Philosophy – Page 82 – William M. Briggs

BBC: Why Is There Something Rather Than Nothing? BBC: Because Something

Opens the BBC's campaign: Some physicists think they can explain why the universe first formed. If they are right, our entire cosmos may have sprung out of nothing at all.…

Book review Philosophy Statistics

An Introduction To Uncertainty: Probability, Statistics, and Modeling of All Kinds

This is a teaser, the first part of a 3,200-word narrative outline for the book that I've started to shop around. The current title is in the headline. Regular readers…

Philosophy Statistics

On Nate Silver’s Predictions: Which Side Of The Probability Equation Are We On?

When I checked FiveThirtyEight.com's Senate prediction, it said "Republicans have a 72.3% chance of winning a majority." There were also words that the "probability that each party will win control…

Culture Philosophy

Evolution & The Big Bang Are Perfectly Consistent With Christianity (And Catholicism)

We interrupt our regularly scheduled blogcast Summary Against Modern Thought to bring you breaking news: Evolution & The Big Bang Are Perfectly Consistent With Christianity. In what should have been…

Culture Philosophy

Jerry Coyne Has A Go At Pope Francis. Shoots Self In Foot

Since it's Halloween, we may as well examine the spooks, hobgoblins, and bogeymen which taunt and haunt the minds of our public undead, which is to say, our intellectuals. Now…

Culture Philosophy

If We Are What We Sexually Desire, How About These Curious People?

Gender theory in brief says we are what we sexually desire. It's not that we have desires, but that we are these desires. They are the core of our being.…

Philosophy Statistics

The Mysticism Of Simulations: Markov Chain Monte Carlo, Sampling, And Their Alternatives

Introit Ever heard of somebody "simulating" normal "random" or "stochastic" variables, or perhaps "drawing" from a normal or some other distribution? Such things form the backbone of many statistical methods,…

Philosophy SAMT

Summary Against Modern Thought: There Is No Accident In God

See the first post in this series for an explanation and guide of our tour of Summa Contra Gentiles. All posts are under the category SAMT. Previous post. An easier…

JH on Death By Organ DonationJuly 27, 2026
Here they have no authority: none whatsoever. Is this an appeal to authority used in reverse? It seems that Dr.…
Steve on Death By Organ DonationJuly 27, 2026
"The prospect of cutting out a juicy heart has blurred their vision..." I commend you. A less restrained man might…
Brian (bulaoren) on Death By Organ DonationJuly 27, 2026
Thank you, Dr. Kevorkian PS. Soylent green is people!
hudbwu on Believing In God Makes You Crave Potato Chips, Say AcademicsJuly 26, 2026
And to think that 20 years ago, when I was much younger, I would have fallen for these things.
Eric Kay Sci Fi on $7.11 at 7:11 PM on 7/11 at 7/11: What Are The Chances?July 24, 2026
Thanks for the write-up. Thinking about things in the way of a probability distribution has always helped me, but also…