Combining Texts

Ideas for 'fragments/reports', 'The Statesman' and 'The Poetics'

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2 ideas

19. Language / D. Propositions / 1. Propositions
A proposition is what can be asserted or denied on its own [Chrysippus]
     Full Idea: A proposition is what can be asserted or denied on its own, for example, 'It is day' or 'Dion is walking'.
     From: Chrysippus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]), quoted by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 07.65
     A reaction: Note the phrase 'on its own'. If you say 'it is day and Dion is walking', that can't be denied on its own, because first the two halves must each be evaluated, so presumably that doesn't count as a stoic proposition.
19. Language / F. Communication / 1. Rhetoric
The question of whether or not to persuade comes before the science of persuasion [Plato]
     Full Idea: The science of whether one must persuade or not must rule over the science capable of persuading.
     From: Plato (The Statesman [c.356 BCE], 304c)
     A reaction: Plato probably thinks that reason has to be top of the pyramid, but there is always the Nietzschean/romantic question of why we should place such a value on what is rational.