Combining Texts

Ideas for 'Through the Looking Glass', 'Dissoi Logoi - on Double Arguments' and 'An American Indian model of the Universe'

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4 ideas

13. Knowledge Criteria / E. Relativism / 4. Cultural relativism
Thracians think tattooing adds to a girl's beauty, but elsewhere it is a punishment [Anon (Diss)]
     Full Idea: Thracians think that tattooing enhances a girl's beauty, whereas for everyone else tattooing is a punishment for a crime.
     From: Anon (Diss) (Dissoi Logoi - on Double Arguments [c.401 BCE], §2)
Anything can be acceptable in some circumstances and unacceptable in others [Anon (Diss)]
     Full Idea: Anything can be acceptable under the right circumstances, and unacceptable under the wrong circumstances.
     From: Anon (Diss) (Dissoi Logoi - on Double Arguments [c.401 BCE], §2)
Lydians prostitute their daughters to raise a dowery, but no Greek would marry such a girl [Anon (Diss)]
     Full Idea: The Lydians find it acceptable for their daughters to work as prostitutes to raise money for getting married, but no one in Greece would be prepared to marry such a girl.
     From: Anon (Diss) (Dissoi Logoi - on Double Arguments [c.401 BCE], §2)
13. Knowledge Criteria / E. Relativism / 5. Language Relativism
Hopi consistently prefers verbs and events to nouns and things [Whorf]
     Full Idea: Hopi, with its preference for verbs, as contrasted to our own liking for nouns, perpetually turns our propositions about things into propositions about events.
     From: Benjamin Lee Whorf (An American Indian model of the Universe [1936], p.63)
     A reaction: This should provoke careful thought about ontology - without concluding that it is entirely relative to language.