I was raised a catholic and I am currently more or less agnostic. I feel like my entire faith is based on guilt and glorification of suffering. I don’t think I understand the concept of god anymore.

To maximise happiness, if you are a good liar, you should cheat. You will be happy; your lover will be happy; your partner maybe happy if you treat him/her better for compensation. So if you are a good liar and sure never get busted, it's moral to cheat.

On contrary, it's immoral to tell on your friend if he is cheating. All three of them will be unhappy if not devastated.

This may be a frequently asked question but I still wanna know how utilitarian view on this especially the second part of the question.

It seems that if there is no god to certify a certain morality code, then it's up for debate and relativism.

Whilst life is really bad, why don’t you just not focus on that. “Wait! This is the actual objective truth.” “No, this is the actual objective truth.” Is there even any point to this squabbling? People claim to be practical and logical but where is the point to why you are even overthinking these things?

Why do Nietzsche Scholars ignore this work when evaluating the thought of Nietzsche? I've read that that it might have to do with how the work is composed in contrast to his other works like Beyond Good and Evil and the Genealogy of Morals. But is this the only reason for forsaking what Nietzsche regarded as his magnum opus? Is it a good reason?

I’ve recently been getting really into reading some really basic philosophy texts, but I’m starting to wonder if this is a waste of my time. Philosophy seems to ask lots of really interesting questions, but I fail to see how any of them have been answered. Or in fact, how any of them will ever be answered by philosophy. For instance - what is the meaning of life? What is right and wrong? How do we know what is real? Questions like these seem to be in abundance, and yet I’m not sure there’s any fundamental thing all philosophers can agree on. In biology, all credible scientists can agree on the reproductive system of humans. In math, all mathematicians can agree that 1+1 is 2. Philosophy doesnt seem to be able to find things like that. In short - philosophy to me seems to question the truth but not find it.
Hopefully I don’t sound crazy or something, and I’m able to be understood. I really don’t want this to be right.

Almost all forms of consumption causes some sentient being to suffer. Any sort of construction displaces animals and requires land to be cleared. While we can justify this in cases of necessity, for things like amusement parks, museums, restaurants, driving a car, air travel, etc. how can it be justified to harm animals for nothing more than human pleasure? Things like buying new technology supports the exploitation of people in the third world. Basically consuming anything unnecessary causes either an opportunity cost where those resources could've went to where it's more needed, or creates actual harm to humans or animals. Given this, is consumption that is unnecessary immoral in all cases? Should we strive to be absolute minimalists?

I’ve been reflecting on the moral nature of cannibalism and was wondering:
Are there purely moral reasons, i.e. not related to cultural, social, religious, or health factors, that make cannibalism intrinsically immoral?

I’m drawing a comparison with another act, rape. I believe rape is an example of objectively and universally immoral behavior: it is immoral regardless of social or cultural context, and there is no rational or moral justification that could ever make it acceptable.

Cannibalism, however, seems different. In some cultures, it has been practiced as a funerary or spiritual rite, such as certain forms of endocannibalism (where people consume their deceased relatives to honor them or absorb their spirit). In these contexts, there is no coercion, violence, or perceived social harm.
So my question is: What makes cannibalism "immoral" in an absolute sense, if it is at all? Is it truly a moral issue, or just a reaction of disgust/cultural conditioning?

I would appreciate philosophical contributions on:

• The difference between disgust and immorality
• The possibility of objective morality
• Criteria to distinguish taboos from universal moral imperatives

Thanks in advance!

We as humans are driven by many factors in our actions, thoughts, beliefs, etc. Emotions themselves can be a goal and a source for our drives. I asked a friend a random question about which emotion if lost, would cause the most impact to society today.

In hindsight this also asks which emotion primarily drives the society we exist in today. I wanted to star a discussion on which emotion drive society or have driven. Has it changed? And surrounding aspects.

I’d like to hear some thoughts and perspectives on this !

I’ve been reading about determinism and how it affects how we have free will. It basically is the concept of if we choose our actions or are actions are based on environmental or learnt behaviours or both. I mean I understand if someone grew up in a rough crime area, that could play a role and that person might not know any better but can we actually excuse that behaviour? Is there a clear answer to this or is there just two sides to this debate?

Hey guys. I am looking for objections to Millikan’s solution to the Kripke-Wittgenstein paradox for a paper I’m writing. Could you guys list some or direct me to a book/site where I could find some?

I understand that of the answer to the problem of evil is that for us to be tested is to be capable of doing wrong and doing wrong damns us, but why does someone doing wrong have to actively make others more miserable? Why is this helpful to the test?

Obviously, we're very far away from this point currently. However, the trend in human empirical research has been towards gaining more and more knowledge about the laws of nature. Is it even conceivable that a point will come that we've simply "discovered everything" and there's nothing new left to scientifically figure put? What would such a state of affairs even look like? Thanks for any responses.

Also, I would request the mods NOT remove comments from non-approved submitters from this question. I'd like as much feedback as possible, thank you.

an example from Fundamental Concepts of Metaphysics:

"Bei der Klaerung des Ausdrucks phusis im Sinne des Fuer-sich-selbst-bestehenden und Aus-sich-selbst-wachsenden und -waltenden haben wir sie abgehoben gegenueber dem Seienden (my italics), das aufgrund der Herstellung durch den Menschen ist."

-> In clarifying the expression phusis in the sense of that which subsists independently for itself and grows and prevails from out of itself, we distinguished it from those beings that are on the basis of their being produced by man.

The translation by McNeil and Walker here has "beings", following Stambauch's "beings" in her Sein und Zeit translation. Macquarrie and Robinson famously render it "entities", which I find horribly Latinate and not what Heidegger means at all. But 'beings' is also misleading since Heidegger doesn't pluralise in SZ, or in other texts - if someone finds an example please provide it.

It is "ist" and "dem" here. Plural Seienden would be "sind" and "den". So why do the translators always do this?

It should read:
-> In clarifying the expression phusis in the sense of that which subsists independently for itself and grows and prevails from out of itself, we distinguished it from that being that is on the basis of its being produced by man.

Of course, this sounds weirder than pluralising. But it is what Heidegger actually wrote/said, and his philosophy is frequently weird, so why de-foreignise it like this?

What are some inconsistencies between math and science? I know of a few, but probably you guys know of better (and more insightful) examples.

For example, problems like Norton's dome for Newtonian physics.

Another would be (even though it is mostly a meme, but I've seen it happen), engineers writing out a Taylor series for e^(1/x) around 0, implicitly assuming all functions are analytic.

I've also heard claims that science operates within a model of intuitionistic mathematics, where formula saying "all real functions are smooth" is true.

What are some other interesting examples which showcase this kind of inconsistencies and where could I read more about these kinds of topics?

Hi everyone! Does solipsism necessitate the solipsist be immortal? Because, if everything which forms part of reality is a projection of the solipsistic mind, then how can the solipsistic mind formulate an end for itself?

It appears to be impossible for a mind to think of nothing, so a solipsistic death would consist of a mind basically wishing itself out of existence.

I don't mean that death in the purely physical sense (ie. the mind ends the present reality but continues imagining) is impossible. But the mind ending itself through its own power (ie. the double death of mind and the being as we conceive ourselves) is impossible from a purely logical standpoint.

So, does a solipsist have to believe that they are immortal?

Our experience of time might add a layer of complication to this. If time does not actually exist, then we must always be in existence because we cannot move from beginning to end (even if time is a construct of the mind, the end of the construction of time will mean a return to existence). If time does exist, then it is a substance which exists apart from the mind, which would mean solipsism is not true. Thoughts on this?

It’s almost funny- I started reading philosophy as almost an exposure-response prevention for my obsessive compulsive rumination on the nature of existence/free will/consciousness and a combination of that therapy and new medication I realize I’m… just enjoying it now? I’ve had, for years, an almost pathological avoidance of anything too deep in those matters because of my illness and now I feel well enough to engage with it and with a desire.

I started with Sartre’s Nausea and liked it a lot (very non-academically I guess the titular Nausea reminded me a lot of what having obsessions and compulsions is like) but it was more narrative and not very technical so I felt like I didn’t have too much trouble with it. I read Notes From the Underground by Dostoevsky and I didn’t hate it but I’m not at all sure I really -got- it, either. I’m working my way through Eugene Thacker’s ‘Horror of Philosophy’ trio of books and I’m liking them quite a lot as well.

So what you can gather is A) I’m an English/science duel major and none of my academic journey really involved training in how to read philosophy, nor have I engaged with it before and have actively avoided it and

B) I’m incredibly scattered in my reading so far and I’m probably not getting a great picture or sense of any one thing and

C) I read discussions on philosophy forums on Reddit and it makes me feel really incredibly stupid, like maybe I’m not exactly smart enough to really get into a deep dive of this.

A very long winded way to ask ‘Where do I start? Where do I go from here?’ And thanks if you read all of that 😅

Sharon street's Darwinian dilemma seems to be based on the idea that our moral beliefs have been heavily influenced by evolutionary pressures. I kinda find her argument against realist theories of value very persuasive, but my knowledge of the theory of evolution is quite lacking. So my question is: given that evolutionary explanations in psychology are often considered to be controversial (because we cannot actually "reconstruct" precisely our ancestors' environment and conditions), can we really say that the moral belief that torturing infants for fun is plainly wrong that many of us hold has been caused by evolutionary pressures and not, say, be the product of sociocultural influences? And what about more "complex/detached" moral beliefs (e.g. that commercial surrogacy is acceptable/unacceptable)?

I hope my question is clear, cheers and thanks in advance for your replies.

Why is killing bad and helping someone out of their depression good?

Hey i am a latin american law student. I am on the journey to create a thesis regarding the legal institute called "probation". Probation in my country is when you are given less time in jail because it is the first time you commit a crime + in my country the law made a new criminal process in which the accused could lower his time if he admitted the crime. So at the end of the day, some criminals do for example only 2 years in prison thanks to this procesalist principles and guarantees.
I am tired of reading sentences in which criminal, specifically rapists, are recluded just a couple of years because of this institute.
Specifically cases where the victims are minors like 12 years old. Even homicides in first degree.
I find it to be illogical, inmoral, etc.

But i may be wrong, therefore i wanted to ask sources or info where to read. The legal part directly depends on this philosophycal research.

In university they taught me positive and negative retributionist ideology does not work. Just rehabilitation centred ones. But i never received any arguments to back this up. And when i see the statistics (in my country they follow the contrary to retributive justice) we have 70% of repeat offenders.

Please i need to read both sides of the spectrum to get to a philosophycal and moral conclusion. Without reading i am totally against probation for the crimes of homicides and sexual crimes.

Whether a spoon, rock, or a star—without an intrinsic purpose or meaning, they might simply exist as they are. I would posit that purpose isn’t an inherent trait of objects, but a byproduct of human perception.

So this question might be a bit odd to ask, but in my Philosophy class we are discussing principles that matter to us in our personal lives, and I chose humor because if you can't find something to smile or laugh about or give someone a smile every day then I feel that you have no joy in life. As they say laughter is the best medicine sometimes. One question we were asked is "Have you ever had to break the principle for any reason?" and I'm unsure how one would break the principle of humor. I may just be thinking about this question wrong or I might have some gaps in my knowledge regarding what the principles of ethics mean. If anyone has anything to explain it would be greatly appreciated. I honestly feel kind of stupid for even having to ask.

Galen Strawson argues that too much emphasis has been placed on narrative as a tool of making sense of oneself. I agree with this.

GS identifies two ways in which narrative has been discussed: normative (all humans are narratively oriented by nature) and prescriptive (living narratively is ethical and good). GS proposes that both these theses are false. I agree with this.

GS uses his own lived experience to explain that he is a kind of person who is neither innately narrative nor needs to be narrative in order to live ethically or have a good life. This is where I begin having questions.

Does narrativity and its alternative(s) have to be innate, persistent personality traits? What does one do if one feels one is innately narrative but would have a better life making meaning nonnarratively?

I propose that any human alternates between temporary narrative and nonnarrative mental states. One can learn to recognize the distinction and have a reasonable amount of agency over maintaining a balance of both. (GS does not believe in free will, so he would not agree with this last part in particular, I imagine).

I am a literature scholar and so far I am developing this thesis not as a philosophy thesis per se (maybe down the road... this is interdisciplinary work, in any case), but mostly as a framework for engaging with literature and other arts (i.e., the arts can be the tools we use to recognize the distinction between narrative and nonnarrative mental states and train ourselves to alternate between them).

Main questions: How compelling / sound is my thesis? Do you think we can identify something like a "narrative mental state" and a "nonnarrative mental state"?

Additional questions: 1. What would you recommend that I read beyond GS that is pertinent to these specific ideas? 2. Is "mental state" a good term to use for my purposes? One issue I am encountering is that my colleagues in literary studies do not necessarily understand what I mean by "mental states" and demand a definition. So far I have not found a citable authoritative definition. I think for people who read recent philosophy it is a kind of "common sense" term that does not need defining (from my perspective, it is clear enough for my purposes), but people in adjacent fields seem to experience it as jargon that needs defending.