Recent Responses
Has philosophy adequately dealt with the mind-body problem? I am looking for a serious answer from a person who is genuinely passionate about philosophy and not mere deferrals of the question through cliche stances so abundantly available amongst hobbyist-philosophers. Not to worry I am not out to justify some sort of theological stance, I am merely curious if professional philosophers are still concerned by this question or its derivatives. I would be very grateful for a response.
Richard Heck
October 22, 2010
(changed October 22, 2010)
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I'm not sure what's meant by "adequately dealt with", but if it means something like, "Come up with an answer that satisfies a fairly large group of people", then no, I don't think so. But to the other question, whether philosophers today still care about the mind-body problem, the answer is... Read more
Why Studying Model Theory is important to Philosophy? How much Math and Logic one needs to know to get down to study Model Theory? and does it have something to say about Hierarchical essence of scientific language?
Richard Heck
October 22, 2010
(changed October 22, 2010)
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I'm not sure studying model theory is important to philosophy, broadly speaking. For some areas, such as the philosophy of set theory, it surely is important that one know at least something about the basic results and techniques, since they are used regularly in set theory itself. But I dou... Read more
Theists often claim that the "fine-tuning" of the universe indicates that it was created especially for man by a divine benevolence. Doesn't the fact that the earth will eventually be incapable of supporting any life (when the sun eventually runs out of energy) disprove this hypothesis? And what of the fact that the entire universe it seems will one day be incapable of supporting intelligent life (the big-freeze)?
Andrew Pessin
November 26, 2010
(changed November 26, 2010)
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Yeah -- I don't think you need to go so far as the future to raise these sorts of questions. To believe in fine-tuning is to believe in being tuned to some end or purpose -- and it's strange to imagine that it's tuned to the purpose of some part or subsection of the universe: it should b... Read more
I'm sure such situations are familiar to many people, especially those who like to think they consider problems from several angles. Bob does something morally reprehensible (cheats on his spouse, kills someone, vandalizes a home, etc). Jane and Mary are discussing the situation, and Jane offers an explanation as to why Bob committed the act (he was sexually frustrated, he was paranoid and thought the victim was watching him, he learned it from his peers). Mary is then upset or angry that Jane would justify Bob's actions. This often happens even though Jane is not actually justifying anything, and agrees that Bob did something wrong - she's only trying to speculate on why he's done what he's done, for curiosity's sake or to help convince any victims that it's not their fault. Yet it would seem that Mary is assuming an explanation for a morally reprehensible action is the same as (or implies) a justification of that action. That, then, is my question: isn't it easy to disentangle explanations of actions from justifications of the selfsame actions, or is it actually harder than it looks? What is the relationship between explaining an act and justifying an act?
Thomas Pogge
October 22, 2010
(changed October 22, 2010)
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I think your question is too broad. There is no general answer here, because much depends on what explanation is being offered for the behavior. An explanation of an action may justify it, may excuse it, may be a reason to forgive it, or may be none of the above.
To justify an action is usu... Read more
Early Islam meets almost every criteria for the definition of a "cult". Believers were removed their friends and families- from Mecca to "The Prophet's Town" Medina, unconditional love was given by a charismatic leader (Muhammad), believers received a new identity based on the group "Muslim", access to material critical of Muhammad or Islam was cut off (the murder of satirical poets by Muhammad), unwavering faith to the group was demanded, leaving the group was prohibited (death penalty for apostates), the beliefs of the group contradict logic and science, it was encouraged that group members only socialize and marry other group members, the threat of hellfire was used to control group members, the beliefs of the group are extremely absolutist ("Islam is the only true religion") and group members were encouraged to gain as many new followers as possible. According to these criteria can Islam still be considered a cult, or has it "evolved" into something else? Furthermore, if we can agree that it at least started out as a cult, should this negatively effect our opinion of Islam today?
Oliver Leaman
October 21, 2010
(changed October 21, 2010)
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I do not recognize Islam from your description of it. Many religions contain events in their past history which look rather questionable, to put it mildly, and I suppose all new religions, although Islam represents itself as not new at all, will institute practices to try to maintain group... Read more
Is science really as neutral and objective as scientists claim? Let me for arguments sake use the example of "ghosts". When a person lives in a country with wide-spread belief in the supernatural they are more likely to interpret a strange event as having a supernatural component. We can say that they are not analysing the event in an objective way, but are interpreting it from the biased mindset that "the supernatural exists". A scientist looking at the same event would not have such cultural assumptions; but he is interpreting the event on the basis of what he already knows about science (ex, That cognitive processes have a biological basis, that immaterial beings violate the laws of physics as they are currently understood, etc.) Now we know from history that many scientific theories which had the support of the entire scientific community turn out to inconsistent with empirical observation in some way and require modification or to be discarded entirely. Similarly, some theories which were once considered wacky (ex. string theory) go on to gain more support in the scientific community. So the scientist interprets the same event from a mindset which (according to sheer probability) has at least some erroneous assumptions. Can we really say his perspective is completely neutral and objective?
Miriam Solomon
October 21, 2010
(changed October 21, 2010)
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This is an excellent question. Science aims for both objectivity and truth. Sometimes science fails to be objective (for example, when scientists ignore important evidence, or lack evidence) and sometimes scientific theories fail to be true (for example, Newtonian mechanics turns out not... Read more
Is a person responsible for their emotions, for the way they feel? Can they ever be held accountable for feeling a certain way?
Sean Greenberg
October 21, 2010
(changed October 21, 2010)
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This is a deep and important question, that goes to the heart of both our understanding of emotions and of responsibility. There seem to be conflicting intuitions about this question. On the one hand, it seems natural to think that an agent is only responsible for what she does, or for w... Read more
Can "reason" or "rationality" ever truly be the final explanation or justification for any action or decision? Don't all decisions and choices need some kind of "irrational" foundation (curiosity, love, boredom, fear, indifference, excitement, desire to do something) in order for a choice to be made?
Peter Smith
October 19, 2010
(changed October 19, 2010)
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What on earth is irrational about being curious about the current state of play in the foundations of quantum mechanics, about loving your beautiful, clever, affectionate daughter, about being bored by mindless chatter about C-list celebrities, about feeling fear when an errant car suddenly h... Read more
Does the wife of an adulterous man have grounds to be angry with "the other woman?"
Eddy Nahmias
October 19, 2010
(changed October 19, 2010)
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Yes, at least assuming that the "other woman" knows, or should know, that the man is married. The wife has grounds, in the sense of appropriate reason, to be angry because anger is an appropriate emotional response to having an important relationship messed up (not to mention other things,... Read more
I have heard that some philosophers claim that "self is an illusion". What does this mean? And how could anyone subscribe to this strange, counter-intuitive belief?
Sean Greenberg
October 19, 2010
(changed October 19, 2010)
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The idea of the self that is called into question when it is claimed that the self is an illusion is the idea of a substantial, persisting, intellectual substance, such as the self of which Descartes, in the second of the Meditations on First Philosophy, claimed to have knowledge, and whic... Read more