display all the ideas for this combination of philosophers
2 ideas
| 8765 | All is vanity, saith the Preacher [Anon (Ecc)] |
| Full Idea: Vanity of vanities, saith the Preacher, vanity of vanities; all is vanity. | |
| From: Anon (Ecc) (21: Book of Ecclesiastes [c.200 BCE], 01.02) | |
| A reaction: If we are swamped by vanity, then there is presumably no hope for the other virtues. A more balanced view would say that we should aim for a mean on the scale of self-esteem, which probably requires an effort to be objective about ourselves. |
| 9762 | We should focus less on subjects of experience, and more on the experiences themselves [Parfit] |
| Full Idea: It becomes more plausible, when thinking morally, to focus less upon the person, the subject of experiences, and instead to focus more upon the experiences themselves. | |
| From: Derek Parfit (Reasons and Persons [1984], §116) | |
| A reaction: This pinpoints how Parfit moves from a view of persons in terms of continuity of consciousness to a utilitarian morality. It brings out nicely what is wrong with utilitarianism - the reductio of a great ball of nice experiences, with no one having them. |