If mind is a special form of matter, doesn't it follow that all matter may possess a special form of mind, and that oak trees and lumps of coal have been quietly thinking all this time?

There was a debate recently about organ donation, and one group of people adamantly opposed the notion of making organ donation mandatory or even opt-out, because, and I quote, "They're my organs and nobody else gets to decide what to do with them." Considering organ donation only ever occurs when a person is deceased and no longer has any use for the organs, how is ownership of organs even relevant to the discussion? Why shouldn't it be acceptable to make organ donation opt-out, or even mandatory?

Can we ever truly understand another's point of view? When each one of us is made up of a different set of experiences and conditioning, and using the "trainings" of life we plug in answers to the perceived questions that surround us, can one really state without a doubt to understand another's mind? The answers might be the same but how we get to them is different, so is it in fact a different answer according to the individual? Sorry i know its a few different questions, but i feel the theme is there.

I am currently reading Theaetetus, for a course at university, and I am struck by the number of times Socrates discusses "God" (for example, 176c, where Socrates says "God" is utterly and perfectly righteous). Considering the fact that these dialogs were written centuries before the birth of Jesus, and the fact that the Greeks were almost certainly not Jewish, it seems odd that the translators should use a monotheistic god when translating Socrates' words. Did the Greeks actually have a serious concept of monotheism, and is this concept what is being referred to in the English translations of Theaetetus? Or is this "God" just a way for the translator to "whitewash" the ancient Greeks so as to make it easier for Christians (be it theistic Christians or non-Christians who grew up with Christian cultural heritage) to relate to the dialog? Does such a translation do justice to the original?

Is it ethical for a pharmaceutical company to keep the results of a negative clinical trial secret? Patients participate in clinical trials of an investigational drug for many reasons. One of these reasons may be the desire to benefit society. If a pharmaceutical company keeps clinical trial results secret, society will not benefit. (Companies keep negative results secret because they want to avoid benefiting a competitor or simply because there is a cost to releasing the information.) There are many adverse consequences of the failure to make negative data public. For example, other companies may unwittingly conduct clinical trials on drugs that work by the same biological mechanism subjecting many people to risks without the possibility of benefit. In addition, the negative results represent important scientific information that may guide researchers to the development of drug strategies that do provide a positive benefit for patients. When pharmaceutical companies enroll patients in a clinical trial,...

If I discover someone is doing something unjust and ignore it, is it wrong for me to ignore it as 'not my business'?

With each language in the world there seems to be a set number of words, some have more it seems and some have less. My question is that in a language that has less words, is it limited in it's ability to conceptualize and describe and thus understand less about it's reality around it, or is it's simplistic view what gives a clearer view of things? Follow up: If you can't define a word without using another word, wouldn't words be subjective?

I was reading a text claiming that people who believe that God is contingent may be uncomfortable with the implications of contingency. The author cited the Barcan formula. Could you please explain what this formula means and why it's controversial? I'm not great at logic. Thanks!

Suppose a very well to do doctor was married to a very bright man who happened to be a house husband. They had no children but he worked very hard maintaining their household. One day however the wife loses her job unexpectedly and asks her husband to help pitch in and get a job. He says, "well I don't want to do that." and in reply she says, "well then maybe we should get a divorce. And he says "Well, yes you can divorce me but I am entitled to half of your earnings for during the time we were married." I don't know this for sure but my gut tells me that most women would find something very wrong with that situation. It would seem wrong because it would seem like the man is responsible for his own livelihood after the relationship terminates. In most situations however the man is the bread winner and the women is the housewife and I think most people don't have a problem with a man paying half his earned income to his divorced wife. Am I wrong in my assumption that women (and men) would balk at the idea...

Hi, I'm a German student in physics. something i noticed is that in every theory we start with a few postulates and conclude predictions about the behaviour of uninlevend objects. Even in quantum- mechanics we can make declarations about things our mind can't even imagine (like electrons). We do all this with math or let's say logic. and here is my question. Why does the universe behave in a logical way? is logic something humans have learned from the universe and only exists in this universe or is logic something that would exist even if this universe wouldn 't exist? Greetings Tobias D. and excuse my bad grammar