Nobody who reads this article is likely to need convincing that there are bad political arguments. But, however many of them are bad, unless there are also some good ones, we can do nothing by reason in politics, there is no possibility of settling disputes rationally or in any other way except by fighting and there could be no ground either why we fight for any one cause rather than any other or why we should fight rather than make peace (...) or vice versa. But surprisingly little has been said by philosophers about this important type of argument. However, this omission is less surprising and less harmful than it might appear at first sight because all thoroughgoing political arguments are, I think, at bottom arguments as to what ought to be done and therefore ethical arguments in a wide sense of the word, and philosophers have certainly said a good deal about ethical arguments. However, it is well worth while treating political arguments separately, especially in these very political days, and considering their particular character. By political arguments I mean, not the abstract arguments of books on political philosophy, but the everyday concrete political arguments of the platform, the press and the meal-time conversation. What is their logical nature in so far as they are not mere fallacies or unsupported assertions, and can the philosopher qua philosopher say anything that will help in such discussions and contribute towards the replacement of bad arguments by good, a most desirable consummation and one the achievement of which in all countries would certainly have prevented the present war? (shrink)

Some modern thinkers have supposed that “cause” is an outworn notion, or at least that it is one of which modern science has no need. This is due mainly to the discovery that, while the scientist can give us general laws as to what in fact happens, he cannot help us to discern the reason for the laws or the inward nature of the forces on which they depend. He can tell us the “that” but not the “why”; he cannot (...) show us in a single case that the effect follows necessarily a priori from the nature of the cause, that any other effect than the one which actually takes place would be logically impossible. He has studied the law of gravitation, but this law does not enable him to see why material bodies should attract each other in this fashion; it is only a generalized statement of the fact that they do. He knows that certain substances, if absorbed by eating, will nourish and others destroy our tissues; but he cannot say why they should do so. He can no doubt analyse them further and discover that, for example, meat is nourishing because it contains a large proportion of nitrogenous matter, but he could not tell a priori whether this nitrogenous matter would be likely to nourish or to poison us. Only where mathematics can be applied do we see necessity in such a way that any alternative becomes inconceivable to us; but mathematics alone can never establish from a quantity present here and now what quantity there will be at a later time or in another part of space. Mathematics can show, e.g. , that, if there is 2 + 2 here and now, there must be 4 here and now, not that, if there is 2 + 2 here and now, there will be 4 in an hour's time or a mile away; and therefore it cannot be made the sole basis of any causal law whatever. (shrink)

Nobody interested in philosophy need be deterred by Kant's reputation for difficulty from familiarizing himself with his ethics. While the Critique of Pure Reason and his other non-ethical works are very hard to follow, the first two chapters of the Fundamental Principles of the Metaphysic of Morals at least are clear and straightforward and presuppose little previous acquaintance with philosophy. The third chapter is not about ethics as such but about the metaphysical problem of freedom and should be omitted by (...) anyone who is not familiar with Kant's general philosophy, but the first two. (shrink)

"Interplanetary travel is very tempting and exciting because the sky is filled with unlimited globes of varying qualities. the desire to travel to other planets can be fulfilled by the process of yoga, which serves as a means by which one can transfer oneself to whatever planet one likes - possibly to planets where life is not only eternal and blissful but where there are multiple varieties of enjoyable energies. Anyone who can attain the freedom of the spiritual planets need (...) never return to this miserable land of birth, old age, disease and death." --Back cover. (shrink)

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History of civilization and human nature of Vietnam.