General Philosophy

I was watching a program on the BBC yesterday where a coupple were looking at various houses to buy. They wanted to spend about £500,000 and get somthing with a few acres of grounds to live there high quality life in a village. I on the other hand have a nice flat, with a bed, desk, lamp, bathroom, comfy chair but no sofa. All clean, tidy, nicely furnished, tuned to perfection and well cared for. Of all the things I have those that are only my own are stored there. This place has just one room and this is on purpose. Sometimes I go into one of my many kitchins in the city center to eat, or walk in my extensive gardens full of parks and other recreational green are…

(Isaac Balshevis Singer) There are several experimental and theoretical results from science that demonstrate the above quote (although there is debate about their interpretation): 1) The Libet delayed choice experiment: electrodes are attached to a subject's head and the impulses and time measured when a.) the subject decides he/she is going to punch a button, b.) when the button is punched. The interesting thing is that there is a pre-decision rise of the brain potential (starting as much as 2 seconds before the subject is consciously aware of his/her decision), so something is stirring in that mass of jelly we call the brain to compel? or recognize? a decision. Lots …

I joined this forum because I thought I had a brilliant idea that should be shared with the science community. Sadly I was wrong but it did get me thinking, if I am unable to recognise my own incompetence, can anyone?If, for instance, a doctor miss' a diagnoses through lack of knowledge and is later correctly diagnosed. Would the doctor recognise his/her incompetence and seek the knowledge he/she lacks or would he/she simply shrug and say with a sheepish grin "oops missed that one" and carry on with the day. From what I have observed of human nature I would say the latter is most likely. In industry whistleblowing or flagging up incompetence is more likely to be met with …

I have heard from people who would rather be anonymous that manifestation is scientifically proven. Is this true? I have no idea. Then my existential crisis kicks in. I would think that everybody sees, and tastes, and has all of their senses different. So, then what color is an apple really? Well, it has no color. It is just photons which don't have a true color. But is the universe real? I don't know, so all I would say is that your brain is the universe. As there is no "true" universe so it makes random crap to make it make sense. We don't know if we are a brain in a jar, making up consciousness so everything can make sense. Therefore, your conscious mind must control s…

And if extinct can it come back again or life was just an accidental.

Imagine: you have 3 or 4 children from beginning school to just starting senior school (5 -12 yrs); indeed, you may already have. I'd like you to consider their relative emotional maturity and life-awareness at those ages to the harsh realities of life; typically.for those ages. Scenario: You are diagnosed with cancer, not terminal at this point, You are put on the relevant therapy, which is very harsh on your body; chemo or radiotherapy probably. At the end of the treatment you go into remission. with all the side effects and anxiety well to the fore in your mind. Four months later, your primary cancer has become metastatic and spread to the major organs. You are t…

Over the past decade, I have formulated my philosophy of life. I have benefited greatly from the process, and I hope that you will benefit from reading the document. A brief summary and link to the full 14-page document may be found here: url deleted I am posting here in order to solicit feedback so that the document may be improved. I look forward to a constructive discussion.

I am at the stage in the life where I have not specialised and am thinking about a career in a scientific field, most likely in biology. However, I have always found thinking about future life choices difficult. I might describe myself as nihlistic, the fact that my lifespan is so short and how the human race will eventually die out is often on my mind. Truth be told, I dislike my existence as a human -- to live for such short a time and to be controlled by so many instincts and requirements is something I'd rather be without. During the course of my existentialist musings, I often think about ways in which I could provide a permanent assistance to mankind -- to me this …

Hi, I was thinking about crime and how a good community leader could reduce poverty and crime in a neighbourhood by providing opportunities and connecting people. In the modern day, people in poor communities have little sense of belonging and meaning since all food, water, shelter are provided by governments. This creates whole in the lives of many poor people and leads them to form criminal organizations that fulfil the void created by modern society, allowing young people the opportunity to gain wealth, status, enjoyment and a sense of belonging. I would argue that a great and intellectual leader could organize people in these communities without the need o…

But then again, anything without truth is a waste of time. Take history. I see that there is no history section around here. Which is just as well. Because Napoleon said, "History is a set of lies agreed upon." And Tolstoy said, "History would be a wonderful thing. If it were only true." Much of history comes about through the winners of some conflict. As it is said, "History is written by the victors." Also, it is said, "In war, truth is the first casualty." For the winning side, it remains a casualty. I could tell you truths about history and back them up that would cause the paint on your walls to peal. But not here. I know this because I have been banned …

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/obituaries/2024/04/19/daniel-dennett-philosopher-atheist-darwinist/ Daniel Dennett, the American philosopher, who has died aged 82, was, with Richard Dawkins, a leading proponent of Darwinism and one of the most virulent controversialists on the academic circuit. Dennett argued that everything has to be understood in terms of natural processes, and that terms such as “intelligence”, “free will”, “consciousness” “justice”, the “soul” or the “self” describe phenomena which can be explained in terms of physical processes and not the exercise of some disembodied or metaphysical power. How such processes operate he regarded as an em…

Here’s a ridiculous question....and I bet it will get loads of abuse....This is hard for me to put into writing, If different colours of light are different frequency’s of light that we can see, and higher frequencies are ultra violet and microwaves that we can’t see. Maybe aliens look at earth, and all they see are ultra violet light and radio waves as their eyes have a different frequency response. They look at our plannet and think it’s all blurry and weird..... kind of what Jupiter looks like to us.... maybe when we look at Jupiter we’re actually seeing their WiFi network or something.

Hello, I am a philosophy student and I'm in need of some information for a project I am working on. What I'm interested in is to research the origin of land property, which canonically in philosophy is thought as a peculiarity of men, but it seems to me that it can be considered more as a characteristic of predatory animals in general (the reasoning being that as far as I know if a group or a single predator gets in an area where another group of predators resides there will be confrontation), but, with this said, I'm in no way an expert, so I was hoping that someone more competent could confirm or debunk my hypothesis. Btw…

Only when we recognise our own failings, do we understand similar frailties in others. My question, why, when we ALL understand ourselves and our failings very well, do we choose to judge others so harshly for having similar failings?

so i am a guy of zeros and ones. i like logic, maths and science. i am not religious at all and have no beliefs at all. , or so i think. the concept of "believing" something annoys me. i either know it or dont know it. and if i dont know it i either want to know it or will stay undecided until i do know it. so in my discussions with religious people i always ask them, "why do you believe something, why not just accept the concept of either knowing or not knowing"? but is there really such a thing? can we really "know" something or is everything just a level of belief?

I have been reading articles about rumination and was wanting to hear whether it is possible to have positive effects from rumination. I definitely like to mull over the negative until it is all I can see, but socially I have been very successful thanks to this. Thoughts?

First off, let me mention that I am in no way a credible or experienced speaker in any science field, nor am I just a crazy person coming here to spew random letters at you. I'd just like to relieve myself with my thoughts and have your own opinion on my view of us humans here on Earth. Science, a largely studied and very complex field of who we are. Humans, the only intelligent life being (that we know), creating, destroying, all while on a piece of rock floating through space. There are so many things we do not know, such as what is out beyond what we've scratched the surface on in space, or even our oceans. We are literally specs of atoms and molecules that have come …

"Here is a tree in the garden. And every summer it produces apples. We call it an apple tree. Because the tree apples. That's what it does. Alright, now here is a solar system inside a galaxy. And one of the peculiarities of this solar system,at least on planet earth, the thing peoples. In just the same way that an apple tree apples." - Alan Watts

I am blown away by the argument that democracy is not rule by reason. Even King James understood the people were demanding rule by reason, when he defended his rule by saying he always gives the people his reasoning. Past revolutions may have been about getting better rulers, but the American Revolution was about having a say in how we are governed. Jefferson explains this: If Jefferson is not talking about rule by reason, what is he talking about?

You to know! ,,,to know best , is not to know what is not understood. So! how much do you understand ,,,with make you thing, you understand more than others ,when come to theory :

why we don't understand something?

I don't know. In a different science forum I have asked how we might come to moral decisions without religion, and that thread is not going so well. Actually the answers to such questions are frightening to me. It appears without at least some philosophy there are people interested in how things work who never question the morality of anything. Amoral science might not be a good thing, and it is what Zeus was afraid of.

"Nothing is good or bad; thinking makes it so" To what extent is the premise of this statement true? There are numerous examples out there that have highlighted some validity for the statement. For e.g.. the concept of demons and angels. For some reason...demons are being viewed differently in some aspects. Yes intrinsically their characteristics model "evil" but it is their actions that is the end game yes? I see this a lot in animation and games and the saying reflects it. Could anyone relate it to other things in reality?

Studies have been found that once all of your basic needs are met, any more money that you make is only going to bring you temporary happiness but then you go back to your base line of happiness. Do you all think it is not possible for a homeless man to be happy? Can the brain be trained to be happy no matter what the situation?

I showed a few of these in my Philosophy of Mind class today. Some of them are pretty amazing (and more or less accurate). Fair warning, they contain profanity.