Philosophers might put the question like this: what constitutes being a living thing? And we might hope for a non-circular definition that spells out exactly what it takes to be a living thing. Among the strategies for answering this sort of question, a common one is conceptual analysis . This strategy is applicable when we think competence with the concept in question (in this case, the concept of a living thing) gives us a kind of seat-of-the-pants knowledge of what it is for the concept to apply to a thing, so that what's left is to turn our commonsense expertise with the concept into a careful definition. We propose a definition, and then test it by trying to imagine an example of a sort of thing that meets the proposed definition but where the concept doesn't really apply (according to our commonsense expertise), or vice versa. Suppose we try that with the concept of a bachelor . Someone proposes the definition unmarried male human . But a newborn boy is surely not a...

Suppose you have two kids: A and B, and you believe that A is left-handed, and that B is left-handed. Being a deft reasoner, you conclude: At least one of my kids is left-handed. Now suppose that, really, B is not left-handed (though you're right, and knowledgeably so, about A). It seems to me that it is still right to count you as knowing that at least one of your kids is left-handed, and it also seems plausible that your belief is in some good sense "based on" a false belief (that B is left-handed). Someone might challenge the latter claim, by observing that your belief about B is inessential to your justification for the "at least one" belief---if you hadn't believed that B was left-handed, after all, you still would have been justified in concluding that at least one of your kids was left-handed. But on that way of viewing things, your "at least one" belief is based on neither of your two beliefs about the left-handedness of A and B (for each of them individually is such...

Obviously there's more than one thing we might mean in saying that someone is happy. Are we describing a momentary or a stable state? A bright mood and outlook or deep satisfaction? Even if we've sorted these things out, saying simply that someone "is happy" seems to make a yes-0r-no matter out of a matter of degree. That is, the simple "is happy" means "is happy to a great degree". But then "great" reveals more mush; surely what degree of happiness counts as "great" (as settling that the person "is happy") is not a matter that is eternally cast in stone--it might vary from context to context. Perhaps in some contexts, the relevant degree is fixed as something like the 60th percentile of current human happiness (yes, that's full of very artificial precision--just squint while reading for the proper effect). In that case, it seems that indeed it can be a relative matter whether someone, in a particular context, is correctly called "happy". (It would be nuts to say simply that "is happy" means ...

Nothing happens to moments; things happen at them. After a moment passes, nothing that happens anymore happens at it. Apast moment might, however, still be remembered and spoken of. Doesthat require that in some sense it "still exists" and is indeedeternal? For surely there is something that we are remembering and speaking of. Or is that a mistake? Could it rather be that while there was something that we are remembering and speaking of, there isn't anything that we are remembering and speaking of? But is it coherent tosay that in addition to all the things that there are, there are also things that that were but are no more? That sure soundsself-contradictory. How about: in addition to all the things that thereare, there are-or-were also the things that were but are nomore? Here, "there are-or-were" functions as a "quantifier" that coversthings that no longer exist. Some philosophers hold that if you use aquantifier like that, you are committed to the view that the...

None. Besides Belgian ales, that is. I'm a plain old atheist: I don't find any of the arguments I've come across for the existence of something I'd be at all tempted to call "God" even slightly compelling, so I consider myself to have as little evidence for believing that there is such a thing as I have, alas, for believing that there's a number such that, if I think of it, my freshman papers will magically grade themselves. In both cases I not only do not believe that there is such a thing but also believe that there is not such a thing. Why I take that further step (in both cases) is harder to say. (It's not that I believe that if there were such a thing I'd likely have evidence of it. ) Anyway, I think that many arguments people have given for the existence of God are enormously philosophically respectable. Thinking about them has produced some really good philosophy. It's just that they're not sound. You might also mean, can we imagine being convinced...

Yes and no. But seriously, now. First, a "conjunction" (an and sentence) might have a true part and a false part: "2 > 1 and 7 > 9". But the usual view of logicians is that a sentence like that is simply false despite having a true conjunct: its truth requires precisely that both conjuncts be true, which is simply not the case. Similarly for "all natural numbers are either less than or greater than 3"---it's simply false, even if there's only one exception among the infinitely many natural numbers. Second, a sentence can be ambiguous, and true on one way of understanding it, but not on another. "Bill Gates contributes generously to charities," for example, might be true if by "giving generously" we mean "giving a great deal of money" but false if we mean "giving so much as to make for a significant sacrifice on the part of the giver". I suppose that if we use this sentence without intending one of those meanings rather than the other---so that it remains ambiguous---it might...

A perfect copy? Wow! That would be an incredible technical achievement, requiring immensely precise matches of material composition and construction. The product of such a vast and unprecedented undertaking (were it feasible) would probably merit a price higher than any original artwork. But suppose, as you might have intended, that such a process became commonplace and inexpensive: Titians for the masses. Then of course the original would fetch a premium over the copies. Why? Because we value artworks not only for their intrinsic features--their look, their material constitution--but for their historical features, for their being the very objects on which the artist exercised their craft. This is why prints tend to be less valuable than paintings by the same artist---they're just a bit towards the replica side of things. Does this make sense, or is it as pointless a fetish as ... saving one of Britney's cigarette butts? I don't know. But it's not only artworks that normally...