67 ideas
| 1403 | A rational donkey would starve to death between two totally identical piles of hay [Buridan, by PG] |
| 15105 | F(x) walked into a bar. The barman said.. [Sommers,W] |
| 12408 | Sartre to Waitress: Coffee with no cream, please... [Sommers,W] |
| 12397 | Said Plato: 'The things that we feel... [Sommers,W] |
| 16678 | Without magnitude a thing would retain its parts, but they would have no location [Buridan] |
| 16793 | A thing is (less properly) the same over time if each part is succeeded by another [Buridan] |
| 12407 | Barman to Descartes: Would you like another drink?... [Sommers,W] |
| 12399 | There was a young student called Fred... [Sommers,W] |
| 20963 | A philosopher and his wife are out for a drive... [Sommers,W] |
| 12404 | Dear Sir, Your astonishment's odd.... [Sommers,W] |
| 12403 | There once was a man who said: 'God... [Sommers,W] |
| 12402 | ..But if he's a student of Berkeley... [Sommers,W] |
| 12409 | The philosopher Berkeley once said.. [Sommers,W] |
| 14694 | "My dog's got synaesthesia." How does he smell? ..... [Sommers,W] |
| 16726 | Why can't we deduce secondary qualities from primary ones, if they cause them? [Buridan] |
| 12401 | A toper who spies in the distance... [Sommers,W] |
| 16577 | Induction is not demonstration, because not all of the instances can be observed [Buridan] |
| 16576 | Science is based on induction, for general truths about fire, rhubarb and magnets [Buridan] |
| 4669 | Persons are conscious, they relate, they think, they feel, and they are self-aware [Glover] |
| 12410 | There once was a man who said 'Damn!... [Sommers,W] |
| 9392 | How do behaviourists greet each other? [Sommers,W] |
| 4656 | A problem arises in any moral system that allows more than one absolute right [Glover] |
| 4657 | Double Effect: no bad acts with good consequences, but possibly good acts despite bad consequences [Glover] |
| 4658 | Acts and Omissions: bad consequences are morally better if they result from an omission rather than an act [Glover] |
| 4659 | It doesn't seem worse to switch off a life-support machine than to forget to switch it on [Glover] |
| 4660 | Harmful omissions are unavoidable, while most harmful acts can be avoided [Glover] |
| 4661 | What matters is not intrinsic value of life or rights, but worthwhile and desired life, and avoidance of pain [Glover] |
| 4648 | 'Death' is best seen as irreversible loss of consciousness, since this is why we care about brain function [Glover] |
| 3785 | You can't separate acts from the people performing them [Glover] |
| 3786 | Aggression in defence may be beneficial but morally corrupting [Glover] |
| 4650 | The quality of a life is not altogether independent of its length [Glover] |
| 3784 | Duty prohibits some acts, whatever their consequences [Glover] |
| 3782 | Satisfaction of desires is not at all the same as achieving happiness [Glover, by PG] |
| 3787 | Rule-utilitarianism is either act-utilitarianism, or not really utilitarian [Glover] |
| 3783 | How can utilitarianism decide the ideal population size? [Glover] |
| 4675 | The sanctity of life doctrine implies a serious increase of abnormality among the population [Glover] |
| 12405 | 'If you're aristocratic,' said Nietzsche... [Sommers,W] |
| 9391 | Why do anarchists drink herbal tea? [Sommers,W] |
| 4654 | Autonomy favours present opinions over future ones, and says nothing about the interests of potential people [Glover] |
| 4655 | If a whole community did not mind death, respect for autonomy suggests that you could kill them all [Glover] |
| 4680 | Autonomy seems to acquire greater weight when the decision is more important to a person [Glover] |
| 4670 | Being alive is not intrinsically good, and there is no 'right to life' [Glover] |
| 4668 | You can't have a right to something you can't desire, so a foetus has no 'right' to life [Glover] |
| 4649 | If someone's life is 'worth living', that gives one direct reason not to kill him [Glover] |
| 4651 | Utilitarians object to killing directly (pain, and lost happiness), and to side-effects (loss to others, and precedents) [Glover] |
| 4671 | What is wrong with killing someone, if another equally worthwhile life is substituted? [Glover] |
| 4676 | The 'no trade-off' position: killing is only justified if it prevents other deaths [Glover] |
| 4685 | Societies spend a lot to save known persons, but very little to reduce fatal accidents [Glover] |
| 4683 | Involuntary euthanasia is wrong because it violates autonomy, and it has appalling side-effects [Glover] |
| 4682 | Euthanasia is voluntary (patient's wish), or involuntary (ignore wish), or non-voluntary (no wish possible) [Glover] |
| 4684 | Maybe extreme treatment is not saving life, but prolonging the act of dying [Glover] |
| 4681 | The Nazi mass murders seem to have originated in their euthanasia programme [Glover] |
| 4665 | Conception isn't the fixed boundary for a person's beginning, because twins are possible within two weeks [Glover] |
| 4667 | How would we judge abortion if mothers had transparent wombs? [Glover] |
| 4652 | If killing is wrong because it destroys future happiness, not conceiving a happy child is also wrong [Glover] |
| 4662 | Defenders of abortion focus on early pregnancy, while opponents focus on later stages [Glover] |
| 4663 | If abortion is wrong, it is because a foetus is a human being or a person (or potentially so) [Glover] |
| 4664 | If abortion is wrong because of the 'potential' person, that makes contraception wrong too [Glover] |
| 4673 | Abortion differs morally from deliberate non-conception only in its side-effects [Glover] |
| 4666 | If viability is a test or boundary at the beginning of life, it should also be so for frail old people [Glover] |
| 4672 | Apart from side effects, it seems best to replace an inadequate foetus with one which has a better chance [Glover] |
| 4674 | It is always right for a qualified person to perform an abortion when requested by the mother [Glover] |
| 4679 | One test for a worthwhile life is to assess the amount of life for which you would rather be unconscious [Glover] |
| 12400 | Cries the maid: 'You must marry me Hume!'... [Sommers,W] |
| 16527 | Causation - we all thought we knew it/ Till Hume came along and saw through it/…. [Sommers,W] |
| 17592 | The barman called 'Time!', and Augustine said..... [Sommers,W] |
| 15208 | The past, present and future walked into a bar.... [Sommers,W] |