Combining Texts

Ideas for 'teaching', 'Continuity and Irrational Numbers' and 'The Rejection of Consequentialism'

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2 ideas

22. Metaethics / B. Value / 2. Values / d. Health
Pythagoras taught that virtue is harmony, and health, and universal good, and God [Pythagoras, by Diog. Laertius]
     Full Idea: Pythagoras taught that virtue is harmony, and health, and universal good, and God.
     From: report of Pythagoras (reports [c.530 BCE]) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 08.1.19
     A reaction: I like the link with health, because I consider that a bridge over the supposed fact-value gap. Very Pythagorean to think that virtue is harmony. Plato liked that thought.
22. Metaethics / C. The Good / 1. Goodness / g. Consequentialism
If the aim is good outcomes, why are killings worse than deaths? [Scheffler, by Foot]
     Full Idea: It is not clear why, in the measurement of the goodness of states of affairs or total outcomes, killings for instance should count so much more heavily than deaths.
     From: report of Samuel Scheffler (The Rejection of Consequentialism [1982], pp.108-12) by Philippa Foot - Utilitarianism and the Virtues p.61
     A reaction: Or drunken drivers worse than careless drivers. Or stolen bracelets than lost bracelets. The point is that morality is about the behaviour of people, and not about consequences.