more from this thinker     |     more from this text


Single Idea 22755

[filed under theme 22. Metaethics / C. The Good / 1. Goodness / b. Types of good ]

Full Idea

Just as fire which is warmth-giving by nature warms all men, and does not chill some of them, so what is good by nature ought to be good for all, and not good for some but not good for others.

Gist of Idea

Like a warming fire, what is good by nature should be good for everyone

Source

Sextus Empiricus (Against the Ethicists (one book) [c.180], II.69)

Book Ref

Sextus Empiricus: 'Against the Physicists/Against the Ethicists', ed/tr. Bury,R.G. [Harvard Loeb 1997], p.419


A Reaction

This is going to confine the naturally good to the basics of life, which we all share. Is a love of chess a natural good? It seems to capture an aspect of human nature, without appealing to everyone. Sextus says nothing is good for everyone.


The 19 ideas with the same theme [candidates for what is supremely good]:

The chief good is unity, sometimes seen as prudence, or God, or intellect [Eucleides]
Good first, then beauty, then reason, then knowledge, then pleasure [Plato, by PG]
Plato's legacy to European thought was the Good, the Beautiful and the True [Plato, by Gray]
Intelligence and sight, and some pleasures and honours, are candidates for being good in themselves [Aristotle]
Goods are external, of the soul, and of the body; those of the soul (such as action) come first [Aristotle]
Goodness is when a thing (such as a circle) is complete, and conforms with its nature [Aristotle]
Final goods: confidence, prudence, freedom, enjoyment and no pain, good spirits, virtue [Stoic school, by Diog. Laertius]
The essences of good and evil are in dispositions to choose [Epictetus]
Like a warming fire, what is good by nature should be good for everyone [Sext.Empiricus]
Pagans produced three hundred definitions of the highest good [Augustine, by Grayling]
The good is the virtuous, the pleasing, or the useful [Leibniz]
Perfection comes through the senses (Beauty), through reason (Truth), and through moral will (Good) [Baumgarten, by Tolstoy]
Reason, love and will are the highest perfections and essence of man - the purpose of his life [Feuerbach]
Goodness is a combination of love and knowledge [Russell]
The three main values are good, right and beauty [Moore,GE, by Ross]
The three intrinsic goods are virtue, knowledge and pleasure [Ross]
The four goods are: virtue, pleasure, just allocation of pleasure, and knowledge [Ross]
The meaning of 'good' and other evaluations must include the object to which they attach [Foot]
Goodness is given either by a psychological state, or the attribution of a property [Korsgaard]