Comments on: Mind-Body Problems

By: Adam Kotsko

Adam Kotsko — Sat, 17 Apr 2004 15:48:01 +0000

John, I like your abecedarium, and I also like Kid A in Alphabet Land: An Abecedarian Roller Coaster Ride Through The Phallocentric Obscurantism Of Jacques Lacan. Did Radiohead name their album after this set of cards? The world may never know. Also, as any theologian will tell you, carnal "knowledge" is a concept from the Hebrew Bible, which is incompatible with the epistemological categories the philosophical tradition has inhereted from the Greeks.

By: Jeffrey Kramer

Jeffrey Kramer — Sat, 17 Apr 2004 13:34:21 +0000

I don’t recall the author, but another philosophical abecedarium entry alluded thusly to Descartes’ use of the Ontological Proof of God’s Existence: D for Descartes, who said “God couldn’t be So complete if He weren’t. So He is. QED.”

By: John Isbell

John Isbell — Fri, 16 Apr 2004 20:55:13 +0000

What would carnal faith be? My feelings about my wife?

By: Dr. Weevil

Dr. Weevil — Fri, 16 Apr 2004 19:47:08 +0000

“The answer should come in a flash of blinding light.” Sounds like Zeus’ answer to Semele’s question.

By: David

David — Fri, 16 Apr 2004 19:04:51 +0000

Recipe for answering John’s question: First, go to this page: http://www.ditext.com/gettier/gettier.html Second, for every “knowledge” at that page, substitute “carnal knowledge” and for every “belief” at that page, substitute “carnal belief”. Third, read the amended paper. The answer should come in a flash of blinding light. ;)

By: jacob

jacob — Fri, 16 Apr 2004 18:49:14 +0000

See also the Unemployed Philosophers Guild, makers of the Nietzche Will to Power Guild, dolls, finger puppets, and the like. http://www.philosophersguild.com/

By: Anatoly

Anatoly — Fri, 16 Apr 2004 17:44:26 +0000

Some Geocities sites don’t have whimpy bandwidth quotas (the ones whose owners decided to pay Geocities). AFAIK you can’t tell in advance.

By: neil

neil — Fri, 16 Apr 2004 17:26:40 +0000

For shame.. you should’ve known better than to link to a Geocities site from such a popular blog. Well, it’ll be fun to read the rest of it in a few days when the traffic dies down.

By: Brian Weatherson

Brian Weatherson — Fri, 16 Apr 2004 17:21:06 +0000

I can’t really do Dan Savage, but it shouldn’t be too hard to adopt the following story to his style, if one has the knack for that kind of thing. Believe it or not, this is how Ben and Jennifer first met. Jennifer saw some guy she didn’t recognise in the corner. It was really Ben Affleck wearing a very good Matt Damon wearing a bad Ben Affleck disguise disguise. She asked me who it was and I said, “Ben Affleck”. Coincidentally, the only reason I said that is that I have a mental tick that makes me say “Ben Affleck” at precisely half-way through my fourth martini every night, and I was, at just that point, precisely half way through my fourth martini of the night. So she thought to herself, “Ben Affleck, he seems like a likely sort,” and went over and started with the Jennifer charms. Ben had been broadcasting a Red Sox game that evening, so naturally he was trashed. So trashed that he thought Jennifer was Lou Merloni, so he readily agreed to whatever she said. Since a Gettier-style example (Jennifer) does not defeat the claim that justified true carnal belief entails carnal knowledge, this claim is true. However, since Ben’s beliefs were not justified, not true, and by most standards not even beliefs, it does suggest the entailment from carnal knowledge to justified true carnal belief is defeated. Some philosophers object to using fantastic examples in our papers, but as I said this is a true story. Really.

By: PF

PF — Fri, 16 Apr 2004 17:00:11 +0000

Jesus Christ Superstore: Allah. Link swiped from the Argus.

By: kevin quinn

kevin quinn — Fri, 16 Apr 2004 16:14:27 +0000

R is for Russell Not a monarchist could he be called, In some things he’d be Left of Pol Pot. Still he worried and worried and worried: Was the present King of France really bald?

By: Chris Brooke

Chris Brooke — Fri, 16 Apr 2004 15:08:55 +0000

It’s mentioned on this page. But the only picture you get is of the Lego Tony Giddens in his study…

By: Chris Bertram

Chris Bertram — Fri, 16 Apr 2004 14:46:07 +0000

Lego figures, action figures and trading cards are all at the theory.org.uk href=”http://www.theory.org.uk/” rel=”nofollow”>http://www.theory.org.uk/ site (though I can’t seem to find the Michel Foucault S&M dungeon “for older boys and girls” this time.)

By: des

des — Fri, 16 Apr 2004 14:36:15 +0000

Dude, you’ve slashdotted them!