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20653
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Six reduction levels: groups, lives, cells, molecules, atoms, particles [Putnam/Oppenheim, by Watson]
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Full Idea:
There are six 'reductive levels' in science: social groups, (multicellular) living things, cells, molecules, atoms, and elementary particles.
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From:
report of H.Putnam/P.Oppenheim (Unity of Science as a Working Hypothesis [1958]) by Peter Watson - Convergence 10 'Intro'
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A reaction:
I have the impression that fields are seen as more fundamental that elementary particles. What is the status of the 'laws' that are supposed to govern these things? What is the status of space and time within this picture?
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16618
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Intellectual and moral states, and even the soul itself, depend on prime matter for their existence [Blasius, by Pasnau]
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Full Idea:
Blasius argued that prime matter is the subject of all our intellectual and moral states. This implies that such states cannot exist apart from the body, which seems to imply further that the soul itself cannot exist apart from the body.
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From:
report of Blasius of Parma (Les quaestiones de anima (lectures on the soul) [1385], I.8 p.65) by Robert Pasnau - Metaphysical Themes 1274-1671 06.3
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A reaction:
It seems that, under pressure, Blasius recanted this view in lectures given eleven years later.
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23059
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Self-interest is not rational, if the self is just a succession of memories and behaviour [Sidgwick, by Gray]
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Full Idea:
Sidgwick said self-interest is not self-evidently rational. Unless we invoke a religious idea of the soul, human personality is no more than a succession of continuities in memory and behaviour. In that case, why should anyone favour their future self?
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From:
report of Henry Sidgwick (The Methods of Ethics (7th edn) [1874]) by John Gray - Seven Types of Atheism 2
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A reaction:
This sounds like Locke's account of the self, as psychological continuity. We can say that our continuous self is a fiction, the hero of our own narrative. Personally I think of the self as a sustained set of brains structures which change very little.
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4129
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It is self-evident (from the point of view of the Universe) that no individual has more importance than another [Sidgwick]
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Full Idea:
It is a self-evident principle that the good of one individual is of no more importance, from the point of view of the Universe, than the good of any other, ..and as a rational being I am bound to aim at good generally, not merely at a particular part.
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From:
Henry Sidgwick (The Methods of Ethics (7th edn) [1874], III.XIII.3)
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A reaction:
Showing that even a very empirical theory like utilitarianism has an a priori basis. Of course, the principle is false. What about animals, the senile, criminals, androids? What bestows 'importance'?
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