Combining Texts

Ideas for 'talk', 'Paradoxes of the Infinite' and 'Thinking About Mechanisms'

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2 ideas

22. Metaethics / C. The Good / 1. Goodness / e. Good as knowledge
The only good is knowledge, and the only evil is ignorance [Socrates, by Diog. Laertius]
     Full Idea: There is only one good, namely knowledge, and there is only one evil, namely ignorance.
     From: report of Socrates (reports of career [c.420 BCE]) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 02.4.14
     A reaction: Ignorance of how to commit evil sounds quite good.
22. Metaethics / C. The Good / 2. Happiness / b. Eudaimonia
Socrates was the first to put 'eudaimonia' at the centre of ethics [Socrates, by Vlastos]
     Full Idea: Socrates' true place in the development of Greek thought is that he is the first to establish the eudaimonist foundation of ethical theory, which became the foundation of the schools which sprang up around him.
     From: report of Socrates (reports of career [c.420 BCE]) by Gregory Vlastos - Socrates: Ironist and Moral Philosopher p.10
     A reaction: I suspect that he was the first to fully articulate a widely held Greek belief. The only ethical question that they asked was about the nature of a good human life.