9 ideas
| 6253 | Reason is our power of finding out true propositions [Hutcheson] |
| Full Idea: Reason is our power of finding out true propositions. | |
| From: Francis Hutcheson (Treatise 4: The Moral Sense [1728], §I) | |
| A reaction: This strikes me as a very good definition. I don't see how you can define reason without mentioning truth, and you can't believe in reason if you don't believe in truth. The concept of reason entails the concept of a good reason. |
| 19440 | How do you know you have conceived a thing deeply enough to assess its possibility? [Vaidya] |
| Full Idea: The main issue with learning possibility from conceivability concerns how we can be confident that we have conceived things to the relevant level of depth required for the scenario to actually be a presentation or manifestation of a genuine possibility. | |
| From: Anand Vaidya (The Epistemology of Modality [2015], 1.2.2) | |
| A reaction: [He cites Van Inwagen 1998 for this idea] The point is that ignorant imagination can conceive of all sorts of absurd things which are seen to be impossible when enough information is available. We can hardly demand a criterion for this. |
| 20168 | Blame usually has no effect if the recipient thinks it unjustified [Williams,B] |
| Full Idea: One of the most obvious facts about blame is that in many cases it is effective only if the recipient thinks that it is justified. | |
| From: Bernard Williams (How free does the will need to be? [1985], 5) | |
| A reaction: The point of the blame might not be reform of the agent, but a public justification for punishment as deterrence, in which case who cares what the agent thinks? Is blame attribution of causes, or reasons to punish? |
| 20167 | Blame partly rests on the fiction that blamed agents always know their obligations [Williams,B] |
| Full Idea: Blame rests, in part, on a fiction; the idea that ethical reasons, in particular the special kind of ethical reasons that are obligations, must, really, be available to the blamed agent. | |
| From: Bernard Williams (How free does the will need to be? [1985], 5) | |
| A reaction: In blaming someone, you may be telling them that they should know their obligations, rather than assuming that they do know them. How else can we give children a moral education? |
| 6256 | Can't the moral sense make mistakes, as the other senses do? [Hutcheson] |
| Full Idea: Can there not be a right and wrong state of our moral sense, as there is in our other senses? | |
| From: Francis Hutcheson (Treatise 4: The Moral Sense [1728], §IV) | |
| A reaction: Hutcheson replies by saying something like they are both fully reliable in normal conditions. It remains, though, a very good question for the intuitionist to face, as the moral sense is supposed to be direct and reliable, but how do you check? |
| 6252 | Happiness is a pleasant sensation, or continued state of such sensations [Hutcheson] |
| Full Idea: In the following discourse, happiness denotes pleasant sensation of any kind, or continued state of such sensations. | |
| From: Francis Hutcheson (Treatise 4: The Moral Sense [1728], Intro) | |
| A reaction: This is a very long way from Greek eudaimonia. Hutcheson seems to imply that I would be happy if I got high on drugs after my family had just burnt to death. Socrates points out that scratching an itch is a very pleasant sensation (Idea 132). |
| 6257 | You can't form moral rules without an end, which needs feelings and a moral sense [Hutcheson] |
| Full Idea: What rule of actions can be formed, without relation to some end proposed? Or what end can be proposed, without presupposing instincts, desires, affections, or a moral sense, it will not be easy to explain. | |
| From: Francis Hutcheson (Treatise 4: The Moral Sense [1728], §IV) | |
| A reaction: We have no reason to think that 'instincts, desires and affections' will give us the remotest guidance on how to behave morally well (though we would expect them to aid our survival). How could a moral sense give a reason, without spotting a rule? |
| 6254 | We are asked to follow God's ends because he is our benefactor, but why must we do that? [Hutcheson] |
| Full Idea: The reasons assigned for actions are such as 'It is the end proposed by the Deity'. But why do we approve concurring with the divine ends? The reason is given 'He is our benefactor', but then, for what reason do we approve concurrence with a benefactor? | |
| From: Francis Hutcheson (Treatise 4: The Moral Sense [1728], §I) | |
| A reaction: Characteristic of what MacIntyre calls the 'Enlightenment Project', which is the application of Cartesian scepticism to proving the foundations of morals. Proof beyond proof is continually demanded. If you could meet God, you would obey without question. |
| 6255 | Why may God not have a superior moral sense very similar to ours? [Hutcheson] |
| Full Idea: Why may not the Deity have something of a superior kind, analogous to our moral sense, essential to him? | |
| From: Francis Hutcheson (Treatise 4: The Moral Sense [1728], §I) | |
| A reaction: This is Plato's notion of the gods, as beings who are profoundly wise, and understand all the great moral truths, but are not the actual originators of those truths. The idea that God creates morality actually serves to undermine morality. |