Mindblown: a blog about philosophy.

In reply to mlyoung57. If we could “guarantee” their security, we’d be doing something to secure it now. We obviously can’t guarantee their security, now or ever, and neither have the need to do so, nor have ever had it. To pro…

In reply to Michael Brazier. Right, “if.” No one has any crystal balls here. One can’t rule out live possibilities on the evidential basis you’ve given, which is just a series of conjectures and no more than that. LikeLike

In reply to Michael Brazier. Sorry, I actually misread your response as coming from Webmaster. But setting aside that mistake, for which I apologize, my response stands, whether as a response to you or Webmaster. LikeLike

In reply to Irfan Khawaja. Not now. Not tomorrow. This is not, I don’t think, a good move improving the Ukrainian position to get a better deal. It is not necessary and so also needlessly antagonistic. The good move here — potentially &#821…

Multitasking is considered a premium job skill, a sign of productivity in both job candidates and job holders. But the psychological evidence is clear: In extreme cases, multitasking is impossible, essentially leading the mind to a kind of paralysis. In less extreme cases, multitasking is a drag on productivity that imposes significant psychological costs. In…

At my urging, MTSP (the PoT-associated discussion group) is tackling Thomas Scanlon’s book, What We Owe to Each Other. In the second chapter, Scanlon endorses the so-called “buck-passing” view of value (BP). On this view of value, instead of value being something basic in the broadly normative realm, is a derivative property that is a…

In reply to Irfan Khawaja. First, Webmaster is not me. I never said Chomsky is an authority on linguistics – and never will. Second, I brought up Chomsky’s scientific work because the way it failed (and it has failed) shows a flaw in the ma…

In reply to Irfan Khawaja. “If”. LikeLike

In reply to Michael Brazier. (Responding to Michael Brazier) Those are all imponderables that we would all be better off not having to ponder. How long can the Russian army fight? I have no idea. They spent ten years in Afghanistan when their economy w…

In reply to mlyoung57. Michael Young: Zelensky has floated the idea of a kind of alliance of democratic nations. I like this idea in principle (because the U.N. seems hopeless as far as reforming or protecting from powerful autocratic nations goes), b…