Philosophy & Ethics

Intelligence Made Simple

Intelligence Made Simple Part #1 of 2 What is Intelligence? I intend to show how intelligence is best understood by getting well away from ideas based on human intelligence. I shall work from humans down to primitive life-forms and then the atom itself.  ...

Blog Post - Patrick Lockerby - Jun 5 2009 - 9:39pm

Intelligence Made Simple: Part 2

Intelligence Made Simple: Part 2 Please see also Part 1 Are there other intelligences in the cosmos?   How would we know? By what universal standard can we know intelligence when we see it? A Universal Definition of Intelligence. This is what I call ' ...

Blog Post - Patrick Lockerby - Mar 29 2009 - 11:19am

The Chicken, the Egg and The Hermeneutic Circle.

The Chicken, the Egg and The Hermeneutic Circle. Which came first, the chicken or the egg? It is often difficult when analysing a problem to know where to start. Cause and effect sometimes seem to chase each other around in a circle. In the study of langua ...

Blog Post - Patrick Lockerby - Mar 30 2009 - 10:39pm

Language as a Proof of Evolutionary Processes.

Please note: despite the date, this is NOT a joke, gag or spoof. Supporters of intelligent design and creation theories keep attempting to subvert our education systems.  They will not be content until every child in every school in every country is taught ...

Blog Post - Patrick Lockerby - Apr 2 2009 - 1:47pm

Windbag The Sailor Spins a Yarn

Spinning a Yarn Ideas in etymology are like ideas in general.  Just as there is the carefully researched and formulated scientific theory as against 'just an idea', so with etymology. It is to be expected that as language becomes more widely res ...

Blog Post - Patrick Lockerby - Apr 7 2009 - 1:58pm

The True History of a Windbag

The True History of a Windbag Ideas in etymology are like ideas in general.  Just as there is the carefully researched and formulated scientific theory as against 'just an idea', so with etymology. It is to be expected that as language becomes m ...

Blog Post - Patrick Lockerby - Apr 7 2009 - 6:13pm

Random Noise 7: Discover a Syzygy

The Scientific Method: Discover a Syzygy This is one of my musings on etymology. The term 'musing' is derived from the notion that our ideas are inspired by the Muses. That in turn gives the notion of a museum as a place in which a person might ...

Blog Post - Patrick Lockerby - Apr 8 2009 - 6:43pm

Philosophy Isn't Dead, No Matter What You May Have Read In The NY Times

Today I was forwarded by several people a really bad and  confused op-ed  piece by New York Times columnist David Brooks. It is entitled “The End of Philosophy,” which naturally raised my baloney detector level to yellow alert. ...

Article - Massimo Pigliucci - Apr 9 2009 - 5:53pm

Incompetent science vs unethical science- defining the parameters

There is bad science and then there is bad science, that is to say there is science which does not meet with the standards of care and objectivity through lack of skill, and competence and then there is science which is rotten to the core, because either i ...

Blog Post - Laurence Arnold - Apr 10 2009 - 12:38pm

Why Does Religion Still Exist?

There was a time when it was virtually impossible not to believe in God.   That made sense; life had (and certainly still has) many mysteries and a divine hand made sense of an irrational world, at least in the sense that you could believe in one supernatu ...

Article - Hank Campbell - Sep 4 2012 - 6:39pm