Please pardon the awkward structure of this question; I am afraid the insuperable inadequacies of autodidacticism will prevent me from asking it clearly. What I want to know is, in a nutshell: Is the Past eternal? That is to say, it makes sense to make statements about the Present (if in fact there is a present; one sometimes reads there isn't) which take the form "X is the case." It also obviously makes sense to say, where t is some point in the Past, things like, "At time t, X was the case." But I'm much less confident that I'm allowed to have sentences like (if X is no longer the case but used to be at t, which is in the past) "At time t, X will always have been the case." And in fact I want very badly to say not only that but "For any X which once obtained, is obtaining, or will obtain, at any time T, will always once have obtained." I also want to believe this not only of propositions which once held, but also of all phenomena & entities which ever occurred & existed. (That they will always once...

Why is it not acceptable to be naked in public? What makes it so absurd for people to be seen in their natual state? If i went to school naked, I would probably get expelled. So how did we come to decide what state of appearance should be in particular settings? Has it originated and developed because of the feelings people feel when they see a nude person that have caused us to think up this idea of clothing our bodies? Get what I'm trying to say? Deep down everyone wants society to make nudity the norm! (Except people living where it's real cold.)

How could experience ever justify us in revising a putatively analytic statement like 'all bachelors are unmarried men'? I imagine Quine is entertaining the possibility that we may stumble across some married or female bachelors. But how could this ever happen? No one can ever be a counter-example to our statement because to do this they would need to be married or female and would then fail to be a bachelor, that is, a married man. Despite the attention it has received, I find it hard to see the plausibility of Quine's position.

The Dover trial exposed Intelligent Design "theory" as a front for Creationism. But the Argument from Design has been around since Descartes at least. Do philosophers consider the latter also a theory worth taking seriously or would they dismiss it like the Dover judge did ID? (I wouldn't say Descartes was fronting it for Catholicism because it was the only religion he knew.) It was an odd trial: the only witnesses called were scientists and all the ID scientists were also Christians. What do you think about this? Why were no philosophers called on to testify when they are so well-acquainted with such arguments?

Philosophy never seems to debate multiple Gods like the Vikings and the ancient Greeks had as well as Hinduism. These could be dismissed as silly, discredited ideas except Hinduism still has numerous believers. It seems no more ridiculous to me than the Father, Son and Holy Ghost scenario. Why is monotheism alone debated by religious Western philosophers? (Atheist ones will only consider a Prime Mover or Argument from Design creator but why is this? Is it because of over 2000 years of Abrahamic Gods, messiahs, and prophets with the attendant respectability these, believers would say, bestow?)

What exactly does Kant mean when he says that we should never treat anyone as a means to an end? Surely there are many situations where I am trying to choose the lesser of two evils. Take a politician for example. He has a certain amount of money to spend on some people, so anything he does will be treating someone as a means to another end, as someone will always miss out at the benefit of someone else (though notice there is no element of selfishness here). I suppose my question is, does Kant mean we shouldn't cause suffering in another for our benefit, or we shouldn't cause suffering in another for ANY end such as for the benefit of another, or does he mean something else entirely? Thanks, Holly M. Fantastic site by the way, I'm addicted.

I do not believe that true freedom can actually exist within any society that is governed by any form of laws or rules. To me, freedom is to be completely without restraint of any kind, be it legal, social, theological, or whatever. As long as there exists any sort of list of things that are not to be done, said, or thought, and these rules are actively upheld by empowered individuals and/or groups, I do not think that anyone within such a society is truly free. I would like to know if anyone agrees or disagrees and why.

Is prostitution wrong? Clearly, it's illegal in some countries. But is it really immoral or wrong? Surely prostitution may, in some limited set of cases at least, even maximize average utility, or involve consenting adults who agree to being used by one another, or one by the other, as "mere" means. What is the relevant difference, in principle, between a one night stand and an instance of prostitution? Or between paying for sex and paying for a cab-ride home for one's sex-partner after a one night stand (or paying for a meal or drinks beforehand)?

Is it fair to require Muslims born in Britain and brought up under Sharia law to accept as universal, laws which are underpinned by and reflect Western values utterly at odds with Muslim beliefs?

Should there be a human right to freely move where people want to, including crossing over into other sovereign territories, provided that this right does not infringe on the rights of others?