Categories
Sideblog
Glossary of free-will debate terms
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How to subscribe to LDS-Herm. An LDS theology and continental philosophy mailing list.
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Economics and utilitarianism
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The new Philosopher's Carnival is up.
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On the Null set
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The book Shopping for God and Mormonism. Interesting discussion in the comments.
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FPR on John's account of Christmas is Revelation. I bring up 1 Ne 11 which is tied to Rev 12.
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FPR on Myth analysis and Mormonism. I tend to take the poststructuralist skepticism although I confess I have a lot of myth-criticism books on my shelf.
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Against Evolutionary Psychology explanations of women with narrow waists and big hips. EP in my view oversimplifies things and produces "just so" explanations. I honestly can't figure out why they are so popular in the press.
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Should cousins be banned from marrying? Would anyone want to anymore? For some reason I always think of rural areas where people have lived stably for a long time with little outflow or inflow of populations. Where is that true now?
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Razib on the follies of economics. I don't know enough to say much beyond noticing that many economic majors have horrible math skills. Not all do of course. But when math is such a big part of modeling it always left me with heavy skepticism towards the profession. Undoubtedly unfairly so since there are many very well versed in math and statistics. I'm also skeptical of the "rational actor" model that is behind so much.
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... the production of spontaneous facial expressions of emotion is not dependent on observational learning but simultaneously demonstrates a learned component to the social management of expressions... (HT: Gene Expression) Not that surprising all things considered. I suspect most human phenomena ends up being about 50-50 learned vs. wired. But there's still a lot of folks who push the nurture basis way too much.
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Happiness and those around you. Argues your happiness doesn't depend upon your friends.
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Reading Burn After Reading. Coen meet Freud.
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Public vs. Public Morality
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Vallicella on Eliminative Materialism. Also see his post on what Eliminative Materialism is.
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Richard refutes Anselm. I think just thinking through all the ways to refute the ontological argument are interesting. It's an excellent problem to think through. I like Kant's existence is not a property approach best. Marion also has a discussion about whether the ontological argument is ontological at all. I'm not sure I agree with Marion (on numerous things) but it is interesting.
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Far Side reenactments (HT: BCC)
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What is the Mormon answer to the meaning of life? I always took us as more Nietzschean than Utilitarian. That is I think happiness isn't the meaning of life but merely something we obtain while pursuing it.
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Nauvoo polygamy. Fantastic discussion that made me reconsider several things. (Although the trolls come in after a while) Also a the earlier post on the same which has some great comments as well.
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FPR on the Divine Council in Hebrew literature.
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Brains and spirituality. Or why discovering cognitive units for spirituality should be expected and not be shocking to the religious person.
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Intuitions of free will. Not at all unexpectedly different people have different intuitions.
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The Sorites paradox and non-standard arithmetic. Great post. This issue of vagueness is one of my favorite philosophical topics.
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Volokh makes the case that voters of both parties are ignorant. The scariest thing about our democracy is how elections are rarely decided on the issues.
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More Entries

Sleep and Evolution

Sleep and evolution.

What is a Trump?

I wanted to respond to Brandon’s comments about trumps. He wrote
[W]hat I claim is that there has been no notion of trump put forward so far in this discussion that lays down coherently and consistently any [difference between very strong authority and a trump]

Gender and Science

Way back in college (OK, not that long ago all things considered) one of my math professors made all his students read various papers on gender differences in mathematics and education. I believe this was actually encouraged by the department to try and get more women in the math and sciences. This was [...]

Interpretation: Latterday Saint Perspectives

Ben Huff has up a discussion of the MSH conference “Interpretation: Latterday Saint Perspectives.”

Parental Influence on Kids

Parental influence on kids. The basic notion that in terms of personality peers and genes are vastly more significant that parents. However of course parents can help determine peers (and obviously genes). I tend to think the most important thing a parent can do is provide opportunities and help develop good habits. [...]

Retortion, Speech Acts, and Truth

Retorition, speech acts and truth. Nice discussion of a kind of philosophical argument that’s very useful to use.

Epistemology of Authority

I’d mentioned on the sideblog a bit about the Theologian’s Fallacy which ends up really being a critique of authority as epistemology. I hadn’t then had time to read Brandon’s post on the issue. It’s quite interesting and Brandon actually brings to bear an argument I’ve often used in some related matters.

Do We Need to Change the Definition of Science?

Woit on do we need to change the definition of science? I’m not sure there ever was a definition. Thus the demarcation problem.

Effect of Feeling Powerless

Feeling powerless impairs higher mental abilities. In one since a “duh” moment but in an other this is a wider phenomena than just what we see in victims of varying kinds of abuse.

No Longer Needed

Five human vestigial organs. No they aren’t what you think.

Running out of Engineers

Japan is running out of engineers. Does the US have a similar problem? (HT: Slashdot) I know engineers who have trouble finding good jobs so I think the US situation is a bit overhyped. It also neglects to discuss kinds of engineers.

Theologian’s Fallacy

The Theologian’s Fallacy. (HT: Maverick Philosophy where there are some comments) I completely agree although I don’t think the “burning in the bosom” in Mormonism functions as absolute authority. I’d discussed this issue in my series on Mormon epistemology such as in “The Failure of Religious Experiences.” Mormonism as a practical [...]

McCain Foreign Policy

Drezner has a good discussion of McCain’s foreign policy. Of course what scares me is McCain’s ignorance and potential incompetence. He’s made too many repeated comments that are wrong for me to trust them as mere “gaffes.”

Mobile Phones and Pregnant Women

Mobile phones and pregnant women. A very surprising study.

Thanks, But I Can Read

Great post over at Philosophy, Science and Method. “Thanks, but I can read the paper myself.” Jeff is griping about having some philosophy talk which consists of someone reading their paper. This is why I dislike philosophy conferences for the most part. Their only benefit is when someone reads a paper [...]

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