Philosophy Games

[Oneironaut Zero]

Play the Philosophy Games, and post your scores!! Battleground God Battleground Analysis Congratulations! You have been awarded the TPM service medal! This is our third highest award for outstanding service on the intellectual battleground. The fact that you progressed through this activity without suffering many hits and biting no bullets suggests that whilst there are inconsistencies in your beliefs about God, on the whole they are well thought-out. The direct hits you suffered occurred because some of your answers implied logical contradictions. At the bottom of this page, we have reproduced the analyses of your direct hits. You would have bitten bullets had you responded in ways that required that you held views that most people would have found strange, incredible or unpalatable. However, this did not occur, and consequently, you qualify for our third highest award. Well done! Click here if you want to review the criteria by which hits and bullets are determined. How did you do compared to other people? * 418067 people have completed this activity to date. * You suffered 2 direct hits and bit zero bullets. * This compares with the average player of this activity to date who takes 1.39 hits and bites 1.11 bullets. * 38.34% of the people who have completed this activity have, like you, been awarded the TPM Service Medal. * 7.73% of the people who have completed this activity emerged unscathed with the TPM Medal of Honour. * 45.77% of the people who have completed this activity took very little damage and were awarded the TPM Medal of Distinction. I'd just like to say that the initial first one that I got wrong was because of a misinterpretation of the question, and the second one was because the question was in direct connection to the first one I'd got wrong. I was hit because I'd realized the mistake I made in the first one, provided a different answer, and the answer was marked as inconsistent with the first. Analysis Your Moral Parsimony Score is 80% What does this mean? Moral frameworks can be more or less parsimonious. That is to say, they can employ a wide range of principles, which vary in their application according to circumstances (less parsimonious) or they can employ a small range of principles which apply across a wide range of circumstances without modification (more parsimonious). An example might make this clear. Let's assume that we are committed to the principle that it is a good to reduce suffering. The test of moral parsimony is to see whether this principle is applied simply and without modification or qualification in a number of different circumstances. Supposing, for example, we find that in otherwise identical circumstances, the principle is applied differently if the suffering person is from a different country to our own. This suggests a lack of moral parsimony because a factor which could be taken to be morally irrelevant in an alternative moral framework is here taken to be morally relevant. How to interpret your score The higher your percentage score the more parsimonious your moral framework. In other words, a high score is suggestive of a moral framework that comprises a minimal number of moral principles that apply across a range of circumstances and acts. What is a high score? As a rule of thumb, any score above 75% should be considered indicative of a parsimonious moral framework. However, perhaps a better way to think about this is to see how your score compares to other people's scores. In fact, your score of 80% is significantly higher than the average score of 64%. This suggests that you have utilised a noticeably smaller range of moral principles than average in order to make judgements about the scenarios presented in this test, and that you have tended to judge aspects of the acts and circumstances depicted here to be morally irrelevant that other people consider to be morally relevant. Moral Parsimony - good or bad? We make no judgement about whether moral parsimony is a good or bad thing. Some people will think that on balance it is a good thing and that we should strive to minimise the number of moral principles that form our moral frameworks. Others will suspect that moral parsimony is likely to render moral frameworks simplistic and that an overly parsimonious moral framework will leave us unable to deal with the complexity of real circumstances and acts. We'll leave it up to you to decide who is right. How was your score calculated? Your score was calculated by combining and averaging your scores in the four categories that appear below. Geographical Distance This category has to do with the impact of geographical distance on the application of moral principles. The idea here is to determine whether moral principles are applied equally when dealing with sets of circumstances and acts that differ only in their geographical location in relation to the person making the judgement. Your score of 100% is significantly higher than the average score of 72% in this category. The suggestion then is that geographical distance plays little, if any, role in your moral thinking. Family Relatedness In this category, we look at the impact of family loyalty and ties on the way in which moral principles are applied. The idea here is to determine whether moral principles are applied without modification or qualification when you're dealing with sets of circumstances and acts that differ only in whether the participants are related through family ties to the person making the judgement. Your score of 100% is a lot higher than the average score of 52% in this category. It looks as if issues of family relatedness play have no significant role to play in your thinking about moral issues. Acts and Omissions This category has to do with whether there is a difference between the moral status of acting and omitting to act where the consequences are the same in both instances. Consider the following example. Let's assume that on the whole it is a bad thing if a person is poisoned whilst drinking a cola drink. One might then ask whether there is a moral difference between poisoning the coke, on the one hand (an act), and failing to prevent a person from drinking a coke someone else has poisoned, when in a position to do so, on the other (an omission). In this category then, the idea is to determine if moral principles are applied equally when you're dealing with sets of circumstances that differ only in whether the participants have acted or omitted to act. Your score of 67% is a little higher than the average score of 61% in this category. However, it is not high enough to rule out the possibility that the distinction between acting and omitting to act is a relevant factor in your moral thinking. More than likely you tend to believe that those who act have a slightly greater moral culpability than those who simply omit to act. If this is what you do believe, it decreases the parsimoniousness of your moral framework. Scale This category has to do with whether scale is a factor in making moral judgements. A simple example will make this clear. Consider a situation where it is possible to save ten lives by sacrificing one life. Is there a moral difference between this choice and one where the numbers of lives involved are different but proportional - for example, saving 100 lives by sacrificing ten? In this category then, the idea is to determine whether moral principles are applied without modification or qualification when you're dealing with sets of circumstances that differ only in their scale, as in the sense described above. Your score of 52% is significantly lower than the average score of 73% in this category. This suggests that scale, as it is described above, is an important consideration in your moral thinking. To insist on the moral significance of scale is to decrease the parsimoniousness of your moral framework. India and Australia In Question 13 you were asked the following: You see an advertisement from a charity in a newspaper about a person in severe need in Australia. You can help this person at little cost to yourself. Are you morally obliged to do so? However, fifty percent of people undertaking this activity are asked a slightly different question, where the country India is substituted for the country Australia. The idea is to determine what kind of impact "culural distance" has on the moral judgements that people make. The important point here is that the vast majority of people who visit this web site are from the United States, Canada and the United Kingdom. Consequently, in a comparison of the lives and lifestyles of TPM Online visitors, residents of India and residents of Australia, there will be bigger cultural differences between TPM Online visitors and residents of India than between TPM Online visitors and residents of Australia. Of course, whether a perception of cultural differences will enter into moral judgements, and if so, what its impact will be is entirely a matter of conjecture at this point. Indeed, whatever results we find here, they will only ever be suggestive of further avenues of enquiry. This aspect of the activity is simply not rigorous enough that it will be possible to draw definitive conclusions. It will nevertheless be interesting! The Results * 26% of respondents who were asked about a person in severe need in Australia responded that they were stongly obliged to help compared to 25% who responded this way when asked about a person in severe need in India. * 43% of respondents who were asked about a person in severe need in Australia responded that they were weakly obliged to help. This is exactly the same as the percentage who responded this way when asked about a person living in India. * 31% of respondents who were asked about a person in severe need in Australia responded that they were not obliged to help. This is exactly the same as the percentage who responded this way when asked about a person living in India. Feel free to post your "In-Depth Analysis," as well. I opted out. Also, I played Do-It-Yourself Deity, and my plausibility score was a 0.9. I would have posted my analysis but I closed out my window before playing other games and thinking about bringing this over to DV. Anyways: Let's see what you got!!! I'll do more later on.

[Wrathful]

You have been awarded the TPM medal of distinction! This is our second highest award for outstanding service on the intellectual battleground. The fact that you progressed through this activity being hit only once and biting very few bullets suggests that your beliefs about God are well thought out and almost entirely internally consistent. The direct hit you suffered occurred because one set of your answers implied a logical contradiction. The bitten bullets occurred because you responded in ways that required that you held views that most people would have found strange, incredible or unpalatable. At the bottom of this page, we have reproduced the analyses of your direct hit and bitten bullets. Because you only suffered one direct hit and bit very few bullets, you qualify for our second highest award. A good achievement!

[Abra]

I've tried the Do-It-yourself Deity and ended up with 1.0 plausibility. The comment was "What kind of God is that?!"

[Never]

This is fun. Battleground Analysis Congratulations! You have been awarded the TPM medal of honour! This is our highest award for outstanding service on the intellectual battleground. The fact that you progressed through this activity neither being hit nor biting a bullet suggests that your beliefs about God are internally consistent and very well thought out. A direct hit would have occurred had you answered in a way that implied a logical contradiction. You would have bitten bullets had you responded in ways that required that you held views that most people would have found strange, incredible or unpalatable. However, you avoided both these fates - and in doing so qualify for our highest award. A fine achievement! Click here if you want to review the criteria by which hits and bullets are determined. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- How did you do compared to other people? 419904 people have completed this activity to date. You suffered zero direct hits and bit zero bullets. This compares with the average player of this activity to date who takes 1.39 hits and bites 1.11 bullets. 7.73% of the people who have completed this activity, like you, emerged unscathed with the TPM Medal of Honour. 45.77% of the people who have completed this activity took very little damage and were awarded the TPM Medal of Distinction. Analysis Your Moral Parsimony Score is 84% What does this mean? Moral frameworks can be more or less parsimonious. That is to say, they can employ a wide range of principles, which vary in their application according to circumstances (less parsimonious) or they can employ a small range of principles which apply across a wide range of circumstances without modification (more parsimonious). An example might make this clear. Let's assume that we are committed to the principle that it is a good to reduce suffering. The test of moral parsimony is to see whether this principle is applied simply and without modification or qualification in a number of different circumstances. Supposing, for example, we find that in otherwise identical circumstances, the principle is applied differently if the suffering person is from a different country to our own. This suggests a lack of moral parsimony because a factor which could be taken to be morally irrelevant in an alternative moral framework is here taken to be morally relevant. How to interpret your score The higher your percentage score the more parsimonious your moral framework. In other words, a high score is suggestive of a moral framework that comprises a minimal number of moral principles that apply across a range of circumstances and acts. What is a high score? As a rule of thumb, any score above 75% should be considered indicative of a parsimonious moral framework. However, perhaps a better way to think about this is to see how your score compares to other people's scores. In fact, your score of 84% is significantly higher than the average score of 64%. This suggests that you have utilised a noticeably smaller range of moral principles than average in order to make judgements about the scenarios presented in this test, and that you have tended to judge aspects of the acts and circumstances depicted here to be morally irrelevant that other people consider to be morally relevant. Moral Parsimony - good or bad? We make no judgement about whether moral parsimony is a good or bad thing. Some people will think that on balance it is a good thing and that we should strive to minimise the number of moral principles that form our moral frameworks. Others will suspect that moral parsimony is likely to render moral frameworks simplistic and that an overly parsimonious moral framework will leave us unable to deal with the complexity of real circumstances and acts. We'll leave it up to you to decide who is right. How was your score calculated? Your score was calculated by combining and averaging your scores in the four categories that appear below. Geographical Distance This category has to do with the impact of geographical distance on the application of moral principles. The idea here is to determine whether moral principles are applied equally when dealing with sets of circumstances and acts that differ only in their geographical location in relation to the person making the judgement. Your score of 100% is significantly higher than the average score of 72% in this category. The suggestion then is that geographical distance plays little, if any, role in your moral thinking. Family Relatedness In this category, we look at the impact of family loyalty and ties on the way in which moral principles are applied. The idea here is to determine whether moral principles are applied without modification or qualification when you're dealing with sets of circumstances and acts that differ only in whether the participants are related through family ties to the person making the judgement. Your score of 100% is a lot higher than the average score of 52% in this category. It looks as if issues of family relatedness play have no significant role to play in your thinking about moral issues. Acts and Omissions This category has to do with whether there is a difference between the moral status of acting and omitting to act where the consequences are the same in both instances. Consider the following example. Let's assume that on the whole it is a bad thing if a person is poisoned whilst drinking a cola drink. One might then ask whether there is a moral difference between poisoning the coke, on the one hand (an act), and failing to prevent a person from drinking a coke someone else has poisoned, when in a position to do so, on the other (an omission). In this category then, the idea is to determine if moral principles are applied equally when you're dealing with sets of circumstances that differ only in whether the participants have acted or omitted to act. Your score of 35% is much lower than the average score of 61% in this category. This suggests that the difference between acting and omitting to act is a relevant factor in your moral framework. Usually, this will mean thinking that those who act have greater moral culpability than those who simply omit to act. To insist on a moral distinction between acting and omitting to act is to decrease the parsimoniousness of your moral framework. Scale This category has to do with whether scale is a factor in making moral judgements. A simple example will make this clear. Consider a situation where it is possible to save ten lives by sacrificing one life. Is there a moral difference between this choice and one where the numbers of lives involved are different but proportional - for example, saving 100 lives by sacrificing ten? In this category then, the idea is to determine whether moral principles are applied without modification or qualification when you're dealing with sets of circumstances that differ only in their scale, as in the sense described above. Your score of 100% is significantly higher than the average score of 73% in this category. It seems that scale, as it is described above, is not an important consideration in your moral worldview. But if, contrary to our findings, it is important, then it decreases the parsimoniousness of your moral framework. India and Australia In Question 13 you were asked the following: You see an advertisement from a charity in a newspaper about a person in severe need in India. You can help this person at little cost to yourself. Are you morally obliged to do so? However, fifty percent of people undertaking this activity are asked a slightly different question, where the country Australia is substituted for the country India. The idea is to determine what kind of impact "culural distance" has on the moral judgements that people make. The important point here is that the vast majority of people who visit this web site are from the United States, Canada and the United Kingdom. Consequently, in a comparison of the lives and lifestyles of TPM Online visitors, residents of India and residents of Australia, there will be bigger cultural differences between TPM Online visitors and residents of India than between TPM Online visitors and residents of Australia. Of course, whether a perception of cultural differences will enter into moral judgements, and if so, what its impact will be is entirely a matter of conjecture at this point. Indeed, whatever results we find here, they will only ever be suggestive of further avenues of enquiry. This aspect of the activity is simply not rigorous enough that it will be possible to draw definitive conclusions. It will nevertheless be interesting! The Results 26% of respondents who were asked about a person in severe need in Australia responded that they were stongly obliged to help compared to 25% who responded this way when asked about a person in severe need in India. 43% of respondents who were asked about a person in severe need in Australia responded that they were weakly obliged to help. This is exactly the same as the percentage who responded this way when asked about a person living in India. 31% of respondents who were asked about a person in severe need in Australia responded that they were not obliged to help compared to 32% who responded this way when asked about a person in severe need in India.

[Never]

Taboo - The Results Results Your Moralising Quotient is: 0.63. Your Interference Factor is: 0.50. Your Universalising Factor is: 0.67. How did you do compared to other people? Taboo has been played 42273 times. Your Moralising Quotient of 0.63 compares to an average Moralising Quotient of 0.34. This means that as far as the events depicted in the scenarios featured in this activity are concerned you are less permissive than average. Your Interference Factor of 0.50 compares to an average Interference Factor of 0.23. This means that as far as the events depicted in the scenarios featured in this activity are concerned you are more likely to recommend societal interference in matters of moral wrongdoing, in the form of prevention or punishment, than average. Your Universalising Factor of 0.67 compares to an average Universalising Factor of 0.46. This means you are more likely than average to see moral wrongdoing in universal terms - that is, without regard to prevailing cultural norms and social conventions (at least as far as the events depicted in the scenarios featured in this activity are concerned). Sick questions...

[LifeStandsStill]

I'd just like to say that the initial first one that I got wrong was because of a misinterpretation of the question, and the second one was because the question was in direct connection to the first one I'd got wrong. I was hit because I'd realized the mistake I made in the first one, provided a different answer, and the answer was marked as inconsistent with the first. I got the same as you did. 2 direct hits I don't really get into all the Religion type stuff, and it was hard for me to understand one of the questions, which ended up giving me 2 hits. I knew I should have went to google with some of those words, but I thought it may have counted as cheating.. Was entertaining though

[Xaqaria]

Battleground Analysis Congratulations! You have been awarded the TPM medal of distinction! This is our second highest award for outstanding service on the intellectual battleground. The fact that you progressed through this activity being hit only once and biting no bullets suggests that your beliefs about God are well thought out and almost entirely internally consistent. The direct hit you suffered occurred because one set of your answers implied a logical contradiction. At the bottom of this page, we have reproduced the analysis of your direct hit. You would have bitten bullets had you responded in ways that required that you held views that most people would have found strange, incredible or unpalatable. However, this did not occur which means that despite the direct hit you qualify for our second highest award. A good achievement! I disagree with my one hit. I said that it was alright not to believe in the Loch Ness Monster if no evidence has been found but that it was faith to be an atheist. The reason why I do not think this is a logical contradiction is because a large prehistoric creature existing in the space of Loch Ness is not quite the same as an undefined entity existing in some form somewhere in the entirety of the universe. It is fairly easy to prove beyond reasonable doubt that the Loch Ness Monster does not exist but the same cannot be said for a God.

[Amethyst Star]

You took 1 direct hit and you bit 2 bullets. The average player of this activity to date takes 1.39 hits and bites 1.11 bullets. 420522 people have so far undertaken this activity. I could argue those, but I'm not going to. You have been awarded the TPM medal of distinction! This is our second highest award for outstanding service on the intellectual battleground. Oh, goodie!

[Taosaur]

I disagree with my one hit. I said that it was alright not to believe in the Loch Ness Monster if no evidence has been found but that it was faith to be an atheist. The reason why I do not think this is a logical contradiction is because a large prehistoric creature existing in the space of Loch Ness is not quite the same as an undefined entity existing in some form somewhere in the entirety of the universe. It is fairly easy to prove beyond reasonable doubt that the Loch Ness Monster does not exist but the same cannot be said for a God. Same here, but I knew what I was getting into when I started playing. I started doing the Philosophical Health Check first and just quit because the questions were coming from such an unconsciously biased perspective that there was no meaningful way to answer. It's fascinating to watch atheists of this sort agree repeatedly to the same points, founded upon unfalsifiable assumptions, while claiming they have no dogma. It's irksome, though, that this particular bunch bill themselves as "philosophers," as if their's is the only philosophical perspective and Christianity the only opposing view.

[Patrick]

I took 2 direct hits and bit 2 bullets. I'm an athiest, determinist, nihilist, existentialist and subjectivist. I disagreed with one of my direct hits and both of my bullets. I just didn't see them as contradictions. Good find though, O!

[Xaqaria]

I took 2 direct hits and bit 2 bullets. I'm an athiest, determinist, nihilist, existentialist and subjectivist. I disagreed with one of my direct hits and both of my bullets. I just didn't see them as contradictions. Good find though, O! The bullets aren't logical contradictions, but rather beliefs that are theoretically sound but most people would still find them odd or unpalatable.

[Universal Mind]

Some of those questions are just too ambiguous for true/false answers. I got screwed up by the question about whether it is rational to believe something based on inner conviction despite external evidence. I said, "True," because in some cases it is. However, in others it is not. If I had said, "False," the game could have gotten me on an exception to that. The game assumes it is an all or nothing situation, which it is not. It all depends on whether the inner conviction is rooted in sound logic. For example, I believe in the truth of determinism despite what modern quantum physicists say about their supposed evidence because I think determinism is flawlessly logical. However, I do not believe in blind faith, and I do not believe serial killers are justified in their actions based merely on hollow inner convictions. That is not a contradictory philosophy, but the game said it is.

[Xaqaria]

Some of those questions are just too ambiguous for true/false answers. I got screwed up by the question about whether it is rational to believe something based on inner conviction despite external evidence. I said, "True," because in some cases it is. However, in others it is not. If I had said, "False," the game could have gotten me on an exception to that. The game assumes it is an all or nothing situation, which it is not. It all depends on whether the inner conviction is rooted in sound logic. For example, I believe in the truth of determinism despite what modern quantum physicists say about their supposed evidence because I think determinism is flawlessly logical. However, I do not believe in blind faith, and I do not believe serial killers are justified in their actions based merely on hollow inner convictions. That is not a contradictory philosophy, but the game said it is. Don't you think that this might be a justification of your own illogical beliefs? I can think of many 'logical' descriptions of the way the world works, but if none of them are supported by evidence, it would still be illogical to believe them. Personally, I would tend to agree with the game on that particular point. After all, you may say that determinism is logically flawless, but the 'logic' behind determinism was invented after the idea was first conceived in order to explain the evidence that science thought it had. When it was believed that everything was deterministic because of the macro-scale evidence, great minds found a logical way for it to be true. I think no matter what the evidence points to, or rather despite any misinterpretation of the evidence we may make, a logical explanation for it is always going to come up. The only way to progress is to see if further evidence still fits our logical conclusions, and as of now; it does not support this one.

[StephenT]

You have been awarded the TPM medal of honour! This is our highest award for outstanding service on the intellectual battleground. The fact that you progressed through this activity neither being hit nor biting a bullet suggests that your beliefs about God are internally consistent and very well thought out. A direct hit would have occurred had you answered in a way that implied a logical contradiction. You would have bitten bullets had you responded in ways that required that you held views that most people would have found strange, incredible or unpalatable. However, you avoided both these fates - and in doing so qualify for our highest award. A fine achievement! That one was easy. I'll do more later.

[StephenT]

I also got everything right on the "So you think you're logical" quiz, but there's so much stuff in the analysis that I didn't bother copy pasting it all. It would be too much.

[R.D.735]

Same here. No hits, no bullets bitten, no sweat. I'm also 100% parsimonious, apparently. Of course, consistency is the curse of small minds, isn't it?

[StephenT]

In regards to contradiction, I don't think so.

[kingofclutch]

Analysis Your Moral Parsimony Score is 43% What does this mean? Moral frameworks can be more or less parsimonious. That is to say, they can employ a wide range of principles, which vary in their application according to circumstances (less parsimonious) or they can employ a small range of principles which apply across a wide range of circumstances without modification (more parsimonious). An example might make this clear. Let's assume that we are committed to the principle that it is a good to reduce suffering. The test of moral parsimony is to see whether this principle is applied simply and without modification or qualification in a number of different circumstances. Supposing, for example, we find that in otherwise identical circumstances, the principle is applied differently if the suffering person is from a different country to our own. This suggests a lack of moral parsimony because a factor which could be taken to be morally irrelevant in an alternative moral framework is here taken to be morally relevant. How to interpret your score The higher your percentage score the more parsimonious your moral framework. In other words, a high score is suggestive of a moral framework that comprises a minimal number of moral principles that apply across a range of circumstances and acts. What is a high score? As a rule of thumb, any score above 75% should be considered indicative of a parsimonious moral framework. However, perhaps a better way to think about this is to see how your score compares to other people's scores. In fact, your score of 43% is significantly lower than the average score of 64%. This suggests that you have utilised a noticeably wider range of moral principles than average in order to make judgements about the scenarios presented in this test, and that you have tended to judge aspects of the acts and circumstances depicted here to be morally relevant that other people consider to be morally irrelevant. Moral Parsimony - good or bad? We make no judgement about whether moral parsimony is a good or bad thing. Some people will think that on balance it is a good thing and that we should strive to minimise the number of moral principles that form our moral frameworks. Others will suspect that moral parsimony is likely to render moral frameworks simplistic and that an overly parsimonious moral framework will leave us unable to deal with the complexity of real circumstances and acts. We'll leave it up to you to decide who is right. How was your score calculated? Your score was calculated by combining and averaging your scores in the four categories that appear below. Geographical Distance This category has to do with the impact of geographical distance on the application of moral principles. The idea here is to determine whether moral principles are applied equally when dealing with sets of circumstances and acts that differ only in their geographical location in relation to the person making the judgement. Your score of 51% is significantly lower than the average score of 72% in this category. This suggests that geographical distance is a relevant factor in your moral thinking. Usually, this will mean feeling a greater moral obligation towards people located nearby than towards those who are far away. To incorporate geographical distance within your moral framework as a morally relevant factor is to decrease its parsimoniousness. Family Relatedness In this category, we look at the impact of family loyalty and ties on the way in which moral principles are applied. The idea here is to determine whether moral principles are applied without modification or qualification when you're dealing with sets of circumstances and acts that differ only in whether the participants are related through family ties to the person making the judgement. Your score of 18% is a lot lower than the average score of 52% in this category. It seems then that family relatedness is an important factor in your moral thinking. Normally, this will mean feeling a greater moral obligation towards people who are related to you than towards those who are not. To the extent that issues of family relatedness form part of your moral thinking, the parsimoniousness of your moral framework is reduced. Acts and Omissions This category has to do with whether there is a difference between the moral status of acting and omitting to act where the consequences are the same in both instances. Consider the following example. Let's assume that on the whole it is a bad thing if a person is poisoned whilst drinking a cola drink. One might then ask whether there is a moral difference between poisoning the coke, on the one hand (an act), and failing to prevent a person from drinking a coke someone else has poisoned, when in a position to do so, on the other (an omission). In this category then, the idea is to determine if moral principles are applied equally when you're dealing with sets of circumstances that differ only in whether the participants have acted or omitted to act. Your score of 51% is a little lower than the average score of 61% in this category. This suggests that the distinction between acting and omitting to act is sometimes a relevant factor in your moral thinking. Probably, you tend to believe that those who act have a greater moral culpability than those who simply omit to act. If this is what you believe, it decreases the parsimoniousness of your moral framework. Scale This category has to do with whether scale is a factor in making moral judgements. A simple example will make this clear. Consider a situation where it is possible to save ten lives by sacrificing one life. Is there a moral difference between this choice and one where the numbers of lives involved are different but proportional - for example, saving 100 lives by sacrificing ten? In this category then, the idea is to determine whether moral principles are applied without modification or qualification when you're dealing with sets of circumstances that differ only in their scale, as in the sense described above. Your score of 51% is significantly lower than the average score of 73% in this category. This suggests that scale, as it is described above, is an important consideration in your moral thinking. To insist on the moral significance of scale is to decrease the parsimoniousness of your moral framework. India and Australia In Question 13 you were asked the following: You see an advertisement from a charity in a newspaper about a person in severe need in India. You can help this person at little cost to yourself. Are you morally obliged to do so? However, fifty percent of people undertaking this activity are asked a slightly different question, where the country Australia is substituted for the country India. The idea is to determine what kind of impact "culural distance" has on the moral judgements that people make. The important point here is that the vast majority of people who visit this web site are from the United States, Canada and the United Kingdom. Consequently, in a comparison of the lives and lifestyles of TPM Online visitors, residents of India and residents of Australia, there will be bigger cultural differences between TPM Online visitors and residents of India than between TPM Online visitors and residents of Australia. Of course, whether a perception of cultural differences will enter into moral judgements, and if so, what its impact will be is entirely a matter of conjecture at this point. Indeed, whatever results we find here, they will only ever be suggestive of further avenues of enquiry. This aspect of the activity is simply not rigorous enough that it will be possible to draw definitive conclusions. It will nevertheless be interesting! The Results * 26% of respondents who were asked about a person in severe need in Australia responded that they were stongly obliged to help compared to 25% who responded this way when asked about a person in severe need in India. * 43% of respondents who were asked about a person in severe need in Australia responded that they were weakly obliged to help. This is exactly the same as the percentage who responded this way when asked about a person living in India. * 31% of respondents who were asked about a person in severe need in Australia responded that they were not obliged to help compared to 32% who responded this way when asked about a person in severe need in India. I also got all the ones right on So you think you're logical?

[Omega Weapon]

I completed God perfectly; no incorrect answers. Awesome.

[StephenT]

Geographical Distance This category has to do with the impact of geographical distance on the application of moral principles. The idea here is to determine whether moral principles are applied equally when dealing with sets of circumstances and acts that differ only in their geographical location in relation to the person making the judgement. Your score of 100% is significantly higher than the average score of 72% in this category. The suggestion then is that geographical distance plays little, if any, role in your moral thinking. Family Relatedness In this category, we look at the impact of family loyalty and ties on the way in which moral principles are applied. The idea here is to determine whether moral principles are applied without modification or qualification when you're dealing with sets of circumstances and acts that differ only in whether the participants are related through family ties to the person making the judgement. Your score of 2% is a lot lower than the average score of 52% in this category. It seems then that family relatedness is an important factor in your moral thinking. Normally, this will mean feeling a greater moral obligation towards people who are related to you than towards those who are not. To the extent that issues of family relatedness form part of your moral thinking, the parsimoniousness of your moral framework is reduced. Acts and Omissions This category has to do with whether there is a difference between the moral status of acting and omitting to act where the consequences are the same in both instances. Consider the following example. Let's assume that on the whole it is a bad thing if a person is poisoned whilst drinking a cola drink. One might then ask whether there is a moral difference between poisoning the coke, on the one hand (an act), and failing to prevent a person from drinking a coke someone else has poisoned, when in a position to do so, on the other (an omission). In this category then, the idea is to determine if moral principles are applied equally when you're dealing with sets of circumstances that differ only in whether the participants have acted or omitted to act. Your score of 67% is a little higher than the average score of 61% in this category. However, it is not high enough to rule out the possibility that the distinction between acting and omitting to act is a relevant factor in your moral thinking. More than likely you tend to believe that those who act have a slightly greater moral culpability than those who simply omit to act. If this is what you do believe, it decreases the parsimoniousness of your moral framework. Scale This category has to do with whether scale is a factor in making moral judgements. A simple example will make this clear. Consider a situation where it is possible to save ten lives by sacrificing one life. Is there a moral difference between this choice and one where the numbers of lives involved are different but proportional - for example, saving 100 lives by sacrificing ten? In this category then, the idea is to determine whether moral principles are applied without modification or qualification when you're dealing with sets of circumstances that differ only in their scale, as in the sense described above. Your score of 51% is significantly lower than the average score of 73% in this category. This suggests that scale, as it is described above, is an important consideration in your moral thinking. To insist on the moral significance of scale is to decrease the parsimoniousness of your moral framework. There's my Parsimony of 55%. I'm pleased with that.

[Universal Mind]

Don't you think that this might be a justification of your own illogical beliefs? I can think of many 'logical' descriptions of the way the world works, but if none of them are supported by evidence, it would still be illogical to believe them. Personally, I would tend to agree with the game on that particular point. After all, you may say that determinism is logically flawless, but the 'logic' behind determinism was invented after the idea was first conceived in order to explain the evidence that science thought it had. When it was believed that everything was deterministic because of the macro-scale evidence, great minds found a logical way for it to be true. I think no matter what the evidence points to, or rather despite any misinterpretation of the evidence we may make, a logical explanation for it is always going to come up. The only way to progress is to see if further evidence still fits our logical conclusions, and as of now; it does not support this one. I have not been convinced by anything supposedly refuting determinism. The weak "evidence" against it only shows that experimental differences occur without known reasons, and I think it is illogical to take that information and conclude that it means such reasons automatically do not exist. The idea that anything can happen for no reason whatsoever is illogical, I stand by that, and the opposing "evidence" I have seen is not sufficiently convincing. If you ever find more solid evidence, let me know.

[Afterglow]

Battleground Analysis Congratulations! You have been awarded the TPM medal of distinction! This is our second highest award for outstanding service on the intellectual battleground. The fact that you progressed through this activity without being hit and biting very few bullets suggests that your beliefs about God are internally consistent and well thought out. A direct hit would have occurred had you answered in a way that implied a logical contradiction. The bitten bullets occurred because you responded in ways that required that you held views that most people would have found strange, incredible or unpalatable. However, because you bit only two bullets and avoided direct hits completely you still qualify for our second highest award. A good achievement! Click here if you want to review the criteria by which hits and bullets are determined. How did you do compared to other people? * 427364 people have completed this activity to date. * You suffered zero direct hits and bit 2 bullets. * This compares with the average player of this activity to date who takes 1.39 hits and bites 1.10 bullets. * 45.77% of the people who have completed this activity, like you, took very little damage and were awarded the TPM Medal of Distinction. * 7.73% of the people who have completed this activity emerged unscathed with the TPM Medal of Honour.

[ClouD]

You have been awarded the TPM medal of distinction! This is our second highest award for outstanding service on the intellectual battleground. The fact that you progressed through this activity without being hit and biting only one bullet suggests that your beliefs about God are internally consistent and well thought out. A direct hit would have occurred had you answered in a way that implied a logical contradiction. The bitten bullet occurred because you responded in a way that required that you held a view that most people would have found strange, incredible or unpalatable. However, because you bit only one bullet and avoided direct hits completely you still qualify for our second highest award. A good achievement!

[Bearsy]

Congratulations! You have been awarded the TPM medal of honour! This is our highest award for outstanding service on the intellectual battleground. The fact that you progressed through this activity neither being hit nor biting a bullet suggests that your beliefs about God are internally consistent and very well thought out.

[skysaw]

My God plausibility was 1.0. On Battleground God, I took zero hits and bit zero bullets. You have been awarded the TPM medal of honour! This is our highest award for outstanding service on the intellectual battleground. The fact that you progressed through this activity neither being hit nor biting a bullet suggests that your beliefs about God are internally consistent and very well thought out.