h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Roadie. It isn't a leap, it's a series of steps of reasoning. Just like in science. The steps are the kalam. You wouldn't dismiss relativity because it's a leap from noticing light etc would you!

toxx

I am less familiar with the kalam argument than the cos/teleo/ontological arguments, but in each case the existence of God is presupposed. It is more like:

1.God created order in the universe, therefore is order in the universe (which I myself don't believe)
2. There must have been something to create this order
3. Therefore God.

Actually, Kierkegaard claimed that there was no rational reason to believe on God, which was what made faith so exciting.

But enough! We risk turning this into the GFOF thread.

Roadie. You can't just bail out when it suits you. Here is the Ladybird book of the kalam. It assumes only what is common knowledge.
http://www.religiouseducation.co.uk/school/alevel/philosophy/cosmological/critique_cosmo.htm

toxx

'Course I can't. I'm suggesting we move it, not stop it. I know Recumbent man is against debates on here.

Many thanks for the link.

Thank you Roadkill, I did express a distaste for discussions here but of course
(1) I'm an offender and
(2) I don't own the site

However it is time for another stimulating quote, don't you think?

Not for instance "and i've already posted several phrases" as posted recently by Male Researcher, Philosopher, Buddist, Marxist-Leninist, Epistemologist, Sociologist, Idealist 217777.

We don't mind repetition do we? we won't yikes you for spamming if you remind us? Or better still, add a different one!

Like "For every problem there is a solution that is simple, straightforward, effective, elegant, and utterly wrong" -- Anon

Or "There are no good books about music" -- Sir Thomas Beecham

Or "Just because you're paranoid, that doesn't mean they're not all out to get you" -- must have been posted already, but bears repetition?

"A sensation ... is not a something, but not a nothing either!" Wittgenstein.

Ah yes!

RMan. I'm not sure that I find that one terribly helpful, really.

toxx

"There are no immoral books, and no moral books. Only well and badly written ones." -- Oscar Wilde.

Roadie. That one has just about sweet FA to do with philosophy. Hmmmm, literature maybe?

toxx

Books.... I think I read a philosophy book once. In a certainl light one might say that quote entirley discounts objective morality.

Roadie. Only from literature, which has no need to be moral anyway.

toxx

Toxxin and Roadkill
I've never seen the point in reading philosophical literature. Gimme a textbook's summary and I'm as happy as a clamboy.

Mal. You don't know what you're missing then. 'Kritik der Reinen Vernunft' is compulsory reading. Just kidding, dude.

toxx

What the hell is a 'clamboy'?

I know what a flamboy is. Something flamboyant.

Oh yeah, textbook summaries are good. But I find novels are fun to read, as they are relaxing and make you think as well. Like textbooks but not so exhausting. Novels have no need to be moral but, this is the point, they try to be anyway.

Besides, I liked the quote. Reading "The Picture of Dorian Gray" at the moment, you see.

"In no branch of learning can an author disregard the results of honest research with so much impunity as he can in Philosophy and Logic" -- Wittgenstein

This was W's first published sentence -- the start of his review of Father Coffey's book "The Science of Logic" in 1912. Our boy came out with his guns blazing.

In the Blackwell "Dictionary of Philosophical Quotations" compiled by A J Ayer and Jane O'Grady, Oscar Wilde has seven entries. (Popper has six, Wittgenstein fifty-four.)

Here's one of Oscar's:

"Education is an admirable thing, but it is well to remember from time to time that nothing that is worth knowing can be taught."

Excellent book, best thing Ayer ever did, even if O'Grady did most of the work.