Combining Texts

Ideas for 'The Fixation of Belief', 'Elements of the Philosophy of Right' and 'Thinking About Mechanisms'

unexpand these ideas     |    start again     |     choose another area for these texts

display all the ideas for this combination of texts


4 ideas

7. Existence / A. Nature of Existence / 3. Being / h. Dasein (being human)
Personality overcomes subjective limitations and posits Dasein as its own [Hegel]
     Full Idea: Personality is that which overcomes the limitation of being merely subjective and gives itself reality - or, what amounts to the same thing, to posit that existence [Dasein] as its own.
     From: Georg W.F.Hegel (Elements of the Philosophy of Right [1821], 039)
     A reaction: This looks like the source for Heidegger's distinctive concept of Dasein. The emphasis in Hegel is on creating it out of subjectivity by an act of choice. For Heidegger Dasein seems to be a primitive concept.
7. Existence / B. Change in Existence / 2. Processes
Activities have place, rate, duration, entities, properties, modes, direction, polarity, energy and range [Machamer/Darden/Craver]
     Full Idea: Activities can be identified spatiotemporally, and individuated by rate, duration, and types of entity and property that engage in them. They also have modes of operation, directionality, polarity, energy requirements and a range.
     From: Machamer,P/Darden,L/Craver,C (Thinking About Mechanisms [2000], 3)
     A reaction: This is their attempt at making 'activity' one of the two central concepts of ontology, along with 'entity'. A helpful analysis. It just seems to be one way of slicing the cake.
7. Existence / D. Theories of Reality / 2. Realism
Realism is basic to the scientific method [Peirce]
     Full Idea: The fundamental hypothesis of the method of science is this: There are real things, whose characters are entirely independent of our opinion of them.
     From: Charles Sanders Peirce (The Fixation of Belief [1877]), quoted by Albert Atkin - Peirce 3 'method'
     A reaction: He admits later that this is only a commitment and not a fact. It seems to me that when you combine this idea with the huge success of science, the denial of realism is crazy. Philosophy has a lot to answer for.
7. Existence / D. Theories of Reality / 4. Anti-realism
If someone doubted reality, they would not actually feel dissatisfaction [Peirce]
     Full Idea: Nobody can really doubt that there are Reals, for, if he did, doubt would not be a source of dissatisfaction.
     From: Charles Sanders Peirce (The Fixation of Belief [1877], p.19)
     A reaction: This rests on Peirce's view that all that really matters is a sense of genuine dissatisfaction, rather than a theoretical idea. So even at the end of Meditation One, Descartes isn't actually worried about whether his furniture exists.