41 ideas
20388 | 'Necessary' conditions are requirements, and 'sufficient' conditions are guarantees [Davies,S] |
Full Idea: A 'necessary' condition for something's being an X is condition that all Xs must satisfy. ...A 'sufficient' condition for something's being an X is a condition that, when satisfied, guarantees that what satisfies it is an X. | |
From: Stephen Davies (The Philosophy of Art (2nd ed) [2016], 2.1) | |
A reaction: By summarising this I arrive at the requirement/guarantee formulation, which I am rather pleased with. What is required for rain, and what guarantees rain? |
22366 | There is no objectivity in social sciences - only viewpoints for selecting and organising data [Weber] |
Full Idea: There is no absolutely objective scientific analysis of 'social phenomena' independent of special and 'one-sided' viewpoints according to which expressly or tacitly, consciously or unconsciously they are selected and organised for expository purposes. | |
From: Max Weber ('Objectivity' in Social Sciences and Social Policy [1904], p.72), quoted by Reiss,J/Spreger,J - Scientific Objectivity 5.1 | |
A reaction: Weber urged some objectivity by not judging agents' goals. Also see Idea 22367 |
22367 | The results of social research can be true, and not just subjectively valid for one person [Weber] |
Full Idea: Cultural sciences do not have results which are 'subjective' and only valid for one person and not others. ...For scientific truth is precisely what is valid for all who seek the truth. | |
From: Max Weber ('Objectivity' in Social Sciences and Social Policy [1904], p.84), quoted by Reiss,J/Spreger,J - Scientific Objectivity 5.1 | |
A reaction: Weber said that although research interests are subjective, the social causes discovered can be objective. |
20389 | A definition of a thing gives all the requirements which add up to a guarantee of it [Davies,S] |
Full Idea: If we specify the 'necessary' conditions that are 'sufficient' for something's being an X, that is a combination of conditions such that all and only Xs meet them, which is the hallmark of a definition of X-hood. | |
From: Stephen Davies (The Philosophy of Art (2nd ed) [2016], 2.1) | |
A reaction: There are, of course, many other ways to define something, as shown in the 2.D Reason | Definition section of this database. This nicely summarises the classical view. |
20391 | Feminists warn that ideologies use timeless objective definitions as a tool of repression [Davies,S] |
Full Idea: According to the feminist critique, ideologies that operate as tools of political repression are falsely represented as definitions possessing a timeless, natural, asocial, universal objectivity. | |
From: Stephen Davies (The Philosophy of Art (2nd ed) [2016], 2.2) | |
A reaction: I suppose this does not just apply to definitions, but to all expressions of ideologically repressive strategy. I'm trying to think of an example of a specifically feminist problem case. Davies doesn't cite anyone. |
17771 | How we evaluate evidence depends on our background beliefs [Bayne] |
Full Idea: A claim that might be very plausible given one set of background beliefs might be highly implausible when evaluated in the light of a different set of background beliefs. | |
From: Tim Bayne (Thought: a very short introduction [2013], Ch.7) |
17770 | Clifford's dictum seems to block our beliefs in morality, politics and philosophy [Bayne] |
Full Idea: Endorsing Clifford's dictum threatens to undermine our right to hold many of our most cherished beliefs about morality, politics, and philosophy, for these are domains in which it is notoriously difficult to secure consensus. | |
From: Tim Bayne (Thought: a very short introduction [2013], Ch.7) | |
A reaction: I would say that those beliefs are amenable to evidence, but the evidence is often highly generalised, which is what makes those subjects notoriously difficult. The existence of a convention is a sort of evidence. |
7082 | Nature requires causal explanations, but society requires clarification by reasons and motives [Weber, by Critchley] |
Full Idea: Weber coined the distinction between explanation and clarification, saying that natural phenomena require causal explanation, while social phenomena require clarification by giving reasons or offering possible motives for how things are. | |
From: report of Max Weber (works [1905]) by Simon Critchley - Continental Philosophy - V. Short Intro Ch.7 | |
A reaction: This is music to the ears of property dualists and other non-reductivists, but if you go midway in the hierarchy of animals (a mouse, say) the distinction blurs. Weber probably hadn't digested Darwin, whose big impact came around 1905. |
17766 | Physicalism correlates brain and mind, explains causation by thought, and makes nature continuous [Bayne] |
Full Idea: The motivations for physicalism about the mind are that it accounts for correlations between states of the brain and states of thought, ...that it accounts for the causal role of thoughts, ...and that it does justice to the continuity of nature. | |
From: Tim Bayne (Thought: a very short introduction [2013], Ch.2) | |
A reaction: [summary] That is a pretty good summary of why I am a physicalist about the mind. I take all other theories to be dead footnotes in the history of thought - unless someone can produce a really good new argument. Which they can't. |
17768 | Perception reveals what animals think, but humans can disengage thought from perception [Bayne] |
Full Idea: One striking feature of human thought involves our ability to disengage the focus of thought from that of our perceptual attention. ...To get a fix on what an animal is thinking about, one need only determine the object of its perceptual attention. | |
From: Tim Bayne (Thought: a very short introduction [2013], Ch.4) | |
A reaction: What happens when an animal closes its eyes, or stirs violently during sleep? I take the hallmark of human thought to be its multi-level character, and this offers nice evidence for that view. Doing philosophy while driving a car is very revealing. |
17769 | Some people centre space on themselves; others centre space on the earth [Bayne] |
Full Idea: Egocentric conceptions of space employ a frame of reference that is focused on oneself; ...geocentric conceptions of space, by contrast, employ a frame of reference that is centred on the earth. | |
From: Tim Bayne (Thought: a very short introduction [2013], Ch.5) | |
A reaction: Famously, Europeans nearly always employ the egocentric conception, but many other cultures are geocentric. Thus the salt cellar is either 'to my left' or 'to the west'. In the latter view, everyone always knows their orientation (even indoors?). |
17767 | The alternative to a language of thought is map-like or diagram-like thought [Bayne] |
Full Idea: One could think that the structure of thought has more in common with that of maps or diagrams, and is not particularly language-like. | |
From: Tim Bayne (Thought: a very short introduction [2013], Ch.2) | |
A reaction: It seems unwise to be ensnared by analogies on this one, since the phenomenon is buried deep. You can no more infer what goes on underneath than you can infer electrons from looking at trees? |
20387 | Aesthetic experience involves perception, but also imagination and understanding [Davies,S] |
Full Idea: It was suggested that aesthetic experience isn't solely perceptual. It's infused by a cognitive but non-conceptual process described by Kant as involving the free play of the imagination and the understanding. | |
From: Stephen Davies (The Philosophy of Art (2nd ed) [2016], 1.2) | |
A reaction: This fits literature very well, painting quite well, and music hardly at all. |
20385 | The faculty of 'taste' was posited to explain why only some people had aesthetic appreciation [Davies,S] |
Full Idea: To explain why not everyone who is prepared to encounter a thing's aesthetic properties can recognise them, ...eighteenth century theorists posited the existence of a special faculty of aesthetic perception, that of taste. | |
From: Stephen Davies (The Philosophy of Art (2nd ed) [2016], 1.2) | |
A reaction: But there seem to be two aspects to taste - first the capacity to enjoy some sorts of art, and second the ability to discriminate the good from the bad. The latter is 'standards' of taste (Hume's title). Do non-musical people lack taste? |
20386 | The sublime is negative in awareness of insignificance, and positive in showing understanding [Davies,S] |
Full Idea: An example of the sublime is the vastness of the night sky. ...It includes negative feelings of insignificance in the face of nature's indifference, power and magnitude, but is positive in that we are capable of comprehending such matters. | |
From: Stephen Davies (The Philosophy of Art (2nd ed) [2016], 1.2) | |
A reaction: The negative part seems to be a very intellectual experience, with close links to religion, and may be the experience that leads to deism (belief in God's indifference). |
20384 | The idea that art forms are linked into a single concept began in the 1740s [Davies,S] |
Full Idea: The first to link the art forms together explicitly and to separate them from other disciplines and activities were the authors of encyclopedias and books in the 1740s and 1750s. | |
From: Stephen Davies (The Philosophy of Art (2nd ed) [2016], 1.2) | |
A reaction: Intriguing that no individual seems to get the credit (or blame). Presumably our modern Aesthetics (applied to art) couldn't exist before this move was made - and yet there is plenty of aesthetic discussion in early Greek philosophy. |
20390 | Defining art as representation or expression or form were all undermined by the avant-garde [Davies,S] |
Full Idea: The avant-garde art of the twentieth century played a significant role in defeating definitions that had prevailed in earlier times, such as ones maintaining that art is representation, expression or significant form | |
From: Stephen Davies (The Philosophy of Art (2nd ed) [2016], 2.2) | |
A reaction: I really think the first rule of philosophical aesthetics is 'ignore Marcel Duchamp'. We wouldn't give up our idea of philosophy if someone managed to publish a long string of expletives in a philosophy journal. Would we?? |
20392 | 'Aesthetic functionalism' says art is what is intended to create aesthetic experiences [Davies,S] |
Full Idea: 'Aesthetic functionalism' maintains that something is an artwork if it is intended to provide the person who contemplates it for its own sake with an aesthetic experience of a significant magnitude on the basis of its aesthetic features. | |
From: Stephen Davies (The Philosophy of Art (2nd ed) [2016], 2.5) | |
A reaction: [Beardsley is cited as having this view] For this you need to know what an aesthetic 'feature' is, and you'd have to indepdently recognise aesthetic experience. |
20405 | Music may be expressive by being 'associated' with other emotional words or events [Davies,S] |
Full Idea: One view explains music's expressiveness as 'associative'. Through being regularly associated with emotionally charged words or events, particular musical ideas become associated with emotions or moods. | |
From: Stephen Davies (The Philosophy of Art (2nd ed) [2016], 6.4) | |
A reaction: This is a more promising theory. I take the feeling in music to be parasitic on other feelings we have, and other triggers that evoke them. I'm particularly struck with story-telling (which Levinson and Robinson also like). |
20403 | It seems unlikely that sad music expresses a composer's sadness; it takes ages to write [Davies,S] |
Full Idea: The 'expression theory' holds that if music is sad that is because it expresses the composer's sadness, ...but composers take a long time composing sad works, and may even been gleeful at receiving payment for it. | |
From: Stephen Davies (The Philosophy of Art (2nd ed) [2016], 6.4) | |
A reaction: [compressed] Pretty conclusive. I see composing as like acting. Just as you can put on a happy or sad face, so a composer can discover music that feels sad or happy. Three movement sonatas don't fit expression at all. |
20393 | The 'institutional' theory says art is just something appropriately placed in the 'artworld' [Davies,S] |
Full Idea: The 'institutional' theory says to be an artwork, an artwork must be appropriately placed within a web of practices, roles and frameworks that comprise an informally organised institution, the artworld. | |
From: Stephen Davies (The Philosophy of Art (2nd ed) [2016], 2.5) | |
A reaction: [He cites George Dickie] This theory seems to entirely developed to cope with the defiant gesture of Marcel Duchamp. Once I am an established artist, I have the authority to label anything I like as a work of art. Silly. |
20402 | Music is too definite to be put into words (not too indefinite!) [Davies,S] |
Full Idea: Mendelssohn said that what music expresses is not too indefinite to put into words but, on the contrary, it is too definite. | |
From: Stephen Davies (The Philosophy of Art (2nd ed) [2016], 6.4) | |
A reaction: Not sure whether that is true, but it is a lovely remark. It certainly challenges the naive philosophical view that words are the most precise mode of expression. |
20395 | The title of a painting can be vital, and the artist decrees who the portrait represents [Davies,S] |
Full Idea: The title as given by the artist is something we might need to know (Brueghel's 'Icarus', for example), ...and if a painting depicts one of two twins, it will be the artist's intention that settles which one it is. | |
From: Stephen Davies (The Philosophy of Art (2nd ed) [2016], 3.5) | |
A reaction: Those two points strike me as conclusively in favour of the importance of an artist's perceived intentions. |
20396 | We must know what the work is meant to be, to evaluate the artist's achievement [Davies,S] |
Full Idea: Learning that a work is a copy of an earlier work, or is done in the style of some other artist, is relevant to an evaluation of what its creator has achieved. | |
From: Stephen Davies (The Philosophy of Art (2nd ed) [2016], 3.6) | |
A reaction: A simple but powerful point. We evaluate a forgery as an achievement, and the original plate of a great print as the focus of the achievement. We can assess the achievement of a poem in any printed copy. But what about perfect painting replicas? |
20399 | Intentionalism says either meaning just is intention, or ('moderate') meaning is successful intention [Davies,S] |
Full Idea: 'Actual intentionalism' holds that work's meaning is what its author intended, ...while 'moderate actual intentionalism' allows that the author's intention determines the work's meaning only if that intention is carried through successfully. | |
From: Stephen Davies (The Philosophy of Art (2nd ed) [2016], 5.3) | |
A reaction: [He cites Noel Carroll for the moderate version] D.H. Lawrence, probably with a dose of Freud, said 'trust the work, not the artist' (of Moby Dick, I think). The thought is that authors only half know intentions, and works reveal them. |
20401 | The meaning is given by the audience's best guess at the author's intentions [Davies,S] |
Full Idea: According to the 'hypothetical intentionalist', the work's meaning is determined by the intentions the audience is best justified in attributing to the author, whether or not these are the ones the author actually had. | |
From: Stephen Davies (The Philosophy of Art (2nd ed) [2016], 5.4) | |
A reaction: [Nehamas, Levinson and Jenefer Robinson are cited] This opens the door for psychiatric interpretations of 'Hamlet', and so on. The experts disagree over the nature of the audience needed to do the job. |
20397 | If we could perfectly clone the Mona Lisa, the original would still be special [Davies,S] |
Full Idea: If we could duplicate 'Mona Lisa', we're likely to be concerned to track the original and keep it separate from its clones, even if we judge that the clone isn't inferior to the original when the goal is art appreciation. | |
From: Stephen Davies (The Philosophy of Art (2nd ed) [2016], 4.3) | |
A reaction: But why? Is it just a sentimental attachment to what Leonardo worked on? Does the original manuscript of a work of literature have the same importance? We treasure such things, but not for aesthetic reasons. |
20398 | Art that is multiply instanced may require at least one instance [Davies,S] |
Full Idea: Some multiply instanced artworks, such as novel and poems, must have at least one instance. | |
From: Stephen Davies (The Philosophy of Art (2nd ed) [2016], 4.4) | |
A reaction: This is a comment on the idea that all artworks, even oil paintings and buildings are potentially multiply instanced (so the work is the type - Wollheim's view, not one of the tokens). |
20404 | Music isn't just sad because it makes the listener feel sad [Davies,S] |
Full Idea: The 'arousal' theory says music is sad because it moves the hearer to sadness, ...but this seems to get things back to front, because we normally think it is because the music is sad that it moves the listener to sadness. | |
From: Stephen Davies (The Philosophy of Art (2nd ed) [2016], 6.4) | |
A reaction: The objection is right. If Beethoven's 'Ode to Joy' always makes me feel sad (because it is so hopelessly optimistic), then that makes the music sad. Is the theory saying that there are no feelings in the music? |
22704 | Immorality may or may not be an artistic defect [Davies,S] |
Full Idea: Immorality in art is sometimes an artistic defect and sometimes not. | |
From: Stephen Davies (The Philosophy of Art (2nd ed) [2016], 8.7) | |
A reaction: Davies seems to avoid the 'immoralist' view, that immorality in a work of art can sometimes be a strength. A sharp distinction is needed, I think, between the morality of what is depicted, and the morality of the whole artwork. |
22705 | If the depiction of evil is glorified, that is an artistic flaw [Davies,S] |
Full Idea: One case when the depiction of immorality becomes an artistic flaw …is when it is presented in brutal detail in a way that glorifies it. The celebration of evil corrodes the work's artistic value. | |
From: Stephen Davies (The Philosophy of Art (2nd ed) [2016], 8.7) | |
A reaction: This doesn't allow for the case where the evil is celebrated in one part of a novel, yet the novel as a whole does not endorse the evil. The Marquis de Sade seems to have fully celebrated what we take to be evil. |
22707 | It is an artistic defect if excessive moral outrage distorts the story, and narrows our sympathies [Davies,S] |
Full Idea: The positive moral stance of a story can be an artistic defect where it shapes the story in an inappropriate fashion. If it displays disproportionate moral outrage, …it reveals a lack of toleration, compassion, or insight into its subject-matter. | |
From: Stephen Davies (The Philosophy of Art (2nd ed) [2016], 8.7) | |
A reaction: There could be narrative irony in a story told by an angry and puritanical person, which continually condemns wickedness, with the reader expected to have a more tolerant attitude. Hard to think of any examples of this problem. |
22706 | A work which seeks approval for immorality, but alienates the audience, is a failure [Davies,S] |
Full Idea: A work that looks for the audience's sympathetic approval and alienates them instead, because it's both morally repulsive and incoherent in what it requires them to suppose, isn't an artistic success. | |
From: Stephen Davies (The Philosophy of Art (2nd ed) [2016], 8.7) | |
A reaction: The implication seems to be that works are only successful if they achieve what the creator consciously intended. Lawrence said trust the novel, not the novelist. Milton's Satan is a famous example of heroism not intended by the author. |
22155 | We are disenchanted because we rely on science, which ignores values [Weber, by Boulter] |
Full Idea: Weber contends that modern western civilisation is 'disenchanted' because our society's method of arriving at beliefs about the world, that is, the sciences, is unable to address questions of value. | |
From: report of Max Weber (works [1905]) by Stephen Boulter - Why Medieval Philosophy Matters 6 | |
A reaction: This idea, made explicit by Hume's empirical attitude to values, is obviously of major importance. For we Aristotelians values are a self-evident aspect of nature. Boulter says philosophy has added to the disenchantment. I agree. |
20725 | The idea of duty in one's calling haunts us, like a lost religion [Weber] |
Full Idea: The idea of duty in one's calling prowls about in our lives like the ghost of dead religious beliefs. | |
From: Max Weber (The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism [1904], 5) | |
A reaction: Great sentence! Vast scholarship boiled down to a simple and disturbing truth. I recognise this in me. Having been 'Head of Philosophy' once is partly what motivates me to compile these ideas. |
21132 | Domination is probable obedience by some group of persons [Weber] |
Full Idea: Domination is the probability that a command with a specific content will be obeyed by a given group of persons. | |
From: Max Weber (Economy and Society [1919], p.53), quoted by Andrew Shorten - Contemporary Political Theory 06 | |
A reaction: Said to be an 'influential definition'. In principle you might have no domination, but be regularly obeyed because your commands were so acceptable to a very independent-minded group of people. That said, good definition! |
20722 | Acquisition and low consumption lead to saving, investment, and increased wealth [Weber] |
Full Idea: If people are acquisitive but consumption is limited, the inevitable result is the accumulation of capital through the compulsion to save. The restraints on consumption naturally served to increase wealth by enabling the productive investment of capital. | |
From: Max Weber (The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism [1904], 5) | |
A reaction: [compressed. He also quotes John Wesley saying this] In a nutshell, this is how the protestant ethic (esp. if puritan) drives capitalism. It also needs everyone to have a 'calling', and a rebellion against monasticism in favour of worldly work. |
20724 | When asceticism emerged from the monasteries, it helped to drive the modern economy [Weber] |
Full Idea: When asceticism was carried out of the monastic cells into everyday life, and began to dominate worldly morality, it did its part in building the tremendous cosmos of the modern economic order. | |
From: Max Weber (The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism [1904], 5) | |
A reaction: Since Max Weber's time I should think this is less and less true. If you hunt for ascetics in the modern world, they are probably dropped out, and pursuing green politics. Industrialists are obsessed with property and wine. |
20717 | Capitalism is not unlimited greed, and may even be opposed to greed [Weber] |
Full Idea: Unlimited greed for gain is not in the least identical with capitalism, and is still less in its spirit. Capitalism may even be identical with the restraint, or at least a rational tempering, of this irrational impulse. | |
From: Max Weber (The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism [1904], Author's Intro) | |
A reaction: The point is that profits have to be re-invested, rather than spent on pleasure. If we are stuck with capitalism we need a theory of Ethical Capitalism. |
20718 | Modern western capitalism has free labour, business separate from household, and book-keeping [Weber] |
Full Idea: The modern Occident has developed a very different form of capitalism: the rational capitalist organisation of free labour …which needed two other factors: the separation of the business from the household, and the closely connected rational book-keeping. | |
From: Max Weber (The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism [1904], Author's Intro) | |
A reaction: For small businesses the separation has to be maintained by a ruthless effort of imagination. Book-keeping is because the measure of loss and profit is the engine of the whole game. Labour had to be dragged free of family and community. |
20719 | Punish the heretic, but be indulgent to the sinner [Weber] |
Full Idea: The rule of the Catholic church is 'punishing the heretic, but indulgent of the sinner'. | |
From: Max Weber (The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism [1904], 1) | |
A reaction: Weber cites this as if it is a folklore saying. It seems to fit the teachings of Jesus, who is intensely keen on unwavering faith, but very kind to those who stray morally. Hence Graham Greene novels, all about sinners. |