Hypothesis: Marketing works by making people dissatisfied with their life, then offering them a product that will relieve their dissatisfaction (for a price). If this is true, then it would seem that marketing always reduces a consumer's quality of life, because it leaves them either dissatisfied or paying for a product they wouldn't have needed if it weren't for the marketing. Hence, marketing harms consumers. How then, can marketing ever be ethical?

What do you philosophers think of when non-philosophers step into your turf? Are "pop-philosophers" (for lack of a better term, I don't see the "man on the street" going hooplah over what Putnam or Kripke says) worth reading or do they have any good philosophical value at all? What do you philosophers think of Dawkins commenting on God which I believe is your turf? What do you philosophers think of when Stephen Hawking says that philosophy is dead?

Hello: Almost two years ago -in January 2009- I was supposed to marry my fiancé with whom I have had a five-year relationship. Three weeks before our wedding, I just called her and cancelled everything over the telephone. That was a very mean and coward thing to do. I inflicted a serious emotional harm on her (and on myself too). A couple of months after I did such an awful thing (I can’t find a better word for that kind of action) I called her to apologize for what I have done. I explained her that I committed such a grave error because I was terrified of getting married. I wanted her back, but she refused me. Since then I’ve tried to gain her love again, but she just do not care for me anymore. I accept that as a fair outcome for my reckless behavior. I just deserve to be refused by my ex fiancé. What I haven’t been able to do until now is to cope with my regrets and my endless sense of guilt. I just can’t believe that I did what I did. I feel awful and unworthy of anything. I don’t need a priest...

Was Heidegger and atheist? I only ask because I get very conflicting statements regarding his stance on theism.

Some people and philosophers seem to see individual human activity as arising, not from interaction between individuals, but from interactions between social groups - that is, what gives rise to the behavior of individual men and women is the dymanic between men and women, as social groups. They see people's motivations as rooted in power, never in lust or greed or any other emotion (or if they do, these emotions are reduced to expressions of power). Everything is symbolic - wars are started not for resources, but in order to impose realities and dominate discourse. My question is this: isn't this all a bit far-fetched? A man who flirts with a woman doesn't seem to be doing so because he feels compelled to exert sexual power over her in accordance to patriarchal discourse; he thinks she's cute. The media doesn't distort information in order to control the all-immersing hyperreality we all live in; individuals simply simplify and exaggerate stories to gain more viewers. What is it that makes this...

Did Bertrand Russell or any of the logicists ever reply or address Goedel's incompleteness theorem directly?

Suppose a man, Frank, weighs 250 lbs. To some extent, whether or not we count Frank as fat will depend on context. If Frank stands only 5'3" then we might say he's fat; however, if Frank is 7'4" then quite clearly he is not fat. There are, of course, other factors to consider, too (e.g. muscle mass). With that said, it seems to me that we can tweak his height, muscle mass, etc., to the point where it's simply unclear whether Frank should count as fat or not, and neither empirical examination nor rigorous conceptual analysis will clear up the matter. There is ultimately a problem with our very notion of what it is to be fat--and there are many, many other similar cases of vagueness in our language. Does this inherent vagueness imply that there is no fact of the matter about whether Frank is fat? What about the cases where it seems so intuitively clear that Frank is fat (e.g. in possible worlds where he's only 5'3")?

Utilitarianism takes the "good" to be that which provides pleasure, or benefit, or reduces suffering. But how does the utilitarian decide that pleasure, benefit or lack of suffering are the yardsticks for ethics? It could be coherent that there are pleasurable things (that don't simultaneously cause suffering) which are unethical, or that there are ethically necessary actions which don't provide any pleasure for anybody, and even increase suffering. I am thinking of ethical, moral or religious systems that, for example, harshly restrict sexuality, the consumption of foods, certain forms of art, etc. So how does the utilitarian view argue that pleasure and pain are indeed, indisputably (from its own point of view, anyway), the foundations of ethics? Is this just common sense, or is there something more?

If personal taste is something that emerges somewhat chaotically from personal experience and potentially genetics, then how can it belong to oneself and truly be personal? Surely, we don't like to think of our tastes as random; on the contrary, they define us. And yet if our tastes are something rational, then we might indeed be able to dispute them with some level of objectivity - some tastes would just be bad or good, and this could be proven. Clearly this isn't the case - so it seems personal taste is neither a chaotic result of our interaction with our life experience, nor some sort of rational conclusion on the subjects of the taste. What, then, is personal taste?

Hello philosophers, I have a question concerning songs. I often listen rappers songs and sometimes I find verses within songs which I suppose are kind of philosophical ones. And I would like to ask you if I could use these verses in my essays as an argument to justify a proposition? I consider that these verses are type of micro philosophy. Yet my teacher can suppose that such an argument is inappropriate or invalid. Moreover, a teacher may perceive that rapper is not an influent figure. But I proclaim that he is a person who creates art. A song is a genre of lyrics like poetry. As a result, I notice a close connection between songs and poetry. People create poetry when they do a lot of thinking. Rappers create songs when they think too. They write their verses on the paper or they think before going to record a song. And it is a big similarity of poetry. Just in a different style. In conclusion, rapper song verses could be a valid argument to justify a proposition in my essays? Or it is not a suitable...