Regarding Ph.d. applications, how important is the writing sample? I am in a top-15 Master's program right now, 3.83 GPA, but the best part of my application is my writing sample. I got a perfect grade on it from a tough grader, and I've fixed up anything that could possibly be "wrong" with it. It's definitely my best work to date. I need that because there are a couple of weaknesses in my application that I need to "make up" for, and I'm hoping the writing sample will do the trick. Thanks.

In a book by John Honner dealing with Niels Bohr's philosophy of physics, he finishes a sentence with "once the framework of complementarity is substituted for that of continuity and univocity." I can't find a definition of 'univocity' in the dictionary, and all google search results seem to apply to religion. Can someone help me with a definition that might apply in this context?

It's possible to define what art is?

The privation of good is a theological doctrine that evil, unlike good, is insubstantial, so that thinking of it as an entity is misleading. Instead, evil is rather the absence or lack ("privation") of good. The relationship between light and darkness is often used to frame a metaphorical understanding of good and evil. This metaphor can be used to answer the problem of evil: If evil, like darkness, does not truly exist, but is only a name we give to our perception of the privation of good, then our widespread observation of evil does not preclude the possibility of a benevolent, omniscient, and omnipresent God. How can I attempt to refute or at least call into question the above depiction of evil if a theist attempts to use it to dodge the problem of evil?

Is torturing an insect less immoral than torturing a non-human primate?

I'm thinking about cutting back my meat consumption for the sake of the environment, but I don't want to go completely meat free. I'm thinking about continuing to eat pork but not beef, since I respect cattle more than pigs as the former have been a vital part of human agriculture for centuries yet the latter would eat human babies trapped in its pen. Am I right in setting up this hierarchy of life unworthy of life?

What differentiates a philosophical movement from an ideology and are philosophers always aware of this?

What do we mean when we say that someone is "ideological"? How does having an ideology differ from simply having a particular set of moral or political views?

Although I can experience feelings of fear, pride, and shame in my dreams, I cannot experience the sensation of sharp pains in my dreams. Right now, I am pinching myself and I am experiencing pain. How does this fail to prove that I am awake?

Is it wrong to fantasize about sex with children? If a pedophile never acts on their fantasies are they still guilty of having evil thoughts, assuming that their abstinence comes out of a genuine desire not to do harm?