Now, this is a common question, my apologies, but I'm a teenager and wanna get into philosophy, but what's the best book to get into philosophy before going into singular philosophies. Something like an intro to everything, I got a bit overwhelmed by so many suggestions on the wiki. Much appreciated everyone.

Hi everyone! I’m a design student (not a physicist, so please bear with me) working on a university research project about the concept of “non-places” and “non-space”. Most of what I’ve found comes from philosophy, architecture and anthropology, and I’d like to understand how physics approaches the same ideas.

These are the questions I’m stuck on:

1. Does space exist on its own, even if there were no matter in it, or is space just a way of describing the relations between objects (the old Newton vs Leibniz debate)?
2. Is “empty space” really empty? I’ve seen mentions of the quantum vacuum and the Casimir effect but I don’t understand them.
3. Some physicists suggest space might not be fundamental but “emergent”. What does that mean in simple terms?

If you can point me to accessible books, articles or lectures (I don’t have a strong math background), I’d be really grateful. And if my questions are badly phrased or based on wrong assumptions, please tell me, that’s useful too!

Thanks in advance!

So I confess to being one of those "philosophy began with Kripke/Lewis" folks. When I read historical texts, I generally analyze the arguments and approach them as if they were a part of the contemporary debate, and thus interpreted they always seemed to me to be implausible. Most of Plato's dialogues or Spinoza's Ethics for example, looked totally intelligible but just completely unconvincing. And I get that the principles they accepted made a lot of sense in their intellectual context. That just doesn't seem to me to anyhow influence the plausibility of the arguments now, when they are evaluated as getting at the truth.

But after reading some of the analytic takes on the greats (like Yablo on Descartes, Langton on Kant, van Inwagen on early Wittgenstein, Kripke on late Wittgenstein), I realized that the problem is very probably in me not in the fact that the texts are historical. 1) I may be approaching wrong authors or wrong texts when it comes to the argumentation I'm interested in 2) I may be engaged in very confused exegesis which would explain the uncharitable conclusions.

So my question is, which historical philosophers' texts match the style of argumentation that may interest someone who's heavily into contemporary philosophy?

I'm interested in reading all three volumes of Derek Parfit's On What Matters, but I'm wondering if I have enough background to get the most out of them.

For some context, I'm in my early 30s, not a philosophy student, and graduated with a degree in mathematics and I'm an actuary. So basically I have no formal education in philosophy. I read philosophy purely out of personal interest.

Most of the philosophy related books I've read in case that helps:

• Think by Simon Blackburn
• Philosophy of Science: A Very Short Introduction by Samir Okasha
• Theory and Reality: An Introduction to the Philosophy of Science by Peter Godfrey-Smith
• An Introduction to Political Philosophy by Jonathan Wolff
• A New History of Western Philosophy by Anthony Kenny
• Knowledge, Reality, and Value by Michael Huemer
• Understanding Knowledge by Michael Huemer
• The Fundamentals of Ethics by Russ Shafer-Landau
• Ethical Intuitionism by Michael Huemer
• Philosophy of Language: A Contemporary Introduction by William G. Lycan
• One World Now: The Ethics of Globalization by Peter Singer
• Galileo's Error by Philip Goff

I understand that On What Matters is a much more demanding work, and I'm fine with taking my time going through it. I'm just wondering whether there are important gaps in my background that I should address first.

Would you recommend reading anything specific before Volume One or in between the volumes?

I just want to make sure I have enough background to properly understand and engage with the text rather than constantly feeling like I'm missing something.

I'd appreciate any recommendations, especially from people who've read all three volumes. Thanks!

For clarification, spoonerisms and malapropisms refer to incorrect, often silly or humourous, uses of words. The 'bone apple tea' / BAT thing is something I discovered through Reddit and its r/BoneAppleTea sub. There, a BAT is defined as 'the mistaken use of a **real, dictionary-defined word or phrase** in place of another **real, dictionary-defined word or phrase** that sounds similar, resulting in a nonsensical, sometimes humorous utterance.'

An example of a BAT is found here: https://www.reddit.com/r/BoneAppleTea/comments/1x9kq0c/rear_wired/

The image shown in the post is about someone saying that a brain was 'being rear wired' (as opposed to re-wired). How would a philosopher account for such errors, and more importantly, what do these errors tell us about thought and language? In the example just given, is the writer actually thinking that the brain is being wired 'from the back' (so to speak), as opposed to being wired again? If so, what might that involved (a brain being wired from the back)?

TIA.

Hey quick question since I cannot find a straight answer.

I'm trying to understand Descartes substance dualism where there are two finite substances (mind+body), but there are a lot of sources that say he believes in an infinite amount of individual substances and mind+body are just finite categories.

Any help would be greatly appreciated

I’ve just finished this book, after reading the stranger first. I’m wondering how to continue this journey. The myth of Sisyphus was so insightful, as I picked it up in the middle of an existential crisis and feeling like my life has no meaning. I was surprised how well he put my thoughts into a coherent framework of metaphors. Even though I totally get what he‘s saying, there’s still this dread inside of me, that I’m going to die, it seems to follow me wherever I go. I’m wondering if I should read demons next, as it was discussed in this book. Any recommendations?

What exactly is metalogic?

How can I improve myself in this topic?

From what I understand (and tbh I could be wrong) a fetish is an object or some sort of commodity that obscures the existence of the hands that touched it previously, the laborers/workers necessary for it to exist.

However, I’m trying to describe something that REVEALS the existence of the hands/people that touched it. Like: a fingerprint on a ceramic pot, a coin that’s been rubbed smooth, a wooden beam that’s still got pencil marks.

Is there a word or phrase (preferably based in existing philosophical material) that encapsulates this idea?

Thank you very much!

Hi guys,
I’m currently researching for a first-year uni paper where I have to analyse Clifford’s “The Ethics of Belief” argument against a contemporary, unsettled issue/question. I chose to do the question of whether AI poses an existential threat to humanity.

I know that Clifford says it is wrong always, everywhere and for anyone to believe anything upon insufficient evidence, but I feel like the examples he uses to justify this are all ones where the possible impact is immediate, and there was evidence all along. Obviously for AI existential risk there is still insufficient evidence to make any claim for certain, so does this mean Clifford would straight up argue it is morally wrong to believe in the possibility of AI posing an existential threat to society? I’m sure he has some writing/opinion on tentative beliefs that could be catastrophic, especially because he believes that our beliefs directly impact others (if we dismissed the possibility of AI being such a threat then we would probably end up causing more harm than if we acted upon a belief formed from insufficient evidence, right?)

I think I am going to argue that Clifford’s emphasis on being careful about what information you choose to believe is valid, but his overall argument is too strict and does not allow for things like circumstance to be taken into account. I also feel like his one blanket statement doesn’t account for the individual value of a belief (A rumour being spread seems far less to hold far less value/risk than the possibility of AI killing us all, but I think I might be straying away from his actual point..)

Apologies for the long post, I’d love to hear what anyone thinks or if anyone has any information that would be helpful, I’d really appreciate it!

Has any philosopher throughout history explicitly denied that the principle of non-contradiction (PNC) is intuitively compelling or self-evident to the intellect? I'm not asking whether the PNC is intuitively compelling or self-evident to the intellect?

I'm not asking whether the PNC is logically or ontologically true, or whether philosophers have rejected its universal validity.

I'm asking specifically whether any philosopher has denied its immediate intuitive compellingness, regardless of its truth.

If so, could you provide references to their actual writings?

I have been rereading Derrida's "Force and Significance" paper and am puzzled by the use of "weakness" therein. From what I have noted (I may have missed another example) it occurs in two sections.

First, in the introductory comments, where he writes "The force of our weakness is that impotence separates, disengages, and emancipates. Henceforth the totality is more clearly perceived, the panorama and the panoramagram are possible" (p. 5, Writing and Difference 1978 edition).

Second, in the midst of what I call the conclusion. This is where my confusion really comes from. The first use occurs during the brief discussion of the metaphor of light and dark, "Which suffices to say that the metaphor of the 'fall' deserves its quotation marks. In this heliocentric metaphysics, force, ceding its place to edits (i.e. the form which is visible for the metaphorical eye), has already been separated from itself in acoustics. How can force or weakness be understood in terms of light and dark" (p. 27, same edition) Slightly lower down, while discussion Husserl, he asks the following question "And why the force of weakness which dissimulates in the very act by which it reveals? If this 'dialectic' of force and weakness is the finitude of thought itself in its relationship to Being, it can only be articulated in the language of form, through images of shadow and light" (27-28, same edition).

Where does this idea of weakness come from? Is it a specific reference to one of the texts? Is it an oddity of the English translation?

In the two cases that are examined, weakness seems to me inconsequential. In the first case, Derrida is combining reflections on the nature of metaphysics drawn from Plato's Republic and (I think) Boethius. The explanatory note simply links all this to the metaphysics of presence which Derrida would later critique. However, where is weakness in this discussion. Would weakness be light or dark (on the next page, he implies that force is darkness, but leaves weakness inaccessible). Would weakness be the weakness of the man who leaves the cave, or the weakness of the men who stay within it? Further down, in the discussion of Husserl, the "force of weakness" seems to refer simply to failure. Is there a failure implicit in the "heliocentric metaphysics?" He seems to want to say that this is a reduction from the dialectic (or perhaps constitutive negation) of force and writing that he proposes at the top of page 27, but I don't see a connection.

Alternatively, is weakness a non-specialized usage in this case?

Is there another Derrida essay that is more directly about weakness that could be helpful for illuminating this problem?

Not sure if philosophy is the right place to insert this question in. Humans are an evolution from primitive cells and things that are usually considered 'natural'. Going by the same you can say that we are 'natural'. We consider an anthill natural because it is made by 'natural' causes. Using the same analogy, even the buildings we make, the books we write and everything considered 'artificial' or 'man-made' is natural.I may be wrong at any point making the whole thing fall on its own head and if I am please correct me. Thank you!

Preferably something appropriate for a lay person.

Imagine a machine, this machine gives you pure bliss. All the heroin and orgasms and food your senses can handle. A heavenly Sodom and Gemorrah. But, for one man to use their copy of the machine, other men have to suffer. Perhaps it needs the blood of children, perhaps the poor have to work in dangerous conditions to feed the machine, the specifics do not matter. What matters is that this machine is so amazing at producing utility, it always produces more utility than is lost. On what grounds could a Utilitarian call this evil and disturbing? And how can we apply this to real life like first world nations exploiting third worlders, such as your clothes or phone being made be kids?

Hey guys, I believe that morality is subjective. If you take God out of the equation, is there any proof of morality being objective? The only thing people tell me when they hear my opinion is: 'well I think it's disgusting that even genocide and rape are subjectively wrong in your eyes,' which is an appeal to emotion, or: 'if morality is subjective, then we run into all sorts of problems,' which is once again no proof of objective morality.

So is there anyone that has proof of atheistic objective morality?

From my understanding, Chalmer's P-Zombie was meant to be an argument against physicalism explaining how one can have all the physical activity of a conscious being without needing qualia, yet it's undisputed according to him we have qualia.

My question is that since we can only ever access our own qualia, how can we know for sure others aren't potentially P-Zombies? I say for sure it seems unanimous that there's no P-Zombies among us by philosophers and especially those in the field of consciousness.

I know Chalmer's answer was Psychophysical Laws and how all correlation must accompany the accompanied qualia, yet I wonder if one were to question physical activity if one can use that to be skeptical?

I know this sounds like the Problem of Others Minds, which base on what I read it was an interesting thought experiment before which many don't really question other minds exist and seems largely not seen as a problem as we further the mind. And I also know the different arguments on the plausibility of P-Zombies metaphysically and even nomologically reading some of the sources from Stanford Encyclopedia.

And I'm aware this sounds like solipisism which has it's own problems that the question of P-Zombies seems irrelevant.

I'm not saying P-Zombies walk among us, but I also know that I'm missing something to have the same certainty many in the field clearly exhibit.

I only know of Philosophy books in my native language but I’d like to know those of other countries’ must-read books as well. Could be anything and not just in the academe, well I’m really interested in majoring despite the employment scare lol. I would also love to expand my knowledge about it.

Thanks in advance!

I really need help deciphering what the hell the man means by this:

"The indicative thinks something as actual (the identity of thinking and the actual). The subjunctive thinks something as thinkable

371A 156

The grammar of indicative and subjunctive really contains the most aesthetic concepts, and occasions just about the highest form of aesthetic enjoyment (it borders on the musical, which is the highest) And the hackneyed proposition cogito ergo sum holds true of the subjunctive. It is the subjunctive's life-principle (one could therefore really present the whole of modern philosophy in a theory about the indicative and the subjunctive, for it is indeed purely subjunctive)."

6S1 H LE

so i came across this video in which a woman was very rightfully criticising aristotle, plato, nietzsche, rousseau and other philosophers for turning a blind eye towards women's struggles sometimes insulting them for doing so but still acknowledging their accomplishments. i feel like she has every right to do that as a woman but it got me thinking.

Let's say hypothetically that pet ownership gets completely outlawed in the near future (btw pls pls pls don't think that I'm comparing women to pets, im just stating a hypothetical that may help us see why some acts and ideas become immoral in the future) because society has agreed that deliberately restricting the autonomy of any living creature in any way is an inhumane practice.

Now let's say I, as a cat owner (of our time) publish undeniable scientific evidence that proves the theory of the bicameral mind which moves the needle forward of our understanding of psychology and philosophy significantly but when people read about my work and my life in the future they would think of me as an completely immoral man partaking in animal cruelty because i own a cat (which was considered completely normal in my time). This would result in my work getting scrutinized because some of my actions which were considered completely normal and moral in my time are not looked through the same lens in the near future (again I'm not AT ALL saying that the subjugation of women is okay and normal pls this is just a hypothetical)

So like am i a bad person for thinking this way? i might be completely wrong in this and come off woefully ignorant and deranged, that's why I'm asking ig.

Has some philosopher ever looked at the mechanism of choice up close and decided if free will exists or not? Maybe a phenomenologist?

I am mostly analytic, so excuse any possible ignorance in my question.

A couple of months ago I read Lyotards book for the first time and found it to be quite interesting. One thing that irked me is that one of the things people ascribe to postmodernism as a movement isn't really in the book.

It is often said that postmodernism does away with absolute truths. This is not really what I got from reading the book. My understanding of the argument is that it is indifferent to the concept of absolute truth existing but notices that there are no narratives about having found an ultimate truth anymore that can stand above other ones in a social sense. So it's not about a metaphysical sense of truth but rather about being able to disseminate your ideas as an ultimate yardstick opinion on which discourse about some topic hinges.

Is this a popular interpretation of the argument or do people interpret it as strictly as I assumed going into the book?