display all the ideas for this combination of texts
2 ideas
1524 | For Empedocles thinking is almost identical to perception [Empedocles, by Theophrastus] |
Full Idea: Empedocles assumes that thinking is either identical to or very similar to sense-perception. | |
From: report of Empedocles (fragments/reports [c.453 BCE], A86) by Theophrastus - On the Senses 9 | |
A reaction: Not to be sniffed at. We can, of course, control our thinking (though we can't control the controller) and we contemplate abstractions, but that might be seen as a sort of perception. Vision is not as visual as we think. |
7611 | Rationality is one part of our conception of human flourishing [Putnam] |
Full Idea: Our notion of rationality is, at bottom, just one part of our conception of human flourishing, our idea of the good. | |
From: Hilary Putnam (Reason, Truth and History [1981], Pref) | |
A reaction: This looks like the beginnings of virtue epistemology, since rationality will have criteria, which would seem to be virtues. I find this idea appealing, both as a view of rationality, and as a view of the human good. |