This is a very difficult question I think. After a bit of consideration, I would like to know whether existence is preferable to non-existence.


If I'm interpreting your question right, then the answer according to Gödel's incompleteness theorems is that it can't.

Deduction being the process by which you move fom two true premises or propositions to a conclusion (Aristotle the Syllogism), a logically valid method of gaining knowledge, yet if you cannot know the momentum and position of a particle (Schroedinger (if that is how you spell it)) then rationalism as a means of gaining knowledge is somewhat obselete. However induction seems to be still valid. For an example of induction if you were standing on a bridge and you saw 10 white swans swim past, you could predict (hypothesis) that all swans are white, with a small amount of accuracy, et.c. for 100, 1000...However it only takes one black swan to prove this wrong. Hence, Karl Popper, a contemporary philosopher said that scientific knowledge is implicitly disprovable only. Yet it is the only method that we can use in our search for knowledge

In my imagination the mankind will destroy the earth one day, as people are not able to manage the problems in the whole world anymore. On the contrary! instead of to solve (big) problems, mankind's problems is getting worse and bigger all the time. Most of them underestimate the dangers of their habits. Without humans the world has a chance to save itself. I guess the existence of humans will be over before the existence of the earth has gone by. I hope so at least.

In reality things are much more complicated, all markets are mixed- to have some degree of freedom and control.
What's the point of arguing that, absolute FREE/OWNED market is far more better than the other? I truly believe, the mixed type is the best for human beings. And it really depends on the circumstances to adjust how free the market should be.

Except claiming it is immoral and shouldn't be done on this basis damages their freedom which is also immoral, otherwise it would make sense to view all discussion and insults immoral as they lead to hurt feelings and everyone would be expected to live their lives as their family desires. It isn't a simple issue and you need to weight up whether their freedom to decide what happens to their body is above some ones desire to see their family treated well even if against an individuals wishes.

A while ago a friend and I were chatting and he had told me about a paradox he came up with concerning our beliefs. It's displayed in the statements below, both of which many of us will hold true.

1) For every given belief we hold, we know it to be true (for if we did not think it true it would not be a belief).

2) We do not think that every belief we hold is true.

Thoughts on this? How do we go about solving this paradox? What implications does it have for knowledge?

Our opinions are true to ourselves. You see, there's opinion and there's fact. You can't state an opinion as true, so while you personally believe it to be true you do not state that it is true for everybody. I'm not sure if my muddled thoughts make sense

Just the inane ramblings of a madman. I wouldn't pay too much attention. :)

Legendary.

It would take staggering computing power to record the momentum, spin, and interactions of every elementary particle in the universe at an arbitrarily large refresh rate.

But one could argue that about any academic field of study. I'm not sure that telling people they 'don't know enough to understand' is acceptable. Certainly the excellent current movement in science communication demonstrates that it is possible to make lay-people understand science.

Then you can admit that your okay with inequality within our own already terribly unequal society??
There's a great study called the Spirit Level by Wilkinson and Pickett, i suggest giving that a read.

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It sounds like you've swallowed an essay question on Heidegger. What makes you think that permissive societies are particularly about the 'private sphere' of family and home?

When a kind of crime goes unpunished the person who does it takes the lack of meaningful consequence as society's blind indifference , or even acceptance, of what they did.
They will either hate people, or gain a quietly perverse pleasure, from people not caring more about their part. Either way, their respect for people will not become better. Their ways need to be examined, discussed, punished a bit, in order for social wounds to heal or the society will quietly bleed to death, affecting the young's quality of life more than anyone, instead under its own hypocrises of having supposedly changed'.

What kind of poll wouldn't give the choice 'both scenarios imply that maths is beautiful which I do not, or do not necessarily, agree with'.

You even said in your post 'Why should the laws of Nature be, among all the possible ones, beautiful?'

So why not have that fully reflected in the choices?

But it's still interesting to wonder why we are content to gloss over the details of arguments and are often satisfied with incomplete or inconsistent ideas. Even philosophers whose role is to question everything and seek rational justification for their arguments still often rely deep down on faulty inconsistent intuitions. It may just be brain economy, but i'm not sure about this. How much more energy does deep (abstract, lateral, sceptical, or highly logical) thinking require compared to 'normal' thinking?

Modified theory: Perhaps we need an emotional aspect to understanding to help us 'know' whether we understand an idea or concept. The 'aha!' or lightbulb feeling is developed to let our conscious mind know when it fully comprehends an idea. Intuitive logical fallacies can trick the brain, and we are falsely informed that we understand the idea with the lightbulb feeling. However when it comes to applying the idea the logical fallacy/inconsistency becomes apparent and therefore makes it difficult for us to articulate the idea coherently. Thoughts?

Is it not a slippery slope into excusing all behaviour though?

Surely not everything can be relative - infanticide, murder, rape etc.

It's one thing to explain cultural reasons for the behaviour, but why can we not say that these things are absolutely wrong?

I wasn't saying that your whole research essay was pointless - the question of whether feral children have a critical period for language development is a scientifically important one with real consequences. It's best settled empirically/scientifically, and the research you've read on it, and consolidated, will hopefully produce a great, solid essay. Wondering over whether they're humans, however, seems to be mere definitional quibblings of absolutely no consequence or importance.

And, anyway, I did give you an answer to the question of what is "human nature".

What I said was that your question was at best question-begging and, at worst, unintelligible. It's like me asking "what is the table-nature?" or "what is pig-nature?" I can list things which all pigs have in common, if you want. But you assume there must be some common "human nature" in your question, which is question-begging. I hate it when vague and obscurantist terms are used in academic research.

But, anyway, if you want an Essentialist's response: Humans tend to be able to reason in a way in which other animals do not (though biologically-similar mentally-retarded counter-examples might challenge that clam). Humans appear to think reflectively, they often act in accordance with moral systems, they are often motivated by passions - governed by the sovereign powers of "pain and pleasure", to use Bentham's language - often self-interested but also capable of acting with appreciation of other people's interests as their goal, like other animals they feel pain, and so forth and such like. Identities are often grasped dialogically, through interaction with others. Bleh.

As for whether language is a necessary condition for thought; I have no empirical evidence either way, and the question cannot be settled through other means. The Sapir-Whorf hypothesis would suggest not, and I would find it difficult to reason without some sort of linguistic apparatus in which to frame ideas. I anticipate Wittgenstein being cited as a support of the hypothesis, but I'm not certain he would say that you can't think without language, merely that philosophical problems are a result of language games. That doesn't necessarily commit you to the belief that thought cannot exist without language. Again, bleh.

X

I don't really understand what new idea we're supposed to be discussing. No, the human brain very probably can't imagine true nothingness, and obviously, if we are reduced to nothing, we couldn't possibly be aware of it.

I've just finished Pinker's book, I've found it very informative but only a few bits relate directly to what I'm writing about. I've done all my research which includes 14 books and god only knows how many websites but it's actually required that I gather opinions from the public as part of my research, so that's what I'd like here.

The title of the topic is bad IMO, it implies that we only use our brains solely for movement, which is definitely not the case.

so you are saying that the word does not strictly apply to those of us alive?

I read somewhere that human consciousness is older than earth and its like a light travelling along the universe, and is totally separate from our body i am quite doubtful about if its eternal but can be pretty sure that it exists without brain, mind or ****what physical things. listening to those who shared about their
near death experiences


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Totally agree, a.k.a. "Everyone's equal, but some are more equal than others." It's a good point that nature does dictate survival of the fittest/getting my genes spread etc. which selfishness and greed all play a part in. But if the introduction of technology like brainwashing were put in place to make everyone nice and selfless, what would societal result be? Assume all natural instinct is negated and effectiveness is 100%.

I think a good way of putting it would be self confidence is a rational belief in yourself and arrogance is unconditional and irrational. Like patriotism is rational support for your country and nationalism is an irrational and unconditional, maybe?

I think they can have similar effects but stem from different causes. Self confidence from self respect and arrogance from self aggrandisement.

I think that hits the nail on the head for defining it :D

I don't believe that the world has yet unified enough to be sent in a single direction but there are certainly regional influences. People as a whole in Europe are fairly liberal and in the USA are fairly right wing and i think policy in these places are being driven by the people so to speak.

On a spiritual level it may sound silly but in recent years I've come to believe that all living things are linked somehow in some way but we simply lack the ability to comprehend it. Starwars probably gets close to hitting the nail on the head (the first minute or so)...





I think "more collective" is the wrong term for human development but rather than because we live in a world of grater globalization and transparency that rather than 1 person very quickly you get 3 or 4 geniuses working on the same problem. At any rate the pace of development is increasing substantially.

"If you build a home in sand, it'll only wash away"

It isn't from anyone famous it's just from a song but it feels like it means something more than just lyrics.

EDIT: Never mind.

If you lose parts of your episodic memory, you will probably still remember certain facts, and still have certain emotional attachments.