12 ideas
| 594 | Speusippus suggested underlying principles for every substance, and ended with a huge list [Speussipus, by Aristotle] |
| Full Idea: Speusippus suggested principles for each substance, including principles for numbers, magnitude and the soul. He thus arrived at no mean list of substances. | |
| From: report of Speussipus (thirty titles (lost) [c.367 BCE]) by Aristotle - Metaphysics 1028b |
| 19558 | Our own intuitions about whether we know tend to vacillate [Cohen,S] |
| Full Idea: One robust feature of our intuitions about whether we know things is that they tend to vacillate. | |
| From: Stewart Cohen (Contextualism Defended (and reply) [2005], 1) | |
| A reaction: This strikes me as important. If we were tacit invariantists (Idea 19557) we should be able to ask ourselves whether we 'really and truly' know various things, but we can't decide. I know lots about Nietzsche in a pub, and very little in a university. |
| 19561 | We shouldn't jump too quickly to a contextualist account of claims to know [Cohen,S] |
| Full Idea: Maybe contextualists are too quick to appeal to our conflicting intuitions regarding knowledge. | |
| From: Stewart Cohen (Contextualism Defended (and reply) [2005], 1) | |
| A reaction: An important point (from Earl Conee). I thoroughly approve of contextualism, but the whole status of whether a witness or a teacher knows what they are talking about is in danger of collapsing into relativism. This is what peer review is all about. |
| 19563 | The context sensitivity of knowledge derives from its justification [Cohen,S] |
| Full Idea: On my own view, the context sensivity of knowledge is inherited from one of its components, i.e. justification. | |
| From: Stewart Cohen (Contextualism Defended (and reply) [2005], 1) | |
| A reaction: That sounds right, and it reinforces the idea that 'justification' is a more important epistemological concept than 'knowledge'. 'Am I justified in believing p?' Answer: 'it depends how well you have researched it'. |
| 19560 | Contextualism is good because it allows knowledge, but bad because 'knowing' is less valued [Cohen,S] |
| Full Idea: Contextualism is a 'good news, bad news' theory. The good news is that we have lots of knowledge and many surfaces are 'flat'; the bad news is that knowledge and flatness are not all they were cracked up to be. | |
| From: Stewart Cohen (Contextualism Defended (and reply) [2005], 3) | |
| A reaction: That is exactly my position. I lost all interest in whether someone precisely 'knows' or 'does not know' something a long time ago (even in scientific or forensic contexts). In the case of flatness the case is even more obvious. |
| 12893 | Contextualism says sceptical arguments are true, relative to their strict context [Cohen,S] |
| Full Idea: Contextualism explains the appeal of sceptical arguments by allowing that the claims of the sceptic are true, relative to the very strict context in which they are made. | |
| From: Stewart Cohen (Contextualism Defended [2005], p.57) | |
| A reaction: This strikes me a right. I've always thought that global scepticism must be conceded if we are being very strict indeed about justification, but also that it is ridiculous to be that strict. So the epistemological question is 'How strict should we be?' |
| 12896 | Knowledge is context-sensitive, because justification is [Cohen,S] |
| Full Idea: The context-sensitivity of knowledge is inherited from one of its components, i.e. justification. | |
| From: Stewart Cohen (Contextualism Defended [2005], p.68) | |
| A reaction: I think this is exactly right - that there is nothing relative or contextual about what is actually true, or what someone believes, but knowleddge is wholly relative because it rests on shifting standards of justification. |
| 12894 | There aren't invariant high standards for knowledge, because even those can be raised [Cohen,S] |
| Full Idea: The problem for invariantism is that competent speakers, under sceptical pressure, tend to deny that we know even the most conspicuous facts of perception, the clearest memories etc. | |
| From: Stewart Cohen (Contextualism Defended [2005], p.58) | |
| A reaction: This is aimed at Idea 12892. This seems to me a strong response to the rather weak invariantist case (that there is 'really and truly' only one invariant standard for knowledge). Full strength scepticism about everything demolishes all knowledge. |
| 19559 | Contextualists slightly concede scepticism, but only in extremely strict contexts [Cohen,S] |
| Full Idea: Contextualism concedes that there is some truth to skepticism, but contains the damage by holding that skeptical claims are true only relative to atypically strict contexts. | |
| From: Stewart Cohen (Contextualism Defended (and reply) [2005], 1) | |
| A reaction: My attitude to scepticism is that everything we ever affirm should have a footnote saying '...but you never know...', and it should then be ignored. In the strictest context everything is doubted simultaneously (including language), and that is paralysis. |
| 22022 | Beauty motivates morality, by harmonising feeling and reason [Schiller, by Pinkard] |
| Full Idea: On Schiller's view, only beauty could shape or evince the necessary harmony between sensibility and reason (between inclination and duty) which provides the crucial motivation for the moral life. | |
| From: report of Friedrich Schiller (works [1794]) by Terry Pinkard - German Philosophy 1760-1860 06 | |
| A reaction: Maybe. Reason should probably be drawn towards feelings which seem inspiring. |
| 7675 | Schiller speaks obsessively of freedom throughout his works [Schiller, by Berlin] |
| Full Idea: Schiller constantly speaks of spiritual freedom: freedom of reason, the kingdom of freedom, our free self, inner freedom, freedom of mind, moral freedom, the free intelligence - a very favourite phrase - holy freedom, the impregnable citadel of freedom. | |
| From: report of Friedrich Schiller (works [1794]) by Isaiah Berlin - The Roots of Romanticism | |
| A reaction: Kant's philosophy and his Kingdom of Ends are an obvious source for this, but I trace the sentiment back to 'Freeborn John' Lilburne during the English Civil War. The English, thanks to Voltaire, embodied freedom in the Enlightenment. |
| 2632 | Speusippus said things were governed by some animal force rather than the gods [Speussipus, by Cicero] |
| Full Idea: Speusippus, following his uncle Plato, held that all things were governed by some kind of animal force, and tried to eradicate from our minds any notion of the gods. | |
| From: report of Speussipus (thirty titles (lost) [c.367 BCE]) by M. Tullius Cicero - On the Nature of the Gods ('De natura deorum') I.33 |