Half a bee, philosophically...

[Jobar]

...must, ipso facto, half *not* be.

So can the bee be said to be
Vis-a-vis its entity?

[Oolon Colluphid]

It's an interesting question, with overlaps in evolutionary things. 'What use is half a wing?' may be easily answered (precisely 1% better than a 49% wing)... but at what point does something become a wing? That is, is half a wing a wing at all?

Is Tiktaalik a fish or an amphibian? It's a fishapod, half a fish. So you don't need a licence for it.

And the same thing applies to development. Is a three-week human foetus actually 'human' at all? And in what sense? Is a tadpole a frog? Is a caterpillar a butterfly?

Cue Dawkins quote about the tyranny of the discontinuous mind... :D

[Hex]

It's an interesting question, with overlaps in evolutionary things. 'What use is half a wing?' may be easily answered (precisely 1% better than a 49% wing)... but at what point does something become a wing? That is, is half a wing a wing at all?

Or, as I've often wondered, is that 'half a wing' useful for short glides as well as still giving an ability to use the grasping fingers or whatever? Is it that the advantage of having those short glides worthwhile compared to those that don't? And as that advantage goes, the more wing the better until somewhere along the line we see creatures who find that they can not only glide, but soar?

But the questions of where does one type begin and another end? That's in the continuity of the entire system, no? Those small changes form one generation to another were likely indistinguishable from those that were alive at any given time, and they all proved viable (if they led to other species, anyhow), no?

[Garnet]

Whut?

[Hex]

Whut?

It's all about Eric.

Eric the half-bee ... :D

[Jobar]

Is this hive employee-ee
Half asleep upon my knee
Some freak from a menagerie?
NO!
It's Eric the half-a-bee!

:D

(Somehow, I feel that this thread does not speak well concerning my suitability for modding a Philosophy forum...)

[Jobar]

But of course, we *could* start talking about fuzzy logic, and the different senses of the word 'be' that the Monty Python crew so amusingly entangled.

[Danhalen]

I suppose the answer depends, in part, upon what we take the "to be" as meaning. Is "half of a bee" a bee at all? Does "half of a bee" warrant its own status as an entity apart from a whole bee?

I tend to think "half of a bee" is not a bee at all. I tend to think "half of a bee" is fully itself and not anything else (at least on the empirical level). So, my question is, what is "entity?"

[Oolon Colluphid]

So, my question is, what is "entity?"
One of the two main attractions of an Entwife, according to Treebeard.





And thus I reveal my suitability for modding Philosophy too, Jobar :D

[Hex]

*winces and hides*

Okay ...I'll hereby nominate the two of you as mods for the forum. At least the discussions won't stay dry for long ... :D

[Danhalen]

*winces and hides*

Okay ...I'll hereby nominate the two of you as mods for the forum. At least the discussions won't stay dry for long ... :DOolon's response was awesome.

[DMB]

No comment, other than this

2rpBAZEVHmI

[His Noodly Appendage]

One of my favourite usernames of all time was "halfarock"