Combining Texts

Ideas for 'fragments/reports', 'Parerga and Paralipomena' and 'Dialectic of Enlightenment'

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3 ideas

22. Metaethics / A. Ethics Foundations / 2. Source of Ethics / b. Rational ethics

20572	De Sade said it was impossible to rationally argue against murder [Adorno/Horkheimer]
	Full Idea: De Sade trumpeted far and wide the impossibility of deriving from reason any fundamental argument against murder.
	From: T Adorno / M Horkheimer (Dialectic of Enlightenment [1944], p.118)
	A reaction: [They focus on 'Juliette'] This is a big problem for utilitarians, because murdering an unhappy person may maximise happiness. Presumably a maniac could will universal carnage, and thus thwart Kant.

22. Metaethics / A. Ethics Foundations / 2. Source of Ethics / e. Human nature

21483	Man is essentially a dreadful wild animal [Schopenhauer]
	Full Idea: Man is at bottom a dreadful wild animal.
	From: Arthur Schopenhauer (Parerga and Paralipomena [1851], VIII:114)
	A reaction: As an example he cites the slave owners in the United States.

22. Metaethics / C. The Good / 3. Pleasure / c. Value of pleasure

21466	Pleasure is weaker, and pain stronger, than we expect [Schopenhauer]
	Full Idea: As a rule we find pleasure much less pleasurable, pain much more painful than we expected.
	From: Arthur Schopenhauer (Parerga and Paralipomena [1851], XII:149)
	A reaction: Never go on holiday with Schopenhauer. This is more accurate about pain, I think.