Hi, I have chosen to write an essay about kant's moral argument for the existence of God and evaluate his contribution to philosophy of religion as an option. However, I am not getting much help. What must I read to cover in the essay and how much of Kant's philosophy must I be familiar with? Thank you for your help in advance. Greta.

If a person has a multiple personality disorder, are they one individual, or several individuals?

Besides the problems surrounding various applications of biomedical science and neuroscience (including questions of the nature of the mind), are there any other major new fields of philosophical inquiry, or any major new insights, that have been opened up by social and/or technological change over the past century? Or are most new problems just old problems rehashed with new examples or with greater magnitude?

I often read that we must judge arguments or claims based on their own merits, rather than on the quality of the person presenting them. This is fine in realms such as logic or everyday life, where we can all have access to the relevant information, but how does this play out in complex domains, such as science? For instance, suppose I am reading two books on the health effects of different nutrients, such as animal fat. One author claims all animal fat is harmful, the other claims that some animal fats, such as fish fat, is fine in moderation. Both cite studies supporting their views, but one author is a spokesperson for PETA and the other is a senior researcher at a well-known university. As somebody who doesn't have access to biology laboratories to conduct experiments, and who perhaps doesn't have the time to read every source cited, critique every study made and read every attack made on both author's views, what is the best thing for me to do? Should I simply decide not to believe anything at...

Do the developments in quantum mechanics (i.e. the best we can do on a very micro level is give probability distributions), really have anything to say about free will? It might mean that determinism isn't true (although there could be a weaker "probabilistic determinism" that gives the likelihood of different possible events), but introducing chance into the equation isn't helpful to free will either.

Kant's contradiction of the will seems to suggest that it is inconsistent for us to allow abortion; that it is inconsistent to simultaneously will that we live and that allow that our mother could have had an abortion (meaning we wouldn't live...) However, I find this a little unconvincing but can't quite get it down. Is it not consistent to argue that the rights of me as a foetus are overridden by my mother's rights as an adult and that I will everybody to be treated according to the rights the can claim despite the consequences? Thanks a lot in advance!

Many people bring forth the argument that the chances of life, especially intelligent human life, occurring are so ridiculously improbable that the only way to explain it is to bring a creator into the picture. I've heard various figures thrown around and grains of sand in the universe brought in to explain how unlikely it is. But is the actual science behind the probability sound? And do you think that this is a good reason to believe in a creator? And what about a rational, logical argument explaining how this is not a very good reason? Thanks.

Why are the lives of plants not considered ethically relevant, when there are more than a few people who think the lives of all animals, including the simplest insects, are? Plants, too, can whither and die. What's the difference between the ethical value of an apple tree and that of a termite?

I'm attending a lecture on the philosophy of science, and our professor told us yesterday that "we constantly rely on inductive reasoning all the time in our lives, such as when we assume that the floor won't suddenly collapse beneath our feet if we walk forwards." This struck me as odd. Is it accurate to say we "assume" such a thing? It seems to me that we don't even think about these things at all, much less try to justify any such assumptions - saying we're relying on some kind of argumentation seems like a stretch, but perhaps it isn't. Is everything we do, then, the result of certain processes of reasoning? Or are there things we just do without any reasoning to support them?

One of the formulation of Kant's Categorical Imperative is that we should never treat humanity as a mere means to an end. I wonder, then, whether this means that horror film directors are behaving unethically. After all, in a horror film, terrible things are made to happen to human beings, solely for the purpose of frightening/pleasing the audience. The human beings may be fictional, but it is nevertheless the fact that they are fictional *humans* that makes horror films effective (as opposed to a horror film where the victims are all robots). It seems to me that the humanity of the fictional characters is being used as a tool to manipulate the audience's emotions. Does this fall under the umbrella of the humanity formulation of the Categorical Imperative? If not, why not? It certainly seems that it is the humanity of the victims (including their emotions, their aspirations, their mortality, their ability to suffer) that is key to the function of horror films.