Some relevant comics 4 Jan 201221 Jun 2018 As always, click to go to the originals. Evolution Humor Religion
Politics Almost, but not quite, right about gay marriage 29 Apr 200818 Sep 2017 The Australian government, still in the period of meeting its election promises, has legitimised the relations between homosexual couples so that they now have the same rights as defacto couples, which is long overdue. But they didn’t quite get it right. Why not? They didn’t allow gays to get married…. Read More
Administrative Month first line meme 6 Dec 200818 Sep 2017 Bora made me do it… first line of the first post of each month the year. It doesn’t quite read like a dadaist poem. January: OK, so the next door party finished about 1.30, but the family disputes finished about 5 am, so instead of thinking, I’m going to let… Read More
Epistemology Plantinga’s EAAN 31 Jan 201231 Jan 2012 A post now up at the Philosopher’s Carnival discusses Alvin Plantinga’s Evolutionary Argument Against Naturalism (EAAN), and comment how it is like (not exactly the same) as a global skepticism argument being self-defeating. Plantinga’s argument goes like this: P1. If evolution is true, then we have modified monkey brains. P2…. Read More
Don’t want to kill the joke with pedantry, but it occurred to me that, taking Zach’s summaries at face value for a moment, you could argue that Bentham’s “maximise happiness” was supportive of, and in a sense a general approximation to Darwin’s point: I can’t speak for other species, but in H. sap. the sex drive is centred on the anticipation of considerable, if not always lasting, happiness; maximising the amount of sex in society would be (done right) one contribution to maximising the happiness in it (just sayin’). You could even stretch a point and argue that Socrates is at least in the right ball park, since “justice and right thinking” should tend to create an environment which favours the survival and reproduction of more individuals than would be the case in an unjust and arbitrary one. But I’m afraid poor old Aquinas is waaaay off beam, there. Not asking the right questions, not even wrong.