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One of my favorite courses so far was last semester’s “Natural Kinds”. Everything from the unique subject matter to the seminar-like structure made the class a blast, up until the final paper was due.
Never one to procrastinate (cough), I got started early and buried myself in the literature. I was on the hunt for a good topic, something I could sink into to keep the required twenty pages tightly focused. I ended up – not surprisingly – back in the sciences, studying natural kinds in chemistry.
I worked feverishly in the final weeks and was rather proud of the finished paper. So, with some encouragement I submitted it to the department’s scholarship program, and was surprised to learn that I won.
The paper is long, probably pretty dull, and in such a tiny niche that I’d only recommend it for someone with at least a bit of experience in the area. For some support material, Natural kinds and the seminal works of Kripke and Putnam.
Archive
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260.
Natural Kinds in Chemistry
One of my favorite courses so far was last semester’s “Natural Kinds”. Everything from the unique subject matter to the seminar-like structure made the class a blast, up until the...
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260.
The Phenomen- ology of Freedom
Are we truly free? Are the paths of our lives charted beforehand, or is every moment an opportunity to break new ground? The answer isn’t easily found, the determinate physical world seems to hit a...
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260.
An Open Letter to God.
So here’s the deal, we’ve been here a while doing great things and…eh things, but there’s always been that trickling or gushing concern about why. We’re amazing, when you stop to think...
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260.
Nietzsche: The Fast Track
The darkly dressed student made yet another existentially pessimistic remark and the professor unleashed one of the harsher insults I’ve heard: “Every student goes: Nietzsche, Schopenhauer,...
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260.
Computers and God
I came across an interesting presentation on digg (and surprisingly, it wasn’t a kitten with horrifying spelling/grammar) recently that compared – albeit often fallaciously – our...
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260.
Surviving Life
The questions we ask are not ones we can ponder in our free time and easily set aside when there’s life to do. What am I? Am I free? What is the purpose of my existence? Why should I strive to...
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260.
The New Erratic Wisdom
Another semester, another redesign (give it a solid refresh to clear your cache). This one’s been brewing for quite some time now, with the notched grid motif coming around a few months ago,...
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260.
Imperfect Art
Plato’s metaphysics and his Doctrine of Forms describes a general division of our universe into forms and particulars. Forms are instantiated by contingent particulars. That is, particulars are...
