Recent Responses
Is medical care or education a basic human right? If so, why? what is a basic human right? Thanks!
Peter S. Fosl
November 28, 2005
(changed November 28, 2005)
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This is one of the most important questions of political philosophy today. It's important, however, to distinguish between the way it may be asked as a legal or empirical question and the way it may be asked as a philosophical question.By rights, here, we are talking about what I call "c... Read more
If a man held a gun to your head and told you to go downstairs, would you have a choice?
Peter S. Fosl
November 28, 2005
(changed November 28, 2005)
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Yes, you would have a choice. You could choose to call his bluff by refusing to go downstairs and risk being shot, or you could obey (and still risk being shot). It's a choice, however, that's made under duress; and it's a choice that's coerced (i.e., where a threat of force or pain or... Read more
If every distinct mental state has a distinct ("corresponding") physical state, how could we tell which was causing which at any given moment? I'm sure that in certain contexts it would be more practical to answer that the mental state was caused by the physical state (e.g., "P is just irritable because he hasn't eaten"), and that in certain other contexts it would be more practical to answer that the mental state caused the physical (e.g., "P moved his hand because he decided to")--but is there any context-free answer to this question, i.e., the question as to whether the mind controls the body or whether the body controls the mind at any given moment?
Joseph G. Moore
November 28, 2005
(changed November 28, 2005)
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Any answer to the mind-body problem struggles to account plausibly for the causal relations that seem obviously to run in both directions between mind and body. For the dualist, who holds that mental states and physical states are distinct, your question is accute: how could a mental st... Read more
Is medical care or education a basic human right? If so, why? what is a basic human right? Thanks!
Peter S. Fosl
November 28, 2005
(changed November 28, 2005)
Permalink
This is one of the most important questions of political philosophy today. It's important, however, to distinguish between the way it may be asked as a legal or empirical question and the way it may be asked as a philosophical question.By rights, here, we are talking about what I call "c... Read more
Do luck and bad luck exist? Or have they just been imagined in order to create excuses?
Thomas Pogge
November 27, 2005
(changed November 27, 2005)
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One might think that (bad) luck does not exist because the universe is deterministic (running like clockwork according to strict physical laws). I assume this is not your concern. The (bad) luck label might then be attached to things happening to an agent insofar as these things (however c... Read more
If we define the science as the study of reality to find the relations among objects through scientific method, is mathematics a science? Or, it's something like logic which can be used in a wide range of sciences, philosophies, and even daily usages.
Peter Lipton
November 27, 2005
(changed November 27, 2005)
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I don't much like the expression 'scientific method', because it suggests that scientific practices come down to one unitary thing, and because it suggests that that thing is fundamentally different from everyday forms of investigation. But your question still stands: is pure mathematics... Read more
If freewill is being the sole author of your actions and there is never a point in life in which you are not influenced (i.e., chemical reaction, previous experience, genetic predisposition, bias, preconceived notions, instinct...), then can one really be the author of their action and exercise free will or is hard determinism the only plausible answer? -Eduardo Alpizar
Peter Lipton
November 27, 2005
(changed November 27, 2005)
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Even if determinism is incompatible with free will, a claim of hard determinism might be false or misleading. It is false if the world is in fact indeterministic. It is misleading if determinism is true, but free will would be impossible even if it weren't. That is, it may be that our ordi... Read more
Does knowledge require the impossibility of doubt?
Peter Lipton
November 26, 2005
(changed November 26, 2005)
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As philosophers typically analyze it, knowledge requires belief, truth, and some kind of justification or reliability; but not certainy or the impossibility of doubt. Yet when I tell my wife that I know that the play starts at 8pm and she replies, 'Are you certain?', I find it difficult to... Read more
As a beginner in philosophy, I got the impression that philosophy is all about arguments. You put in statements (premises), use some rules of argumentation to manipulate these premises, and reach other statements (conclusions). Is there a way to argue for the rules of argumentation themselves? I mean, we use them all the time but how do we know that they are true? What kind of rules would we use to prove the rules of argumentation? Can we use the same rules? Thanks.
Peter Lipton
November 26, 2005
(changed November 26, 2005)
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Many years ago a meteorologist told me that persistence forecasting compares favourably with other, more sophisticated rules for predicting the weather. When I asked the obvious question, she told me that persistence forcasting is the rule that says that the weather tomorrow will be the... Read more
According to statistics one in five people experiences depression. If depression is so common, how do we know it is an illness and not just a normal part of being human?
Marc Lange
November 26, 2005
(changed November 26, 2005)
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That is an excellent question. The distinction between health and illness is tremendously controversial. Some philosophers believe that the difference is fixed entirely by various facts about the natural world. These philosophers might point out that insofar as depression arises from the pro... Read more