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Small favour - define existence, please.
Without using a dictionary.
Existence - n. ................................................
Thankyouplease.
~ Sofi ~
"And so tomorrow there will be another number for the one who had a name."
To be?
---Anyone perfect must be lying, anything easy has its cost, Anyone plain can be lovely, anyone loved can be lost, What if I lost my direction? What if I lost sense of time? What if I nursed this infection? Maybe the worst is behind---
waking up every morning and being grateful
Existence is what I'm best at.
Message deleted on 2015-09-05 06:30:16 PDT
Alternatively you could write my philosophy of religion essay?
~ Sofi ~
"And so tomorrow there will be another number for the one who had a name."
Message deleted on 2015-09-05 06:30:16 PDT
a) It's only losely related to existence. I genuinely need to know a variety of definitions of existence for it.
b) I'm, like, 16. I still have 'teachers' and 'homework' and ****. Thou shalt not overestimate me.
c) When did you get so highly moralled?  )
~ Sofi ~
"And so tomorrow there will be another number for the one who had a name."
Message deleted on 2015-09-05 06:30:16 PDT
I bet you eat babies.
~ Sofi ~
"And so tomorrow there will be another number for the one who had a name."
Message deleted on 2015-09-05 06:30:16 PDT
the a priori assumption of everything you can see, touch, smell, hear, think about (if only as a thought, it still exists). put another way, the a priori assumption of everything our mental representations are representing/trying to represent.
the problem with looking at it this way is that when we talk about a thought as an existing 'thing', thoughts then become sufficient, i.e., we don't need the outside world (which supposedly causes the thought) to explain our experience of the world. Descartes recognized this. when we touch something, what we experience is not the thing itself, but a mental representation of the thing. so, if all we have are our representations, how can you say anything exists, much less explain what existence means. if we assume it means something when i say something 'exists', then the only genuine claim we can make of existence is that it is the underlying attribute we assign to everything we have mental representation of (which seems a bit circluar).
so from the epistemological perspective, existence is the quality of being we ascribe to the objects of our mental represenations.
of course, things start to make sense when we start talking pragmatically. i have a mental representation of a chair. i assume it exists. i reach out to where i think the chair is and get a tactile representation of it...support for its actual existence. i sit down. i dont fall on my ass, which further supports the claim that the chair exists. so its not hopeless. if we think about stuff for a while and then go live in the world, we avoid all the anguish of someone who only thinks.
this is a bit too stream-of-conscious to be definitive, but i think itll get your mind turning.
Post Edited (11-16-06 16:33)
no takers to discuss matters philosophical? that sucks.
Message deleted on 2015-09-05 06:30:16 PDT
Maybe we could have a conversation about it when I don't have 2 essays about the ontological argument for the existence of God and 2 on virtue ethics due in 3 days.
But if you wanna talk about philosophy...I met Peter Vardy on Friday. He's a bit of a racist bigot for someone so enveloped in ethics. And he's obsessed with the female body. To the point that he referenced it 6 times in a lecture about God. Woo.
~ Sofi ~
"And so tomorrow there will be another number for the one who had a name."
st. anselm? i took a class in college simply titled "God", and we spent a couple days on st. anselm's proslogion. his argument gets a little messy because he assumes existence is a perfection. in other words, something that actually exists is more "perfect" than something that doesnt. the meaning of "perfect" is not very clear here. plus, its a pretty bold claim that the veracity of the proof hinges on. not the best foundation to lay when attempting to simply and clearly prove God's existence.
of course, st anselm does have a lot of great things to say, and it must be remembered that he is trying to understand from within faith. "i believe that i may understand." faith is always a leap. there will never be a proof that cannot be denied by someone for the existence of God. yet, believers need not worry since the existence of something is not dependent on one's ability to prove its existence. if nothing else, its thought provoking.
as for Peter Verdy, a) ive never heard of him (i majored in philosophy in college but was mainly concerned with the more classic philosophers) and b) talking about him, whether hes a bigot or not, would be talking about a philosophER, not philosophY. for me at least, talking philosophy is more interesting than gossipping about aholes. dont let him ruin philosophy for you.
Anselm, Gaunilo, Decartes and Kant.
~ Sofi ~
"And so tomorrow there will be another number for the one who had a name."
Hmmm, I've really been thinking about studying philosphy in collge.
---Anyone perfect must be lying, anything easy has its cost, Anyone plain can be lovely, anyone loved can be lost, What if I lost my direction? What if I lost sense of time? What if I nursed this infection? Maybe the worst is behind---
All studying philosphy has done thus far is make me an even better procrastinater.
~ Sofi ~
"And so tomorrow there will be another number for the one who had a name."
gaunilo wrote the reply to anselm about the island, correct? his criticism has problems of its own. descartes is pretty good, especially in the beginning, but then he makes some questionable leaps. and kant is an absolute beast. good luck with him. i took an entire class on his "Critique of Pure Reason"...it was insane. extremely challenging, but, once you start understanding the vocab he uses, it starts to make sense. however, i wouldnt spend my free time or money on Kant.
good to hear it, musicdude. at least take an intro course or whatever lower level course you can get into without having to major in it. try it out. if it tickles your fancy, go for it. of course, one thing to consider is your future. a degree in philosophy is definitely valuable...i couldnt imagine not having majored in it. itll teach you how to think, how to learn, the limits of reason, the logic of arguments, etc, etc. however, as a degree it is not explicitly valuable in the business world. youre not going to find many companies asking for philosophy majors like they would for mbas or architecture degrees. you just have to decide what you want to do.
TRANSFERABLE SKILLLZZZ.
~ Sofi ~
"And so tomorrow there will be another number for the one who had a name."
Well I finished it and it's awful, if you wanted to know.
~ Sofi ~
"And so tomorrow there will be another number for the one who had a name."
the paper was awful or its subject matter or philosophy in general??
The essay.
~ Sofi ~
"And so tomorrow there will be another number for the one who had a name."
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