Philosophy & Ethics

Comparing The Animate With The Inanimate

One of the key points that perpetually surfaces in the Intelligent Design debate is comparing animate with inanimate objects and attempting to draw comparisons or conclusions 1.  This becomes more pronounced when we begin to consider the role of less tangi ...

Article - Gerhard Adam - Nov 13 2009 - 1:58pm

The role of Science and Technology in Building a More Equitable and More Sustainable World: Take II

I recently attempted to write an article with the above title for a writing competition that I randomly decided to enter. I have to admit that I failed miserably. It’s a pretty hard topic to write about (or at least I thought so). A few months later, I sti ...

Blog Post - Sonia Buckley - Nov 13 2009 - 11:03pm

Evolution of the God Gene

Nicholas Wade has a new article on the evolution of religion. Evolution of the God Gene http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/15/weekinreview/12wade.html?hpw He seems to be making the case for a conciliatory relationship between religion and science. Here is wha ...

Blog Post - Asha John - Nov 15 2009 - 2:52pm

Philosophy and Science at War? (A reaction to Massimo Pigliucci's post)

Massimo had an interesting post on his “Rationally Speaking” blog last week about the rift between science and philosophy. He feels that too many of the “new atheists” are being over enthusiastic in their support of science as the only means of understand ...

Blog Post - Asha John - Nov 18 2009 - 4:16pm

Prophets and Philosophers

(Essay 3 in the Evolution and Morality Series) Religious morality is by no means the only source of moral reasoning available to us. There is in fact a long history of secular philosophy dating all the way back to the 5 th century BC.   And not just the m ...

Blog Post - Asha John - Nov 18 2009 - 5:09pm

How an atheist sought the existence of God

In my younger years, the belief in a world populated by divine entities plagued my thoughts. To the eyes of an atheist, I was a religious adherent, albeit not as devoutly as some of my contemporary acquaintances. What underlay my faith in Buddhism was my f ...

Blog Post - Lam Nguyen - Nov 19 2009 - 3:55am

On The Difference Between Science And Philosophy

Attentive readers of this blog may have noticed that those who post comments to my entries often show two interesting and complementary attitudes: a fundamental distrust of (if not downright contempt for) philosophy, coupled with an overly enthusiastic en ...

Article - Massimo Pigliucci - Nov 19 2009 - 11:18am

The Incoherence Of Free Will

I recently re-read a classic piece by J.L. Mackie (April 1955), entitled “Evil and Omnipotence,” a stupendous philosophical essay about why theologians like Richard Swinburne are forced by their belief in an omnipotent, omnibenevelont and omnipowerful god ...

Article - Massimo Pigliucci - Nov 24 2009 - 5:45pm

Philosophy and Science

The question was just raised in a previous blog entry about what a research scientist could learn from philosophy.  Perhaps this article, " Mad Science? Growing Meat Without Animals " can provide some insight. Particularly telling was this quote: ...

Blog Post - Gerhard Adam - Nov 19 2009 - 7:03pm

Morality and the Scientific Method

Why science is a better way to explore morality. We think of science as a noun, in reality it is a verb, a process. The scientific method is a codification of a specific technique of handling and processing information. This method involves meticulous doc ...

Blog Post - Asha John - Nov 25 2009 - 11:20pm