Is Your Soul Weighing You Down? Store It! Or, if you're tired of your own soul, try a new one on for size! Er... uh oh. [more inside]
posted by zarq on Jul 10, 2009 - 37 comments

On Truth and Reality. Despite several thousand years of failure to correctly understand physical reality (hence the current postmodern view that this is impossible) it is actually very simple to work out how matter exists and moves about in Space. The rules of Science (Occam's Razor / Simplicity) and Metaphysics (Dynamic Unity of Reality) require that reality be described from only one single source existing, as Leibniz wrote: "because of the interconnection of all things with one another." [more inside]
posted by netbros on Jan 30, 2009 - 46 comments

Victor Kahn. Jim Warren. Artie Kornfeld.
posted by Esoquo on Jan 19, 2009 - 12 comments

“In the condition I was in, it assumed at the time the quality of a beacon, a light on the far shores of the murk; what's more, it was proof that there was something left to express artistically besides nihilism and destruction.” Lester Bangs on the topic of Van Morrison's Astral Weeks which began recording exactly 40 years ago today in Century Sound Studios NYC. [more inside]
posted by philip-random on Sep 25, 2008 - 36 comments

Neurolaw - The Brain on the Stand
posted by Gyan on Mar 11, 2007 - 8 comments

Beyond metaphysics, there is 'pataphysics. Beyond metaphor, there is pataphor.
posted by painquale on Jan 15, 2006 - 49 comments

Does God Play Dice?
posted by Gyan on Dec 3, 2005 - 104 comments

Is there any real possibility of an after-life? Some argue that belief in the after-life is an inherently unfalsifiable proposition. Others argue that science has already ruled out the possibility. Buddhism takes a radically different view, embracing a conception of the after-life far different from any found in the Judeo-Christian faiths. What about the possibility of Eternal Recurrence, as proposed by Nietzsche? Just what do we mean when we speak of the "after-life" anyway?
posted by all-seeing eye dog on Oct 13, 2005 - 129 comments

Did the discovery of evolution lead to Darwin's agnosticism, as claimed? Carl Zimmer wonders. More importantly, can evolution be reconciled with Christianity?
posted by daksya on Aug 11, 2005 - 90 comments

Who are YOU?
posted by Gyan on Aug 7, 2005 - 47 comments

The Determinism and Freedom Philosophy Website
posted by painquale on Jan 19, 2005 - 17 comments

Smolin vs. Susskind on the anthropic principle. For those keeping score: Stephen Hawking is for it. Brian Greene is not.
posted by kliuless on Sep 4, 2004 - 10 comments

Essence of Everything? According to Zuse, cellular automata (PDF). He's not alone.
posted by Gyan on May 1, 2004 - 9 comments

What am I? Clearly the most pressing question facing the human race today. Every individual human brain contains around 10^12 (1 trillion) neurons and 10^15 (1 quadrillion) synapses, capable of changing in milliseconds, and there are 6x10^9 (6 billion) people on this planet, all potentially capable of interacting and influencing one another. Last year alone 1.6x10^11 (160 billion) minutes of international telephone calls were made between people talking at a rate of 120 to 150 words per minute. A collection of articles at newscientist.com.
posted by mokey on Jun 14, 2003 - 12 comments

Into the Garden of Good and Evil - Muhammad Iqbal's "THE DEVELOPMENT OF METAPHYSICS IN PERSIA" (first published in 1908 and free online courtesy the Bahai's): "The most remarkable feature of the character of the Persian people is their love of Metaphysical speculation." Strong, bipolar Good vs. Evil distinctions, and the notion of a cosmic struggle between the two, seem to have originated in ancient Persia as Persian Dualism. See Manicheanism here, here (warning-spurious windows), and here. Special bonus - Freepers fulminate over a German theologian's exegesis of Manichean american political rhetoric!
posted by troutfishing on Feb 21, 2003 - 14 comments