Re: No animals "benefit" from farming (wrong!)

dh_ld_at_nomail.com
Date: 02/25/05 

Date: Fri, 25 Feb 2005 11:57:18 -0500

On Fri, 25 Feb 2005 05:47:12 GMT, "lin" tried to influence the structure
of our thought by writing:

>Taken from a Philosophy dictionary (albeit an old one) I happen to have
>laying around here,

    I damn sure don't believe that.

>this is the crux of the biscuit, as it were.
>Metaphysics -
>
>"The branch of philosophy concerned with providing a comprehensive account
>of the most general features of reality as a whole; the study of being as
>such. Questions about the existence and nature of minds, bodies, god, space,
>time, causality, unity, identity, and the world are all metaphysical issues.
>>From Plato onwards, many philosophers have tried to determine what kinds of
>things (and how many of each) exist.

    That involves all matter.

>But Kant argued that this task is
>impossible; he proposed instead that we consider the general structure of
>our thought about the world.

    That involves very little matter.

>Strawson calls the former activity revisionary,
>and the latter descriptive, metaphysics."
>
>Got that?
_________________________________________________________
meta-

(also met- before a vowel or h)

  • combining form forming words referring to: 1 a change of position or condition: metamorphosis. 2 position behind,
after, or beyond: metacarpus. 3 something of a higher or second-order kind: metalanguage.

  — ORIGIN from Greek meta ‘with, across, or after’.

http://www.askoxford.com/concise_oed/meta?view=uk
ŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻ
    I'm guessing Strawson wants to say that thinking about things gives
them a type of existence regardless of whether or not it involves matter,
or at least regardless of how much it involves if any.

>You should - you're all so friggen smart, & that *is* a very
>undetailed, basic, 100-level definition. Ok, going on. How the hell do *you*
>expect to even be able to *define* existence? You can't do it; all of the
>major philosophers can't (or couldn't) do it; even today's scientists &
>doctors can't do it.
>
>Please. Define "existence"

    How do you want to define it? Do you want it to involve matter, or not?

>for all of us. Cos if you *can* come up w/ a
>definition everyone can agree w/, you'll have the Nobel Prizes for Science,
>Literature, *&* Peace in yer back pocket by this time next yr. You'll have
>solved all the major problems of the world

    I sure don't believe that

> - whether abortion is murder or
>not,

    or that

>whether organ transplants are ethical,

    or that

>whether a person in a high-level
>coma should be kept alive or be allowed to die

    or that

>(like Karen Ann Quinlan, who,
>once she *was* disconnected, didn't die anyway!),

    (okay, maybe that)

>whether capitol punishment
>should be abolished,

    Too bad you're slinking off, because I'd love for you to explain how the
correct definition of existence could decide whether capitol punishment
should be abolished.

>etc. You'll have ALL the answers!

    I sure don't believe that

>You, & you alone,
>will be the only person in History to have figured it all out. Won't you
>just be hot *** on a stick?
>
>I'll tell you what I tell my students:

    or that
_________________________________________________________
metaphysics

    Branch of philosophy concerned with providing a comprehensive account
of the most general features of reality as a whole; the study of being as such.
Questions about the existence and nature of minds, bodies, god, space, time,
causality, unity, identity, and the world are all metaphysical issues. From Plato
onwards, many philosophers have tried to determine what kinds of things (and
how many of each) exist. But Kant argued . . .

http://www.philosophypages.com/dy/m7.htm
ŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻŻ
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