"[It's] time for the human race to enter the solar system." - Dan Quayle

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The Philosophical Lexicon

chomsky, adj. Said of a theory that draws extravagant metaphysical implications from scientifically established facts. "Essentially, Hume's criticism of the Argument from Design is that it leads in all its forms to blatantly chomsky conclusions." "The conclusions drawn from Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle are not only on average chomskier than those drawn from Godel's theorem; most of them are downright merleau-ponty."

church, n. A tightly constructed, heavily defended medieval place of worship, now primarily a tourist attraction.

derrida. A sequence of signs that fails to signify anything beyond itself. From a old French nonsense refrain: “Hey nonny derrida, nonny nonny derrida falala.”

flew, (1) n. An old-fashioned device for blowing smoke into church. "He was so annoyed by the fitch that he stuck it up the flew." (2) v. To glide rapidly and superficially over difficult terrain (cf. foot and randall). "We were trying to heidegg the suppesitions in hampshire but he just flew right by."

foucault, n. A howler, an insane mistake. “I’m afraid I’ve committed an egregious foucault.”

habermass, (from the Middle High German halber Marx; cf. ganzer Marx) n. A religious ceremony designed to engender an illusion of understanding through chants describing socio-economic conditions. Hence also, habermass, v. "He habermassed Einstein; he attempted to deduce the special theory of relativity from the social structure of the Bern patent office." "Nothing but a gadam habermass" - H. S. Truman.

heidegger, n. A ponderous device for boring through thick layers of substance. “It’s buried so deep we’ll have to use a heidegger.” Also useful for burying one’s own past.

immanuel, n. (from im-, not, + manual, guide or rulebook) A set of instructions for doing something that kant (q.v.) be done.

jerry-mander, v. To tailor one's metaphysics so as to produce results convenient for the philosophy of mind. E.g. "Paramecia don't have mental representations; therefore the properties they react to are nomic." Hence jerry-rigged, adj. said of an argument proceeding from jerry-mandered premises. "Paramecia only react to nomic properties; therefore, they don't have mental representations."

lacanthropy, n. The transformation, under the influence of the full moon, of a dubious psychological theory into a dubious social theory via a dubious linguistic theory.

lycan, n. An automated trash sorter containing a powerful solvent; one deposits a jumble of theories in it, pushes a button, and the mess is dissolved into its components, neatly packaged and ready to discard.

lyotard, n. The new clothes of the present King of France.

nagel, v. To sense, vaguely, that something crucial but ineffable has been left out of account. "No sooner had I completed my proof that the robot was conscious than I was beset by a swarm of nageling doubts."

nozick, n. (from nostrum + physick) Political snake oil, a patent medicine, esp. a cathartic or purgative. "Waste not logick, not yet strong physick, on the Leviathan; serve it nozick, and stand back." - Hobbes.

rand, n. An angry tirade occasioned by mistaking philosophical disagreement for a personal attack and/or evidence of unspeakable moral corruption. "When I questioned his second premise, he flew into a rand." Also, to attack or stigmatise through a rand. "When I defended socialised medicine, I was randed as a communist."

rawl, n. A fishing line, baited with a few apparently innocent intuitions about fairness, but capable of bringing in such big fish as Pareto optimality and God knows what else. “But some who use a rawl are only fitching.” Hence rawl, v. “When he rawled that slender line in, I could hardly believe my eyes.”

ricoeur, v. To interpret all philosophical questions by means of a limited range of insights and themes. Hence ricoeursive procedure, a recipe for generating infinite philosophical insights from a very limited subset thereof. "The Tractatus proceeds ricoeursively."

rort, n. m. (1) an incorrigible report; hence, rorty, adj. incorrigible. n. (2) Fashionable but confused discourse. "Don't talk rort."

voltaire, n. A unit of enlightenment. Hence voltairage, as in the warning to would-be purveyors of superstition and tyranny: "Danger: high voltairage in this vicinity."

wittgenstone (from Old High Anglo-Austrian, witty and Stein) (1) v. To deny resolutely the existence or importance of something real or significant, on the ground that the grammatical pre-conditions for such a denial do not obtain. “Some think qualia should be quined or fostered – but I think they should be wittgenstoned.” (2) n. Clever but utterly unrelated metaphor used as an argumentative move to silence the opponent. “He argued that on my view I don’t know that I’m in pain; but since he’s not a good kripkographer, I managed to outsmart him with a wittgenstone.”


Unfortunately I don't get most of the jokes on the page.