And people are ready to drive cars at different ages. But I'm going to guess that it would be a bad thing overall if 12-year-olds were allowed to drive. And people are intellectually capable of entering into contracts at different ages, but even the 10-year-olds who think they are probably aren't. In America, we tend to favor laws that aren't paternalistic. We tend to think that we should err on the side of treating adults as able to make responsible decisions, even though there are lots of cases where they aren't. But in America (and most places), we tend to think that paternalism about non-adults is another matter. It's not just that on average, non-adults are less ready to make decisions than adults. It's also that there are plenty of adults who would be quite happy to exploit the over-confidence, lack of experience and impulsivity of many non-adults. They'd be happy to sell whisky to 10-year-olds. They're be happy to hire children for bad wages to do dangerous work. If you want to argue that there...

If I want to construct a sound system of beliefs, then there's not much to be said for merely relying on gut instinct. That's not because gut instincts are necessarily wrong or unreliable. It's because if I'm trying to construct a system as opposed to simply enumerating my commitments, critique, evaluation and adjustment are part of the process. But most people don't have a system of beliefs, and even to the extent that they do, it's bound to be a limited system. My beliefs about some things are much more systematic and reflective than about other things. Given that none of us have endless resources to commit to working out our beliefs, that's inevitable. But you say that "many people build their moral beliefs out of deep-seated gut feelings that themselves have no rational grounding." I'm worried about that way of putting things. If by "rational grounding" you mean something like "argument from explicit reasons," then I'd disagree that this is what's always needed. It's not just that giving...

A few points. At least in the US, the idea that there is widespread, systematic discrimination against white people, let alone systematic oppression, is not defensible. This is true even if some white people are sometimes discriminated against because they're white. It's also true even if some of the policies that are sometimes used in an attempt to redress the results of past discrimination and oppression are wrong. For example: let's suppose that some affirmative action programs are unjust. If that's so, it's appropriate to object, sue, work to have the policies and laws changed... But that's not what "lobbying for white power" suggests. Why? After all, the expression "white power" takes its cue from the older expression "black power." But bet's think about the slogan "Black power!" What's the message here? It's not that black people should have power over white people. The claim that lies behind the slogan is that overall, black people have had less power than white people and that this...

Like you, my instinct is that this would be wrong. Your question is: assuming it harms a child to watch its parents have sex, what exactly is the harm? Of course, the assumption might be wrong. It's an empirical question. But if it's harmful, what's the nature of the harm? The obvious first point is that the harm would be psychological, not physical. The perhaps less obvious second point is that if it is harmful, this isn't inevitable, but has a great deal to do with context, expectations, cultural norms and the like. Imagine a society in which people live in close quarters and privacy is a luxury. It's nor hard to imagine that for purely practical reasons, people would end up being seen by others when they have sex, including by their own children. If the norm in the society was that this was not a big deal, and the normal pattern of behavior was simply to ignore the couple, it's easy to imagine that seeing one's parents have sex wouldn't make for any psychological trauma. Our society...

Your distinction between something not yet defined and something for which there could never be a definition is a reasonable one, and thus an answer that bears only on the former doesn't answer your question. Here's one possible approach. If something exists, it has some properties or other; for every property a thing might have, the thing either has it or it doesn't. If that's right, then we might say that nothing could be that thing unless it has that set of properties. And in that case, we might say that the set of properties "defines" the object, whether or not any finite list could capture all the properties. That's a rough sketch. It would need careful spelling out and it would also be subject to various objections; leave those aside. The point is that if we look at things this way, the notion of "definition" we're appealing to needn't have anything to do with how limited creature like us get a grip on the object. If this line of reasoning is correct, then nothing could exist unless...

If I have it right, your issue is with Biblical scholars who think what's recorded in the Bible justifies believing that the Resurrection (for example) " most likely happened ." But your last sentence asks whether these scholars are being consistent if they say that the resurrection happened when their methods can only establish whether an event most likely happened . So I'm a bit confused. But before we proceed, another point. You use the terms "Biblical scholar" and "historian" interchangeably. However, not all Biblical scholarship is historical scholarship, and some Biblical scholarship is unashamedly sectarian. A Biblical scholar who argues for the Resurrection (we'll stick with that case) on purely Biblical grounds would happily concede that s/he isn't offering a purely historical argument. Whether the argument is adequate or merely question-begging is a rabbit-hole we won't go down. Returning to your post, it sounds as though you're saying in your last sentence that the scholars you have...

You clearly know that there are things you're not allowed to take on a commercial airliner. Presumably you also know that there are reasons why you're not allowed to take those things on the plane, even if the reasons aren't all equally good. Also: you don't have an unqualified right to travel on an airplane. Commercial air travel is regulated, and not by a gang of goons. It's a matter of laws enacted by a government that ultimately owes its ability to regulate to the consent of the citizenry (though not, of course, consent of every single citizen.) Maybe you think all government is illegitimate and that there shouldn't be laws at all. That's way too big a topic to take up here. But even if air travel weren't regulated by the government, it's a safe bet that airline companies would have some restrictions on what they allow you to take on board. And while someone might argue that rather than making you forfeit your can of gasoline, they should hold onto it until you show up later to reclaim it, it's...

Plato is not the only ancient author who refers to Socrates. For a quick summary, see this Wikipedia article: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socrates Note the section Socrates as a Figure , which comments on the question you ask.

You're no doubt right that any computers we happen to have available will only compute π to a finite number of digits, though as far as I know, there's nothing to stop a properly-designed computer from keeping up the calculation indefinitely (or until it wears out.) But you add this: "Beyond that limit those numbers are unknown and essentially do not exist until they are observed" Why is that? Let's suppose, for argument's sake, that we'll never build a computer that gets past the quadrillionth entry in the list of digits in π. Why would than mean that there's no fact of the matter about what the quadrillion-and-first digit is? What does a computer's having calculated it or (at least as puzzling) somebody having actually seen the answer have anything to do with whether there's a fact of the matter? To be a bit more concrete: the quadrillion-and-first digit in the decimal expansion of π is either 7 or it isn't. If it's 7, it's 7 whether anyone ever verifies that or not. If it's not 7, then it's...

You seem to be assuming that the idea of a positive right is nonsense, though perhaps you don't intend anything quite that strong. If that's what you do intend, then I'll leave it to others to say moe about the debate, but I'd simply note that it's not just obvious that only negative rights can be genuine rights. What I wanted to do instead is to highlight an assumption that lies behind your example and point out that it's open to question. It's the assumption that there's some antecedent fact of the matter about what's "your money." Like it or not, the money you earn (whether as salary or as an entrepreneur) comes to you within a system in which government is already deeply involved. There are courts and police. There are regulatory bodies that keep the banking system (for example) from turning into the wild west. There's a vast network of infrastructure that in fact is provided through the government. The list could clearly be extended. That background of rules, institutions, personnel, physical systems...