| 24441 | Jacobi said Spinoza's pantheism is atheism, and his determinism destroys morality [Jacobi, by West] |
| Full Idea: Jacobi argues that Spinoza's pantheistic belief that nature and God are the same thing is really equivalent to atheism, and the fatalist implications of his deterministic system was deemed incompatible with genuine freedom and moral responsibility. | |
| From: report of Friedrich Jacobi (Letters on the Teaching of Spinoza [1785]) by David West - Continental Philosophy: an introduction 2 'Critics' | |
| A reaction: Spinoza would only be atheistic if he reduces God to nature, rather than raising nature to God. European philosophy is dominated by this (false!) idea that responsibility needs perfect free will. |
| 24440 | Analytic philosophy is the heir of the Enlightenment [West] |
| Full Idea: Analytic philosophers of the twentieth century can be regarded as the Enlightenment's reasonably direct heirs. | |
| From: David West (Continental Philosophy: an introduction [2010], Pref) | |
| A reaction: Nice to see that asserted. It is what I've always felt. Blaming the Enlightenment for WW2 always struck me as crazy. |
| 24464 | True statements are largely based on our categories, which are not fixed [Lakoff/Johnson] |
| Full Idea: In general, true statements are based on the way we categorise things and, therefore, on what is highlighted by the natural dimensions of the categories. | |
| From: G Lakoff / M Johnson (Metaphors We Live By [1980], 24) | |
| A reaction: Since categorisation is rather fluid and imprecise, they infer from this that there is no such thing as what they call 'absolute' truth. This is a failure to understand the word 'true', which means it is right. Period. Their problem is epistemological. |
| 24411 | For Kant a 'deduction' is not a proof, but the validation of a concept [Kant, by Wolff,RP] |
| Full Idea: Kant meant by a 'deduction' not a proof of one proposition from another, but a demonstration of the legitimacy of a concept. | |
| From: report of Immanuel Kant (Critique of Pure Reason [1781], 1.1) by Robert Paul Wolff - In Defence of Anarchism 1.1 | |
| A reaction: I assume this leads to Hegel using 'logic' to mean the derivation of the implications of concepts. I can only think that the 'legitimacy' of a concept must refer to the accuracy of its reference. But there are many dimensions to the efficacy of a concept. |
| 24397 | Truth is indeterminate in processes like coming to be and passing away [Rescher] |
| Full Idea: Truth-value indeterminacy is implicated no less in coming to be and passing away than it is in the context of situations of future contingency. | |
| From: Nicholas Rescher (Process Metaphysics [1996], 7.2) | |
| A reaction: The classic case of truth-value indeterminacy is Aristotle's sea fight tomorrow. Rescher rightly adds the arrival and departure of things, which are always processes rather than abrupt events. When is a foetus a person? When exactly did Pompeii cease? |
| 24383 | We only solve problems once we see that all of reality is mobile [Bergson] |
| Full Idea: We can find a solution to philosophical problems only if we succeed, by a reversal of our mental habits, to see in mobility the only reality that is actual. Immobility is but a picture taken of reality by our mind. | |
| From: Henri Bergson (works [1910], III:560), quoted by Nicholas Rescher - Process Metaphysics 01.08 | |
| A reaction: Rescher presents Bergson, along with the pragmatists and Whitehead, as a founder of process philosophy. Heraclitus, of course. Begson's view is undeniable at the atomic and subatomic level. But approximate immobilities dominate our world. |
| 24384 | Whitehead's building blocks are unit processes, called 'actual occasions' [Whitehead, by Rescher] |
| Full Idea: Whitehead envisages the building blocks of reality not as substances at all, but as 'actual occasions' - processual units rather than 'things' of some sort. | |
| From: report of Alfred North Whitehead (Process and Reality [1929]) by Nicholas Rescher - Process Metaphysics 01.10 | |
| A reaction: Rescher isn't a fan of this version of process philosophy, presumably because if processes are divided into units, they would be hard to distinguish from substances. Aristotle is credited with the active substance view. Do processes need building blocks? |
| 24385 | Process philosophy is either phenomenological or biological or physical [Rescher] |
| Full Idea: Process philosophy can be phenomenological (as experience and order of cognition), or biological (as fundamental to life and organic existence), or as fundamental to nature and physical existence. | |
| From: Nicholas Rescher (Process Metaphysics [1996], 01.10) | |
| A reaction: Rescher says Whitehead combines all three, but he himself opts for the third, which strikes me as much the best version. The others are potentially both dualist and idealist. |
| 24387 | Prefer activity to substance, process to product, change to persistence, novelty to continuity [Rescher] |
| Full Idea: Process metaphysics says understanding the worlds realities call for the prioritisation of activity over substance, process over product, change over persistance, novelty over continuity. It does not deny the reality of the second members of those pairs. | |
| From: Nicholas Rescher (Process Metaphysics [1996], 2.1) | |
| A reaction: I presume 'prioritise' means to prefer as a source of good explanations. I see no reason to prefer the fluidities over its stabilities when explaining nature. To explain nature you must put pins in maps, not wave your hands. Explain the processes! |
| 24388 | A process is a coordinated group of changes, linked causally or functionally [Rescher] |
| Full Idea: A processs is a coordinated group of changes in the complexion of reality, an organised family of occurrences that are systematically linked to one another either causally or functionally. | |
| From: Nicholas Rescher (Process Metaphysics [1996], 2.3) | |
| A reaction: I appreciate a philosopher who attempts a full definition of their central concept. Some bones to pick over. I'm increasingly drawn to a process philosophy that emphasises functions. We need the origins and the roles of a process. |
| 24389 | Aristotelians say all processes are 'owned', and are thus subordinate to things [Rescher] |
| Full Idea: The medieval Aristotelians espoused the principle of 'Operari sequitur esse'. Operation (process) is subordinate to the being of things; all actually is the activity of substantial things, so that every process is owned. | |
| From: Nicholas Rescher (Process Metaphysics [1996], 2.5) | |
| A reaction: The question is where explanations must terminate. He has just distinguished (p.42) between 'owned' and 'unowned' processes. Clearly some processes are not owned by any agency. But can the unowned processes be explained, or must they be primtives? |
| 24390 | The orthodox view sees processes as the manifestations of stable dispositions of things [Rescher] |
| Full Idea: Traditional metaphysics is inclined to view processes (such as a rod's snapping under a strain) as the manifestation of dispositions (fragility) which are themselves rooted in the stable properties of things. | |
| From: Nicholas Rescher (Process Metaphysics [1996], 2.5) | |
| A reaction: My preferred approach is to subsume an account of processes within an ontology of primitive powers. Dispositions are more complex and high level than the powers. The heart of the discussion concerns the nature of properties. Rescher seems to agree. |
| 24391 | Processes without entities are possible, but there can't be entities without processes [Rescher] |
| Full Idea: Processes without substantial entities are perfectly feasible in the conceptual order of things, but substantial entities without processes are effectively inconceivable. | |
| From: Nicholas Rescher (Process Metaphysics [1996], 2.5) | |
| A reaction: Hard to disagree with this well-made argument in favour of processes as more basic. Russell observed that nothing seems to count as an object in the centre of the sun. Physics reveals a rock to be a flurry of minute activity. |
| 24395 | Processes instantiate and transmit patterns, though these are not predictable [Rescher] |
| Full Idea: Process philosophy insists that processes themselves both instantiate and transmit structural patterns. …That is denied is the exclusive prevalence of inevitable preestablished patterns that make prediction unfailingly possible. | |
| From: Nicholas Rescher (Process Metaphysics [1996], 3.2) | |
| A reaction: I include this because it offers a link to the idea of mathematics (in Resnik's phrase) as 'the science of patterns'. What then links the enduring nature of mathematics to unpredictable patterns is functions, which are multiply realisable. |
| 24448 | Events are metaphorical objects (and activities are substances, and states are containers) [Lakoff/Johnson] |
| Full Idea: Events and actions are conceptualised metaphorically as object, activities as substances, and states as containers. | |
| From: G Lakoff / M Johnson (Metaphors We Live By [1980], 06) | |
| A reaction: A nice, and persuasive, example of how deeply metaphors penetrate the way we conceptualise things. It takes an big effort to reject the object metaphor, and really conceive of events as processes. |
| 24394 | Maybe physical objects are stability-waves in a sea of processes [Rescher] |
| Full Idea: Process metaphysics stresses the need to regard physical things - material objects - as being no more than stability-waves in a sea of process. | |
| From: Nicholas Rescher (Process Metaphysics [1996], 3.1) | |
| A reaction: Invites the obvious question (for physicists, not me) of why they are stable. Standing waves are a familiar phenomenon in physics. So I'm (merely?) a stability-wave. |
| 24386 | Processes and events like storms are just as real as things like dogs [Rescher] |
| Full Idea: The concentration on perduring physical things as existents in nature slights the equal claims of another ontological category, namely processes, activities, events, occurrences - items better indicated by verbs than nouns. Storms are as real as dogs. | |
| From: Nicholas Rescher (Process Metaphysics [1996], 2.1) | |
| A reaction: The obvous response is that all of those entities are necessarily composed of things. But things exist at an instant, but his examples all need duration. His view needs the addition that the small things that compose them are themselves processes. |
| 24393 | The world contains many 'things' which are not substances [Rescher] |
| Full Idea: The world is full of 'things' that it does not make sense to count as substances; for example: rumours, heatwaves, songs, headaches. | |
| From: Nicholas Rescher (Process Metaphysics [1996], 3.1) | |
| A reaction: Rescher, of course, prefers to think of them as 'processes'. The word 'process' strikes me as over-emphasising where it is going, at the expense of what it is. Songs and headaches are vivid in the moment, with their duration simply an extra feature. |
| 24398 | A key form of knowing-how is knowing how to obtain and apply knowing-that [Rescher] |
| Full Idea: One of the most significant and characteristic kinds of know-how is the knowledge of how to operate at the level of theory - how to conure with theoretical knowledge-that over the range from obtaining it to using and conveying it. | |
| From: Nicholas Rescher (Process Metaphysics [1996], 7.4) | |
| A reaction: A nice point (made by a pragmatist) that propositional and procedural knowledge are not sharply distinct. Knowing-how is not only a fully rational process, but it is continuously needed in abstract thinking and practical reason. |
| 24392 | Primary properties describe what it is; secondary properties underlie the impact and responses [Rescher] |
| Full Idea: Primary properties describe the substance as it is in and by itself; secondary properties underlie the impact of substances upon others and the responses they invoke from them. | |
| From: Nicholas Rescher (Process Metaphysics [1996], 2.6) | |
| A reaction: A good summary of secondary qualities. If we are to explain the secondary 'impact' (though not the response), then we must use the primary to explain the secondary. |
| 24454 | Two metaphors for one thing may be coherent, even if inconsistent [Lakoff/Johnson] |
| Full Idea: Two different metaphors for 'argument' (journey, or container) would be consistent if there were a way to completely satisfy both purposes with one clear concept; instead we get coherence, where there is a partial satisfaction of both purposes. | |
| From: G Lakoff / M Johnson (Metaphors We Live By [1980], 16) | |
| A reaction: As a fan of coherence (as the main criterion of justification) I like this. We grasp the experience of an argument clearly enough, but it is complex, so varied metaphors can highlight different aspects. |
| 24445 | Seeing experiences as entities facilitates reference, categorising, quantifying and reasoning [Lakoff/Johnson] |
| Full Idea: Once we can identify our experiences as entities or substances, we can refer to them, categorize them, group them, and quantify them - and, by this means, reason about them. | |
| From: G Lakoff / M Johnson (Metaphors We Live By [1980], 06) | |
| A reaction: I've finally found authors who endorse this important point. However, they see objectification as an aspect of much wider metaphorical thought, where I prefer to see it in terms of a specific 'philosophical' faculty. Inflation is their example. |
| 24447 | Seeing experience as objects doesn't (unlike metaphors) enhance understanding [Lakoff/Johnson] |
| Full Idea: Merely viewing a nonphysical thing as an entity or substance does not allow us to comprehend very much. But ontological metaphors may be further elaborated. | |
| From: G Lakoff / M Johnson (Metaphors We Live By [1980], 06) | |
| A reaction: An important step to their view that metaphors are the mental tool which lead us to understanding. Mere objectification enables the manipulation of a concept, withouth a full grasp of it. |
| 24450 | Metaphorical concepts arise not from concrete images but from general ones [Lakoff/Johnson] |
| Full Idea: Metaphorical concepts are defined not in terms of concrete images (flying, creeping, going down the road etc.), but in terms of more general categories, like passing. | |
| From: G Lakoff / M Johnson (Metaphors We Live By [1980], 09) | |
| A reaction: An important aspect of their claim that metaphors are foundational to our conceptual scheme. It seems obvious that concepts generated from more concrete images are more 'foundational' than the generalised ones. Generalisation precedes metaphors. |
| 24449 | Personification sees object in human terms, usually selecting one aspect [Lakoff/Johnson] |
| Full Idea: Specifying objects as persons can comprehend experiences in terms of our motivations, characteristics and activities. Each personification picks out a different aspect (such as attacking, outwitting, giving birth to). | |
| From: G Lakoff / M Johnson (Metaphors We Live By [1980], 07) | |
| A reaction: [compressed] This is helpful in pointing to a more detail understanding of personification. They give 14 examples of the kind of aspects that can be selected. (They also cite metonymy and synecdoche) |
| 24457 | We must explain how concepts are grounded, structured, related, and defined [Lakoff/Johnson] |
| Full Idea: An adequate theory of the human conceptual scheme will have to give an account of how concepts are 1) grounded, 2) structured, 3) related to each other, and 4) defined. | |
| From: G Lakoff / M Johnson (Metaphors We Live By [1980], 18) | |
| A reaction: They place metaphor at the centre of such an account. I like the idea of mental files as the framework for such an account (especially since it implies the organisation of the relevant neurons). Does philosophy contribute to this project? |
| 24458 | Definitions give the essence of a concept, but metaphors are how we use them [Lakoff/Johnson] |
| Full Idea: Definitions characterise things that are inherent in the concept, but we are concerned with how humans get a handle on the concept - to understand it and function in terms of it. | |
| From: G Lakoff / M Johnson (Metaphors We Live By [1980], 19) | |
| A reaction: Their thesis about metaphorical thought is particularly persuasive if it concerns mental techniques we use in order to grasp and manipulate concepts (for example, the way we think about and discuss arguments). Metaphor is a tool of coherence. |
| 24446 | Human purposes imposes boundaries around our experiences [Lakoff/Johnson] |
| Full Idea: Human purposes typically require us to impose artificial boundaries that make physical phenomena discrete just as we are: entities bounded by a surface. | |
| From: G Lakoff / M Johnson (Metaphors We Live By [1980], 06) | |
| A reaction: Nice. An obvious example is the concept of an 'event'. Logicians then have to face the problem of vague boundaries. |
| 24451 | We usually conceptualise vague nonphysical things in terms of more precise physical things [Lakoff/Johnson] |
| Full Idea: We typically conceptualise the nonphysical in terms of the physical - that is, we conceptualise the less clearly delineated in terms of the more clearly dilineated. | |
| From: G Lakoff / M Johnson (Metaphors We Live By [1980], 12) | |
| A reaction: They sugggest 'in the kitchen' and 'in love' as instances. The authors demonstrate how this tendency runs much more deeply (see what I did there!) than you might expect. |
| 24452 | We reject the standard view that all concepts are analyzable into primitive concepts [Lakoff/Johnson] |
| Full Idea: Standard theories of meaning assume that all of our complex concepts can be analyzed into undecomposable primitives. …We assume that this is fundamentally mistaken. | |
| From: G Lakoff / M Johnson (Metaphors We Live By [1980], 14) | |
| A reaction: If any concepts are primitive they are the universally familiar ones which arise from immediate experience, such as 'water', 'sky', 'tree', 'leg'. I don't think those can be 'analysed' into categories like 'liquid' or 'limb', or 'object'. |
| 24455 | Metaphors help us to understand aspects of concepts [Lakoff/Johnson] |
| Full Idea: A metaphor works when it satisfies a purpose, namely, understanding an aspect of the concept. | |
| From: G Lakoff / M Johnson (Metaphors We Live By [1980], 17) | |
| A reaction: There is a tension in their account between metaphors as the creators of concepts, and as means for understanding concepts. I'm trying to fit together their nice account of metaphor with the idea of concepts as mental files (qv). |
| 24460 | Categories as prototypes can be qualified by a variety of verbal 'hedges' [Lakoff/Johnson] |
| Full Idea: Categories as prototypes can be extended with modifiers (called 'hedges'), such as 'par excellence', 'strictly speaking', 'loosely speaking', 'technically', and 'in certain respects'. | |
| From: G Lakoff / M Johnson (Metaphors We Live By [1980], 19) | |
| A reaction: [They cite Lakoff 1975] These two are committed to the prototype view (which seems plausible to me), and this addition of hedges greatly strengthens that theory, which can otherwise sound implausibly rigid (e.g. the prototype human being). |
| 24465 | Sentence meaning determines its truth-value in various situations [Lewis] |
| Full Idea: A meaning for a sentence is something that determines the conditions under which the sentence is true or false. It determines the truth-value of the sentence in various possible states of affairs. | |
| From: David Lewis (General Semantics [1970], III) | |
| A reaction: A somewhat clearer assertion of the view originating with Frege, and championed by Davidson. Meaning is a 'something', and so opposed to the nihilistic Kripkenstein view. I agree with Lewis on that. Meanings are mental states. |
| 24443 | Metaphor not only pervades language, but also our fundamental conceptual scheme [Lakoff/Johnson] |
| Full Idea: Metaphor is pervasive not just in language but in thought and action. Our ordinary conceptual system is fundamentally metaphorical in nature. | |
| From: G Lakoff / M Johnson (Metaphors We Live By [1980], 01) | |
| A reaction: The main thesis of their book. I'm a philosopher of thought, not of language (Dummett's distinction) so I like this. But I am not persuaded that metaphor is 'fundamental'. |
| 24444 | Metaphors understand and experience one thing in terms of another [Lakoff/Johnson] |
| Full Idea: The essence of metaphor is understanding and experiencing one kind of thing in terms of another. | |
| From: G Lakoff / M Johnson (Metaphors We Live By [1980], 01) | |
| A reaction: A pretty good definition, which gets us away from a mere comparison or resemblance. I'm cautious, though, about the word 'understanding' here. It seems obvious that metaphorical conceptualising could lead straight to misunderstanding. |
| 24456 | Argument seen as journey, container or building reveals eight different aspects of it [Lakoff/Johnson] |
| Full Idea: The metaphors for 'argument' (journey, container, building) reveal the following aspects: content, progress, structure, strength, basicness, obviousness, directness, clarity. | |
| From: G Lakoff / M Johnson (Metaphors We Live By [1980], 17) | |
| A reaction: A nice illustration of their main thesis - that metaphor has an epistemological role, and is not mere linguistic decoration. |
| 24463 | Metaphors restructure our experience, and thus create new similarities [Lakoff/Johnson] |
| Full Idea: A metaphor, by virtue of giving coherent structure to a range of our experiences, creates similarities of a new kind. | |
| From: G Lakoff / M Johnson (Metaphors We Live By [1980], 22) | |
| A reaction: One of the most persuasive ideas in their book. For example 'Juliet is the sun' is taught simply as a compressed simile, but she is nothing like a large fiery ball until you see her through Romeo's feelings about her. |
| 24462 | Metaphor stuctures our conceptual and decisions systems, and is not mere language [Lakoff/Johnson] |
| Full Idea: Metaphor has traditionally been viewed as a matter of mere language rather than primarily as a means of structuring our conceptual system and the kinds of everday activities we perform. | |
| From: G Lakoff / M Johnson (Metaphors We Live By [1980], 23) | |
| A reaction: The best statement they offer of their main thesis, which I find plausible, despite their tendency to over-emphasise metaphor in thinking and concept formation. Better, perhaps, to say that making connections does the structuring. |
| 24428 | Morality just needs equality and an absence of authority [Bakunin] |
| Full Idea: Equality and the absence of authority are the only conditions essential to the morality of every man. | |
| From: Mikhail Bakunin (Science and the Urgent Revolutionary Task [1870], p.128) | |
| A reaction: The anarchist's view of the basics of morality. I like the recognition that even the most personal morality has a social and political dimension. It is a Kantian view that morality from authority is not the real thing, which needs personal judgement. |
| 24396 | What has value for humans is quite separate from any ideas of endurance and permanency [Rescher] |
| Full Idea: It is simply inappropriate of human most concerns, always and everywhere, that 'it just won't matter in a hundred years hence'. For one must not confuse value with permanency, importance with endurance. What matters is the overall scheme of things. | |
| From: Nicholas Rescher (Process Metaphysics [1996], 6.5) | |
| A reaction: Even Platonic ideals would cease to matter, by that reckoning, if there were no longer any creatures, such as humans, to take an interest in them. It is total nihilism to reject key values now on the grounds that some key moment will pass. Saving a life. |
| 24453 | The concept of 'love' is structured mostly in physical terms [Lakoff/Johnson] |
| Full Idea: The concept of 'love' is structured mostly in physical terms, as journey, a patient, a force, madness, war etc. | |
| From: G Lakoff / M Johnson (Metaphors We Live By [1980], 15) | |
| A reaction: Their case is that nearly all of our moral thinking grounded in general metaphorical concepts. 'Good' doesn't seem to be metaphorical, even if it starts in direct experience. Mere 'I feel love' doesn't seem metaphorical. |
| 24425 | Wealth is essential for all human goods [Bakunin] |
| Full Idea: Wealth has always been and still is the indispensable condition for the realisation of everything hunman. | |
| From: Mikhail Bakunin (Science and the Urgent Revolutionary Task [1870], p.120) | |
| A reaction: Diogenes of Sinope (perhaps the first anarchist) would disagree, but in the modern world it is hard to deny this claim, which comes from a famous anarchist. Note that it is necessary, but probably isn't sufficient. Anarchists must create wealth, then. |
| 24442 | Mere universalising of maxims doesn't pick out the moral actions [West on Kant] |
| Full Idea: It has become a familiar criticism of Kant to point out that simply universalizing the maxims of one's actions does not enable us to distinguish moral and immoral ones. | |
| From: comment on Immanuel Kant (Groundwork of the Metaphysic of Morals [1785]) by David West - Continental Philosophy: an introduction 3 'Hegelian' | |
| A reaction: Interesting. Of course, Kant doesn't just say 'universalise your maxim'. He says choose the maxim which can be rationally universalised. That said, it is rational to universalise 'eggs are best boiled for four minutes'. |
| 24437 | For anarchists people may not be naturally good, but they are social [Woodcock] |
| Full Idea: The anarchists believe …that man may not be naturally good, but he is naturally social. | |
| From: George Woodcock (Anarchism: A Historical Introduction [1977], 1) | |
| A reaction: A nice point, and a good response to the objection that anarchism is contradictory - believing men can live well together because they are good, but bad because power corrupts them. Virtually all people are social. |
| 24429 | A state can only exist as a conspiracy for exploiting working people [Bakunin] |
| Full Idea: No State can exist without a permanent conspiracy, directed, of course, against the mass of drudge-people, for the enslavement and fleecing of which all States can exist. | |
| From: Mikhail Bakunin (Science and the Urgent Revolutionary Task [1870], p.129) | |
| A reaction: The view of a famous anarchist. The interesting claim is not that states happen to do this, but that necessarily all states do it. Presumably any state launched with lovely intentions would quickly turn into this criminal enterprise. Power corrupts. |
| 24435 | The tacit general contract was a fiction, supporting the propertied classes [Bakunin] |
| Full Idea: The science of law, based upon metaphysics but in reality upon the class interests of the propertied classes, sought to discover a rational basis for the existence of the State. They reverted to the fiction of the general and tacit agreement or contract. | |
| From: Mikhail Bakunin (Science and the Urgent Revolutionary Task [1870], p.144) | |
| A reaction: Might one raise the same challenge to Rawls's original position? I don't think Rousseau is committed to any particular outcome of the initial contract, and anarchists can offer their own version of how the first contract might have gone. |
| 24422 | Rousseau uses 'general will' as both aiming at the common good, and as mere consensus [Wolff,RP on Rousseau] |
| Full Idea: The 'general will' is ambiguous in Rousseau's usage. It should mean 'will issuing laws which aim at the general good', but it frequently has for him the meaning 'consensus of the group'. | |
| From: comment on Jean-Jacques Rousseau (The Social Contract [1762]) by Robert Paul Wolff - In Defence of Anarchism 2.4 | |
| A reaction: Wolff says this leads Rousseau into erroneous assumption that the general will always aims at the common good, and should therefore be accepted by the minority. |
| 24410 | People see tradition as an adequate reason for a repeated action [Wolff,RP] |
| Full Idea: The fact that something has always been done in a certain way strikes most people a a perfectly adequate reason for doing it that way again. | |
| From: Robert Paul Wolff (In Defence of Anarchism [1970], 1.1) | |
| A reaction: Not entirely absurd. 'Don't reinvent the wheel' is a good slogan. But repetition of events and actions becomes a way to dilute possible criticisms. Some traditions are ludicrous. |
| 24427 | Given power, people are natural oppressors [Bakunin] |
| Full Idea: Human nature is such that given power over others a man will invariably oppress them. …Take the most radical revolutionist and place him on the all-Russian throne …and within a year he will become worse than the Emperor himself. | |
| From: Mikhail Bakunin (Science and the Urgent Revolutionary Task [1870], p.128) | |
| A reaction: Humans can live well in anarchy, so humans must be intrinsically good, but not so good that they can resist the temptations of power. Bakunin must hope that no such temptations are available among anarchists. |
| 24430 | The ruling classes produce a small group, to organise state power and exploit the people [Bakunin] |
| Full Idea: The interests of the ruling classes demand that an even more compact governmental minority crystallise from their midst, small enough to agree between themselves to organise their group and the forces of the state, for the estates and against the people. | |
| From: Mikhail Bakunin (Science and the Urgent Revolutionary Task [1870], p.129) | |
| A reaction: This just states the obvious fact about any government, but Bakunin sees a different motivation in the process. An organised crime group would similarly produce a small group to run it. But then so would a monastery, or a bunch of saints. |
| 24426 | The believers were united, and renounced possessions, which they shared in common [Luke] |
| Full Idea: And the multitude of them that believed were of one heart and of one soul: neither said any of them that ought of the things which he possessed was his own; but they had all things common. | |
| From: St Luke (05: Acts of the Apostles [c.86], 4:32) | |
| A reaction: A quote loved by Winstanley and the Diggers. I surmise that being united in heart and soul might be a necessary precondition for sharing all their possessions. |
| 24439 | Authority is unnatural, and social ills are because we cannot act according to reason [Godwin, by Woodcock] |
| Full Idea: Godwin proposed the classic anarchist argument that authority is against nature, and that social ills exist because men are not at liberty to act according to reason. | |
| From: report of William Godwin (Enquiry Concerning Political Justice [1798]) by George Woodcock - Anarchism: A Historical Introduction 2 | |
| A reaction: This seems particularly true when a large country has a central government, from which many regions are very distant. We are all often stuck watching while rational solutions are not implemented. Potholes in roads. |
| 24436 | True anarchists accept society, which is more important without a government [Woodcock] |
| Full Idea: In rejecting government, the true anarchist does not reject the idea or the fact of society; on the contrary, his view of the need for society as a living entity becomes intensified when he contemplates the abolition of government. | |
| From: George Woodcock (Anarchism: A Historical Introduction [1977], 1) | |
| A reaction: Presumably drop-out anarchists are 'false' anarchists. The idea sounds right, in the sense that if you wanted any of the benefits of society, like schools and roads, you must create them yourself. Poor areas suffer if there is no central funding? |
| 24400 | People are sociable and self-sufficient; if that is not so, why allow men to rule others? [Walter] |
| Full Idea: Anarchists think almost all men are sociable, and similar, and capable of living their own lives. …If all men are so bad that they need to be ruled by others, anarchists ask, how can any men be good enough to rule others? | |
| From: Nicolas Walter (About Anarchism [1969], p.01) | |
| A reaction: There seems to be an important inconsistency in anarchism, which is huge optimism about ordinary people, and deep pessimism about people when they acquire power. We're lovely ruling ourselves, but horrible when ruling others. |
| 24402 | Liberals and socialists want government, which suppresses either equality, or freedom [Walter] |
| Full Idea: Both liberals and socialists depend on government - liberals ostensibly to preserve freedom but actually to prevent equality, socialists ostensibly to preserve equality but actually to prevent freedom. | |
| From: Nicolas Walter (About Anarchism [1969], p.04) | |
| A reaction: A bit too neat and simplistic. A good point, though. Lots of freedom will struggle to prevent inequality, and rigid equality is bound to limit some freedom. This seems to contradict Idea 24401. How can anarchism deliver equality? |
| 24407 | Anarchists co-ordinate their mutualist groups into a federation [Walter] |
| Full Idea: Federalism is the co-ordination of society by a network of councils. Virtually all anarchists are federalists, but that is not confined to anarchist movements. International systems like air traffic control are federalist. | |
| From: Nicolas Walter (About Anarchism [1969], p.15) | |
| A reaction: [compressed] Federalism builds on grass roots mutualism, so it ends up with quite a complex social structure, which needs to be stable and well funded. Eventually the anarchists will battle to stop the federation from turning into a modern state. |
| 24408 | Syndicalism expands worker control through enhanced and widespread trade unions [Walter] |
| Full Idea: Syndicalism is the view that society should be based on trade unions, as the expression of the working class, but covering both occupations and areas, and in the hands of the rank and file, so as to manage the whole economy. | |
| From: Nicolas Walter (About Anarchism [1969], p.17) | |
| A reaction: The dream of the workers running a modern factory looks dubious, because technology is now so sophisticated. It makes sense only where what needs to be done is fairly obvious. I like unions, but they can become very authoritarian. |
| 24409 | Syndicalism overemphsises work, and the role of the working class [Walter] |
| Full Idea: The main argument against anarcho-syndicalism, and against syndicalism in general, is that it overemphasises the importance of work and the function of the working class. | |
| From: Nicolas Walter (About Anarchism [1969], p.18) | |
| A reaction: Walter says anarchists are not attracted to the marxist view of society in terms of classes. If it is a matter of classes, then I (along with Aristotle) will champion the middle classes, who always get a bad press. Modern classes are too fluid. |
| 24404 | Anarchists want organisation by consent, so there will be more planning, not less [Walter] |
| Full Idea: Anarchists actually want much more organisation, though organisation without authority. …When compulsion is replaced by consent there will have to be more discussion and planning, not less. | |
| From: Nicolas Walter (About Anarchism [1969], p07) | |
| A reaction: The spectre of a way of life consisting largely of committee meetings looms. A sensible anarchy will delegate lots of small authorities. |
| 24399 | Anarchism is the political expression of the common reaction against authority [Walter] |
| Full Idea: Anarchism is the political elaboration of the psychological reaction against authority which appears in all human groups. | |
| From: Nicolas Walter (About Anarchism [1969], p.01) | |
| A reaction: This obviously implies a converse political movement as the expression of people who love authority. Hence one could hardly justify anarchist politics just because it expresses this particular feeling. That said, the point seems correct. |
| 24406 | Mutualism is the voluntary formation of groups of people, seen as equals [Walter] |
| Full Idea: Anarchist mutualism would organise society by individuals entering into voluntary agreements on the basis of equality and reciprocity. | |
| From: Nicolas Walter (About Anarchism [1969], p.14) | |
| A reaction: That is probably how most social institutions started, but how do you prevent them from becoming ossified and even corrupt over a long period of time? Institutions seem to need a constitution. How do you get rid of domineering bullies? |
| 24413 | An anarchist has no country, since he views all governments in an equal light [Wolff,RP] |
| Full Idea: We might characterise the anarchist as a man without a country, …since he stands in the same relationship to 'his' country as he does to the government of any other country he might happen to stay in. | |
| From: Robert Paul Wolff (In Defence of Anarchism [1970], 1.3) | |
| A reaction: This seems to be an understandable ground (along with all the others!) for a conservative person to dislike anarchists, because they lack national loyalty. Are anarchists loyal to their families? If so, why? |
| 24412 | States have a right to rule, but autonomous people refuse to be ruled. Hence Anarchism [Wolff,RP] |
| Full Idea: The defining mark of the state is authority, the right to rule. The primary obligation of man is autonomy, the refusal to be ruled. …So it seems that anarchism is the only political doctrine consistent with the virtue of autonomy. | |
| From: Robert Paul Wolff (In Defence of Anarchism [1970], p.18) | |
| A reaction: If you enthusiastically support a dictator, that looks like an exercise of personal autonomy. He relies heavily on Kant's view of morality, as the individual's duty to follow a self-imposed categorical imperative. Try virtues instead. |
| 24414 | Democracy is the only politics which might reconcile authority and autonomy [Wolff,RP] |
| Full Idea: There is only one form of political community which offers any hope of resolving the conflict between authority and autonomy, and that is democracy. …It tries to extend the duty of autonomy to the realm of collective action. | |
| From: Robert Paul Wolff (In Defence of Anarchism [1970], 2.1) | |
| A reaction: He is not including anarchism, which presumably demolishes the authority (just as totalitarians demolish the autonomy). He goes on to explore the democratic approach, and eventually rejects it. |
| 24415 | Democracy ideally wants unanimous directness, with compromises because of obstacles [Wolff,RP] |
| Full Idea: Unanimous direct democracy is the ideal which underlies much classical democratic theory. The devices of a majority and representation are introduced to overcome obstacles in the way of unanimity and directness. | |
| From: Robert Paul Wolff (In Defence of Anarchism [1970], 2.2) | |
| A reaction: Apparent unanimity probably involves a minority quietly giving up, rather than 100% enthusiasm. It is usually a conspiracy when they say 'the people want this'. But any close group must aspire to unanimity. |
| 24420 | Since the majority are much stronger, we need rule by ballot to prevent their rule by force [Wolff,RP] |
| Full Idea: Since the majority are, militarily speaking, likely to be the superior body, they must be allowed to rule by the ballot; for otherwise they will resort to force and throw society back into chaos. | |
| From: Robert Paul Wolff (In Defence of Anarchism [1970], 2.4) | |
| A reaction: I'd never thought of this, and I find it persuasive. However, it seems to be a strong objection to the author's preferred anarchy. In ungoverned communities there will be regular majorities. How can we prevent them from enforcing their will? |
| 24438 | For large area issues anarchists prefer short-term delegates, not representatives [Woodcock] |
| Full Idea: Where issues affect large areas, the anarchist preference is to appoint assemblies of delegates rather than representatives, chosen for short periods, and subject to recall. | |
| From: George Woodcock (Anarchism: A Historical Introduction [1977], 1) | |
| A reaction: A large number of UK MPs seem to become very detached from the interests and beliefs of their constituents, which makes this idea quite appealing. If we could instantly 'recall' our MP. Specialists could be chosen for specific issues. |
| 24416 | What authority have laws made by a representative who is unlike me, and doesn't know me? [Wolff,RP] |
| Full Idea: On what grounds can it be claimed that I have an obligation to obey the laws which are made in my name by a person who has no obligation to vote as I would, and no way of discovering what my preferences are? | |
| From: Robert Paul Wolff (In Defence of Anarchism [1970], 2.3) | |
| A reaction: Some UK MPs barely even visit their constituencies. This objection applies less in local government, but is a good objection to a large national assembly. One of the many causes of voter alienation. |
| 24417 | If the views of candidate and voter don't coincide, there is no way they can really represent them [Wolff,RP] |
| Full Idea: If a citizen cannot even find a candidate whose views coincide with their own, then there is no possibility at all that he will send to parliament a genuine representative. | |
| From: Robert Paul Wolff (In Defence of Anarchism [1970], 2.3) | |
| A reaction: He has shown that the complexity of issues makes such a coincidence of views a virtual impossibility. Ain't this the truth? All you can hope for is to elect someone who seems to be 'my sort of person'. |
| 24421 | In most disputes, especially early on, the minority are usually in the right [Wolff,RP] |
| Full Idea: Experience would seem to suggest that truth lies with the minority in most disputes, and certainly that is the case in the early stages of the acceptance of new discoveries. | |
| From: Robert Paul Wolff (In Defence of Anarchism [1970], 2.4) | |
| A reaction: Aristotle says that if the majority is overwhelming then they are probably right. But in closer cases Wolff has a very good point. |
| 24419 | The minority in a vote make a moral judgement which is then forcibly overruled [Wolff,RP] |
| Full Idea: A member of a minority voting against a law appears to be in the position of a man who, deliberating on a moral question, rejects an alternative only to find it forced upon him by a superior power. | |
| From: Robert Paul Wolff (In Defence of Anarchism [1970], 2.4) | |
| A reaction: If felt like this about the 2016 Brexit. I was forced to reject people I considered to be our friends. Wolff (following Kant) sees individual moral autonomy as the main human value, so this is the key anarchist objection to democracy. |
| 24403 | Only small scale democracy is possible, but then it is unnecessary [Walter] |
| Full Idea: Genuine democracy is possible only in a small community where everyone can take part in every decision; and then it is not necessary. | |
| From: Nicolas Walter (About Anarchism [1969], p04) | |
| A reaction: It is hard to see how the majority could fail to prevail, even in this local situation. Unless powerful bullies dominate. You can't achieve unanimity or consensus on every occasion. |
| 24418 | Very few of us really believe in government by the people [Wolff,RP] |
| Full Idea: Most modern belief in democracy is very shallow. It is obvious that very few individuals really hold with government by the people. | |
| From: Robert Paul Wolff (In Defence of Anarchism [1970], 2 App) | |
| A reaction: He says that a system of instant electronic direct democracy would immediately be rejected as 'too democratic'. Even in a very democratic tribe I would expect a few less respected members to be excluded from discussions. |
| 24423 | If you competitively cut prices to gain advantage, you push all the prices down [Wolff,RP] |
| Full Idea: As each entrepreneur strives to increase his profit by cutting his price slightly, hoping thereby to seize a larger portion of the total market, the market price of his commodity falls steadily, and everyone experiences a decline in profit | |
| From: Robert Paul Wolff (In Defence of Anarchism [1970], 3.1) | |
| A reaction: This is the logic which leads to the universal tacit cartel of keeping prices higher than they need to be. A complex instance of the Prisoner's Dilemma. How come all the plumbers in an area charge roughly the same rate? |
| 24424 | Free markets very efficiently coordinate behaviour, without need for coercion [Wolff,RP] |
| Full Idea: Classical liberal political economists have pointed out that the natural operation of the market is an extremely efficient way of coordinating human behaviour on a large scale without coercion or appeal to authority. | |
| From: Robert Paul Wolff (In Defence of Anarchism [1970], 3.2) | |
| A reaction: Wolff says that this is true, but it is not rational to allow it if you actually know how to control the markets to limit their worst effects. This freedom of markets is a mantra for the right wing, but what is the downside of free markets? |
| 24461 | Cultures were partly westernised by the new time-is-money metaphor [Lakoff/Johnson] |
| Full Idea: The Westernisation of cultures throughout the world is partly a matter of introducing the time is money metaphor into those cultures. | |
| From: G Lakoff / M Johnson (Metaphors We Live By [1980], 21) | |
| A reaction: Nice thought, though I would guess that the invention of the cheap clock is what initiated this development. |
| 24433 | My freedom needs everyone's freedom [Bakunin] |
| Full Idea: The freedom of all is essential to my freedom. | |
| From: Mikhail Bakunin (Science and the Urgent Revolutionary Task [1870], p.136) | |
| A reaction: A resounding slogan, but I doubt whether it is actually true. The full citizens of ancient Athens had a high level of freedom, despite reliance on slavery. Prisons don't overtly impinge of the freedom of the rest of us. Maybe we just don't feel free. |
| 24434 | Respect for freedom is the highest duty and virtue [Bakunin] |
| Full Idea: Respect for the freedom of others is the highest duty of man. To love this freedom and to serve it - such is the only virtue. That is the basis of all morality; and there can be no other. | |
| From: Mikhail Bakunin (Science and the Urgent Revolutionary Task [1870], p.137) | |
| A reaction: I sometimes think that respect might be the highest virtue, but that would involve more than respect for someone's freedom. Freedom to commit suicide? Freedom to oppress others? Freedom to be miserable? Freedom to believe nonsense? |
| 24401 | Anarchists show that freedom and equality are essentially the same [Walter] |
| Full Idea: The crucial contribution to political theory made by anarchists is the realisation that freedom and equality are in the end the same thing. | |
| From: Nicolas Walter (About Anarchism [1969], p.03) | |
| A reaction: They can't be the same thing, but they may be inseparable. Two slaves can be equal, and two unequal people (in wealth, say) can be very free (in separate countries). But local inequality seems to restrict someone's freedom. |
| 24405 | Anarchists only favour personal property which cannot be used to exploit others. [Walter] |
| Full Idea: Anarchists are in favour of the private property which cannot be used by one person to exploit another - those personal possessions which we accumulate from childhood. | |
| From: Nicolas Walter (About Anarchism [1969], p.08) | |
| A reaction: Talk of childhood possessions ducks the problem. What is wrong with owning a house, if you don't actually exploit anyone? Can you own a car? Or a taxi? Is all renting of property exploitative? Anarchists do, of course, discuss these issues. |
| 24432 | Deny free will, and abolish punishment, since human actions are the consequence of society [Bakunin] |
| Full Idea: Anarchism needs the negation of free will and the right to punish. Every human individual is but an involuntary product of natural and social environment. | |
| From: Mikhail Bakunin (Science and the Urgent Revolutionary Task [1870], p.134) | |
| A reaction: [He then spells out four social causes of immoral behaviour] I don't think negating free will entails the abolition of punishment, so these two are separate. Hegel and Marx seem to be the sources for this view. All actions are 'involuntary'? |
| 24382 | Teachers should hold knowledge worthless if it does not enhance our lives [Pufendorf] |
| Full Idea: Teachers should hold that all human knowledge which is not useful for human and civil life is worthless. | |
| From: Samuel Pufendorf (On the Duty of Man and Citizen [1673], II.18) | |
| A reaction: An idea which was despised in the twentieth century, but is approaching orthodoxy in the twenty-first. Personally I think the arts and philosophy hugely enhance human life, but that view is becoming an uphill struggle. |
| 24431 | A free society needs full compuslory education, followed by promotion of exact science [Bakunin] |
| Full Idea: A genuinely free society must grant to knowledge a two-fold right. 1) the education of both sexes, accessible and compulsory until the coming of age, which then ceases. 2) the spreading of ideas based on exact science, aimed at universal conviction. | |
| From: Mikhail Bakunin (Science and the Urgent Revolutionary Task [1870], p.133) | |
| A reaction: We would now be less confident of a consensus on what 'exact science' tells us, and compulsory education followed by brainwashing (however virtuous) doesn't sound very anarchist. Is philosophical dialectic permitted? I do think free needs truth. |
| 24459 | We understand time in almost entirely metaphorical terms [Lakoff/Johnson] |
| Full Idea: The experience of time is understood almost entirely in metaphorical terms (as spatialised, or as moving object,, or as money). | |
| From: G Lakoff / M Johnson (Metaphors We Live By [1980], 19) | |
| A reaction: But we also abstract away from this metaphorical (and physical) presentation, and try to consider time in itself. We represent it in equations as plain 't', or as a number like 10:15. |