Customers! Oy! 4 Jun 2009 I used to run a service department so that’s why this site amuses me so much. Yeah, I know I’m probably fifteen years behind everyone else: The World: America’s Theme Park (Note: this takes place at our cafe in Kuranda, Australia.) Tourist: “Lady, how about we make a deal? I wanna buy this bottle from you.” Me: “Oh, sorry. We only have four of the blue ones and they’re not for sale.” Tourist: “So you’re telling me I can’t buy this?” Me: “Yes… I know it’s a nice bottle, but we do need it for the water.” Tourist: “Lady, I don’t think you understand what I’m getting at.” (The tourist pulls a wad of US money from his wallet.) Tourist: “I got REAL money here!” Humor Social evolution
Epistemology Naturalism and investigating the unnatural 21 Sep 201118 Sep 2017 Recently, Tim Williamson attacked what is known in the philosophical community as naturalism in a blog at the New York Times. A rejoinder by Alex Rosenberg defended it. Williamson’s argument is that the idea of naturalism – that we can somehow reduce all properties and things to physical things through… Read More
Evolution Sudden impact: Darwin on cognition and a leap of faith 19 May 2008 If scientists working in biology or a related field like psychology want to get attention, they will say something like this: Darwin was wrong, or made a mistake, or is insufficient to explain X, where X is whatever they are researching. It makes them seem to be proposing something important,… Read More
Humor The difference between the name and the thing 9 Sep 2009 Sometimes, comics do philosophy: Read More
“Trust me. I’m a metaphysician”: Customer: “Well, I don’t know what it is I always get. My daughter usually gets it for me.” […] Me: “…was it ‘coffee’ or ‘not coffee’? Customer: “Hmm…I believe it was both.”
Ha! Even nice Americans can be rude that way. I remember the couple that hosted me as an exchange student complaining about people not speaking English when they came to visit México.