Combining Texts

All the ideas for 'Characteristics', 'Truth-making without Truth-makers' and 'Positions'

unexpand these ideas     |    start again     |     specify just one area for these texts


4 ideas

1. Philosophy / H. Continental Philosophy / 6. Deconstruction
Deconstruction is not neutral; it intervenes [Derrida]
     Full Idea: Deconstruction, I have insisted, is not neutral. It intervenes.
     From: Jacques Derrida (Positions [1971], p.76)
     A reaction: This, I think, is because there is in Derrida, as in most French philosophers, a strong streak of Marxism, and a desire to change the world, rather than merely understanding it. Idea 8213 shows the sort of thing he wants to change.
2. Reason / C. Styles of Reason / 1. Dialectic
I try to analyse certain verbal concepts which block and confuse the dialectical process [Derrida]
     Full Idea: I have tried to analyse certain marks in writing which are undecidables, false verbal properties, which inhabit philosophical opposition, resisting and disorganising it, without ever constituting a third term, withour ever leaving room for a solution.
     From: Jacques Derrida (Positions [1971], p.40)
     A reaction: [I have simplified his sentence!] Much of Derrida seems to be a commentary on the Hegelian dialectic, and the project is presumably to figure out why philosophy is not advancing in the way we would like. Interesting...
14. Science / D. Explanation / 2. Types of Explanation / a. Types of explanation
There are 'conceptual' explanations, with their direction depending on complexity [Schnieder]
     Full Idea: The direction of conceptual explanations seems to be owed to factors of conceptual complexity and primitiveness.
     From: Benjamin Schnieder (Truth-making without Truth-makers [2006], p.33), quoted by David Liggins - Truth-makers and dependence 10.2
     A reaction: Schnieder proposes that there are just 'causal' and 'conceptual' explanations. Liggins objects that there are other types of dependence which offer explanations.
21. Aesthetics / A. Aesthetic Experience / 2. Aesthetic Attitude
The disinterested attitude of the judge is the hallmark of a judgement of beauty [Shaftesbury, by Scruton]
     Full Idea: Shaftesbury explained the peculiar features of the judgement of beauty in terms of the disinterested attitude of the judge.
     From: report of 3rd Earl of Shaftesbury (Characteristics [1711]) by Roger Scruton - Beauty: a very short introduction 1
     A reaction: Good. I take our vocabulary to mark a distinction between expressions of subjective preference, and expressions of what aspire to be objective facts. 'I love this' versus 'this is good or beautiful'.