All Questions

I just watched the movie "Cloud Atlas", and I am having trouble understanding the metaphysics behind it. I would like to know in terms of which theory the movie could be explained? How can I unite ...

It is understandable that what Religions are speaking about is in some sense non-reachable by scientific method. Matters like what is the origin of the whole universe, of existence, whether there is a ...

In many religions, for example, the Abrahamic ones, there exists a place of eternal punishment for those who live in violation of God's commandments. Assuming an infinitely-long afterlife, in which "...

Is it possible to conclude, whether similarity or difference is more fundamental notion? Is there any support from e.g. biology as to whether our senses support similarity more than difference? From ...

In Nature of Necessity (1974), Plantinga writes: The distinction between necessary and contingent truth is as easy to recognize as it is difficult to explain to the sceptic's satisfaction. ...we ...

According to infinitism:"No reason is sufficiently justified in the absence of a further reason. That is, there are no foundational reasons". Pretend that somehow there was a statement whose chain of ...

As a comment to an answer Conifold mentioned that "Causes may not require any energy to produce the effect". After thinking about that, I couldn't come up with any such causes outside of metaphysical ...

I consider myself a utilitarian and in my conception of it, happiness and suffering are distinct from pleasure and pain. I came to this conclusion by noting that I could be in pain but happy, or ...

Bertrand Williams describes a thought experiment involving a swapping machine. What does his hypothetical machine do? How does he think we should identify A and B after the machine? Is he right? ...

Why does human life have innate value over that of other animals? Why is it wrong to murder another human, but morally permissible to hunt or fish?

(I have in mind here, something similar to "uniqueness" proofs in math. I think if we want to name something, we should show both that it exists and is unique.) (By "divine attributes", I mean ...

What is the rational, or most rational, response to finding out you're about to die? Not just to mortality, but that there's little more you can do in your life, and you're soon going to be, or are, ...

Diverse, contradictory, and bizarre as they are, people commonly feel that everyone ought to conform to their culture’s moral norms and even feel violators deserve punishment, though perhaps that ...

Some people place humans as 'higher animals' because we are uniquely capable of rational thought, while most other animals are not. This assumes that the trait of rationality is superior to other ...

Is "physicality precedes spiritual" a view or a state of nature? Are there views that would question this kind of "physicalism"? Perhaps one can find some dichotomy in expressing the idea through ...

As Nietzsche differentiated there are two kind of good: this question focus is on the contrary of bad, not the contrary of evil. There are quite a lot possibilities to define the common term "good". ...

Descartes says "I think therefore I am", isn't he using psychologism, by using a personal experience of thinking? I had read someone claim he was against foundationalism, or specifically psychologism....

In relation to the writings of Epictetus or Seneca, what is some adequate criticism to stoicism? Any writings/papers dealing with that in particular?

The criterion that determines a person who is professionally trained in philosophy and does philosophical research, to be either a western or eastern philosopher is not clear to me. Suppose, we have ...

As I understand it, the Pythagorean Theorem, which defines the metric for Euclidean space, is said to be strictly mathematical in the sense that it is derived from a set of purely theoretical axioms (...

I've heard Neil deGrasse Tyson and other important scientists say that mature science does not rely on our senses, but all explanations I read about the roundness of earth are sense-based: How a ship ...

As we know that most of the values in Special Relativity such as energy and also in general physics like Kinetic Energy are defined with respect to the frame of the observer but in this world who is ...

Is there a way to believe that God is the source of morality without also having to believe that morality is arbitrary?

Did Nietzsche violate Christian morality in his life, in his behaviour? Was he urging anyone to do so? He seems to have had a long standing grudge against it.

According to Aristotle, you will be deemed as living well if you experience worldly pleasures while still being morally upright and virtuous. How can you identify what is morally right without the ...

I’m trying to explain to my friends about things existing. I gave them this question: if you place a pencil in an opaque box and close the box, does the pencil exist? They say yes and I ask how do ...

I've found that I'm really interested in some research in the philosophy of mathematics and physics that's currently happening at various institutions. However, I don't have much experience in ...

The simulation theory has gained track in recent years; even Elon Musk has spoken on it. As it follows the associated, can belief in the simulation theory be considered a form of religion? The ...

I feel like for all three of these terms, they can contain different meanings, but they are all vague as well. For example, proper education could mean a university education/college education/...

Is there any authoritative source for all known self-evident logical truths that most specialists would agree are true although they can't be proven? There are many different axiomatic systems, and ...

Example 1 There is a phenomenon that once in a while we have it, called tip of the tongue. It is when you know that you know a thing very well, but you just can't put the finger on it, and this makes ...

Suppose these are the interpretations we are working with: ♢Ψ iff no explicit contradiction can be deduced from Ψ in FOL or in other words it's not provable that ~Ψ in FOL. ~♢Ψ iff an explicit ...

When is reasoning with "unknown" knowledge permissible? E.g. when can one "legitimately" formulate political beliefs or laws based on knowledge, which contains unknowable, unpredictable parts? If ...

Is there any way to gain "truth"/accuracy in social truth? How? What seems to make it difficult is that I don't know if social truth has any generally accepted epistemologies, truth deduction ...

Can anyone recommend a good translation of The Aesthetic Education of Man by Friedrich Schiller?

“If you don’t go to the doctor tomorrow, you won’t get better. You will go to the doctor tomorrow. So, you will get better.” What kind of fallacy does this argument fall under? I have a suspicion it’...

In a recent piece of work I described sentences containing a specific natural language connective as ᴛʀᴜᴛʜ ғᴜɴᴄᴛɪᴏɴᴀʟ. More specifically, I wrote something along the lines of [wording changed to make ...

Lets assume I. Kant would have became aware of Darwins theory of Evolution after writing his "Kritik der reinen Vernunft". How could the knowledge have affected his idea about the "ursprünglich ...

Suppose a father tells his kid that he can play video games whenever he wants. Then, one day, when the kid fell sick, the father told him that he can play video games until he recovers. Does this '...

If our language was infinite to describe an infinite amount of objects, would it even be possible for any of those concepts to mean anything? My intuition is that the meaning of a word is given to it ...

So I've browsed through some questions here but none of them really fits my thought process: If you assume that determinism is not the case, your actions will therefore be the right decision. If ...

I've asked the question below on Physics SE but it seems an answer may not be straight forward... Question: Is there any answers from Epistemology or philosophy-of-science? Its often said QM is ...

I started reading the most famous work of Nietzsche's, and then on the first chapter after the prologue, thus spoke Zarathustra: Or is it this: wading into dirty water when it is the water of truth,...

I remember I once read in Kant's "Kritik der Reinen Vernunft" about the tendency to come up with or invent new terms/words, about which he was quite "critical" (pun intended). I need the exact quote, ...

I have a question about why philosophers seem to disagree on virtually everything. I have been reading up on philosophy since I was 16 (now 19) with the goal of finding an end solution to the ...

My interest is in presenting results from the science of social morality in ways that will be culturally useful. (This science is the study of the origins and function of behaviors motivated by our ...

I am briefly aware of Descartes' argument that even if an Evil Genius made us believe that the world is real the fact that we can doubt this shows that we are thinking and that through thought we can ...

The argument can be made that "showing-off" is not ethical since that behaviour will likely make other people jealous and feel bad about themselves. But on the other hand, jealousy and self-loathing ...

Have dead people really died if they don't exist? Can we predicate having died of a dead person, if they don't exist? I'm not asking if they're dead, they are. I'm not sure that Pegasus has ever ...

I am trying to understand the abstraction that is provided by computer software. Below is my understanding. Do I have a correct understanding? Suppose my computer has this data: Hello, world The ...