It would be easy to point out flaws that I may present in my timeframe, or other mistakes in logic that I’m bound to make considering I’m writing, editing, and publishing with no assistance.

That’s why I’ve kept my personal interpretation so vague.  Attacking a position is easy to refute rather than the real, complex position of an opponent.  What is my position?  My life story is real, and I simply pose the question, “What just happened?”

I included many vignettes that were designed to imply that if a particular argument is good enough to be accepted, then the same argument, strengthened, provides even more reason to accept it.

These events could easily be misconstrued as an accident, that which is no part of its essential nature.  An accident may be added or subtracted to an object without changing its essence.  The color of a person’s eyes is an accident; having a mind is not.

I’ve tried to refrain from making conditional statements that contain an untrue antecedent, for example, if humans had three eyes instead of two there would be fewer traffic accidents.

This book is pretty matter-of-fact, it refers to statements that are grounded in personal experience, providing knowledge of the world.

My only goal was to stay focused on presenting a causal explanation of the events purely in terms of the causes of the events, and let the reader use inference to draw conclusions from a set of existing facts.

Causation one of the main philosophical problems examined in the area of metaphysics.  It is the relationship that exists between two events where, when one occurs, the other always follows, and where the first makes the latter occur.

Each and every event has a cause and if all necessary and sufficient antecedents for a particular event existed again, it would be impossible for that event not to occur.  This concept is traditionally associated with the problem of free will.  The position known as hard determinism maintains that all behavior is invariably and without exception determined by causal factors beyond the control and responsibility of any individual, so that, in effect, free will and moral choice do not exist.  However, soft determinism, a form of compatibilism, maintains that while there is a cause for all action, certain choices can still be made freely as actions that stem from the character or will of the agent, thus preserving the notion of moral responsibility.

I rely on inference to the best explanation: a line of reasoning that permits inferring the existence of unknown, unseen, and immeasurable entities, if this inference is the best way of understanding known facts.

Grouping my experiences by induction, the process of reasoning that infers a general statement from a class of specific instances, contrasted with deduction, I hope to show their correlation is unequivocal.

I don’t have a complete argument that properly elucidates their connection.  I give a line of reasoning containing premises and left it open-ended.  I don’t know if there is a connection between my premises, but given two generally similar things, if one of those things has a particular feature, the other may also contain that feature, depending on the degree of similarity between the two things being compared.

The identity of indiscernibles states that if two things share all of the same properties, then they are the same.  It is a way of specifying when two things are logically the same.

It might appear that I’ve made some hasty generalizations by drawing a general conclusion based on an insufficient number of samples or on the basis of atypical samples accidentally encountered.

I realize much of what I present in this text is anecdotal evidence; it’s not based on scientific inquiry, but on a small sampling and hearsay.

The problem of induction, sometimes called Hume’s problem, questions whether it is justifiable to infer a general statement from some samples of a population because we never know whether the samples we’ve take are representative or skewed.  More accurately, even if we have representative samples, there is an assumption that nature is basically and continuously uniform, such that standard samples will reveal the same kinds of things over time.  Hume pointed out that we can never be certain that nature is uniform in this way.

This leads us into a hermeneutic circle: the difficulty in interpretation that results when an object or element which is part of a whole cannot be understood without the context of the whole, yet the whole cannot be truly known without an understanding of the original object or element.  Thus, one cannot be understood without the other.

Due to this, I’ve used a heuristic method, a rule of thumb or method for approaching a problem which, although not always completely accurate, has approximated a solution.

Everything in here qualifies as a logical possibility, an event or thing that, while it may not be likely in this world, cannot be ruled out as prevented by the law of non-contradiction.  For example, while cylindrical cubes are logically impossible, it is logically possible that elephants could one day fly.  The law of non-contradiction simply states that contradictory statements cannot both at the same time be true.

I believe in the logically possible world as a way of imagining alternative possibilities to our existence and reality, regardless of whether we are able to bring them about, with the only criterion being that they don’t violate the law of non-contradiction.  The basic use of this concept is in modal logic, a branch of logic whose fundamental concepts are necessity and possibility.

My confirmation will be the degree to which evidence, collected through rational investigation, supports the conclusion I meant to support. 

I don’t mean to beg the question by assuming something to be true rather than proving it to be true; an argument for a conclusion that simply assumes its truth, without any other premises or any other reason.  To beg the question or conclusion is to assume the very thing I should be trying to prove. 

I believe I propose a clear and distinct idea, a phrase used by Rene Descartes to describe those Ideas that are so clear and distinct, so self-evident, and so impossible to imagine as false, that we must accept them, even when employing Cartesian doubt. 

My beliefs fall outside the current realm of the coherence theory of truth.  This is the theory that a belief is true because it is a member of a body of a consistent set of beliefs that all hold together and make sense, and hence, need not rest on one certain truth.  This contrasts with the correspondence theory of truth and foundationalism.

I believe not just because there is evidence to believe, but because it is efficacious to do so.

I’m not trying to force you into trusting me with fear of dire consequences, intimidation, or press to force acceptance of a conclusion that would not otherwise be accepted on rational grounds.

I need verification, the process of ascertaining, either through logical argument or empirical demonstration, the truth of my proposition.

I need you to believe me more than you need you to believe me.  I need the mental acceptance of my statements as true, for the will and beliefs of society around me are so strong I am quick to doubt, and resplendent disaffirmation have at times made me believe I myself am mentally unfit.

I am flawed, as is everyone else, and I implore you not to appeal to the person, the fallacy of reasoning that attempts to disprove an argument by irrelevantly attacking the person who presents it.

And I don’t expect you to stand behind me and argue for a conclusion just because no evidence is given to the contrary.  It is perfectly reasonable to conclude this was just a giant coincidence.

I don’t want people feeling sorry for me, and make no attempt to use sympathy as a way to redirect attention from relevant evidence in order to gain support for a conclusion that would not otherwise be accepted.

I’ve left my personal beliefs and cultural influence to a minimum, as I would not try to exploit the prejudices and widely held beliefs of the people to gain support for my argument.

There is no authority on this subject, if there was it would be me.  I’m more like an unqualified authority who, although knowledgeable in other areas, is without expertise in the subject area of the argument.  And I have little idea as to why my life seems so much different than everyone else’s.

I feel at one with the universe, and most are totally alienated.  It seems that your selves are never really connected to other selves or the material world.

I have the burden of proof, but my witnesses are all silent.

Conscience is the awareness which conscious beings have that their actions are either morally right or wrong.

There are a variety of irreducible views about morality, none of which are entirely true, and more importantly, humans will never agree about which theory of morality is true.  As such, I encourage tolerance when discussing ethical issues instead of simplistic absolutism.

Ethical egoism is an ethical theory claiming that the pursuit of self-interest is morally correct and rational; often associated with the Russian-born, American philosopher, Ayn Rand, it claims that ethics would be less hypocritical if everyone acknowledged the truth of its claims.

All human behavior is motivated by self-interest; this is a factual claim about human nature, whereas ethical egoism makes a claim about how humans should act, regardless of the truth of psychological egoism.  This view arises in ethics because, if true, it renders altruistic theories impossible.  Hence, defenders of altruistic theories see a need to defeat it.  I see the obvious connection between my own self-interest and the environment which sustains me.

Ethical egoism varies from hedonism: the ethical theory that claims that the pursuit of one’s own pleasure should be the aim of all action.

Intentional actions done in the pursuit of personal happiness are less likely to produce real happiness than the unintended consequences of some disinterested concern for others.  This paradox was originally described by Aristotle, who observed that people who set out to be happy often aren’t, whereas people who aim for excellence in some area often are.

At some point we made a social contract, a concept which proposes that humanity’s emergence from the savage state of nature to organized, civilized society be accomplished by virtue of a tacit agreement among its members, which now includes legal and moral obligations that ensure the continuation of civilization.

Many of us are of the hive mind, and some aren’t.  Also, I think there are varying degrees of interconnection.

I hoped to present the book in standard terms, but it’s ended up in some kind of private language that can be known only to me because its terms are defined by my subjective experience.

The answer to what is right and wrong is held by each individual’s personal beliefs, and moral decisions are made by consulting one’s own conscience.  But moral values can be objectively true independent of individual, subjective feelings.

Critical realism is any view that acknowledges that our knowledge of the real, objective nature of the world is mitigated by the mind, on which sensory experience is necessarily dependent.

Our personal identity, the property which causes a single individual to have consciousness of his or her own identity, and through time, enables one to differentiate herself from all others.  The major candidates for grounding this kind of identity are memory and the continuity of a human body over time.

We all have privileged access to the unique, exclusive, and unerring processes of our mind by means of introspection.  This is critical thinking, the analysis, criticism, and evaluation of statements claimed to be true and of arguments claimed to be valid.

There is an overwhelming unwillingness to take responsibility for the self one has created by one’s decisions when faced with crucial choices in life.  Instead, one blames uncontrollable circumstances such as genetics, bad luck, and environment for what one is.  A person who does this is called inauthentic.

I hold that the rightness of an act is derived from its logical consistency and universalizability.  Deontological ethics famously holds that the right thing is obligatory without regard for consequences.

I have a disinterested benevolence and unselfish concern for the welfare of others, with no other end in mind.  Happiness and good of others is desirable, and such happiness should be spread as equally and as widely as possible among the beings affected.

I have a true belief in perfectionism, the ethical theory that the ideal of ethics is to make oneself as perfect as possible, to make society similarly perfect, and finally, to perfect humanity.  I don’t really believe true perfection can be achieved, but a constant search for it can.

I reject universals and hold that only particular instances of things are real, and that the only thing a class of items really has in common is its name.  Humanity does not exist in general, but only as individual instances of humans who only have a name, humanity, in common.

Moral action requires that the greatest good be attained for the greatest number of beings, with regard to who the individuals are that receive that happiness.

I emphasize the importance of human dignity, welfare, and values, especially in contrast to theological or supernatural views.

Cultural relativism should be eliminated in its entirety.  This is the ethical theory that moral evaluation is rooted in, and cannot be separated from the experience, beliefs, and behaviors of a particular culture, and hence, that what is wrong in one culture may not be so in another.

The world is capable of becoming increasingly better through human action, thus improving the human condition.

The value of an act should be judged solely on the basis of that act’s effect on other beings.  This is in contrast to aretaic ethics, where the value of an act is determined by the character of an agent, or deontological ethics, where the value is determined by the intentions and motives of the agent.  If one drops the maximizing premise (the one that directs us to create the “greatest” good for the “greatest” number) of utilitarianism, one gets the more minimal theory of consequentialism.

No matter what I claim to know, the only concepts I have at my disposal are hypothetical imperatives.  Unlike categorical imperatives in ethics, hypothetical imperatives or commands are ethical obligations arising from a particular goal or desire, for example, “If we want world peace, we should destroy all nuclear weapons.”

The horns of my dilemma are the choices with which we are confronted, to act or not.  I’ve sat by passively watching the world around me degenerate, and I can no longer bear witness.  Everyone in this book has a choice, to either verify or deny my statements as being fact, or to do nothing.  I consider quietism, the theological concept that rejects active involvement in the world in favor of quiet contemplation and passivity, an unacceptable course.  The erroneousness of this becomes apparent in hindsight.

An even older approach would be Stoicism, the school of philosophy founded by Zeno around 300 BC in ancient Greece.  It views the world as a divinely organized whole in which all things eventually happen for the best; therefore, the wise and ethical man should be resigned and accept the inevitability of the universe.

I see a moral obligation to validate my account by most everyone involved, regardless of whether or not they believe what I have proposed, or even believe that it accounts for anything in the real world.

I can see fear for their own well-being as a concern, since I have grappled with the idea of me and my family being tortured or hurt by this in any way.  Given the gravity of the situation, I’ve decided that I may perform actions that could kill or hurt, but the acts are permissible only if I do not intend the killing or hurt.  Giving increasing dosages of morphine may depress respiration and kill a terminal patient, but so long as the physician only intends to relieve suffering and not to kill, the action is allowed.  In its strictest form, this doctrine holds that if an action has two effects, one evil and one good, then the action is morally permitted if: (1) the action is good in itself or not evil, (2) the good follows as immediately from the action as the evil effect, (3) only the good effect was intended in the agent’s mind, and (4) the reason for performing the action was as important as that for allowing the evil effect.

I see my actions as a categorical imperative, a moral principal formulated by Kant which directs, “Act only according to that maxim which you can at the same time will that it should become a universal law.”  More generally it is a moral requirement which must be obeyed with no exception.

I do this because the dispositional properties, the properties of a thing that are potential and defined in terms of what would happen if a certain set of circumstances were to occur, are so grave it is worth the risk; for example, polar ice has the dispositional property of solubility if above-freezing temperatures were ever to occur, whether such temperatures ever occur or not.

Sadly, the world suffers a sad weakness of will.  Where one knows a thing is good, desires that thing, yet still does not embrace it.

One of the most famous ideas in ethics and politics, the slippery slope argument is used to oppose any change in society often involving medicine or restriction of rights.  It envisions a continuous slope, where there is a good reason for taking the first step, but where at the bottom of the slope there is a morally repugnant result.  Because it will be very difficult to say why, if we take the first step, the same kind of reasons won’t also justify going from the first to second steps, it claims that we shouldn’t take the first step.  If we do, it says, we will soon end up where we didn’t want to be at the start.  For example, “If euthanasia is permitted for competent, consenting adults in cases of terminal illness and hopeless pain, before long, doctors will kill patients for lesser illnesses or for those who have not consented.”

This is in effect reductionism, a program used in science that attempts to explain complex things in more fundamental terms, for example, anatomy was once taught by understanding gross structure, then it progressed to understanding functions of the body at the cellular level, then to the biochemical level, and one day, it may be reduced to the level of physics.  Each step is reductionistic.  Some theorists oppose this, saying too much is lost, for example, in explaining conscious states as the simple firing of neurons.

It is my sole intention to be the standard, model, framework, or pattern for a concept around which subsequent investigation is structured.

We must begin the process of establishing knowledge based on eliminating any belief that might be false.  This is associated with Descartes, and advocates suspending belief in any proposition that can be doubted or that has even the barest possibility of being untrue.  After all false beliefs are discarded, one builds on the remaining true, indubitable beliefs.

I don’t have the answer as to why this happened to me, but I know it was real.  My statements may itself have little independent justification, but when added to a theory, saves that theory from rejection.  In other words, it is a temporary fix.

I have no proof, no argument with such irrefutable premises that it establishes a justified conclusion, but I hope to provide something assumed as correct until something more accurate comes along, or until a strong enough reason arises to overturn it.

I believe everyone has the right of liberty, the freedom to perform those acts that one wants to do.  For example, the ability to say what one wants in public, without fear of reprisals.  Freedom is untenable, as I can choose my actions regardless of their repercussions.

There are legal rights, natural rights, human rights, and moral rights in any particular society.  I don’t believe I have violated the rights of any people in this book.  And, although it does not possess much intrinsic value, when combined with the life I’ve lived and the people I’ve met, forms a cohesive structure.

Normally, the efficient cause of a book is its writer, but in this instance I’d say the agent by which it was produced was immanence, the state of being inherent in or coming from within something.