Is there any credence to the idea that acting morally works in evolutionary terms, i.e., that it helps preserve the unity and survival of a co-dependent group? If this is the case, surely talk of absolute morality derived from religious scriptures is worthless, and our morality is just a refined survival technique. Thanks for a great site!

One can create axioms that make statements like "all bachelors are married" true. What is wrong with calling these truths analytic as a shorthand for the type of truth it is based on the type of axiom it is derived from, much in the way we use the adjectives arithmetic, set-theoretic, or logical to denote those types of formal truths? I feel like one could decide whether a truth is analytic by seeing which (kinds of) axioms need to involved in making it true.

Many claims about what is possible or logical seem to rest on what is conceivable to the human mind. But what reason do we have to believe that there's any link between the way our minds work and the way things actually are?

I was taught that philosophers should not try to abolish ordinary notions like "existence" or "truth," but only to explore them. But I have also heard that time may not be necessary for fundamental physics. In general it seems possible for science to drop an ordinary type of notion by demonstrating a theory (or theories) without it. Can philosophy also do away with an ordinary notion? Should it try to?

Can poetry be used to express deeply philosophical ideas?

People say that to be a good person you should help others without expecting anything in return, because then you're just being selfish. But anytime we help someone, we all get a feeling of self gratification. Helping others makes us feel good inside. Isn't that in itself being selfish? Can it be that the real reason we help others is because it gives us something back, that being, a good feeling inside? In which case, wouldn't it be fair to say that we're all selfish, and will only help others to help ourselves?

Recently in politics the word 'elitist' has been used in bad connotations; as if it is bad to be elite. Why shouldn't our leaders be elitists?

To whom it may concern; I thank you in advance for your assistance. I had a discussion with some of my colleagues regarding a problem that I identified. Basically, I got two different and contradictory results of the same problem (i.e., a paradox) using different but equally valid methodologies and rationales in our area of research. I propose to resolve this paradox by making some adjustments to the methodologies in order to make them consistent. As you know, when paradoxes are found, solutions have to be advanced in order to resolve the inconsistencies, and this in turn strengthens the whole methodology. The problem is that I identified the aforementioned paradox by means of a simulated, laboratory-type of study, in which ideal conditions are assumed and simulated. Since my area of research is business studies, my colleagues allege that the “paradox” I found is not valid, because it is not based on data from real firms. They added that for the paradox to be valid, real data would have to be used. I...

Are mathematical statements existential statements? I ask because we're taught that set theory is, in a sense, foundational to all mathematics, and most of the propositions considered in set theory essentially assert the existence of particular sets.

Two questions. It seems that no one has figured out good standards for acceptance or rejection of philosophical arguments. In science, observation is king. If evidence contradicts a theory under careful conditions, the theory is false. In math, we justify things formally; we cannot expect more certainty. So would you agree that philosophy, as a field that aims at knowledge and not something else like evoking emotions, suffers from a lack of standards? And since at the moment I suspect it does, I want to ask also, why do philosophers act so certain? To them their arguments are true or correct (or whatever) without empirical evidence or rigorous proof. They should be the most uncertain people of all, even more so than scientists. And they are pretty darn humble. (A better way to ask this might be, aren't proof and evidence the two best ways to knowledge? If so, shouldn't philosophers be much more uncertain than they appear (to me)? I now realize it's dependent on how I see things, so I only hope you can...