43 ideas
| 6575 | Philosophy may never find foundations, and may undermine our lives in the process [Fogelin] |
| Full Idea: Not only is traditional philosophy incapable of discovering the foundations it seeks, but the philosophical enterprise may itself dislodge the contingent, de facto supports that our daily life depends upon. | |
| From: Robert Fogelin (Walking the Tightrope of Reason [2003], Ch.2) | |
| A reaction: In the end Fogelin is not so pessimistic, but he is worried by the concern of philosophers with paradox and contradiction. I don't remotely consider this a reason to reject philosophy, but it might be a reason to keep it sealed off from daily life. |
| 6585 | Rationality is threatened by fear of inconsistency, illusions of absolutes or relativism, and doubt [Fogelin] |
| Full Idea: The three main threats to our rational lives are fear of inconsistency, illusions (of absolutism and relativism) and doubt. | |
| From: Robert Fogelin (Walking the Tightrope of Reason [2003], Ch.4) | |
| A reaction: This is a very nice analysis of the forces that can destroy the philosopher's aspiration to the rational life. Personally I still suffer from a few illusions about the possibility of absolutes, but I may grow out of it. The other three don't bother me. |
| 6568 | A game can be played, despite having inconsistent rules [Fogelin] |
| Full Idea: The presence of an inconsistency in the rules that govern a game need not destroy the game. | |
| From: Robert Fogelin (Walking the Tightrope of Reason [2003], Ch.2) | |
| A reaction: He only defends this thesis if the inconsistency is away from the main centre of the action. You can't have an inconsistent definition of scoring a goal or a touchdown. |
| 6557 | Humans may never be able to attain a world view which is both rich and consistent [Fogelin] |
| Full Idea: It might be wholly unreasonable to suppose that human beings will ever be able to attain a view of the world that is both suitably rich and completely consistent. | |
| From: Robert Fogelin (Walking the Tightrope of Reason [2003], Intro) | |
| A reaction: Fogelin's lectures develop this view very persuasively. I think all philosophers must believe that the gods could attain a 'rich and consistent' view. Our problem is that we are a badly organised team, whose members keep dying. |
| 6560 | The law of noncontradiction is traditionally the most basic principle of rationality [Fogelin] |
| Full Idea: Traditionally many philosophers (Aristotle among them) have considered the law of noncontradiction to be the deepest, most fundamental principle of rationality. | |
| From: Robert Fogelin (Walking the Tightrope of Reason [2003], Ch.1) | |
| A reaction: For Aristotle, see Idea 1601 (and 'Metaphysics' 1005b28). The only denier of the basic character of the law that I know of is Nietzsche (Idea 4531). Fogelin, despite many qualifications, endorses the law, and so do I. |
| 6565 | The law of noncontradiction makes the distinction between asserting something and denying it [Fogelin] |
| Full Idea: People who reject the law of noncontradiction obliterate any significant difference between asserting something and denying it; …this will not move anyone who genuinely opts either for silence or for madness. | |
| From: Robert Fogelin (Walking the Tightrope of Reason [2003], Ch.1) | |
| A reaction: This seems a sufficiently firm and clear assertion of the basic nature of this law. The only rival view seems to be that of Nietzsche (Idea 4531), but then you wonder how Nietzsche is in a position to assert the relativity of the law. |
| 6574 | Legal reasoning is analogical, not deductive [Fogelin] |
| Full Idea: There is almost universal agreement that legal reasoning is fundamentally analogical, not deductive, in character. | |
| From: Robert Fogelin (Walking the Tightrope of Reason [2003], Ch.2) | |
| A reaction: This raises the question of whether analogy can be considered as 'reasoning' in itself. How do you compare the examples? Could you compare two examples if you lacked language, or rules, or a scale of values? |
| 6582 | Conventions can only work if they are based on something non-conventional [Fogelin] |
| Full Idea: Convention, to exist at all, must have a basis in something that is not conventional; conventions, to work, need something nonconventional to build upon and shape. | |
| From: Robert Fogelin (Walking the Tightrope of Reason [2003], Ch.3) | |
| A reaction: Fogelin attributes his point to Hume. I agree entirely. No convention could ever possibly catch on in a society unless there were some point to it. If you can't see a point to a convention (like wearing ties) then start looking, because it's there. |
| 6576 | My view is 'circumspect rationalism' - that only our intellect can comprehend the world [Fogelin] |
| Full Idea: My own view might be called 'circumspect rationalism' - the view that our intellectual faculties provide our only means for comprehending the world in which we find oruselves. | |
| From: Robert Fogelin (Walking the Tightrope of Reason [2003], Ch.3) | |
| A reaction: He needs to say more than that to offer a theory, but I like the label, and it fits the modern revival of rationalism, with which I sympathise, and which rests, I think, on Russell's point that self-evidence comes in degrees, not as all-or-nothing truth. |
| 6589 | Knowledge is legitimate only if all relevant defeaters have been eliminated [Fogelin] |
| Full Idea: In general a knowledge claim is legitimate only if all relevant defeaters have been eliminated. | |
| From: Robert Fogelin (Walking the Tightrope of Reason [2003], Ch.4) | |
| A reaction: The problem here is what is 'relevant'. Fogelin's example is 'Are you sure the suspect doesn't have a twin brother?' If virtual reality is relevant, most knowledge is defeated. Certainly, imaginative people feel that they know less than others. |
| 6596 | For coherentists, circularity is acceptable if the circle is large, rich and coherent [Fogelin] |
| Full Idea: Coherentists argue that if the circle of justifications is big enough, rich enough, coherent enough, and so on, then there is nothing wrong circularity. | |
| From: Robert Fogelin (Walking the Tightrope of Reason [2003], Ch.4) | |
| A reaction: There must always be something wrong with circularity, and no god would put up with it, but we might have to. Of course, two pieces of evidence might be unconnected, such as an equation and an observation. |
| 6597 | A rule of justification might be: don't raise the level of scrutiny without a good reason [Fogelin] |
| Full Idea: One rule for the justification of knowledge might be: Do not raise the level of scrutiny in the absence of a particular reason that triggers it. | |
| From: Robert Fogelin (Walking the Tightrope of Reason [2003], Ch.4) | |
| A reaction: That won't decide the appropriate level of scrutiny from which to start. One of my maxims is 'don't set the bar too high', but it seems tough that one should have to justify moving it. The early scientists tried raising it, and were amazed by the results. |
| 6588 | Scepticism is cartesian (sceptical scenarios), or Humean (future), or Pyrrhonian (suspend belief) [Fogelin] |
| Full Idea: The three forms of scepticism are cartesian, Humean and Pyrrhonian. The first challenges belief by inventing sceptical scenarios; the second doubts the future; the third aims to suspend belief. | |
| From: Robert Fogelin (Walking the Tightrope of Reason [2003], Ch.4) | |
| A reaction: A standard distinction is made between methodological and global scepticism. The former seems to be Cartesian, and the latter Pyrrhonian. The interest here is see Hume placed in a distinctive category, because of his views on induction. |
| 6590 | Scepticism deals in remote possibilities that are ineliminable and set the standard very high [Fogelin] |
| Full Idea: Sceptical scenarios deal in wildly remote defeating possibilities, so that the level of scrutiny becomes unrestrictedly high, and they also usually deal with defeators that are in principle ineliminable. | |
| From: Robert Fogelin (Walking the Tightrope of Reason [2003], Ch.4) | |
| A reaction: The question of how high we 'set the bar' seems to me central to epistemology. There is clearly an element of social negotiation involved, centring on what is appropriate. If, though, scepticism is 'ineliminable', we must face up to that. |
| 6583 | Radical perspectivism replaces Kant's necessary scheme with many different schemes [Fogelin] |
| Full Idea: We reach radical perspectivism by replacing Kant's single, necessary categorial scheme with a plurality of competing categorial schemes. | |
| From: Robert Fogelin (Walking the Tightrope of Reason [2003], Ch.3) | |
| A reaction: It certainly looks as if Kant sent us down a slippery slope into the dafter aspects of twentieth century relativism. The best antidote I know of is Davidson's (e.g. Idea 6398). But then it seems unimaginative to say that only one scheme is possible. |
| 6555 | We are also irrational, with a unique ability to believe in bizarre self-created fictions [Fogelin] |
| Full Idea: We as human beings are also irrational animals, unique among animals in our capacity to place faith in bizarre fictions of our own construction. | |
| From: Robert Fogelin (Walking the Tightrope of Reason [2003], Intro) | |
| A reaction: This is glaringly true, and a very nice corrective to the talk of Greeks and others about man as the 'rational animal'. From a distance we might be described by Martians as the 'mad animal'. Is the irrational current too strong to swim against? |
| 6605 | Critics must be causally entangled with their subject matter [Fogelin] |
| Full Idea: Critics must become causally entangled with their subject matter. | |
| From: Robert Fogelin (Walking the Tightrope of Reason [2003], Ch.6) | |
| A reaction: This remark is built on Hume's views. You may have a strong view about a singer, but it may be hard to maintain when someone plays you six rival versions of the same piece. I agree entirely with the remark. It means there are aesthetic experts. |
| 6607 | The word 'beautiful', when deprived of context, is nearly contentless [Fogelin] |
| Full Idea: Like the word 'good', the word 'beautiful', when deprived of contextual support, is nearly contentless. | |
| From: Robert Fogelin (Walking the Tightrope of Reason [2003], Ch.6) | |
| A reaction: If I say with, for example, Oscar Wilde that beauty is the highest ideal in life, this doesn't strike me as contentless, but I still sympathise with Fogelin's notion that beauty is rooted in particulars. |
| 6604 | Saying 'It's all a matter to taste' ignores the properties of the object discussed [Fogelin] |
| Full Idea: "It is all a matter of taste" may be an all-purpose stopper of discussions of aesthetic values, but it also completely severs the connection with the actual properties of the object under consideration. | |
| From: Robert Fogelin (Walking the Tightrope of Reason [2003], Ch.6) | |
| A reaction: This remark grows out of his discussion of Hume. I like this remark, which ties in with Particularism in morality, and with the central role of experiments in science. The world forces beliefs on us. |
| 6586 | Cynics are committed to morality, but disappointed or disgusted by human failings [Fogelin] |
| Full Idea: Cynics are usually unswerving in their commitment to a moral ideal, but disappointed or disgusted by humanity's failure to meet it. | |
| From: Robert Fogelin (Walking the Tightrope of Reason [2003], Ch.3) | |
| A reaction: I felt quite suicidal the other day when I saw someone park diagonally across two parking spaces. They can't seem to grasp the elementary Kantian slogan 'What if everybody did that?' It's all hopeless. I wonder if I am becoming a bit of a Cynic? |
| 6572 | Deterrence, prevention, rehabilitation and retribution can come into conflict in punishments [Fogelin] |
| Full Idea: The purposes of punishment include deterrence, prevention, rehabilitation, and retribution, but they don't always sit well together. Deterrence is best served by making prisons miserable places, but this may run counter to rehabilitation. | |
| From: Robert Fogelin (Walking the Tightrope of Reason [2003], Ch.2) | |
| A reaction: It seems to most educated people that retribution should be pushed far down the list if we are to be civilised (see Idea 1659), and yet personal revenge for a small act of aggression seems basic, normal and acceptable. We dream of rehabilitation. |
| 6573 | Retributivists say a crime can be 'paid for'; deterrentists still worry about potential victims [Fogelin] |
| Full Idea: A strict retributivist is likely to say that once a crime is paid for, that's that; a deterrence theorist is likely to say that the protection of potential victims overrides the released convict's right to a free and fresh start. | |
| From: Robert Fogelin (Walking the Tightrope of Reason [2003], Ch.2) | |
| A reaction: Interesting since the retributivist here has the more liberal attitude. Reformists will also have a dilemma when years in prison have failed to reform the convict. Virtue theorists like balance, and sensitively consider our relations with the criminals. |
| 20624 | Work degrades into heat, but not vice versa [Close] |
| Full Idea: William Thomson, Lord Kelvin, declared (in 1865) the second law of thermodynamics: mechanical work inevitably tends to degrade into heat, but not vice versa. | |
| From: Frank Close (Theories of Everything [2017], 3 'Perpetual') | |
| A reaction: The basis of entropy, which makes time an essential part of physics. Might this be the single most important fact about the physical world? |
| 20623 | First Law: energy can change form, but is conserved overall [Close] |
| Full Idea: The first law of thermodynamics : energy can be changed from one form to another, but is always conserved overall. | |
| From: Frank Close (Theories of Everything [2017], 3 'Perpetual') | |
| A reaction: So we have no idea what energy is, but we know it's conserved. (Daniel Bernoulli showed the greater the mean energy, the higher the temperature. James Joule showed the quantitative equivalence of heat and work p.26-7) |
| 20625 | Third Law: total order and minimum entropy only occurs at absolute zero [Close] |
| Full Idea: The third law of thermodynamics says that a hypothetical state of total order and minimum entropy can be attained only at the absolute zero temperature, minus 273 degrees Celsius. | |
| From: Frank Close (Theories of Everything [2017], 3 'Arrow') | |
| A reaction: If temperature is energetic movement of atoms (or whatever), then obviously zero movement is the coldest it can get. So is absolute zero an energy state, or an absence of energy? I have no idea what 'total order' means. |
| 20622 | All motions are relative and ambiguous, but acceleration is the same in all inertial frames [Close] |
| Full Idea: There is no absolute state of rest; only relative motions are unambiguous. Contrast this with acceleration, however, which has the same magnitude in all inertial frames. | |
| From: Frank Close (Theories of Everything [2017], 3 'Newton's') | |
| A reaction: It seems important to remember this, before we start trumpeting about the whole of physics being relative. ....But see Idea 20634! |
| 20628 | The electric and magnetic are tightly linked, and viewed according to your own motion [Close] |
| Full Idea: Electric and magnetic phenomena are profoundly intertwined; what you interpret as electric or magnetic thus depends on your own motion. | |
| From: Frank Close (Theories of Everything [2017], 3 'Light!') | |
| A reaction: This sounds like an earlier version of special relativity. |
| 20635 | The general relativity equations relate curvature in space-time to density of energy-momentum [Close] |
| Full Idea: The essence of general relativity relates 'curvature in space-time' on one side of the equation to the 'density of momentum and energy' on the other. ...In full, Einstein required ten equations of this type. | |
| From: Frank Close (Theories of Everything [2017], 5 'Gravity') | |
| A reaction: Momentum involves mass, and energy is equivalent to mass (e=mc^2). |
| 20627 | Electric fields have four basic laws (two by Gauss, one by Ampère, one by Faraday) [Close] |
| Full Idea: Four basic laws of electric and magnetic fields: Gauss's Law (about the flux produced by a field), Gauss's law of magnets (there can be no monopoles), Ampère's Law (fields on surfaces), and Farday's Law (accelerated magnets produce fields). | |
| From: Frank Close (Theories of Everything [2017], 3 'Light!') | |
| A reaction: [Highly compressed, for an overview. Close explains them] |
| 20630 | Light isn't just emitted in quanta called photons - light is photons [Close] |
| Full Idea: Planck had assumed that light is emitted in quanta called photons. Einstein went further - light is photons. | |
| From: Frank Close (Theories of Everything [2017], 3 'Light!') | |
| A reaction: The point is that light travels as entities which are photons, rather than the emissions being quantized packets of some other stuff. |
| 20637 | In general relativity the energy and momentum of photons subjects them to gravity [Close] |
| Full Idea: In Einstein's general theory, gravity acts also on energy and momentum, not simply on mass. For example, massless photons of light feel the gravitational attraction of the Sun and can be deflected. | |
| From: Frank Close (Theories of Everything [2017], 5 'Planck') | |
| A reaction: Ah, a puzzle solved. How come massless photons are bent by gravity? |
| 20629 | Electro-magnetic waves travel at light speed - so light is electromagnetism! [Close] |
| Full Idea: Faradays' measurements predicted the speed of electro-magnetic waves, which happened to be the speed of light, so Maxwell made an inspired leap: light is an electromagnetic wave! | |
| From: Frank Close (Theories of Everything [2017], 3 'Light!') | |
| A reaction: Put that way, it doesn't sound like an 'inspired' leap, because travelling at exactly the same speed seems a pretty good indication that they are the same sort of thing. (But I'm not denying that Maxwell was a special guy!) |
| 20632 | In QED, electro-magnetism exists in quantum states, emitting and absorbing electrons [Close] |
| Full Idea: Dirac created quantum electrodynamics (QED): the universal electro-magnetic field can exist in discreet states of energy (with photons appearing and disappearing by energy excitations. This combined classical ideas, quantum theory and special relativity. | |
| From: Frank Close (Theories of Everything [2017], 3 'Light!') | |
| A reaction: Close says this is the theory of everything in atomic structure, but not in nuclei (which needs QCD and QFD). So if there are lots of other 'fields' (e.g. gravitational, weak, strong, Higgs), how do they all fit together? Do they talk to one another? |
| 20642 | Photon exchange drives the electro-magnetic force [Close] |
| Full Idea: The exchange of photons drives the electro-magnetic force. | |
| From: Frank Close (Theories of Everything [2017], 6 'Superstrings') | |
| A reaction: So light, which we just think of as what is visible, is a mere side-effect of the engine room of nature - the core mechanism of the whole electro-magnetic field. |
| 20639 | Quantum fields contain continual rapid creation and disappearance [Close] |
| Full Idea: Quantum field theory implies that the vacuum of space is filled with particles and antiparticles which bubble in and out of existence on faster and faster timescales over shorter and shorter distances. | |
| From: Frank Close (Theories of Everything [2017], 6 'Intro') | |
| A reaction: Ponder this sentence until you head aches. Existence, but not as we know it, Jim. Close says calculations in QED about the electron confirm this. |
| 20631 | Dirac showed how electrons conform to special relativity [Close] |
| Full Idea: In 1928 Paul Dirac discovered the quantum equation that describes the electron and conforms to the requirements special relativity theory. | |
| From: Frank Close (Theories of Everything [2017], 3 'Light!') | |
| A reaction: This sounds like a major step in the unification of physics. Quantum theory and General relativity remain irreconcilable. |
| 20641 | Electrons get their mass by interaction with the Higgs field [Close] |
| Full Idea: The electron gets its mass by interaction with the ubiquitous Higgs field. | |
| From: Frank Close (Theories of Everything [2017], 6 'Hierarchy') | |
| A reaction: I thought I understood mass until I read this. Is it just wrong to say the mass of a table is the 'amount of stuff' in it? |
| 20626 | Modern theories of matter are grounded in heat, work and energy [Close] |
| Full Idea: The link between temperature, heat, work and energy is at the root of our historical ability to construct theories of matter, such as Newton's dynamics, while ignoring, and indeed being ignorant of - atomic dimensions. | |
| From: Frank Close (Theories of Everything [2017], 3 'Arrow') | |
| A reaction: That is, presumably, that even when you fill in the atoms, and the standard model of physics, these aspects of matter do the main explaiining (of the behaviour, rather than of the structure). |
| 20633 | The Higgs field is an electroweak plasma - but we don't know what stuff it consists of [Close] |
| Full Idea: In 2012 it was confirmed that we are immersed in an electroweak plasma - the Higgs field. We curently have no knowledge of what this stuff might consist of. | |
| From: Frank Close (Theories of Everything [2017], 4 'Higgs') | |
| A reaction: The second sentence has my full attention. So we don't understand a field properly until we understand the 'stuff' it is made of? So what are all the familiar fields made of? Tell me more! |
| 20640 | Space-time is indeterminate foam over short distances [Close] |
| Full Idea: At very short distances, space-time itself becomes some indeterminate foam. | |
| From: Frank Close (Theories of Everything [2017], 6 'Intro') | |
| A reaction: [see Close for a bit more detail of this weird idea] |
| 1466 | Claims about God don't seem to claim or deny anything tangible, so evidence is irrelevant [Flew, by PG] |
| Full Idea: An assertion is logically equivalent to denying its opposite, but claims about a 'gardener', or God, make neither claims nor denials of anything, so no evidence can count against the claim, or for it. | |
| From: report of Antony Flew (Theology and Falsification [1950]) by PG - Db (ideas) |
| 1465 | You can't claim a patch of land is tended by a 'gardener' if there is no evidence, and all counter-evidence is rejected [Flew, by PG] |
| Full Idea: If someone claimed a patch of land was tended by a 'gardener', but there was never a shred of evidence to support this view, the claim would gradually dissolve into meaninglessness, especially if it was suggested that evidence was irrelevant. | |
| From: report of Antony Flew (Theology and Falsification [1950]) by PG - Db (ideas) |
| 1467 | Religious people seem unwilling to accept any evidence that God does not love us, so their claim is unfalsifiable [Flew, by PG] |
| Full Idea: Religious people seem unwilling to accept any evidence which shows that God does not love us, so what would they accept? If nothing counts that way, their claim is unfalsifiable, and hence meaningless. | |
| From: report of Antony Flew (Theology and Falsification [1950]) by PG - Db (ideas) |