Combining Texts

Ideas for 'On Liberty', 'The Meaning of the Word' and 'fragments/reports'

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3 ideas

22. Metaethics / A. Ethics Foundations / 1. Nature of Ethics / g. Moral responsibility
It is a crime for someone with a violent disposition to get drunk [Mill]
     Full Idea: The making himself drunk, in a person whom drunkenness excites to do harm to others, is a crime against others.
     From: John Stuart Mill (On Liberty [1857], Ch.5)
     A reaction: This principle (based on knowing your own dispositions) is a very good account of the ethics drunkenness. We have a moral duty to know and remember our own dispositions. Violent people should avoid arguments as well as alcohol.
22. Metaethics / B. Value / 2. Values / d. Health
Wisdom creates a healthy passion-free soul [Democritus]
     Full Idea: Medicine heals diseases of the body, wisdom frees the soul from passions.
     From: Democritus (fragments/reports [c.431 BCE], B031), quoted by Clement - Pedagogue 1.6.2.1
     A reaction: The interesting concept of a healthy mind seems to have got lost in modern moral philosophy.
22. Metaethics / C. The Good / 1. Goodness / f. Good as pleasure
Happiness is identifying and separating the pleasures [Democritus, by Stobaeus]
     Full Idea: Democritus thinks that happiness consists in the determination and separation of pleasures, and that this is what is both finest and most beneficial for people.
     From: report of Democritus (fragments/reports [c.431 BCE], A167) by John Stobaeus - Anthology 2.07.3
     A reaction: A great deal of the strategy and ethics of living consists (if you are lucky) of discriminating among possible pleasures. Philosophers should produce criteria.