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Wrestling with Philosophy : Day 3: Psychological Jade and The Arrogance of Ignorance
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Friday, May 15, 2015. Day 3: Psychological Jade and The Arrogance of Ignorance. Before reading this, I suggest reading my post from yesterday. Since most of what I talk about here relates to it (and I end up retracting most of what I said). Effect: You have so little knowledge of a particular domain that you are unable to assess how little you actually know and grossly overestimate how much you do know, in turn leading you to wildly wrong conclusions. They seemed normal to me! They look fine to me! Obvio...
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Wrestling with Philosophy : November 2014
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Tuesday, November 25, 2014. Can Vegans Make Broth from Dead Vagrants? Before continuing I should make one thing clear: These arguments only work so long as the byproducts would (a) otherwise be thrown out and (b) do not contribute to the demand for the primary product. Also I'll need to assume that current conditions persist, that is, the majority of the population isn't vegetarian and there is significant demand for the primary products. People to take it (e.g., farmers who use it fields or to f...I'm n...
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Wrestling with Philosophy : Day 2: Naiveté, Falsificationism, and the Counterfactual
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Thursday, May 14, 2015. Day 2: Naiveté, Falsificationism, and the Counterfactual. Many years ago in my early 20s I read a short story that stuck with me for its nightmarish realism. I can't remember the title or the author, although I think it was G.G. Marquez. I do. Know it was a Latin American author (if you know the story I'm talking about let me know so I can put a link- it's a great short story). The general plot goes something like this:. There were, of course, also cases were the patients did.
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Wrestling with Philosophy : July 2015
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Monday, July 27, 2015. Abortion, Animal Rights, and Moral Consistency. Before continuing I just want to emphasize that this article isn't intended to engage with all of the philosophical literature on abortion- that would require a book or more. The intent is to look at some the most common reasons given for opposing abortion and how they relate to animal rights if moral consistency has any value. At the end I'll briefly. P1 Abortion is killing an innocent person. P2 Killing an innocent person is murder.
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Wrestling with Philosophy : January 2015
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Friday, January 30, 2015. Review and Summary of "Ethics and Observation" by Harmon. Major debate in ethics is whether there are objective moral facts. There are a variety of defenses and objections to either position. Those who say there are objective moral facts are called "realists" while those who deny realism are called anti-realists or nihilists (there are actually more positions such as constructivists and non-cognitivists but let's not worry about that). Ok, so those are very simplified versions o...
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Wrestling with Philosophy : August 2014
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Thursday, August 21, 2014. The Impoverished State of the American Campfire and How to Build A Fire Properly. When I was in Japan what drove me (and most other Western foreigners) loco was the Japanese obsession with procedure and protocol. There's a correct way to do everything in Japan and if you don't do it that. Way, the outcome is often next to worthless- or at the very least the cause of furrowed brows. You perform the throw is just as important as throwing your opponent. Examples abound but I t...
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Wrestling with Philosophy : May 2015
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Wednesday, May 20, 2015. Solving US Health Care Cost Problems: Free Market vs Government Policy. Part 1. I apologize in advance for the somewhat scattered nature of this post. I'm trying to work through some ideas. If you're like me, your thinking, "wait a minute, I didn't consume even close to $9 000.00 in health care this year. Where is this number coming from? In a single year, what percentage of total health care dollars spent do you think went to the top 5% of health care users? For more fun facts a...
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Wrestling with Philosophy : April 2015
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Tuesday, April 28, 2015. Evidence for Moral Claims Part 2: Coherentism. Of beliefs they are. Coherentism is perhaps best understood in contrast to foundationalism. A foundationalist holds that certain kinds of beliefs are- well- foundational while others are either inferred from or not as privileged as the foundational set. For example, in terms of justificatory status, Descartes foundationalism privileges a priori. Or derived from a priori. Belief, the latter belief is more justified because a prior.
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Wrestling with Philosophy : September 2014
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Sunday, September 28, 2014. Aristotle's Virtue Ethics: A Common Misunderstanding. The first question of philosophy is "how should I live my life? Sometimes this is also presented as "what is the good life? Because the trivial answer to the first formulation is "the best way possible." However you want to frame it, it eventually boils down to the same thing. For the purposes of this article, I'll frame it as "what is the best possible way to live? To summarize, something has instrumental. Value if we valu...