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  • Mythology, Religion, Anthopology and Science: What Makes Sense, or not, Philosophically?
    [W]hat kind of fool thinks they only are alive and the world is dead? — unenlightened
    Well, I'm the kind of fool who thinks the world is undead: a shambling zombie that appears to be moving inexorable towards oblivion as every part(icle) of the cosmic corpse (including maggots like us) burns out, rots, decomposes, cools ... Ask any virus (or Schrödinger's Cat) – for (late) moderns "dead" & "alive" are indistinguishable. :smirk:
  • In Support of Western Supremacy, Nationalism, and Imperialism.
    ↪Bob Ross
    Fyi – I've not read this thread but, fwiw ...

    You & co seem to be conflating normative ethics (re: interpersonal harms) with applied ethics (re: structural/policy injustices), Bob. Consider this post reply to @Leontiskos from the thread The Breadth of the Moral Sphere
    https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/899132
  • Mythology, Religion, Anthopology and Science: What Makes Sense, or not, Philosophically?
    ↪T Clark
    :smirk:
  • Mythology, Religion, Anthopology and Science: What Makes Sense, or not, Philosophically?
    I enjoy mythic fiction, including Marion Zimmer Bradley and Bernard Cornwell. Being half Irish by descent, I am particularly interested in Celtic and British legends, including those in the Magbinon, Arthur and those surrounding Glastonbury. Tolkien also presents a fascinating journey into the mythic imagination. — Jack Cummins
    :nerd: :100: :sparkle:
  • What Are You Watching Right Now?
    22Jan69

    Thanks for Billy, George! :up:

    "You're in the group!" :cool:
  • What is meant by the universe being non locally real?
    What is meant by the universe being non locally real? — Darkneos
    Suppose spacetime is fundamentally entangled ...
  • Mythology, Religion, Anthopology and Science: What Makes Sense, or not, Philosophically?
    [Religions] also have associated metaphysics that guide people's understanding of the universe ... — T Clark
    I think rational-pragmatic philosophies aspire to much more than 'superstitiously living according to the folk stories of miracles and magic' canonized by religions (& cults).

    @Jack Cummins
  • Mythology, Religion, Anthopology and Science: What Makes Sense, or not, Philosophically?
    ↪Jack Cummins
    Apologies if the following rambles too far off-topic ...

    An excerpt of a post from a (2022) thread The Philosopher will not find God
    Recognizing that "God" does not explain anything (re: mythos) is what motivated the Presocratic proto-scientists (physiologoi) in Ionia & Elea to speculate on rational explanations (logos) for nature (phusis) and our minds (nous). — 180 Proof

    In other words, it seems g/G is just a primitive – atavistic – personification of (an) unknowable-inexplicable power(s), likely beginning as animism (i.e. the world is enchanted aka "magical thinking"). Later Mythos had been invented to ethno-narratively memorialize such personified – anthropomorphized – power(s) by and around which (the) cultus formed and then, iirc, medieval scholars had called "religion" (from religare). For two and half millennia the Western philosophical tradition has striven to exorcize, or domesticate (deflate), ineliminable Mythos (i.e. narrative g/G-of-the-gaps pathos) by making explicit – reflectively meditating on – (its) Logos. :fire:

    (2020) An excerpt of a post from your thread What is the purpose of dreaming and what do dreams tell us?
    Logos confronting, or reflecting on, mythos (but within the hermeneutical context of mythos) was once the grounds for doing philosophy and, I think, still is; otherwise, Jack, why bother? — 180 Proof

    Also, Jack, from your (2021) thread To What Extent Does Philosophy Replace Religion For Explanations and Meaning?
    https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/614799
  • A Deist Creation Myth
    ↪Brendan Golledge

    We wanted to fix what was wrong with Deism, ... by determining why it failed. — Gnomon
    Afaik, deism is just 'the god of theism' on its day off (or on vacation), and so, if the latter is a fiction (e.g. ontologically separate – "transcendent" – from existence aka "nonexistent"), then the former must also be fictional. :chin:

    Alternatively, by analogy, just as "the big bang" is a (measureable by current physics) twist in a Möbius-like loop process that marks only a (ca.13.8 billion year old) developmental change to the latest version of the universe and not "the beginning" (à la Hartle-Hawking), pandeists speculate that 'the current phase – observable, explicable nature – in the eternal cycle of of existence (à la Laozi, Epicurus, Spinoza, Nietzsche) is only an undead-like decaying corpse of (the) deity that will reincarnate and subsequently destroy itself (à la P. Mainländer) and then reincarnate again infinitely many times (à la the multiverse and/or R. Penrose's conformal cyclical cosmos). Imo, this myth of ontological immanence is much less unintelligible (i.e. question-begging, evidence-free, nihilistic) than typical transcendence – dualist / supernaturalist – myths, and thereby more rational. :fire:
  • Epistemology of UFOs
    ↪Tom Storm

    I think the UFO/alien folks are looking for meaning beyond the mundane. — schopenhauer1
    Yes, that's why I wrote
    "UFOs" = angels & ghosts — 180 Proof
  • Buddhism and Ethics: How Useful is the Idea of the 'Middle Way' for Thinking About Ethics?
    As far as the relationship between ethics and religion (including esotericism) the two evolved together. — Jack Cummins
    :chin: Why do you believe this?

    For instance, the ancient Hebrews would not have survived as a "people" – viable social group – "wandering for 40 years in the wilderness" had they not (usually) observed moral prohibitions against murder, lying, theft & adultery BEFORE they had received "commandments" (and subsequent Mosaic Laws).

    As a reasonable generalization, h. sapiens must have survived for at least a hundred millennia or so as a eusocial – instinctually moral – species BEFORE they had invented "religion", so why do you say "the two evolved together"? Clearly, religions much later had coopted ethical norms, no?
  • A Deist Creation Myth
    ↪Brendan Golledge
    Pandeism (as I've explicitly pointed out) means that 'the deity' BECAME the universe and therefore 'the deity' does not exist while the universe exists. "Everything is holy" is either animism or pantheism, not pandeism. Your supernatural-bias blinds you to what I've actually written – unless you haven't even read or comprehended my posts (& links).
  • Epistemology of UFOs
    ↪ssu
    ↪schopenhauer1
    I agree with you both but iff the "Roswell, NM '47 crash & Area 51" 1950s era flying saucer (+ alien abductions) myth happens to be true. IMHO, the "UFO scare" was a mass psy-op product of 'Cold War nuclear war anxiety and espionage paranoia' to distract the public from – then officially cover for – various covert military and surveillance test aircraft (like today's drones, etc) or LEO sats. Contra the prevailing anthropo/geo-centricity, I'm skeptical that Earth is exo-scientifically worthy of any interstellar traveling ETIs survellance / contact efforts (e.g. "UFOs"):

    (2022) Convergence of our species with aliens ...
    https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/774893

    (2022) UFOs ...
    https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/814458
  • A Deist Creation Myth
    Before the beginning, there was God. — Brendan Golledge
    "Before the beginning" = north of the north pole :roll:

    Nothing was before God, and neither does God depend on anything else.
    Again, it makes more sense – cogently, parsimoniously, naturalistically – to substitute existence (or laws of nature (à la Laozi or Epicurus, Spinoza or Einstein)) for "God".

    Fwiw, my own No Creator Myth, etc ...
    https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/569517 (further links included)

    ↪Gnomon
    ↪kindred
    How is it that "creator" is not merely an unwarranted anthropomorphization / personification of chance? Or that cosmos is not one of countless phase transitions of chaos? :chin:

    To infer 'intentional agency' from current cosmology is, at best, unsound (i.e. :sparkle: -of-the-gaps).
  • Buddhism and Ethics: How Useful is the Idea of the 'Middle Way' for Thinking About Ethics?
    ↪praxis
    :up:

    NB: Nietzsche's suggestion that belief in life after death, being an immaterialist or being religious (e.g. a Christian) is nihilism – this life, this world, Nature-devaluing – makes sense to me.

    ↪Jack Cummins
    I don't see what your response has to do with the substance of my previous post. In reference to the thread title (topic). As a moral naturalist¹ I find "esotericism" like Buddha's "Middle Way" – though it can be somewhat interesting – useless "for thinking about ethics".

    (2023)
    https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/857773 [1]
  • Can the existence of God be proved?
    ↪kindred
    You made the claim so you have the burden of proof. Believe whatever you fancy, sir – apparently, you don't understand the argument from poor design. or why your "belief" is fallacious as I've pointed out
    ↪180 Proof
    .
  • Can the existence of God be proved?
    My beliefs are based on observation of the natural world which as I’ve stated before shows signs of intelligence, design whatever you wanna call it. This to me constitutes evidence of God. — kindred
    Compositional fallacy —> (believer's) confirmation bias. Also: your "creator deity / intelligent design" belief, sir, is refuted by the argument from poor design.

    Just not possible.
    How do you/we know this?
  • A Deist Creation Myth
    ↪kindred
    Yes, I don't see why 'Spinoza's God' (i.e. natura naturans) could not have produced – evolved-developed within the constraints of its 'physical laws' – superhuman beings (with technoscientific mastery (perhaps several orders of magnitude more advanced than our own today (re: Clarke's Third Law)) which h. sapiens have worshipped – superstitiously misrecognized – as "gods".
  • A Deist Creation Myth
    ↪kindred
    Why assume existence "comes from" anything else or is "created"?
  • A Deist Creation Myth
    Yet in God, in the abstract, exists all else that could be. — Brendan Golledge
    It makes more sense to me – cogently, parsimoniously, naturalistically – to substitute existence (or laws of nature (à la Laozi or Epicurus, Spinoza or Einstein)) for "God".
  • Buddhism and Ethics: How Useful is the Idea of the 'Middle Way' for Thinking About Ethics?
    I do appreciate the idea of 'the middle way' in Buddhism as a basic point for balanced approaches to ethics. It looks beyond the idea of 'perfectionism' in morality and ethics as being about real life dilemmas. This goes beyond the idea of ethics and morality as being about salvation on a personal level. — Jack Cummins
    Afaik, "perfectionism" & "salvation" are religious ideals, not ethical principles. For avoiding extremism (or dogmatism) in moral judgment, I prefer more naturalistic (adaptive) approaches such as Aristotle's aretaic golden mean, Epicurus' disutilitarianism and/or J. Dewey's pragmatic ethics to the esoteric "middle way" of Buddhist practice.
  • What are you listening to right now?
    Oldies and Some Goodies

    Side One

    1956


    https://youtu.be/cXXw_5G7Fhk?si=iuFXB1S5KNJDw-DQ

    1957


    https://youtu.be/no-nuFTHetE?si=BNmAgY6FwUyv7cbq

    1958


    https://youtu.be/HbsyDHxca7Y?si=02vgpqJFsLvWSo0r

    1960


    https://youtu.be/6AJGrcx_PIY?si=KH_r3JBUT3NG37By

    1961


    https://youtu.be/EDtBq6FnlCY?si=wz_4mhaVb-Yhk5As

    1962


    https://youtu.be/FZy3T0IhQ2o?si=7wH7D87AF5mBi0zc

    1962


    https://youtu.be/7yVM4LrWTl4?si=1oQBbSYMJpyuGahH


    bonus:

    1970


    https://youtu.be/o6iaSWSB7rE?si=3_J_6j9rcLVjn7vC
  • Epistemology of UFOs
    ↪Hanover
    Just as atheists are less likely than religious people to "believe in" angels & ghosts. As you're well aware, we (confabulatory metacognitive) h. sapiens are quite often (virally) delusional. :pray: :nerd:
  • Epistemology of UFOs
    ↪schopenhauer1
    "UFOs" = angels & ghosts :roll:
  • "Potential" as a cosmological origin
    Is there a distinction in quantum theory between "nothing" and "nothing-ness?" — Count Timothy von Icarus
    I do not think either term is used in QT. Afaik, "nothing-ness" is a nonsense term only used in naive metaphysics.
  • "Potential" as a cosmological origin
    ↪Count Timothy von Icarus
    I think you are (like most others) confusing nothing with nothing-ness (which is self-contradictory or impossible). I agree F. Wilczek is not talking about nothing-ness when he says "nothing" and neither am I in my previous post
    ↪180 Proof
    .
  • The case against suicide
    [No] reason to really struggle and fight for a place in the world. No reason to really pursue anything. One can just end [one's] life and be done with the pursuit and struggle. — Darkneos
    So be a bum. Many people give up, get off the hamster wheel and drop out of "the struggle" e.g. monastics, hermits, homeless, (RV) nomads, off-the-grid preppers, et al. Ancient traditions of (e.g.) Epicureans & Kynics celebrated this marginal way of life as attaining "ataraxia". For some, dumb animal "happiness" suffices. :strong:

    You (all of us) are going to die soon enough anyway so why the rush to end yourself? :eyes:

    As pointed out already, suicide is a permanent (non)solution to a temporary (non)problem – thus, irrational (or pathological). That there is no inherent reason to live demonstrates that there is no inherent reason to kill yourself. You were Born. You Learn. You Love-Lose. (You unLearn.) You will Die. No "argument" for or against "life" – or the lack of an "argument" – changes these facts of life, so stop whining and get over yourself, dude. :death: :flower:
  • "Potential" as a cosmological origin
    Addendum to
    https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/953124

    To go beyond the Actual (physical) to inquire into what's logically Possible (meta-physical). — Gnomon
    This assumes that "beyond the Actual" – possibilism¹ – makes sense whereas beyond the merely "logically possible" – actualism² – is a much more reasonable and parsimonious metaphysical approach.

    [1] countlessly many merely possible worlds of which the actual world is only one possible world (S. Kripke, D. Lewis)

    [2] factually possible ways the actual world could have been (or can be described / modeled) i.e. actual world-versions rather than "possible worlds"

    a more (orthodox) academic summary ...
    https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/possibilism-actualism/

    @Ben96
  • The case against suicide
    ↪unenlightened
    :100: .
  • The case against suicide
    This is the first and last question that philosophy must answer - 'What's the point?' The answer is "love". If you wonder what love is, I can only tell you that it is what you lack, whenever you ask this question. Suicide makes sense if there is no love, but only self. We are not here to be satisfied, but to become satisfactory. — unenlightened
    :fire:
  • The case against suicide
    I’ve struggled to find a good argument against suicide ... — Darkneos
    Well I have never found a "good argument" for suicide either. Afaik, empirically, suicide does not solve any unsolvable problems or change anything that cannot be changed (e.g. past events, past actions, persisting consequences) and often only deeply harms the suicide's own family, former lovers and/or close friends.

    If you are struggling, sir, seek professional clinical help ASAP.

    ↪T Clark
    :up:
  • Dare We Say, ‘Thanks for Nothing’?
    The human condition in a square bracket. We have caused most of our own misery - not entirely unknowingly, because there was always at least one 'enemy of the people' who warned us and was overruled for all the wrong reasons. — Vera Mont
    :100:

    Those who have almost nothing are usually thankful for the little they have.
    Those who have almost everything usually think they deserve better.
    — unenlightened

    The whole point of institutional religion.
    :fire:
  • Ontological status of ideas
    So, chairs exist and numbers subsist? Is that a common understanding? — Art48
    Yeah "common" for philosophers, iirc, since A. Meinong¹. Simply put: existents are causally relatable to each other and subsistents (which are only instantiable via existents) are logically / grammatically relatable but are not causally related at all.

    https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nonexistent_objects#Meinong's_jungle [1]
  • What are you listening to right now?
  • "Potential" as a cosmological origin
    Why is there something instead of nothing? — Benj96
    This is a pseudo-question because of its 'something/nothing' (fluctuation/vacuum) false dichotomy. The physical fact is 0.999 of every something (nonzero dimensional X) is nothing (zero dimension).
    'Nothing' is unstable. — Frank Wilczek, theoretical physicist
    Also, there is no ultimate "why" that doesn't beg the question except There Is No Ultimate "Why" – existence (i.e. fundamental disorder-dynamics-void fluctuations ... 'necessary contingency') is the brute fact.

    ↪T Clark
    :up: :up:
  • In defence of the Principle of Sufficient Reason
    Since the PSR is a first principle of metaphysics, like logic, then it is part of the fabric of reality. — A Christian Philosophy
    Fallacy of misplaced concreteness (i.e. mapmaking =/= terrain). At most the PSR is, "like logic", a foundational property of reason.
  • Cosmology & evolution: theism vs deism vs accidentalism
    NB: a cosmos (i.e. an emergent, autopoietic, dissipative fractal-structure) is only one of countless phase transitions of chaos (i.e. void, formlessness, randomness) – like sound in silence or a wave on the ocean or a cloud in the sky or a spot on the sun ... anthropic illusions of "design" :eyes:
  • What is creativity?
    I define creativity as producing intentional accidents (i.e. disciplined improvisation).
  • In defence of the Principle of Sufficient Reason
    ↪A Christian Philosophy
    So what is the sufficient reason (why) for the "PSR" (Why) or any so-called "sufficient reason" (why) as such?
  • In science there is progress and answers. In philosophy there is 2500 years of mental masturbation
    Modern science is an artifact of 2,500 years of philosophy.
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