-
Is it possible to be morally wrong even if one is convinced to do the right thing?Better than your non-answer ...
-
Nature of the Philosophical Project
To start, the dialectics inherent in any thesis "X is real": not-X is real ad infinitum.What precisely is the problem with cataphatic metaphysics (x is real)? — Agent Smith -
Nature of the Philosophical Project
"Direction" =/= destination (i.e. "finality"). That this sentence ends, for instance, is not the purpose, goal, or meaning of this sentence. Likewise, "the cosmos", my friend, is not an intentional agent with an intrinsic telos (category mistake, no?) but a dissipative mega-structure with a sell-by date.But science just hides finality from view. It is still there in the principle of least action and the second law of thermodynamics. Something has to give the Cosmos its definite direction. — apokrisis -
Nature of the Philosophical Project:cool: :up:
:chin:Metaphysics is in the end only a tool for doing ethics. — Banno
To paraphrase Leonard Cohen:What isthephilosophical project? — Pantagruel
It has always seemed to me that philosophy is an attempt to make sense of human existence by reflective reasoning deliberately in contrast to non-rational practices (e.g. myth, superstition, intuition, magic, etc). In this Socratic light, my "philosophical project" is to unlearn self-immiserating (i.e. maladaptive) habits of thinking and conduct by striving daily to understand – to reduce "intuitive" (folk, common sense) misunderstandings of – what we do not know about what we think we know (e.g. sciences, histories, technics, arts).There are cracks in things which is how insight gets in.
So far, in order to make sense of human existence as a whole, classical (cataphatic) metaphysics has down the millennia proposed various, speculative absolutes/categories ("X is real")-of-the-gaps which illuminate as well as occlude those gaps in our knowledge, however, without closing or eliminating them. Prodigious developments in modern natural sciences in the last few centuries have eclipsed the indispensible speculations of metaphysics to the point where several schools of "anti-metaphysical thought" became fashionable which are as vacuous as they are themselves also self-refuting forms of metaphysics (e.g. positivism, nihilism, existentialism, deconstructionism / radical relativism, scientism, etc). It seems to me, the more productive way forward (thanks again @Tobias!), rather than these "anti-metaphysics" cul de sacs is to seek, so to speak, a 'Non-Euclidean' formulation of classical metaphysics (i.e. "what is real?"). For me, as I've mentioned quite a few times elsewhere, this alternative approach begins with: What must reason exclude from conceiving reality as such – what is necessarily not real?
Much of what is self-immiserating (à la dukkha), or maladaptive, consists in failing to align our expectations – what we think we know – with reality due to, I suspect, acquired habits of fixating on – attachments to – 'things which are not real and false beliefs about unreal things' aka "illusions of knowledge" (i.e. believing we know what and when, actually, we do not or cannot know). Perhaps speculating on what cannot possibly be real – a Non-Euclidean (e.g. apophatic) metaphysics – is the step forward after, so to speak, throwing away Witty's ladder. :smirk: -
Does quantum physics say nothing is real?:up:
If "it's all simulation and therefore nothing is real", then the simulation is also not real. :smirk: -
How Objective Morality Disproves An All-Good God
https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/740227If all there is to this world is this world, the existence of a(n) (omni)benevolent god is doubtful. — Agent Smith -
How Much Is Certain or Uncertain in Life and Philosophy?Known knowns are a minute subset of known unknowns which are an infiniesmal subset of unknown unknowns. –180 Proof's Law
"The future's uncertainI am asking about how much is certain and uncertain in life experiences and knowledge? — Jack Cummins
And the end is always near"
~JDM
"Only in uncertaintyWhat is the tension between the certain and uncertain in philosophical understanding?
are we naked
and alive"
~PG -
Is there an objective/subjective spectrum?Deleuze wrote two on him: Spinoza: Practical Philosophy and Expressionism in Philosophy: Spinoza. Which one are you referring to? (Btw, youll get more out of either book if you have read Spinoza's Ethics first.)
-
Is there an objective/subjective spectrum?
I'm saving up my woo-woos for this@180 Proof Haven't seen you say "woo" in a while. :wink: — Manuel
https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/746676 :smirk: -
The Earth is ...Arda is flat. :sparkle:
Middle Earth is round (after "The Downfall of Númenor" in the 2nd Age).
"Earth" (today) is actually the 6th Age / 7th Age of Middle Earth.
NB: I prefer Earthsea. :nerd: -
Is there an objective/subjective spectrum?
Yes! :gasp:I think we have good reasons to believe that matter thinks, so there isn't a mind-body problem. — Manuel
For me, it's Spinoza's dissolution of the MBP with property dualism. -
Does Camus make sense?Camus is not an existentialist like Sartre or Kierkegaard and his notion of – encounter with – the Absurd is not derived from "the death of God" or "meaninglessness of life" and is certainly not the basis of Foucault's or Deleuze's postmodernism. Read the works of these philosophers and learn why you're wrong about Camus et al rather than just relying on derivative third-hand and fourth-hand sources.
-
Is there an objective/subjective spectrum?Some folly, however, is significant folly. Remember, padawan: the path is often the goal, the journey is the destination. :fire:
-
Foundational Questions of Physics & Metaphysics
Why don't you ever answer any of my polite, direct, simple questions of your "unorthodoxy & jargon"? Apparently, you are afraid of exposing your own inability to make sound arguments in support of "Enformationism", etc. I'll gladly answer your questions above, Gnomon, once you have shown you're not, in fact, afraid by either (1) answering the following questions from old posts or (2) demonstrating that my questions of your "personal philosophical worldview" are unwarranted. :cool:That being the case, why do the Woo-Booers harp on my own unorthodox interpretation & jargon --- presented not as a scientific model, but as a personal philosophical worldview. I am not the first or last to present an extensive thesis on TPF with specialized technical jargon. But something about Enformationism seems to threaten the heart-felt belief system of a few counter-posters. Lashing-out emotionally, they don't offer alternative arguments, but merely ad hominems (Dunning-Kruger) and stereotyped labels (New Age). What are they afraid of : that philosophy might possibly contribute something new & positive to our understanding of how & why the world works as it does? — Gnomon
https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/742056 (15 days ago)
https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/718369 (3 months ago)
https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/comment/709894 (4 months ago) -
Is it possible to be morally wrong even if one is convinced to do the right thing?Also, human nature is separate from "nature"? — 180 Proof
So you cannot differentiate Man from "man-made structures"? :roll:Man-made structures ... — god must be atheist
Btw, cite a single case of a "man-made structure" that is separate from nature – unconstrained by laws of nature.
:sweat:If you think you can freely insult my intelligence, then don't be surprised if I insult yours. -
Does Camus make sense?"If Camus makes sense"? I can't make sense out of your question (above).
-
Does quantum physics say nothing is real?
Well said, sir! :100: :fire:One [AP] is the free play of syntax, the other [p0m0] is the free play of semantics. My usual point in any philosophy thread is that you need semiotics as a theory of meaningful utterances where syntax and semantics are in an enactive modelling relation with whatever world is under discussion. — apokrisis -
Is there an objective/subjective spectrum?
All horizons are "unattainable", and yet –O seems unattainble, we must perforce retreat towards S. — Agent Smith
You must go on. I can't go on. I'll go on. — The Unnamable
The obstacle, Smith, is the way forward. Amor fati – imagine Sisyphus happy! :death: :flower:Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try again. Fail again. Fail better. — Worstword Ho -
Does Camus make sense?No question (philosophical or otherwise), just your (mis)reading of speculative essays by a novelist-dramatist. So why start a new thread?
-
Does quantum physics say nothing is real?:roll: I don't think so.
:up:... much of the metaphysics within physics is fundamentally muddled because physicists are unused to thinking outside this particular box. — apokrisis
-
Foundational Questions of Physics & Metaphysics
QED. :rofl:Gnomon's famously – Dunning-Kruger? dogmatically New Ageist? – incorrigible on this point.
— 180 Proof
Innovatorsare often "incorrigible" in the face of Inquisition. — Gnomon -
Is it possible to be morally wrong even if one is convinced to do the right thing?
:roll: Genetic fallacy. Also, human nature is separate from "nature"?I agree with Introbert that human morality does not exist outside of humanity. Trying to apply human morality to nature is unnatural. — god must be atheist -
Does quantum physics say nothing is real?
So, a non-epistemic "true or false"? :chin:Yes, but it's an epistemological problem AFAIK. So, I wasn't asking whether, if a statement has no possibility of empirical verification, we can know it to be true or false, but whether we can know that it could not be true or false. — Janus -
Does quantum physics say nothing is real?Problem of the criterion – you're aware of it's significance?
-
Foundational Questions of Physics & Metaphysics
Gnomon's famously – Dunning-Kruger? dogmatically New Ageist? – incorrigible on this point.Generally, you [Gnomon] seem quite uniformed about the wide range of scientific views that have led to this information theoretic turn in physics (and life science).
If you are genuinely interested, you wouldn't have to invent your own jargon. You would start by mastering all the jargons that have been created so as to then start to see the broader outlines of this central modern metaphysical project. — apokrisis -
Does quantum physics say nothing is real?
As far as I'm concerned, you've not "proved" anything yet, gmba.The claim by 180 Proof, or by T Clark was that metaphysical claims can't be evaluated for truth or falsehood. I said, that's false, and proved it. — god must be atheist -
Foundational Questions of Physics & Metaphysics
Pedantic fyi – Ludwig Boltzmann & James Clerk Maxwell founded statistical mechanics / thermodynamics in the 19th century.Physicists have recently begun to equate Information with energy. — Gnomon -
Does quantum physics say nothing is real?
The statement is not a contradiction, it's conceptually incoherent (i.e. not even false)."My spirit is green and my spirit is not green." Metaphysical claim that is necessarily false. — god must be atheist
180 Proof
Start FollowingSend a Message
- Other sites we like
- Social media
- Terms of Service
- Sign In
- Created with PlushForums
- © 2026 The Philosophy Forum