences with newly invented words? Sometimes we can invent a word and make perfect sense for people who listen to it for the first time. My point is that, after all, it seems that linguistic meaning isn't meaning according to a language. Or, if this is wrong, at least there is no "definite philosophical way" to say that something is one (rather than two or half) language, or that some sentence belongs to one language rather than to an arbitrary number of languages (made of arbitrary sums of other languages). Or so it seems to me... :-) (I love your site. It's terrible when you are on vacation, that's always when questions appear to me.)
Gabriel Segal
June 13, 2013
(changed June 13, 2013)
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It depends on what you take ‘language’ to mean. I take it to mean, roughly, a set of rules for constructing meaningful sentences. These rules specify a list of words and ways of putting them together to form sentences. It specifies the meaning of each word and how to compute the meaning of sente... Read more