Emil O. W. Kirkegaard blog
beyond the hoax – alan sokal Much of the material is the same as in Sokal and Bricmont’s earlier book. But there is some new material as well. I especially found the stuff on hindu nationalism and pseudoscience interesting, and the stuff on pseudoscience in nursing. Never heard of that before, but it wasnt totally…
Continue Readingevery thing must go Preface This is a polemical book. One of its main contentions is that contemporary analytic metaphysics, a professional activity engaged in by some extremely intelligent and morally serious people, fails to qualify as part of the enlightened pursuit of objective truth, and should be discontinued.We think it is impossible to…
Continue ReadingI am taking a metafysics class1 and last lectur’s topic was time travel. That is an issu i sort of like but i dislike the way people discuss it, in general. Ther is a widespred lack of clarity and lack of training in the relevant logics (that is, modal logics: alethic logic and temporal logic)….
Continue Reading1. There is a thing, x, such that it is a contingent proposition. ∃xCx 2. For any thing, x, if x is a contingent proposition then there is a possible world, w, where x is true, and there exists a possible world, w’, where x is false. ∃xCx→∃x∃w∃w’Pxaw∧Pxbw’ 3. Thus, there is a thing, x,…
Continue Reading“Although I generally prefer negative theories – those which posit as few unempirical concepts* as possible – my own leanings in this particular case are toward Realism. My attraction to the theory is bolstered by one further consideration: I can see no way to account for the existence of certain items, e.g. pieces of music,…
Continue ReadingSome people think that the identity notion is captured by the second proposal above. I think we need two notions of identity. I will not discuss that now. Strict identity For all things, for all things, for all predicates, that x and y are strictly identical logically implies that that x has predicate F is…
Continue ReadingFor all things, for all locations y, for all locations z and for all times t, that a thing is in location y at time t and that y is not identical to z logically implies that that thing is not in location z at time t. (∀x)(∀y)(∀z)(∀t)((Lxyt∧x≠y)⇒¬Lxzt) Idea The principle is meant to capture…
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