Recent Responses
In the 12-step program, used by Anonymous Alcoholics and other similar organizations, the 4th step talks about a "moral inventory of ourselves", while the 8th step is mentioning "persons we had harmed". Some of my friends say that they did morally harm themselves only and no one else. I'm sure that one can easily cause material or psychological damage to oneself, but is it possible to morally harm oneself?
Sally Haslanger
November 30, 2006
(changed November 30, 2006)
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I'm not sure what you have in mind by "moral harm" but one thought would be that moral harm to someone results when a moral obligation to that person is violated. So if I have a moral obligation to respect your bodily integrity, then if I assault you, I violate that obligation and not... Read more
Largely the scientific community argues evolution as their leading theory behind the existence of life. The Church argues creationism. What if they are both wrong and in reality it is both. For anything to exist, it seems fair and logical to say - it had to have been created in order to exist and evolution is an obvious factor seen in daily life. So if true, could the two views merge one day?
Sally Haslanger
November 30, 2006
(changed November 30, 2006)
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Strictly speaking creationism says not just that life on earth was created, but that it was created by God; and evolution says not just that life has evolved, but that life emerged through evolutionary processes (and not God's act of creation). So they aren't strictly speaking compatib... Read more
I remember reading a biography of George Orwell in which Orwell and A.J. Ayer met in a hotel in France and spent an evening together (in the hotel bar, I hasten to add). The biographer (with a literary background) described them whimsically as 'two men of near-genius'. Is the concept of genius pointless? If it depends who you ask, surely it is - John Lennon, Babe Ruth, Jackson Pollock, etc. and it can't simply be a question of aesthetics when applied to Newton or Aristotle, say. I reckon there are no criteria outside of a dictionary. How does philosophy deal with such vague terms? Thanks.
Amy Kind
November 29, 2006
(changed November 29, 2006)
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I wanted to respond to the suggestion in your question that if a term is vague it is thereby "pointless" -- that doesn't seem right to me. For example, although the term "bald" is vague -- we can't specify the precise number of hairs a person must have (or not have) to count as bald -- the te... Read more
I am thoroughly confused by the ethics of vegetarianism, which to my mind seems more of a religious objection towards eating meat than a scientific point of view. Recently I attended a lecture by Peter Singer (<i>Animal Liberation</i>) on the ethics of eating meat. One thing he did not address was differentiating between the 'killing' of the (sentient) animal and the 'eating' of it. OK- so here is my question: is it ethical to eat roadkill, or animals that have died of "natural" causes or of "old age"? Further to this, is being killed by a human primate not a "natural" cause of death of a cow? If humans shouldn't kill cows to eat (because we know better), perhaps we could let lions kill the cows, then we can eat them afterwards? Isn't it unethical to tell people in the developing world they shouldn't eat meat? - especially when a huge percentage of women in the developing world are iron deficient? Thanks, Grant M.
Sally Haslanger
November 29, 2006
(changed November 29, 2006)
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There are at least three different kinds of argument in favor of vegetarianism, and each of the arguments have slightly different implications for what is OK.
One argument is concerned with human health (so is more prudential than moral). The idea is that eating dead animals is not h... Read more
Is there any serious discussion in philosophy that applies ethics to hypothetical (currently non-existent) situations? Let's say I'm pondering the rights of a person who is put in a suspended state through a time machine, for example.
Matthew Silverstein
November 28, 2006
(changed November 28, 2006)
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Philosophers love to talk about hypothetical situations (often called thought experiments). Usually, we use thought experiments to help us draw distinctions or isolate intuitions that would be muddled or difficult to discern were we to limit our discussions to the actual world.
Here... Read more
I was thinking, Is "absolutely nothing" logically possible? And I would just like to know what you would think of this argument. IF it is accepted that 1) "X is true if X corresponds to reality" then it would be logically impossible for "absolutely nothing" to exist. "Absolutely Nothing" implies no reality. If there is no reality then one can never say that "absolutely nothing" can exist, since "absolutely nothing" does not correspond to reality. But I ask you, if "absolutely nothing" is even possible. And if it is not possible, then what logical proofs are there. Thank you!
Allen Stairs
August 9, 2007
(changed August 9, 2007)
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I'd like to take this question in a slightly different direction. I accept the point made by Prof. George: we don't need to think of the phrase "absolutely nothing" as referring to something; the logic of "There's milk in the fridge" isn't the same as the logic of "There's absolutely nothing in... Read more
I work for a housing charity who deal with homeless clients. The local housing authority refues to consider heroin users or alcoholics as vulnerable enough for emergency accommodation because their drug use is a "lifestyle choice." Even if they have severe medical problems [deep vein thrombosis, liver disease, etc.] which in another case may be deemed serious enough to make them "vulnerable." My colleagues and I are confused. Can addictive behaviour seriously be described as an act of free will? I don't know if your rules forbid such qestions as being medical/psychological rather than philosophical, but I have worked in addictions services for nearly 15 years, and I have never seen a definitive answer to this question, therefore I suspect it may be one for the philosophers rather than the men in white coats! Please help us if you can.
Mitch Green
November 27, 2006
(changed November 27, 2006)
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Thank you very much for your contribution. I'm not a specialist on issues of free will, or on the psychology or neuroscience of addiction. I hope that other panelists will add their comments here as well. However, one thought that comes to mind in response to your question is that there... Read more
Appearances can be deceiving. I feel that humans are hindered by what they perceive, visually. Perhaps almost all forms of major prejudice come from visual representation of ideas that we believe we do not like. I feel that sight is an anchor to the physical realm and without it, perhaps humans could transcend into higher states of being, perhaps becoming super-human, evolutionarily speaking. So my question is: Philosophically, do you feel that humans are hindered from becoming a complete being due to some of our inherent senses, etc. and do you feel it is possible to overcome these physical limitations to attain a higher state of being?
Peter Lipton
November 26, 2006
(changed November 26, 2006)
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I agree that sight and indeed the senses are our anchor to the physical realm, but I think that is a good thing, since the physical realm is what we need to understand. At the same time, our senses give us only very limited contact with the physical world, much of which is unobservable.... Read more
Do we always make the choice we want to in a given situation? My professor said that for better or for worse, we always make the choice that we wanted to make in a given situation. My professor gave the example that a drug user decides to use again because he decided he wanted to, irrespective of whether the choice is detrimental to his health or not, it was his choice. I argued with another example that a person who decides to walk to the store to buy milk does so by choice. But, if he begins to daydream about a final exam he needs to study for and then he forgets why he was going to the store, did he make the choice to not buy milk? Would you say that he made the choice to daydream about his exam? How does one get out of this conundrum?
Jyl Gentzler
December 20, 2006
(changed December 20, 2006)
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It seems to me that, in order to count as making a choice between multiple options, I must consciously consider these options and I must decide to pursue one of the options rather than the others. My choice is determined, it seems to me, by what, among the options I consider, I most want t... Read more
I can see images and hear sounds inside my head at command. How is our mind able to perceive these things without them being real? I can create whatever image I want, and recall sounds, but I don't understand where or how this information is stored in the brain, and how we can see or hear it.
Cheryl Chen
December 21, 2006
(changed December 21, 2006)
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It might help to distinguish between imagination and perception. There's a sense in which what I perceive is not up to me. Although I can control what I see by turning my head, opening or closing my eyes, or taking off my glasses, once I've done those kinds of things, what I see as a resu... Read more