Thank you for these interesting reflections! As for your first point, there are a number of philosophers who address radical skepticism (e.g. can any of us know with certainty that we are not, as we seem to be, wide awake and acting in the world rather than, say, dreaming?) in the way you suggest. Arguably, life may continue just as it appears until one's death and yet there would be no decisive reason to rule out the possibility one was merely a brain in a vat. And because of this, some philosophers think that such radical skeptical hypotheses are idle or nonsensical or of no interest. I am somewhat of the other mind: I think we can imagine radical hypothetical states of affairs in which we are indeed systematically mistaken in almost all our beliefs about ourselves in the world (in brief, I think it conceivable that we might be in the matrix). While this does not have awesome practical consequences, I think it should humble us in our knowledge claims. As for the second point, Quine set out to...

While Ayer's verificationism has gone out of fashion (he and others could not settle on a formulation of it that did not rule out science or some such apparently meaningful discourse) there are forms of what is called anti-realism which define 'truth' in terms of warranted assertability, which would rule out the possibility of there being truths that are out of reach from what we can know (at least in principle). Alas, there is a good argument against such a position in Thomas Nagel's work The View From Nowhere. One other idea to consider is that your friend may be right but in a way that has nothing to do with THIS (our) world. Some philosophers (David Lewis etc) have argued that there are indefinitely many POSSIBLE WORLDS. So, you might reply that, yes, leprechauns actually do exist but in a possible world not remotely related to ours! Check out Lewis's book on the plurality of worlds. It is awesome.

Good question! German idealism is so complex, but in general it may be said that phenomenology (as established by Edmund Husserl) was more bound to the study of appearances than, say, Hegel, even in his Phenomenology of Spirit. Hegel is prepared to think quite abstractly about being and nothingness, the rational and the real, and the dialectical movement of history (which we see Marx re-formatting), whereas Husserl's Cartesian Meditations is far more (for lack of a better word) experiential and involving the first-person. But interpreting Husserl and Hegel is not easy, and Husserl's book Ideas Pertaining to a Pure Phenomenology and Phenomenological Philosophy (1913) has been interpreted (I believe wrongly) as a traditional form of idealism. One minor point about your excellent question: some phenomenologists do not despair about the "thing-in-itself." There are what are known as phenomenological realists like Deitrich von Hildebrand who are committed to claims about the nature of the world (and the...

Great question, but to really give a proper response we might have to consider specific cases or types of cases. In general, however, it may be said that utilitarians tend to give the same ranking to an act and an omission or failure to act. A utilitarian thinks right action is the action that will produce the best consequences (utility, happiness, pleasure....) and they tend to think that if failing to act brings about the same bad effects as acting, then the two are on an equal footing in terms of accountability. This is a radical position, however, and while there are some cases when it seems plausible there are many cases when it seems unreasonable. Maybe a person's not giving to famine relief will mean that a person will die of starvation and surely that is bad, but is it as bad as the person actively hunting down and killing the person? If you would like to engage a philosopher who tends to equate acts and omissions, check out the work of Peter Singer.

Hello Sara M: you might find Roger Trigg's Philosophy of the Social Sciences a good place to begin. Some philosophers do engage in what might be called sociology or, more generally speaking, history. Alasdair MacIntyre and Charles Taylor have produced sweeping treatments of the modern era (most recently Taylor's A Secular Age). Another book which combines philosophy and social studies is Habits of the Heart. You also might find John Searle's work interesting on social constructs. I know your question is about bringing sociological methods to bear on philosophy, but in the reverse direction, you might want to explore the ways in which philosophical work on the mind, language, and ethics might have a bearing on sociology. Good wishes, CT

As you probably know, the title "Ph.D." is (technically or literally) a Doctor of Philosophy so someone with a Ph.D. in mathematics is not exactly completely free of philosophy. I mention this because mathematics as well as what we would today call sciences were often practiced by those known as philosophers. Pythagorus (who may have been the first person called a philosopher) was also someone we would call today a mathematician. So, my first response is that those known as "philosophers" (Greek for lovers of wisdom) were those who sought wisdom in all areas, including mathematics and carried out investigations into the nature of the world and values. Early philosophers like Plato may sound to us as silly, but I urge you to put yourself in Plato's position. Athens had just been defeated in a major war. His teacher, Socrates, a veteran of a defeated army raised questions about what is justice, courage, friendship...what is good? And Socrates was executed for raising such questions (and perhaps...

Great question! There is actually a significant literature out now on the philosophy of forgiveness and some significant controversy over whether and when forgiveness should or should not be given. One of the most prominent philosophers to contribute to the philosophy of forgiveness is Jeffrie Murphy and he definitely thinks that one should not forgive very easily. He thinks that someone who almost always forgives wrongs may lack self-respect or may even have self-hatered or self-deception. Richard Swinburne agrees and he argues that one should not forgive another person unless the person has confessed and repented. I think that is too extreme. Someone may harm us and then die, making confession and reform impossible and yet (it seems to me) one can still forgive the wrong-doer. Still, Swinburne has a point in that if the person does not confess or even ask for forgiveness there is little chance there could be a full restoration of a relationship. So, in your case, I suggest you might consider at...

I am inclined to agree. The issues are complex ( of course) so I will do less in offering your an analysis and more in the way of making a recommendation: I highly recommend the book Journalistic Ethics: Moral Responsibility and the Media by philosopher Dale Jacquette. Dale does a terrific job on such cases.

A CLASSIC case! This is a major issue going back to ancient philosophy. The example used then was the ship of Theseus (a Greek hero). Imagine you have the ship of Theseus and a similar ship side by side. First you switch one part (the mast, say). Is the ship of Thesus still the same? Many of us want to say 'yes,' but then we get puzzled as more and more parts are switched until eventually it seems the ships have changed places. One route that philosophers have taken might bring peace to your family: some philosophers distinguish a strict sense of identity from an identity that is "popular and loose." On a strict view, you are right. Any object with parts is not the same if even a single part is removed. This is technically called mereological essentialism. According to mereological essentialism, your father's body today is not identical with the body he had as a boy. You might even suggest to him that while he went to first grade, that (pointing at his body) did not. You can retain...

There is quite a good literature on aesthetics that gets at spirituality. I co-authored a recent book (out last year) with the American artist Jil Evans: The image in mind (Continuum) that gets at the aesthetic dimension of different ways of viewing the world (principally theism and naturalism) and we have a co-edited book Turning Images with Oxford that deals with aesthetics and religion / spirituality. An older book which has an excellent collection of different thinkers is: Art, Creativity, and the Sacred edited by Diane Apostolos-Cappadona. Gordon Graham has a good book: The Re-enchantment of the Word (OUP 2007), and Oxford has published an amazing series of five books on aesthetics and theology or the sacred by David Brown. It is disappointing that the Routledge volume did not include more on spirituality, as many of those who contributed to aesthetics historically and quite recently have had spiritual concerns. Plato's dialogue on beauty, the Symposium, is partly about the ascent of the soul to...