It should be Science, Philosophy, and New Age Spiritualism.

Seriously half of the threads on here have nothing to do with science or philosophy. Just an observation.

Why is this the case?

because philosophy and religion/spirituality go hand in hand.

I would agree with you wholeheartedly, except:

Unfortunately, philosophy is not restricted to the basic (classic or modern) divisions of philosophy, and it is not restricted to what is being discussed in academic philosophical circles.

Instead, there is a valid argument that philosophy is whatever a person calls philosophy.

If you have an even more valid argument to refute that, I'll be the first one to support you fully. (But no religion either.)

I read somewhere, that philosophy eludes definition... and that prevents to successfully prevent anything posted on a philosophy phorum.

If anything, I'd like to see three forums: a New Age, a Science and a Philosophy forum. One forum each, a veritable triumvirat.

Owl be the first to agree that Science and Philosophy should be two entirely seperate forums.

I guess owl be the second one to agree that Philosophy and Spirituality do ineed belong together. Spiritual ideas do indeed quality as philosophical ideas.

Unless a person wants to restrict philosophy only to physics, but in that case why bother calling it philosophy at all? Why not just trash philosophy altogether and just call it science?

What would be the difference between philosophy and science if they both demanded physical evidence and proofs?

Well unfortunately I agree with you all. To me philosophy is using logical debate to determine a solution. In the forum I would like to see real debate, maybe discussing classical arguments, or great philosophers.

I have a hard time connecting psychic vampires, alien sloths, and draconians with either science or philosophy.

It's not so hard, if you practice it for a while. Some of my best friends now are Draconian Sloths and Alien (mainly Transylvanian) vampires.

Werewolves... now that's another issue. Everybody hates them. They're the cowboys of elves. Who sing. Brr. You don't want to hear a song sang in an elvish way. (Brr. I stole this from Pratchett.)

Maybe I will practice it for a while.

I think that would equate the two; and as a physical evidence to prove this, I offer that there has been a lot of empirical discoveries that settled, mooted and muted a whole bunch of philosophical debate.

The only problem I have with the old classical philosophers is that they start out with old outdated premises.

So in a nutshell, I'd just say, "Sure, given their premises I'd come to their conclusions too".

However, today we no longer accept those original premises so those arguments are no longer valid.

That's typically the way I see many of the Classical Philosophies. They're just based on outdated premises.

So that would most likely be my view. Depending on precisely what it was you wanted to debate.

I would suggest starting a thread on the topic you would like to debate and just see where it leads.

If you get responses that you feel don't merit your level of discussion just skip over those until you find one that address the meat of what you're looking for. Then respond to that in kind.

Create your own world by how you react to it.

It's philosophy until it's proven to be true. As soon as it's proven to be true it instantly becomes science.

This is why there is no such thing as a 'proof' in philosophy. If you could prove something in philosophy it would no longer be philosophy, it would be science.

Some of us tried, really, honestly and with a straight face, introduce topics taken from old, classical philosopy, such as "does form define the function or does function define the form." In and by itself it was so trite that we yawned. We did not decry the original post, or the poster; we just saw our will to argue leave by the indoor. It was excrutiatingly boring.

But. We will always put down something if the topic is exciting. Such is the appeal and basis of the pupularity of drama. If some says "abortion" or any of the old and tried and never settled hot issues, there is always an avalanche of posts. Some things never die. Like "does anyone know where my carkeys are? (or the cat's front legs, etc.) I just put them down a moment ago."

So... welcome to proceed on your classical or modern or academic debate, but make it interesting, please, because we are not getting paid for this, you know, the debate runs on an all-volunteer basis.

Somewhat very true, and there must be a formula that shows the exact rate of transition of philosophy into science.

That might let us predict the last day of philosophy as such, the day that all philosophical issues will be solved.

I agree.

Those who have been around for a while remember when there was only the "General Religion" forum and all of this stuff we discuss in here was mixed in with what you now see in that forum (i.e. mostly the Christians.vs.everyone else.)

But really, the most heated arguments in that forum were usually (and often still are) between the "scientists" and everyone else, which is exactly what you see in this forum.

So maybe it would be good to give the scientists a place to discuss things scientifically, without being interfered with by the philosophers - and vice versa.

The only problem I see is in drawing the line. Science and Philosophy are so closely related that it is difficult to deparate the two. I'm mean, look at string theory and the Holographic Universe theory. Are they philosophy or science? There is a lot of science and logic involved in both, but both are based on as-yet unprovable (and possibly not provable at all) ideas. So where does one draw the line?

Just some thoughts.

But hey! There's a rub! Science, by its philosophical mandate, cannot prove anything positive. Only can prove the falsehood of something to perfection; the truth it shows is only a fraction of the probability of the real truth. (Brr. I stole the cat's front paws joke from Monty Python.)

Well lets talk about Alien mimes. Specifically do they make a noise if the chop down a tree in the middle of a forest without anyone around.

Yes, they do. I happen to know for sure. I was there.

I'm getting to be too much. Mania is kicking in. I'll say good bye for now.

I used to post daily science news in hope for some comments, perhaps some idle speculation, nope nothing. No one is interested. If its not gossip, or feel good spiritual navel well wishing, its pretty much ignored, or maybe you get a few, ahh cool posts, but that was it.

As far as REAL academic philosophy, not the colloquial any thought will do as philosophy tripe, its so misunderstood that its rare you can engage more then a few people and learn, or add anything new.

What is interesting to me also, is these labels we use, new age. Not a single concept that falls under this title is new at all. They use science buzz words that are newish, and not well understood by the public so they get away with themselves knowing little or nothing about the science behind it, its great fun.

hell, this forum needs to be separated into two distinct forums. science and philosopy? jeez. lets do astronomy and astrology next. arks and the advance of maritime shipping? the freight forum-fedex, ups and santa?