29 ideas
11193 | Understanding begins with the notion of being and essence [Avicenna] |
Full Idea: Understanding begins with the notion of being and essence. | |
From: Avicenna (Abu Ibn Sina) (Commentary on the Metaphysics [1022], 1/6), quoted by Thomas Aquinas - De Ente et Essentia (Being and Essence) p.91 | |
A reaction: I think I might put it that wisdom is only really possible for people who aim to grasp being and essence in some way. I see no prospect of understanding 'being', and even essences may be forever just beyond our grasp. |
6253 | Reason is our power of finding out true propositions [Hutcheson] |
Full Idea: Reason is our power of finding out true propositions. | |
From: Francis Hutcheson (Treatise 4: The Moral Sense [1728], §I) | |
A reaction: This strikes me as a very good definition. I don't see how you can define reason without mentioning truth, and you can't believe in reason if you don't believe in truth. The concept of reason entails the concept of a good reason. |
11209 | The simple's whatness is its very self [Avicenna] |
Full Idea: The simple's whatness is its very self. | |
From: Avicenna (Abu Ibn Sina) (Commentary on the Metaphysics [1022], 5.5), quoted by Thomas Aquinas - De Ente et Essentia (Being and Essence) p.103 | |
A reaction: Aquinas endorses this Aristotelian view in Idea 11208. |
11204 | The ultimate material of things has the unity of total formlessness [Avicenna] |
Full Idea: The ultimate material of things has the unity of total formlessness. | |
From: Avicenna (Abu Ibn Sina) (Commentary on the Metaphysics [1022], 11/12.14), quoted by Thomas Aquinas - De Ente et Essentia (Being and Essence) | |
A reaction: This remark is not invalidated by developments in modern particle physics. |
16065 | Constitution is identity (being in the same place), or it isn't (having different possibilities) [Wasserman] |
Full Idea: Some insist that constitution is identity, on the grounds that distinct material objects cannot occupy the same place at the same time. Others argue that constitution is not identity, since the statue and its material differ in important respects. | |
From: Ryan Wasserman (Material Constitution [2009], Intro) | |
A reaction: The 'important respects' seem to concern possibilities rather than actualities, which is suspicious. It is misleading to think we are dealing with two things and their relation here. Objects must have constitutions; constitutions make objects. |
16067 | Constitution is not identity, because it is an asymmetric dependence relation [Wasserman] |
Full Idea: For those for whom 'constitution is not identity' (the 'constitution view'), constitution is said to be an asymmetric relation, and also a dependence relation (unlike identity). | |
From: Ryan Wasserman (Material Constitution [2009], 2) | |
A reaction: It seems obvious that constitution is not identity, because there is more to a thing's identity than its mere constitution. But this idea makes it sound as if constitution has nothing to do with identity (chalk and cheese), and that can't be right. |
16069 | There are three main objections to seeing constitution as different from identity [Wasserman] |
Full Idea: The three most common objections to the constitution view are the Impenetrability Objection (two things in one place?), the Extensionality Objection (mereology says wholes are just their parts), and the Grounding Objection (their ground is the same). | |
From: Ryan Wasserman (Material Constitution [2009], 2) | |
A reaction: [summary] He adds a fourth, that if two things can be in one place, why stop at two? [Among defenders of the Constitution View he lists Baker, Fine, Forbes, Koslicki, Kripke, Lowe, Oderberg, N.Salmon, Shoemaker, Simons and Yablo.] |
16068 | The weight of a wall is not the weight of its parts, since that would involve double-counting [Wasserman] |
Full Idea: We do not calculate the weight of something by summing the weights of all its parts - weigh bricks and the molecules of a wall and you will get the wrong result, since you have weighed some parts more than once. | |
From: Ryan Wasserman (Material Constitution [2009], 2) | |
A reaction: In fact the complete inventory of the parts of a thing is irrelevant to almost anything we would like to know about the thing. The parts must be counted at some 'level' of division into parts. An element can belong to many different sets. |
15036 | An essence can either be universal (in the mind) or singular (in concrete particulars) [Avicenna, by Panaccio] |
Full Idea: Avicenna's 'indifference of essence' says the essence of certain things can become universal or singular, according to whether it is entertained by the mind (as a universal) or concretely exemplified as a singular thing. One essence can exist in two ways. | |
From: report of Avicenna (Abu Ibn Sina) (Commentary on the Metaphysics [1022]) by Claude Panaccio - Medieval Problem of Universals 'Sources' | |
A reaction: This would appear to be a form of nominalism, since in the concrete external world we only have particulars, and it is our mode of thinking (by abstraction?) that generates the universal aspect. I think this is probably right. |
16074 | Relative identity may reject transitivity, but that suggests that it isn't about 'identity' [Wasserman] |
Full Idea: If the relative identity theorist denies transitivity (to deal with the Ship of Theseus, for example), this would make us suspect that relativised identity relations are not identity relations, since transitivity seems central to identity. | |
From: Ryan Wasserman (Material Constitution [2009], 6) | |
A reaction: The problem here, I think, focuses on the meaning of the word 'same'. One change of plank leaves you with the same ship, but that is not transitive. If 'identical' is too pure to give the meaning of 'the same' it's not much use in discussing the world. |
6248 | Reason is too slow and doubtful to guide all actions, which need external and moral senses [Hutcheson] |
Full Idea: We boast of our mighty reason above other animals, but its processes are too slow, too full of doubt, to serve us in every exigency, either for our preservation, without external senses, or to influence our actions for good without the moral sense. | |
From: Francis Hutcheson (Treatise 2: Virtue or Moral Good [1725], §VII.III) | |
A reaction: This idea was taken up by Hume, and it must have influence Hume's general scepticism about the importance of reason. What this idea misses is the enormous influence of prior reasoning on our quick decisions. |
6238 | We approve of actions by a superior moral sense [Hutcheson] |
Full Idea: By a superior sense, which I call a moral one, we approve the actions of others. | |
From: Francis Hutcheson (Treatise 2: Virtue or Moral Good [1725], Intro) | |
A reaction: This tries to present moral insight as being on a par with the famous five senses. This doesn't seem quite right to me; separate parts of me can operate individual senses, but the whole of me is required for moral judgements, based on evidence. |
6239 | We dislike a traitor, even if they give us great benefit [Hutcheson] |
Full Idea: Let us consider if a traitor, who would sell his own country to us, may not often be as advantageous to us, as an hero who defends us: and yet we can love the treason, and hate the traitor. | |
From: Francis Hutcheson (Treatise 2: Virtue or Moral Good [1725], §I.VI) | |
A reaction: A nice example, which certainly refutes any claim that morality is entirely and directly self-interested. High-minded idealism, though, is not the only alternative explanation. We admire loyalty, but not loyalty to, say, Hitler. |
6240 | The moral sense is not an innate idea, but an ability to approve or disapprove in a disinterested way [Hutcheson] |
Full Idea: The moral sense is not an innate idea or knowledge, but a determination of our minds to receive the simple ideas of approbation or condemnation, from actions observed, antecedent to any opinions of advantage or loss to redound to ourselves. | |
From: Francis Hutcheson (Treatise 2: Virtue or Moral Good [1725], §I.VIII) | |
A reaction: This may claim a pure moral intuition, but it is also close to Kantian universalising of the rules for behaviour. It is also a variation on Descartes' 'natural light' of reason. Of course, if we say the ideas are 'received', where are they received from? |
6242 | We cannot choose our moral feelings, otherwise bribery could affect them [Hutcheson] |
Full Idea: Neither benevolence nor any other affection or desire can be directly raised by volition; if they could, then we could be bribed into any affection whatsoever toward any object. | |
From: Francis Hutcheson (Treatise 2: Virtue or Moral Good [1725], §II.IV) | |
A reaction: Of course, notoriously, the vast mass of people have often been bribed to love a politician, by low taxes, or bread and circuses. Still, you cannot choose to love or admire someone, you just do. Not much free will there. |
6247 | Everyone feels uneasy when seeing others in pain, unless the others are evil [Hutcheson] |
Full Idea: Every mortal is made uneasy by any grievous misery he sees another involved in, unless the person be imagined morally evil. | |
From: Francis Hutcheson (Treatise 2: Virtue or Moral Good [1725], §V.VIII) | |
A reaction: This is the natural compassion on which Hume built his moral theory. This remark emphasises that a concern for justice is just as important as a compassion for pain. Kant was more interested in what we deserve than in what we get. |
6256 | Can't the moral sense make mistakes, as the other senses do? [Hutcheson] |
Full Idea: Can there not be a right and wrong state of our moral sense, as there is in our other senses? | |
From: Francis Hutcheson (Treatise 4: The Moral Sense [1728], §IV) | |
A reaction: Hutcheson replies by saying something like they are both fully reliable in normal conditions. It remains, though, a very good question for the intuitionist to face, as the moral sense is supposed to be direct and reliable, but how do you check? |
6244 | Human nature seems incapable of universal malice, except what results from self-love [Hutcheson] |
Full Idea: Human nature seems scarce capable of malicious disinterested hatred, or an ultimate desire of the misery of others, when we imagine them not pernicious to us, or opposite to our interests; ..that is only the effect of self-love, not disinterested malice. | |
From: Francis Hutcheson (Treatise 2: Virtue or Moral Good [1725], §II.VII) | |
A reaction: I suppose it is true that even the worst criminals brooding in prison don't wish the entire population of some foreign country to die in pain. Only a very freakish person would wish the human race were extinct. A very nice observation. |
6243 | As death approaches, why do we still care about family, friends or country? [Hutcheson] |
Full Idea: How comes it that we do not lose, at the approach of death, all concern for our families, friends, or country? | |
From: Francis Hutcheson (Treatise 2: Virtue or Moral Good [1725], §II.V) | |
A reaction: A nice question. No doubt some people do cease to care, but on the whole it raises the 'last round' problem in social contract theory, which is why fulfil your part of a bargain if it is too late to receive the repayment afterwards? |
6246 | My action is not made good by a good effect, if I did not foresee and intend it [Hutcheson] |
Full Idea: No good effect, which I did not actually foresee and intend, makes my action morally good. | |
From: Francis Hutcheson (Treatise 2: Virtue or Moral Good [1725], §III.XII) | |
A reaction: This is one of the parents of utilitarianism repudiating pure consequentialism. Bentham sharply divided the action (which is consequentialist) from the person (who has useful intentions, but is not particulary important); this division is misleading. |
6252 | Happiness is a pleasant sensation, or continued state of such sensations [Hutcheson] |
Full Idea: In the following discourse, happiness denotes pleasant sensation of any kind, or continued state of such sensations. | |
From: Francis Hutcheson (Treatise 4: The Moral Sense [1728], Intro) | |
A reaction: This is a very long way from Greek eudaimonia. Hutcheson seems to imply that I would be happy if I got high on drugs after my family had just burnt to death. Socrates points out that scratching an itch is a very pleasant sensation (Idea 132). |
6241 | Contempt of danger is just madness if it is not in some worthy cause [Hutcheson] |
Full Idea: Mere courage, or contempt of danger, if we conceive it to have no regard to the defence of the innocent, or repairing of wrongs or self-interest, would only entitle its possessor to bedlam. | |
From: Francis Hutcheson (Treatise 2: Virtue or Moral Good [1725], §II.I) | |
A reaction: If many criminals would love to rob a bank, but only a few have the nerve to attempt it, we can hardly deny that the latter exhibit a sort of courage. The Greeks say that good sense must be involved, but few of them were so moral about courage. |
6257 | You can't form moral rules without an end, which needs feelings and a moral sense [Hutcheson] |
Full Idea: What rule of actions can be formed, without relation to some end proposed? Or what end can be proposed, without presupposing instincts, desires, affections, or a moral sense, it will not be easy to explain. | |
From: Francis Hutcheson (Treatise 4: The Moral Sense [1728], §IV) | |
A reaction: We have no reason to think that 'instincts, desires and affections' will give us the remotest guidance on how to behave morally well (though we would expect them to aid our survival). How could a moral sense give a reason, without spotting a rule? |
6245 | That action is best, which procures the greatest happiness for the greatest number [Hutcheson] |
Full Idea: That action is best, which procures the greatest happiness for the greatest number; and that worst, which, in like manner, occasions misery. | |
From: Francis Hutcheson (Treatise 2: Virtue or Moral Good [1725], §III.VIII) | |
A reaction: The first use of a phrase taken up by Bentham. This is not just an anticipation of utilitarianism, it is utilitarianism, with all its commitment to consequentialism (but see Idea 6246), and to the maximising of happiness. It is a brilliant idea. |
6251 | The loss of perfect rights causes misery, but the loss of imperfect rights reduces social good [Hutcheson] |
Full Idea: Perfect rights are necessary to the public good, and it makes those miserable whose rights are thus violated; …imperfect rights tend to the improvement and increase of good in a society, but are not necessary to prevent universal misery. | |
From: Francis Hutcheson (Treatise 2: Virtue or Moral Good [1725], §VII.VI) | |
A reaction: This is a very utilitarian streak in Hutcheson, converting natural law into its tangible outcome in actual happiness or misery. The distinction here is interesting (taken up by Mill), but there is a very blurred borderline. |
6254 | We are asked to follow God's ends because he is our benefactor, but why must we do that? [Hutcheson] |
Full Idea: The reasons assigned for actions are such as 'It is the end proposed by the Deity'. But why do we approve concurring with the divine ends? The reason is given 'He is our benefactor', but then, for what reason do we approve concurrence with a benefactor? | |
From: Francis Hutcheson (Treatise 4: The Moral Sense [1728], §I) | |
A reaction: Characteristic of what MacIntyre calls the 'Enlightenment Project', which is the application of Cartesian scepticism to proving the foundations of morals. Proof beyond proof is continually demanded. If you could meet God, you would obey without question. |
6255 | Why may God not have a superior moral sense very similar to ours? [Hutcheson] |
Full Idea: Why may not the Deity have something of a superior kind, analogous to our moral sense, essential to him? | |
From: Francis Hutcheson (Treatise 4: The Moral Sense [1728], §I) | |
A reaction: This is Plato's notion of the gods, as beings who are profoundly wise, and understand all the great moral truths, but are not the actual originators of those truths. The idea that God creates morality actually serves to undermine morality. |
6250 | We say God is good if we think everything he does aims at the happiness of his creatures [Hutcheson] |
Full Idea: We call the Deity morally good, when we apprehend that his whole providence tends to the universal happiness of his creatures. | |
From: Francis Hutcheson (Treatise 2: Virtue or Moral Good [1725], §VII.V) | |
A reaction: From the point of view of eternity, we might accept that God aims at some even greater good than the happiness of a bunch of miserable little creatures whose bad behaviour merits little reward. The greater good needs to be impressive, though. |
6249 | If goodness is constituted by God's will, it is a tautology to say God's will is good [Hutcheson] |
Full Idea: To call the laws of the supreme Deity good or holy or just, if these be constituted by laws, or the will of a superior, must be an insignificant tautology, amounting to no more than 'God wills what he wills' or 'His will is conformable to his will'. | |
From: Francis Hutcheson (Treatise 2: Virtue or Moral Good [1725], §VII.V) | |
A reaction: This argues not only against God as the source of morality, but also against any rules, such as those of the Categorical Imperative. Why should I follow the Categorical Imperative? What has value must dictate the rules. Is obedience the highest value? |