Combining Texts

All the ideas for 'The Definition of Good', 'Meno' and 'Approaches to Intentionality'

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19 ideas

1. Philosophy / A. Wisdom / 1. Nature of Wisdom
Spiritual qualities only become advantageous with the growth of wisdom [Plato]
     Full Idea: If virtue is a beneficial attribute of spirit, it must be wisdom; for spiritual qualities are not in themselves advantageous, but become so with wisdom…..Hence men cannot be good by nature.
     From: Plato (Meno [c.385 BCE], 88c)
     A reaction: Personally I haven't got any 'spiritual qualities', so I don't really understand this.
5. Theory of Logic / L. Paradox / 2. Aporiai
How can you seek knowledge of something if you don't know it? [Plato]
     Full Idea: How will you aim to search for something you do not know at all? If you should meet with it, how will you know that this is the thing that you did not know?
     From: Plato (Meno [c.385 BCE], 80d05)
     A reaction: Vasilis Politis cites this as a nice example of the 'aporiai' (puzzles) which Aristotle said were the foundation of enquiry. Nowadays the problem is called the 'paradox of enquiry'.
11. Knowledge Aims / A. Knowledge / 3. Value of Knowledge
True opinions only become really valuable when they are tied down by reasons [Plato]
     Full Idea: True opinions are a fine thing and all they do is good, …but they escape from a man's mind, so they are not worth much until one ties them down by (giving) an account of the reason why.
     From: Plato (Meno [c.385 BCE], 98a3)
     A reaction: This gives justification the role of guarantee, stabilising and securing true beliefs (rather than triggering some new thing called 'knowledge').
11. Knowledge Aims / A. Knowledge / 4. Belief / a. Beliefs
Belief is the most important propositional attitude [Lyons]
     Full Idea: Belief might be accorded the status of core or chief propositional attitude.
     From: William Lyons (Approaches to Intentionality [1995], p.126)
12. Knowledge Sources / A. A Priori Knowledge / 3. Innate Knowledge / b. Recollection doctrine
Seeking and learning are just recollection [Plato]
     Full Idea: Seeking and learning are in fact nothing but recollection.
     From: Plato (Meno [c.385 BCE], 81d)
     A reaction: This is a prelude to the famous conversation with the slave boy about geometry. You don't have to follow Plato into the doctrine of reincarnation; this remark is a key slogan for all rationalists. As pupils in maths lessons, we pull knowledge from within.
The slave boy learns geometry from questioning, not teaching, so it is recollection [Plato]
     Full Idea: The slave boy's knowledge of geometry will not come from teaching but from questioning; he will recover it for himself, and the spontaneous recovery of knowledge that is in him is recollection.
     From: Plato (Meno [c.385 BCE], 85d)
     A reaction: Of course, if maths and geometry are huge tautological axiom systems, we would expect to be able to derive them (with hints from a teacher) entirely from their axioms. It is not clear why we might be able to derive the truths of all nature a priori.
13. Knowledge Criteria / A. Justification Problems / 1. Justification / b. Need for justification
As a guide to action, true opinion is as good as knowledge [Plato]
     Full Idea: True opinion is as good a guide as knowledge for the purpose of acting rightly.
     From: Plato (Meno [c.385 BCE], 97b)
     A reaction: This is the germ of Peirce's epistemology - that knowledge is an interesting theoretical concept, but opinion/belief is what matters, and most needs explanation.
13. Knowledge Criteria / D. Scepticism / 6. Scepticism Critique
You don't need to learn what you know, and how do you seek for what you don't know? [Plato]
     Full Idea: You could argue that a man cannot discover what he does know or what he doesn't. The first needs no discovery, and how do you begin looking for the second?
     From: Plato (Meno [c.385 BCE], 80e)
15. Nature of Minds / B. Features of Minds / 4. Intentionality / b. Intentionality theories
Consciousness no longer seems essential to intentionality [Lyons]
     Full Idea: In contrast with Brentano and Husserl, consciousness or attention are no longer seen as essential to intentionality.
     From: William Lyons (Approaches to Intentionality [1995], Intro)
     A reaction: This strikes me as being correct, although there seem to be plenty of current philosophers who do not accept it (e.g. Searle). I think philosophy of mind may be stuck in the dark ages if thinkers don't accept this proposal.
17. Mind and Body / E. Mind as Physical / 4. Connectionism
Perceptions could give us information without symbolic representation [Lyons]
     Full Idea: It is possible to give an account of concept-formation without a language of thought or representation, based on perception, which in the brain seems to involve information without representation.
     From: William Lyons (Approaches to Intentionality [1995], p.66)
     A reaction: This claim strikes me as being a little too confident. One might say that a concept IS a representation. However, the perception of several horses might 'blur' together to form a generalised horse.
18. Thought / A. Modes of Thought / 2. Propositional Attitudes
Propositional attitudes require representation [Lyons]
     Full Idea: How else, other than via some form of representational system, could a human organism contain information as a content over which it could operate or 'attitudinise'?
     From: William Lyons (Approaches to Intentionality [1995], Intro)
     A reaction: Depends what you mean by 'representational'. In its vaguest sense, this is just a tautology - content must be held in the mind in some form or other, but that tells us nothing.
18. Thought / A. Modes of Thought / 4. Folk Psychology
Folk psychology works badly for alien cultures [Lyons]
     Full Idea: It is not easy to employ our folk psychology in the understanding of persons in a very different culture.
     From: William Lyons (Approaches to Intentionality [1995], p.241)
     A reaction: This strikes me as a highly significant problem for the friends of folk psychology. It also breaks down in extreme situations, or with mental illness. It seems closer to culture than to brain structure.
18. Thought / C. Content / 1. Content
All thinking has content [Lyons]
     Full Idea: I cannot say I am simply thinking but not thinking about anything.
     From: William Lyons (Approaches to Intentionality [1995], Intro)
     A reaction: Hard to disagree. However, I can plausibly reply to 'What are you thinking?' with 'Nothing', if my consciousness is freewheeling. Utterly disconnected content isn't really what we call 'thinking'.
23. Ethics / C. Virtue Theory / 1. Virtue Theory / c. Particularism
The ground for an attitude is not a thing's 'goodness', but its concrete characteristics [Ewing]
     Full Idea: The ground for an attitude lies not in some other ethical concept, goodness, but in the concrete, factual characteristics of what we pronounce good. ...We shall not be better off if we interpolate an indefinable characteristic of goodness besides.
     From: A.C. Ewing (The Definition of Good [1948], p.172), quoted by Francesco Orsi - Value Theory 1.4
     A reaction: This is a forerunner of Scanlon's Buck-Passing theory of the source of value (in other properties). I approve of this approach. If I say 'actually this very strong cheese is really good', I'm not adding goodness to the cheese.
23. Ethics / C. Virtue Theory / 2. Elements of Virtue Theory / d. Teaching virtue
Is virtue taught, or achieved by practice, or a natural aptitude, or what? [Plato]
     Full Idea: Is virtue something that can be taught, or does it come by practice, or is it a natural aptitude, or something else?
     From: Plato (Meno [c.385 BCE], 70a)
If virtue is a type of knowledge then it ought to be taught [Plato]
     Full Idea: If virtue is some sort of knowledge, then clearly it could be taught.
     From: Plato (Meno [c.385 BCE], 87c)
It seems that virtue is neither natural nor taught, but is a divine gift [Plato]
     Full Idea: If our discussion is right, virtue is acquired neither by nature nor by teaching. Whoever has it gets it by divine dispensation, without taking thought.
     From: Plato (Meno [c.385 BCE], 99e)
23. Ethics / C. Virtue Theory / 2. Elements of Virtue Theory / j. Unity of virtue
How can you know part of virtue without knowing the whole? [Plato]
     Full Idea: Does anyone know what a part of virtue is without knowing the whole?
     From: Plato (Meno [c.385 BCE], 79c)
Even if virtues are many and various, they must have something in common to make them virtues [Plato]
     Full Idea: Even if virtues are many and various, at least they all have some common character which makes them all virtues.
     From: Plato (Meno [c.385 BCE], 72c)