Secular, Social, Scientific
Friday 28. The last day of the IAHR 2015 Conference. This is the session guide, and this the Abstract Book of the XXI Quinquennial World Congress of the International Association for the History of Religions (IAHR), Erfurt, Germany, August 23-29,... Read More | Share it now!
Dear Ryan, this posting has been on my list far too long. I loved this your diagram of the realism/anti-realism antagonism. The very topic is cool. Most people will shake their heads about the options you are presenting. “Where exactly is the... Read More | Share it now!
I know that this is mined territory but I assume that we are all wondrously competent to think in more than one mode and that all the time. The believer can tell me all kinds of things about her trust in God. If I ask her to let her two year old kid... Read More | Share it now!
This is not really a question Let me first examine the question in its functionality. It is essentially a move “theists” (today a term atheist are keeping alive) might make to vex atheists over their particular problems with agnosticism. It is... Read More | Share it now!
If there is one thing the early 18th century has taught me, it is that we are all eventually paid in the same three currencies. Whatever we do, we do it for physical pleasure, social prestige or money. Money is, of course, the most usual currency in... Read More | Share it now!
Why is it that Wikipedia is a man’s world? Why is our community 90% male, mostly white, either young or retired, mostly nerds, people whom you will not meet in clubs, a high rate of temporary singles… and mostly amateurs in the fields of their... Read More | Share it now!
The golden days of Wikipedia, the days of unlimited growth, are over. Yes, we are still getting new articles. But this is basically because we have a couple of open areas like plane crashes, new wars, new movies, new celebrities that generate this... Read More | Share it now!
This video has gone viral. It is wonderfully concise and designed to be both haunting and self-reflexive. We are all subjected to these viral pieces of information. We see them, they trigger an emotion, and all we have to do is press share ore like... Read More | Share it now!
The following passages are an excerpt from John Stuart Mill‘s Auguste Comte and Positivism, a book lenght appraisal of Comte’s philosophy including his theory of knowledge, his Religion of Humanity and his ideas of future societies. The... Read More | Share it now!
Why did I ask for all those #LLAP selfies? For a @gishwhes task as a tribute to Leonard. Thank you! pic.twitter.com/3NQZ5siINe — William Shatner (@WilliamShatner) August 9, 2015 Leonard Nimoy’s death last month is particularly sad news. He (or... Read More | Share it now!
Quora a question-and-answer website where questions are created, answered, edited and organized by its community of users. The company was founded in June 2009, and the website was made available to the public on June 21, 2010. Quora aggregates... Read More | Share it now!
This is definitely a non-topic. Ludwig Wittgenstein’s On Certainty – thoughts compiled from April 1950 to April 29, 1951 – does not show any clearer interest in “conspiracy theories”. The very phrase could be there and isn’t. Mental... Read More | Share it now!
From the 26th to the 28th of June Ariel Hessayon and Lionel Laborie welcomed about a hundred historians at London’s Goldsmith College to take a broader look at prophecies of the three centuries between 1500 and 1800. Science fiction fans might start... Read More | Share it now!
continuing: Logical positivism debunked (1): The philosophy that cannot even prove that its own statements have a “meaning” In the Laundry. You are handed back your belongings all washed, and you notice that this is not your jacket. Actually... Read More | Share it now!
Logical positivism: all statements that can't be empirically verified are meaningless. — Ryan (@ryan_the_kang) March 11, 2014 Response to logical positivism: you can't empirically verify that claim… — Ryan (@ryan_the_kang)... Read More | Share it now!
What would the world look like if logical positivism had been “debunked”? – A question I have been requested to answer on Quora (“your best source for knowledge”, so the advertisement). (I hate these sources that ask you instead... Read More | Share it now!
The Guardian and the Independent spread news that a chatbot was able to convince the jury in a Turing test – or rather 33% of that jury (may we assume that the test was conducted with three jurors of whom one succeeded where I failed with the... Read More | Share it now!
The deadline for the fifth topic “On the way to vote – election day” is Sunday 25 May at midnight CET. For this theme you are invited to send in from one up to five photos. The jury winner of the best photo(s) will be announced on Friday... Read More | Share it now!
The following is an interview between Olaf Simons for positivists.org and Elder Brown and Elder Colson, Nate Brown and Eric Colson, two Mormon missionaries, who are presently stationed in Gotha, east Germany. Perhaps a bit of information to frame the... Read More | Share it now!
The following is an (abridged) English version of an interview I gave for Germany’s Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung on Wikipedia and why scholars hesitate to write for the online encyclopedia (their issue of April 9, 2014, last page). Friedemann... Read More | Share it now!