Here is the presenter's response to responses that can help your response to someone's response on 3quarksdaily.com. (Wasn't that a fun sentence!)
The Link:
Sam Harris' Response
Have fun with this one!
Tuesday, March 30, 2010
Science and Morals
Watch the video again -- this will give you a chance to see it in its entirety.
In your comments, go to http://www.3quarksdaily.com/3quarksdaily/2010/03/can-science-answer-moral-questions-sam-harris-makes-the-case.html and read the comments. Copy a section of someone's comment and respond to what he or she (or they if whether they are male or female is ambiguous) says.
The central issue is whether the talk shows that science can create a language that supports and defines moral values.
Happy viewing.
In your comments, go to http://www.3quarksdaily.com/3quarksdaily/2010/03/can-science-answer-moral-questions-sam-harris-makes-the-case.html and read the comments. Copy a section of someone's comment and respond to what he or she (or they if whether they are male or female is ambiguous) says.
The central issue is whether the talk shows that science can create a language that supports and defines moral values.
Happy viewing.
Tuesday, March 23, 2010
Metaphysics/Foundations or Empiricism/Perspectives
Is all that is opinion or perspective about truth (and universal Truth is lost)? With examples like moral truth, family values, and education, ARE ALL TRUTHS opinion/REVISABLE/EMPIRICAL OR innate/METAPHYSICAL, AS WITH our decisions about why we do what we do, i.e. not kill each other, go to school etc.
The question is -- Why do we (people) all seem to go along with what we are told (go to school, work a regular 9 to 5 job, not be cannibals) if the power to choose is based in our own opinions? (Why don't more people act more randomly or individualistically?)
Are we all simply victims of cultural and paternal influence and lemmings to those dictates and therefore conform or is there another reason for the continuity we see in people's actions?
The question is -- Why do we (people) all seem to go along with what we are told (go to school, work a regular 9 to 5 job, not be cannibals) if the power to choose is based in our own opinions? (Why don't more people act more randomly or individualistically?)
Are we all simply victims of cultural and paternal influence and lemmings to those dictates and therefore conform or is there another reason for the continuity we see in people's actions?
Wednesday, March 17, 2010
All cheating IS NOT immoral.
"Can were say, therefore, the all cheating is immoral?"
Cheating, in its lowest form, is a means of survival. Surviving a test, surviving the punishment one would have received from a parent due to a low grade. Surviving the shame.
Sure, cheating is very easily abused, and in most cases is unnecessary and immoral. But say for example, and this is very situational, that a travesty occurs. One so grand, yet resolved early enough, that a student cannot study for a test, but must go to school the next. Surely the student does not want to fail, or do poorly. And because they were unable to study, cheating is a must to getting a good grade. Is this immoral? To have the desire to succeed? To utilize others? Is it not sharing, or assisting?
Most cheating is immoral, I will agree on that. Cheating out of laziness, cheating on one's husband or wife, cheating in a game. That is all very immoral. However, circumstantially, cheating can prove to a moral decision and in turn, proves that all cheating is not immoral.
Posted by David Basile
Cheating, in its lowest form, is a means of survival. Surviving a test, surviving the punishment one would have received from a parent due to a low grade. Surviving the shame.
Sure, cheating is very easily abused, and in most cases is unnecessary and immoral. But say for example, and this is very situational, that a travesty occurs. One so grand, yet resolved early enough, that a student cannot study for a test, but must go to school the next. Surely the student does not want to fail, or do poorly. And because they were unable to study, cheating is a must to getting a good grade. Is this immoral? To have the desire to succeed? To utilize others? Is it not sharing, or assisting?
Most cheating is immoral, I will agree on that. Cheating out of laziness, cheating on one's husband or wife, cheating in a game. That is all very immoral. However, circumstantially, cheating can prove to a moral decision and in turn, proves that all cheating is not immoral.
Posted by David Basile
FACT VS. VALUES
As a means to continue our discussion about whether there are right or wrong actions in the world, we should reflect on a student's statement, "No one would say that cheating is moral."
Can were say, therefore, the all cheating is immoral?
Is there a ground for a value claim that is beyond opinion and carries some "fact of the matter" that can substantiate that to cheat is to be immoral?
Does the context of situation of cheating change the meaning of "cheating is immoral" or are we just changing the word from cheating to some other term?
Please respond to as many of the questions as you like. But make sure to reference one of your classmates comments, starting with the first brave person who post who should refer to the quotation from the student.
Due by Friday's class.
Can were say, therefore, the all cheating is immoral?
Is there a ground for a value claim that is beyond opinion and carries some "fact of the matter" that can substantiate that to cheat is to be immoral?
Does the context of situation of cheating change the meaning of "cheating is immoral" or are we just changing the word from cheating to some other term?
Please respond to as many of the questions as you like. But make sure to reference one of your classmates comments, starting with the first brave person who post who should refer to the quotation from the student.
Due by Friday's class.
Friday, February 19, 2010
INTRO TO PHIL
The goal of the course is simplistic, yet simplicity is a willful and difficult act of metacogniton that requires, paradoxically complex thought about what thinking is, what the thinking process looks like, and how to control it; especially if you are just trying to be simple, straight forward, what you are.Although we may not move only in chronological order, nor beg that question that one philosophical movement is necessarily a direct reaction and evolution of the previous movement in history, it is important that we look at the way that historical contexts effect philosophical movements and how seemingly disparate movements, separated by time, might participate in similar conversations about what thinking is.Below are some links to Western Philosophical Time lines for Figures and Movements we will cover during the semester:
Kent State Professor of Computer Science Link
Philosophical Society .COM
Pre Socratics
Kent State Professor of Computer Science Link
Philosophical Society .COM
Pre Socratics
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