Category: philosophical musings

The wisdom of my Flist

~ Nancy E. Shaffer ~ 19 Comments

Great quotes:

I’m pretty fucking serious about my writing. It’s not a hobby, it’s not a pastime, it’s not a whim. So, when I sit down to write, it’s not because I’m bored and I need to kill a few hours. It’s because this is what I’m passionate about, and the practice of writing is the practice of that passion. — yuki_onna

…a dialogue, the philosophical kind, isn’t something you win, it’s something that you try to resolve. When one party is determined to be right and not listen to any contrary views, it’s not really a dialogue. —jupitah

It is entirely likely that I am thinking too much today. I believe I will eat chocolate and read trash for a bit now. —__angela__

You can prove any thing with logic once you stop caring about how the world actually is. —jupitah

I’m starting to collect these.

Atheism, skepticism, and agnosticism

~ Nancy E. Shaffer ~ 13 Comments

Cleanthes’ words of wisdom over at the ATPo board:

If you don’t think there’s such a thing as a fundamentalist Atheist, and you claim to be atheist, then you are a fundamentalist atheist.

If you worship Skepticism without the slightest bit of skepticism over skepticism, then Ockham will haunt you.

As to the rest of his dialogue with Fresne, alas, I am too left-brained to follow all its intricacies.

A curse on my over-sized left brain!

I’m so glad we have these folks gracing our board.

Way kewl

~ Nancy E. Shaffer ~ 6 Comments

Ganked from jupitah, butofcourse

I’ll go along with this, considering the alternatives. After all, I am a little nervous nelly agnostic empiricist skating on the edge of nihilism. Well, f*** nihilism. Life is ultimately about billiards, beer and chicks.

You are David Hume. You are the most famous empirical skeptic who has ever lived. You single-handedly extended the doctrine of complete doubt to almost completely destroy philosophy. Employi
You are David Hume. You single-handedly made monkeys out of guys with a lot more education and experience than you, making you the most famous empirical skeptic who has ever existed. You believed that all ideas were merely copies of sensations, and with this simple principle you almost destroyed all of philosophy, not to mention religion, ethics, and the basis of natural science. While you give us no assurances that we are justified in any of our most treasured beliefs, you never let these pain-in-the-ass views stop you from enjoying a beer and a good game of billiards at the end of the day.

Which philosopher are you?
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Spiritual musings

~ Nancy E. Shaffer ~ 8 Comments

I don’t know what it means to have a spirituality when you’re an agnostic who withholds judgement, pro or con, about things that cannot be proved by the mind or the five senses. I know I find what could be called “spiritual comfort” in the workings of nature. And not just because that’s about the only thing we can prove anything about. I just feel spiritual when I’m in nature, and that happens on the ineffable level of emotions, something very deep.

I found this poem this morning. I’m not sure if I agree with all of it, but it captured the sense of connectedness I feel to something greater than myself when I’m in nature:

You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
for a hundred miles through the desert, repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves.
Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscapes,
over the prairies and the deep trees,
the mountains and the rivers.
Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clear blu air,
are heading home again.
Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting–
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.
— Mary Oliver, 1986