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What if the only valid questions are 'how' questions? (In fact, to assume the validity of certain types of 'why' questions, e.g. those which seek a human brand of purpose in the universe, could be seen as question begging to some extent.)

But what is the nature of the 'I' whose existence is demonstrated by Descartes?

More succinctly, Iron, I call false dichotomy on this one.

It's not that simple Iron. Individual freedoms on one level - in this case the freedom to self-determine gender without fear of undue persecution - can be compatible with social cohesion or a even a communitarian ethic. Individualism alone does not appear to ensure happiness, but individualism...

I'll have my rational humanistic ideology any day. Why can't we have more than one type of male? Allow the sensitive and introspective to exist alongside the rugged and neolithic. And at the same time, why not allow females the same range of gender identity? I think it's silly to pigeon hole...

Haha, I always enjoy receiving the statements for my ~ $1 super fund. It is slowly being whittled down by administration costs.

It's closer to 250k for the upper levels of the staff specialist award - which is fantastic money IMO. Keep in mind that this is within the public system. Private practitioners, especially proceduralists, can earn more and have greater control over their hours (some areas, e.g. fertility...

Define what you mean by natural and supernatural.

The driver is responsible in a causal sense (i.e. they were driving the car which killed the invisible pedestrian), but I don't think that you can reasonably hold them to be morally responsible. Moral responsibility involves blameworthiness / failure to perform some morally required action. A...

Perhaps our inhereted moral discourse is riddled with contradictions? (I <3 moral nihilism)

I concur with Enteebee here. Virtual particles in quantum theory can't really be cited as proof of something coming from nothing. (1) as NTB's link shows, we aren't really dealing with a theoretical 'nothing' and (2) even if we were there are reasonable arguments to be levelled against theories...

Not if it can't be helped. Though the issue does become interesting in light of assistive reproductive technologies. If technology X has a lower rate of spontaneous abortion than natural conception then perhaps a moral imperative then arises to use X instead of natural means.

Straw man.

If you assume this you not only beg the question, but also make your own position of theism more shakey (reducing it to faith, versus critical reasoning).

Your intial statement of the law (that things tend towards disorder) was a pop-science paraphrase. What is your understanding of the implications of the 2nd law of thermodynamics?

Who's down with kickstarting the cult of Dionysus?

The world is only as just as we make it (and, ufortunately, different forces are trying to institute difference conceptions of justice). You could always go vigilante?

This is another strawman attack. An unrefined atheist may argue that there is no apparent evidence in nature, therefore god does not exist (period). I disagree with this argument myself. What is reasonable, I feel, is to say that given the present lack of evidence any belief in god is...

I am skeptical of a political philosophy which rejects any kind of state apparatus. Like Enteebee I am interested to know what your definition of 'state' is. The moral psychology research that I have been exposed to makes me doubt the human capacity to self regulate international, or even...

Haha, I agree entirely with the washinton post quote above. Palin was effective but terrible. That was such a strange debate. Is anyone else having trouble believing what they were hearing?? I can't get over her opening line: You know, I think a good barometer here, as we try to figure out...