Thomas Aquinas. He continues to impress me with his systems thinking. I'm not qualified enough to seriously criticize anything in his metaphysical system. He seems to have foreshadowed many future philosophical developments, and even his triad of the mind is strikingly similar to Peirce's theory of semiotics. Kant may be the best answer to Scholastics like Aquinas; not very contemporary Scholastics seem to really recognize Kant as a legitimate threat to their entire metaphysical enterprise.

However I do think Aquinas' ethics is more open for controversy. Natural law theory is unintuitive (to me) and reflects the attitude the Scholastics had at the time - the world was their oyster, ripe for the taking, and was also overflowing with teleology, thus making it easy to feel at home in the world. All you have to do is follow the telos of your natural kind and you'll do fine. I personally try to argue that this essentialist doctrine is nauseatingly oppressive, and puts the natural kind over individuality in terms of importance. I try to argue that part of the existential predicament of man is that he has no telos at all, thus teleological ethics are null. The ability to transcend effectively means humans no longer have a place in the immanent, where all the teleology is at.

I also take the route Kiekegaard and Nietzsche went and criticize how Aquinas seemed to think there was a universal purpose for humanity (what Nietzsche would have called nauseating, which I agree), and that his theological-metaphysics excludes personal experience, a la Kierkegaard's criticism of Hegelian systems. The idea that we'll all be part of some City of God (except for all the animals, cause fuck 'em) gives me a knee-jerk reaction of opposition.

That's the thing about system theories - they are intoxicatingly all-encompassing and yet oftentimes sideline other things in the process. They promise answers to everything and thus act as an intellectual crutch of sorts, the promise of a future complete understanding gives meaning and purpose to inquiry. In my case at least, devotion to an INCOMPLETE metaphysical system is fallacious and inauthentic.

It's also likely that Aquinas was pressured in some ways to synthesize Aristotelian metaphysics with Catholic dogma, which, unless Catholicism is "correct", means Aquinas essentially bastardized Aristotelian metaphysics.

G. E. Moore and his common-sense intuitionist philosophy.

"Here is one hand, and here is another, therefore there are at least two external objects, therefore an external world exists."

How the hell is this even an argument?!

Can't that be said for all academia though? Usually after you studied you are so specialized that it makes no sense to make it public to people because they don't understand. That is the essence of why we create groups in the first place, to gather with people who know all the relevant information on how to be a klu klux klan etc. — intrapersona

Every discipline has it's esotericism. It's just that philosophy, especially analytic philosophy, tends to be almost entirely esoteric. It's meaningless, worthless, and an Other to those who have never studied it.

Seriously, the analytic metaphysicians have some good stuff but it's also almost entirely separated from any relevant scientific inquiry. This means two things:

1.) There is no communication between the relevant sciences, especially physics and the biological sciences, and philosophy, specifically metaphysics.

2.) Because of this, metaphysical questions might be better suited for science, or relevant scientific theories are not being taken in account when metaphysicians "work".

Problems arise when you think you know everything and you actually don't. We see this on both sides and it's only really not a problem when you are knowledgeable and active in both philosophy and the relevant sciences. Philosophy divorced from science is pure, unaided speculation without natural constraints (it can come across more like intellectual art than actual inquiry; everyone tries to make the most aesthetically pleasing or excitingly surprising theory, even if it's outlandish), and science divorced from philosophy makes it crude and dogmatic.

There's philosophy of religion, but not religion of philosophy.

8-)

It seems you can have non-futile actions if a futile universe. What sense does it even make to call a universe futile though? If it has no purpose, then it is futile. I doubt we can find out the answer to that so the best we can do is imagine both states where it is futile and where it isn't and decide what the differences are. — intrapersona

I wouldn't say the universe itself is futile. Maybe it could be argued that it has a knack at creating futility. Or in a more absurdist light, the universe is programmed to maximize irony. Ha!

Actions, processes, goals, those sorts of things are futile, again in terms of a limiting context.

So does having a broken leg. Berating yourself over it won't make it any better, would it? — Question

Ignoring it doesn't really work either.

I don't mind analytic philosophy, in fact I study it often. It's just that it has the tendency to create over-specialization and cottage industries: professional philosophers writing for professional philosophers. Nobody else, except the oddball like myself who takes a glance at their work. Analytic philosophy, especially metaphysics and epistemology, is largely irrelevant to other fields and society at large.

Why should anyone 'suffer' from depression? — Question

Cause it sucks?!

but I find it fairly difficult to find those people who are interested and have the time. — Bitter Crank

I'm still looking. :s

Philosophers are a bunch of oddballs.

Last time I checked I was a classical liberal.

if you were asked to explain philosophy to someone who didn't know much about it... where would you start? — anonymous66

Yes, so long as they seem genuinely interested. When discussing philosophy with some friends a few months back, the topic came up: what even is philosophy? All sorts of answers (it's how you live!, it's like science but less cool!, it's kinda stupid!) were given until I, the great darthbarracuda, laid waste to the terrain and enlightened everyone with my unquestionably superior view, that philosophy is rational speculation into the nature of the world and humanity's relationship to it.

Many heads nodded in agreement and two days later I received an envelope in the mail asking if I wished to be the head lecturer at my university's philosophy department. I declined, of course, because I won't support the nihilistic regime known as contemporary analytic philosophy.

This is 100% true.

I'm going to be polemical here and say the people who are socially conservative and "religious" are not typically seen as the sharpest tool in the shed.

I won't deny that you can be very intelligent and be religious and socially conservative. But I will affirm that, at least in my experience, encounters with people of this dual nature tends to leaves a sour taste in my mouth. Both positions may be reasonable but from my own experiences the vast majority of participants are not.

In fact, now that I think about it, the same applies to the opposite spectrum. There are some really stupid liberal atheists.

No, I tend to keep to myself in regards to philosophy. Philosophical discussions with those who don't have a background in philosophy nor take the material seriously are usually disappointing in depth and field.

Futility is a limitation in terms of something else. Fighting a one-man revolution is an exercise in futility, for example. Trying to bring back the dead is futile. Proving God's existence on pure reason alone is an exercise in futility, despite what some super-sophisticated theologians might pretend to know.

Not everything is futile so long as it's described within a context that makes action worthwhile.

But if we're talking about the state of the world, where it's going, where we are going as a species, what we're doing and why we're doing it in the first place, all within a broad, existential cosmic context, then I would say it's pretty obvious that we spend a great deal of effort fighting the unstoppable force of entropy. That surely is futility.

The Sartreian leap into freedom, as I interpret it, involves accepting the absurd irrational character of life, as you put it. This is liable to give you the nausea of the novel's title, an existential despondency; it's only by the existential leap of choice, of decision, however absurd, that one makes oneself, and thereby makes one's contribution to making the world. — mcdoodle

Bennington does comprehensively show, however, that Kierkegaard's meaning was about 'folly' or foolishness not 'madness', a conclusion which has its own ramifications. — mcdoodle

I can't see how else we are to describe such an existentialist leap of faith, though, apart from irrational, absurd "madness". There has to be a good reason for why we ought to continue living. Otherwise why else should we continue living? Why take the leap of faith, why live absurdly?

Camus attempts an irrational reason for continuation - the aesthetic of a survivor, of a rebel. But this is surely irrational, as a revolutionary would not rationally choose to fight the government on his own. Playing a losing game or a highly risky game is similarly just plain stupid.

I say keep the likes away from here. I agree with , a voting system fucks everything up. It subconsciously influences people's decision-making.

If we have to bring back the like system, make it transparent so that only those receiving the likes are notified. Nobody really needs to know how popular an opinion is.

In that case they have a diagnosable mental illness. Crazy wishes are best suppressed with a little Thorazine. — Bitter Crank

Who gets to decide whose wishes are crazy?

Or what about the Platinum Rule: treat others how they want to be treated. Simple.

I fucking love Egypt.

If I've learned anything truly useful in college it's that coffee doesn't give you energy, it just keeps you from falling asleep.

"“Most people do not really want freedom, because freedom involves responsibility, and most people are frightened of responsibility.” - Sigmund Freud.

Unless you are Paris Hilton and have someone managing your life for you, being famous and great and all that is a lot of work and a big risk. Not many people want to do this, because most people aren't ambitious enough to really care about getting in the big leagues. So long as they get their morning coffee they are okay.

Even the engineers and scientists and whatnot that you mentioned are not usually "great". They're told what to study, what to build, what to invent. For every engineering team that comes up with a new fantastic invention, there's thousands of others that make your mouse-pad and your teacup.

Existence is a fullness which man can never abandon: to me that's what Sartre himself is trying to assert, through his character Roquentin, beyond the inner debate with reason and chance. — mcdoodle

Does Sartre find any way of overcoming the absurd, irrational character of life? His characters certainly seem to understand it.

Then you believe wrongly. It is not being dead that people fear but dying, the transition from life to death. The reason being that they expect it to be painful. This hardly suggests a deficient fear of pain. If anything we have an over-aggressive fear of pain which makes, as often as not, the anxiety about pain worse than the actual pain itself! — Barry Etheridge

It's probably both. People fear being dead and they also fear the process of dying. As for the over-aggressive fear of pain, I don't think it's the pain that is what makes people fear dying per se but the sense of loss and feeling that they'll "miss out" on everything else that makes people fear death.

It would be fun, maybe, if we had a month on the board where: — Terrapin Station

I would rather there not be requirements for membership apart from basic decency and respect.

If someone lives who is ignorant of the potential for great pain, and they live well, isn't their quality of life far better than someone who is acutely aware of every potential mishap and lives a life of fear? — Nerevar

Yes, I suppose this is correct. It is a double-edged sword. By understanding the possibility of horrible pain in the future, you might end up dooming yourself. But understanding also lets you live more ethically. So the acquisition of wisdom has an ethical side.

Yet remember that events that you once classified as horrible, like skinning your knee as a child, or being without a toy as an infant, can now be borne with ease, simply because you have endured so much worse as an adult. — Nerevar

It's also because we have an unconscious filter that prevents us from actually re-living these bad experiences, at least normally (see PTSD).

Experiences do not happen without your interpretation of them, so only you can determine if the pain of death will be greater or less than any pain that you have endured in your life. — Nerevar

It's not even just the pain of death, but any truly terrible pain. There is an obvious asymmetry in intensity between the possibility of pain and pleasure. Pain can get extraordinarily bad, and only relents when you fall unconscious. Pleasure doesn't do that to you. Nobody actually falls unconscious because of pleasure.

To put it another way, a person living in pain for much of their early life could find a partial cure for their ailment and live 60 years with only moderate pain, and be pleased and grateful that their suffering was lessened, even a little. — Nerevar

On the other hand, a person in moderate health could suffer from a debilitating disease for their final 60 years, in the same amount of pain as the first person, and be miserable the entire time. It's all a matter of perspective — Nerevar

I would say that horrible pain is not worth experiencing. But if you've already experienced it, it's over, you might as well move on. This doesn't justify the initial experience, though.

Yes.

Mass Effect.

So similar to how we assume there actually is an external world outside of our consciousness, or Hume's skepticism of causality?

This is the "seduction" of metaphysics that speculative realism talks about. Phenomenology is all cool and all, but what's really interesting is what the rest of the world is like, because the rest of the world could be radically different than anything we can imagine.

This doesn't follow. If our understanding of motion is of a particular kind of phenomena then even if this phenomena is caused by something "beyond" the phenomena, it would be a category error to say that this "something else" is motion. Rather this "something else" is just the cause of motion, with motion just being the particular kind of phenomena. Compare with being red and having a particular frequency of light. — Michael

I'm not sure I follow.

A ball moves towards me. In reality, this means that the ball is changing locations, traveling distance, in a specific discrete amount of time. But I do not actually experience the ball moving towards me, I experience a reconstruction of the episode, a painting of the real thing.

Consider how, if you cover up one of your eyes, it becomes much more difficult to see depth of field. The ball is still moving, but it's harder to register this because you aren't given enough information. Until it smacks you in the face, that is.

The phenomenal reality we experience everyday is a crude and limited reconstruction of the unknowable world beyond, a world apparently filled with mysterious dark matter and energy, curved space-time, and ruled by probability. Assuming there is such a world at all.

So what causes the experience of motion if it isn't necessarily actual motion? — apokrisis

The experience of motion is more like the experience of changing secondary properties. Sort of like how programs can model three-dimensionally but it's actually just a two-dimensional design with shading.

Isn't a change in our phenomenal world exactly how we understand motion anyway? Science is an empirical thing, after all. — Michael

Right, but if you don't move out of the way, that baseball is going to hit you. We register that there is a change going on in our phenomenal world, but we make a further assumption when we believe this change correlates to something actually moving outside us.

Apo's strange presentation of optical illusions shows this. We register change when there actually isn't any. There is a disconnect between what is the case and what seems to be the case. What seems to be the case are secondary properties. What is the case are primary properties.

No, again, motion is primary, but the experience of motion is secondary. All we're registering is a change in our phenomenal world.

So illusory motion and real motion look the same, but your primary and secondary quality distinction holds? — apokrisis

The appearance of motion is different than the actual motion itself.

So then, is motion a primary quality if what we experience doesn't have to be what is really there? — apokrisis

I mean, illusory experiences happen all the time. What is actually happening need not correspond to what we register, just as wavelength is not identical to color.

Clearly, the whole is greater than the sum of its parts, because as part of the whole, nerve cells, flower petals, and so on can do things that they can't do alone. Actually, as parts, nerve cells can't do much of anything. — Bitter Crank

This, I would say, is contentious. We could be mereological nihilists and think that the parts of the flower are arranged "flower-wise", but not believe that there is such a thing as a "flower".

So are the arrangements of parts themselves something? Is an arrangement a thing? I would argue that perhaps we ought to see arrangements, or structures, as something parts do. Thus complex static objects don't exist, but what we commonly see as complex static objects are really processes of parts all working together. The act of working together is "something".

As such, there are no strict boundaries between systems. The world is messy.

So how do we experience motion illusions under this kind of property dualism? — apokrisis

Is this supposed to be one of those knock-down a-HAH! arguments?

Something can be seen to be moving while actually not moving at all. Something can also be seen to be static and yet be quite dynamic.

I would of thought that when we discovered that red is a certain wavelength of the EM spectrum that is exuded by the type of material light is reflected from it would've meant that we did away with thinking "redness" is something instantiated universally by objects, that it is a thing in itself rather than just a physical occurrence. ?? — intrapersona

Yes, well we can make distinctions between different sorts of properties. If we go the dualist route, we can plausibly say that there are primary and secondary qualities. Primary qualities are things like mass, volume, shape, distance to/from, velocity, etc. Secondary qualities are things like color, magnitudes of experience, etc.

"Red" is not an EM wave with wavelength 620-740 nm. That is what red is caused by, but the experience of red is something different. Again under a dualist schema. Red is not a property of an object, but rather a property that an object causes us to experience.

I am not a physicalist, so I can only continue to speculate. My guess is that mass-energy is not considered a (universal) property in the same way that existence is not considered a predicate. — aletheist

But we use mass and energy as predicates with power. Things have different amounts of mass, different amounts of energy. We can measure how much mass or energy things have.

But then we're back at square one, still. If they are nothing but concepts, then when does it end? What concept is actually referring to something that exists?

Say the physicalist argues that whatever is physical is whatever has mass or energy or what have you. Then we simply have to ask, well, what is mass, what is energy? What could mass and energy be other than a property something has, or a kind of "stuff" that everything has? And how is this not a universal?

Sorry, I meant matter in the broad modern sense that includes energy and space-time. The point is that the physicalist denies the reality of non-material forms. — aletheist

But this is exactly what I am disputing, how can physicalism have a coherent definition of what "physical" entails or what "mass" or "energy" entail without appealing to something other than the physical, the massive, or the energetic?

In your view, what's the difference for nonphysicalists, then? — Terrapin Station

Nonphysicalists are those people who reject the doctrine that everything is "physical", whatever that entails precisely. Dualists are not physicalists, nor are idealists or anyone else like that.

I'm a physicalists who doesn't at all deny that there are properties. It's just that properties are physical particulars. Re this: "It's not physicalism if it posits there there are things in the world that aren't physical (whatever a particular species of physicalism considers 'physical' to denote, exactly)," to which you responded, "If that is what physicalism entails then I doubt anyone would actually want to call themselves a physicalist," I call myself a physicalist in the sense that you're saying no one would want to call themselves. — Terrapin Station

I can't say I understand what motivation you could have to hold such an extreme reductive view.

If properties are physical particulars, then what does is mean that the property of being a physical particular is a physical particular? This seems circular.

On my account, it simply refers to the fact that what there is is exhausted by matter, relations of matter and processes of matter. — Terrapin Station

Yes, but are these different arrangements of matter themselves made of matter? That's what is at issue here. Matter can only be part of the explanation, there has to be a Form as well. Neither can exist without the other.