Erosophia

Month: April 2009

  • Sex with Minors?

    by Jason Stotts One problem with the lack of knowledge of sexual issues is a loss of clarity regarding these issues. Indeed, there is a very rich vocabulary in English to cover most every sexual possibility and to clearly differentiate one from the next. Unfortunately, people frequently do not know these terms and end up…

  • Kinsey and Sexual identity

    by Jason Stotts For those few of you who have never heard of him, Alfred Kinsey (1894-1956) was an American sex researcher and a pioneer in the field of sex research. He is best known for his two books “Sexual Behavior in the Human Male” (1948) and “Sexual Behavior in the Human Female” (1953). But,…

  • Ruminations on Meta-Ethics

    by Jason Stotts Teleology is the field of philosophy concerned with achieving ends (telos is Greek for “end”). In teleology, one judges the efficacy of the means in question to achieve a particular end. For example, if my goal is to write a sentence on a piece of paper, then a pen is “good” for…

  • How to Lie with Numbers

    by Jason Stotts Most people don’t realize how easy it is to lie with numbers as they don’t understand statistics or the difference between a causal connection and a correlation. For a great demonstration of this, see this essay where Stephen ironically proves that exercise causes obesity. Also, XKCD chimes in on the issue of…

  • Aristotle and Causation

    by Jason Stotts Aristotle develops the idea of the “four causes” in his Physics (III.3.194b16) and Metaphysics (I.3; II; V.1,2; ). The four causes are: Efficient (“the primary source of change or rest”), Material (“that out of which a thing comes to be”), Formal (“the form or the archetype”), Final (the “end or that for…

  • Atheism Posters

    by Jason Stotts I’ve just come across this site of motivational posters for Atheists. Go there, enjoy yourself.

  • A Unique Case

    by Jason Stotts I spend lots of time reading books on sexual attraction, fantasy, paraphilias, etc. I do this in order to make sure that I’ve covered at least all of the major issues in my book and that my theory will be able to account for all cases. In this research, one of the…

  • A Victory for Reason!

    by Jason Stotts Today the Iowa Supreme Court ruled that gay marriage is now legal in Iowa! (http://tinyurl.com/dld5ev) Of course, the “social conservatives”, i.e. the Religious Reich, is upset over the fact that now four states allow godless homosexuals to marry. However, it looks like the trend in the country is moving towards truly treating…