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Why can't you tickle yourself?
What are some solutions to the Fermi paradox? I.e. why don't we see more evidence of extra-terrestrial life?
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J. Haydn Gurmin said
(i) Maybe it's the problem of entropy - everything heading towards equilibrium rather than 'order'... i.e. it's hard to get life to evolve (although if it has happened here, perhaps statistically speaking it is likely to happen elsewhere).
(ii) If they do exist and attempt to communicate would we understand?
(iii) maybe it's anthropocentric to think other life-forms would be remotely interested in communicating with an alien species even if they knew we exist.
(iv) maybe our instruments of detection are not sufficient to detect alien life forms.
(v) Worst scenario, we might appear like insects to more advanced alien life-forms - swarming the planet and if they came and saw us destroying the planet they might want to do a 'rentokil' job on us.
(ii) If they do exist and attempt to communicate would we understand?
(iii) maybe it's anthropocentric to think other life-forms would be remotely interested in communicating with an alien species even if they knew we exist.
(iv) maybe our instruments of detection are not sufficient to detect alien life forms.
(v) Worst scenario, we might appear like insects to more advanced alien life-forms - swarming the planet and if they came and saw us destroying the planet they might want to do a 'rentokil' job on us.
Would academics referee papers more quickly if there was a public database listing how long it took on average for each academic to referee a paper?
I find it so interesting that the universe is thought to have undergone incredibly rapid growth in the first 10 to the minus 30 seconds of its existence.
Is Indian English a dialect of English? It seems to have its own words: I have noticed that 'taking a bath' in Indian English means taking a bath or shower.
Do animals have property rights? Does a lion own anything?
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Rami Elali said
I suppose it might own what it can defend?
Richard Price said
I'm wondering whether the notion of ownership is based on legal contracts, rather than ethical rights.
Apparently 'starboard' in sailing comes from 'steering side', as the steering oar used to be on the right. 'Port' is the side that boats used to moor against.
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Richard Price said
Boats wanted to protect the side with the steering oar on, so they moored with their left side to the dock.
Is journalism going to survive as an industry? Or will the rise of social media mean that we can always hear news directly from industry sources, via blogs etc?
What aspects of today's society will people look back on in 100 years and think are deeply immoral, like the way we think of the racism and slavery of the past?
Should journals offer bonuses for faster referee reports, i.e. ones done in under 24 hrs, or 3 days?
I am wondering whether deduction is a defeasible method of acquiring knowledge, like perc. exp. Perhaps it's defeated when it leads to high risk conclusions.
I have just been reading 'Knowledge and Objective Chance' by John Hawthorne and Maria Lasonen: http://users.ox.ac.uk/~univ1906/. Really nice paper!
Why do films cause emotions in you like fear, but don't motivate you to action? I.e. if a tiger jumps out at you in a movie, you feel scared but don't run. Why?
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Marija Dalbello said
Perhaps you may find it interesting to read Noël Carroll's, "Philosophy of Horror, or, Paradoxes of the Heart" - on emotion elicited by "art horror" and the discussion of horror as the problem of knowledge.
Richard Price said
Thanks for the tip!
I've been thinking about business transactions between 2 entities where it's hard to decide which direction the money should flow in-i.e.it could flow in either
I have been thinking today about how to tell when a debate in philosophy becomes purely verbal.
I just wrote a post about fineness of grain, looking at McDowell's appeal to demonstratives in his reply to Evans: http://oxford.academia.edu/RichardPrice/Blog
I just wrote a blog post about my struggle to understand the relational view of experience: http://oxford.academia.edu/RichardPrice/Blog
Will Twitter be as big as Facebook?
What should the price of an option be where the option's strike price = the underlying stock price, and the stock price accurately reflects market risk?
I learnt yesterday that sun shining through glass won't give you sunburn, but can give you skin cancer, as untreated glass blocks UV-B rays, but not UV-A rays
Funnily enough I find that knowing whether someone is going to tickle me doesn't make a difference as to how ticklish it subsequently feels.