I'm currently struggling to convince many people that murdering a child can be justified in some very extreme situations. There's this character in a novel who attempts to murder an innocent child because, if he hadn't, his entire family would have gotten executed with certainty (his 3 children, his lover and himself). Was the character justified in attempting to murder this child? I believe that he was. After all, to do otherwise would have resulted in the deaths of 5 other people. Aren't 5 lives generally worth more than one?

In the rare event that all the professional philosophers in the world agreed on the answer to a philosophical problem, would that mean it is solved? If not, what good is philosophy anyway?

I hope this isn't too general, but here's a question I've been wondering about: What is it that one has or does that, if one has or does it, one's life was not a waste?

Although societal pressures do play a role, does atheism manifest itself mostly due to an inborn lack of religious "sense" rather than hearing the logical arguments against God or a life force? Research has shown that autistic people are very unlikely to be religious. I don't know what phrase philosophers of mind use to describe this, but when we talk about people with a strong sense of humor, people with a weak sense of humor, or people with no sense of humor at all, are we talking about a non-physical and antimaterialist noumenon that can be enhanced with training?

Will computers ever be able to solve philosophy problems and should they? If they could, would they give better answers than humans?

More of an observation than a question, about "compatibilism" in the free will "versus" determinism debate. In the short run, there is a strong correlation between life expectancy tables and the number of people who die in a calendar year. Somehow, even though on the level of the individual, many of these events may be due to "luck" (wow, that train just missed me; or wow, what a freak combination of factors to lead to such a bizarre accident); on the level of the population, the total number of deaths in a year can be "predicted" fairly well even if no individual death can be predicted. In the long run, life expectancy tables do change over time: collectively, each individual person uses what they learn about diet, exercise, cigarette smoking, etc. and makes adjustments in their day-to-day lives; and the aggregate results over time do reflect these changes. It seems to me that there is a good question buried here in this analogy but I can't quite figure out how to unearth it. Any thoughts from a...

As a professional philosopher; which philosophical idea brings you the greatest joy whenever you think about it?

My question seems to be a simple one but I haven't been able to find a balanced answer to it so easily. As far as I can ascertain, there are two broad schools of philosophy, the Analytic school and the Continental school. Whilst Analytic philosophy focuses upon logic and reason and favours empirical or evidential arguments that focus to examine very clearly defined concepts, Continental philosophy tends to focus on a more abstract theorising that I am lead to believe, rejects the empirical and the rational as the means to discovering knowledge, and even treats knowledge, truth, and ideas in a much more relative manner. Therefore my question is as follows: "Does Continental philosophy really eschew logic and reason, if so then on what basis are credible arguments made? If this is not the case, then what is the general difference between the two schools and why should it be taken seriously in opposition to Analytic philosophy which at face value seems to be much more accessible and 'down to earth' in the...

What makes a good philosopher?

What defines a individual? What makes someone who they are?