Q without A

October 28, 2005 2:28 PM

This is for a writing project: in layman's terms, what are The Big Questions? Examples: Is there a God? Does free will exist?

I am trying to come up with a list of the major philosophical questions/issues that have plagued/fascinated mankind. Here's what I've come up with so far (below). Please feel free to correct this list, add to it, or explain how two or more entries could be engulfed into a single category.

-- Is there a God?
-- Do people have free will?
-- Do other people experience the world as I do?
-- What is consciousness?
-- Do I exist?
-- Does anything besides me exist?
-- Is there a soul? (I had listed "Is there an afterlife?" and "Is there a mind/body split?" but I think "Is there a soul" contains or is-necessary-for these other questions. Do you agree?)
-- What is time?
-- How can acts be good or evil?
-- Do concepts (i.e. numbers) exist outside of minds?
-- Is there such a thing as cause-and-effect?
-- What is life?

posted by grumblebee to religion & philosophy (52 comments total)

What is the origin of life? When does life begin?

I prefer "what happens after I die" to "is there a soul", which to me is a different question.

Can animals think?

You'd probably want to think cross-culturally though if you are interested in all mankind. A society that believes that rocks are animate might well not think that "what is life" or "can animals think" a comprehensible question.
posted by Rumple at 2:32 PM on October 28, 2005

Why does Rice play Texas?
posted by NotMyselfRightNow at 2:43 PM on October 28, 2005

What should we do?
What is the point of life?
How do words mean? (maybe less universal, this one)
posted by gorillawarfare at 2:44 PM on October 28, 2005

s there a difference between synthetic and analytic truth?
how do we learn?
is language innate?
where did the universe come from?
what is time?

perhaps not layman enough?
posted by andrew cooke at 2:46 PM on October 28, 2005

Does life exist elsewhere in the universe?
posted by cribcage at 2:51 PM on October 28, 2005

Who/What am I?
(questions about solipsism, identity, consciousness, the soul)

Where am I?
(questions about Reality, Nature, Time, Universe)

What should I do?
(Morality, Free will, predestination)

What will happen to me?
(Questions about the Afterlife)
posted by vacapinta at 2:53 PM on October 28, 2005

What is the inherent nature of humans? (evil, benevolent, etc.)
posted by whatitis at 2:55 PM on October 28, 2005

Are people inherently good or evil?
Is humanity inherently good or evil?
Does either question even make sense?
posted by ozomatli at 2:56 PM on October 28, 2005

Damn you whatitis, damn you!!!!!!!!
posted by ozomatli at 2:56 PM on October 28, 2005

Some ideas, not all in simple question form:

Is there a purpose to life?
Follow-up to "Do I exist?" -- Why do we exist?
What is intelligence?
Is there such a thing as objective morality? Or are good and evil just relative to an individual or a society?

I would say "Is there an afterlife?" is deserving of being separately listed.

"Does anything besides me exist?" -- This could address the scientific/metaphysical question: Is there a world out there, or are there only sensory stimuli? If there is, how I prove it?

The question about cause and effect is tricky. A fundamental premise of science, or just observation and thought in general, is that things will be as they have been. The sun will rise tomorrow as it did today. What is the basis for that axiom?

I'm currently reading Lila, so: is there such a thing as objective quality, or is quality a subjective determination?

Why do bad things happen to good people?

Are things better than they used to be, are they getting worse, or does nothing ever change? Are we any smarter/more sophisticated/more moral/more enlightened than our ancestors?

Theory or pragmatism? How does philosophy relate to day-to-day life?
posted by Khalad at 2:57 PM on October 28, 2005

What should we do?
-- are you talking about morals/ethics or do you mean what should we do in order to be happy/not bored/content?

What is the point of life?
-- I've never understood this question (along with "What is the MEANING of life"). I guess I get hung up on the word "point." I don't see how this question is different from, "What is the point of a rock." Most of us would probably answer, "A rock doesn't have a point. It just is." (Or am I wrong about this?).

I do see who life might have a point in a theistic universe. We might have been created by God for some specific purpose. Can this question possibly be meaningful in a non-theistic context?
posted by grumblebee at 2:57 PM on October 28, 2005

Something about emotions vs. intellect.
posted by Khalad at 3:01 PM on October 28, 2005

"is there such a thing as objective quality, or is quality a subjective determination?"
-- Khalad (thanks, I can't believe I missed this one. I talk about it all the time.)
posted by grumblebee at 3:02 PM on October 28, 2005

Grumblebee, questions about the meaning of life are very much theistic. Atheism tends to reject such questions out of hand but I think it's more that meaning-without-God is an underexplored area of thought, rather than saying that God is the only provider of meaning.

Think along the lines of: I exist, and there must be a reason for my existence. What is that reason? Is there a larger purpose to life? A grand scheme?

I don't personally think there's any big purpose, but I understand that line of thought.
posted by Khalad at 3:06 PM on October 28, 2005

What should we do?
I meant this in both a moral/ethical sense (what is the right course of action for me?) and in a societal/justice sense (what is the right course of action for the lot of us?).

What is the point of life?
I'm totally with you, grumblebee, it's a weird and ill-formed question. Still, it seems like a lot of people care about it. Maybe the question has only been asked outright since lots of people stopped believing in God, but I feel like people have long sought some kind of general account of what humans are and what that suggests about what we should do. I guess your "What is life?" captures that too.
posted by gorillawarfare at 3:12 PM on October 28, 2005

To me, the most fundamental is an explanation for the "Things are as they have been" axiom. This axiom underlies all rational thought, and to the extent that we are limited by rational thought, is unsolvable.

Ask a philosophy major.
posted by phrontist at 3:18 PM on October 28, 2005

What does it mean to be happy?

Just what does it mean to be in love?

What drives a person more: love or the fear of not being loved?
posted by ozomatli at 3:21 PM on October 28, 2005

The grandest question of all, of course, is the hardest one to phrase: Why is there anything at all? Why is there *this*? What is existence? Why is there not "nothing", in the most profound sense of that word?

All variants of the same question which is difficult to state but that we can feel. And if you ponder it too much, its difficult not to avoid slipping into nihilism...
posted by vacapinta at 3:21 PM on October 28, 2005

I exist, and there must be a reason for my existence.

Yes, the reason why I exist is because my mother gave birth to me. But I assume people mean something grander than this by "reason". They mean what is the PURPOSE for my existence, right? We can ask "What is the purpose for a hammer," because a hammer was designed by somebody. So we can mean, "what was the intent of the designer when he made a hammer."

But if we don't believe people were designed, how can we ask that? What can the question even mean?
posted by grumblebee at 3:36 PM on October 28, 2005

To me, the most fundamental is an explanation for the "Things are as they have been" axiom.

Can you explain further, phrontist?
posted by grumblebee at 3:37 PM on October 28, 2005

Are we alone in the world?
posted by hopeless romantique at 3:54 PM on October 28, 2005

Is there a priori knowledge?

What is meaning?

What is known as true yet unproveable?

Do contradictions exist?
posted by Gyan at 4:16 PM on October 28, 2005

Why does anything matter when the sun will eventually flare and consume the earth before it dies, and when the universe itself will expand until it ultimately destroys itself entirely?
posted by scarabic at 4:23 PM on October 28, 2005

Here are a bunch, but maybe they're not broad enough. Pick whichever you like! (It was fun to think these up.)

Is anything infinite?
What is possibility? What is probability?
Why is there something rather than nothing?
What is perfection?
Is knowledge based upon ultimate foundations? (ie Is there a first philosophy?)
How can you get values from a world of facts? (ie What is normativity?)
What makes beliefs justified?
Are all truths truths about physics?
Does anything separate science from other knowledge-gathering enterprises? (ie The demarcation problem)
What makes humans different from animals?
Does anything exist which we cannot possibly conceive of? (ie Cognitive closure, the problem of noumena)
How can we avoid despair? (That is, if there's nothing but science, if there is no God, if there's no free will, etc.)
What should we want out of life?

A few that might not be layman-oriented enough, but might be able to be massaged into something simpler:
What is intensionality?
How does language hook onto the world?
How can we know things about abstract objects?
Is it possible to form new concepts? If so, how?
What are truthmakers?
Do universals exist?
Is meaning use?
Are all philosophical problems language problems?
posted by painquale at 4:48 PM on October 28, 2005

How do we know if we're dreaming or awake?
posted by grafholic at 4:59 PM on October 28, 2005

How do words mean? (maybe less universal, this one)

A very tiny quibble - philosophers haven't really been so interested in this question. It does relate to (and is subsumed by) one they have been interested in for thousands of years, though: how do sentences mean?
posted by advil at 5:01 PM on October 28, 2005

Since the laws of physics are invariant under time-reversal (as far as we can tell so long as we reverse charge and parity too), why does entropy increase forward in time and not backward?

This one really bugs me.
posted by Aknaton at 5:07 PM on October 28, 2005

How can I get laid?
posted by nixerman at 5:27 PM on October 28, 2005

Why would someone mark their own response as a best answer?
posted by knave at 5:48 PM on October 28, 2005

If God does exist, where did he come from? Oooooooh.
posted by Idiot Mittens at 6:14 PM on October 28, 2005

Why would someone mark their own response as a best answer?

knave, I marked my own post as best answer because it quoted Khalad's post. Khalad made a long post. I thought all of it was good, but I wanted to call attention to one specific point in it. So rather than misleadingly mark his whole post as best answer, I pasted the part I liked into a new comment and marked that best answer. My goal was to point to Khalad not me.
posted by grumblebee at 6:25 PM on October 28, 2005

Aknaton, this is probably to involved to get into here, but on the offchance I'm wrong, how do we know entropy can't increase backward in time?
posted by grumblebee at 6:38 PM on October 28, 2005

Khalad: A fundamental premise of science, or just observation and thought in general, is that things will be as they have been. The sun will rise tomorrow as it did today

This can be parsed two ways:

1)The sun will rise tomorrow, but everything won't be the same. Eventually, the sun won't rise (presumably). Is there anything permanent? Well, gut instinct is that there is an essence which is atemporal and unchanging.

2)How do we know the sun will rise tomorrow? This is the Problem of Induction. There's no proof for this.
posted by Gyan at 6:41 PM on October 28, 2005

"Why does Rice play Texas?"

Oh, sure, whip out THE BIG UNANSWERABLE.
posted by mr_crash_davis at 6:42 PM on October 28, 2005

why does entropy increase forward in time and not backward?

Because forward in time is defined as the direction in which entropy increases? And, without entropy increase, things dont change. And without change, there is no notion of "time"?
posted by vacapinta at 6:49 PM on October 28, 2005

Why is there something rather than nothing?

Is reason the handmaiden of passion?

What is justice? How should resources be distributed?
posted by Ugandan Discussions at 6:58 PM on October 28, 2005

Blu-Ray or HD-DVD?
posted by robbie01 at 7:07 PM on October 28, 2005

I was told once in a philosophy class that the field could be divided into three disciplines...

epistemology: What is true and how do we know that it is true?

aesthetics: What is beautiful and what is not?

ethics: What is (morally) right and what is (morally) wrong?
posted by Clay201 at 7:41 PM on October 28, 2005

Douglas Adams positied that civilizations move through three distinct phases, each of which could be summed up in the form of a question:
1. How do we eat?
2. Why do we eat?
3. Where shall we have lunch?
posted by cosmicbandito at 7:47 PM on October 28, 2005

Why does there have to be a reason for there to be anything? Does nothing need a reason to exist? By extension, does something need a reason to exist? Who needs reasons when you have heroin?

I recommend the World Question Center.
posted by meehawl at 8:36 PM on October 28, 2005

The grandest question of all, of course, is the hardest one to phrase: Why is there anything at all? Why is there *this*? What is existence? Why is there not "nothing", in the most profound sense of that word?

posted by vacapinta at 3:21 PM PST on October 28 [!]


Best answer imho...
posted by jikel_morten at 9:14 PM on October 28, 2005

Thank you all for your great answers. Here's my synopsis of this thread so far. (Sorry about those I left out. They were generally repeats of ones that I'd already listed -- or ones that my biases told me were based on more primative, more important questions.)

If this was your list, is there anything you'd add, remove or re-categorize? Would you condense or expand anything?

--epistemology: What is true and how do we know that it is true? [Clay201]
===== Why is there anything at all? [vacapinta]
===== Is there such a thing as cause-and-effect? [grumblebee]
===== What caused the universe? [andrew cooke, paraphrased]
===== What is life? [grumblebee]
===== Do I exist? [grumblebee]
===== Who/What Am I? [vacapinta]
===== Does anything besides me exist?
===== Is anything conscious besides me [Runple, paraphrased]
[grumblebee]
===== Where am I? [vacapinta]
===== When do I exist (what is time?) [grumblebee]
===== Is there a soul? [grumblebee]
===== What will happen to me? [vacapinta]
===== Is there a God? [grumblebee]
===== What is the point of life? [gorillawarfare]
===== Is anything infinite?

-- What is language / knowledge? [grumblebee]
===== How does language hook onto the world? [painquale]
===== How can we know things about abstract objects? [painquale]
===== Is it possible to form new concepts? If so, how? [painquale]
===== Do universals exist? [painquale]
===== Is meaning use? [painquale]
===== Are all philosophical problems language problems? [painquale]
===== Is there a priori knowledge? [Gyan]
===== What is meaning? [Gyan]
===== What is known as true yet unprovable? [Gyan]
===== Do contradictions exist? [Gyan]
===== What is possibility? [Gyan]
===== What is probability? [Gyan]
===== How can you get values from a world of facts? (ie What is normativity?) [painquale]
===== What makes beliefs justified? [painquale]
===== Are all truths truths about physics? [painquale]
===== Does anything exist which we cannot possibly conceive of? (ie Cognitive closure, the problem of noumena) [painquale]

--aesthetics: What is beautiful and what is not? [Clay201]
===== Do other people experience the world as I do? [grumblebee]
===== Is there such a thing as objective quality, or is quality a subjective determination? [Khalad]
===== What is perfection? [painquale]

--ethics: What is (morally) right and what is (morally) wrong? [Clay201]
===== What should I do? [vacapinta]
===== Do people have free will? [grumblebee]
posted by grumblebee at 9:46 PM on October 28, 2005

The possibility/probability were suggested by painquale. I'm disappointed he didn't suggest, "do qualia exist?" :-)
posted by Gyan at 9:56 PM on October 28, 2005

Unless the categories are important to you, drop them. Depending on one's stance, some questions don't have an unambiguous classification.
posted by Gyan at 9:59 PM on October 28, 2005

Gyan: "do qualia exist?"

That's not a problem at all!
:)

I wouldn't put "Do people have free will?" under ethics, but it's interesting that you put it there. I'd also move the "What is normativity?" question down into the ethics section. Actually, you could probably bulk up that section quite a bit. How about:

Is an ethical calculus possible?
What compels people to action?
What is obligation?
Is morality relative or absolute?
Are there any moral laws?
Are some actions always impermissible?
What makes a good person?
Can statements about morality be true or false? If so, what makes them true or false?
posted by painquale at 11:12 PM on October 28, 2005

how do we know entropy can't increase backward in time?
= decrease forward in time

We don't know it. Indeed, if we "know" that physics is time-reversible, then we know there shouldn't be a way of distinguishing the two time directions. But look around you; we can distinguish the future from the past -- entropy will be higher then.

Entropy is a measure of how much we don't know about a system. If we take an approximate description of a system (e.g. a bunch of gas particles in a box) and run it forwards in time, we begin to know less and less, basically the Butterfly Effect. Entropy increases.

Unfortunately, if we take an approximate description and run it backwards in time, exactly the same is true! So what gives?
posted by Aknaton at 11:13 PM on October 28, 2005

I agree with Gyan about the categories. Personally, I'd put most of your 'epistemology' questions under metaphysics.

It may or may not be a direct answer to your question, but a really fun paradox is the Paradox of the Question [pdf]. The linked PDF is a paper by Ned Markosian. An angel comes down and says "You can ask me any one question and I'll answer it." Everyone has to decide what question to ask.
posted by miniape at 11:13 PM on October 28, 2005

You are almost completely leaving out the physical, such as:

"Why does my anus continue to itch so much?"

Seriously. I just CAN'T be the only person who asks this question.

More questions:

What substance is the earth made of? What is the moon made of? What is the sun made of? What about the stars and the rest of space? Who or what put those things there (physical mechanism, like a never ending column of tortoises holding up the world)?
posted by tweak at 1:02 AM on October 29, 2005

Who or what put those things there (physical mechanism, like a never ending column of tortoises holding up the world)?

Pfft. Everyone knows it's Turtles all the way down.
posted by dash_slot- at 4:23 AM on October 29, 2005

You can ask them to compile a FAQ ;)

One I've been thinking about that has not been mentioned here is: "Will we be able to fully understand the workings of our own brains?"

For more inspiration, take a look at 10 Big Questions.
posted by koenie at 11:34 AM on October 29, 2005

I forgot to add this one: Is conceivability indicative of possibility?
posted by Gyan at 12:05 PM on October 29, 2005

The grandest question of all, of course, is the hardest one to phrase: Why is there anything at all? Why is there *this*? What is existence? Why is there not "nothing", in the most profound sense of that word?

Considered by some to be a non-question. Or at least inappropriate for AskMe.

</slightlybitterbutfinereally>
posted by weston at 3:34 PM on October 29, 2005