14 ideas
| 7893 | Our life is the creation of our mind [Anon (Dham)] |
| Full Idea: What we are today comes from our thoughts of yesterday, and our present thoughts build our life of tomorrow: our life is the creation of our mind. | |
| From: Anon (Dham) (The DhammaPada [c.250 BCE], §1.1) | |
| A reaction: I may adopt this as a second epigraph for the database. This idea records the subjective view, which now comes up against evolutionary psychology. Maybe philosophy is opposed to science, because it is committed to exploring the subjective view? |
| 14637 | Only individuals have essences, so numbers (as a higher type based on classes) lack them [McMichael] |
| Full Idea: Essentialism is not verified by the observation that numbers have interesting essential properties, since they are properties of classes and so are entities of a higher logical type than individuals. | |
| From: Alan McMichael (The Epistemology of Essentialist Claims [1986], Intro) | |
| A reaction: This relies on a particular view of number (which might be challenged), but is interesting when it comes to abstract entities having essences. Only ur-elements in set theory could have essences, it seems. Why? Rising in type destroys essence? |
| 14636 | Essences are the interesting necessary properties resulting from a thing's own peculiar nature [McMichael] |
| Full Idea: Essentialism says some individuals have certain 'interesting' necessary properties. If it exists, it has that property. The properties are 'interesting' as had in virtue of their own peculiar natures, rather than as general necessary truths. | |
| From: Alan McMichael (The Epistemology of Essentialist Claims [1986], Intro) | |
| A reaction: [compressed] This is a modern commentator caught between two views. The idea that essence is the non-trivial-necessary properties is standard, but adding their 'peculiar natures' connects him to Aristotle, and Kit Fine's later papers. Good! |
| 14640 | Maybe essential properties have to be intrinsic, as well as necessary? [McMichael] |
| Full Idea: There is a tendency to think of essential properties as having some characteristic in addition to their necessity, such as intrinsicality. | |
| From: Alan McMichael (The Epistemology of Essentialist Claims [1986], VIII) | |
| A reaction: Personally I am inclined to take this view of all properties, and not just the 'essential' ones. General necessities, relations, categorisations, disjunctions etc. should not be called 'properties', even if they are 'predicates'. Huge confusion results. |
| 14638 | Essentialism is false, because it implies the existence of necessary singular propositions [McMichael] |
| Full Idea: Essentialism entails the existence of necessary singular propositions that are not instances of necessary generalizations. Therefore, since there are no such propositions, essentialism is false. | |
| From: Alan McMichael (The Epistemology of Essentialist Claims [1986], I) | |
| A reaction: This summarises the attack which McMichael wishes to deal with. I am wickedly tempted to say that essences actually have a contingent existence (or a merely hypothetical dependent necessity), and this objection might be grist for my mill. |
| 7898 | The world is just the illusion of an appearance [Anon (Dham)] |
| Full Idea: When a man considers this world as a bubble of froth, and as the illusion of an appearance, then the king of death has no power over him. | |
| From: Anon (Dham) (The DhammaPada [c.250 BCE], §13.170) | |
| A reaction: Strictly, of course, this says you can 'consider' things this way. Perhaps we could substitute 'pretends', but the world's great religions don't go in for that sort of thing. Berkeley would be shocked to learn he was approaching Buddhism. |
| 7894 | Hate is conquered by love [Anon (Dham)] |
| Full Idea: Hate is not conquered by hate: hate is conquered by love. This is the law eternal. | |
| From: Anon (Dham) (The DhammaPada [c.250 BCE], §1.5) | |
| A reaction: [N.B. This thought was not invented by Jesus] The challenge to this view might be the tit-for-tat strategy of game theory, which says that hate is actually conquered by a combination of hate and love, judiciously applied. |
| 7899 | Even divine pleasure will not satisfy the wise, as it is insatiable, and leads to pain [Anon (Dham)] |
| Full Idea: Since a shower of gold coins could not satisfy craving desires and the end of all pleasure is pain, how could a wise man find satisfaction even in the pleasures of the gods? | |
| From: Anon (Dham) (The DhammaPada [c.250 BCE], §14.186) | |
| A reaction: I'm never sure how so many ancient thinkers arrived at this implausible view. They seem to think that no one knows when to stop, and that every drink leads to hangover. What is actually wrong with moderate sensible pleasure? |
| 7896 | The foolish gradually fill with evil, like a slowly-filled water-jar [Anon (Dham)] |
| Full Idea: The falling of drops of water will in time fill a water-jar. Even so the foolish man becomes full of evil, although he gather it little by little. | |
| From: Anon (Dham) (The DhammaPada [c.250 BCE], §9.121) | |
| A reaction: This coincides closely with Aristotle's view of moral education. Maybe a wise man can maintain one small vice. Not all slopes are slippery. |
| 7897 | The wise gradually fill with good, like a slowly-filled water-jar [Anon (Dham)] |
| Full Idea: The falling of drops of water will in time fill a water-jar. Even so the wise man becomes full of good, although he gather it little by little. | |
| From: Anon (Dham) (The DhammaPada [c.250 BCE], §9.122) | |
| A reaction: Again, this is like Aristotle's proposal of how to educate people in virtue. In my experience, there is no guarantee that small acts of politeness and charity will eventually guarantee goodness of character. Thought is also needed. |
| 7895 | Don't befriend fools; either find superior friends, or travel alone [Anon (Dham)] |
| Full Idea: If on the great journey of life a man cannot find one who is better or at least as good as himself, let him joyfully travel alone: a fool cannot help him on his journey. | |
| From: Anon (Dham) (The DhammaPada [c.250 BCE], §5.61) | |
| A reaction: This is a slightly disturbing aspect of Buddhism, possibly leading to contradiction. It urges friendship and love, but the finest people will have virtually no friends, and solitude is presented as a finer state than friendship. |
| 6005 | Animals are dangerous and nourishing, and can't form contracts of justice [Hermarchus, by Sedley] |
| Full Idea: Hermarchus said that animal killing is justified by considerations of human safety and nourishment and by animals' inability to form contractual relations of justice with us. | |
| From: report of Hermarchus (fragments/reports [c.270 BCE]) by David A. Sedley - Hermarchus | |
| A reaction: Could the last argument be used to justify torturing animals? Or could we eat a human who was too brain-damaged to form contracts? |
| 14639 | Individuals enter into laws only through their general qualities and relations [McMichael] |
| Full Idea: Individuals appear to enter into laws only through their general qualities and relations. | |
| From: Alan McMichael (The Epistemology of Essentialist Claims [1986], VIII) | |
| A reaction: This is a very significant chicken-or-egg issue. The remark seems to offer the vision of pre-existing general laws, which individuals then join (like joining a club). But surely the laws are derived from the individuals? Where else could they come from? |
| 7900 | Speak the truth, yield not to anger, give what you can to him who asks [Anon (Dham)] |
| Full Idea: Speak the truth, yield not to anger, give what you can to him who asks: these three steps lead you to the gods | |
| From: Anon (Dham) (The DhammaPada [c.250 BCE], §17.224) | |
| A reaction: I don't recall either the Old or New Testament, or the Koran, placing great emphasis on speaking the truth. The injunction to give is not so simple. Give to greedy children, to alcoholics, to criminals, to the rich, to fools, to yourself? |