Discussion Question Category: Epistemology

Where the Wild Things Are

Max experiences the fantastical forest and monsters as if they are real. Does that mean that the forest and monsters are real? How do you know whether something is real or imagined? How do you know whether or not you are dreaming right now? Is it possible for time to go by without anything changing? Where the Wild Things Are

Sylvester and the Magic Pebble

WHAT IS MAGIC? Is magic real? What kinds of things are magic? IMAGINATION AND EXISTENCE Can anything you imagine really exist? If you had a magic pebble like the one Sylvester found what would you do with it? What would you wish for? What other ways could you get your wish? Do you think the Sylvester and the Magic Pebble

Press Here

Did what we did affect the book? How do we know what’s going to happen? How do we know when one event causes another event? Was the book magic? Contributed by Gobe Hirata

Penguin Story

Why is Edna unsatisfied that she can only see three colors (white, black and blue)? Are there unknown things that you wish to see and learn about, just like Edna? What are they? What are the most important things to know? If Edna had only ever seen three colors, then how could she know that Penguin Story

Obstinate Pen

Where do thoughts come from? Do we always do what we intend? What is the relationship between what we intend and our actions? Do we have control over our thoughts? Over our actions? What is the mind? What kinds of things have minds? Can a pen have a mind? A table? A plant? An ant? Obstinate Pen

Morris the Moose

Why does Morris believe that the cow is a moose? Does Morris have good reasons for believing this? Does the cow have good reasons for insisting she is not a moose? What are these reasons? When the animals see their reflections in the stream, what makes them conclude that they are not the same after Morris the Moose

Man Who Kept His Heart in a Bucket

Jack has real experiences, but doesn’t feel anything – does this make his experiences inauthentic in some way? What makes an experience an authentic one? What does it mean to be authentic? Jack is breathing and working and eating and sleeping, but is he really living in any meaningful sense? Why does his situation seem Man Who Kept His Heart in a Bucket

Magic

What does a fortune teller claim to know? How could she know that? Do you think we could know what the future holds? If so, how? If not, why not? Would it be easier to predict the immediate future, or the distant future? Why? Is human behavior more difficult to predict than other behavior (maybe Magic

Little Blue and Little Yellow

What it is that makes us who we are? Once little blue and little yellow are green, are they no longer blue and yellow? Can something change and still remain the same? If you change, are you still the same person? Is the way things appear to us a good basis for believing something? Do Little Blue and Little Yellow